First Love, Last Love by Carole Mortimer Read Free Book Online Page A

‘He doesn’t need your pity,’ she told Carly tightly. And she didn’t mean Daryl! ‘He’s just too fond of having his own way.’
    ‘Aren’t we all?’ Carly smiled.
    ‘Perhaps.’ But Alexander Blair had met his match in her, Lauri Prescott, she would make sure of that.

CHAPTER THREE
    S HE felt very conspicuous standing outside the restaurant at one o’clock, aware that she had received a few curious looks from people entering this fashionable eating house. It was ten past one already; if Alexander Blair didn’t turn up soon she was leaving.
    As it was she had had another row with Daryl, this time about her not meeting him for lunch. She had told him she and Jane were going shopping, but he had wanted to know why she couldn’t meet her aunt at five o’clock and do their shopping then. Lauri had made the excuse that Jane might have to work late, hating having to lie to him, but at least he seemed to accept that explanation. Anyway, it could be the truth, Jane could be working late.
    She looked down at her wrist-watch. Another five minutes, that was all she would give him, and then she was off. If he thought she was going to stand about here waiting for him then he was sadly—
    ‘Are you going to get in?’ drawled that infuriatingly familiar voice. ‘Or do you want me to get booked for illegal parking?’
    Lauri looked over at the source of that voice. A low sleek black car, a Ferrari, she thought, was parked next to the pavement. And Alexander Blair was seated behind the wheel. She had seen the car draw up, but as she was looking for a brown and gold Rolls-Royce the arrival of this car had meant nothing to her, except to register what a fantastic car it was.
    ‘I didn’t realise it was you,’ she told him resentfully, moving to stand by the open window on the passenger side.
    He gave her an impatient look. ‘Are you even going to argue about getting into the car?’ he sighed.
    ‘No, of course not!’ She wrenched open the door and scrambled inside, at once sinking into the luxury—and intimacy—of the interior. Alexander Blair was much too close in the confines of such a car, making her aware of the tangy aftershave he wore and the much more basic male smell of him. ‘I was looking for the Rolls,’ she added stubbornly.
    The car moved off smoothly under his expert handling, entering the flow of traffic leaving town. ‘The Rolls is badly dented, as you know.’
    ‘Yes,’ the word came out as a hiss. ‘But I wasn’t to know you wouldn’t still be driving it.’
    ‘It’s in the garage being straightened out.’
    He hadn’t even looked at her since she had got in the car and she found herself glaring at him resentfully. ‘Rather quick, isn’t it?’ she snapped.
    His mouth twisted tauntingly. ‘Some things can be arranged that way.’
    ‘If you have the money!’
    His dark eyebrows rose. ‘Yes. I wouldn’t have thought you the sort of girl to show prejudice because I happen to be rich.’
    Lauri blushed at his rebuke, wondering just what sort of girl he
had
thought her to be, although she doubted he had actually given the matter a moments thought. ‘I’m not,’ she agreed quietly. She grinned suddenly, her eyes sparkling mischievously. ‘Do I seem as if I’ve shown you any preferential treatment?’
    A smile touched his mouth, a firm controlled mouth that didn’t look as if it did much smiling. ‘None at all,’ he acknowledged.
    ‘This is a lovely car, isn’t it?’ She forgot her hostility in that brief moment of shared humour. ‘Did the garage lend it to you while yours is being mended?’She remembered the old grey wreck Steve’s garage had lent him when Gertie had gone in for servicing last week. Gertie might be old, but even she was more reliable than that had been.
    ‘Dare I admit that I own this car too?’ Alexander Blair mused, giving her a fleeting glance before turning his attention back to the road.
    Her eyes widened. ‘You do? Oh, I much prefer this to a