More Than Just One Night (The Selwood Sisters Novellas) (3 page)

 Back in the conference room, she slipped
into her seat, keeping her eyes on the table’s polished surface, while Alex stood
at the head of the table and cleared his throat.

“I’m afraid the mediation will have to be
postponed until another mediator can be found,” he said.

Eric straightened. “What? Why?”

“Because I have a conflict of interest. I
have a personal relationship with one of the parties.” He glanced at her.

Eric saw the glance and turned to face her. “With
Cora?”

She nodded.

“I don’t understand,” Eric said. “What sort
of personal relation—?”

“It isn’t relevant,” Alex said, cutting him
off. “All you need to know is that I can’t mediate in these circumstances. It’s
unfortunate, and I apologise for the inconvenience. Obviously, you won’t be
billed for my expenses.”

“”Look, I really don’t think that’s the issue
here—”

“We’ll have to leave it there, I’m afraid.
I’m sure you all understand.”

Cora gathered her paperwork, pushed back her
chair, and went to shake hands with the client, ignoring the curiosity in the
way he looked at her. Him, she could handle; Eric, she avoided. She slipped out
of the room while he was occupied. Steven gave her a lopsided smile as she
passed him — and there was another problem. She didn’t want to learn that Steven
was gossiping about her to her employees, and she didn’t know him well enough
to guess whether he could be trusted to keep quiet.

Once she’d double-checked that she was alone
in the passageway to her office, she let out an exaggerated sigh. Why did this
have to happen to her? The one and only time she’d felt anything remotely like
a real woman since Paul had died, and it had to turn out this way.

She looked up at the sound of Lily’s voice,
and saw her talking to Joan at the reception desk. Instead of entering her
office she detoured into reception.

“Do you have a minute please, Lily?”

“Sure thing.”

“Come through to my office.” She looked at Joan.
“Are there any messages for me?”

“Just a couple. Has the meeting finished
already?” Joan handed her some slips of yellow paper.

“It’s off.” As she read the top message, she
heard footsteps behind her and tensed.

“Cora!”

She pasted an innocent smile on her face
before turning. “Yes, Eric?”

“I want to have a word with you. In your
office.”

“I’m sorry, I can’t talk to you now. Lily has
an urgent problem to discuss with me and it can’t wait.”

Eric looked across at Lily whose eyes had
widened a fraction, but Cora was relieved to see that she hid her surprise
quickly.

“Yes, I’m sorry, Eric,” Lily said, “but this
really can’t wait.”

Eric scowled, before checking his watch. “I’m
going back to work. I’ll call you later, Cora.”

“Yes, do that. I’ll look forward to your
call.” She swivelled towards her office. “Come on in, Lily.”

Inside her office, she gave Lily a rueful
smile. “I don’t suppose you have a problem you want to discuss now that you’re
here?”

Lily grinned and shook her head. “No, thanks.
Everything’s fine, but I appreciate the opportunity.”

“Thanks for going along with me out there.”

“What are sisters for? Any time you want to
use me as an excuse not to talk to Eric or anybody else, feel free.”

“It’s just…” Cora shook her head. “I don’t
need a lecture from Eric right now.”

“You shouldn’t have to listen to a lecture
from anybody. You’re the boss.”

Cora took a breath, and let it out slowly. “Well,
in name, at least. Is there anything you have to rush back for?”

When Lily shook her head, she picked up the
phone. “Joan, will you let me know when the visitors have left, please?
All
of them.”

She replaced the phone and grimaced at Lily. “Something
godawful
has happened here today.”

Lily’s expression became serious. “Tell me
about it.”

“I’ve just been through a very embarrassing
meeting.”

Lily waited.

“It was a mediation. You’ve heard about the
Pearson project?”

“Yes. I’ve seen the figures.”

“Well, today was the mediation where we were
supposed to thrash out a solution. However, it turned out that the mediator
was…someone I knew.”

“I don’t understand. How was that a problem?”

Cora blew out a breath. “When I say I knew
him, I mean I
knew
him. Not for long, but
really
well.”

“Oh.” Lily started to smile, but bit her lip
as if she wasn’t sure a smile was appropriate. “You mean you had a fling with
him?”

Cora nodded.

 “Gosh. And you didn’t know he was going to
be at the meeting?”

“No way! I never expected to see him again,
so it was a heck of a shock.”

“I’m sure it was.” Lily’s eyes were wide now.

“And as a result, the mediation had to be
called off.” She shook her head. “It was so embarrassing.”

“I can imagine.”

“And now I’m avoiding Eric because he’ll have
plenty to say about it, and I might be the boss, but that won’t stop him. He seems
to think that he still has to look out for Paul’s interests.”

“Well, they were best friends for a long time.”

“Yes, but Paul’s been dead for six years, and
if Eric had his way I’d be faithful to Paul forever.”

“But you don’t want to be?”

Cora sighed. “I have been, of course, until
now, and I still would be if I hadn’t met Alex. It’s not as if I make a habit
of…gah! I’d never given it a thought until I met him, and then…”

“And then what? Did you fall in love with
him?”

“Oh my God, no. Nothing like that, but it
was…good to feel attractive again. I thought I was way past it.”

Lily hesitated. “I’m probably not the world’s
best judge since I left school and got married all in the same week, but I
think after six years, you should be allowed to move on if you want to.”

Cora managed a small smile. “Don’t forget, I
hadn’t had much more experience than you when I married Paul. Seems to be a
Selwood thing to marry too young.”

“I wasn’t too young,” Lily said indignantly.
“I wouldn’t want my daughter to be married at eighteen, but it all worked out
for Brandon and me.”

