The rain also melted the tears that were streaming down her cheeks. Crying because she had to let go of those childish dreams of the father who never was, and the father that there could have been, but mostly because Ellie knew that every man she ever loved would always be a little bit less than the man she’d walked away from this afternoon.
She’d done the right thing, so why did it feel like the end of everything that was good?
Her grief was interrupted by the shrieks of two girls as they ran across the square, ducking this way and that as if they could dodge the drops. Ellie wiped a wet hand across her wet face, her make-up all but a faint memory by now, sniffed and was just about to worry about what prolonged exposure to rainwater would do to her straightening treatment when she saw a figure walking slowly through the sheets of driving rain.
She squinted as the figure came towards her. He was shielded by a behemoth of an umbrella so his suit was absolutely bone dry, as was the garment bag draped over one arm.
He stopped when he was within five metres of Ellie and said something that was lost in the dirge of the deluge.
‘What are you doing here?’ Ellie yelled, closing the gap between them so he could hear her. ‘How did you know where I was?’
‘Ari told me,’ David said. He stared at her in disbelief. ‘You’re absolutely soaked.’
Ellie shook dripping rats’ tails of hair out of her face. ‘Never mind that. Why would Ari tell you where I was?’
‘Because when I told her I was in love with you, she took it better than you did.’
Ari’s track record when it came to affairs of the heart was pitiful, so Ellie wasn’t going to let her mother’s opinion sway her.
‘Nothing’s changed,’ she said. David was so close that she was now standing under his huge record-company-logoed umbrella and it was hard to keep her body from straining towards him. Not just from want, but because it seemed a shame to let him get damp when he‘d managed to stay dry so far. ‘But thanks for bringing my garment bag over.’
‘Everything’s changed. I’ve changed,’ David said, but they were just empty words from an empty man.
‘Nothing has changed.’ Ellie shook her head again and he shuddered as he got hit with a smattering of spray. ‘There’s nothing you can say or do that’s going to change who we are or the reasons why we are never, ever going to work.’
David handed Ellie her garment bag by way of reply and she couldn’t help but feel a twinge of regret. Actually, it was less a twinge and more like a sucking chest wound. He could at least try to plead the case for the defence, but he was more interested in suddenly placing the upturned umbrella down on the ground where it would fill up with rainwater and be no use to man or beast.
Like her, David was soaked through in a second. His expensive suit clinging to his lanky frame, hair flat to his skull and she could see the rain trickling down his cheekbones and dripping off the end of his nose.
‘Have you gone completely mad?’
‘I’m in, Ellie! I’m all in,’ he shouted, and he took hold of her wrists and gave her a gentle shake. ‘You’ve got me, all of me, 24/7, if you’ll have me.’
Her heart sped up for five frantic beats but, for once, her head was made of much stronger stuff. ‘I won’t have you. Yes, it’s wonderful when it’s just the two of us but it’s never going to be just the two of us, is it?’
She tried to pull away from his hands, but he held her tight. It was so hard to tell what he was thinking when there was a wall between them. Not even a metaphorical wall, but a wall of water.
‘I’ve quit my job,’ David said. ‘I’ve cleared out my desk.’
She couldn’t have heard him properly. She shook her head again. ‘You did what? You didn’t. You wouldn’t. You said—’
‘But I did. I resigned, effective immediately.’ He looked a little smug at her expression of stunned disbelief. ‘I have absolutely no prospects now. I’m a lame duck. You have to take me under your wing.’
Ellie had to do no such thing, but she was going to kill her mother the first chance she got. ‘You know you’ll easily find a new job with some other firm of corporate soul-suckers.’ David opened his mouth to protest, Ellie was sure of it, so she placed a finger against his lips. ‘Though you could use your legal skills for the greater good or set up on your own to help people not get tied into punitive—’
She clapped her hands over her mouth, because she was doing it again, without even thinking about it: trying to fix someone.
‘If I do have some prospects, then surely that’s a good thing and if I don’t have prospects, then I’m a lame duck, and Ari did say that lame ducks were your type,’ he said with a winsome smile that didn’t suit him and was ruined by the fact that the rain was washing it off his face.
‘I can’t believe that you’d do that, quit your job, for me. Your career means everything to you,’ she reminded him, in case he’d had a swift blow to the head and forgotten what his priorities were.
