“If things are going badly now the last thing he needs to do is put off donors.”
“He’s not taking your money?” She bites her lip. “Would you let me talk to him? Please? The sanctuary’s just barely keeping its head above water, Chance. He needs all the help he can get.”
“Oh, there’s no expiration date on my help.” I reach into my wallet to pay for the beer. Mariam shakes her head. “Mariam, I’m paying for my drink.”
“I’m not the one who needs your money,” she says fiercely. I warm to her a little more. Perhaps I’m not the walking wallet after all.
“Hey, Madison!” A voice calls from behind me. I turn around to see Harry Friars, one of the younger men from the conference, waving me over in his board shorts. “We’re hiring out a speedboat – care to join?”
I don’t doubt Harry grew up riding speedboats the way the rest of us rode pushbikes. But he looks more than a little buzzed, and knowing him I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s been swigging champagne since breakfast.
“Maybe later,” I say. “I’m going for a swim.”
That’s all I want right now. To feel the cool sting of the ocean as I chew over my day’s failures alone. I bid Mariam goodbye – at least that’s one of the Jacobs family who doesn’t hate my guts – and head off to grab my swimming trunks from the hotel.
CHAPTER NINE
Zara
I’m far, far out beyond where the waves break. Beyond where Mariam’s customers can waggle their empty cups at me or send their half-eaten plates back. Beyond where my Dad and his unspoken troubles can eat at my heart. Most especially, beyond where Chance Madison can touch me at all.
At least, that’s what I tell myself. As long as I stay out here, lying on my surfboard with my face blinded by the sun’s glare, rocked by the mighty swell of the waves, he’ll never touch me again.
My limbs ache pleasantly from my recent efforts. There’s nothing like the feeling of catching a wave, feeling the board take flight beneath your feet. The adrenaline’s enough to drive every care from your mind.
That’s what I tell myself.
I stare into the sun, because when I close my eyes I see Chance’s face. His perfect, rugged face with its sculpted jaw half-hidden under that cropped beard I want to drag my fingernails through. The saltwater dries on my lips, leaving them itching for the touch of a mouth I haven’t forgotten after all this time. What the hell is wrong with me?
I bet he isn’t thinking about me at all. He didn’t even come here looking for me, but my goddamn father. That’s how much I mean to Chance Madison.
I roll off the surfboard with a groan and drench myself in the ocean again. The water’s cool out this deep, and the shock of it brings me back to my senses. I hear birds calling in the air. The thrum of a speedboat not too far away. The chatter and shriek of kids playing in the surf along the shore.
I’m about to start sculling back towards the beach when I realise why I’ve been out here so long. It’s not because I’m afraid to face Mariam – this isn’t the first time I’ve ditched her out on a shift, after all. It’s not as if she’ll fire me. Dad would kill her.
It’s because I’m afraid Chance will still be there, sitting in the Snack Shack, waiting for me with his gorgeous dark eyes shaded against the sun.
What exactly would I say to him? What do I want him to say?
What will I do if he’s not there? Would that be better?
For god’s sake, Zara, get a grip on yourself. At most he’s only going to be here for a week or two. You’ve still got the same old problem – he’s in Mayhew. Well, London now, most likely. And you’re in Malaysia.
I love Moon Beach. It has everything I need. That’s what I tell myself.
With a frustrated groan, I pull myself back onto the surfboard and lie out again. My mind is churning, and there’s another feeling deep inside me that I don’t even want to think about hard enough to put a name to. A hot, sweet, aching feeling that starts up every time the image of Chance’s face swims back before my eyes, or the new wide set of his shoulders, or the strong, thick grasp of his hands.
I’m trying to tell myself that I don’t want to know what it would be like to feel those hands on my body again, and I’m failing – badly.
That’s the thought I’m lost in when I realise one of the noises from the beach has got a lot louder than it should.
