Page 49 of One Forbidden Night In Paradise (Hot Winter Escapes)

As the doors opened, he stepped aside to let her pass, scared that if he didn’t, that if he left first, she would take the lift back down and flee into the night. Because he had seen that look before. That need to hide away with your pain. Although Frida hadn’t fled so much as sleepwalked.

But back then he had been a different man. A man who was incapable and unwilling to see what was in front of him. He wasn’t that man any more. In large part thanks to the woman he was following into the living room.

‘I want to.’

‘Well, I don’t.’

Her eyes were huge and dark as if he was hurting her just by being there and that hurt more than he could have imagined. Hurt enough that he had to press his feet into the quarter sawn white oak flooring to steady himself.

Behind her, he could see a thin, pale line along the horizon and he knew that if he walked to the window and looked down, the city would look like one of those snow globes they sold for tourists. But up here it felt as though everything were still shaking.

‘This was a mistake,’ she said hoarsely. ‘All of it. It was supposed to be a one-night stand. I should have gone to a hotel. I should never have let you talk me into it.’

‘You think I talked you into this?’ He was shocked, appalled.

‘I wish I had been thinking, but I was busy pretending this was who I am, but it’s not.’

He stared at her, his heart ricocheting against his ribs. He couldn’t believe that she was the same woman who had reached for him in the moonlight. He could remember the heat in her eyes, that fierce glitter of desire. They had been lovers. Now she was looking at him as if he were her enemy.

No, not her enemy, he thought with a jolt. Her executioner.

‘Look, I get that you’re upset about what happened in the club. I am too, so maybe it would help to talk about it,’ he said, and he was surprised and relieved to hear how calm his voice sounded. But that was what she needed him to be because she was in shock, he just hadn’t realised it earlier because she had seemed so cool-headed and efficient.

‘I don’t want to talk.’ She looked away to the far side of the room and he saw a flash of something like fear cross her face. ‘I want to go to bed. On my own.’ Her voice was edged with hysteria and he could see that she was close to tears. Could almost hear her desperation to escape hammering through her veins as she toed off her shoes and edged towards the stairs. And then she was running up them lightly, disappearing into the darkness. He heard a door slam, the slight click of a lock.

He stared down at her shoes, his heart pounding. He felt suddenly exhausted, and cold, as if the falling snow had leached into his bones. But he couldn’t risk going to bed in case she sneaked out as she had before. Only this time there would be no note.

Keeping one eye on the staircase, he made his way to the kitchen. Aside from coffee he wasn’t a big fan of hot drinks, but he needed something to bring warmth back to his limbs. He made a pot of tea, remembering as he did so that night on the island when she’d found him watching the storm.

It was nature at its most explosive. Stunning and terrifying, even more so when you were out on the ocean, and yet he was more scared now than he had been that night.

He made his way back into the living room and sat down on the sofa. His eyelids felt heavy and, picking up a cushion, he hugged it closer, letting his body go limp. Except it wasn’t a cushion, it was Jemima. His arms tightened and he pulled her against him, her heartbeat washing through him, steadily like waves hitting the shoreline.

His eyes snapped open.

‘Jemima.’

The cushion was on the floor but she was standing there at the end of the sofa, still in her shimmering skirt and blouse. In the half-light, her face was pale and blurred at the edges, her pupils, saucer wide. ‘I’m sorry for what I said. You didn’t talk me into doing anything. I wanted it, wanted you, and I don’t think it was a mistake. I just wanted you to know that I didn’t mean what I said.’

‘I do know...’ He hesitated. ‘And I know that after everything I told you the other night you have no reason to think I could help.’

She was shaking her head. ‘I don’t think that.’

‘I wouldn’t blame you if you did,’ he said quietly. Now that she was here, he was desperate not to scare her away.

And she was scared as well as being upset, he realised suddenly, remembering how her eyes had darted round the room.

His feet braced against the floor.

No questions. No conversation. You don’t need to know anything about me and I don’t want to know anything about you... I want to get naked with you, now, tonight.

He could hear Jemima’s voice in his head, could still feel his reaction; that moment of wordless shock followed by a heart-pounding affirmation. Yes, and yes, and yes again.

And for a light-headed second, part of him wanted to pull her closer, kiss away the ache in her voice, but he couldn’t do that, not before he knew what or who had made Jemima both fear and seek the shadows. Not before he knew for certain that he wasn’t the reason.

‘What scared you?’

She didn’t react; it looked as though she wasn’t even breathing. He only realised he was the one holding his breath when she sat down on the other sofa.

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