‘We should talk.’
Georgie stared at him in mute, resentful silence but she stayed put even though every instinct in her was telling her to run away as fast as possible.
‘I need to get back home.’
‘Fifteen minutes is all I ask. I return to my country in two days’ time, after I’ve sorted the last remaining legalities of the hotel purchase. The way we parted company last time... Let’s at least clear some of the air before I head back to Qaram.’
Georgie wondered what he could possibly say to her that could clear the air. But of course, even now, things would seem straightforward to him. He didn’t know of the beautiful life they had created between them. He didn’t realise that nothing was straightforward any more.
In the days and weeks and months after he’d left Georgie had gradually come to accept that he just hadn’t felt the same way about her as she had felt about him. He hadn’t seen her as ‘relationship material’, for want of a better description.
As she had tackled huge changes to her life she had never, ever foreseen, she’d looked back and assessed what she’d missed at the time, in the heat of the moment. They’d never discussed the details of their lives, never shared their surnames. They’d adopted a ‘live for the moment’ philosophy that had suited her at the time and would have worked if only she hadn’t ended up wanting so much more.
Now a few more things fell into sharp relief. The way the one-bed flat that she’d been renting when she’d first arrived in Ibiza had always been used as their base. She’d had no idea where he’d lived and he’d been adept at swerving around awkward questions. She’d assumed that he worked at one of the many hotels that lined the long strip of beach because he’d never denied it. He’d had a cool air of self-assurance that had made him seem so much more mature than his peers, but she’d just put that down to the fact that he was from another country and had been brought up differently. Although, in retrospect, those were details that had also been kept from her.
Now it made perfect sense, all those missing bits. He was a prince and she was a pauper and she wasnevergoing to be relationship material for him.
Was that what he was so keen to talk about? Did he want to justify his disappearance?
He reappeared in the middle of her agonised deliberations and she blinked. It was frustrating that she still couldn’t seem to look at him without being intensely aware of his sexual pull even though she knew that it was that damned innate magnetism he possessed that had sucked her in in the first place.
He dragged a chair over to where she had sat once again on the sofa and leant forward, forearms loosely resting on his thighs.
‘What did you tell them?’ Georgie asked flatly. ‘I don’t want any gossip circulating about me. This is a small place. People talk.’
‘I told them you were still a bit shaken, probably run off your feet preparing for this visit. I said that I blamed myself for the situation and, that being the case, I would take a corner seat and stay while you gathered yourself. Least I could do. The less fuss everyone makes, the better. I assured your boss that once you were less woozy, I would ensure that you were safely delivered back to where you live. I assure you that there will be no gossip.’
‘You were always good with words.’
‘I never lied to you.’
‘No?’
‘Perhaps I would have told you the truth, but the fact is that I never enjoyed the company of a woman the way I enjoyed yours and to have told you who I really was would have put an end to what we had. I was selfish and greedy and I wanted you for as long as possible.’
‘And then you left and didn’t spare a thought for me,’ Georgie said bitterly. ‘I suppose, given what I now know—that you’re royalty—it wouldn’t have occurred to you that I might have had feelings, that I might have been hurt at being used as a rich boy’s plaything and then discarded without a second thought.’
Abe flushed. ‘We had fun, that’s all. There was always going to be an end to it and I thought you understood that.’
Tears stung the backs of Georgie’s eyes because how differently had they viewed the situation. Had he used her? Not in his eyes, clearly, because they had just been having fun, two ships briefly crossing paths on separate journeys to other destinations.
In his case—to rule a country and run around buying hotels. In her case—to face a life that had been utterly derailed.
‘The least you could have done would have been to tell me that you were going,’ she said coldly. ‘Did you think that if you’d done the decent thing and said goodbye that I might have become annoying and clingy?’
‘I...had to leave suddenly.’ He raked his fingers through his hair and sat back.
‘How convenient. You could have texted me, but I guess that didn’t occur to you either. Why should it? It seems that you are a man who can do as he likes with the click of a finger and that included walking off without a word. I looked for you, you know. I spent ages asking around and in the end I gave up.’ She thought of Tilly, beautiful, innocent Tilly, the result of a relationship that never was.
‘I was recalled to my country because my father had had a heart attack,’ Abe said bluntly. ‘It was sudden and there was no choice in the matter. Yes, I could have texted you but there seemed little point. I had to go and I felt it better to sever ties completely, without needless post-mortems. I knew you would move on.’
As he obviously had, Georgie thought with a mixture of sadness and animosity. People moved on after brief flings. It was always harder when the heart was involved though, as hers had been.
‘Your father,’ she said quietly. ‘Did he recover?’
‘In a manner of speaking. Tell me how it is that you’ve ended up here, working as a chef in a hotel in London, when you had plans to continue with your art, to freelance as an illustrator. I know you worked in the kitchen at that hotel in Ibiza...did you suddenly develop a craving to change career course?’
Georgie stilled as the present met the past. She glanced at the clock on the wall. Time was ticking by and she had to go. He needed to know about his daughter but...not right now. She just had to work things out in her head first, work past the pain of knowing that he had abandoned her without a backwards glance.
