Take a Chance on Me: Blind-Date Marriage / Saying Yes to the Millionaire

‘Still feeling strange?’ he whispered into her hair.

‘I think it’s worse, if anything.’ She swallowed hard, and raised her eyes to meet his. They were impossibly blue beneath his dark brows, and he wasn’t smiling any longer. Deep in his eyes she saw a flicker of something previously hidden. Beneath the smooth-talking, city-slicker image, this was a good man, with a good heart.

His voice was warm on her cheek. ‘A few more millimetres and we could really set the world spinning on its axis.’

‘That was really cheesy,’ she whispered back.

Still, it didn’t stop her eyelids fluttering closed as his lips made the achingly slow journey to hers. In the moment just before they touched, she trembled uncontrollably.

It was everything a first kiss should be. Soft, sweet, full of promise. Never mind about separate hemispheres, they seemed to be the only two people on the planet. She clung to him and buried her fingers in his thick hair—the way she’d been longing to ever since their lives had collided in the rush hour traffic only a few days ago.

His palms cupped her face and his fingers stroked her jaw.

Never had she been kissed like this. It had never been anything more than a clashing of lips and teeth with the drifters she’d gone out with when she had been younger, and stupid enough to believe they could fill the empty spaces in her heart. Kissing Jake was so different. The sensation travelled from her lips right into her very soul.

Too soon he pulled away, tugged her crocheted hat a little more firmly onto her head, and led her down the path towards his car. All she could focus on for the rest of the afternoon was when—please, let it be when, not if—the next kiss was coming.

If Cassie had been any more desperate for information, she’d have been dribbling.

‘I want to hear all the gory details.’

‘I’m pretending I don’t know what you’re talking about, Cass. Absolutely nothing about my love-life could ever be described as “gory”.’

‘Not even the crash-and-burn flings of the past?’

‘Yes … well … That was then—this is now.’ She gave what she hoped was a superior look. ‘I have evolved.’

Cassie grinned and shuffled a little closer. ‘Come on, girlfriend. How’s it going with the hot-shot accountant?’

‘You know, Cass, a vicar’s wife can definitely not pull off a word like “girlfriend”.’

‘Not even one with funky pink hair and a nose-stud?’

She smiled. Cassie was the most unconventional minister’s wife you could hope to see. Her short baby pink hair stuck up every which way, and she had four holes in each ear and one in her nose. ‘Not even close, darling.’

‘Shame. I pick phrases like that up from the youth group. I hardly notice I’m doing it. Anyway, stop being the word police and tell me what I want to know. Resistance is futile. You should know that by now.’

‘You never change, do you?’

‘Not since that day I waltzed into the common room at Foster’s and saved you from another year of sitting in the corner writing doleful little poems you wouldn’t let anybody read.’

Serena gasped in horror. ‘My poetry was never doleful! Rambling and self-indulgent, maybe, but never doleful.’

‘Whatever. You needed a little livening up.’

‘You certainly did that!’

‘What did Prudence and her gang call us again?’

Serena clapped her hands and grinned. ‘The freaky twins!’

‘Joined at the hip for evermore!’ yelled Cassie, punching the air.

‘Until you met Steve, anyway. I should be cross, but he’s such a sweetie I forgave you ten seconds after I met him.’

Cassie stared off into space and her streetwise demeanour melted. ‘He is rather wonderful …’

‘Do you remember what your parents said when you told them about him?’

‘Do I? They totally freaked! I can still hear my father—’ She dropped her voice an octave to a low rumble. ‘Cassandra. You’re only nineteen. You’re far too young to understand what marrying into the establishment means.’

They both collapsed in a heap of giggles.

Serena sighed and wiped a finger under her eye. ‘At least they came round in the end. They practically fall over themselves now to tell their friends that their son-in-law runs an inner city project for underprivileged kids.’

‘Ah, yes, but the dog collar still makes them squirm.’

‘And you love it.’

Cassie giggled into her coffee mug.

‘You’re a minx, Cassie Morton.’

‘It’s why you love me.’

‘No, I love you because you’re the best friend anyone could ever have.’ All traces of laughter left her voice and she fixed Cassie with a solemn stare. ‘You’re right. You did save me that last year at Foster’s. It would have been hell without you. I owe you big-time.’

Cassie’s eyes sparkled. ‘And I know a way you can repay me.’

Serena slumped on the kitchen table in defeat. ‘Go on. Pass me the carrot cake, and I’ll tell you everything.’

Cassie just smiled, cut a thick wedge of cake, and plopped it on a chipped willow pattern plate. Serena dragged it across the table towards her, dipped her finger in the cream cheese icing and tried to think of where to start.

She almost didn’t want to share this with Cass, which was a first. Not that she thought she would jinx it if she talked about Jake, but because it all seemed too precious. She wanted to keep all the memories locked up inside her. She’d have to tell Cass something, though, or she’d get the thumbscrews out.

‘He’s definitely in the running for Mr Right. We’ve had dinners and picnics and been to the ballet. I always thought there was more to a date than standing in the back of a smoky pub watching my other half play pool. It’s like being Cinderella …’

‘You’ve got it bad!’

She stared at the carrot cake, but didn’t take a bite, her appetite arrested by the thoughts swirling round her head. ‘Do you think so? Is this what really falling in love feels like?’

‘Well, that depends. How do you feel?’

She sighed. ‘He’s all I can think about. When I’m not with him I’ve got butterflies thinking about the next time we’ll meet, and when we’re together I get butterflies just because I’m with him! He makes me feel special. For the first time I think I’ve met a man who likes me. Not Michael Dove’s daughter, but me.’

Cassie put her coffee down and cocked her head on one side.

‘So, have you …?’