Page 78 of Me and Mr. Darcy

‘Would you care to dance?’ he asks, directing his question at me. He’s sweating slightly and is all pink in the face. He blots his forehead with a tissue and smiles eagerly. He has bad teeth.

‘Like I said. Invisible,’ mutters Rose into her champagne flute.

I hesitate. I’m caught between a rock and a hard place. The hard place being staying here, answering Spike’s awkward questions about Mr Darcy. The rock being the guy in the skirt. I glance at Spike. He’s still got that investigative journalist look on his face.

I go for the rock.

‘That would be great.’ I smile, turning back to him. ‘Lead the way.’

Chapter Twenty-two

Barry, my dancing partner, turns out to be a marketing manager for a large pharmaceutical firm in Aberdeen, and for the next twenty minutes he leads me around the dance floor while telling me all about a new breakthrough drug for indigestion. I ask him all the pertinent questions, smile at all the right junctures, and I say ‘wow’ a lot. Men, I’ve learned from my many dates, like to hear the word ‘wow’ a lot when they’re talking about their career.

But what I really want to do is ask him what the new breakthroughs are for boredom, as I’m about to die of it quite shortly.

‘. . . but the most exciting thing about this drug is how it works on your acid reflux. It neutralises the bile in a whole new way,’ he’s saying brightly.

‘Wow.’ I force a smile, but I’m not really listening. Instead, my mind is tied up with thoughts of Mr Darcy. As Barry launches into a monologue about an exciting new development in fungal creams, I glance wistfully around the ballroom for a dark, handsome figure, wondering when he’s going to turn up.

That’s ‘when’, not ‘if’. Because I’m confident I am going to see him again. After all, this isn’t some flaky guy I’ve met in a bar; this is Mr Darcy.

‘May I interrupt?’

My heart jumps into my mouth. Is that . . . ? I twirl round excitedly.

And get a thud of disappointment.

Spike.

‘Well, actually, me and this bonnie lassie were in the middle of a conversation—’ begins Barry.

And usually I would have agreed. After all, the last thing I want to do is dance with Spike. Except that’s not strictly true. I might hate Spike, but I hate the idea of spending any more time with Barry and his fungal remedies more. So, like a drowning man spotting a lifeboat and seeing his chance of being rescued about to pass him by, I cut in, ‘But now we’ve finished,’ and quickly untangle myself from Barry’s grip.

‘Thought so,’ smiles Spike.

I throw him a frosty look. So what if he’s rescuing me? I still don’t have to like him.

Meanwhile Barry hovers blinking in the middle of the dance floor, not quite sure what just happened. Guilt twinges. I feel mean abandoning him.

‘I actually have some free samples in the car,’ he says hopefully.

On second thoughts I don’t feel that mean.

‘Wow. Maybe I could look at them later?’ I smile and, without further hesitation, move quickly away and clamp my hand on Spike’s shoulder. Sometimes in life you just have to put yourself first.

We start dancing – well, it’s not really dancing, it’s more holding your partner and shuffling around the room. The awkward, clumsy type that needs conversation and jokes and witty observations about the party, otherwise you end up feeling like a self-conscious idiot and all you can think about is the fact you’ve got your boobs pressed up against a man’s chest, and the only thing between you is a flimsy bit of satin and a cotton shirt.

‘I thought you didn’t like dancing,’ I blurt, saying the first thing that comes into my head.

‘I don’t,’ he agrees, and, as if to prove it, promptly steps on my foot.

‘Ouch,’ I yelp.

‘Bloody hell, sorry,’ he apologises. ‘Are you OK?’

Crouching down to rub my sore toes, I glare up at him suspiciously. ‘Did you do that on purpose?’

‘On purpose?’ he repeats in astonishment. ‘Why would I stomp on your foot on purpose?’