Читать книгу Mills & Boon Showcase - Christy McKellen - Страница 10

CHAPTER FOUR

HE SAID SHE showed her emotions on her face? She didn’t need a PhD in psychology to read his, either. It was only too apparent he was just buying time before spilling the words he knew she wouldn’t want to hear.

For an interminable moment he said nothing. Shifted his weight from foot to foot. Then he uttered just one drawn-out word. ‘Well...’

He didn’t need to say anything else.

Sandy swallowed hard against the sudden, unexpected shaft of hurt. Forced her voice to sound casual, light-hearted. ‘Hey, I was joking, but...but you’re serious. You really don’t want me around, do you?’

She pushed the rain-damp hair away from her face with fingers that weren’t quite steady. Gripped the edge of the countertop hard, willing the trembling to stop.

When he finally spoke his face was impassive, his voice schooled, his eyes shuttered. ‘You’re right. I don’t think it’s a great idea.’

She couldn’t have felt worse if he’d slapped her. She fought the flush of humiliation that burned her cheeks. Forced herself to meet his gaze without flinching. ‘Why? Because we dated when we were kids?’

‘As soon as people make the connection that you’re my old girlfriend there’ll be gossip, speculation. I don’t want that.’

She swallowed hard against a suddenly dry throat, forced the words out. ‘Because of your...because of Jodi?’

‘That too.’

The counter was a barrier between them but he was close. Touching distance close. So close she could smell the salty, clean scent of him—suddenly heart-achingly familiar. After their youthful making out sessions all those years ago she had relished the smell of him on her, his skin on her skin, his mouth on her mouth. Hadn’t wanted ever to shower it away.

‘But...mainly because of me.’

His words were so quiet she had to strain to hear them over the noise of the rain on the metal roof above.

Bewildered, she shook her head. ‘Because of you? I don’t get it.’

‘Because things are different, Sandy. It isn’t only the town that’s changed.’

His voice was even. Too even. She sensed it was a struggle for him to keep it under control.

He turned his broad shoulders so he looked past her and through the shop window, into the distance towards the bay as he spoke. ‘Did Kate tell you everything about the fire that killed Jodi and my son, Liam?’

‘No.’ Sandy shook her head, suddenly dreading what she might hear. Not sure she could cope with it. Her knees felt suddenly shaky, and she leaned against the countertop for support.

Ben turned back to her and she gasped at the anguish he made no effort to mask.

‘He was only a baby, Sandy, not even a year old. I couldn’t save them. I was in the volunteer fire service and I was off fighting a blaze somewhere else. Everything was tinder-dry from years of drought. We thought Dolphin Bay was safe, but the wind turned. Those big gum trees near the guesthouse caught alight. And then the building. The guests got out. But...but not...’ His head dropped as his words faltered.

He’d said before that he didn’t want to talk about his tragedy—now it was obvious he couldn’t find any more words. With a sudden aching realisation she knew it would never get easier for him.

‘Don’t,’ she murmured, feeling beyond terrible that she’d forced him to relive those unbearable moments. She put her hand up to halt him, maybe to touch him, then let it drop again. ‘You don’t have to tell me any more.’

Big raindrops sat on his eyelashes like tears. She ached to wipe them away. To do something, anything, to comfort him.

But he’d just said he didn’t want her here in town.

He raised his head to face her again. ‘I lost everything that day,’ he said, his eyes bleak. ‘I have nothing to give you.’

She swallowed hard, glanced again at the scars on his hands, imagined him desperately trying to reach his wife and child in the burning guesthouse before it was too late. She realised there were scars where she couldn’t see them. Worse scars than the visible ones.

‘I’m not asking anything of you, Ben. Just maybe to be...to be friends.’

She couldn’t stop her voice from breaking—was glad the rain meant they had the bookshop all to themselves. That no one could overhear their conversation.

He turned his tortured gaze full on to her and she flinched before it.

The words were torn from him. ‘Friends? Can you really be “just friends” with someone you once loved?’

She picked up a shiny hardback from the pile to the left of her on the counter, put it back without registering the title. Then she turned back to face him. Took a deep breath. ‘Was it really love? We were just kids.’

‘It was for me,’ he said, his voice gruff and very serious, his hands clenched tightly by his sides. ‘It hurt that you never answered my letters, never got in touch.’

‘It hurt me that you never wrote like you said you would,’ she breathed, remembering as if it were yesterday the anguish of his rejection. Oh, yes, it had been love for her too.

But a small voice deep inside whispered that perhaps she had got over him faster than he had got over her. She’d never forgotten him but she’d moved on, and the memories of her first serious crush had become fainter and fainter. Sometimes it had seemed as though Ben and the times she’d had with him at Dolphin Bay had been a kind of dream.

She hadn’t fully appreciated then what was apparent now—Ben wasn’t a player, like Jason or her father. When he loved, he loved for keeps. In the intervening years she’d been attracted to men who reminded her of him and been bitterly disappointed when they fell short. She could see now there was only one man like Ben.

