Fiancee for One Night (14 page)

And Sam’s eyes opened wide, his arms pumping up and down. ‘Fith!’

She laughed, chasing the fish in the shallows even as she envied her young son his raw enthusiasm. She envied him his simple needs and pleasures. Why did it have to become so hard when you were a grown up, she wondered, when the world spun not on the turns of the planet and shades of dark or light, but on emotions that made a mockery of science and fact and good sense.

Wanting Leo was so not good sense.

Loving him made even less.

Maureen was wrong. She had to be.

The mood at dinner was jovial, the conversation flowing and fun. Only Leo seemed tense, strangely separate from the group, as if he’d already moved on to the next place, the next deal. The next woman. ‘Are you all right?’ she asked, on the way back to their bure, his hand like a vise around hers. ‘Do you want to go take a walk first?’

Hannah had taken Sam back earlier and by now he would be safely in the land of Nod. They didn’t have to rush back if he had something on his mind.

He blew out in a rush. ‘I’ll sleep on the sofa tonight,’ he said almost too quickly, as if the words had been waiting to spill out. ‘It’ll be better that way.’

And she stopped right where she was and refused to move on so he had no choice but to turn and face her. ‘You’re telling me that after three nights of the best sex of my life, on the last night we have together, you’re going to sleep on the sofa? Not a chance.’

He tried to smile. Failed miserably. ‘It’s for the best.’

‘Who says? What’s wrong, Leo? Why can’t you tell me?’

‘Believe me,’ he snorted, ‘you really don’t want to know.’

‘I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t want to know. What the hell changes tonight? The fact you don’t have to pretend anymore?’

‘You think I ever had to pretend about that?’

‘Then don’t pretend you don’t want me tonight.’ She moved closer, ran her free hand up his chest, ‘We’ve got just one night left together. We’re good together. You said that yourself. Why can’t we enjoy it?’

He grabbed her hand, pushed it away. ‘Don’t you understand? It’s for your own good!’

‘How can I believe that if you won’t tell me? What’s wrong? Is it the dreams you’re having?’

And he made a roar like a wounded animal in distress, a cry that spoke of so much pain and anguish and loss that it chilled her to the bone. ‘Just leave it,’ he said. ‘Just leave me.’

He turned and stormed off across the sand towards the beach, leaving her standing there, gutted and empty on the path.

Maybe it was better this way, she thought, as she dragged herself back to the bure, forcing herself to put on a bright face for Hannah who wasn’t taken in for a moment, she could tell, but she wasn’t about to explain it to anyone. Not when she had no idea what was happening herself.

She checked Sam, listening to his even breathing, giving thanks for the fact he was in her life, giving
thanks for the gift she’d been given, even if borne of a mistake. He was the best mistake she’d ever made.

And then she dragged bedding to the sofa, knowing from the previous night Leo was more likely to disturb her if he tried to fit onto the sofa than because of any nightmare he might have. At least she knew he would fit on the big king sized bed.

She lay there in the dark, waiting for what seemed like hours, until at last she heard his footfall on the decking outside. She cracked open her eyelids as the sliding door swooshed open and she saw his silhouette framed in the doorway, big and dark and not dangerous, like she’d always seen him, but strangely sad. He crossed the floor softly, hesitating when he got to the sofa. She could hear him at her feet, hear his troubled breathing.

Come to me,
she willed,
pick me up and carry me to bed like you have done before and make love to me.

And she heard him turn on a sigh and move away. She heard the bathroom door snick closed and she squeezed her eyes shut, wondering what he would do if she sneaked into the bed before he came back; knowing it was futile because he would straightaway head for the sofa.

He didn’t need her any more. Or he didn’t want her. What did it matter which or both it was? They both hurt like hell. They both hurt like someone had ripped out her heart and torn it to shreds and trampled on the pieces.

Could injured pride feel this bad? Could a miffed ego tear out your heart and rip it to shreds? Or had she been kidding herself and it had been Maureen who had been right all along?

Oh god, surely she hadn’t fallen in love with Leo?

And yet all along she had known it was a risk, the greater risk; had known the possibility was there, the possibility to be drawn deeper and deeper under his spell until she could not bear the thought of being without him. All along she had known he had a heart of stone and still she had managed to do the unthinkable.

She’d fallen in love with him.

She lay there in the semi-gloom, the once silvery light of the moon now a dull grey, listening to him climb into bed, listening to him toss and turn and sigh, wishing him peace, even if he couldn’t find it with her.

