“Did you say something?” He tried to make his smile look innocent.
She avoided looking at him as she crossed the room to the dresser, reached inside, and pulled out some black silky number.
She was killing him.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were taking the exam for promotion?”
Ah, the reason she’d given him the cold shoulder ever since they’d walked into her bedroom.
“I didn’t think you cared,” was his honest reply. Then he qualified it with, “I’ve hardly had time to accept the position, much less jump on the phone to my estranged wife to give her the good news.”
She closed her eyes for a second, as if shutting out the sting of his words, then swiftly turned away.
“I’ll use the bathroom first.” Without waiting for his response, she disappeared into the adjoining pale peach room. And closed the door behind her with a final snap.
Luc’s gaze landed on the tiny bed with all the pent-up frustration he felt. How much effort would it take to send that thing crashing to the floor under him? Unfolding himself from the window seat, he crossed to the far end of the room where Belle had set it up. Clearly, she didn’t trust him anywhere near her bed. He’d have to walk half a mile to get to her if he got any ideas in the night.
Luc sat on the cabin bed.
It appeared more solid than it looked. He bounced a couple of times, expecting it to creak beneath his weight. When it didn’t he bounced a little harder.
Still nothing.
Dropping to his knees, he peered underneath, disappointed to find all the rivets and bolts were fixed tight. He narrowed his gaze further, then glanced around the room for something he could use as a tool.
He stuck his head back under the bed. What size were those nuts? He measured one between his fingers, trying to gauge the size. Ten millimetres? Maybe Annie had a spanner he could borrow.
“Have you lost something?”
Luc’s heart nearly flew out of his mouth at the sound of Belle’s voice behind him. Feeling like a five-year-old caught pilfering chocolate from the secret Christmas stash, he glanced over his shoulder, trying to appear cool and natural as if he had indeed been looking for something he’d misplaced. Although, faced with Belle’s intelligent gaze, he couldn’t think what that would be.
She stood just inside the room, her beautiful face scrubbed clean of makeup. Cheeks flushed pink. Hair pulled down from her ponytail cascaded in a silky, yet barely tamed arrangement around her shoulders. Her bare feet and fingers were all he could see of the rest of her body hidden beneath a thick white towelling robe that nearly touched the floor, the lapels drawn right up to her throat so tight he didn’t know how she managed to breathe.
And he still found her sexy. Luc had to fight a sudden reckless urge to kiss her until the ache in his heart dissipated.
He glanced away.
Like the pilfered Christmas chocolate around his mouth, the bed nut between his fingers would no doubt incriminate him. “Just wondering if this thing is going to collapse in the middle of the night.”
She headed for her bed. “I’m confident it’ll be fine. It isn’t very old and has hardly been used. Gran keeps them for when she’s putting up lots of the family.” She pulled back the covers, but didn’t make a move to take off her robe and get in. “The bathroom’s free.”
This was ridiculous. She was waiting for him to leave the room before she’d get into bed? Aggravation slammed into him. When did things get this bad?
“Look, Belle”—he got off his knees, pulled himself to his full six-foot-two height— “I have no intention of touching you without your invitation, so for heaven’s sake, relax.” He stomped into the bathroom, barely refraining from slamming the door. Did she think he’d turned into a Neanderthal in the last six months?
He spent long enough under the shower to give her time to fall asleep. When he exited the en suite, Luc found that Belle had dimmed the lights low enough for her to be able to drift off while allowing him to see his way around the bedroom. She faced away from him so he couldn’t tell whether she was asleep or still awake, though the slight uneven rhythm to her breathing made him suspect she was awake.
What he wouldn’t give to drop the towel from around his waist, slide between the sheets with Belle and pull her into his arms. He didn’t hold out much hope of sleeping, knowing she was in the same room and he couldn’t touch her.
He hit the light switch on his way to the pathetic excuse for a bed. Since he hadn’t gotten around to taking his flight bag out of his hired car, Luc unhitched the towel covering his nakedness, tossed it in the vicinity of the chair, dropped onto the cabin bed, and pulled the sheet to his waist.
