Just Friends (51 page)

Jack looked at his watch: nine-fifteen. She must come.
She must!
He had arrived with such excited expectancy, even while warning himself to expect nothing. Every time the door opened he had looked up, hoping it would be her. He’d secured one of the most desirable tables in a quiet corner, romantically lit. He’d enjoyed choosing the champagne (dry? brut?
pink??
) and ordering it at once, so that it would be waiting for her in its frosted bucket. He wanted to tell her about his book. He ached to see her face—her smile, her eyes, her lips.

Tonight had been his real deadline for months. Valhalla’s, the eighth at eight. All summer and into the autumn, riding back and forth in the pickup, listening to country songs of love and loss and longing, he’d dreamed of this chance to tell her that he was sorry, and to prove to her that he had changed. Sometimes he thought of those dog graves in Cornwall, carved with the names of King Arthur’s court, and imagined his own inscription: Sir Jack, not very chivalrous knight. Freya had banished him; and only Freya could recall him. If she chose to.

Jack gripped the edge of the table, so tight that his thumbnails whitened. He wanted her here—
now
. He missed her company and her laugh; he missed her cleverness and her fighting spirit; he even missed their arguments. Ever since Cornwall he’d been unable to think about any other woman: again and again he’d found himself waking from vivid erotic dreams; his mind full of her eyes, her breasts, her legs . . . He remembered how she had looked, lying on the bed beneath him. She’d once said to him, “You don’t want a woman like me.” But she was wrong. Freya was exactly the woman he wanted. She was the
only
woman.

Here was the waiter again. Jack waved him away and checked the time: nine-thirty. Once again he ran through the reasons that might explain her lateness. But he was kidding himself. She wasn’t late; she had never intended to come. She wasn’t sick or stuck in a meeting or stranded without a cab; she wasn’t here because she didn’t want to be.

Jack glanced again at the champagne resting in the bucket beside him, and the sheaf of flowers waiting on her chair. The flame of hope that had been burning inside his heart flickered one last time and went out. Well, that was it. He could take a hint. He wouldn’t bother her again. He signaled to the waiter to bring him the check.

CHAPTER 37

Where were they all? She couldn’t believe it. Cars raced toward her, headlamps blazing, paintwork rippling with reflected light, but she couldn’t see a single cab. Wait! There was one. Damn, its light was off. Freya strained her eyes down the avenue. She thought she could just make out another one, lined up at the traffic stop. The lights changed. Yes! She stepped off the curb and waved wildly. The cab put its blinker on. Thank God! Then, to her fury, it stopped about ten yards before reaching her and someone else got in. Freya shook her fist as it shot past. Now the traffic lights had turned to red again, banking up another wave of cars. She pictured Jack in the restaurant, waiting for her, looking at his watch, wondering if she was coming. Frantic with impatience, Freya turned and began to walk.

Was she was kidding herself? Would he really remember the bet after so many months? Even if he did, would he turn up after the terrible things she’d said to him? Jack probably wasn’t even
in
New York. She knew now that he hadn’t married Candace, but he might still be canoodling with some little sugarplum down under the ol’ magnolia trees.

Still no cabs. She could see the crisscross flash of Thirty-Fourth Street ahead of her. It was already nine-thirty. This was hopeless. Should she give up? She stopped dead, catching her breath, trying to decide. There was a ringing in her ears, drowning out the sounds of the street. Into the muffled hush, as clearly as if old Mrs. da Filippo were standing right next to her, came the words:
A woman always knows. And when she knows she must act.

Freya broke into to a run, long coat tangling in her legs, high heels stuttering on the sidewalk. She remembered the terrace in the moonlight, when the heel of her shoe had come off, how Jack had picked her up in his arms. A flame of desire licked through her. She had known then, but she hadn’t trusted her heart. She had let fear of rejection and her own stupid pride stand in her way. But she knew now. And she was suddenly certain that, against all the odds, against reason or probability, Jack was waiting for her. She would race into the restaurant, breathless—she could see his incredulous smile. She’d be smiling, too. She’d walk right up to him and say . . . What would she say? The words formed in her mind—words she had never allowed herself to speak aloud—like a tight bud swelling, unfurling, bursting open to the light.
I love you.

A cab! She waved at it desperately and it stopped.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Freya fell back against the seat, amazed at the idea she had just admitted into her mind. She loved him! Well, of course, she loved him. Hadn’t she been carrying him around in her heart for months? She missed his laugh. She missed his company. Some nights she couldn’t sleep for wanting the touch of his body.

At last! Here was the long plate-glass curve of the restaurant. There was a queue outside, figures huddled into coats, stamping their feet. Freya squashed dollar bills into the cabdriver’s hand, and raced to the door of the restaurant.

“Hey, you! Get in line!” called a belligerent voice.

“I’m meeting someone,” Freya tossed over her shoulder.

She pushed her way into the entrance. A crowd of people was clustered two and three deep around a long chromium bar. She barged her way through and walked straight into the sea of tables, head swiveling this way and that. Her heart slammed at her ribs. Where was he?

“Excuse me, miss, do you have a reservation?”

Freya jerked her head impatiently at the polite male voice without looking around. “I’m meeting someone,” she repeated, stepping farther into the room. She felt a chill of panic. He
must
be here.

