The Mistress Assignment. Penny Jordan

there simply wasn’t time, and the smartest thing she had in her wardrobe right now was the elegant dress and coat she had originally bought for her brother’s wedding and which, though smart, was hardly the kind of outfit she could wear to a charity ball.

      After she’d checked that she had securely locked the shop and that the alarm was switched on she made her way up to the flat. She was still finding it hard to understand what on earth had possessed her to agree to Dee’s outrageous scheme last night. She was normally so careful and cautious, so in control of her life. Beth was the gentle, easily manipulated one of the two of them; she was far more stubborn and self-assured. Too stubborn, her brother often affectionately told her.

      Certainly she knew her own mind; she was, after all, a woman of twenty-four, adult, mature, educated and motivated, a woman who, whilst she would ultimately want to have a loving partner and children, was certainly in no rush to commit herself to a relationship. The man with whom she eventually settled down would have to accept and understand that she would expect to be treated as an equal partner in their relationship, that she would expect in him the same qualities she looked for in a best friend: loyalty, honesty, a good sense of fun, someone who would share her interests and her enthusiasms, someone who would enhance her life and not, as she had seen so often happen in so many other relationships, make the kind of demands on her that would prevent her from living her life as she really wanted to live it

      ‘But what happens if you fall in love with someone who isn’t like that?’ Beth had once questioned when they had been discussing men and relationships.

      ‘I won’t,’ Kelly had responded promptly.

      Poor Beth. What was she doing right now? How was she feeling...? Kelly had never seen her looking so wretched or unhappy... Beth had really believed that Julian Cox loved her.

      Since their break-up Kelly had heard rumours that Beth wasn’t the first woman he had treated badly. No, Beth was better off without him, Kelly decided as she went into their kitchen and filled the kettle. She gave a small shudder as she remembered the night she had returned early from a weekend visit to her parents to discover Beth almost unconscious on her bed. Taking too many sleeping tablets had been an accident, an oversight, Beth had assured her, and had pleaded with her not to tell anyone else what she had done as Kelly sat beside her hospital bed. Unwillingly, Kelly had agreed. Luckily she had found Beth in time...luckily...

      Remembering that incident, Kelly slowly sipped her hot coffee. Was Dee really asking so much of her? No. She didn’t relish the role she was being called upon to play—what modern woman would?—but it was only a means to an entirely justifiable and worthwhile end.

      But that still didn’t solve the problem of what she was going to wear. She and Beth were approximately the same size although Beth was fair-skinned and blonde, with soft, pretty grey eyes, whereas she was brunette, her skin tone much warmer, her eyes a dark purplish brown, damson—the colour of lilac wine, one besotted admirer had once called them.

      The ball had been the subject of a great deal of excitement and speculation in town. It was to be the highlight of the town’s social year. The de Varsey family, who owned the elegant Georgian mansion where the event was to be held, had been local landowners for the last three hundred years and, despite their cost, tickets had been snapped up and the event sold out within a week of them going on sale, which made it even more extraordinary that Dee should have been able to produce a pair at such short notice.

      Kelly could remember how thrilled and excited Beth had been when Julian had told her that he had bought tickets for the event.

      ‘I’ll have to hire something really special. This isn’t just a social event for Julian, it’s a very important business opportunity as well,’ she had told Kelly breathlessly.

      Kelly had never properly discovered just exactly what line of business it was that Julian was in. He had talked very grandly about his own financial acumen and the hugely profitable deals he had pulled off, and he certainly had spent a lot of time talking into the mobile phone he took everywhere with him. He drove a very large and very fast BMW, but lived in a surprisingly small service flat in a new and not particularly attractive apartment block on the outskirts of town.

      Kelly hadn’t been at all pleased when she had learned that he had suggested to Beth that she allow him to have some of his business mail addressed to their flat, but she had refrained from making too much fuss, not wanting to upset her friend.

      Beth had been thrilled at the prospect of attending such a prestigious social event with him—as his fiancée; now another woman would be going there with him in Beth’s place.

      ‘Remember she could be just as much a victim of his ruthlessness as Beth was,’ Dee had reminded her and Anna last night when Kelly had commented that she didn’t know how any woman could date a man who she knew was supposedly committed to someone else.

      If that was the case, Julian Cox deserved to be revealed as the unpleasant and untrustworthy creep that he was, for her sake as much as Beth’s, Kelly acknowledged, frowning as she heard her doorbell ring.

      She wasn’t expecting any visitors. Although she and Beth had made several new acquaintances since moving to the town, as yet they hadn’t progressed to the stage of many close friendships. Getting up, she went downstairs to open the door that faced onto the main street.

      A man was standing outside, a large box at his feet, a delivery van parked on the roadside behind him.

      ‘Kelly Harris?’ he asked her, producing a form for her to sign. ‘Just sign here, please...’

      ‘What is it?’ Kelly asked him uncertainly, automatically signing the form, but he was already picking up the box and handing it over to her.

      Fortunately, despite its awkward shape, the box was very light. Mystified, Kelly carried it up to the flat and then, placing it on the sitting-room floor, sat down beside it to open it.

      The outer layer of strong brown paper, once removed, revealed an elegant, glossy white box. There was a letter attached to it. Opening it, Kelly quickly read it.

      Dear Kelly, you’ll need this to wear this evening.

      Good hunting! Dee.

      Intrigued, Kelly opened the box and then folded back the tissue paper inside it to reveal a dress that made her catch her breath in delight.

      Two layers of material, one in conker-brown, the other a toning deep, dark damson, in the sheerest silk chiffon, floated through her fingers. Picking up the dress, she hurried into the bedroom and held it against herself, studying her reflection in the full-length mirror.

      In both colour and design it might have been made with her in mind, the toning shades of chiffon so perfect with her colouring that they immediately drew attention to her eyes and made them look even more dramatically pansy-dark than usual. And as for the style—the current vogue for Jane Austen-type high-waisted, floating, revealing evening dresses was one that could, in the wrong hands, look insipid and totally unflattering to anyone over the age of seventeen, but Kelly knew instinctively that this dress was far from insipid, and that its deceptively sensuous cut could never be worn by a woman who was anything less than totally at ease with herself and her sexuality. In other words, Dee couldn’t have chosen a dress which would suit her more, and Kelly had no need to look at the immediately recognisable designer label attached to it to know that it must have been horrendously expensive.

      Wonderingly she touched the fine chiffon. Although the dress was fully lined, the flesh colour of the lining meant that in a dimly lit room it could easily look as though she was wearing a dress that was virtually transparent.

      Dee had even managed to get the size exactly right, Kelly acknowledged ruefully. Placing the dress reverently on her bed, she went back to the sitting room.

      Inside the box beneath another layer of tissue paper lay a pretty matching chiffon stole and a pair of high-heeled satin sandals with a matching satin evening bag.

      Dee had thought of everything, she admitted as she sat back on her heels.

      Fortunately