The low, throaty growl of a speedboat is suddenly roaring in my ears. I sit up on my board and see it, still some metres away but revving at full throttle, and leaping erratically this way and that in the water. At this rate whoever’s driving it is going to end up going overboard. That’s what you get when you’re a young, crazy rich kid with more money than sense. It wouldn’t be the first motorboat accident we’ve seen on Moon Beach.
I dip my hands into the water and start sculling away. I want to put some distance between myself and the idiots driving this thing – a pair of young men, whooping and waving their arms in the air. They’ve got no idea what they’re doing, that much is obvious. There’s no way I can outswim that thing if they should come closer.
A bottle sails up into the air behind them and lands in the water a few metres away.
“Fuck!” wails Idiot Number One. “My beer!”
Laughing, he steers the boat in a wide circle to go retrieve it. I really don’t like the look of this now – it’s brought them much too close to me. I give them a wave to alert their attention, but if they see me, they don’t acknowledge it. The boat skives back and forth, still skimming the waves much too quickly, as Idiot One attempts to steer it and grab his beer out of the water at the same time.
Then the inevitable happens, and he catapults over the side of the boat and lands in the water, kicking and spluttering.
Then the not-so-inevitable happens, and instead of killing the engine Idiot Number Two grabs the wheel of a boat he clearly doesn’t know how to drive, and kicks everything up a notch.
It all happens so fast I only understand what happens afterwards.
The boat spins in a circle so tight it almost capsizes. The man in the water shrieks as it narrowly misses running him down. The man on the boat is shrieking too, as he wrestles with controls he doesn’t understand, but he doesn’t kill the engine – he kicks it up faster.
And it comes straight for me.
I dive from my board as the boat smashes into it, cracking it down the middle with a splintering thud that I can feel in my heart.
I feel a heavy impact catch my on the right thigh, and then I’m spinning through the water. I don’t know where the surface is. I don’t know where my arms are, my legs. I can’t feel anything except the burn of water in my lungs. My eyes blur through a turquoise chaos. I’m drowning. I see the boat roll overhead and I kick back away from it to avoid cracking my head open, but my legs barely work.
Then I break the surface, choking. I gasp and no air enters my burning chest. I cough up saltwater. My throat blisters with pain. The sun scalds my eyes. I flail around for something to grab hold of before I sink under again, and I come up against my board.
Or rather, a chunk of it.
I cling and float, and suddenly realise there’s blood in the water. I suddenly understand why I’m barely keeping my head in the air. With one arm clinging desperately to the chunk of my beloved surfboard, I inspect my body. I’ve heard terrifying stories – who hasn’t? – and in my confusion and shock I wonder for a moment if my leg’s been ripped off by a shark.
Two arms – check. Two legs. Stomach intact. My fingers run up my right thigh and jerk back from a sudden lance of burning pain.
Ok. I can handle this. It’s not as bad as I thought. I try kicking my right leg and it hurts so much my vision temporarily blacks out.
Fuck me, I’m going to drown out here.
I look around for the speedboat. It’s a long way off, and the guy has finally worked out how to kill the engine. I kick my left leg and stumble through the water towards it. It feels like it’s a long
way away. Out of the corner of my eye I catch sight of the guy who fell out of the boat into the water. He’s swimming strongly, heading for the shore.
“Help me!” I shout. The effort pushes my head under the water again. When I emerge, spluttering, he hasn’t turned around.
I tread water for a minute, collecting my breath, considering my options. The ocean that only a moment ago seemed like my peace and tranquillity has suddenly become a deadly enemy. I need to get out of the water, fast, before shock sets in. The bastard swimming for shore isn’t going to turn back and help me. The boat is out in deeper water, and the drunk idiot driving it doesn’t look like he knows first aid.
I’ll have to swim it myself.
I press down on the wound in my leg with one hand, grit my teeth against the pain and start kicking. It hurts, but not as much as before. I don’t know if it’s the shock setting in or the water numbing me, but it helps. I’m moving. I can do this. All I have to do is get close enough to shore to signal for help from someone who’s not running away or drunk, and…
And there’s a figure swimming through the water towards me. A dark blonde head, darker still in the water, and a strong pair of arms that eat the distance between us quicker that my spinning head can comprehend.
