Love and Liability (Dating Mr Darcy - Book 2) by Katie Oliver Page B

musician you were seeing.”
    “You’ll be happy to know that Mick and I broke up. He and his amplifiers have departed from my life — permanently.”
    “Well, I’m not sorry to hear it. You can do
so
much better, darling. Here, take this out and circulate.”
    So saying, her mother thrust a tray with cheese and pineapple cubes skewered onto a grapefruit into Holly’s hands.
    “What on earth is that naff thing?” Holly asked as she eyed the tray with distaste.
    “It’s a cocktail hedgehog. Offer it to Henry first.” And she nudged Holly out of the door.
    Well, Holly reasoned as she circulated with the cocktail hedgehog, Alex hadn’t said anything to indicate he’d seen the
BritTEEN
interview. Surely he would have confronted her by now.
    Ergo, she reasoned as Mrs Henley finally appeared to call everyone in to dinner a few minutes later, there was really no need to tell him about it yet, was there?
    No need at all.

Chapter 14
    At dinner, Holly found herself seated between Alex and Lady Blandford.
    This isn’t so bad
, she decided, and began, by degrees, to relax a bit. After all, Camilla Shawcross was gone, she had Alex all to herself at dinner, and she hadn’t heard a word back from Sasha.
    Which meant, Holly hoped, that her off-the-record interview disaster with Alex wasn’t, perhaps, such a disaster after all? If it was, Sasha would surely have called her back by now.
    Alex reached inside his jacket pocket and leaned over. “Don’t tell anyone, Ms James, but I’m having a quick look at my messages before the soup arrives.”
    Holly, smoothing the napkin on her lap, froze. “Messages?”
    “Yes. I’m expecting an email, rather an important one.” He began tapping the screen.
    “No!” she squeaked, panicked. “You can’t do that!”
    “I can’t do what?”
    “You can’t look at your messages!”
    He looked at her oddly. “Why on earth not?”
    “Because…it’s rude, that’s why. Incredibly rude!”
    “It’ll only take me a second, I promise.”
    Oh, crikey, Holly thought as her panic escalated, if Alex played her voice message now, he’d know that his off-the-record comments had been published in
BritTEEN
. He’d be livid. He’d tell everyone at the table what she’d done, and they’d all think she was a proper berk—
    “I can’t get a signal,” he grumbled after a moment.
    “Oh, yes, you’ll find that, living out here in the country, WiFi can be as unreliable as the Lib Dems,” Alastair remarked. A ripple of laughter went round the table.
    “Let me try,” Holly urged, and held out her hand for the phone.
    Alex frowned. “Perhaps if I just hold it up a bit, I might get one or two bars…”
    In an agony of despair, Holly eyed his mobile. “That’s the new myPhone, isn’t it?” she asked, and lunged for it. “Look at what a lovely, big screen it has! Let me have a look, please!”
    But he held it fast. “Ms James, I’d really rather you didn’t touch my phone—”
    “Don’t worry. I only want to look at it.”
    She reached out and attempted to wrestle it away from him, but he held fast. “Just — let me — see — the bloody — thing!” she hissed.
    Unfortunately, as Holly grappled with Alex to wrest control of his mobile, it flew out of their hands and sailed aloft, landing with a dull splash in the tureen of vichyssoise that Mrs Henley had just set out on the table.
    There was a moment of horrified silence.
    “My vichyssoise!” Mrs Henley gasped.
    “My phone!” Alex exclaimed, and half rose from his seat. “You’ve ruined it!”
    “I’m certain it’s fine,” Holly assured him, although secretly she had her doubts. She leaned forward and fished the mobile, dripping with creamy leek, potato, and chicken stock, out of the tureen and held it up gingerly. “See? It’s perfectly okay. A little vichyssoise never hurt anything.”
    Alex snatched it away from her. “Bloody hell,” he snapped as he sat back down, “you’re mad. Bonkers. If you’ve