The Yuletide Engagement & A Yuletide Seduction Read Free Page B

found herself the focus of Patrick’s McGrath’s enigmatic grey gaze.
    He really was the most gorgeous-looking man, she acknowledged weakly. All six foot two inches of him!
    â€œYou know where I am if you should change your mind…” he told her pointedly.
    Yes, he was gorgeous, and there was no doubt that having him as her escort would have salvaged her damaged pride—just as there was no doubt she had no intention of taking him up on his offer!
    â€˜I won’t,” she assured him with finality.
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    H OW could Ellie have known, how could she possibly have guessed, that something disastrous would occur during the following week—something that would necessitate her not only changing her mind, but having to go to Patrick McGrath herself and ask him if he would consider coming to the company dinner with her after all?

CHAPTER TWO
    â€œH OW do I look?” She grimaced at Toby questioningly as she entered the kitchen where her brother sat eating the dinner she had prepared for him before getting ready for her evening out.
    â€œYou look great,” he assured her enthusiastically. “New dress?” he observed teasingly.
    Of course it was a new dress; she couldn’t go out with Patrick McGrath wearing the old trusty little-black-dress that she had worn to last year’s company Christmas dinner. No, as Patrick’s dinner date she wanted to wear something much more stylish. And noticeable.
    She had known as soon as she saw the knee-length figure-hugging red dress in the shop that it would ensure, once and for all, that Gareth was no longer under any misapprehension concerning her having fully got over him. Especially with Patrick McGrath as her dinner partner!
    â€œDo you like it?” she asked her brother uncertainly.
    Trying the dress on in the shop and actually putting it on at home were two different things, she had realised a few minutes ago. Seen in this homely setting, the dress was much more revealing than anything Ellie had ever worn before, clinging to her slenderness in a bright red swathe, the low neckline and sleeveless style showingarms and throat still lightly tanned from her holiday in the summer.
    Her hair was swept up loosely from the slenderness of her neck and secured with two gold combs. The change in hairstyle seemed to enlarge her eyes and the dark sweep of her lashes. Blusher highlighted her cheeks, and the bright red gloss on her lips was the same colour as the dress.
    Ellie had noted all of this in her bedroom mirror a few minutes ago, sweeping out of the room and down the stairs before she had time for second thoughts and settled for the familiar black dress after all.
    â€œYou look wonderful, sis,” Toby told her, sitting back to look at her admiringly. “You’re going to knock him off his feet!”
    She frowned. “Toby, the idea isn’t for me to attract Patrick McGrath—”
    â€œI was referring to Gareth,” he murmured pointedly.
    â€œOh…Gareth,” she acknowledged weakly, feeling the colour warming her cheeks at her mistake. In all honesty she had totally forgotten about Gareth as she prepared for her evening out. Which was ridiculous when he was the reason she had gone to all this trouble in the first place.
    The reason she had swallowed her pride and gone to Patrick, and told him she had changed her mind after all!
    To give the man his due, he hadn’t batted an eyelid when she had turned up at his office three days ago—without an appointment—and asked him if he was still agreeable to going out with her on Friday evening.
    She had acted instinctively, knowing that if she gave herself time to think about whether or not she should goand see him she would change her mind. Although she had been a little thrown by his opening comment!
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    â€œI ’VE been expecting you.” He put his gold pen down on top of the papers on his desk before smiling across at her as she stood just