‘There are very few things that mean more to me than making senior partner,’ David said and this time his smile was a little unsteady to match the tone of his voice, like he was heading into unchartered territory. ‘But you’re one of them. You’re top of the list.’
‘Look, I’m halfway to falling in love with you too but I’m not sure that you can change, however much you might want to,’ Ellie argued. ‘You could still end up breaking my heart and I don’t want to be like my mother. I don’t want to waste the rest of my life refusing to let myself love anyone else.’
‘Ellie, stop it,’ David said. Ellie squinted through the rain at him, then looked down at the hand he placed over her heart. ‘I promise I won’t break this.’
‘You can’t make that kind of promise …’
‘I can,’ he said simply. ‘I can guarantee I’ll piss you off and I’ll make you so angry that you’ll get that funny little vein pop up on your forehead, and yes, there are times that I’ll be a sanctimonious fucker, but I won’t break your heart.’
He talked a really good game and it would be so easy to just give in but … ‘You can’t decide to change and then be changed. It doesn’t work like that.’
‘For crying out loud, Ellie!’ She wondered if he was using the stern voice because he suspected that it turned her on. ‘I’ve walked away from my job, which means I’ve walked away from Billy Kay. He was coming between us. Now he’s not. So, tell me, are there any other obstacles I should know about that are stopping us from being together?’
‘No! Of course I want us to be together but—’
‘Or is it the thought of learning to cook at least one signature dish?’
Somehow he was making her laugh. ‘Well, if you’re between jobs at the moment maybe you could use the downtime to master the art of shortcrust pastry.’
‘Is that a yes?’
‘Well, it’s not a no.’ It couldn’t be this easy. Nothing was this easy.
‘Look, Ellie, I’ve quit my job for you and I’m standing in a puddle and my handmade leather shoes are ruined, and you were wet so I threw away my umbrella so I’d be wet too even though I hate getting wet. Now, will you please agree to my terms so we can go inside where it’s less wet?’
Ellie was currently encased in a prison of soaked and chafing cotton, but that wasn’t going to influence her decision-making. ‘Well, I’ll need to see the small print because you’re a devious lawyer but yes. Let’s go inside now.’
‘Yes to going inside or yes to being with me?’ Ellie had already started to move towards the nearest doorway but David blocked her path. ‘I’m afraid I’m going to have to insist on at least a verbal commitment.’
‘This is why nobody likes lawyers,’ Ellie told him, and she didn’t know what the future would hold, only that she couldn’t bear the thought of a future without him. ‘Why don’t we just shake on it?’
‘I’ve got a much better idea,’ David said.
And then he kissed her.
About the Autho
r
Sarra Manning is an author and journalist. She started her writing career on Melody Maker, then spent five years on legendary UK teen mag J17, first as a writer then as entertainment editor. Subsequently she edited teen fashion bible Ellegirl UK and the BBC’s What To Wear magazine.
Sarra has written for ELLE, Grazia, Red, InStyle, the Guardian, the Mail On Sunday’s You magazine, Harper’s Bazaar, Stylist, Time Out and the Sunday Telegraph’s Stella. Her bestselling young adult novels, which include Guitar Girl, Let’s Get Lost, the Diary Of A Crush trilogy, Nobody’s Girl and Adorables, have been translated into numerous languages.
She has also written three grown-up novels: Unsticky, You Don’t Have To Say You Love Me and Nine Uses for an Ex-Boyfriend.
Sarra lives in North London.
For more information on Sarra Manning and her books, see her website at www.sarramanning.co.uk
Also by Sarra Manning
YOU DON’T HAVE TO SAY YOU LOVE ME
NINE USES FOR AN EX-BOYFRIEND
UNSTICKY
and published by Corgi
TRANSWORLD PUBLISHERS
61–63 Uxbridge Road, London W5 5SA
A Random House Group Company
www.transworldbooks.co.uk
IT FELT LIKE A KISS
A CORGI BOOK: 9780552163279
Version 1.0 Epub ISBN: 9781448126095
First published in Great Britain
in 2014 by Corgi Books,
an imprint of Transworld Publishers
Copyright © Sarra Manning 2014
Sarra Manning has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.
This book is a work of fiction and, except in the case of historical fact, any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorized distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
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Sarra Manning, It Felt Like a Kiss
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