“Hi,” Josie said, wishing her stomach would calm down. She shouldn’t feel this nervous. It was Helen—she’d thrown her, that was all.
He leaned against the doorframe and ran one hand over the stubble on his jaw. “Hey,” he said easily, whatever had soured his mood yesterday clearly a thing of the past. “Ready?”
“I, err…” She brought a hand to her hair but dropped it, remembering not to mess it up after she’d spent so long taming it. “Yes, in a minute. I wasn’t sure…” She trailed off, but he got her meaning anyway.
“If I was coming? I wouldn’t abandon you like that,” he said, with a casual shrug. “Besides, it was my idea in the first place.”
“Right,” she said, for some reason hyperaware of the fact she was barefoot. “I’ll just grab my shoes, give me a sec.” He nodded and stepped inside so she could shut the door on the draft from the corridor. So what if he’d lied about where he worked? she thought. Maybe he’d been fired or something and didn’t want to admit it in front of Helen—she wasn’t exactly the type of person you immediately wanted to open up to. She put her laptop back, grabbed her heels and sat on her bed to slip them on, then checked the mirror one last time before picking up her bag and heading back out to meet him. She didn’t really know much about him, though, and here she was, letting him into her house. She bit her lip. No. She couldn’t let Helen get to her, even if she did mean well.
Max straightened up from where he’d been leaning against the door when she came back into the hallway. God, should she have told him to sit down or something? She offered him an overly bright smile in an effort to compensate, feeling incredibly self-conscious as her heels clicked on the floor, like she’d suddenly forgotten how to walk in them. And it was like he bloody knew that, the way his gaze dropped to her shoes, lingered on her legs.
His eyes sparked when she reached him. “I got you a present,” he said, producing a box from his pocket and holding it out to her. His brows pulled together slightly when she didn’t immediately take it.
Her stomach did a small somersault. “You didn’t have to do that!” She wasn’t sure where to look, now that he was looking right at her.
“Here,” he said, a little aggressively. He thrust it into her hands.
She opened it, feeling incredibly self-conscious and trying to arrange her face into a suitable expression. When she saw what was inside, she stared mutely for a moment, then picked one up to examine it. The earrings. The big, dangly star earrings she’d pointed out at Fortnum’s. She shook her head—she remembered the price tag on these. “I can’t…I mean, these are amazing, but I can’t accept this, it’s too much.”
He shrugged, and that little frown returned. “Well, either you have them or I’ll have to get my ears pierced—there’s a no-return policy on earrings.” She bit her lip. He sighed. “If you won’t take a Christmas present, then consider it a thank you.” She met his gaze, and it was almost like he was staring her out, daring her to refuse. But when he spoke, his voice was soft. “If it weren’t for you, I would have just been sat around moping these last few days.”
She hesitated, but, at his encouraging nod, took the earrings out of the box and replaced her studs with them. She touched one of them. “Thank you,” she said. “They’re beautiful.”
He reached out and traced a finger along her earlobe, down the sparkling earring. “They might not shine as brightly as you, but at least they’re pretty.” For a moment, he held her gaze, and even though his touch was light, Josie found herself flushing. She looked down quickly, but when he held the door open for her, she touched the place on her ear where his fingers had been, her skin still tingling.
It was just a short train ride from Josie’s flat to Battersea, where the party was, so they arrived at the venue promptly at six p.m., right on time. It was being held at Battersea Arts Center, a grand, impressive building from the outside, with mini turrets out of the roof giving the impression of a small castle. There were two Christmas trees on either side of the pillared entrance, decorated simply in silver and gold, and there were fairy lights just below the archway. Josie smiled at Max as he opened the door for her, trying to control the squirming in her stomach that had only gotten worse on the journey over here.
A man, dressed smartly in a black suit, smiled at them as they arrived. “The Peacock’s party?” Josie nodded. “Please check your coats just here, then you’re in the Grand Hall.” The man indicated where he meant.