The Man Every Woman Wants (2 page)

Curiouser and curiouser.

But she didn't say yes, either.

‘Look,' he said firmly. ‘I'm not asking you out on a date. Just for a drink. Lots of work colleagues go for drinks on a Friday afternoon.'

‘I do know that,' she said stiffly.

‘Then what's your problem?'

Again, she hesitated.

‘Look,' he went on determinedly, ‘I do realise that you don't like me much. No no, Laura, don't bother to deny it; you've made your feelings quite obvious over the past two years. I have to confess that I haven't exactly warmed to you, either. But even the most indifferent and insensitive male would notice that you're not yourself today. As unlikely as it might seem, I find myself quite worried about you. Hence my invitation to take you for a drink. I thought you might relax over a glass of wine and tell me what's up.'

And why you gave me that odd look when you first came in
, he added privately to himself.

‘Even if I tell you,' she replied, her eyes unhappy, ‘There's nothing
you
can do about it.'

‘Let me be the judge of that.'

She laughed, but it was not a happy sound. ‘You'll probably be annoyed with me.'

‘That's a very intriguing thing to say. Now, I simply won't take no for an answer. You are going to come for a drink with me—right now. And you're going to tell me what this is all about!'

L
AURA
knew it was silly of her to feel flattered by his concern—and even sillier to agree to have a drink with him at the Opera Bar, of all places.

The Opera Bar was
the
place to go for an after-work drink in Sydney's CBD, conveniently located near the quay and with one of the best views in town—the Opera House on the right, Circular Quay on the left, the Harbour Bridge straight ahead, not to mention the harbour itself. Half the staff at Harvey, Michaels and Associates gathered there every Friday evening. Even non-social Laura occasionally went with them. She knew that it would cause a stir if she was seen drinking there in the company of Ryan Armstrong.

Why, then, had she agreed?

This was the question which tormented her during the short walk down to the quay.

By the time they arrived at the bar—early enough not to be spotted by any of her work colleagues yet, thank heavens— Laura was no nearer a logical answer.

Alison would have said that she was secretly attracted to him. There again, dear Alison was a hopeless romantic, addicted to those movies where the heroine hates the hero on sight but somehow falls madly in love with him before the credits go up at the end.

Laura could never buy into that plot. When she didn't like
someone, she didn't like them—end of story. She'd never liked Ryan Armstrong and certainly wasn't secretly attracted to him.

Okay, so he was good-looking, smart and, yes, highly successful. Ten years ago, she might have found him fascinating. These days, however, she was immune to handsome charmers who used women for their sexual satisfaction—sometimes for other rotten reasons—and gave them nothing in return but the dubious pleasure of their company. They shared nothing of themselves, either emotionally or financially. They were greedy selfish men who wanted their cake and wanted to eat it too. Laura had been involved with two such men in her life and had developed a sixth sense whenever she met a man of their ilk.

Ryan Armstrong had set off warning bells in her head from the first moment they had met, which was why she made an extra effort every Friday to down-play her looks even more than had become her habit during the last few years.

Not that she needed to worry about his making a play for her. It had been obvious from the start that he didn't like her any more than she liked him. That was why she'd been surprised today by his suddenly being nice to her. He'd got under her guard a couple of times already and now here she was, about to have drinks with him.

It was all very perverse.

‘Let's sit outside,' Ryan said, and steered her out to the alfresco area where the sun was still shining, providing enough warmth to counter the freshness of the harbour breeze.

‘What would you like to drink?' Ryan asked as he pulled out a chair for her at an empty table right by the water's edge.

‘Bourbon and coke,' she replied, which made him raise his eyebrows. But he made no verbal comment before turning away and returning to the bar inside to order the drinks.

Being left alone gave Laura even more time to think and to worry. Not about her virtue—no way could she ever be seduced by the likes of Ryan Armstrong—but about the confession which Ryan was seemingly intent on getting out of her.

She still could not believe she'd been stupid enough to do what she'd done. And now it had backfired on her, big time. Not that she could have foretold that the doctors would be proved wrong and that her grandmother would come out of her coma and remember every single word that her granddaughter had said as she had sat by her bedside. Laura's intentions at the time had all been good, but what did that matter now?

