“I suppose.” Obviously picking up on her mood, he fell silent.
Her stomach knotted. They hardly ever argued, and she wasn’t used to this feeling of awkwardness with him. Yet again, she worried about the distant look he’d had in his eyes over the past week. She swallowed down the panic that threatened to rise within her. He would never leave her at the altar. He’d only done that before because Cathryn had been so awful to him.
“I’d better go,” he said.
Something was definitely wrong. She closed her eyes and tried to envisage him in her arms, in her bed, but that only made her heart race even faster at the thought of what could go awry in that area. “Is everything all right, Dex? Only you sound…odd.”
“I’m fine,” he said. “I’ll ring you tonight.” He hung up.
She stared at the phone, flipped it shut and then banged the steering wheel. She’d annoyed him with her questions. He was nervous and anxious, just like she was. Why did she have to blow everything out of proportion?
And why was she so worried about the bloody wedding night? She wasn’t a virgin, for crying out loud. Saturday was going to be wonderful, the culmination of a year of longing, a blissful coming together of two souls who were meant to be together. Ian had called her bad in bed because he wanted to hurt her—it didn’t mean anything. Dex loved her—it didn’t matter if she hadn’t swung from the chandeliers or didn’t know the Kama Sutra inside out. Just being together was going to be fabulous. Nothing was going to go wrong.
She bit her lip. Please God, don’t let anything go wrong.
Chapter Nine
Dex slipped the phone back into his pocket and walked across the café to the table where he’d left Cathryn nursing a latte. He pulled the chair out and sat, conscious of her watching him, and leaned back, putting as much distance between them as he could.
Honey’s call had unsettled him. He hated lying to her. Well, he hadn’t lied because she hadn’t asked where he was and who he was with, but he hadn’t been open either. He hadn’t said, “By the way, my ex came to see me and we’re just having a chat.” He hadn’t told Honey because he knew it was wrong and it would upset her. So what the hell was he doing here?
He wished he’d walked away when he saw Cathryn standing by the car, but his instinct to get her away from his hometown had overrode his natural caution at being within ten feet of her. He’d driven to a café on the state highway some fifteen minutes from Kerikeri, but now it didn’t seem far enough. He should have driven to Australia.
His heart thudded at twice its normal pace as he wondered what she was doing there. Her letter had been brief, had just said that she’d be in the area and had thought of popping into the station to see him. How had she found out where he was? He hadn’t told her where he was going when he’d left Wellington.
He wondered if she’d heard he was getting married. Had she come to ruin it? He wouldn’t put it past her. She was smart, beautiful and sexy, but she had a mean streak he had been on the receiving end of too many times to doubt her ability to drop a bombshell should the need arise.
She smiled at him over the rim of her coffee cup, the naughty twinkle in her eye that he remembered so well suddenly appearing. “Relax, sweetie. I don’t have an axe hidden in my handbag or anything. I’m not here for revenge.”
He said nothing, turning a packet of sugar over and over in his fingers. He wasn’t willing to believe it just because she said so.
She sipped her coffee, looking across the room and out of the window to the road as she did so, watching the logging lorries and numerous cars trundling past. He took the opportunity to study her, to see how she had changed over the past two years. She was still shockingly beautiful. Her dark hair was longer, shiny, bouncing around her shoulders. She’d put on a little weight but it suited her, filling out her figure, and she’d lost the haunted, gaunt look she’d had near the end, when things had got so bad between them. There was no evidence of the hatred, the madness that had seemed to overtake her that last time they’d met, when she’d screamed until her voice was hoarse, the razor in her hand, threatening to slit her wrists.
His last memory was of walking out of the house, glancing back over his shoulder and seeing her fall to her knees, her face filled with fury and anguish that he didn’t seem to care if she took her own life. He hadn’t, at the time. Later, he’d rung one of her friends to make sure she was all right, but it was more out of guilt than out of genuinely caring whether she lived or died. In many ways, he knew it would have been easier for him if she had died, although the guilt would have been even worse then, probably bad enough to ruin any future relationships for him.