I stop kicking and use my remaining strength to cling onto my board while I wait for Chance to reach me. The water around me turns pink, then red with my blood. Now that I’ve stopped kicking, the pain in my leg is back again. It’s almost more than I can do to keep my head above water.
“They smashed my surfboard,” I tell him the minute he reaches me. My teeth are chattering, even though I know the water can’t be all that cold.
“Christ, Zara, just hold on to me,” he commands me. I let go of the board and instantly sink under. Chance’s arms wrap around me and pull me back to the surface. He puts my arm around his neck and lays my head on his shoulder. His body feels hard and tight in the water. I note the way his muscles move with fuzzy astonishment.
“You’re really strong,” I murmur. “Did you always swim this well?”
“That’s right, keep talking,” he says, cutting through the water with a strong backstroke. He obviously knows his lifesaving skills. “Tell me about your board, Zara. What model is it?”
“I don’t wanna talk to you,” I complain blearily. It’s getting hard to think. “I wish you weren’t even here. You don’t get to hear ‘bout my surfing. You don’t get to hear ‘bout nothing.”
“That’s ok. You tell me about anything. Tell me about your job. How’s working for your sister?”
“Screw you, Chance. What you want to know for? Stay outta my life!” My lips are numb now. It’s hard to form the words. Even harder to think about what to say. I know I’m angry with him, angrier than I’ve ever been with anyone in my life, but right now I can’t remember why.
Chance is standing in the water now, not swimming any longer, and he’s carrying me through the shallows with one arm under my legs and the other holding me close against his chest.
“Put me down!” I shout, with all the strength I can muster. “You think you can just carry me off into the sunset? You left my board out there!”
“Damn it, woman,” he growls through gritted teeth. “I swear if I wasn’t saving your life I’d throw you down on the sand and spank you. I am not going back out there for your half a surfboard.”
We reach the Snack Shack and he shoulders his way inside, taking care not to bump me on the doorway. Mariam lets out a scream when she sees us.
“Look what you’ve done,” I mumble, as Chance lowers me into a chair. “Blood all over the floor. Who’s going to mop it up? You, Mr Big Shot?”
“Get me a tea towel,” he orders. Mariam throws over a clean one and runs off to find the first aid kit while Chance kneels in front of me, pressing the tea towel into the deep gash on my thigh.
I let my forehead sink forwards until it’s knocking against his. “Chance, I… I don’t feel too good.”
“I know, princess. But you’re safe now. You’ll feel better soon. And you were amazing out there.”
He gently strokes the hair back from my face. I open my eyes and find them looking into his. A burst of electricity sizzles its way through the haze in my brain.
This is where I ought to be. This is where we should have been all along. Chance and I, fighting the world together. Nothing has ever felt so right as this.
Then an immense shiver racks my body and the moment’s passed. Chance rubs his hand over my arm. “Mariam! Grab her a towel!”
A warm, fluffy towel descends on my shoulders. Mariam rubs me vigorously, bringing some heat back into my body. “It’s a bad cut,” she says. “We’ll bandage you up now, but we’ll have to take you to hospital.”
“I’ll call a taxi,” says Chance. He takes my hand and presses it into the cloth on my leg. “Keep pressure here.”
“I know what to do,” I snap. Now that my mind’s warming up, I’m starting to remember why having Chance around is a bad idea. “I’ll be fine, Mariam. I don’t need a hospital. I certainly don’t need two of you fussing over me.”
“No arguing,” says Chance sternly. “That accident wasn’t your fault, but you could still have died out there. Let’s get you checked out.”
“Don’t pretend like you would care whether I lived or died, Chance.”
