Killer Heels by Rebecca Chance

Author:Rebecca Chance [Chance, Rebecca]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2013-12-19T05:00:00+00:00

Coco

C oco was wearing the Max Mara sequin dress for her date that evening. It hung a little looser on her now – she had barely eaten anything for the last few days, ever since accepting the dinner invitation – but still looked wonderful. Besides, when you wore a sequin dress, you didn’t need accessories, which meant one less thing to worry about.

She had had it dry-cleaned, of course, since that night at Xavier’s the week before; woken up at the crack of dawn, sneaked out, leaving him sleeping, and retrieved her dress, knickers and shoes from his kitchen floor, borrowing a sweater of his to throw over the dress for decency. It was still, quite obviously, the walk of shame, but one of the best things about living in New York was that there was almost always a cab instantly available, and she’d been able to nip home before going into work and change into more appropriate work clothes.

The worst part had been giving Xavier his sweater back. She had seriously considered being cowardly enough to put it in a bag and leave it for him on the Men’s Style reception desk; if she didn’t include a note, that would be a clear hint that she considered the night before to have been a one-off.

But I’d be livid if a guy did that to me, she’d thought, ashamed of herself. I can’t be that much of a bitch.

She had been debating what to do all day; should she ring him, arrange to go out for a drink, to at least have the decency to let him know face to face that she didn’t want to date him? Of course, she thought hopefully, he might not be interested in dating me either. Lots of guys seem all keen until they’ve got what they wanted.

But she’d sensed that Xavier was more serious than that, and she’d been right. That afternoon, he’d come up to the Style offices, beaming with excitement, trying to act cool in front of Coco and the other junior fashion editors, nonchalantly leaning against her new desk. Coco’s heart had sunk at the sight of him.

‘I just wandered by to officially congratulate you on your promotion,’ he’d said casually, for the benefit of the girls around her, but his dark eyes, lit up and shining, gave her a very different message. ‘See where you’re hanging out now.’

‘O-oh!’ she’d stammered. ‘Thanks . . .’

And her tone of voice had been all Xavier had needed to understand that things weren’t going to go as he had hoped. Anyone used to swimming in the shark-infested waters of the New York dating scene had developed finely tuned antennae that could pick up the merest whisper, the faintest hint that interest was fading and that they should protect themselves by feigning indifference. All of the light had drained from his eyes, leaving them flat and dull as black stones, and he’d pushed back off the desk, standing straight up.

It had been horribly hard to watch.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.