A line had been crossed.
The way he had touched her just then, the look in his eyes...there had been amusement and indulgence that had made her squirm with pleasure but had clearly had the opposite effect on him. This was just a bit of time out for him, she thought, whereas for her it was...
Well, what was it?
The voice in her head was more insistent now than it had been previously, and her heart began to beat at a rapid tempo. She cared for him. How had that happened? This was more than just a sexual craving for her. Somewhere along the line, the force of his personality, his intelligence and wit, curious kindness and generosity of spirit had pierced through her defences and got her feeling things she had no right to feel.
Had he sensed that?
Sophie felt a prickly, heated rush of blood to her head as the mortifying possibility that he had sensed something she herself had only now begun to figure out took shape.
And he’d retreated faster than a speeding bullet.
He had made it clear what he wanted from this...liaison. She had agreed because at the time it had seemed a simple equation: fun and adventure with no price to pay afterwards. Months of pent-up misery and anxiety had fuelled a response in her that had been easy to categorise. Very quickly, Sophie knew that she had to make certain decisions. She could retreat or else she could enjoy what they had, knowing that she would be heartbroken when it ended.
Whoever said that life was simple?
She wanted to pack as many memories as she could into the next couple of days, enough to keep her warm at night and to remind her of what it felt like to bealiveafter months of living the life of a zombie. Scott had broken through her misery, but his presence had been toxic.
Niccolo, on the other hand, inappropriate as he was when it came to any sort of forever guy, had somehow managed to go a long way to healing her.
She reckoned that might be just about the last thing he would want to hear, only slightly ahead ofI’d really like what we have to continue...ormaybe we could see where this takes us...
‘I got sunburned once,’ She carried on the conversation, her voice light and unbothered. ‘When I was ten. We went to Majorca on holiday and I forgot about the sunblock and, believe me, it’s a mistake I’ll never make again. How is Annalise? We had breakfast together and I left a few bits and pieces with her to do if she gets bored.’
She began walking away, ignoring any awkwardness and shutting down the thoughts swirling in her head. She felt him fall into step alongside her but she didn’t look at him.
‘Although,’ she continued gaily, ‘how on earth could anyone get bored on this yacht? Sun...sea... I guess all that’s missing is the sand! She might feel something of an anti-climax when we get back to London, but I have lots of things in store that Annalise and I can do together.’ She glanced sideways at him to see that he was staring ahead but no longer frowning.
‘That’s very diligent of you.’ He was smiling when he said that and she relaxed fractionally, eager to pick up the thread and run with it.
‘I’m a very diligent person.’ There was a smile in her voice now as well. ‘It’s something to do with dealing with plants,’ she confided. ‘You can’t hurry them along. You have to be patient and wait to see the results of all the effort you put in.’ She launched into describing some of the projects she had worked on before her university career had abruptly ended and was still chatting as they made their way down a stunted stairwell to a part of the yacht she had not even glimpsed in passing.
She fell silent. Somehow she had expected...she didn’t quite know what. Certainly not a boat within a boat. Belatedly she spotted two of the crew waiting in the wings, and in a daze she was ushered into the speedboat, along with two hampers and a Louis Vuitton canvas bag.
Only as the streamlined boat slid out from the bowels of the superyacht did she turn to Niccolo with an awestruck expression.
‘Really?’she asked, and he burst out laughing as he steered the boat away from its mothership, picking up confident speed across the open ocean.
‘It’s an indulgence, I admit,’ he shouted over the powerful roar of the motor, and for a while Sophie just stayed completely silent and watched the blur of scenery whipping past her as she held her face away from the spray of sea flicking up as the boat shot through the water.
There was nothing to see and yet there was everything to see. Sea and sky and the pure vastness of nature took her breath away. She’d always been way too careful to enjoy going fast in anything, from a car to the one time she had been persuaded by Scott into riding pillion on his motorbike, but this...
She’d tied her hair back and she could already feel it unravelling, whipped around by the force of the wind against her face.
The speed was an aphrodisiac...not to mention the sight of him, all bronzed, with his shirt unbuttoned and his shorts emphasising the length of his muscular legs.
She gasped as the speedboat began to slow and then the deep navy blue of the ocean gradually gave way to paler, lighter blues, then streaks of bright turquoise blending with dazzling clear green, lapping the shores of a completely deserted cove.
With a tangle of trees and shrubs and bush rising against a steep hill at the back, the cove was clearly accessible only by boat and they seemed to be the only visitors.
‘An indulgence...’ Sophie said as he killed the engine and expertly anchored the speedboat so that it was just a case of slipping over the side into warm, shallow, stupidly transparent water.
‘Haven’t done anything with it for too long,’ he admitted, helping her out and to the beach and then proceeding, in stages, to transport the hampers to dry land.
Sophie smiled and said teasingly, as she looked all around her, taking everything in, ‘That’s the problem with toys. Sooner or later they get chucked to one side.’
Niccolo grinned and saluted. ‘Yes, ma’am. That’s told me.’
