Page 61 of Bedding his Innocent Mistress

Running on the sand, earphones in, wearing only a pair of shorts, so that his glorious body was on display to her, and she could only watch him, her mouth dry, her heart racing, her soul soaring. She watched as he took step after step and then she was running to, running towards him, with no idea what she must look like and no ability to care.

“Rafe,” she shouted, as she got close enough that surely he must hear.

He lifted his head in her direction and a sharp flash of emotion crossed his face before he flattened it, leaving only cool disdain.

He lifted his earphones out and left them dangling around his neck. His chest was moving with the efforts of his run. He stood still, his hands by his side, silently watchful, intense, but not because he was reading her as he had done in the past. This was an intensity born of emotions – emotions she didn’t understand.

He didn’t speak and suddenly Ivy had too many words and yet they were locked inside of her.

“I’m so sorry,” she said in a rush.

He didn’t speak. His eyes held hers, and she had no idea what he was feeling, nor what he wanted.

“I never meant to hurt you,” she added, with a shake of her head, catching her hair as the breeze ran off the sea and lifted it. She tucked it behind her ear and saw the way his eyes followed the gesture.

“Did you have coffee with him?”

Ivy shook her head. “Yes,” she contradicted. “I had to.”

He visibly withdrew from her. “I see.”

“No, you don’t.” She frowned, knowing that the next words she spoke were some of the most important in her life. “I was with him for a very long time. Up until a few months ago, I thought he was all I wanted.” She saw the pain on Rafe’s features and knew that she was causing it. She hated that, but the truth was essential. “But I was wrong. So wrong. It’s hard to explain. I just… so much of who I thought I was seemed wrapped up in who I was with Steve. So many memories have him in them. He’s everywhere I look. I thought he was a part of me, too big a part to let go. But he’s just my past. He’s just history.”

He looked away, along the beach, and a muscle jerked in his jaw.

“I don’t love him. I think I probably haven’t loved him for a long time. We were friends. Good friends. But it was never this.”

He still didn’t look at her.

“I refused to admit to myself that I love you, Rafe. I knew there was danger with you, from the minute we met, but I told myself it was just sex and that you weren’t interested in a relationship – for all the reasons this shouldn’t make sense.”

“And what reasons are those?”

“Come on! You’re a billionaire, you live in Spain, you don’t have girlfriends, you don’t do relationships…”

“When did I ever say that?”

“You told me you’d never been with anyone for more than a few nights…”

“Until I met you,” he corrected. “Then, I threw my life open, welcomed you into it. You, I have needed and wanted unendingly.” He paused, to let the words take effect. “And you know the other things do not matter.”

She bit down on her lip, knowing she needed to finish what she was saying. “I’m trying to explain how I felt, what I told myself, why I kept you at a distance. I didn’t want to fall in love with you and I think that made me cling to the memory of Steve even tighter, as though being heartbroken over him would protect me from this. But this, what we are, it’s so much bigger than anything I’ve ever known. I hate that I’ve hurt you. I hate it. I hate that you told you loved me and that I didn’t say it straight back, that I walked away from you, leaving you thinking I was going to go back to Steve. I hate that moment of my life, and I wish, I wish on a thousand stars and sunrays that I could undo it.” She lowered her voice, the words trembling across the sea. “ Because I do love you, Rafe. I love you. I’ve loved you every time we’ve touched and kissed and laughed. I love you for how patient you’ve been with me, how you’ve given me breathing space to realise how I felt. I love you because you are good and strong and kind and smart and my perfect, perfect match in every way.”

Slowly, painfully slowly, he turned to face her, and his expression was unreadable.

“Is it over with him?”

“It was over months ago.”

“Still… you let him get under your skin. What if he calls in a week? A month? A year?”

“He won’t.”

But it was like a red rag to a bull. His eyes flashed. “I am no woman’s second choice, Ivy.”

“How can you think you would be?” She pushed her hands to his chest then, needing to touch him, to forge the connection that had always held them together. “I’m telling you I love you. That I love you in a way I’ve never known I could love. That I love you in a way that has become my oxygen and hope, that you are my all. Steve could call every day and it would make no difference. I don’t want him. I don’t want the life I had with him. I want… if you’ll have me… I want this. I want us.”

He stared at her and Ivy’s heart was aching inside of her.

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