Cora made a non-committal sound in her
throat. “But look at Gwen. I know she regrets not waiting until she was older
to marry Stuart. Now she’s divorced with a seventeen year old daughter and
she’s only thirty-six.”

“Well, things were a bit different with Gwen,
weren’t they? She was always trying to compete with you.”

Cora sighed. “Typical middle child syndrome.”

“I suppose so, but it’s true. She wanted what
you had, or better. You were married at nineteen and pregnant at twenty, so she
had to beat that and be pregnant at nineteen.”

“And then you beat both of us.” Cora pulled a
pile of papers across the desk towards her. “Let’s just hope that none of our
daughters follow our examples.”

“Agreed.” Lily took the hint, and stood. “Before
I go, where did you meet this man? Is he local? Do I know him?”

“No. God, no, he’s not local. I met him in
Sydney at that conference I went to a few weeks ago.”

“Ah, yes. I thought you seemed distracted
when you got back.”

Distracted was an understatement.

“Are you going to see him again?”

Cora squirmed. She wished she could deny it,
but she’d never been in the habit of lying to either of her sisters and
couldn’t bring herself to do so now. “I’m having dinner with him tonight at The
Clarendon.”

Lily broke into a smile. “So, you’re going to
date him, then?”

“No, no. It’s one dinner, that’s all.”

“Oh. What a shame.”

After Lily had left, Cora looked at the messages
Joan had given her. Some of them were probably important, but she couldn’t
force herself to pick them up and deal with them. She was having dinner with
Alex tonight, and there didn’t seem to be capacity in her brain for any other
thought right now.

Before Cora entered the Clarendon, she tugged
at the stretchy fabric of her black dress, attempting to stop it clinging to
every inch of her body, wishing she’d worn a different outfit. Jeans, maybe, with
a baggy t-shirt. Anything but this dress. She hadn’t intended to change at all;
she’d meant to work until twenty minutes before the seven o’clock date, and make
do with a quick freshen up in the office bathroom before driving the short
distance to the hotel. Instead, she’d dashed home after her final meeting for
the day, showered, shaved her
legs
for heaven’s sake, and spent a good
thirty minutes trying to make the momentous choice between two black dresses.

She was not this woman. She didn’t
do
this sort of thing.

And after all the effort, she’d chosen a
wraparound cotton jersey dress that was a fraction too tight, a fraction too
short, and a more than a little out of character for her. She shook her head
before pushing at the heavy door.

Alex was waiting in the lounge bar. Rather
than going right over to him she took a moment to wonder what on earth a man
like him wanted with a woman like her. She could only see his profile, and yet
he exuded masculinity. How was that even possible? His dark hair was short and
neat. Lawyer-like. Nothing out of the ordinary. But there was nothing at all
ordinary about her reaction to him. It disoriented her.

She grimaced, and gave her head a little
shake. In the same moment he spun around on his barstool, a welcoming smile on
his face. He was at her side before she’d even straightened her expression.

“Hi. I wasn’t completely convinced that you’d
turn up.”

“How did you know I was here?”

He raised his eyebrows. “Sorry?”

“Did you sense me looking at you?”

“Sense you…?” His confusion cleared, and he
laughed. “No. There’s a mirror behind the bar,” he said, pointing.

“Oh.” She looked at the mirrored wall of
shelves. Well, of course there was, and now she sounded like an idiot.
Sensed
her. Gah!

“Let’s go straight through, shall we? I’m
starving.” He pointed the way to the table with one hand, and touched the small
of her back with the other. As soon as he made contact, she knew she should
have worn a suit. With a thick cardigan underneath it. Layers of clothing would
have been a very good idea. Layers and layers. But she gritted her teeth and
walked into the restaurant as if his touch wasn’t causing her insides to tie
themselves into pretzels.

Once they were settled at a table and had
ordered their meals and drinks, he said, “You look beautiful. That’s a very nice
dress.”

She took a sip of water from her glass, and
shook her head. “Thank you, but you don’t need to humour me, you know.”

“What?” He gave her a puzzled look.

“Don’t overdo it. I can believe that I look well
turned-out, or good for my age, maybe. That’s as much as I can expect.”

“Is that so?”

She nodded. “It’s okay, I don’t have a
problem with that, but it does make me wonder about you.”

“Whether I have impaired vision?”

“Do you?”

He laughed. “No, I don’t. I can see you
perfectly.”

“Hmm, well that wasn’t what I meant anyway. You
could be having dinner with someone your own age, someone who really is
beautiful. So, what is it with you? Why are you so desperate?”

“I’m not desperate.” He took a long drink of
water, then put down his glass and met her eyes. “I can find a woman to have
dinner with if I want to.”

Of course he could. One flash of his life-changing
smile at that Sydney hotel and she’d agreed to have dinner with him. How could
she possibly think that he didn’t have the same devastating effect on every
woman he met?

“Finding a woman I want to spend time with
after
dinner is more difficult. I enjoy talking to you, and you have a great laugh
once you relax. I like that. Is it so hard to understand?”

Flattered in spite of herself, she said, “I
understand that we got on well—”

“I think that’s putting it mildly.”

“Okay, I get that we were drawn to each other,
that there was some sort of…
thing
between us, but it was meant to be
just one night. In private, not like this.” She gestured around the restaurant.
“Doesn’t it bother you that people will look at us and wonder what you’re doing
with someone so old?”

“You’re not old, but if they want to wonder
about us, let them. You didn’t worry about what people thought in Sydney.”

She gasped, then reached for her water glass
again.