Dancing in the Dark Read Free Page A

that.”
    George and I hit it off immediately. I was promoted to “property negotiator”. Me! Now George was contemplating opening a branch in Woolton, a relatively middle-class area of Liverpool, and I was determined to be appointed manager, which was why I was writing the report. I’d driven round Woolton, taking in the number of superior properties, the roads of substantial semidetacheds, the terraced period cottages that could be hyped and sold for a bomb. I’d noted how often the buses ran to town, listed the schools, the supermarkets . . . The report would help George make up his mind and show him how keen I was to have the job.
    It was through Stock Masterton that I’d found my flat.
    The builders had gone bankrupt and the units were being sold for a song, which was unfair on the people already there who’d paid thousands more but the bank wanted its money and wasn’t prepared to wait.
    “I’ve not done bad for someone not quite thirty,” I murmured to myself. “I’ve got my own place, a job with prospects and a car. I earn twice as much as Gary.”
    No, I’d not done badly at all.
    Yet I wasn’t happy.
    I leaned on the iron rail and rested my chin on my arms. Somewhere deep within I felt a deadness, and I wondered if I would ever be happy. There were times when I felt like a skater going across the thinnest of ice. It was bound to crack some time, and I would disappear for ever into the freezing, murky water beneath. I shook myself. It was too lovely a morning for such morbid thoughts.
    I’d forgotten about James. He appeared on the balcony tucking a black shirt into his jeans. Even in casual clothes, he always looked crisp, neat, tidy. I turned away when he fastened the buckle of his wide leather belt.
    He frowned. “What’s the matter?”
    “Nothing. Why?”
    “You shuddered. Have you gone off me all of a sudden?”
    “Don’t be silly!” I laughed.
    James sat in the other chair. I swung up my bare feet so they rested between his legs and wriggled my toes.
    “Cor!” he gasped.
    “Don’t look like that. People will realise what I’m doing.”
    “Would you like to do it inside where no one can see?”
    “In a minute. I want to take a shower.”
    He smacked his lips. “I’ll take it with you.”
    “You’ve just got dressed!”
    “I can get undressed pretty damn quick.” He looked at me quizzically. “Does this mean I’m forgiven?”
    “For what?” I was being deliberately vague.
    “For proposing. I’d forgotten you modern women take an offer of marriage as an insult.” He took my feet in his hands. I was conscious of how large and warm and comforting they felt. “As an alternative, how about if I moved in with you?”
    I tried to pull away my feet, but he held them firmly.
    “The flat’s only small,” I muttered. “There’s only one bedroom.”
    “I wasn’t contemplating occupying the other if there were two.”
    No! I valued my privacy as much as my independence.
    I didn’t want someone suggesting it was time I went to bed or asking why I was late home—and did I really want the living room painted such a dark pink? I wished I could start the day again and stop him proposing. I had been quite enjoying things as they were.
    James put my feet down carefully on the balcony floor.
    “Between us we could get somewhere bigger.”
    “You’ve changed the rules,” I said.
    He sighed. “I know, but it’s not the rules that have changed, it’s me. I think I’m in love with you, Millie Cameron. In fact, I know I am.” He tried to catch my eyes. “I take it the feeling isn’t reciprocated?”
    I bit my lip and shook my head. James turned away and I contemplated his perfect profile: straight nose, broad mouth, pale, stubby lashes. His hair lay in a flattering corn-coloured quiff on his broad, tanned forehead. He didn’t look as if it was the end of the world that I’d turned him down. According to his mother, who never failed to mention it, there’d been an army of