A sound similar to a gulp resounded around the room. He raised his head and looked over at Belle. She hadn’t moved.
He slid his hands behind his head. The worst kind of torture, he’d come to discover, was to want someone but know you can’t have her.
It seemed like hours as he tossed and turned and did his damndest to break the bed.
“Will you stop thrashing around? You’re going to break that thing.”
That’s the idea! He glared up at the pitch-black ceiling. So he was right—Belle wasn’t asleep.
“Luc? Are you awake?”
As if he could sleep with her in the same room, keeping his thoughts firmly on all the enjoyable things he could be doing instead of sleeping. He puffed out an annoyed breath. “No.”
She chuckled. “Me neither.”
A reluctant smile forced its way onto his lips. “Then you must be talking in your sleep.”
“Do you think Mia knows?”
“How could she? I haven’t mentioned our split to anyone. Have you?”
“I’ve been too busy.”
Too busy to care that she’d ended the best thing that had ever happened to him? The insight into Belle’s ability to move on without giving him a thought cut deeper wounds in his heart. Wounds he would never let her see. “Then stop worrying. No one could possibly know without us telling them.”
“I don’t know, Luc. She sounded like she was trying to drive home a message with her ‘I’ll never let him go’ speech.”
“Trust me, sweetheart. She hasn’t a clue. And if she did, firstly, why not come to you directly with her knowledge, and secondly, we’ve put up too solid a display that all is well for anyone to doubt our relationship.”
Minutes passed as Belle mulled over his words. “I suppose you’re right.”
“I am right.”
They both fell quiet once again.
When Belle’s breathing grew even, Luc began to relax a little. Something in Mia’s non-verbal communication as she’d spoken directly to Belle had gotten his attention. But he was absolutely sure no one besides him and Belle could possibly know of their divorce.
“Luc?” Belle’s soft voice pulled him out of his musings.
“I thought you’d dropped off.”
“Sing Patrick McNally’s.”
“What?”
“You know...that song you used to sing sometimes.”
“You want me to sing an Irish drinking song in the middle of the night?”
“It helps me to go to sleep.”
Luc turned onto his side. All he could see of Belle was an outline. “I know for a fact that isn’t true. You giggle the whole way through.”
“Sing it, Luc.”
Despite his earlier annoyance, he gave a satisfied grin. If Belle wanted to hear him sing, it could only mean one thing. She missed him. “I’ll wake everyone.”
“Not if you sing quietly.” He could hear the smile in her voice.
“Whisper the song?” That was going to be interesting.
“No. Just sing low. Like this...At Patrick McNally’s, you’ll find what you need.” She began the Irish drinking song in a soft, feminine tune at odds with the rugged lyrics.
Luc gave a short amused laugh and continued from where she left off. “Each patron will raise you his
glass.”
As predicted, by the fifth line Belle giggled.
When he got to the last line, Luc had to admit his irritation had eased. Was it possible for him and Belle to do what the song suggested and go home friends at the end of this weekend? He prayed that when they left here, they did so as much more than friends.
As man and wife.
“Luc...?” Belle’s whisper alerted him to the raw emotion in her tone.
He didn’t think he could take it if she was about to offer him mere friendship. “Go to sleep, Belle.”
8
Dripping with sweat, Luc opened the back door and stepped into the kitchen just as Belle took a tray of golden muffins out of the oven, the delicious scent filling the air.
His stomach rumbled in response.
He’d risen to birdsong, retrieved his bag from the car, thrown on his jog wear, and gone for a run before dawn had completely given way to daylight.
“Hi.” Luc grabbed the dark blue towel he’d left on the counter and dragged it over his face. “Those smell great.” He sniffed the air. “What’s that? Blueberry?”
Smiling, Belle nodded but avoided making eye contact as she took the tray to the breakfast counter. Was it his imagination, or did she seem a bit self-conscious with him this morning?
