‘Yes, well, not everyone keeps late nights.’ A deafening silence greeted this and it didn’t take a rocket scientist to work out what was going through his head. Either he had reached the right conclusion, namely that she didn’t want him around, in which case his active mind would already be jumping ahead to reasons and maybe, just maybe, coming up with the right one. Or else, she would be confirming his sweeping assumptions that she was as dreary as he thought she was, someone who retired to bed before ten with a cup of cocoa when all the world was out having a good time on a Saturday night.
Tessa fetched the phone book from the little bookshelf behind her and handed it to him.
‘What did you say the name of that pizzeria was…?’
She gave it to him and watched in despairing silence as he rapidly phoned and placed his order before clicking off his mobile and sticking it back into his pocket.
‘Forty minutes,’ he informed her. ‘I guess the place is so busy with hordes of appropriately dressed teenagers that the food orders are moving a little slowly.’
Tessa hesitated, torn between ignoring the light-hearted remark, made at her expense, and diving into a serious debate on his short-sightedness in not listening to what his daughter was trying to tell him. In the intervening silence, he solved the dilemma for her.
‘Not funny? I suppose you think I’m making fun of a serious situation?’
‘What I think doesn’t matter and what you do doesn’t concern me.’
‘Very lofty sentiments,’ Curtis mused, eyes narrowing on her. ‘Must be easy getting through life when you can detach yourself from annoying situations with such ease.’
‘I’m not detaching myself from anything,’ she responded hotly. ‘I’m just telling you that you have to sort out these temporary problems with Anna yourself. I can’t be of any help.’
‘You were a great deal of help when it came to rampaging the shops with her in hot pursuit of skimpy clothes.’
Tessa nearly laughed. Did he really see what those women he entertained wore? Had he really noticed Susie’s outfit, which just about managed to cover her? If he thought Anna’s new wardrobe was comprised of skimpy clothes, then how would he describe his girlfriends’ choice of garments?
Silly assumption, she thought. What was good enough for his girlfriends was certainly not good enough for his daughter. Beneath the sharp, unconventional exterior, there beat the heart of a pure traditionalist.
‘Would you like a cup of coffee?’ Tessa asked, resigning herself to yet more emotional involvement in his life. ‘Tea?’
‘Coffee would be good.’ He shoved himself away from the counter and sat at the kitchen table, watching in silence as she made them both a mug of coffee.
It was as clear as daylight that she wanted to get rid of them, or rather of him, he suspected. The decent thing would have been to leave her in peace, to enjoy the uneventful evening she had planned, but he decided that he really did want to talk to her about Anna, whose behaviour was as mysterious as it was unexpected. He also realised that he was rather enjoying himself here, watching her pad around preparing a meal, listening to her voice her opinions with absolutely no regard for whether she trod on his toes or not.
It was refreshing, he decided.
Refreshing to be in the company of a woman without the inevitability of sex.
He looked at her lazily from under his lashes, noting the slenderness of her body, the perfect jut of her rear, which was always so cunningly camouflaged at work underneath those asexual suits she insisted on wearing. There was nothing obvious about her, he thought. She didn’t announce her sexuality, but look just a little deeper and there it was, as subtle but as fragrant as a summer breeze.
‘Hello?’ Tessa couldn’t resist tossing his sarcastic mantra back at him. ‘Is anybody there?’
‘Hilarious,’ Curtis responded, his mouth twitching at the corners. ‘Sit down. You’re making me nervous hovering over me like that.’
Tessa laughed, not one of those cultivated tinkling laughs, but a proper laugh. ‘I don’t think it’s possible for anyone to make you nervous.’
‘Because, as I’ve mentioned before, I’m one hundred per cent man?’
‘Because you’re self-assured and arrogant.’
Curtis eyed her narrowly, trying to work out whether she was joking or being serious and realising that he didn’t like it in the least that she thought he was arrogant. Coming from another woman, it wouldn’t have bothered him in the slightest, but coming from her…
‘Self-assured, yes. Arrogant, no.’
‘Well, you seem to make a pretty good job of assuming you know exactly what’s right for Anna without even considering that you might just be wrong.’ Tessa sat down, rested her elbows on the table and sipped some of the coffee.