Now, though, she seemed calm, and when her gaze came back to him, her eyes danced with the playful humour that had kept him coming back to her so many times even though deep down he’d known she was bad news.
“So how’s it been?” she asked.
He stirred his coffee, which he hadn’t yet touched. “Good.” He lifted the cup, blew on the coffee, then returned it to the saucer untouched. It was no good—he couldn’t do this, acting like nothing had happened. “What are you doing here?”
“Visiting Laura,” she said.
He searched his brain—her cousin? “And while you’re here you thought you’d look me up?” He couldn’t remove the cynicism from his voice that she happened to be visiting the week before the wedding.
She tipped her head. “Is that so unlikely? I haven’t seen you for an awfully long time, Dexy. I know we didn’t end well. I just wanted to say hi.”
He shuddered at her nickname for him, remembering how she would whisper it in his ear while they had sex. He shook his head as if he could rattle the memory out of his head, but it lodged in there like a tick in a dog’s fur. “‘We didn’t end well’ is the understatement of the year,” he snapped. “You told me you were pregnant to get me to marry you.”
“I thought I was,” she mumbled.
He said nothing, knowing she was lying. Out of guilt, her friend had told him the day of the wedding that Cathryn had admitted to her that she’d faked the pregnancy to get him up the aisle. No doubt a few days after she had a ring on her finger, she’d have faked a miscarriage as well.
Nausea rose inside him. He didn’t want to think about it.
“I’m getting married,” he said.
She smiled. “I know. I’m pleased for you, sweetie.”
He didn’t believe that for one minute. “Oh really?”
She shrugged. “It’s been two years. I’ve moved on too, you know.”
He wondered who she’d got her claws into now. Some poor sap who had no idea what he was getting himself into. But for the first time some of the stiffness faded from his spine. Maybe she was telling the truth—maybe she really was just visiting the area.
“Who is she?” Cathryn asked.
Dex hesitated. He didn’t want to talk about Honey, not with his ex. He looked at his watch. “I really need to go.”
“Does she make you happy?” Cathryn whispered. “I know you never believed it, but that’s all I ever wanted.”
“Yes, she does make me happy.” His voice could have cut steel.
An impish look crossed her face. “Is she good in bed? Only I know how important that is to you.”
“We haven’t…” The words were out before he could stop them, and he bit his tongue, cursing himself inwardly, sure she would start laughing. But her face registered curiosity and interest rather than amusement.
“You haven’t slept together?”
He pushed the full coffee cup away. “We’re waiting until we’re married.”
Something crossed her face, gone too soon for him to catch. “How romantic.”
“I thought so.”
She leaned forward, resting her arms on the table. The movement pushed up her breasts, showing a generous amount of cleavage above the low cut top. Was she aware? Of course she was, he decided. Cathryn had been very conscious of body language and had always ut
ilised it to her advantage.
He forced himself to keep his eyes on hers and not to glance down.
“How long have you been dating?” she asked.
“Just over six months,” he admitted reluctantly.
She studied him with something akin to pity. “So you haven’t had sex for six months?” That made her smile. “Good grief. I can’t imagine you going without sex for a week, let alone that long.”
“It’s surprising what you can do when you’re in love,” he said, meaning to sound noble, but to his ears it sounded childish.
“So you have no idea what she’s going to be like in bed.” Cathryn moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue. Against his will, his gaze was drawn to them, painted in a deep red, his favourite colour. Honey never wore it, preferring a subtler pink gloss, and he’d never asked her to, but Cathryn had worn it all the time. Her lips curved a little as she noticed his eyes rest on them. “Does she know what a naughty boy you are in the bedroom?”
His gaze snapped back up to hers. “Don’t.”
She leaned forward, amused now, her eyes daring, taunting. “Do you think she’ll be willing to let you do the kind of things that I let you do to me?” She moistened her lips again. “Whatever your dirty mind could come up with?”
