Page 28 of For Love or Money
‘Yeah,’ Lesley nodded as she wound linguine onto her fork. Then she had an idea. ‘Why don’t you add me on Snapchat and I’ll message you?’
‘I don’t have Snapchat,’ Stella said with an apologetic smile.
‘Friend me on Facebook, then?’
‘I’m not on Facebook either.’
‘Really?’
‘Sorry. I don’t like social media.’
‘Oh.’ That was a bit weird. ‘Okay, well, give me your phone number and I’ll send you on my info.’
‘That went well,’Lesley said as they drove back to her house.
‘Apart from you deciding to be a meditation teacher. Are you pathologically incapable of telling the truth about what you do?’
Lesley shrugged. ‘It was just a spur of the moment thing. Anyway, it went down well, don’t you think? Stella was very interested. Maybe it could be a bonding thing for us.’
‘What if she decides to pursue it?’
‘It’ll be fine. I can breathe in and out with the best of them.’
‘And you said you’d send her your details.’
‘No problem.’ Lesley had already decided she could use the site she was building for Madeleine. She could just tweak some of the content, replace Madeleine’s photo and contact details with her own, and send Stella a link to the back end.
‘Anyway, what did you think?’ Al asked.
‘Of Stella? She’s pretty reserved, isn’t she? I wouldn’t say it’s easy to get to know her.’
‘That’s why I’m paying you the big bucks,’ Al said with a smile.
‘She really clammed up when I asked her about her background, didn’t she?’
‘Yeah, she definitely didn’t want to talk about it.’
‘She’s very solicitous of Peter,’ Lesley said, thinking of how Stella had fussed over him, and he had consulted her about what he should eat. ‘But that could all be an act. I mean, it’s not as if she’s going to show her hand at this stage.’
‘And it’s in her interests to keep him fit and well for now. She’d want to make sure he survives long enough to endow her with all his worldly goods.’
‘She was different to what I was expecting, though,’ Lesley said thoughtfully. ‘More … low-key.’
Al nodded. ‘Me too. I suppose I thought she’d be more of a show pony,’ he mused. ‘You know, all platinum blonde hair, and acres of silicon cleavage.’
‘So you were expecting your cliché cartoon gold-digging bimbo?’
‘Exactly,’ he said with a grin. ‘Weren’t you?’
‘I was reserving judgement,’ she said primly. If she was honest, she had expected a pneumatic airhead in high heels and a low neckline. The fact was, Stella could hardly have been more different from the blowsy sex bomb of her imagination. But she wasn’t going to tell Al that. ‘Sheisblonde, though. So you got that right. And she does have fake boobs.’
‘Really?’ Al’s eyebrows shot up. ‘You could tell?’
‘I’m pretty sure.’
‘Anyway, we’re out of the closet now,’ Al said. ‘We should start going out together in public and cross-pollinating our Facebook pages. How do you feel about coming on a mini-break with me?’
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