Now, it wasn’t to be. He’d agonised over how to introduce the subject of her engagement and felt it was better to rip off the plaster in one swift, painful movement.
‘How did your party go?’
‘Good. Great, actually.’ Jenna chewed her lip, the way she had when he’d first ‘met’ her at their initial Teams meeting. He’d thought it was nervousness then, and it had endeared her to him even more. He hadn’t seen it since – until today.‘Um. I think I owe you an apology. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about Nathan.’
His stomach knotted. Had she picked up on the fact he’d been trying to arrange a date with her? A date that would have involved him travelling almost nine hundred miles? Or had she still assumed he was only suggesting a friendly drink with her and her colleagues when he was in the area?
He laughed softly, hiding all his feelings of trepidation. ‘No need to apologise. Your private life is private.’
She was tapping her feet on the floor. He couldn’t see her feet – he wasn’t sure he ever had, except in a group photo on the Land’s End website – but he could hear the tapping, attuned as he was to every nuance of their online chats. He knew the calendar of Cornish scenes behind her, the ceramic pug on the desk – even though she didn’t have a dog – and the coffee mug with her photograph on it. Had that come from her fiancé?
He’d known everything that happened in that small frame of her laptop screen and thought he’d known everything about her.
‘Well, I ought to have at least mentioned him before everyone burst into the office, but I didn’t want to bore you with my love life.’
‘You could never bore me,’ Cam said, forcing a smile, and Jenna’s shoulders slumped with relief. ‘Congratulations – again. So, tell me about the party.’
‘Oh – it was wild.’ She laughed. ‘Well, as wild as anything can be down here. All my friends and family came and we didn’t leave the pub until after two. We all had very sore heads the next morning. Good job it was a Saturday.’
‘I can imagine.’
‘I can email some photos if you’d like? As you were in at the start?’
‘I’d love that.’ Cam’s stomach was a tight ball, yet he could feel his mouth stretched in that insane grin. ‘Have you known each other long?’
‘Like forever. Well, notquite, but Nate’s been kind of in and out of my life for decades, really. He was at the same school – but five years above, so obviously we never spoke.’
‘Obviously.’
‘Anyway, I went to uni, he went away – worked in Brighton – then he came back down here and started his business.’
‘He’s a businessman?’ Cam pictured a suit and a Lexus, a mobile phone surgically attached to Nathan’s ear.
‘A property developer. Well, a glorified builder, to be honest, but he’s done pretty well round here. Good builders are always in demand. Anyway, he came back to Cornwall and we got together and ... here we are.’ She hesitated and said shyly, ‘Planning to spend forever together. It seems an awful long time.’
‘Not if you love each other.’
‘No. Exactly.’ She perked up. ‘How’s your weekend shaping up? Are you babysitting Lachlan again?’
It didn’t sound very exciting, put like that, even if it was true that Cam did share a lot of the childcare duties with his sister or she couldn’t have held down her job as a civilian support officer for the police.
‘I’m looking after Lachlan tonight, but tomorrow I’ll probably go to the pub. There’s a ceilidh band.’
‘Sounds fun. At the Tap Room? That involves a folk band and dancing, doesn’t it?’
Jenna seemed relieved that Cam had a life. Did she suspect his feelings for her? He suppressed a shiver. He hoped not. Now he knew about Nathan, he would find it excruciating if she did.
‘Yes. It involves lots of people flinging each other around while getting sweaty.’
Jenna rested her chin on her hand. ‘So will you be flinging anyone in particular around?’
Cam hesitated. Jenna sounded – hopeful. In fact, she sounded desperate for him to have someone in particular to share the ceilidh with.
He managed one more wry half-smile, knowing it was the last one in his armoury. ‘Maybe ...’
Her blue eyes widened. ‘Oh, “maybe”, he says. Go on, tell me more. Is it serious?’
‘Um. We’re not engaged or anything.’
