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She shoved it in her bag with a decisive movement. He decided to be a humanitarian and move on. “So what are you doing in London? Work or play?”
“I’m doing a favor for my boss.” She grimaced and pressed the can tighter to her head. “It was supposed to be a quick in and out on my way home from Italy.”
“Just your luck,” he grinned. “You picked the one faulty elevator in London.”
“Please don’t remind me.”
“What line of work are you in?”
She took a sip of her water. “Communications... You?”
“I own an entertainment company, based in New York.” He leaned back against the wall, keeping up the small talk he abhorred as it seemed to be putting a bit of color back into her cheeks. “Was Italy work too?”
She shook her head. “I was doing a cooking course with my girlfriends in Tuscany. We rented a villa on the coast, chilled out and learned how to make a mean bruschetta.”
“That will make your man very happy.”
“I didn’t do it for a man, I did it for myself.”
He noted the defensive edge to her voice. “No man in your life, then?”
She set her jaw. “No.”
He wondered why he liked that idea. “How many of you were in Italy?”
“Eight of us, including me.”
He smiled. “The Italian men must not have known what hit them.”
She shot him a sideways look. “Meaning?”
“Meaning I can only imagine the impression eight of you made on the locals...Tuscany will never be the same, I’m sure.”
Her mouth curved. “My friend Jo was a big hit with the Italian men. She’s a bit of a one-woman wrecking crew.”
He gave her a considering look. “I’m sure she wasn’t the only one.”
She blinked. Looked away. Shy, he registered in astonishment. Were there actually any of those women left in Manhattan? It had been so long since he’d met one he’d thought they were extinct.
A loud creak split the air. He dropped the water, his heart slamming into his chest as he braced his hands on the floor. Isabel launched herself at him, wrapping her limbs around him. He held her close as the elevator swayed and groaned beneath them, his breath coming hard and fast.
What the hell?
CHAPTER TWO
“WHAT WAS THAT?”
Isabel screeched the words in his ear, wrapping her arms around his neck in a chokehold. The car rocked beneath them, but this time more gently, without the bloodcurdling creak. He sucked in a breath. “It’s just shifting,” he told her, hoping that’s all it was. “You’re okay.”
Her chest rose and fell rapidly against him. Seconds ticked by. The swaying slowed and then stopped. “Isabel, we’re fine,” he murmured, his heartbeat regulating as he brought his head down to hers. “I promise you, those cables don’t break.”
She drew in a deep breath, then another, stayed pressed against him. As his cortisol levels came down, his awareness of her skyrocketed. Her fingers were dug into his thigh, her light floral scent filling his nostrils. Her thoroughly touchable curves were plastered against him. And God help him, it was making him think improper thoughts. Like how much he’d appreciate those slender fingers wrapped around another part of his anatomy...
She drew back, her face chalk-white. Exhaled a long, agitated breath. Realized where her hand was. He struggled to wipe his expression clean as she lifted her horrified gaze to his, but he was pretty sure from the way her eyes widened and the speed with which she snatched her hand away, she’d known exactly where his head was at.
“I am so sorry,” she murmured. But she was still in his lap, clutching his shoulder for dear life, and he was in severe danger of getting extremely turned on. Worse when she caught her plump bottom lip in her teeth and hell, he wished she wouldn’t do that. He wanted to kiss her, and not the “Sunday walk in the park” variety.
Her pupils dilated, but she didn’t go anywhere. He cleared his throat. “If this was your book,” he drawled mockingly, “this’d be the part where I ravish you in the elevator, no?”
She was off his lap in a flash. She sat back against the wall, her shoulders pressed against the paneling. “Yes, well, that’s why they have security cameras in elevators, don’t they?” she pronounced stiffly. “To prevent that sort of behavior.”
He had to stop himself from laughing out loud. “That sort of behavior? How very Victorian of you.”
She fixed her eyes on the wall opposite her. “I think this elevator’s getting to me.”
She wasn’t the only one. He waved a hand at her. “Think of it as extreme exposure therapy. After this you’ll definitely be cured.”