She transferred the muffins to a cooling rack, her back turned to him. She looked fresh from a recent shower, her hair damp and curling around the shoulders of her black blouse. The jeans she wore sported a cute little double loop fashion buckle at the back that begged him to undo it.
Luc covered a wicked smile by scrubbing the towel over his face once more and tried to focus on the mundane, yet deeply intimate, domestic scene surrounding him.
Belle glanced up, hardly letting her gaze pause on him as she plucked hot muffins from the baking tray. “I didn’t hear you get up. How was the run?”
He looped the towel around his neck. “Good.”
When Belle passed him on her way to the sink, he caught her familiar scent—the scent he’d grown used to over the years. A scent that had once comforted, excited, and reassured him that all was well with his world, now reminded him it was falling apart. His plan to get Belle back didn’t seem to be working.
He hadn’t expected her to fall into his arms after only one day. Nevertheless, after the moment they’d shared late in the night, he’d expected things between them to be almost normal. Yet Belle seemed even further out of his reach emotionally than when he’d first turned up yesterday.
Luc watched in silence as she paused in drying a metal mixing bowl to hook a lock of damp hair behind one ear. Why was she ignoring him?
This weekend’s opportunity was supposed to be his chance to remind Belle how things used to be between them. Yet he was the one knocked sideways with memories of their lives together. Had she deliberately made blueberry muffins while he was out for his run to torment him with memories? Or simply because she knew they were his favourite?
As she reached to open the cupboard next to his head, Luc caught her arm. He was going to find out what was going on. They had a moment last night—didn’t they? “Belle—”
“Luc, I—”
“For goodness’ sake, you two.” Tommy walked into the kitchen, his heels scraping against the tiled floor. “My stomach can’t take your loved-up display this early in the day,” he grumbled, rubbing his rounded belly as if to prove the point.
Using the interruption, Belle pulled away, opened the cupboard, and popped the mixing bowl on the top shelf.
She flicked an almost shy glance at him as she turned to grab a dishcloth. Luc caught the glance, held it captive as he conveyed a promise to talk later, before he allowed her to hide behind the task of clearing up.
He grabbed a warm muffin and bit a chunk out of it. With his jaws working a mouthful of melt-on-the-tongue delicious blueberry muffin, he headed out of the kitchen, slapping Tommy on the back as he past him.
“You look a bit rough, mate. Hard night?”
Without waiting for Tommy to tell him where to get off, Luc continued toward Belle’s en suite for a long shower. Then he intended to have that little chat with her. Whatever was going on, he would find out.
He barely missed colliding with Mia on his way out of the kitchen.
“Hi, Luc. Where are you off to?”
“Shower.” He kept his pace. The sooner he hit the shower, the sooner he’d be able to tackle Belle on the issue of their divorce.
“Don’t forget church this morning,” Mia called as he reached the stairs.
He paused for just a second. He’d forgotten that Gran always insisted on church on Sundays and expected everyone to join her.
“I’ll be there.” He puffed out a breath. Yet another delay to his talk with Belle.
~*~
BELLE WAS doing her best to ignore Tommy’s muttered grumblings when Mia breezed into the kitchen, her light blonde hair streaked with chocolate brown in something she called toasted highlights fell in mass of curls down her back. Belle had hoped to get a breather once Luc had left the room. The minute he’d entered the kitchen he’d brought the scent of morning sunshine and Alpha man in with him. She’d hardly been able to look at him for fear of giving into the sudden desire to throw herself into his arms.
As it was, she’d come close to telling Luc she loved him when he’d thwarted her effort last night, and as good as dismissed her. Perhaps she should be grateful he’d stopped her from admitting to an emotion she shouldn’t encourage. How foolish she would have looked holding her heart in one hand, and divorce papers in the other.
Thank God Luc had stopped her.
“Mmm, something smells good.” Spotting the muffins on the breakfast bar, Mia dived to the counter to grab one. “Is that what you’re wearing to church?”
Belle rinsed the dishcloth she’d used to wipe down the countertops. “Church?”
