Fire After Dark Read Online Free PDF Page B

somehow. It will still taste the same, right?
    I round the corner into Randolph Gardens and I don’t know exactly how I manage to do it but the next moment I’ve almost walked smack into a man on the pavement in front of me. He must have been ahead of me and stopped without my noticing so I kept right on going until my nose was practically pressed into his back.
    ‘Oh!’ I exclaim and step backwards, losing my balance so that I stumble off the pavement and into the gutter, dropping the bag with my ice cream in it. It rolls away and comes to rest on a dusty drain stuffed with litter and dead leaves.
    ‘I’m sorry,’ he says, turning around, and I realise I’m looking straight into the handsome face of the man from across the way. ‘Are you all right?’
    I can feel myself flushing scarlet. ‘Yes,’ I say, sounding breathless, ‘but it was all my fault. Really. I should watch where I’m going.’
    He’s quite mind-blowing close up, in fact I can hardly look at him, concentrating instead on his beautifully cut dark suit and the bunch of white peonies he’s carrying. How weird, I think, he’s holding my favourite flower.
    ‘Let me get your shopping,’ he says. His voice is deep, low and his accent is well educated and cultured. He steps forward as if to get down into the gutter to get my ice cream for me.
    ‘No, no,’ I say quickly, blushing an even hotter scarlet. ‘I’ll get it.’
    We both bend and reach out at the same time and his hand lands right on top of mine, warm and heavy. I gasp and pull away, and promptly stumble forward into the gutter. He instantly clasps my arm in a strong grip, stopping me from falling forward flat on my face.
    ‘Are you all right?’ he asks as I try to regain my balance. He isn’t letting me go, and my face is flaming with embarrassment.
    ‘Yes . . . please . . .’ I say faintly, only aware of the iron fingers round my arm holding me up. ‘You can let me go now.’
    He releases me and I bend down to retrieve my bag with the all-too-obvious tub of ice cream in it. Bits of old leaf stick to my bag. I rub a hand across my face and feel the grit of dust there. I must look a fright.
    ‘Just the weather for ice cream,’ he says, smiling. I look up shyly. Is that a teasing note in his voice? I suppose I’m just some random girl in the gutter with streaks of filthy dust on her face, holding ice cream like a little kid with her treat. But he is something else. His eyes are so dark they’re almost black but it’s his eyebrows I really notice: strong black lines with a devilish hint about the arch. He has one of those straight noses that have a kink at the bridge that, oddly, only adds to its perfection, and below that is a full, sensual mouth, although at the moment the lips are curving into a smile and revealing straight white teeth.
    All I can think, weakly, is Wow. All I can do is nod. I’m completely speechless.
    ‘Well, good night. Enjoy your ice cream.’ He turns and heads quickly up the steps of the apartment building, vanishing inside the front door.
    I watch him go, still in the gutter, now feeling the grit between my toes. I breathe in, a long, desperately needed breath. I’ve been holding it while he looked at me. In fact, I feel really strange, a bit overwhelmed, with a kind of buzz in my head.
    Slowly, I walk into the apartment building and make my way back up to Celia’s flat. When I get there, I go straight to the sitting room. The light in the flat opposite is on now, and I can see him quite clearly. I fetch a spoon from the kitchen and go back, pulling a chair up to the window, close enough so that I can see out easily but not so close that I’m visible. I open my tub of ice cream and watch as the man moves about, going in and out of his sitting room. He’s taken off his jacket and tie now and is walking about in a blue shirt and dark trousers. He looks effortlessly sexy, the shirt emphasising his broad shoulders and the trousers his lean masculine