His Irresistible Darling - Sarah Randall Page 0,24

been caught ogling. Again. “Come on, I think it’s time I took you home,” he told her, holding out his hand.

“What?” she shrieked at him and he automatically dropped his hand. “Are you kidding? It’s my birthday, well my party anyway and I’m not ready to go home, not for a long time.” He knew it wasn’t her birthday for a few days yet. She surprised him by taking hold of his hand and gently urging him forward. “Come and dance with me and then you can keep a proper eye on me like I know my brother told you to.”

Jumal was pleased that she was making her own assumptions about his turning up at her birthday party. For once, it worked in his favour.

“I don’t dance,” he said sharply, shaking his head.

She dropped her hand from his and strangely he missed the comforting contact. He wasn’t a “hand-holding” kind of person, even with his family or Faridah. “You’re kidding?” She put her hands on her hips and tilted her head to the side. God she was beautifully annoying.

“As you have told me on numerous occasions, I don’t have a sense of humour when it comes to you,” he replied, straight-faced.

“Fine, you can just stand like a sulking Muppet and I’ll dance around you like a bloody maypole.” And she was off again, twirling around him whilst holding his shoulders as he kept his focus straight ahead, fighting the need and desire to track her every movement.

“A what?” he asked, when she finally came to a stop.

“Oh never mind.” She sulked again with her hands on her hips. Was she aware that the action caused her perfectly sized breasts to jut out even further? “It’s just as I thought,” she ranted at him.

“What is?” he asked, impatiently. The girl spoke in riddles.

“You’re too old to have fun. You act like an old fart. I can’t believe that I—” she waved her arms dismissively at him “—never mind. Your loss.” And with that she was off, leaving him standing there in the wake of Hurricane Halle, his mouth hanging open like a fish—or to use her earlier phrase, a Muppet.

He tracked her movements again as she laughed and joked with her friends at their table and finished off a long dark drink before she made her way back to the dance floor.

“She didn’t manage to get you dancing then?” Malik enquired as he handed him another beer and took up position at his side.

“Not a chance,” he replied, taking a long swig. He surveyed Malik and shook his head. “So what the hell have you come as and why didn’t you tell me it was fancy dress?”

“Me? Well I’m the American President.”

Jumal looked him up and down and gave him a puzzled look. “Which one?” he asked.

“Any. See, I’m wearing the little stars-and-stripes pin on my suit jacket.” He turned to show him the pin.

Jumal couldn’t help but chuckle. “That has got to be the worst fancy dress I have ever seen,” he teased, smiling.

“Hey, I have a slave driver for a boss and I was at work till late on a deal that’s going to get him in next year’s Forbes richest list. This was the best I could come up with. I thought it was inspired when I saw the pin in my desk drawer. Melina brought it back from her trip to New York last year. And I did try to tell you it was fancy dress but you hung up on me cursing, so—”

Their heads turned in unison towards the shrieks of delight coming from the dance floor as someone appeared to be trying their hand at breakdancing. Jumal had never understood the appeal of spinning on one’s head but then again, as Miss Darling had so eloquently put it, he was an old fart…and right now, yeah, he felt like one.

Chapter Four

Jumal glimpsed occasional flashes of orange on the dance floor but despite being a couple of inches over six foot he couldn’t quite see over all the bobbing heads and writhing and gyrating bodies. Where the hell has she gone? he thought, as he was forced to stand on tiptoe—a fact that grated on him no end.

“Who the hell is that guy?” he growled at Malik, having finally spotted her.

“Which guy?” Malik asked, trying to see through the human medley.

“Which guy?” Jumal repeated incredulously. “That one,” he shouted, pointing, “with his hands all over Pippa.”

“Ah right, that guy. Yeah well he’s the reason I called.