“You know.” Mia turned the muffin over in order to inspect the underside, a habit from childhood when their mother always used to burn the bottom of whatever cake she was baking. “The place we go each Sunday to praise God.”
“Very funny.” Drying her hands, Belle leaned her bottom against the sink. “It slipped my mind. What time are we leaving?”
“Ten.”
“That gives me plenty of time to change.”
Obviously deciding the cake was edible, Mia sunk her teeth into the still warm muffin, then moaned.
“This is so good, Belle. You should’ve been a chef.”
“Yeah.” Belle folded her arms and crossed her right ankle over her left. “But I save more lives as a surgeon.”
Mia gave her a long, thoughtful look. “Have you ever considered that your desire to save lives may have something to do with Dad?”
“My desire to save lives is simply a desire to save lives, Mia. Stop trying to psychoanalyse me. Don’t you have some clinically dependent client who needs you to talk them down from a ledge or something?”
“Ouch. Testy.” Mia pinched off a piece of muffin and popped it into her mouth as she slid onto a stool. “Want to talk about it?”
“Mia, give it a rest,” Tommy cut in, his head inside the open fridge as he rummaged around. “Is it possible for you to can the psychobabble for the rest of this weekend? If I’m stuck here with you”—he came out of the fridge with a carton of tomato juice—“I don’t want to have to listen to you trying to give everyone therapy.”
Mia turned cool blue eyes on him. “To the best of my knowledge, Tommy, you aren’t stuck here. Since you live only four miles away, I’m sure you can easily pop home...and stay there.”
Grabbing a glass from a nearby cupboard, Tommy filled it with tomato juice. “Gran invited me to her family gathering this weekend, so even if I lived right next door I have every intention on staying to the end. Besides, I have one or two things I’d like to share before this weekend is over.”
Mia rolled her eyes. “Such as?”
Tommy tapped his nose. “Now that would
be telling before I’m good and ready.”
“You know what I think? I think you’re only hanging around to make Luc’s life miserable, if you can. Admit it, Tom; you still hate him because Sally-Ann Kent dropped you the second she set eyes on Lucas. She was hoping he’d notice her once she got rid of you.”
“Mia.” Belle had never known her sister to be so insensitive. If such a thing were true, then surely she’d realise how inappropriate it was to voice it.
Neither Mia nor Tommy unglued their glares from each other.
“It’s the truth, Isobel. The reason Tommy hates Luc is Sally-Ann Kent. He’s harboured a secret, unrequited love for that girl every since he was ten and broke his arm jumping off the porch roof to impress her.”
“Let’s not start letting secrets out of bags, Mia.” Tommy swigged his juice, then pointed his forefinger along with his glass at Mia. “’Cause I could let one or two slip about you.”
“I have no secrets, Thomas.” Mia abandoned the muffin to the countertop. “If you think you know something about me, please feel free to share it.”
Mia may not have any secrets, but Belle had one she would rather not have exposed. If Mia and Tommy were about to start flinging out each other’s secrets, she didn’t want to hang around in case they started on her as well.
“Hey you two, what’s going on? I know you’ve never got on, but I’ve never known you to be at each other’s throats like this.”
Mia cut Tommy one last glance. “Whatever you’re planning, I suggest you forget it.” With that last remark, she walked out of the kitchen, leaving Belle befuddled and Tommy nose-flaring angry.
He muttered something Belle didn’t catch but, from the sour twist to his mouth, she guessed whatever he’d said she wouldn’t want to overhear.
Belle hung the tea towel she’d left on the counter back onto its hook. “I’m going to get changed for church.”
She left Tommy glaring into his tomato juice.
9
By the end of Sunday, Belle’s deception had her nerves stretched so taut she was jumping every time someone spoke her name. And if that hadn’t been enough to ensure at least one year off her life, Luc had done everything he could to guarantee she was always aware of his presence. He’d kept her on a constant edge all day with his touching, kissing and intense gaze locking.
Let's Pretend (Romantic Comedy, Contemporary, Second Chance, Sensual) Page 5