Cyril was talking. She watched his moving mouth; she was dissolving.
“I’d like to do some proper producing, as a lead. Bit off that Miss Somerville does and I don’t, though she’s quite good—not saying she isn’t. Can’t tell the chaps from school I’m junior to a woman, though. They’d rag me to death.”
“You’d be brilliant at producing, I’m sure,” Maisie told his lips.
“I wouldn’t mind a stint in New York radio either, someday. Meant to be quite different, but maybe you know about that?”
She remembered that the supposed point of this outing was for her to describe New York. Maybe he means for us to have another date? He must, surely. I hope. Please.
“Tell me,” he asked. “Why do they call it the Big Apple?”
Sooner or later he’s got to ask a question whose answer I know.
“Oh, er, well, a lot of apples grow there,” she ventured, half remembering reading something about the nickname, and that it had nothing to do with fruit.
“I thought it might be named after you,” he said, waggling his eyebrows.
Maisie tried to remember to breathe.
“What?”
“Well, its skin turns red.”
A treacherous joke about green apples entered her mind, but she couldn’t speak.
Skin. Those freckles. She pictured him on the sand in Brighton, legs, arms, that wide-open grin lighting his face as he ran by the water. The smell of the sea on his skin, the tiny grains of sand caught on his flesh as he pulled her close . . .
“Maisie!”
“Sorry?”
“I asked if you were ready to go,” he said, looking impatient. The plates and cups were empty.
“Yes,” she answered, hoping she wasn’t expected to use any more syllables.
“Let’s get a cab,” he suggested, and she was soon sitting on a plush upholstered seat, surrounded by dark wood and small windows. She’d never been in a London cab before. She longed to stroke the cushions and polished wood.
Cyril settled next to her, his lazy smile glowing in the semidarkness.
“New York girl, eh?” and he pulled her to him.
All she knew of kisses was what she had seen onstage. This was different. Better. Magic. His lips guided hers, encouraging her to melt into him. She trembled so hard, she was afraid she was going to bite his lip, but his hands were steady on her shoulders and he didn’t pull away, so she must be doing something right.
Please don’t let this stop.
The cab stopped and the yawning driver asked for the fare.
They were on a quiet street, moderately well-kept houses full of sleeping clerks and hardworking hopeful juniors. If it were New York, one house would hide a speakeasy. Maisie grinned. It would be just like Cyril to know of an underground place in London.
He kissed her again, his body pressed against hers. There was nothing except this man, this mouth, this moment.
“Quick, let’s get upstairs,” he breathed.
“What?” She was gasping, embarrassingly loud.
“Shush, come on, this way.”
“Where are we? Is it a nightclub?”
“Ha. Perhaps tonight it will be. It’s my flat. Well, a bedsit, but there’s privacy enough. We’ll take the back stairs. No one will see you.”
“What?” She was still having trouble breathing.
“We ought to hurry,” he urged.
“No, I . . .”
He wasn’t really suggesting what he sounded like he was suggesting, was he? He couldn’t be. This wasn’t . . . His eyes were so bright and liquid. She wanted to kiss him more, kiss him forever. It would be so easy. Say yes. Trust him.
But it was too much at once.
“I don’t think I should. I mean, not the first . . . I’m sorry.”
His eyes chilled, raking her face. “Are you making a joke?”
“I . . . What?”
“You’re not actually . . . ? Look, haven’t I done rather nicely by you this evening?”
It was like walking downstairs and missing the last step.
“What?”
Because there weren’t any other words.
“You can’t . . . Haven’t you done this before?”
She couldn’t look like a girl who had, could she? Plenty of girls did, she knew, but were they ones who still got married?
“It’ll be fun, won’t it?” He took her hand. “You’re not teasing me, are you?”
“What? I, no, I wouldn’t. I’m not that sort, truly.”
“Good. Let’s go.”
“Cyril, I’m . . . not that sort either.”
“You are serious, aren’t you?” His hand pulled away, and she was sinking. “Well, I never. Bit of a turn-up, that.”
“What?”
Which asked so many questions.
“Ah, Maisie, go on. You’re not . . . That is . . . A girl like you, I mean . . . Ah, what’s a bit of practice between chums, eh? Just some fun, a laugh.”
She was never going to laugh again.
“I have to go home.”
Now. Before he saw her cry. He wasn’t going to see her cry.