Legally Addicted - By Lena Dowling Page 0,41

been years since Georgia had been subjected to that particular humiliating moniker. She didn’t remember Paris, but then she might have been among the younger students Georgia didn’t know so well. She had never let the other girls see how much it got to her, but now, inexplicably, she felt her bottom lip tremble.

Suddenly, Georgia was thirteen again, forced to wear a uniform that was second- or third-hand, donated by the ‘friends of the school’ — do-gooder society matrons who had nothing better to do than collect up hand-me-downs to torture her with. Like her PE uniform, with baggy pilled shorts two sizes too big and a polo shirt that was supposed to be white but which had turned a charming shade of puce, providing inspiration for the detested nickname.

‘Well, Grubby, I have to thank you, both of you.’

The woman pivoted around to refocus on Brad. She was about to say something more, but he put up his hand to stop her.

‘I’m sorry to break up your little reunion, Paris, but Georgia and I are off-duty now, so if you don’t mind excusing us.’

‘Sure, okay. I won’t interrupt you further, but thanks anyway,’ Paris said, taking the hint and slipping back to her own table.

Georgia grabbed a menu, still fuming as her mind finally decided to jump into gear and generate a slew of witty, cutting comebacks she could have used on Paris, if she had only thought of them earlier. Instead, she had let that woman push her back through time into a stinking school changing shed.

Brad stole a glance at Georgia as she scanned her menu. Her blue eyes had clouded over with anger and he didn’t blame her; but God she was breathtaking when she was angry.

Breathtaking and ballsy.

Not many women could wear jeans as an item of evening wear and get away with it, but with her low cut silk tunic showing as much as could be considered decent of her perfect breasts, and her tight jeans and boots accentuating her willowy frame, she cut the best figure of any woman in the restaurant, and that included Paris Walsh.

Paris, the daughter of Ruby, the mistress who Douglas had since lived to regret making his second wife, obviously rated herself, but her’s was a surgeon sculpted, make-up enhanced, bleached blonde sort of beauty. In a cheaper dress she would have looked just as at home on stage gyrating against a pole. Georgia’s was a natural understated beauty, made all the more alluring by the fact that she didn’t seem to appreciate how damned attractive she was.

But why hadn’t he noticed just how bitchy some women could be before? Miriam had been spot on with her advice. Georgia could do with a Sir Galahad. She had achieved so much on her own that she deserved some support. Instead she had women like Caro, and now Paris Walsh, constantly having a go.

‘Another?’ Brad asked, poised to pour the pinot he was holding over her glass.

Had she really drunk the first glass that fast? The wine tasted of raspberries and something deliciously cool and herbaceous. After the run-in with Paris she needed something to take the edge off.

‘Mmmm, yes please.’

‘So, you were about to tell me how, against the odds, you made it as a successful lawyer?’ Brad said, refilling her glass and demonstrating his attentiveness by returning their conversation to where they had left off.

‘Having someone take an interest made the difference. I was lucky to have people who intervened.’

Brad’s eyes sharpened and he nodded thoughtfully and deliberately, as if something she had said resonated with him.

‘I was going to ask you about that? Who helped you out?’

‘A couple of teachers; one at primary school and then another one at secondary school, who coached me for scholarships in their own time. I got the Morton Scholarship to Rose Bay Girls’ Grammar and then the Ellen Maree Award to the University of New South Wales.’

‘You got an Ellen Maree? My father made that endowment. Ellen and Maree are my mother’s middle names: Evelyn Ellen Maree Spencer — one of his many grand gestures after mother found him out. After a while, flowers and jewellery weren’t enough for the job.’

‘I don’t know what to say.’

Georgia felt awkward, like she should thank him or something, but in the circumstances of how the award came to be, it seemed a bit off.

‘You don’t have to say anything. It’s just great to see Dad’s legacy making a difference.’ Brad raised his hand in the