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

Phoebe dropped her head back with a groan. ‘That’ll be my mother. She wants to talk to me about Ben’s wedding.’

‘You’re not really going to go to that, are you?’ asked Bella curiously.

‘I’ve got to,’ she said. ‘Ben’s family and mine are so close, it would be like his sister not being at his wedding.’

‘Still, they can’t expect you to celebrate your fiancé marrying somebody else,’ said Kate.

‘They don’t know it wasn’t a mutual decision to break up,’ Phoebe confessed. ‘They were all so happy when Ben and I got engaged, I just couldn’t bear to tell them. I love Penelope and Derek. Ben’s parents are closer than any of my own aunts and uncles. They would have been devastated if I hadn’t pretended that Ben and I had both agreed that it wasn’t going to work.’

‘They must have had a clue when he told them he was going to marry Lisa, surely?’

‘He didn’t tell them immediately. They might have suspected something, but I think they’d prefer to believe that I’m quite happy with the situation, so if I don’t turn up they’ll realise immediately that’s not exactly the case.’

Phoebe ran her fingers through her hair in a hopeless gesture. ‘Then they’d be upset, and it would spoil the wedding for them, and I can’t do that to them. As it is, Penelope and Mum are desperately worried in case I’m embarrassed, or Ben is embarrassed, or Lisa is embarrassed …’

She sighed. ‘I think they’re secretly afraid that I might make some kind of scene when it comes down to it. I’m dreading going to the wedding on my own. It’s bad enough at the best of times. You know what people are like about single women in their thirties, and it’s going to be worse at this wedding since there’ll be so many old friends there who all knew me when Ben and I were together.

‘I know I’m going to end up looking like Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction. Either people are going to be edging warily around me and making sure any stray bunnies are safe, or they’ll be desperately sorry for me. I’ll spend my whole time being told cheerily that it will be my turn next,’ she finished gloomily.

‘It’s dire, isn’t it?’ said Kate with heartfelt sympathy. ‘It’s either that or being asked if it isn’t time you were thinking of getting married—like you’ve got some kind of choice in the matter!’

Bella had been pondering the problem. ‘What you need,’ she said, ‘is a man.’

‘Tell us something new!’

‘No, I’m serious. You should take a fabulous lover to show off at the wedding.’

‘Oh, yes, and fabulous lovers are so easy to find!’ said Kate sarcastically. ‘Didn’t you hear the announcement? It’s now official: there are now no single, straight men over thirty at all in London, let alone any with a modicum of intelligence and financial stability. And as for trying to find one not suffering from a morbid fear of commitment … forget it!’

‘Maybe not,’ said Bella, ‘but there’s nothing to stop Phoebe inventing one.’

CHAPTER THREE

FOR a moment there was utter silence, and then Kate looked at Bella with new respect. ‘That’s a brilliant idea, Bel!’ she said.

Phoebe was less impressed. ‘I don’t see that an imaginary lover is going to do me much good, however fabulous he is!’

‘The whole point is that he doesn’t seem to be imaginary,’ said Bella. ‘All you need is to hire someone to pretend to be a lover as fabulous as you want!’

‘You don’t mean hire a male escort?’ Phoebe stared at her, appalled. ‘I couldn’t do that!’

‘I’m not suggesting that you pick up some gigolo,’ said Bella reasonably. ‘I bet you’re not the first woman to need an escort in this kind of situation. There must be some reputable agencies that supply presentable types who are used to going along to weddings and official dinners. You’d have to pay for it, of course, but there wouldn’t have to be any funny business.’

‘Yes, and since you’re paying him, you could get him to say whatever you wanted,’ Kate added eagerly, picking up the idea and running with it with typical enthusiasm.

‘He’s bound to be good-looking if he works for an escort agency, so you could pretend he’s incredibly rich and successful, too. You can tell everyone that he utterly adores you, and asks you to marry him every day, but you’re not sure whether he’s exactly what you want, so you’re keeping him dangling.’

‘Why would I want to do that?’

‘So everyone will envy you, of course. The other women at the wedding, anyway,’ Kate qualified. ‘And the best thing is that if anyone meets you in the future and asks what’s happened to him, you can say that you just got bored with his insatiable sexual demands!’

Phoebe couldn’t help laughing. ‘That doesn’t sound very likely!’

‘OK, he can’t satisfy your insatiable appetite!’

‘Oh, yes, I can see myself telling Mum that when she asks why I don’t bring my nice young man down for the weekend!’

‘Kate’s just complicating things,’ said Bella, bringing them back to order. ‘All you need is someone attractive who will brush up nicely in a suit and look suitably adoring so that instead of everyone pitying you or making their husbands and boyfriends cover their eyes whenever you go near them, they’ll all be madly jealous!’

Phoebe let herself imagine what it would be like to turn up at Ben’s wedding with someone apparently rich and good-looking on her arm. She had to admit that as an idea, it had its advantages. Her mother and Penelope would relax and enjoy the wedding for a start, and there was no doubt that it would be easier to meet Ben and Lisa if she wasn’t quite so obviously left on the shelf.

‘I’m not sure I would have the nerve to carry it off,’ she said doubtfully.

Bella was having none of that. ‘Of course you would,’ she said briskly. ‘Now, the first thing is for you to start dropping a few hints to your mother that you’ve met someone special, and then we’ve just got to find you a man and get him primed up with your story.’

‘I don’t know …’ said Phoebe feebly, half dazzled and half terrified by the way Bella and Kate were sweeping her along on the tide of their enthusiasm.

They were always doing this, pushing her into doing things and then holding up their hands in innocence when the said things turned out to be a terrible mistake.

The colour of the bathroom paint—a lurid pink they had assured her would look fantastic—was a case in point.

Ignoring her feeble attempts to come up with some sensible objections—Phoebe was sure there had to be thousands, if she could only think of them—Kate and Bella were discussing how best to track down a reputable escort agency.

‘I suppose we could try the obvious and look in the Yellow Pages,’ said Bella eventually. ‘Where are they, anyway?’

She started hunting through the pile of clutter on the table. ‘I’m sure I saw them here the other day. God, we must tidy up soon, I can’t find anything—oh, that’s where my glove is!’ She fished it out triumphantly and tossed it onto the sofa, where it promptly slipped down out of sight once more.

‘Aha!’ she cried, spotting the directory, dragging it free of a welter of paper and beginning to flick through it without much system. ‘What do I look under? A for agency or E for escorts?’

‘Hold on,’ said Kate slowly. ‘I’ve got a better idea.’

Bella looked sceptical. ‘Not another of your elaborate fantasies?’

‘No, no, this is so simple and so obvious I don’t know why neither of you thought of it,’ she insisted. ‘Why go through an agency when we’ve got the perfect candidate living right here in the house?’

‘Who?’

‘Gib, of course!’

Kate sat back and beamed, delighted with her own brilliance.

‘Gib?’

The other two stared at Phoebe’s outraged tone. ‘I never knew you could do such a good Lady Bracknell impression!’ said Bella, diverted.

Phoebe shot her a look. ‘I’m not asking Gib!’

‘Why not? You’ve got to admit, he’s incredibly attractive.’