“Or I’ll never set foot in an elevator again.”
“Let’s work toward the former.” He gestured toward the can that had rolled to the corner of the elevator. “Put that on again.”
She lifted it to her forehead. Stayed plastered against the wall like a modern painting, her white, pinched face a halo against the dark paneling. He cursed inwardly. He needed a distraction or this wasn’t going to be pretty. What in the world would he say to his sister Gabby, who was severely claustrophobic?
“I have an idea,” he suggested. “Let’s play a game.”
“A game?”
“You tell me something no one knows about you and I’ll do the same.”
She lifted a brow. “I’m channeling my sisters here,” he offered grimly. “Humor me. If you go all panicky, it’s not a good thing.”
“Okay.” She closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the wall. “In seventh grade, when Steven Thompson asked me to dance at the school mixer, I told him I’d sprained my ankle.”
“You didn’t like him?”
“I adored him.” She opened her eyes. “I’d idolized him for years. But I thought my sister had put him up to it, like I was some kind of charity case, so I turned him down.” She grimaced. “Turns out she hadn’t.”
“Ouch. So the poor guy got rejected for no good reason?”
She nodded. “I was persona non grata after that.”
“And you females wonder why men aren’t gallant anymore. We stick our necks out for that.”
She gave him a wry look. “I hope you’re using the royal ‘we,’ because I can’t imagine you have ever been rejected in your entire life.”
And that’s where she was wrong. The one time he had been, the only time it had mattered, he’d been left for dead by the woman who’d meant everything to him.
“Nobody goes through life unscathed,” he said roughly. “You should have given the guy a chance. Maybe you scarred him for life.”
“Since he was dating Katy Fielding by the next Monday, I highly doubt it.” Cynicism tainted her voice. “Okay, your turn.”
He thought about it. And for some strange reason, he was dead honest. “I wish I’d made different decisions at times.”
Her gaze sharpened on him. “Is that a general observation or something you’d care to elaborate on?”
Most definitely not. He’d shut the door on that part of his life a long time ago. Never to be opened again. “A general observation.” He rested his gaze on her face. “Sometimes in life you’re only given one shot. Use it wisely.”
Her eyes stayed on his, assessing, inquisitive. Then she let it go with a sigh. “This interview I have tomorrow? I don’t even know if I want the job. But it’s a once-in-a-lifetime kind of thing.”
He frowned. “Why don’t you want it? I assume it’s a step up?”
“Fear,” she said simply. “I’m afraid of what happens if I get it.”
“Take it from me,” he counseled, “fearing the unknown is far worse than facing it. I have no doubt you’ll knock them dead, Isabel. Just be your quirky self.”
She looked insulted. “Quirky?”
“Tell me it doesn’t fit.”
“Well...maybe just a bit.”
She jumped as the phone rang. He pushed to his feet, walked over and picked up the receiver. But the news wasn’t what he wanted to hear. Two and a half hours.
He hung up. “We have to sit tight for another couple of hours.”
Isabel’s face fell.
“Think on the bright side,” he said, sliding down beside her and giving her a wicked look. “You can read me excerpts from your book. It was just getting good.”
* * *
Exactly two and a quarter hours later, at about the time Izzie’s flight was scheduled to take off from Heathrow, a rescue team arrived.
She and Alex stood to one side as the crew unscrewed a panel from the top of the car and dropped a ladder down, a burly, safety-cable-laden rescuer climbing in moments later with two harnesses slung over his shoulder.
“Ready to get out of here?” he asked them, a wide grin splitting his face.
“You’ve no idea,” Izzie murmured, flashing a sideways look at Alex. She really wasn’t sure what she would have done without him. She had a sneaking suspicion she would have lost it completely.
“All right then,” the technician said, strapping one of the harnesses around Izzie. “The next floor is about eight feet above us. We’re going to climb up the ladder, out the top of the elevator and up onto the lobby floor.” He snapped the harness into place and stepped back. “Keep moving, don’t look down and you’ll be fine.”