They both spoke at the same time.

‘Why—?’

‘Why—?’

Then answered at the same time.

‘My father—’

‘Your father—’

Sandy gave a short nervous laugh. ‘And my mother, too,’ she added, turning away from him, looking down at a display of mini-books of inspirational thoughts, shuffling them backwards and forwards. ‘She told me not to chase after you when you were so obviously not interested. Even my sister, Lizzie, got fed up with me crying over you and told me to get over it and move on.’

‘My dad said the same thing about you. That you had your own life in the city. That you wouldn’t give me a thought when you were back in the bright lights. That we were too young, anyway.’ He snorted. ‘Too young. He and my mother got married when they were only a year older than I was then.’

She looked up to face him. ‘I phoned the guesthouse, you know, but your father answered. I was too chicken to speak to him, though I suspect he knew it was me. He told me not to call again.’

‘He never said.’

Sandy could hear the beating of her own heart over the sound of the rain on the roof. ‘We were young. Maybe too young to doubt them—or defy them.’

An awkward silence—a silence choked by the echoes of words unspoken, of kisses unfulfilled—fell between them until finally she knew she had to be the one to break it.

‘I wonder what would have happened if we had—’

‘Don’t go there, Sandy,’ he said.

She took a step back from his sudden vehemence, banging her hip on the wooden fin of a carved dolphin. But she scarcely felt the pain.

‘Never torture yourself with what if? and if only,’ he continued. ‘Remember what you said? Water under the bridge.’

‘It...it was a long time ago.’

She didn’t know what else she could say. Couldn’t face thinking of the ‘what ifs?’ Ben must have struggled with after the fire.

While he was recalling anguish and irredeemable loss, she was desperately fighting off the memories of how much fun they’d had together all those years ago.

She’d been so serious, so strait-laced, so under her father’s thumb. For heaven’s sake, she’d been old enough to vote but had never stayed out after midnight. Ben had helped her lighten up, take risks—be reckless, even. All the time knowing he’d be there for her if she stumbled.

He hadn’t been a bad boy by any means, but he’d been an exciting boy—an irreverent boy who’d thumbed his nose at her father’s old-fashioned edicts and made her question the ways she’d taken for granted. So many times she’d snuck out to meet him after dark, her heart thundering with both fear of what would happen if she were caught and anticipation of being alone with him.

How good it had felt when he’d kissed her—kissed her at any opportunity when they could be by themselves. How his kisses, his caresses, had stirred her body, awakening yearnings she hadn’t known she was capable of.

Yearnings she’d never felt as strongly since. Not even for Jason.

Saying no to going all the way with Ben that summer was one of the real regrets of her life. Losing her virginity to him would have been an unforgettable experience. How could it not have been when their passion had been so strong?

She couldn’t help remembering their last kiss—with her father about to drag her into the car—fired by unfulfilled passion and made more poignant in retrospect because she’d had no idea that it would be her last kiss from Ben.

Did he remember it too?

She searched his face, but he seemed immersed in his own dark thoughts.

Wearily, she wiped her hand over her forehead as if she could conjure up answers. Why had those kisses been printed so indelibly on her memory? Unleashed passion? Hormones? Pheromones? Was it the magic of first love? Or was it a unique power that came only from Ben?

Ben who had grown into this intense, unreadable, tormented man whom she could not even pretend to know any more.

The rain continued to fall. It muffled the sound of the cars swishing by outside the bookshop, made it seem as if they were in their own world, cocooned by their memories from the reality of everyday life in Dolphin Bay. From all that had happened in the twelve years since they’d last met.

Ben cleared his throat, leaned a little closer to her over the barrier of the counter.

‘I’m glad you told me you never got my letters, that you tried to phone,’ he said, his voice gruff. ‘I never understood how you could just walk away from what we had.’

‘Me too. I never understood how you didn’t want to see me again, I mean.’

She thought of the tears she’d wept into her pillow all those years ago. How abandoned she’d felt. How achingly lonely. Even the agony of Jason’s betrayal hadn’t come near it.

Then she forced her thoughts to return to today. To Ben’s insistence that he didn’t want her hanging around Dolphin Bay, even to help his injured aunt at a time of real need for the old lady.

It was beyond hurtful.

Consciously, she straightened her shoulders. She forced a brave, unconcerned edge to her voice. ‘But now we know the wrong my father did maybe we can forget old hurts and...and feel some kind of closure.’

‘Closure?’ Ben stared at her. ‘What kind of psychobabble is that?’

Psychobabble? She felt rebuffed by his response. She’d actually thought ‘closure’ was a very well-chosen word. Under the circumstances.

‘What I mean is...maybe we can try to be friends? Forgive the past. Forget there was anything else between us?’

She was lying. Oh, how she was lying.

While her mind dictated emotion-free words like ‘closure’ and ‘friends’ her body was shouting out that she found him every bit as desirable as she had twelve years ago. More so.