A weary sigh escaped her lips. What was that old saying? ‘The road to hell was paved with good intentions.'

The sight of Ryan walking towards their table with the drinks in his hands reminded her of why she'd chosen
him
to lie about to her grandmother. He really was the epitome of what her grandmother would think the perfect partner for her favourite granddaughter. First there was the matter of his looks. Gran had always said that she liked a man to look like a man, advising Laura to steer clear of pretty boys whom, she'd said, invariably had no backbone and, more importantly, no muscles to speak of.

‘And they usually go bald early,' Gran had claimed with a perfectly straight face.

Laura had never been overly impressed by her grandmother's tendency to make superficial judgements when it came to the opposite sex. Though perhaps she should have listened, since the two men who'd broken her heart had both been pretty boys.

Ryan certainly wasn't a pretty boy. All his facial features were large and masculine. He had a broad forehead, an aquiline nose and a strong, square jaw which wasn't softened at all by the dimple in the middle of his chin. His hair was dark brown and would have been thick, if he ever grew it past his military-style crew cut. He certainly wasn't in danger of going prematurely bald, with no sign of a receding hairline.

Gran also liked men with blue eyes, for some reason.

Ryan's eyes were blue, though they were so deep-set under his thick dark brows that they sometimes looked black from a distance. Up close, however, their blue was the colour of a
bright summer sky—but not nearly as warm. His eyes carried a hardness which no doubt served him well when he was negotiating a deal.

His body would have gained Gran's tick of approval as well, being tall and broad-shouldered, with muscles in all the right places. Admittedly, Laura had never seen him dressed in anything but a business suit—the kind he was wearing today—but she had seen him jacket-less with his sleeves rolled up and there was no hiding the fact that the man was very fit, with a flat stomach and no flab anywhere.

It was no wonder that she'd chosen him as her imaginary Mr Right, she realised as she watched Ryan walk towards her. He fitted the bill perfectly. Not only did he look like a man physically, but he was financially secure, charming when he wanted to be and, yes, old enough to be experienced in life.

Gran always said that a girl should never marry a man around her own age.

‘Boys mature much later than girls, Laura,' she'd advised her granddaughter on more than one occasion. ‘They need to experience life before they're ready to settle down.'

Of course, when she'd been waxing lyrical about Ryan by her Gran's hospital bed, she hadn't mentioned just how ‘experienced' he was, Laura thought caustically. She didn't think her rather old-fashioned grandmother would approve of a man who'd had more women than underpants. And who changed them just as often.

Frankly, it always amazed Laura why women kept getting sucked into having a relationship with Ryan Armstrong. If you could call what he had with women ‘relationships'. They were just ships passing in the night from what she'd heard. And she'd heard plenty over the past two years.

He smiled as he placed the drinks down on the table, a wickedly sexy smile which gave her a glimpse of how dangerously attractive he could be. If one was susceptible to that kind of thing.

‘I decided to have what you're having,' he said as he sat down and swept up his own bourbon and coke. ‘Cheers!'

She picked up her drink, clinked it against his, then took a deep swallow. Their eyes met over the rims of their glasses. His glittered with wry amusement whilst she kept hers as cool as always. But, underneath the silk lining of her black jacket, Laura was startled to feel her heart beating a little faster.

Maybe she wasn't as immune to the man's charms as she imagined. But it was not enough to worry about.

Nevertheless, she glanced away at the harbour. It really was a spectacular setting for a city, especially on a warm spring afternoon. Lots of boats were out on the sparkling water, creating a visual feast for all the tourists who'd flocked to the quayside area to take holiday snaps of the bridge and the Opera House.

‘Sydney's a truly beautiful city, isn't it?' Laura said with pride in her voice.

‘It surely is,' he agreed. ‘You only have to live in other cities in other countries to know how lucky we are.'

She looked back at him. ‘You sound like you've lived in lots of other countries.'

Ryan shrugged. ‘Quite a few. But no more prevaricating, now,' he said as he put down his glass. ‘Tell me what's going on in your life which has sent you into such a spin today.'

‘I'm not in a spin,' she said defensively.

‘Laura, you're sitting here having a drink with me. That's evidence enough that something has thrown you for a loop. So stop denying it. Given you're not the sort of girl to make a professional mistake, it has to be a personal problem. And I'm involved in some weird way. Am I right about that?'