The scream woke him and he stilled with fear, hoping he’d imagined it. But then he heard the shouting, his father’s voice, calling his mother those horrible names he didn’t understand only to know they must be bad, and he cringed, waiting for the blow that would come at the end of his tirade. Then it came with a thump and his mother made a sound like a football when you kick it on the street and he vomited right there in his bed. He climbed out, weak and shaky, to the sound of his mother’s cries, the bitter taste of sick in his mouth.

‘Stamata,’
he cried weakly through his tears, knowing he would be in trouble for messing up his bed, knowing his mother would be angry with him, wanting her to be angry with him so that things might be normal again.
‘Stamato to tora.’
Stop it now!

And he pulled the door open and ran out, to see his father’s fist raised high over his mother lying prostrate on the floor.

‘Stamato to!’
he screamed, running across the room, lashing out at his father, young fists flying, and earning that raised fist across his jaw as his reward, but not
giving up. He couldn’t stop, he had to try to make him stop hurting his mother.

He struck out again lashing at his father, but it was his mother who cried out and it made no sense, nor the thump of a body hitting the floor and then a baby screamed somewhere, and he blinked into consciousness, shaking and wet with perspiration, and waking to his own personal nightmare.

She was lying on the floor, looking dazed, tears springing from her eyes and her hand over her mouth where he must have hit her. And Sam screaming from the next room.

And he wanted to help. He knew he should help. He should do something.

But the walls caved in around him, his muscles remained frozen. Because, oh god, he was back in his past. He was back in that mean kitchen, his father shouting, his mother screaming and a child that saw too much.

And he wanted to put his hands over his ears and block it all out.

Oh god.

What had he done?

What had he done?

S
HE
blnked up at him warily, testing her aching jaw. ‘I have to get Sam,’ she said, wondering why he just sat there like a statue, wondering if that wild look in his eyes signalled that he was still sleeping, still lost in whatever nightmare had possessed him.

‘I hit you,’ he said at last, his voice a mere rasp, his skin grey in the moonlight.

‘You didn’t mean to,’ she said, climbing to her feet. ‘You were asleep. You were tossing and—’

‘I hurt you.’

He had, but right now she was more concerned with the hurt in his eyes. With the raw, savage pain she saw there. And with reassuring her son, whose cries were escalating. ‘It was an accident. You didn’t mean it.’

‘I warned you!’

‘I have to see to Sam. Excuse me.’ She rushed around the bed to the dressing room and her distraught child, his tear streaked face giving licence for her own tears to fall. ‘Oh Sam,’ she whispered, kissing his tear stained cheek, pushing back the damp hair from his brow and clutching him tightly to her as she rocked him against her body. ‘It’s all right, baby,’ she soothed, trying to believe it. ‘It’s going to be all right.’

She heard movement outside, things bumping and
drawers being opened, but she dared not look, not until she felt her son’s body relax against her, his whimpers slowly steadying. She waited a while, just to be sure, and then she kissed his brow and laid him back down in his cot.

And then she stood there a while longer, looking down at her child, his cheek softly illuminated in the moonlight, while she wondered what to do.

What did you do when your heart was breaking for a man who didn’t want family? Who didn’t want your love?

What could you do?

‘What are you doing?’ she asked when she emerged, watching Leo stashing clothes in a bag.

‘I can’t do this. I can’t do this to you.’

‘You can’t do what to me?’

‘I don’t want to hurt you.’

‘Leo, you were in the midst of a nightmare. I got too close. You didn’t know I was there.’

He pulled open another drawer, extracted its contents. ‘No. I know who I am. I know what I am. Pack your things, we’re leaving.’

‘No. I’m not going anywhere. Not before you tell me what’s going on.’

‘I can’t do this,’ he said in his frenzied state, ‘to you and Sam.’

She sat on the bed and put a hand to her forehead, stunned, while he opened another drawer, threw out more clothes. ‘You’re not making any sense.’

‘It makes perfect sense!’

‘No! It makes no sense at all! Why are you doing this? Because of a nightmare, because you accidentally lashed out and struck me?’

He walked stiffly up the bed, his chest heaving. ‘Don’t you understand, Evelyn, or Eve, or whoever you are, if I can do that to you asleep, how much more damage can I do when I am awake?’

And despite the cold chill in his words, she stood up and faced him, because she knew him well enough by now to know he was wrong. ‘You wouldn’t hit me.’

‘You don’t know that!’ he cried, ‘Nobody can know that,’ giving her yet another hint of the anguish assailing him.

And Eve knew what she had to say; knew what she had to do; knew that she had to be brave. She moved closer, slowly, stopping before she reached him, but wanting to be close enough that he could see the truth of her words reflected on her face in the moonlight, close enough that she could pick up his hand and hold it to her chest so that he might feel her heart telling him the same message.