“May I have the name?”

Freya turned reluctantly, taking in the white shirt, black trousers, professional smile.

“Madison,” she told him, with a tiny thrill at saying the name aloud.

“If you’d just come with me—?”

Freya followed him to his smoothly sculpted lectern and held her breath as she watched his forefinger skim down the open pages of his reservations book.

“Madison! Here we go,” said the man. Freya could have kissed him.
Yes!
“But that table was booked for eight o’clock.” He cocked his arm fussily to check his watch. “I think he’s gone.”

No!
Aloud she said, “Are you sure? Which table was it?”

The man put out his hand to stop a young woman who was passing, a slim blond in a black dress. “Suzie, this lady was supposed to be meeting Mr. Madison, table twelve. Do you happen to remember if he left already? Suzie takes the coats,” he explained.

Suzie was looking curiously at her. “I remember him all right. He gave me some flowers—absolutely gorgeous. Said he didn’t need them anymore. Then he left.”

Freya stared at her bleakly, not wanting to believe it.

“Tall, blond guy,” Suzie added. “Handsome.”

“Did you see which way he went?” Freya demanded, looking from one to the other. “Did he saying anything? When did he leave? How did he look?”

“He went maybe twenty minutes ago,” Suzie answered. “He looked pretty low.”

Freya gave a sigh of defeat. “Okay. Thanks.” She turned away.

She walked back past the bar and pushed her way outside. The queue was still there. Instinctively she swung away from the lights and laughter, and walked alone down the dark street, head down, hands pushed into her pockets.

Jack had come, and she’d missed him. How could she ever explain?
Sorry, Jack, I forgot. I was at a Singles evening.
She’d rejected him before. He would think that she’d done it again, deliberately—that she didn’t care. Jack was a proud man. He’d given her one last chance, and she’d blown it.

Her own cruel words taunted her. She’d called Jack useless, pathetic, too spineless to commit to anything. But he had kept his promise. He had waited for her for almost two hours, conspicuously alone in a fashionable restaurant. He’d bought her flowers. She was the one who had doubted. This time she had disappointed him as bitterly as he had once disappointed her.

Freya gave a despairing sob. She didn’t even know how to contact him. He could be anywhere—
anywhere!
—in this teeming city. She’d lost him, maybe for good.

Freya blinked, then blinked again. Something was bothering her at the extreme edge of her vision, an intermittent, flickering light. She turned her head. Across the street was a fluorescent sign.
North by Nrthwest
, she read. The second
o
had slipped and was dangling by a cable, spitting sparks. Freya stared. It was a cinema.
North by Northwest
was one of Jack’s favorite films.

Before she knew it she had stepped off the curb and was walking across the street. The place looked like an old fleapit, probably on the last lap of its lease before demolition. A ticket lady—Chinese, maybe, or Korean—sat in a glass booth, watching a small portable TV and eating popcorn.

Freya bent her head to the narrow slot. “Excuse me, has anyone bought a ticket in the last half hour or so? A man?”

The lady stared at her with bored eyes and chewed her popcorn. “You want ticket?”

“Okay.” Freya took out her wallet and handed over a bill. What was she doing?

“Movie almost finished,” the woman said, sliding Freya’s ticket across.

Freya ignored her. She crossed the dingy foyer, drawn by the music—panicky violins and the bang of drums.

She pushed through the doors and stopped, blinded in the sudden dark. On-screen, Cary Grant was clinging to a rock-face with one hand; the other gripped the hand of a blond woman dangling in space, about to fall toward pine trees far, far below.

Freya scanned the audience as her eyes adjusted to the dark. There were perhaps a dozen figures scattered through the rows. None of them was Jack.

The agonized face of the blond woman filled the screen. “I can’t make it!” she cried, raising despairing eyes to Cary Grant.

“Yes, you can. Come on.”

“I’m tired. . . .”

Freya turned to go. She felt desolate. It had been stupid to think she could find her way to Jack, just because she loved him.

Wait a minute!
There was a figure right over the other side, his legs propped on the seat in front. It was Jack. He was wearing those cute college-boy glasses. Freya felt her heart would burst. She hurried around the walkway behind the seats and down the far aisle.

On-screen the couple were now in each other’s arms on the upper bunk of a train compartment. The woman was wearing white pajamas. “This is silly,” she laughed.

“I know. I’m sentimental.”

Freya reached the row where Jack was sitting, one seat in from the end. He hadn’t noticed her yet. His face was unguarded, his expression wistful. Freya melted with tenderness. She began to tremble.

But when she spoke, her voice was light, almost teasing. “Is this seat taken?”

Jack looked up. His face flooded with astonishment and delight. He reached for her hand, holding it as if he would never let go, and flipped down the seat to draw her close. His eyes smiled into hers. “I’ve been saving it for you,” he said.

About the Author

© Jerry Bauer

ROBYN SISMAN was born in Los Angeles and grew up in various parts of the United States and Europe. After a spell teaching in Ethiopia, she settled in London and worked in publishing. The author of
Perfect Strangers
, a London
Sunday Times
bestseller, she is a full-time writer and currently lives in Somerset, near Bath.