Page 56 of One Forbidden Night In Paradise (Hot Winter Escapes)

Can’t wait to see you. The new and the old you. The unstoppable Jemima Friday. xxx

Her heart cartwheeled in her chest. She had told herself that she and Chase couldn’t survive in real life but now here was Holly telling her that she was unstoppable. And she was. But she wanted Chase there by her side.

She felt her eyes blur with tears. Experience had taught her to assume that she was only capable of loving irreparably damaged men, and so she had simply refused to accept that loving Chase was an option. That he was different and she was different with him. She had held onto her first impressions like a dog with a bone and it didn’t matter that she had lost him and pushed him away, she knew that her love for him was never going anywhere.

Except love wasn’t a big enough word for the feeling that now overwhelmed her. A feeling that made everything she had ever called love before feel insipid and colourless in comparison because loving Chase was not a feeling. It was an imperative. He was up there with oxygen and water and food and shelter.

Without him she couldn’t survive.

Only she had been so scared that it might not work that she had sabotaged it intentionally.

Her phone alarm chimed again, and, looking down at the time on the screen, she felt her pulse quicken. How could it be so late? Her flight was in less than an hour. She swiped onto her list of contacts, and scrolled down, picked a number.

Somewhere on the island, a phone was ringing. Her breath caught as a man’s voice answered.

‘Sam,’ she said quickly. ‘It’s Jemima. Jemima Friday—you gave me a lift from the airport. I was wondering if you could come and pick me up. I’m in a bit of a hurry.’

Waiting for Sam to arrive was agonising. She couldn’t stay still and in the end she had to leave the house and walk up and down the beach to stop herself from screaming. Finally she heard the sound of his car.

She ran back to the house, darting into her bedroom to get her shoes.

The door was open but Sam knocked on it anyway and she felt a rush of relief that he was there.

‘I’ll be there in two seconds. I know that there’s a speed limit on the island but I really need you to drive as fast as you can because I need to get to the harbour.’

‘Why do you need to go there?’

She froze, then turned, her heart in her mouth. It wasn’t Sam standing in the doorway, but Chase.

Blood was rushing to her head. She felt as if she were floating. ‘What are you doing here? I thought you were on the boat.’

‘I was. We found a cannon yesterday just before the light went. It’s beautiful, hardly a nick on it. They’re going back down this morning.’

‘Why aren’t you with them?’

Chase stared at her, his heart filling his throat.

‘Because I didn’t want to be there. Not without you.’ Beneath her glasses, her grey eyes were wide and stunned. ‘I know you don’t believe me.’ He took a deep breath. ‘And I know you don’t love me and you think I don’t love you and I can understand why you would think that. Why you would think it was just words. But it’s not.’

He gritted his teeth against the tears building in his throat. ‘After Frida, I was so scared of loving again, that’s why I didn’t accept what I was feeling. But I love you, Jemima. That’s why I want to come to England with you. Why I had to come here today. I don’t want to be anywhere you’re not and I know I didn’t make that clear yesterday. I said too little, and I know it’s too late but I’m not your father. I couldn’t just let you leave. I had to come after you.’

Jemima felt as if her heart were about to burst. ‘It’s not late.’ She was shaking her head. ‘Not for me. Yesterday, I panicked. I’ve made so many mistakes in my life and I couldn’t bear for you to be one of them. I thought that it would be better to remember all this, remember you, like a beautiful dream rather than try and make it real. But then you went and I couldn’t breathe.’

They both moved as one, reaching for another, hands touching, gripping, tightening around each other. She felt Chase pull her closer. ‘I shouldn’t have left.’

Her hands tightened in his shirt. ‘I shouldn’t have pushed you away. I was just so scared of losing you.’

Leaning forward, he rested his forehead against hers. ‘That doesn’t make any sense.’

‘I know.’ She started to laugh, and then, quite suddenly, she was crying.

‘We make sense, Jemima. You and me,’ he said softly.

She reached up and touched his face. ‘Perfect sense.’

Heart pounding with relief and gratitude, he lowered his mouth and kissed her. Finally, they broke apart. ‘Why were you going to the harbour?’

Her face softened and he watched with delight as a blush spread across her cheeks. ‘I was going to hire a boat so that I could go and look for you.’

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