‘Yes,' she said, seeing no point in lying. It was obvious Ryan wasn't going to let up until he knew every depressing detail, so she took a deep breath then launched into her tale of woe.

‘It's a bit of a long story, so please be patient with me.'

Patience, she knew, was not one of Ryan's strong points. But he didn't say a word, the expression on his face showing
genuine interest. He might feel differently when he learned the part he'd played in her disaster, albeit unknowingly.

‘Two weeks ago, my grandmother had a bad fall down some steps and ended up in a coma in hospital. Not in a Sydney hospital— In John Hunter Hospital in Newcastle. Gran lives up in the Hunter Valley. Anyway, the family was told she wasn't likely to pull through. In fact, the doctors didn't even expect her to last the night. So I sat with her all that night and, because I didn't want to go to sleep and not be with her if and when she did pass away, I kept talking to her. And, because I thought it wouldn't matter, I told her all the things that I knew she'd always wanted to hear: that I'd finally found Mr Right and I was very, very happy.

‘Of course, it didn't take very long to make that simple announcement, so I was forced to elaborate somewhat to fill in time. Unfortunately, I've never had a great imagination; creativity is not a talent of mine. So I thought of all the men I knew and worked with and came up with the one who fitted the bill of Mr Right from my grandmother's viewpoint. Superficially, that is,' she added with a rueful glance Ryan's way.

‘Good God,' he said, sitting up straight. ‘You're talking about me, aren't you?'

‘Unfortunately, yes,' she admitted dryly.

He laughed, then laughed again. ‘Damn it, but that is funny, Laura. In an ironic way,' he added. ‘I don't think what happened to your poor grandmother is funny. I have a soft spot for grandmothers.'

Indeed, his eyes did soften with his words.

‘I must be missing something here,' he went on, his forehead crinkling into a frown. ‘What harm did it do for you to invent a fictitious Mr Right on your grandmother's deathbed? Frankly, I think it was rather sweet of you to do what you did.'

Laura sighed. ‘Sweet, but stupid. I should have known that Gran would pull through. She's always been a fighter. Not only did she pull through, but somehow she remembered every single word I said when she was supposed to be unconscious.
Well, perhaps that's a slight exaggeration. But she did remember my saying that I'd finally met Mr Right and his name was Ryan Armstrong. Now she's out of hospital and wants me to bring you home to meet her this very weekend.'

‘Naturally,' Ryan said, then laughed again.

‘Don't laugh—it really isn't funny, because she's still not at all well. The doctors found out that she'd had a small stroke, and that was probably why she fell. The family's been warned that she could have another stroke at any time. Or even a heart attack. They did lots of tests whilst she was in hospital and things are not good, artery-wise; there are a few serious blockages. But she refuses to have a bypass or any kind of invasive treatment. Says she's had a good life and is quite happy to go.'

‘Oh dear,' Ryan said with some genuine sympathy in his voice. ‘You really have landed yourself in a right pickle, haven't you?'

‘I really have. But it's not your problem. I only told you because you insisted.'

‘So what are you going to do?'

‘I guess I'll delay things for as long as I can. I'll make up some excuse for why you can't come to meet her this weekend—a business trip, or an illness. But I can hardly keep on saying that. In the end, I'll have to tell her the truth—though I don't want to say that I lied about our relationship. She'd be so disappointed with me. I'll have to say that things just didn't work out between us after all.'

‘You can say that I didn't want to marry you. Which is true, after all,' he added, smiling.

‘Very funny.'

‘It is, rather, if you stop to think about it. I can't imagine two more unlikely lovers.'

‘Well Gran doesn't know that, does she?' Laura snapped, piqued by his remark.

‘No, she doesn't. Of course, there is one other solution to your problem.'

‘I can't imagine what.'

‘Of course you can't. You don't have an imagination.'

Laura rolled her eyes at him. ‘Then enlighten me, oh brilliant one.'

‘I could go with you to your grandmother's place this weekend and pretend to be your Mr Right.'

Laura almost spilled the rest of her drink, but she soon gathered her usual poise and gave Ryan the drollest look. ‘And why, pray tell, would you do something as sweetly generous, but as patently ridiculous, as that?'