Page 47 of Stars Shine In Your Eyes

Being with Josie made him see that maybe he had other choices. She’d grown up with a single mother, and he had a feeling that money had been tight. And yet, it sounded like they had done so much together. They’d made choices to enrich their lives, rather than getting locked into a job that demanded every hour.

“Penny for your thoughts,” she said.

“Just miles away,” he said.

“I can see that,” she said with a smile, then she reached for his hand.

He liked that she wasn’t shy about showing her affection to him in the Tube, because the likelihood of either of them knowing anyone was quite low. And yet, it didn’t feel like enough to him. He still wanted more. He found himself wanting to declare that she was his, and not just to the people on this train, but to everyone. To his family. To hers. And to her as well.

He leaned over and kissed her gently. That was when he heard someone say his name.

“Malcolm.”

Josie drew back, her eyes big.

One of the guys from his firm was just getting on the Tube at St. James’s Park.

Edward Willoughby was on their finance team. Young and entitled, Edward had attended all the right schools, knew important people. His grandfather was a lord. He was perfectly competent at his job, but more than happy to coast on his connections rather than putting in real work wherever possible. He was also addicted to gossip.

“Edward,” Malcolm said, nodding and doing his best to signal to the man to leave them alone.

He turned back to Josie, trying to be as dismissive as he could.

But Edward wasn’t so quick to be dismissed. “Is this the famous Katrina I’ve heard so much about?” he asked in an accent so posh it sounded like he was putting it on. He looked at Josie, clearly confused that she wasn’t six feet tall and whippet-thin.

Before Malcolm could even try to explain, Josie spoke up. “No, I’m Josie. A friend from the States.” She smiled at the man, but it didn’t completely reach her eyes the way her smiles normally did.

Edward offered a hand. “Edward Willoughby. Make sure Malcolm shows you around London properly.” He raised an eyebrow, clearly having caught them kissing and no doubt wondering what Malcolm was playing at taking a date on the Tube instead of in a chauffeured car. “Aren’t you supposed to be on holiday somewhere exotic this week?” he asked Malcolm.

It was pretty obvious Malcolm hadn’t been in the office, and he had cleared his schedule to go on holiday, so it wasn’t an outrageous question. But he’d be speaking to Edward later about reading the room. Or the train carriage.

Malcolm shook his head. “I had some family matters to attend to this week and next,” he told Ed, even though it was none of his business. Malcolm had never warmed to the man. He reeked of everything that Malcolm found distasteful about the financial world over the years. A sense of self-importance. An arrogance that he and he alone knew everything and that anyone who disagreed with him was automatically wrong. And worst of all, that he was untouchable and didn’t have to abide by the same rules as mere mortals.

“Well, this is my stop,” Edward said when they reached Blackfriars. “Nice to meet you, Josie.”

Willoughby got off the train, and Josie looked at Malcolm. “I’m not wrong in thinking that your kissing me is going to be all over the office by tonight, am I?”

He wasn’t going to lie to her. “No. If I had known that someone might see us…”

But that in itself was a lie, the idea that he would have not kissed her. He leaned in close and whispered in her ear, “I don’t think I would have been able to keep from kissing you, even then.” He felt her give a slight shiver as his breath wafted over her earlobe. And he was glad when she didn’t pull away.

He wasn’t nearly as glad, however, when she said, “Well, I don’t know how much of a scandal it could possibly be, given that I’ll be gone in a little over ten days. Just another woman to pass in and out of your life, that’s all I’m claiming.”

That wasn’t what he wanted anyone to think. And even hearing her say aloud that she was leaving made his chest clench tightly. Previously, whenever he was with a woman, and they talked about the future, that was when his chest would clench, at the idea of being “stuck” with her for much longer. But it was the exact opposite with Josie.

He was the one who didn’t want to let go. She was the one who reminded him that he would have to do exactly that.

* * *

Josie tried really hard to take being spotted by Malcolm’s associate in her stride. What did it matter if someone from his world had seen them together? Sure, there was that obvious look of surprise when the man realized she wasn’t a supermodel. And she got the clear sense that he thought she was punching way above her weight. She was, so she couldn’t argue with that. But she’d assumed that Malcolm would be more upset about it. And at first, it seemed that he had been. Until he whispered in her ear that he would have kissed her all over again even knowing they would be spotted. She couldn’t quite add that up. Couldn’t quite make sense of the way it sometimes felt like this was more than a fling to him. That when he looked at her, when he touched her, when he kissed her, she meant something to him.

Something big, something special, something real. Something lasting.

In any case, she refused to let being spotted spoil her day. Her time here was so precious, and she already felt like she was counting down the minutes. It was so great that Malcolm had thought to bring her out to East London, an area she had heard so much about and had longed to explore.

After they got off the Tube, they stopped first for incredible falafel from a street vendor. They were so delicious and yet another wonderful thing about being in such a cosmopolitan city. She had heard London referred to as one of the ultimate melting pots, and she was witnessing it. People from all cultures and countries, all coming together to enjoy this incredible city.

And then, hand in hand, their appetites sated, they headed toward Old Spitalfields Market. There was yet more food at the street market, but also fantastic vendors who sold everything under the sun, from clothes to handmade purses to wooden carvings to exquisite tiles.

---