Just months ago—when she’d still had a job—she’d worked on a campaign for a hot teen surf clothing label. Ben at nineteen would have been perfectly cast in the lead male role, surrounded by adoring bikini-clad girls.

Now, Ben at thirty-one could star as a hunky action man in any number of very grown-up commercials. His face was only improved by his cropped hair, the deep tan, the slight crinkles around his eyes and that intriguing scar on his mouth. His damp shirt moulded to a muscled chest and powerful shoulders and arms.

Now they were both adults. Experienced adults. She’d been the world’s most inexperienced eighteen-year-old. What would she feel if she kissed him now? A shudder ran deep inside her. There would be no stopping at kisses, that was for sure.

‘You may be able to forget we were more than friends but I can’t,’ he said hoarsely. ‘I still find you very attractive.’

So he felt it too.

Something so powerful that twelve years had done nothing to erode it.

Her heart did that flippy thing again, over and over, stealing her breath, her composure. Before she could stutter out something in response he continued.

‘That’s why I don’t want you in Dolphin Bay.’

She gasped at his bluntness.

‘I don’t mean to sound rude,’ he said. ‘I...I just can’t deal with having you around.’

What could she say in response? For all her skill as an award-winning copywriter, she couldn’t find the right words in the face of such raw anguish. All she could do was nod.

That vein throbbed at his temple. ‘I don’t want to be reminded of what it was like to...to have feelings for someone when I can’t...don’t want to ever feel like that again.’

The pain behind his confession made her catch her breath in another gasp. It overwhelmed the brief flash of pleasure she’d felt that he still found her attractive. And it hurt that he was so pointedly rejecting her.

‘Right,’ she said.

Such an inadequate word. Woefully inadequate.

‘Right,’ she repeated. She cleared her throat. Looked anywhere but at him. ‘I hear what you’re saying. Loud and clear.’

‘I’m sorry, I—’

She put up her hand in a halt sign. ‘Don’t be. I...I appreciate your honesty.’

Her heart went out to him. Not in pity but in empathy. She had known pain. Not the kind of agony he’d endured, but pain just the same. Her parents’ divorce. Jason’s callous dumping. Betrayal by the friends who’d chosen to be on Jason’s side in the break-up and had accepted invitations to today’s wedding of the year at St Mark’s, Darling Point, the Sydney church famed for society weddings.

But the philosophy she’d evolved in those years when she’d been fighting her father’s blockade on letting her lead a normal teenage life had been to refuse to let hurt and disappointment hold her back for long. She now firmly believed that good things were always around the corner. That light always followed darkness. But you had to take steps to invite that light into your life. As she had in planning to leave all the reminders of her life with Jason behind her.

Ben had suffered a tragedy she could not even begin to imagine. Would he ever be able to move out of the shadows?

‘Honesty is best all round,’ he said, the jagged edge to his voice giving a terrible sincerity to the cliché.

She gritted her teeth against the thought of all Ben had endured since they’d last met, the damage it had done to him. And yet...

From what she remembered of sweet-faced Jodi Hart, she couldn’t imagine she would want to see the husband she’d loved wrapping himself in a shroud of grief and self-blame, not allowing himself ever again to feel happiness or love.

But it was not for her to make that judgement. She, too, belonged to Ben’s yesterday, and that was where he seemed determined to keep her. He did not want to be part of her tomorrow in any way.

If only she could stop wondering if the magic would still be there for them...if they could both overcome past hurts enough to try.

She had to force herself not to sigh out loud. The attraction she felt for him was still there, would never go away. It was a longing so powerful it hurt.

‘Now I know where I stand,’ she said, summoning the strength to make her voice sound normal.

He was right. It was best to get it up-front. Ben was not for her. Not any more. The barriers he had up against her were so entrenched they were almost visible.

But in spite of it all she refused to regret her impulsive decision to return to Dolphin Bay. It was healing to meet up with Ben and discover that he hadn’t, after all, heartlessly ditched her all those years ago. Coming after the Jason fiasco, that revelation was a great boost to her self-esteem.

She forced a smile. ‘That’s sorted, then. Let’s get back on track. Tell me more about Bay Books. I’m going to be the best darn temporary manager you’ll ever see.’

‘So long as you know it’s just that. Temporary.’

She nodded. She could do this. After all, she loved reading and she loved books—e-books, audiobooks, but especially the real thing. Added to that, the experience of looking after the bookshop might help her snag the candle store franchise. Maybe her reckless promise to Ida might turn out to benefit herself as much as Ben’s great-aunt.

Yes, making that swift exit off the highway this morning had definitely been a good idea. But in five days she would get back into her green Beetle and put Dolphin Bay and Ben Morgan behind her again.

Five days of wanting Ben but knowing it could never be.

Five days to eradicate the yearning, once and for all.

But the cup-half-full part of her bobbed irrepressibly to the surface. There was one other way to look at it: five days to convince him they should be friends again. And after that who knew?