Daughters by Elizabeth Buchan Page B

literature should subtly suggest the connection, thereby emphasizing reliability and the best virtues. Yet if a successful rebranding was to be achieved, they must also encapsulate change and a bright, smart, adaptable future …
    Branding speak.
    The second time, snow had arrived, causing mayhem in the airports. Jasmine found herself overnighting in a hotel and having dinner with her chief executive, Jason, who fussed endlessly over the altered schedule. She texted Duncan about Jason and he replied, That’s being sixty for you.
    She rang to cancel her supper date with Eve, who sounded manic. ‘A lot of work’s come in,’ she said. ‘Just as I’d cleared the backlog. It’s going to stack up for a couple of months at least.’
    ‘I was hoping to get going on the wedding.’
    ‘Evie, you got going on the wedding a hundred years ago.’
    At her end of the phone, Eve hummed and hawed.‘You know me. Am I driving you crazy? I don’t mean to, Jas.’
    ‘Bridezilla,’ she said fondly. ‘How’s Andrew?’
    ‘OK.’ Pause. ‘Ish. He gets bored with all the arrangements. That’s why I need you, Jas.’
    Early the next morning, she flew back, went straight into the office and didn’t get back to Duncan’s flat until late in the evening. He was high on a long-running deal, which had finally slotted into place only that afternoon. Otherwise he would have been asleep.
    It wasn’t a good sign when Duncan couldn’t sleep. There he was, all bright-eyed and hyper with adrenalin, plus a glass or two of the celebratory stuff. ‘Nothing lost, though,’ he said, when she narrated the story of the travel chaos.
    They were lying together in bed. ‘I missed my supper with Eve. She wanted to make some decisions and required my cool, wise judgement.’
    ‘Cool, wise judgement? I don’t think so.’
    Her finger found the point where the skin stretched over his hip and pressed. He yelped.
    There was silence, broken only by the occasional murmur.
    Eventually, he said, ‘Don’t let Eve use you too much, Jas. You’ve got your own stuff to deal with.’
    Jasmine raised herself on her elbow. Her hair brushed Duncan’s shoulder. ‘Meaning?’
    ‘She’s a bit needy over the wedding.’ He wound a finger through her hair and tugged it.
    ‘Of course she is. That’s what weddings do.’ She wished she hadn’t said that. ‘It’s her big moment.’
    ‘I never quite know what she’s thinking. I know you do, but not many others do. She hides behind the efficiency and the smart exterior. But Andrew has years of wedded bliss to sort that out.’
    She nearly said, so very nearly,
And us?
    He knew well enough what went on in her head, and she knew the furniture of his – and that was what she loved about them. Duncan pulled her down and kissed her.
He knew
. ‘Love you.’
    Her need to know, to resolve, welled like physical hunger.
    ‘Duncan?’
    ‘Don’t start, Jas. Please.’
    ‘OK.’
    He was murmuring his usual lovely things and, languorous as a cat, she let them drift through her.
    She closed her eyes. At times like this, her body burned with a sadness she could never put her finger on.
    ‘Put your arms around me,’ he asked. ‘Please.’
    With a soft laugh, she obeyed. ‘Idiot.’
    Describe how she had first met him.
    It had been at the IT conference. She was there to bone up on the latest technology and totally focused on her career. She was not looking for love. He was there for research prior to a merger. He had a girlfriend. He was epically busy. There he had been: sitting across the aisle, tapping into his phone. The cast of his head, the manner in which one leg was folded over the other, sent a dart into her stomach. She shivered, and the thought had winged into her head: This is the man I’m going to marry.
    ‘Are you with me, Jas?’ Duncan was growing sleepy. ‘Talk to me.’
    She shifted to free his trapped arm. ‘I was remembering how Eve made me stop biting my nails when I was small.’
    Duncan slid a