Page 37 of The Rules of Their Red-Hot Reunion

CHAPTER NINE

THROUGHOUTTHERESTof her day, Aisha questioned her reaction to Pasco’s lack of consideration, wondering if she’d allowed their past to colour her response to his actions. After all, rescheduling appointments was something she often did, and there had been many times when she couldn’t make an appointment because something else arose. It was never a big deal.

But she always had the decency to let the other party know, to explain her actions. No, she decided, Kildare had messed up and she’d been right to let him know he was out of line. And, yes, maybe she had been a little ruder to him than necessary because she felt as if she’d been snapped back into the past and she was nineteen again, pacing their flat because he’d promised to come home early so that they could catch a late dinner. Or she was waiting in the hallway, her packed suitcase at her feet, waiting for him to take her on a weekend away only to find out, hours later, that he had to work. Alone in her bed, crying herself to sleep, because she was so damn lonely and felt neglected and unloved.

But she wasn’t nineteen any more and she was a professional woman who stood up for herself.

You are so much stronger than the girl you were, Aisha, and you’re not a pushover.

She grinned into the darkness. She’d come a long way.

Aisha scowled at the dark trees as she walked back to her cottage, navigating the path by the torch on her phone.

Tired and headachy, she pulled the pins out of her hair and allowed it to tumble down her back. She shoved the pins into the pocket of her jacket, hunching her shoulders against the cold wind cutting through her clothes. While she’d been nursing her anger at Pasco, a cold front had come in, bringing cloudy skies threatening rain, and a biting wind. She increased her pace, thinking about what she could eat when she got home. She tried to recall what was in her fridge and pulled a face. Apart from a few bottles of wine in her small wine rack—she’d be having a glass or three tonight—there wasn’t much in her house in the way of food. She kept meaning to go into the village to stock up, but it kept getting shoved down to the bottom of her to-do list.

Maybe if she headed into town around lunchtime tomorrow, she could catch Pasco at his Franschhoek restaurant, nail down a time for them to meet and pick up some food, either before or after. And when they met again, they needed to have a tension-free, productive conversation about the restaurant. She had to get their working relationship back on track and, to do that, she’d have to keep her distance from him, to put space between them.

When he’d walked into her office earlier, her heart had fizzed and fumbled, stuttered, and stumbled. No man, before and after him, had ever made her feel off balance, shaky, as if she were attached to the charging pads of a defibrillator. Despite being incandescently angry with him, she’d had to grip the edge of her desk to stop herself from leaping into his arms.

His arms were where she most wanted to be. Dammit.

She couldn’t regret sleeping with him—their lovemaking had been off-the-charts wonderful and she’d enjoyed every minute out of bed too—but she knew it couldn’t happen again. Every non-professional encounter she had with him made her want more, encouraged her to throw caution to the wind, allowed him to slip a little deeper under her skin, a little further into her soul.

There was no future for them. There couldn’t be. He couldn’t see her as an equal partner, would never make her a priority, and she could never settle for anything less.

Friends and fellow professionals, colleagues. That was all they could be.

Aisha walked up to her veranda and yelped when she saw a shadow-like figure in the corner. Then, when her mouth caught up to her brain, she let out a small screech and started to kick off her heels so she could bolt away.

‘It’s me, sweetheart,’ Pasco said, not moving from his seat on the swing in the corner.

Aisha, off balance because she was only wearing one heel, slapped her hand to her chest and released a low growl. ‘You scared me, Kildare! What the hell are you doing lurking on my veranda?’

‘Waiting for you,’ Pasco stated.

Looking down, Aisha located her heel and bent down to pick it up. Standing on one foot, she put her heel back on before stepping onto her veranda. Her eyes flicked over Pasco, noticing he’d pulled on a leather bomber jacket over his shirt and that his hair looked more messy than normal. In fact, he looked exhausted and, she squinted at him in the low light, sad.

‘Everything okay, Pasco?’ she asked him as she inserted her key into the lock before pushing open the door to her cottage.

‘It’s after eleven. Do you always work so late?’ Pasco asked from a couple of steps behind her. ‘Please tell me that my idiocy today isn’t the reason you are home late.’

He looked genuinely contrite, so Aisha shook her head. ‘No, this is my life.’ Aisha dropped her laptop bag onto the dining table and watched him as he strode into her place, holding a large cooler box with ease.

‘Got any wine?’ he asked. He lifted the box with one hand. ‘I’ll trade a massive glass for lemon chicken, roasted potatoes with rosemary, roasted vegetables, and a pecan nut pie.’

Exhausted, she thought about asking him to leave, but her stomach was grumbling and she needed food. Then she looked at Pasco, really looked, and saw his tight lips, his turbulent expression, and the devastation in his eyes.

He looked both gutted and furious, upset and disheartened. Something had happened between him leaving her office and now, something that rocked his world.

‘Sit down, Pasco,’ she told him, kicking off her heels. Reaching for a bottle of red from her wine rack, she put it on the table and rooted around in a drawer to find the corkscrew. ‘Open that and pour us some. The glasses are in the cupboard above the fridge. I’m just going to change into something warmer and more comfortable.’

Without replying, Pasco reached for the wine and Aisha scampered into her bedroom to change into a pair of track pants and an oversized hoodie. She pulled thick socks onto her feet and roughly pulled her hair back into a messy tail.

Aisha sighed as she caught a glimpse of herself in the freestanding mirror in the corner of her room. She looked about sixteen, and sloppy. But this wasn’t a date. This was a meal—thank God!—some wine, and then she would send Pasco on his way.

What was he doing here anyway? Had he come to apologise?

Aisha walked back into the open-plan living area and saw that Pasco had not only poured wine, but was also in the process of unwrapping a plate of food. He tested the temperature with the back of his hand, grimaced, and stomped over to the microwave. Aisha had no problem heating food, but Pasco, picky chef that he was, despised the practice.

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