Page 6 of Love Is…?

She peered at the screen. Tilde Morgensen, editor, requested Jayde’s attendance at a meeting tomorrow at nine which would be conducted at a house in Lanbrook, the wealthiest, most discreet suburb in Melbourne. No mention of the profile subject. Or a house number for that matter.

“Okay. Weird.”

Jayde opened a new tab, typed in the street name and hunted about on the internet for any info on that particular Melbourne location. Google Maps was pointless, and it turned out that the street didn’t use house numbers anyway.

“Really?”

Clearly she’d lost the capacity to read, because when Jayde checked the email again, Tilde stated that someone called Isabelle would email the house location to her in the morning.

“And here we go.” Jayde grinned.

Chapter

Three

Tessa checked her phone again.

“Would help if there were house numbers,” she muttered, then huffed. Luckily, Tom Campbell had asked her to be on the look out for an enormous sandstone terrace house with ivy on the wall, and a gate with black metal panels, and a fenced-off driveway leading to, Tessa assumed, an underground garage.

It was very much like the street in Vancouver where the Parkers lived. Expensive.

Swivelling her gaze from one side of the road to the other, Tessa halted as suddenly a house matching the description appeared right in front of her.

A high wall, covered in ivy and probably hiding barbed wire, towered above her, which wasn’t difficult as everything towered above her. The house was beautiful and private and Tessa could hear the building saying, “Piss off, please.” There would be a please. People with manners lived in this house.

“Hi there. I didn’t know there were two of us this morning.”

Tessa squeaked, spun around, and took in the sight of a very attractive woman who was wearing aviator glasses and leaning against the wall.

The woman then removed those very sexy sunglasses and Tessa fell into a pair of brown eyes. The darkest of brown. Almost black. Arresting. And she was sticking with arresting because that’s what they were. She felt pinned.

“I…I don’t know,” Tessa stuttered.Two of us?Her shoulders sagged. Perhaps she wasn’t a sure thing for the position after all.

“Well, I hope we get inside before the rain,” the woman said. Her quick head-tilt-quirked-lips combo, added to the gorgeous hair that Tessa immediately wanted to run her fingers through, was rather flirty and made Tessa take a longer look. Probably not the time, or place, or occasion, to be having those types of looks, especially if this woman was her competition.

Tessa shoved her phone into the pocket of her jeans. “Yes. It’s forecast.”Yes. It’s forecast?That was the tiniest small talk she’d ever engaged in.

“You're here to see Isabelle as well?” The woman spoke as if her voice were a shrug that held back an intensity, like she needed answers to questions not yet asked, but would wait all day for them if she had to. One seemed to battle the other, which gave off the impression that the indifference was more a cloak than a cape. Then the woman’s words registered.Isabelle?Tessa was sure she was meeting someone called Tom.

“Um. Well, I guess I am now,” she said uncertainly. “I’m not sure. It seems a little disorganised for such an important position.”

The woman nodded. “You’re right about the importance. This job could direct my entire career.”

Tessa blinked. Nannying was important, for sure. Having responsibility for someone else’s children was based on one hundred percent trust, but she’d never heard of someone taking a position that woulddirecttheir nannying career. Talk about an extreme focus on life.

Suddenly the tiny green light above the little speaker blinked on.

“Good morning.” A man’s voice, the American accent obvious with the strong ‘r’, was crystal clear.

Tessa stepped forward. “Hi, I’m Tessa Connor and?—”

“Jayde Ferguson.” The woman, Jayde, winked, and Tessa inexplicably blushed, then quickly gathered herself because she refused to make blushing part of her resumé.

“I’m here to see Tom Campbell, but apparently?—”

The voice cut her off. “Yep, that’s me. Jayde? Isabelle’s here as well. Come on in.”

Tom restedhis ankle on his opposite knee and beamed, his eyes twinkling. Tessa had liked him as soon as he’d shaken her hand and invited her into the lounge room, his black spiky hair and eclectic clothing leading the way.

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