He pushed his chair back, stood and walked out of the café, wishing he’d done it ten minutes ago, wishing he hadn’t let her into the car. He strode across the car park and unlocked the car door, but before he could open it she put her knee against it, forcing it closed again.
“Going so quickly?” she said breathlessly. “We’ve only just got started.”
“Get out of my way,” he snapped, pushing her to the side.
She grabbed him, however, tightening her arms around him and locking her hands behind his back. “I know you,” she said, her voice low and sultry. “She’s been happy to go without sex for so long. Do you think she’s going to understand when you want it five times in one night? When you ask her to do things—wicked things to fill that darkness inside of you?”
He tried to loosen her arms, failed and banged her back against the car. “Let me go!”
But she refused to let him go, one hand holding his head, her fingers tightening painfully in his hair. Her red lips reminded him vividly of when she used to go down on him. She had been fantastic at oral sex, and it had been a difficult vision to eliminate from his memories.
Her lips clamped on his, sticky and hot, and for a brief moment—it couldn’t have been more than a second or two—Dex hesitated. Her body was soft, her breasts pressing against his chest, and the slide of her tongue in his mouth and the feel of her against him had the blood racing around his body.
And then a vision of Honey shot into his head, and he stumbled back, nausea flooding him. Fuck. What the fucking fuck was he doing?!
Scrubbing at his lips, he pushed Cathryn away, got in the car and drove off without another word, leaving her standing there. She didn’t run after the car or even shout—just watched him drive away, a solitary figure in his rear view mirror, her face filled not with hatred this time but with amusement and an abiding sense of victory.
He pushed the accelerator to the floor and flew back up the state highway. His head spun and for a few minutes he worried he might throw up on the passenger seat.
In one swift move, he’d put his new life in danger, risked it all for a snatched kiss outside a seedy café. Had anyone seen him? He’d been in uniform, for Christ’s sake, leaning against a police car. He was well known throughout a good portion of the Northland and he hadn’t even dragged her around the corner out of sight—he’d kissed her in full view of the passing traffic. Someone could be on their mobile to Honey right now, telling her. I saw your fiancé kissing another woman in public.
He pulled over to the side of the road, opened the door and sat there for a moment, close to vomiting.
Eventually, his stomach settling a little, he shut the door and leaned his head back, closing his eyes. His heart pounded, but he forced himself to calm down, to keep his cool.
Yes, he’d made a grave mistake. But it could have been worse. He hadn’t taken her off to a motel and fucked her. It had only been a kiss, less than five seconds of their lips touching, hardly enough to bring an engagement to an end.
You think that matters? His brain screamed at him. You think Honey would understand if she found out? Would you understand, if you saw her kissing Ian Mc-Fucking-Idiot? Of course he wouldn’t—he would be terribly, irrevocably hurt. He would think she still loved her ex, and that she couldn’t possibly love him, Dex, to have betrayed him so badly.
He just had to hope she didn’t find out. There was no guarantee he’d been seen by anyone he knew. The kiss had been brief after all, and even if someone had seen them in the café talking, that wasn’t a crime—he often met up with friends and colleagues for a drink.
His mouth felt sour, and his head ached. Despair and doubt swirled around him. Cathryn had touched a nerve—she’d hit on his deepest innermost fear—that Honey had seemingly coped fine being single for a long time, and maybe her ex had been right and she wasn’t interested in sex. He’d tried to fight it—she always reacted well enough to his kisses, but the worry had eaten away at his brain like a maggot in an apple. How would he cope if she didn’t like sex, or only wanted it once a month? With the lights off, in the missionary position? If he asked her to do something and it disgusted her? He’d planned to let her dictate the pace at which they explored their sex life, only suggesting one thing at a time, taking it carefully to make sure he didn’t overstep the mark. But he didn’t think he could bear it if he frightened or hurt her, and he worried that she’d go along with something she didn’t want to do just to please him.
