Convenient Engagements: Fiance Wanted Fast! / The Blind-Date Proposal / A Whirlwind Engagement

‘Why not?’

‘I don’t believe that you would ever be taken in by someone with so little integrity,’ he said coolly. ‘You’re too …’ He stopped, searching for the right word.

Too what? Phoebe found herself wanting to know, when really she shouldn’t be caring one way or another what he thought.

‘… too perceptive?’ Gib wondered, almost as if she had asked out loud. ‘Too honest? Too intelligent, maybe? Anyway, I can’t see it happening.’

Hhmmnn. How was she supposed to take that? On the surface, being thought intelligent and honest and perceptive ought to be a compliment, but as usual it was impossible to tell from Gib’s voice whether he was being serious or not.

In the end, Phoebe chose to ignore his comment altogether. ‘All right, maybe there’s some ex-girlfriend you forgot to mention,’ she offered as an alternative. ‘She gets in touch with me, weeping and wailing and complaining that you’ve broken her heart, and I feel so sorry for her that I break it all off with you.’

Gib lifted an eyebrow. ‘Would you really do that?’

‘I might if you were annoying me anyway and I was looking for an excuse to end the relationship.’

That disconcerting crease was back at the corner of his mouth. ‘But what could I possibly do that would annoy you enough to kick out a man like me—wealthy, successful, a passionate lover—on the say-so of some neurotic ex?’ he asked, assuming an aggrieved air.

Phoebe tried to think of all the ways he irritated her, but it was hard to put her finger on exactly why she found him so unsettling. It wasn’t so much anything he did, she realised. It was just the way he was.

‘You’re too possessive,’ she offered eventually.

‘Oh, come on, you’ll have to do better than that!’

‘And you snore.’

Gib’s expression showed how much he thought of that suggestion.

‘You don’t get on with Kate and Bella.’

He snorted. ‘No one’s going to believe that! I can’t imagine anyone not getting on with those two.’

It was true, Phoebe thought, startled by the pang of envy that shot through her. Everybody loved her friends. They were bright and bubbly and fun in a way she could never quite manage. Of course Gib got on with them. It would be a lot easier for him to pretend to be in love with Bella or with Kate than her with her prickles and her sharp tongue.

Still, it was too late to start being sweet now. ‘If you’re going to be difficult about it, I’ll tell everyone I was just using you as a sex toy and got bored with your technique,’ she said crisply.

‘Ouch!’ Gib winced. ‘I think I’ll take the vengeful girlfriend, thanks!’

He glanced at Phoebe, who was sitting straight in her seat, her fine cheekbones tinged with colour and the smooth dark hair slipping silkily around her face. As he watched, she hooked a swathe behind her ear and he glimpsed the pulse beating nervously in her throat before he made himself look back at the road. She was trying hard, but she must be dreading the day ahead.

‘Of course, you realise that she’ll turn out to be the one who’s lying, don’t you?’ he said, wanting to distract her, to stop her thinking about Ben and the fact that another bride was going to be standing in the place that should have been hers. ‘You’ll find that out too late, though, and realise that I was perfect after all, and then you’ll be sorry!’

‘Hah! I am so not going to have any regrets,’ said Phoebe, shaking back her hair, but Gib was glad to see that she was laughing.

His tomfoolery had diverted her and for the first time she felt able to relax. For a while they talked easily, and it was only when they turned off the motorway that the butterflies started to swoop and flutter around her stomach once more.

Smoothing the map nervously over her knees, Phoebe directed Gib through the lush Wiltshire countryside with one part of her mind, while the other was fully occupied reviewing all the potentially disastrous scenarios that might unfold when they arrived.

‘You won’t forget that you’re going back to London tonight, will you?’ she fretted.

‘What, and miss that meeting in Zurich? Impossible!’

Phoebe was too dithery by this stage to pick him up on his sarcasm. ‘Right, so we’d better order a taxi to the station when we get there. It can pick you up after the reception. If we say half past six, that ought to be fine—oh, next on the left!’

Gib muttered under his breath at the lateness of the instruction and swung the car round the bend with a squeal of tires. ‘Thanks for the warning! Do you think you could concentrate on the map and forget how you’re going to get rid of me for the moment?’

‘Yes, sorry …’ Phoebe bent her head diligently over the map, only to be struck by another thought. Gib looked so much the part in his suit that it was easy to forget that he didn’t have a real job. She chewed her lip, eyeing him under her lashes.

‘Um … have you got enough cash to get you back to London?’ she asked awkwardly. ‘I brought some extra with me, just in case, so if you need it …’

Gib’s smile twisted as she trailed off uncomfortably. ‘Don’t worry about it,’ he said. ‘I’ll be fine.’

‘I don’t want you to be out of pocket.’

‘I tell you what,’ he said briskly. ‘I’ll keep an account of everything I spend today and we can tally it up at the end. You can add it to the fee we agreed.’

Phoebe went back to her map-reading. ‘Oh. Right. Yes, of course. If you’re happy with that.’

Now that the subject had come up, perhaps it might be an idea to sort out a few other things, she thought. Things she had deliberately avoided thinking about so far.

She cleared her throat. ‘Maybe we should talk about what happens when we get there,’ she said stiltedly. ‘Lay down a few rules of engagement, so to speak.’

‘Engagement?’ Gib lifted his brows. ‘I thought we were just lovers?’

‘Engagement as in a battle,’ she said with a frosty look. As if he didn’t know.

‘Battle? I didn’t know things were going to get that serious,’ he said, not bothering to disguise the undercurrent of laughter in his voice. ‘Perhaps I should have negotiated danger money?’

‘You might think so after today,’ said Phoebe, unamused. ‘I should warn you that you are going to be kissed a lot by people like my mother and Penelope who are going to fall on your neck for rescuing me from dreary spinsterhood.’

‘I don’t mind a few kisses,’ he said equably.

‘Good.’ Phoebe bit her lip. ‘And, er, I might have to … you know … hold your hand or something. Just for show,’ she added hastily.

‘Holding hands, eh?’ said Gib. ‘Passionate stuff!’

‘Nobody’s going to expect you to throw me down and ravish me in front of the bridesmaids just to prove your affection,’ she retorted in a tart voice. ‘You’re back in England now!’

‘Still, I think we could do a bit better than holding hands,’ he said, amused. ‘Maybe we could go wild and have a little kiss every now and then, just to show them how much in love we are?’

Phoebe’s colour deepened. She wished she could treat it as lightly as Gib. It was all just a big joke to him. ‘If you don’t mind,’ she said stiffly.

Gib slid her one of those unsettling sideways looks. ‘No, I don’t mind,’ he said.

‘Just so long as you realise that it doesn’t mean anything if … if …’

‘If you kiss me back?’

‘Yes,’ she said, grateful to him for putting it into words but obscurely resentful of his casual attitude. He might at least pretend to find the prospect of kissing each other as awkward as she did!