Page 78 of Wedding Crasher

Dark waves. Merry eyes. A dirty laugh. And whoops, there went her stomach.

‘You aren’t wearing any earrings. Rookie mistake.’

He laughed again as she guiltily touched her naked earlobes. Marla flicked her hair over her tell-tale ears and stared at him, wishing she hadn’t had a drink because it seemed to have amplified his beauty even more.

‘Did you want something?’

He nodded, completely unperturbed, that big, annoyingly gorgeous smile still plastered all over his face.

‘To say happy birthday.’

How the hell did he know it was her birthday?

‘Well, thank you. You’ve said it now, so you can leave.’

He raised his eyebrows in mock shock. ‘Aren’t you going to be polite and offer me a coffee?’

‘Let me think about that …’ Marla tapped the tip of her nose. ‘Nope.’

‘Shame. I brought you a gift too.’

‘Why would you do that?’

He studied her for a second with inscrutable eyes. ‘Because, despite our professional differences, Marla, I like you, and I want you to like me too.’

His honesty wrong-footed her, making her feel ungracious in the face of his charm offensive.

‘Fine. You can have coffee,’ she grumped. ‘But I have to go out soon, so …’ She tailed off in the hope that she’d said enough for him to make his visit a short one.

‘Really? That’s weird, because your mum said you were hiding out in here all day and pretending it wasn’t your birthday.’

She gasped. ‘I’m doing no such thing!’

Her mother.She might have guessed. That woman had some serious questions to answer when she came back.

She leaned sideways and glanced around him at the empty lane. ‘Where’s your bike?’

‘Not here. I hitched a lift with Dan.’

Marla tried not to visualise Dan and Gabe cruising down her lane in the hearse. She nodded for him to follow her through to the kitchen, where she reached for the coffee beans and swung open the fridge to grab the milk. Her eyes landed longingly on the open bottle of champagne, lurking next to the milk carton. Her fingers lingered on the neck of the bottle. Offering Gabe anything more serious than coffee was a risk, and drinking anything other than coffee around him was riskier still. ‘Unless you’d rather have champagne?’Jesus. The treacherous words actually came out aloud.

‘It would be rude to refuse you on your birthday.’ He grinned.

Marla reached down for an extra champagne flute and grabbed the bottle. ‘Come on, let’s go outside.’

Gabe glanced back towards the front door. ‘You go on out. I’ll just grab your present.’

Marla dragged a second sun lounger from the shed and set it up a safe distance from her own, then pushed the table between the two chairs for extra protection. She heard Gabe close the front door as she poured the champagne, and a second or two later he appeared in the garden carrying a wicker basket tied with ivory ribbons.

‘Oh God! It’s not alive is it?’ It reminded her of puppy baskets from schmaltzy American movies.

‘Relax.’ He laughed easily. ‘It’s not alive.’ He set it down on the grass and accepted the glass she held out. ‘To you. Happy birthday.’ He clinked the rim of his glass against hers and watched her over the top.

She smiled. What else could she do in the circumstances? He’d rumbled her cover story right away, so she could hardly knock the champagne back and run out the door. Besides, where would she go? She was slightly squiffy, with wild hair and a crumpled sundress. The pub garden would be her only viable option, and there was something unbearably grim about drinking in the pub alone on your birthday. In your own garden, fine, but in public? No.

Besides, she wanted to stay in.

It had been her fabulous plan. She’dlovedthat plan.

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