Cathryn had reminded him how suited they’d been sexually. They’d got up to all sorts of things he’d never have dreamed of before he met her, although he knew she’d never understood that even though they’d been good in bed together, after sex with her he’d always felt tainted. She would never understand how much he loved being with Honey because of the way she made him feel—clean and unsullied, renewed.
But the fact was that he hadn’t changed—deep down he was still the same man with the same faults, even though he tried to hide them. He’d been stupid and briefly given in to his libido, which wasn’t hugely surprising considering how long it had been since he’d had sex—it didn’t make it okay by any means, but it was understandable.
And then shame swept over him and he sank his head into his hands, clutching his hair. Understandable? He was the pits, the worst kind of man that ever existed. He didn’t deserve Honey Summers, who was an angel on earth, who’d been treated badly herself and who needed a good man to look after her, someone who wouldn’t hurt her.
He wasn’t that man. He’d kidded himself he could change, but he was an old dog and that was a decidedly new trick. At that moment, Dex hated himself. And he wished he’d never been born.
Chapter Ten
“You’ve been so long in that bath I’m surprised you haven’t turned into a prune.”
Honey looked over her shoulder to see Cam walking toward the deck, coffee in hand. “Hiya.”
“Can I join you?”
“Of course.” She cupped her hot chocolate in both hands and smiled at him as he sat beside her. She had indeed spent over an hour in the bath, soaking until the water turned cool, and now she wore her favourite pink pyjamas and soft white fluffy robe, her feet—stuffed into matching white fluffy slippers—propped on one of the wooden garden chairs.
He sipped his coffee, and they looked out across the lawns to the darkening gloom of the Waitangi Forest. Although it was nearly April and therefore officially autumn, the sub-tropical Northland hung onto its summer jealously. The air had not yet cooled enough for Cam to don a jacket, and cicadas still called from the bush.
Cam placed his mug on the table between them. “Missy told me you rang Dex before you got in the bath.”
�
��Yes.”
“But he was busy tonight.”
“Yes.” She looked at her hot chocolate and picked out a tiny fly that had attempted to go for a swim in it.
“Everything all right?” Cam asked.
She sighed. “I think so. Probably. I don’t know. I rang him at lunch today and he was…weird. And tonight he was…” She trailed off, not knowing how to voice it. “Distracted, I suppose.”
“Work?” Cam suggested.
“Maybe.”
“He’s a busy man. He has a lot on his plate,” Cam said. “And he’s probably nervous about Saturday.”
“I know.” That didn’t explain his irritated tone, she thought. His curt, clipped sentences. The awkward silences. Something had changed, and it wasn’t just her imagination.
“Did you tell him about the court case?” Cam asked.
“No…” she said slowly. “I told him I wasn’t allowed to discuss it outside the courtroom.”
“You discussed with me.”
“I know.”
He sipped his coffee as he waited for an explanation.
She watched a pair of pukekos walking across the lawn, their blue feathers bright in the late evening sunshine, their red feet comical as they strutted to the pond. “I didn’t want to mention it,” she said tiredly. “I didn’t want to have the conversation, because I’d talk about Sarah Green and he’d pick up from my tone that it was upsetting me, and then he’d get angry that I was comparing her to myself and tell me off.”
The corner of Cam’s mouth curved up. “He wouldn’t tell you off.”
“Yes, he would.”
“No, he wouldn’t. He would tell you—rightly—that this case has nothing to do with you or Ian, and it’s not fair on you or the defendant for you to let your emotions become involved.”
Honey bit her lip. It was an easy thing to say, but not so easy to carry out. The afternoon had been no easier than the morning. The prosecuting lawyer had cross-questioned Sarah ruthlessly. Honey thought that maybe James had paid a lot of money for the smartly-dressed, hotshot lawyer to come up from Whangarei—the nearest city an hour away, rather than hiring one from the smaller law firms in Kerikeri, whereas Sarah’s pro bono lawyer—although he had done a good job in trying to elicit some sympathy for her—wore an old suit and didn’t seem quite so on the case.
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