The Decoy Date

Chapter Fourteen

Imogen sat behind the counter flicking through the photos on her phone, she smiled as she saw picture after picture of Charlie and animals from the zoo. In each one he was grinning at her behind the camera and pointing at a tiger or a penguin; she hadn't realized she'd taken so many of him. There were also pictures of the two of them, Toby had offered to take a few of them. One in particular caught her attention; Charlie had his arm around her waist while she stood smiling at the camera, Charlie on the other hand was looking at her instead with a look that made her stomach somersault.

He looked so happy smiling down at her, his eyes a little dazed and in awe of her; it was almost like he was in love. Well he was a really good actor, Toby or anybody looking at the picture would think he was in love with her, the way he looked at her and touched her.

"Are you sure you're alright cashing up? Remember last time you did it by yourself, you panicked when you were £3.35 short and you'd covered it up with your mug on the desk." Jess made her jump as she walked through from the back room, now donned in coat and scarf ready to brave the evening rush and November cold.

"I'll be fine. It won't take long anyway."

"Okay see you tomorrow." She patted Imogen on the shoulder and walked over to the door, she turned the open sign to closed and went outside to meet her boyfriend. Imogen watched as Matt pulled Jess into a long hug and kissed her tenderly, sighing Imogen put her phone on the counter and began counting the shops takings; it had been another slow day but not as bad as yesterday. She took the bag of money to the safe in the storeroom through the door at the side of the counter and returned to the shop to turn the lights off.

A tap on the door disturbed her, when she looked up she saw Charlie smiling in at her; he was wearing the silly bobble hat he'd had on last night that made him look incredibly cute. She walked over to the door, unlocked it and let him in.

"Hi, what are you doing here?"

"I thought we could practice the song for the wedding again, if you're not doing anything else." Charlie took his hat off, leaving his hair tussled like he'd just woken up; Imogen was left a little breathless by how sexy he looked when he hadn't taken time to do his hair. Imagine waking up with that! Her heart sped up as she imagined Charlie in her bed in nothing but her bed covers. Stop it! Just stop it! Great now she couldn't stop imagining him naked.

"Well actually I was going to work on my speech for the wedding, I have absolutely no idea where to start. I'm not very funny so I can't go down that route, besides the best man'll be doing funny; he does stand-up gigs at the weekend. So funny's definitely out." Imogen put the bolt across the door so no one could get in and went through the door and up the stairs to her flat with Charlie right behind her.

"Funny's good if it's funny, I know that sounds obvious but when it doesn't make people laugh you can actually see the tumbleweeds roll by. I'd go for heartfelt, something sentimental that'll get all the ladies crying; it isn't a wedding until the women are crying." He smiled as they walked into the living room together, she stopped at the kitchen and put her iPhone on charge.

"Do you want anything to drink? I've got tea, coffee, water, juice, squash, wine, vodka, tequila . . ." She shivered at the memory of her tequila binge a few weeks ago and hoped he wouldn't opt for it, she couldn't take another hangover like that one again.

"Wine would be great thanks. White if you've got it." She was grateful when she opened the fridge and found a full bottle of pinot grigio, she pulled two glasses from the nearest cupboard and filled them with the pale liquid. Charlie was looking at her fish tank when she found him and handed him one of the glasses.

"Am I going crazy? I swear the tank wasn't here last time."

"It wasn't I sent it to be cleaned at the weekend, my goldfish Patrick died last week so I thought I'd get it cleaned and get some new fish." She smiled at the tank that was now the home of three clown fish, she'd wanted one ever since she'd seen Finding Nemo. "That one is Ian, that's Dennis and that's Thierry, I think. It's kind of hard to tell they all look the same." She smiled back at him as she pointed at each of the three fish swimming round in the tank.

"Do you name them all after Arsenal players?"

"Yeah, it's a tradition from my childhood, we used to have a hamster called Alan after Alan Sunderland and a labrador called Brady after Liam. Daisy wanted to call him Fudge but my dad insisted it should be Brady." Charlie laughed as he moved away from the tank and sat down on the sofa. She walked over and joined him, her notepad and a pen sat on the table waiting to be picked up and used.

"What have got so far for this speech?" Imogen picked up the notepad and showed the empty page to Charlie. "Oh, I see. Well you could talk about Daisy as a child, maybe how she always dreamed of falling in love and getting married. If she did" He looked at her questioningly and she nodded, taking the pen and noting down his suggestions. "Then throw in some quotes about love and boom! Everybody will love you." He grinned and took a sip of wine.

"Once I heard someone say: If a man loves a woman, he will find a way to be with her, no matter what it takes. Sam's done that with Daisy, he'd do anything for her; I've never seen anyone devoted to another person like he is and vice versa for Daisy. They love each other but they're also best friends who care deeply about each other." Charlie nodded at her paper and she wrote down what she'd just said, she picked up her wine glass and took another mouthful, the coolness relaxing her.

"I once read somewhere that the Greeks believed humans were created with four arms, four legs and two faces but Zeus thought they were too powerful so split them into two separate parts, condemning them to spend the rest of their lives in search of their other halves. I like that whole idea of there being one person out there for everyone, one soulmate, one person you're meant to spend the rest of your life with."

Imogen looked at him in surprise, she hadn't expected anything so deep and philosophical. "Do you really believe that? That there's one person for everyone?" She rested her pen and notepad on her lap and looked at Charlie, waiting for his reaction.

"Yeah, I do; and I think when you find that person you should just tell them how you feel." She sipped the rest of her wine and considered what he'd said.

"How do you know that that person is the one you want to be with, the one you're supposed to be with? I mean you could have already dumped the woman you're supposed to be with." She smiled coyly at him and raised her eyebrows questioningly at him.

"I don't know, I suppose it just feels right with them, comfortable with them. You don't feel you have to be someone else, you can be who you are and the other person accepts you that way; they love you because of who you are and in spite of who you are." He was so serious as he said the words she could do nothing but believe him. He seemed so sure of himself and she had no reason to doubt him; she'd never felt that way with a man, never been comfortable being herself around any of the men her mother had set her up with. She was always trying to be someone close to herself but not as quirky or full on.

However around Charlie she could be herself, let all the crazy out without worrying what he thought about her. Maybe it was something to do with the fact that she already knew him and he already knew her, they weren't meeting for the first time. She found herself writing her speech with ease, offering parts to him and seeing what he thought about it; asking for his advice of what to put in next. Before she knew it the speech was done and pretty much exactly as she wanted it.

They finished their wine and went on to practice the song for the wedding. Everything seemed to be fitting into place between them for the ceremony and it all looked good.