Love is a Four Letter Word. Zara Stoneley

proper country stuff is it? It’s country stuff for city people so they can pretend they’re having a relaxing time. Not that the country is relaxing. Latte and shoe shopping sounds a much better deal to me.”

      “Says the country girl.”

      “Reformed.” She stared blankly at the sheet of paper. “And can you honestly think of a male model we’ve used recently who looks rugged? He’s even put ‘modern day John Wayne’ in brackets after it. Good job it’s in fucking pencil then I can rub it out, I mean, what the hell does that mean?”

      “Rugged.” Ella wriggled and settled deeper into the cushions. “A real man, with abs and muscles and… how about your biker boy?”

      “Jake? Piss off, I am not asking Jake. Stop looking at me like that. No. No way, and he’s not a model.”

      “But Toby doesn’t want a model, he wants a real man. A bad boy, and he knows you’re the expert.”

      “Will you stop keeping saying real like you’re saying alien.”

      “It would give you a chance to see him again, you know you want to.”

      “No, I don’t. You can’t even look me in the face when you say it, wimp.”

      “Where does he live? Have you got his number?”

      “How should I know where he lives? You’re sounding like catty Carol now.”

      Ella didn’t rise to the bait. “You’ve got a pic? We can flash it around town, we’ll soon root him out.”

      “He’s not a fox gone to earth.”

      “People will know him if he’s half as sexy as you say, well the girls will anyway.”

      “You’re beginning to sound like a stalker, and no I haven’t got a photo. Was I supposed to shout ‘smile’ while he was shagging my brains out on a motorbike?” Georgie closed her eyes. Let’s face it, he was exactly what Toby was after. A dark, brooding figure in the background. A guy who’d look sexy in torn dirty jeans and a T-shirt in a way that none of the models they could afford would look. She didn’t want to see him again. He’d given her the orgasm of a lifetime, but hey, how much of that was down to a few drinks and the thrum of the engine? No, she definitely didn’t want to see him again. But, if they used him on the shoot he would just be a hired hand. He wouldn’t get a chance to wind her up and be rude to her. Not that he’d been outright rude, just courteous in a rude way that got under her skin.

      “So, what is it with you and this Jake? Did you snog behind the bike sheds at school or something?”

      “No.” More’s the pity, except I was a dull little mouse back then. “We were at the same school but we might as well have been on different planets.” For all the notice he took, except he did remember me, which is a weird one. “He was one of the bad boys and I was one of the good girls.”

      “Yeah.” Ella laughed. “Sure you were.”

      But she had been. She’d worked hard, been happy. Until her parents had split up, and she’d been shipped off to a crappy boarding school in the back of beyond.

      “Okay, maybe I wasn’t that good.” She forced a grin onto her stiff face. Ella didn’t know what her life had been like. Ella only knew the person she’d turned herself into. The girl who knew what she wanted and went out and got it. On her own. With as many thrills and spills crammed in along the way as she could manage. “But Jake was definitely bad. I didn’t recognise him at first, it was a long time ago. And he definitely didn’t have a big beast like that ready to be unleashed when we were at school.”

      “You are so rude. So?”

      “So, what?”

      “Is he the real deal? Are you going to go dig him out so we can all have a look?”

      “I don’t know.” She nibbled the side of her nail.

      “I’m sure Toby will sort something out if we can’t, I mean he’ll understand that you can’t always deliver.”

      Georgie shook her head slowly at Ella. She was winding her up, challenging her because she knew Georgie didn’t like to fail. Ever.

      Ella raised an eyebrow, sensing victory. “It’s your call.”

      And yeah, he was the real deal. “I’ll try and find him, ask him.” He’d say no. What was it he’d said? Don’t let having it all fuck you up? Something told her that Jake didn’t want it all, he never had. He’d always shunned the rich kids at school, kept his distance and kept his pride. And she had a horrible feeling that even flashing her posh frocks and posy job made him angry. He thought she was a rich, spoiled brat who just used people. He hadn’t had to say it, it was in his eyes, in that slightly judgemental tone he’d tried not to let creep into his voice. He’d taken her out on his bike because she’d asked, and because he’d wanted her as much as she wanted him. But he didn’t want anything else to do with her.

      Which could make this tricky. But she wanted to know why. Which made it even trickier. What did she care? He was a thug with a chip on his shoulder. Except he wasn’t a thug. Bugger.

      She tried not to grin, look like she didn’t care either way. “If he says no, then it’s your turn to think of someone, Ella.”

      “If he says no, then you’re losing your touch, wild child.”

      “Thanks.”

      “Welcome. So where do we start?”

      “We?” Georgie raised an eyebrow.

      “We.” Ella folded her arms. “What does he do?”

      “Do?”

      “Can we cut the monosyllabic responses George, I know you’re smarter than that. What does he do, you know, for a job?”

      “How the hell am I supposed to know?”

      “So what did you two talk about then?”

      “Talk?” She raised the eyebrows as high as they could go and looked at her friend as though she’d sprouted an extra head. “This wasn’t supposed to be the start of a beautiful relationship, Ella.”

      “Sorry, I forgot for a moment there who I was talking to.”

      Georgie stared at the ceiling. One thing she’d liked about this place when she was growing up was that everyone knew everybody else. And their business. Which she hated now, but… “I know somebody who is good at talking. Mrs Bea. Come on, we’re going for a walk.”

      “Walk?”

      Georgie grinned at the way Ella was staring at her feet. Beautifully encased in her new, totally impractical, designer shoes. “Now who can’t string a sentence together?” She still wasn’t entirely convinced this was a good idea, but the damned man seemed to have taken residence in her head, and the only way to evict him was to see him in broad daylight when she was sober. Then he wouldn’t be the bad boy super stud she’d imagined. He’d be normal, boring and not in the slightest bit interesting at all. He probably had a weak chin, and spots. And a bad haircut. And he was probably so rough at the edges he wouldn’t even do for the shoot. “Let’s go hunt us down a biker boy.”

      ***

      The sweet shop wasn’t quite how she remembered it. The bell still pinged when you opened the door, but that was about it. Obviously, just selling plain old sweets didn’t cut the mustard these days, you needed to sell them labelled as sugared candy or ‘Olde Worlde’ and replace the pocket money prices with wage packet ones.

      And cuddly Mrs Bea had been replaced by a sullen girl with long, straight, blonde hair and a scowl. If she’d been in earlier she’d have known, but somehow since returning to the town sweets hadn’t been high on her priority list. Men kept the pounds off the hips, well at least the type she’d been after did, sugar put them on. So she’d concentrated