Page 12 of Mistletoe Mistake
However, would Cole still want to work with us now that he knew about my involvement? And if he did, could we really move past the awkwardness of our initial meeting?
And even if the answer to both of those questions was yes, could I work with him? Could I really stand being in the same room with him, pretending I didn't remember the feel of his body against mine?
Eventually, the crowd around us thinned as people drifted towards the restaurant, leaving Holly and me free to make our own way there. We expected to be sitting at a table with Signor Morelli himself, but as we got closer, we could see that there were no available seats.
Before we could look for someone to ask where we were meant to be, Jackson appeared next to Holly. “I believe you ladies are with us,” he told us with a smile, gesturing towards a nearby table with two empty chairs, across from Cole and Vanessa who were already seated, their backs to us. When I gave him a suspicious look, he chuckled. “Cole wasn't kidding about getting what he wants, and what he'd like right now is to get to know more about the two of you and your business. Won't you please join us?”
A quick look around the room told me that all the other seats had been assigned. Cole must have somehow changed the seating plan, though I couldn't imagine how he had done that at someone else’s party, and so quickly. When I looked to Holly for help, she simply shrugged. We hadn't had a chance to speak about Cole at all yet since we ran into him, and though I would have preferred to come up with a game plan with her before we spoke to him, it didn't look like that would be an option.
As gracefully as I could, I slid into the seat across from Cole with Holly beside me while Jackson sat at the head of the table, between me and Cole. Cole's eyes locked on me the moment I sat down, but I avoided looking at him, taking a drink from my glass and looking around the room. For a moment, no one spoke. Jackson seemed to be waiting for Cole to take the lead, but when he finally opened his mouth to say something, I quickly jumped in before he had a chance. I needed to try to keep some control over the situation if I wanted to have any chance of keeping it together for the rest of the evening.
“So, Vanessa, do you also work with Stamer Hotels?”
I fixed a friendly smile on her as I asked the question. Obviously, she was here as Cole’s date, but that could mean any number of things. Were they colleagues? Dating? Maybe that explained why he'd been looking for a woman he could pay, so that it didn't get back to his girlfriend that he'd been with someone else?
Vanessa gave me a polite, calm smile in return. “No, I'm just a friend of Mr Stamer.”
'Mr Stamer'? Apparently, they weren't all that close. “So, what do you do, then?”
“I'm an actress and model,” she replied, glancing over at Cole as if looking for direction.
“And professional escort,” Cole supplied, sounding completely unbothered by the fact. “If that's what you were getting at.”
If nothing else, I had to give him credit for owning it. “I hadn’t reached that conclusion, but thank you for making things clear.”
So, he brought a woman with him whom he paid to be here. Did that mean he did this regularly? I couldn’t tell if that made me feel better or not. If those were the kind of women he usually spent time with, perhaps it made a little more sense that he had thought I would be the same.
“I don't believe in making things unnecessarily complicated,” Cole said. When I finally met his eyes, I couldn’t see any trace of embarrassment or guilt there, only confidence and determination. “I apologize if we got off on the wrong foot last night, but I would like to focus on business now.”
So, he was going to acknowledge what happened between us, sort of. Holly nudged me under the table, and understanding her unspoken question, I gave her a small nod. When her eyes widened, I knew that she got the message: the man across from us and the man I had told her about this morning were one and the same.
I gave him a polite but determined smile of my own. “Well, in case you hadn't noticed, Mr Stamer, this isn't a business meeting. If you call our office on Monday, we'll be pleased to set up an appointment for you.”
“We're all here now,” Cole pointed out. “I'm sure you have access to your portfolio on your phone. You could start by showing us some of your work.”
I couldn’t fault his persistence, but I had no intention of giving in that easily. “My phone doesn't really do justice to our work. At our office, we have models and high-res photos we can show you. It will give you a much better idea of what we're capable of.”
“Of course,” Jackson agreed, shooting a look at Cole that looked to me like a warning. “We'd be delighted to make an appointment but we're only in town for a couple of weeks. We go back to the States on the 15th.”
That gave me a perfect opportunity to try to move the discussion away from work until Holly and I had a chance to regroup. “What do you have planned for your stay in London? It's a great place to be, especially just before Christmas. Do you visit often?”
Acting like I hadn’t spoken, Cole looked up at the ceiling above us. “How were you able to take out the wall that used to be here? It must have been load-bearing.”
It surprised me that he knew there had been a wall there, and I couldn't help glancing up to see if we had left any tell-tale signs, but the cover-up looked as smooth as I expected it to be. Had he been in the hotel before the renovation, or did he actually know enough about architecture to know that there would have been a wall here in the original design?
Jackson shook his head apologetically. “You'll have to forgive him. He's not really much for small talk.”
I couldn't help remembering how quickly Cole and I had jumped from standing under the mistletoe to having his finger inside me. No small talk, indeed.
I flashed Jackson a cheeky smile. “Well, since he’s the one who changed our seating assignments, he's just going to have to grin and bear it.”
Jackson rewarded me with a charming smile of his own. “I completely agree. And to answer your question: we've been to London a few times on business, but we've never really spent much time just seeing the city. What would you recommend?”
“I would need to know a bit more about you before I make any recommendations.”
I dialled up my flirt factor just a touch as I leaned closer to him, and Cole tensed, giving me a little thrill of satisfaction. Did it bother him to see me flirting with his friend? I had to admit that the idea of him being jealous appealed to me, though I couldn’t fully explain why.
Playing into it, I leaned even closer to Jackson and lowered my voice. “For example, it's no use telling you to spend the day checking out the churches in the City if you'd rather be at the Museum of Sex Objects.”
