An Autumn Crush Read Free

all other possible candidates on it and threw it behind her because of that smile. Yep , it said. She’ll do . The crazy
hedgehog-rescuer with the very nice speaking voice and self-help book in her bag was The One.
    She proffered the chocolate digestives and Floz took one with a very smiley ‘Oooh’ of delight. The deal was sealed.
    And that was how, by seven o’clock that night, Floz Cherrydale had introduced her suitcases and her boxes to the floor of her new bedroom and was sitting on her new flat-mate’s sofa
picking from the Great Wall takeaway menu, watching Emmerdale and drinking celebratory measures of Baileys.

 
Chapter 2
    Juliet’s phone rang just as she had taken her coat off in the office. It was Coco, being his deliciously nosy self ringing her, as he liked to, five minutes before he
opened up his Perfume Palace in the town-centre shopping mall.
    ‘So how was your first night with your new flatty then? Anything happen after I left?’
    ‘Like what?’ teased Juliet.
    ‘Any goss?’
    ‘Like what?’
    ‘Ooh, you are awkward this morning. Is this what you’re going to be like now you’ve got a new friend ?’
    Juliet laughed. ‘That is so rich coming from someone who drops me like a hot brick when he’s got the tiniest glimmer of a love interest.’
    ‘I can’t help it if I’m an obsessive,’ sniffed Coco. ‘Doesn’t she speak nicely? Not like you, you common tart. Ooh, and what perfume does she wear?’
    ‘How the bloody hell do I know?’
    ‘Whatever it was, it had a hint of strawberries in it. Delightful.’ He made a mental note to ask Floz the next time he saw her.
    ‘I think Floz must like strawberries. She’s got little pictures of them on her wall, and when she opens her door, the smell of them wafts out of her room.’
    ‘Aw bless,’ smiled Coco. He knew that anyone who smelled like Floz Cherrydale could be nothing other than a darling soul.
    ‘I don’t suppose you’ve heard anything from Darren?’ Juliet asked softly.
    ‘Nope, still nothing,’ said Coco, his smile falling to the ground on hearing his last lover’s name. ‘That’s three weeks, six days and fourteen hours now. Not that
I’m counting. I still think he will ring. My intuition is strongly telling me that I’m on his mind.’
    ‘No, sweetheart, I don’t think you are,’ replied Juliet. She wasn’t the sort of person to lie to Coco and give him false hope. What would be the point of that? When a man
was full on with his attentions then suddenly disappeared and didn’t answer phone calls or texts, he was not going to suddenly reappear with a viable excuse. Unless he had died – then
he was still unlikely to turn up.
    ‘Okay,’ said Coco, trying not to give way to an inner surge of rising emotion. ‘Change of subject. What do you know about Floz so far then?’
    ‘Not that much,’ said Juliet. ‘She’s single, as you might have gathered from that book she dropped, works from home making up jokes and poems for the greetings-card
industry, drives a Renault – all boring stuff
    ‘That it?’
    ‘’Fraid so for now, kiddo. No doubt we’ll get to know more in time,’ said Juliet. ‘I like her. We had coffee together this morning. She gets up quite early to start
work.’
    ‘Such a shame she isn’t Guy’s type,’ said Coco, who never missed a good match-making opportunity.
    ‘I thought exactly the same,’ sighed Juliet.
    Yes, it was a shame that Floz was so small and red-haired and eggshell crushable. Had she been tall and statuesque and blonde, Juliet would have grabbed her brother and frog-marched him over to
the flat to meet Floz five minutes after she moved in.
    ‘You could have gone double-dating,’ said Coco, with glee. ‘Floz and Guy and you and Piers.’
    ‘Oh, don’t get me going. He’ll be here any minute, breathing the same air as me.’ Juliet melted at the thought of having a little bit of her boss inside her – even
if it was just his exhaled breath in her