‘When we went to Barbados...’ He sighed heavily, channelling his thoughts. ‘Falling into bed with you... I didn’t look beyond a straightforward situation of two people who had discovered their mutual attraction to one another, recognised it and decided to follow where it led. Under a tropical sun, things blossomed, and it was all very black and white.
‘I look back on my life and I see that it was always very black and white when it came to relationships. I knew what loss was about, and in my mind it was always associated with the emotional freefall that came from loving someone and then being let down by them. If you never loved, then you could never be let down.’
‘And what began in Barbados was going to stay in Barbados,’ Ellie said softly, remembering just how clear he had been on the rules of the game, at which point she had blithely deferred thinking abouttomorrow because todaywas too much fun.
‘Come and sit next to me,’ he murmured, patting the space beside him on the sofa. Ellie hesitantly shifted over to the spot and curled up, feet tucked underneath her, still too suspicious to go too close but already opening up to the roughened honesty of his voice and what he was saying to her.
He covered her hand with his but respected the small distance she had made to maintain between them.
‘That was the plan,’ he said gravely.
‘Until Naomi appeared and blew everything out of the water.’
‘Everything had been blown out of the water long before then,’ he mused thoughtfully. ‘I always assumed that I was immune to emotional involvement with any woman. Like I said, I lost both lost parents when I was young, but you lost a parent devoted to you. I lost parents who were devoted to one another. Money bought them freedom from any kind of conscience. They dipped in and out of our lives. They were spectators, you could say, although in Izzy’s case perhaps that would be an exaggeration. She got the brunt of their attention. For me...’
He shook his head ruefully. ‘Not so much. You’d think, that being the case, that their loss would have been felt less, but not so. It felt like questions I had yet to ask could then never be answered.’
Ellie shifted closer to him so that her knee was touching his thigh and she could feel the spread of warmth from his body, enfolding her like a safety blanket.
It struck her that there was something about him that had always made her feel safe, even when she had just been his dutiful secretary. She had always known that he had her back. When she thought about it, all the time he’d beentellingher that he didn’tdoemotional investment, he had beenshowingher that he did. And that had culminated in him trekking across the Atlantic to hold her hand and support her because he had known that she would need him, even without her having to tell him. Heknewher, just as sheknewhim.
‘I had an ill-fated relationship shortly after the death of our parents,’ he admitted heavily. ‘I would say that that was the nail in the coffin of any inclination I might have had to test the waters of emotional involvement.’
‘What happened?’
‘I sought refuge in the wrong woman. I was lost, and I foolishly thought that I needed someone to help me find my way. It was a learning curve. After that, I closed myself off, and I liked it that way. I liked knowing that I was in control of everything and everyone. No unpleasant surprises. Women came and went and there was no attachment. If any of them started thinking outside the box, well, I guess, looking back, I was pretty ruthless, but it was a ruthlessness I never questioned.’
Mesmerised by this outpouring of heartfelt admissions, Ellie could only stare at him, round-eyed.
‘I always knew the score, so when we became lovers I assumed you did as well, because you knew me as well as I knew myself. No attachments. Three years working with someone...’ He smiled wryly. ‘You were all but my wife without the ring on your finger.’
‘That’s hardly true.’ Ellie flushed and lowered her eyes.
‘Maybe not then but certainly once we became lovers.’ He stared broodingly at her, then smiled again—a lazy, rueful smile that sent a tingle racing through her. ‘I’d never felt so comfortable with anyone before. Of course, now I know why. I was in love with you, and everything was different. The lights had been switched on, only I didn’t realise it. I just knew that I wasn’t ready for things between us to end.’
‘And yet when I...when I told you how I felt...’
‘I did what I was programmed to do,’ he admitted ruefully. ‘I fled, but there was only so far I could run and for only so long. The last day and a half have been hell, and there was no way I could contemplate going to Hawaii and pretending that my life wasn’t in freefall without you in it.’
Every word he said was music to her ears. She had bared her soul and now he was baring his.
‘So,’ he concluded, reaching towards her to tangle his fingers in her hair, eyes pinned to her face. ‘I can’t live without you. I love you and I need you and I was a fool for not recognising the symptoms of love sooner. I told you that I wouldn’t expect you to sleep with me without a ring on your finger...so, will you marry me?’
‘I think...’ Ellie smiled and looked at him with all the love she was now free to express. ‘I think you know the answer to that...’
Ellie slipped her hand into James’s, looked up at him and smiled.
She couldn’t have been happier. Yet now, a mere couple of days after his proposal, she found that she was nervous as they walked towards the private function room in the five-star hotel where she would meet his assembled family.
‘You look radiant,’ he murmured, tipping her chin so that their eyes met. ‘And it’s not as though congratulations haven’t already been flying across the airwaves.’ He grinned. ‘Izzy has texted a hundred times. They can’t wait to get to know you.’
Ellie glanced down at her dress, jade-green and softly falling from thin spaghetti straps to just above her knees. She had angsted over what to wear and, concluded, with precious little time to choose, that the outfit would be fine for a lunchtime do, bearing in mind that many more would be joining them for an early supper—including, she had gathered, Max’s fiancée Mia’s sprawling family. She took a deep breath and met his reassuring grin with a smile.
‘Seems unfair that Max and Mia’s big day is just round the corner and we’ve gate-crashed it with an announcement of our engagement...’
‘We didn’t do that,’ James pointed out. ‘A certain malevolent ex did...’
He thought back to the text he had received from Naomi a couple of days ago. She hadn’t been able to resist getting in touch so that she could rub his nose in it, pleased with herself for landing him in a place she’d figured he’d loathe. It had given him huge satisfaction to inform her of the aisle he would be walking down with the woman he loved right there by his side. No need to block her number, because he knew that he wouldn’t be hearing from her again any time soon.