Mariam sucks in a breath. “She’s in shock,” she says. Chance is standing with his phone in his hand, a number half-dialled into it. He looks at me with an unfathomable expression in his dark eyes. I know – I hope – I must’ve hurt him, but he’s not showing it.
“Let me call you that taxi,” he says, and steps outside.
CHAPTER TEN
Chance
I leave my contact details with Mariam, but I doubt I’ll hear from the Jacobs family again. Perhaps I was wrong to go in the way I did. It was too sudden, too unexpected. I shouldn’t have assumed Zara would have been thinking about me all these years the way I’ve been thinking about her. I wasn’t prepared to be the shock to her that I was.
I miscalculated. Next time, I’ll be better prepared. And now that I know the effect she has on me, I’ll be prepared for that, too.
Part of me was hoping that seeing her again would be enough to put an end to it. For ten years now every woman I’ve met – and there’s no shortage of beautiful women when you’ve been as successful as I have – has looked like a poor imitation of what a woman ought to be.
I can afford the very best in life. My cars, my houses, my food, my wine. The only thing that’s missing is the perfect woman.
You see, I already know what it’s like to have her. I can’t persuade myself to settle for second best. I’ve done my best to drown myself in everything the opposite sex has to offer… but that blind passion I knew for Zara? The fire she awoke in me with every touch?
I’d persuaded myself that it was nothing more than a dream. The naivety of my youth.
And yet the instant I found myself in Malaysia there I was, setting a trap for my own heart. I’ve seen her again and I know it’s real. Everything I used to dream about. The body I’ve spent aching nights imagining in my arms again. The eyes that flash with blue rage and slay me. She’s uncontainable, unimaginable – unreachable.
I have to have her again. I don’t yet know how, but the cogs of my mind are turning. It’s difficult to navigate myself a collision course with Planet Zara when even the thought of it sets my cock raging fit to burst inside my trousers, but I’m doing my best. The first class lounge of Malaysia Air is no place to take care of that particular need.
“Do you have everything you need, sir?” asks the pretty air hostess. She bends towards me with an all-too-familiar look in her eyes, her arms angled delicately inwards to make the most of her cleavage.
Sometimes it feels like every woman in the world is ready to throw themselves at the famous billionaire. Too bad they’ve all bored me from the beginning. I know what real passion tastes like, and now I
know it wasn’t a dream…
“Just the wi-fi password,” I say, giving her a cold smile. She saunters off, jiggling her hips a little. That’s the kind of woman James used to urge me to eat up for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Until Clarissa dropped into his lap and screwed his head on the right way round. Now he eats every meal out of the palm of her hand. And loves it.
I was as shocked as anyone when my playboy brother decided to come good and settle down. Not least because he’d managed to achieve the one dream I’d always held most dear – without even trying. Typical James.
Now, I spend as much time as I can stand with James and Clarissa and their beautiful baby girl. But it’s like looking in at a cosy family scene through a cold glass window. They’ve got their lives together and as much as they try to include me, I’m on the outside, looking in.
I want what James has. That’s all I’ve ever wanted. My own girl at home. A child who looks like the two of us. The security of a future stretching ahead with the pair of us in it and our children growing up around us. Why did I never manage to achieve this, when everything else in life has come to me so easily?
One look at Zara and there’s my answer, clear as day.
It wasn’t just a wife I wanted. It was her. It’s always, only, ever been her.
The air hostess brings me the password and I type it into my laptop. I feel a stab of guilt doing this all behind James’s back, but it’s a necessary evil. When Zara left me the first time, there was no-one to pick up the pieces but him. He won’t be at all pleased to hear about what I’m planning now.
Step one – although steps two and three are still fuzzy. Get Kelsey Technologies a solid base in Malaysia. I need a reason to be over there, as often as possible.
There’s only one name worth mentioning when it comes to international business on Sarawak, and that’s Martin King. I learnt more than enough at the conference to know that for sure. So he’s the first name on my list. I send him an email, sounding him out, then settle back down to wait for my plane.
Taking His Own Page 7