‘Ella?’
A deep voice pulled her from her thoughts. When she turned, she found a man standing a few metres from her, his black suit jacket slung casually over one shoulder, his white shirt open.
‘Gabe?’ She burst out laughing. ‘You’reGabriel?’
His smile widened and brought his face to life, his dark eyes dancing across hers as he stepped towards her, kissing her cheek.
‘Isabella Rose,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘What a surprise.’
‘How did I not—’ Her hand went to her mouth. ‘I can’t believe it didn’t click. After all these years, I can’t believe it’s you.’
‘How long has it been? Ten years? Twelve?’
She shook her head again. ‘Honestly, I’m not sure. It’s been a long time, that’s all I know.’ Gabe had been her crush all through school, a friend until they’d kissed behind the science block, the day before he’d left to take up a scholarship at a music school in the Netherlands. She’d sobbed into her pillow for weeks after he left, and then never heard of him again. In fact, until today, she hadn’t so much as thought of him in years.
‘I have to say, you’re far from who I expected to meet tonight when Daisy asked me for a favour.’
‘Ditto,’ she replied.
‘Do you want the truth?’
She nervously wrapped her arms around herself, finding his smile impossible not to return. ‘Go on then.’
‘I figured the woman I was meeting would be older,’ he said. ‘Mucholder.’
‘Let me guess, she told you I was looking for help researching my family history, and you immediately thought I’d be some old spinster.’
‘Well,’ he said with a grin, ‘I hadn’t given any thought to the spinster part, specifically, but definitely old. You’re at least two decades younger than I thought you’d be.’
They both stood for a moment, Ella trying to ignore quite how beautiful his face was, and Gabe staring back at her. His eyes were as dark as cocoa, his jawline grazed with stubble, and those full lips of his seemed permanently tipped upwards into a smile. He’d been a good-looking kid, but he’d grown into a gorgeous man. Why had she never thought to look him up?
A small group of people emerged from the building behind him then, catching both of their attention. They were all dressed similarly to Gabriel—the men in black dinner jackets and the women in long black dresses—and one of them whistled.
‘Where are all the instruments?’ she thought out loud, surprised to see all the musicians without them.
‘They let us store everything here for the night. It’s very secure, so we don’t have to worry about them.’
‘Gabe! Come on!’ they called out.
‘I’ll catch you up!’ he called back.
‘Please, I don’t want to keep you from your friends. This can wait until another time,’ Ella said. ‘You were so kind agreeing to meet me, and it’s been so good seeing you after all these years, but—’
He cocked his head slightly to the side, as if trying to decide whether to say something or not. ‘Do you want to join us for a drink? I mean, I’d love to catch up. It has been a while.’
‘Oh, I couldn’t.’Could she?
He took the jacket from his shoulder and slung it around her instead, rubbing her arms gently before gesturing for her to follow. ‘Come on, you look cold, and I’m well overdue a drink. It’s been a very long night. What do you say?’
Ella was never lost for words. She was also usually very hard to impress. In fact, at that moment, the feminist within wanted to reject the jacket around her shoulders and return it to sender. But the fact that this man, whom she hadn’t seen since he was a teenager, had noticed that she was cold and given her his jacket without thought, and was now leading the way for her to join him for the evening, was also one of the sweetest things a man had ever done for her. And why the hell couldn’t a man give a woman his jacket? It was incredibly romantic, or at least right now it seemed that way to her.
‘I hope I haven’t overstepped?’ he said, perhaps wondering why she was frozen and gaping at him. ‘If you don’t want to come…’
‘I am most definitely okay, and I’d love to come,’ she said quickly, matching her stride to his. ‘Tell me, how do you know Daisy?’And why didn’t I ask her myself when she offered me the tickets? Please don’t be an ex-lover of hers. Please.
‘We met when I was abroad, many, many years ago, when she was an art student and I was away on my scholarship studies,’ he said, giving Ella a quick smile as he glanced across at her. ‘We were both Londoners in the Netherlands, and we had a similar group of friends.’
‘Well, you’ve both clearly done very well. Daisy is smashing it, and although I know nothing about music, what you did on stage back there was pretty impressive. I was blown away.’