‘I know it, because I’ve been with you Leo. I’ve spent nights filled with passion in your bed. I’ve spent days when you made me feel more alive than I have in my entire life. And I’ve seen the way you pulled my child from the sea when you saw him fall into the surf before I did. I know you would never harm him.’

She shook her head, amazed that she was about to confess something so very, very new; so very, very precious and tender, before she had even time to pull it out and examine it for all its flaws and weaknesses in private herself.

‘Don’t you see? I know it, Leo, because—’ She sucked in air, praying for strength in order to confess her foolishness. Because hadn’t he warned her not to get involved? Hadn’t he told her enough times nothing could come of their liaison? But how else could she
reach him? How else could she make him understand? ‘Damn it, I know it because I love you.’

He looked down at her, his bleak eyes filled with some kind of terror before he shut them down, and she wondered what kind of hell she would see when he opened them again.

‘Don’t say that. You mustn’t say that.’ His words squeezed through his teeth, a cold, hard stiletto of pain that tore at her psyche, ripping into the fabric of her soul. But while it terrified her, at the same time she felt empowered. After all, what did she have left to lose? She’d already admitted the worst, she’d already laid her cards on the table. There was nothing left but to fight for this fledgling love, to defend it, and to defend her right to it.

‘Why can’t I say it, when it’s the truth? And I know it’s futile and pointless but it’s there. I love you, Leo. Get used to it.’

‘No! Saying I love you doesn’t make everything all right. Saying I love you doesn’t make it okay to beat someone.’

But he hadn’t—

And suddenly a rush of cold drenching fear flooded down her spine along with the realisation that he wasn’t talking about what had just taken place in this room. And whatever he had witnessed, it was violent and brutal and had scarred him deeply. ‘What happened to you to make you believe yourself capable of these things? What horrors were you subjected to that won’t let you rest at night?’

‘The nightmares are a warning,’ he said. ‘A warning not to let this happen, and I won’t. Not if it means hurting you and Sam.’

‘But Leo—’

‘Pack your things,’ he said simply, sounding defeated. ‘I’m taking you home.’

Melbourne was doing what it knew best, she thought as they touched down, offering up a bit of everything, the runway still damp from the latest shower, a bit of wind to tinker with the wings and liven up the landing and the sun peeping out behind a gilt edged cloud.

But it was so good to be home.

He insisted on driving her—or rather, having his driver drive them—and she wondered why he bothered coming along if he was going to be so glum and morose, unless it was so he could be sure she was gone.

And then they were there. At her house she had until now affectionately referred to as the hovel and never would again, because it was a home, a real home and it was hers and Sam’s and filled with love and she was proud of it.

‘Let me help you out,’ Leo said and she wanted to tell him there was no need, that the driver would help unload and that she could manage, but there were bags and bags and a child seat and a sleeping Sam to carry inside, and it would have been churlish to refuse, and so she let him help.

Except what was she supposed to do with a billionaire in her house?

She had Sam on her hip, heavy with sleep, head lolling and clearly needing his cot while Leo deposited the last of her bags and her car seat, looking around him, looking like the world had suddenly been shrink wrapped and was too small for him. What on earth would he think of her tiny house and eclectic furniture after his posh hotels and private jet?

‘Thank you,’ she said, her heart heavy, not wanting to say goodbye but not wanting to delay the inevitable as clearly he looked for an exit. ‘For everything.’

‘It wouldn’t work,’ he offered, with a thumb to the place he knew he’d hurt her. ‘It couldn’t.’

She leaned into his touch, trying to hold it for as long as she possibly could, trying to imprint this very last touch on her memory. ‘You don’t know that,’ she said. ‘And now you’ll never know.’

‘There are things—’ he started, before shaking his head, his eyes sad. ‘It doesn’t matter. I know there is no way…’

‘You know nothing,’ she said, pulling away, stronger now for simply being home, by being back in her own environment, with her own bookshelves and ancient sofa and even her own faded rugs. ‘But I do. I know how you’ll end up if you walk out that door, if you turn your back on me and my love.

‘You’ll be like that old man in the picture in your suite, the old man sitting hunched and all alone on the park bench, staring out over the river and wondering whether he should have taken a chance, whether he should have taken that risk rather than playing it safe, rather than ending up all alone.

‘You will be that man, Leo.’

He looked at her, his eyes bleak, his jaw set. He lifted a hand, put it one last time to Sam’s head.

‘Goodbye, Evelyn.’