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Apparently only one.
She swallowed hard, wondering if this was the number he gave all the women he lined up for a little light entertainment on a tour. She knew what sending a car meant, and he hadn’t even been subtle about it. She might not have had much romance in her life, but that didn’t mean she’d given up on it completely—nor was she going to drop her standards.
Her hands dropped away from her hips. All of a sudden acting on her passionate nature with this man seemed a little too like getting in way over her head.
* * *
Rose came home to twenty-four yellow roses.
Rita Padalecki had brought them in when the delivery had arrived.
‘You weren’t home, Rose,’ said the little note, ‘so I used my key. Twenty-four roses, dear. He’s thinking of you.’
Rose sat a
t her kitchen bench with a coffee and stared at Plato’s card. Just his name. In Cyrillic. She traced the ink with her index finger, wondering if he had written it. Possibly…probably. She doubted the local florists were literate in Russian.
He was thinking of her. Without Mrs Padalecki’s note and understanding of the language of flowers she would never have known that. She would have thought he was greasing that slippery pole he expected her to go sliding down.
A house on the lake and dinner. Bed.
He wasn’t even picking her up. He was sending a car.
She scowled, and then her face crumpled because for a moment there with him this afternoon it had felt close to something…
But she couldn’t go on that date. Even if he was thinking of her. This was clearly his modus operandi. She knew his reputation. She was just a face in a crowd to him, and she knew what kind of girls he dated. The non-permanent, non-stick variety.
She picked up the vase of roses and transferred it to her study, where she wouldn’t have to face temptation. Then she thumbed in his number. He picked up almost immediately.
‘Da, Rose.’
The sound of his growly Russian voice threatened to buckle her knees. She leaned against the door frame between study and hallway.
‘I don’t think dinner is a good idea, Plato. It’s not something I’m interested in. Please don’t send a car for me.’ She took a deep breath. This sounded awful. ‘You’ve been so kind helping me out, and I really do appreciate it, but I’m not really your kind of gal.’
She had expected him to interrupt her, but there was silence on the other end.
‘I hope the Wolves win tomorrow night,’ she said inadequately, and then pressed ‘end’ and flattened the cell phone against her lips.
If she stood very still and kept her mind blank this awful feeling of having thrown something important away would subside.
Rose jumped when her cell buzzed almost immediately. She closed her eyes, tried to bring down her anxiety levels before she answered. But when she looked at the screen she realised it wasn’t Plato.
‘Phoebe.’
Several of her girlfriends, two of whom also happened to be working part-time at Date with Destiny, were going out for drinks tonight at a new bar downtown to celebrate the future success of the business.
‘Okay—yes. Sure.’ She heard herself agreeing to it even as a tiny voice whispered that he might come round, might just turn up…
Oh, honestly, Rose. He hasn’t called back. He’s not going to come. It’s over before it began.
No, much better to go out and just get on with things. Except…
When she was eleven her brother Cal had put her on her first bull calf. She’d been scared half to death but she’d known better than to show it. The little brown beast had thrown her first buck. She’d barely stayed on more than a few seconds. The longest three seconds of her whole life. Dusty and battered, she’d been scooped up from the dirt and made to promise not to tell Dad. She’d nodded, dirt on her face, a graze on her cheek, through tears she refused to shed. Her other brother Brick had told her she was pretty brave for a girl. She’d felt ten feet tall.
Right now she felt about an inch high. Rose Harkness, she thought with an odd little pang, when did you become this scaredy-cat?
* * *
