Legally Addicted - By Lena Dowling Page 0,42
direction of the waiter as he continued, ‘See — sometimes having money isn’t such a bad thing after all. Not when it helps someone like you.’
Helping someone like you.
Georgia toyed with the idea of bringing up the addiction centre proposal. Brad had been positive about supporting it at the shelter, but support was one thing; three million dollars was something else. Things were going well, but it was so new between them. They were still getting to know each other. Even positively affected by the wine, Georgia managed to summon enough clarity of thought to realise that it would be better to wait until their relationship had a firmer foundation before asking Brad for the money.
They gave their orders and when dinner arrived, it was amazing, living up to the promise provided by the sleek and shiny surroundings of the restaurant. Conversation over their meal came easily as she found they had plenty to talk about, trading legal war stories of cases won and lost, and settlements nailed down against the odds. Despite the huge differential in the quantum of the settlements, she and Brad found plenty of common ground in the legal issues and emotional responses of the clients.
‘What now?’ Brad said when, at the end of the evening, the waiter returned to their table, delivering the bill in a leather folder.
‘We split the bill,’ Georgia said, reaching for the folder.
He didn’t try to stop her.
A thousand dollars?
Georgia looked at the three zeros before looking again. She wondered if the wine was causing her to see double.
No, the figure hadn’t changed, it was still a thousand dollars.
What the hell had they been drinking? There were times, like at the beach house, when she had paused to wonder if maybe Brad’s wealth didn’t matter so much, but then something like this happened and it hit her just how wide the gulf was between them. When she thought how far a thousand dollars would go providing meals at the shelter, there was no forgetting that Brad still came from that same sector of society that she had grown up despising. If it wasn’t for the addiction centre proposal, all freshly typed by Miriam, now sitting in her handbag, waiting for the right moment to make her pitch to Brad, she wasn’t sure if she could put all of that aside to be getting into this relationship business.
Relationship.
She shivered just thinking about the word.
She composed herself, hoping that her shock hadn’t showed, before slipping her credit card into the folder and sliding it back across the table to him.
‘Have it your way,’ he said, placing his own platinum card inside the folder. ‘What do you say, Ms Murray, shall we go for a walk around the quay?’
Despite her misgivings about where this thing between them was headed, the suggestive twinkle in Brad’s eye still had the power to undo her.
If they walked the promenade around Circular Quay, they would end up at the door of Spencer Towers.
He was trying to make this easy.
Far too easy.
Chapter Ten
Brad woke up with the sun, which was streaming through a chink in the blockout blinds. He had turned off the alarm so as not to wake Georgia. This was the second time he had woken up with the bewitching Ms Murray still beside him, and he loved watching her sleep.
When she was awake, even now, after she had shared something of her past with him, there was still the residue of a protective guard around her, but asleep he got to see the real Georgia, her lightly freckle dusted face completely at ease, the tiny creases in her forehead ironed smooth, her sweet rabbit-like nose twitching occasionally. As she shifted position, hits of the distinctive fruity-floral scent she wore wafted up from the bedclothes. For the first time in his life, despite all his wealth and privilege, he felt like a lucky man.
But after their first couple of encounters he wasn’t taking anything for granted. Georgia, he had realised, was always ready to run. He had seen it in her eyes on the street outside the homeless shelter, and even in the complete safety of Café Macquarie, when the maître d’ surprised her, chasing her for her coat. She had backed away from him, taking in her surrounds like a cornered animal, as if she was weighing up whether to stay or turn tail and leg it out of there.
Given her background, it made sense, but he hoped that with time he could make her see