To the Moon and Back by Jill Mansell

Author:Jill Mansell
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Sourcebooks, Inc.
Published: 2011-09-24T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 30

‘Jamie? Are you there?’ She didn’t say it out loud, just in her head. But he heard her anyway.

‘I’m always here.’ He appeared in the living room, grinning and barefoot. ‘I’m like Lurch in The Addams Family. You rang?’

‘You’re better looking than Lurch.’ Ellie waited. ‘Which is your cue to tell me I’m looking pretty good too.’

‘You already know that. That’s my favorite dress.’

They’d spotted it three years ago in the window of a little shop in Totnes. Simply styled in slippery, matte silk, it was peacock blue with swirls of emerald green and gold handprinted around the neckline and hem. It was a beautiful dress and she’d worn it when they’d gone out to dinner on his last birthday.

‘The main reason it’s your favorite is because you discovered you could undo the zip with one hand.’

Jamie said good-naturedly, ‘Just as well I’m staying home tonight. Wouldn’t want your dress coming undone while you’re out at your fancy do with your boss.’

Ellie pumped her tube of lip gloss. ‘I hate to break it to you but you aren’t really here. Your zip-unfastening days are over.’

‘I know.’ He watched her apply a layer of gloss to her lips. ‘Is that the one that tastes of apricots?’

‘Yes.’ Ellie’s throat tightened; he used to kiss it off her, deliberately getting it all over his own mouth.

‘Don’t cry. You’ll wreck your makeup.’

Easier said than done. She threw the lip gloss into her evening bag and said, ‘I’m going now.’

‘Have fun.’ Jamie’s expression softened. ‘I mean it. I want you to enjoy yourself.’

A glitzy dinner at Claridge’s in Mayfair. What wouldn’t she give for her and Jamie to be able to spend the evening there together? OK, stop this, don’t think about it now. ‘I will. Bye.’

***

Zack wasn’t Jamie but he created quite an impression. As the taxi pulled away down Brook Street, Ellie glimpsed their reflection in the window of Vidal Sassoon opposite Claridge’s. She was looking like a better than usual version of herself and Zack, in his dark suit, was quite literally turning heads. One girl, too busy ogling him to look where she was going, slipped off the curb and almost toppled into the gutter.

Zack, not realizing why she’d stumbled, rested a protective hand in the small of Ellie’s back and said, ‘Careful, these pavements aren’t great.’ He steered her across the street towards the hotel and she caught sight of them both in another window.

Yee-ha, look at us, heading towards the entrance to Claridge’s like a proper glamorous couple in a Chanel ad, if girls in Chanel ads have ever worn emerald-green shoes from Topshop and jeweled hair combs from Primark. Well, you never know, they might.

They reached the other side of the road. Ellie paused to gaze up at the row of flags hanging outside the hotel entrance. Heads of state stayed here. Royals stayed here. Think how many famous people had passed through those revolving doors and—

‘Oh, hello! It’s Ellie, isn’t it? How funny, I was just

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