A Marriage Proposal For Christmas. Carole Mortimer

she made no effort to go and make coffee, or indeed anything else, as she heard the outer door open before being closed with suppressed violence. Nothing had changed there, then!

      ‘Can I help you?’ she heard Pam offer politely.

      ‘I certainly hope so,’ the man rasped.

      Noel Carlton!

      There was no doubt about it, Cally accepted with a wince after taking a surreptitious peek from behind the slightly ajar door and easily recognizing her nearest neighbour.

      She couldn’t mistake that handsomely chiselled face, or the dark hair he wore much longer than was fashionable. His suit, even from that brief glance, looked expensively tailored, as did the handmade black leather shoes.

      Not that any of that mattered just now. There could be only one reason for this man turning up here: her comments this morning had obviously elicited some sort of response, after all!

      ‘A human being at last,’ he continued scathingly. ‘You are a human being, aren’t you?’

      ‘Indeed I am,’ Pam answered in her most soothing voice, always the calmer one of the two sisters—a fact Cally had always blamed on her own vibrantly red hair as opposed to Pam’s more muted auburn. ‘Would you be the gentleman who rang earlier?’ she queried.

      ‘Five times!’ he confirmed indignantly.

      Noel Carlton was the angry man on the answering machine?

      ‘We don’t actually open until nine o’clock, I’m afraid, Mr…?’

      ‘Carlton,’ he snapped.

      ‘Mr Carlton,’ Pam acknowledged smoothly—giving no indication of having recognized the name at all. ‘I’m sorry there was no one here to take your calls earlier, but, as I said, we don’t actually open the office until nine o’clock. However, I’m obviously more than happy to offer you any assistance that I can now.’

      No, don’t say that! Cally mentally tried to communicate with her sister. Noel Carlton was the last person either of them even wanted to talk to. Until they had consulted a lawyer, at any rate. Not that Cally thought she was even slightly in the wrong with her complaints, but that didn’t mean that her neighbour saw it that way, too.

      Cally took another peek around the door, just in time to see the man lowering his long length into the chair opposite Pam’s desk, his back towards Cally now as she frantically tried to attract her sister’s attention over one of his broad shoulders.

      Pam shot her a questioning glance, obviously still none the wiser as to why Cally had disappeared so swiftly.

      Cally quietly opened the door a little wider, raising her hands to make a movement as if she were holding the steering wheel of a car.

      If anything Pam just looked even more perplexed!

      Cally gave her sister a frustrated frown, pointing at Noel Carlton’s broad back, then at herself, before repeating the action of holding a car’s steering wheel.

      Nothing.

      Her sister looked completely puzzled now, at the same time staring at Cally as if she had gone slightly insane.

      And maybe she had, Cally conceded heavily. She might have been extremely upset this morning, and told him exactly what she thought of him—but having Noel Carlton turn up at her place of work was the last response she had expected!

      ‘The thing is that I need—Do I have your full attention… Mrs Davies?’ Noel Carlton prompted, having paused briefly while he read the name on the front of the desk.

      Pam broke her gaze away from Cally, a blush in her cheeks now. ‘Of course you do, Mr—I’m sorry, what did you say your name was?’ she encouraged in a slightly hushed voice, her eyes widening now with sudden recognition.

      At last! Maybe there wouldn’t be any need to hit her sister over the head with a book later, after all!

      ‘Carlton,’ he supplied again through clenched teeth. ‘The thing is that I need—Mrs Davies?’ he bit out impatiently as he obviously sensed her attention wandering again.

      Not surprisingly really; Pam’s gaze had returned to Cally as she stood behind him. The look in Pam’s eyes was a mixture of recognition and excitement, tinged with wariness as to what he was actually doing here.

      Cally had a pretty good idea as to the answer to the latter, although she hoped not to have to discuss that with her sister in front of her neighbour.

      ‘What the—?’ Noel Carlton, having followed Pam’s gaze and glanced behind him, stood up abruptly as he saw Cally standing there. ‘You!’ he accused.

      Her.

      And Noel Carlton looked no more pleased to see her again than she was to see him!

       CHAPTER TWO

      THE TWO OF THEM continued to stare at each other, Cally challengingly, Noel Carlton’s expression now completely unreadable as he looked at her with those deep blue eyes.

      In Cally’s opinion, it wasn’t fair that one man should be so good-looking. As well as that overlong hair being thick and darkly waving and his eyes being a beautiful deep cobalt-blue, his nose was straight and arrogant, his lips perfectly sculptured—the lower lip sensually fuller than the top—his jaw was square and determined, and his body tall and muscular, totally belying the thirty-five years or so that Cally guessed him to be. All that and rich too, Cally dismissed scathingly.

      ‘Er—do you two know each other?’ Pam was the one to break the chilly silence that had descended after Noel Carlton’s initial outburst, her gaze accusing as she shot Cally a pointed glance.

      Completely deserved, Cally accepted with an inner wince. But she simply hadn’t had a chance yet to calm down enough to be able to rationally discuss the full events of this morning with her sister. Not that she thought Pam would be too impressed with that explanation, but it was the only one she had.

      ‘No!’

      ‘Yes.’

      Noel Carlton and Cally spoke at the same time, Cally in the negative, Noel Carlton in the positive.

      But if he thought having invited her out to dinner two months ago, and then promptly forgetting he had ever made the invitation, along with the argument this morning, gave him any right to claim an acquaintance with her then he was sadly mistaken; in fact, it was the opposite!

      Pam gave the two of them a gleeful smile. ‘Come on, now, which one is it?’ she taunted.

      ‘We most certainly do not know each other,’ Cally answered before he even had chance to do so.

      ‘Oh, come on, Cally,’ Noel Carlton drawled, those deep blue eyes mocking now as he looked at her challengingly. ‘That’s not the impression I had earlier this morning.’

      Cally’s eyes widened indignantly, a blush creeping into her freckle-covered cheeks as Pam repeated, ‘Earlier this morning, hmm?’

      ‘Don’t take any notice of him, Pam.’ Cally glared at her infuriating neighbour. ‘He’s just trying to be clever!’

      ‘And succeeding,’ Pam pointed out. ‘Dare one ask how it is the two of you happened to be together earlier this morning?’ The look she gave Cally clearly said, You certainly didn’t tell me that!

      Cally drew in a sharp breath at her sister’s speculative expression. ‘It’s really quite simple—’

      ‘Oh, very,’ Noel Carlton agreed mildly. He folded his arms across the width of his chest now as he looked at the two women. ‘Tell me, are the two of you related? I seem to see a certain resemblance in the colouring and bone structure…’

      ‘Sisters,’