The Gigolo Read Free Page B

but he stood at the kerbside and watched as the cab pulled away.
    Kara looked out of the rear window as the driver turned right at the end of the road. He was still looking.
    What a stupid thing to say! It sounded as if she’d brushed him off. She’d given him the impression she wasn’t interested in him – why..? Maybe it was because William Baron had somehow known her secret and that scared her. She got the feeling that he had the power to give her what she wanted and she was suddenly terrified of what that might mean.
     
     
    CHAPTER TWO
     
     
     
    Kara woke early on Saturday morning and she smiled as she recalled her date with William but she was scared she’d put him off and he wouldn’t ring again, She tried to think of a reason that she could contact him instead as she made coffee and warmed a croissant in the oven.
    It was a lovely sunny da y. Kara took her breakfast out into the garden to sit on the terrace in the early morning sun. The grass was neatly cropped and the flower borders newly planted with summer annuals but it looked more like a municipal park than a home. It needed people in it. It needed messing up a bit. She imagined William playing football with his mates; scuffing up the grass and knocking heads off the flowers. She imagined his things strewn around the house – his pocket change in the dish by the door; his jacket hanging next to hers, and his boxers on the floor beside her bed. Stop it! You’ll be practising his last name as your signature next, s he chided herself.
    A courier arrived a little after nine o’clock with a package for her. Kara signed for it and took it back into the house. She opened the accompanying card first.
    Thank you for dinner . It was from William. Kara smiled and unwrapped the package. It was the painting – the Paul Blake. She picked up the phone and dialled his number but no one answered.
    Kara propped the painting on the kitchen unit and stood back to examine it. Why would he send her this when she’d clearly told him she didn’t like it?
    Kara called him again at 11:30. This time he answered on the second ring. He sounded as if he’d run to the phone. She could hear the hum of London traffic in the background as if his front door was still open.
    ‘I can’t keep this ,’ she said grimacing at the way the paint had been so haphazardly daubed onto the canvas.
    ‘Wh at?’ he said. He was being purposely ambiguous.
    ‘The painting, of course.’
    ‘Why not? It was bloody expensive. It’s supposed to make you feel guilty enough to accept another date with me.’
    Kara smiled into the phone.
    ‘I can’t accept it because I bloody hate it!’ she replied bluntly.
    ‘ I’ll come and collect it if it’s bothering you that much,’ William hit back but she could hear the smile in his voice and she was glad that she hadn’t scared him off.
    ‘We could meet halfway for lunch, if you’re not too busy,’ Kara suggested.
    ‘It’s a beautiful day – how about a picnic alongside the Serpentine?’ he said.
    ‘I’d love that.’ Kara smiled. ‘What shall I bring?’ A single man was unlikely to have the ingredients for a picnic in the park in his fridge.
    ‘Just yourself. I have everything else under control.’
     
    ***
     
    Kara had the painting couriered back to William’s house on Elgin Crescent – the address he had written on the back of the card should the painting have not been delivered. She wouldn’t have felt happy lugging such an expensive piece of artwork to the park.
    He texted and thanked her just as she was setting off in a cab. – I ’ll be there in 5mins , she replied.
    She was wearing a little summer dress that buttoned up the front, leather thong sandals and a sun hat and dark glasses for the sake of anonymity.
    He was waiting in the car park with a proper wicker hamper and a c ool bag containing two bottles of champagne. He was wearing jeans and a pink and white polo shirt with the collar half up and half down as if he