Page 10 of Untether

Silence.

I glance around the table. Mara’s rolling her eyes at me—she’s already told me, in ananimatedvoice message, that she thinks I’m being pathetic.

Lizzy’s processing, and I can see conflict written all over Cate’s face: sympathy warring with the knowledge of how hard she pushed on my behalf to get this off the ground. While I approached Alchemy myself, and Gen was the one who suggested Callum, it’ll be a real pain in the ass if things don’t work well between me and the guy who’s supposed to be my sexy mentor, for want of a less horrifying term.

‘How’d you leave it?’ Cate enquires calmly. She has one of those fabulously authoritative voices that don’t need to be raised to get attention.

I sigh. ‘Callum kind of saved me, I guess. He suggested that a daytime meeting with someone I’d just met wasn’t the best format for me to feel comfortable sharing my sexual desires, so he’s taking me out—tonight. He said we needed a date and some liquor so we could get to know each other better.’

Relief floods Cate’s patrician features. ‘Excellent. That sounds very sensible. I don’t disagree with him—it was always going to be excruciating.’

‘But first impressions are that you’re attracted to him?’ Lizzy asks, pointing at the wall. We all turn to gaze appreciatively at Callum.

I swallow. ‘Yeah. Of course. I mean, that’s part of the problem. I think it all hit me yesterday, you know?Oh, hey, insanely hot young guy. Nice to meet you. Can’t wait to fuck you. And sure, let’s sit here and talk about all the ways I want that to happen. Fun!’

‘The feeling is mutual,’ Mara points out. ‘Gen told you how up for it he was when she pitched it to him.’

Oh God, it feels like I’m back at high school and myfriends are whispering to a guy’s friends that I like him, and then it comes back along the grapevine that he might like me too, but it’s never a hundred percent trustworthy.

Kill me now.

‘Jesus, I don’t know,’ I protest. Sure, he seemed very interested in my legs, but this is all feeling far too real for me right now.

‘In case this focuses the mind…’ Mara says. She pulls her feet off the table and stands with a pained sigh, like she really resents that I’ve put her in this position. From her gorgeous, buttery Loewe backpack, she pulls an envelope that looks like it’s from a printing shop and stalks over to the cork-board. I crane my neck, but I can’t see what she’s pinning there.

She turns with another sigh and steps aside, rapping her knuckles against the board. ‘Fromthattothis.That is what we’re dealing with, love. And don’t you fucking forget it.

Thatis a paparazzi photo of my ex-husband that I recognise from the media onslaught on our family after his women kissed and told. He was sleeping on the couch in the basement at the time. In the shot he looks exhausted, haggard, and over one hundred years old. It’s an unfairly unflattering photo of a still-arresting man.

Mara’s pinned him right next to Callum who, by contrast, is glowing and dripping sex appeal and looks positively lickable.

It’s official.

The woman is the devil.

But she’smydevil.

I giggle despite myself. ‘Wow, that’s harsh. Remind me never to piss you off.’

‘You won’t piss me off because you’reyou.This guy’—she jabs her fingertip at John’s face—‘betrayed your trust andfucked over the mother of his children. The very hot, very amazing mother of his children. And this guy’—she strokes Callum’s square, bearded jaw—‘wants to fuck you. That is literally the issue here. Nothing else.

‘So you, my friend, are going to get your head back in the fucking game, and you’re going to let Sex Master McHottie take you out tonight, and you are going to pull that stick out of your vagina and think about all the lovely things he could put up there instead.

Are you with me?’

7

CAL

I’m a little ashamed of just how big an ego boost it is to watch Aida Russell walk into a club and know she’s here to seeme. Ashamed partly because it’s a pretty adolescent reaction to being the target of a hot woman’s attention, and partly because this entirething—however nebulous, however tantalising in its very nebulousness—is about her, not me.

Heads turn as she approaches, because her face is part of the very fabric of British culture. Or maybe they turn because she’s a fucking knockout in a little black dress that shows off her spectacular tan. Her lean, toned limbs. She’s wearing sky-high, bondage-style heels I bet Maddy would kill for, and her mouth is painted its customary scarlet.

I watch her visibly relax as she locates me.Relaxis probably the wrong word. There’s a palpable flash of relief followed by a pressing together of her lips like she’s bracing for what lies ahead.

Smart girl.

She may be a seasoned reporter and interviewer, used toa camera trained on her face, but one of the most charming facets of this undeniably charismatic woman is that she’s never been one to hold back her reactions under a mask of implacability.

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