“Not your fault, nor your problem apparently.” He caught her wrists and flipped her back on the bed. He was moving over her instantly, pausing only to secure protection before plundering her sweet depths once more. She cried out and wrapped her legs around his middle, eager as always to feel his strength stir her soul.
She squeezed her eyes shut as sensations began to flow through her; though when had they ever stopped? Since coming to the island, her body had been in a permanent state of satisfaction and readiness. Her limbs tingled, her legs ached, everything felt alive and grateful.
God, when she thought back to the stale sex she and Jordan occasionally indulged in, she practically fell asleep. No wonder he’d cheated! Why hadn’t she? Why had she ever thought that was good enough? Why had she ever thought they had anything worth saving?
She froze.
The very idea was utterly wrong.
She was cheating on her husband to save her marriage. Precisely because she believed it was stupid to throw away so much history over one stupid indiscretion. Because she believed that sex wasn’t everything.
That surely meant they had something that was definitely worth saving. Didn’t it?
“Hey,” Thad dropped his head and captured her lower lip between his teeth. “You are doing it again.”
She blinked up at him. “Doing what?”
He shook his head. “Did you know that sometimes, when we are together, you cry?”
“What?” She lifted her fingers to her face in surprise. Sure enough, her cheeks were wet. “I didn’t realize.”
He pushed into her again and she groaned. “It must just be a reflex or something.”
“Yes, I’m sure,” he said, disbelief obvious in his tone. And not for the first time, he wondered what was going on behind the curtains. What more was there to this woman he had become completely addicted to?
It was the sex he was addicted to. Not her. And he had to remind himself of that anytime his intentions started to stray.
He enjoyed stoking her flames until she burst into an explosion of pleasure. He doubted he could ever tire of seeing her head tilt back and color flush her cheeks. He doubted he would ever get enough of the mewling noises she made low in her throat when she was at the height of pleasure.
He held her tight and tipped himself into her, and he told himself to stop thinking in such florid terms. He’d had dozens of partners. Prior to Aristotle’s death, he would have only entered into a relationship that was as satisfying as it was noncommittal. So why was he letting this get the better of him?
It must have been emotional splash-back from Aristotle’s death. And he couldn’t let it sway him. If this was going to work, he had to keep the focus on the physical, just as she was.
He stared at her, ignoring the beautiful way her eyes danced and her cheeks flushed. “I have a meeting in Paris next week.”
And for a second, Saphire’s heart almost stopped still. To go to Paris with Thad would be a dream come true. It was ridiculous, for how complicated things were. She couldn’t even go to Athens with him for dinner. How could she possibly contemplate a visit to Paris?
On the brink of demurring he spoke before she could. “Stay until then. I will take you to the airport when I leave.”
The pain was unexpected. It lanced her sharply. She felt it like a hot blade, but she nodded.
He mistook her silence for doubt and expelled an impatient sigh. “What more do you want, Zafeiri?” He demanded, using the Greek pronunciation of her name. It sent threads of warmth knotting through her.
“I want …” She shook her head. “I want to call my friend,” she mumbled, pushing out of the bed.
He watched her walk across the room. Naked, as she’d been almost the whole time they’d spent together. “You will stay.”
It wasn’t a question, but she spun around anyway. “Yes,” she expelled the word as though not saying it might have harmed her. “I’ll stay until then.”
Thad fell back against the pillows, his expression impossible to read and his feelings difficult to decipher.
For Saphire’s part, she paused outside his bedroom only to grab a robe from the adjacent bathroom. She wrapped it around herself and cinched it at the waist before padding downstairs. Her handbag was in the entrance way, where it had been since arriving. She lifted her phone out as though it were a bomb.
Still switched off from the flight, she brought it to life now with a sinking feeling. Sure enough, it began to beep almost instantly. Message after message spurted onto the screen. Anita, Anita, Anita, Jordan, Jordan, Anita, her mother, Jordan, Jordan, Anita. Her stomach rolled.
She clicked into one randomly.
Baby, I’m worried. Call me.
Yeah, right. She deleted it angrily and tapped to the next one.
Saffy, darling, I can explain everything if you’ll only listen to me.
Somehow she doubted that.
Saffy, I love you.
Love was as love did, she thought bitterly. And his behavior was not that of a loving spouse. As for hers? Well, in some ways, though it sounded ludicrous, she was the one making a sacrifice so that they could make their marriage work.
How had her parents known he was so untrustworthy? She shook her head. They’d been adamant that she’d regret the marriage. Ice trickled down her spine. Had they known something? Had they, mortifyingly, observed him with Anita in the past? Worse, someone else? How many women had he screwed behind her back? Was her best friend the beginning? Or the end?
Saff, you’re my best friend. I don’t want to lose you.
Yeah, right. She erased the message without hesitation.
Her fingers shook as she pulled up her husband’s name in the phone. His face grinned back at her from the top of the screen. She’d taken the picture on their honeymoon.
What a joke! They’d gone to Barcelona and spent the whole time walking through the beautiful city; she should have felt alive and enraptured, but she’d simply felt hot and sticky for the most part. They hadn’t even slept together because he’d had a middle ear infection that he claimed affected his balance.
It began to ring and she lifted the device to her ear and then stepped out of the front door, onto the sand spotted grass lawn that was at the front of the mansion. She walked across the warm ground slowly, right to the edge of the cliff. It was met by spiky trees and bushes; in the distance she could see the watermelons that Thaddeus had told her about, scrambling wildly in the cracks of the cliff. She crouched down and ran her fingers over a blade of grass, pleased when the sharp edge sliced her skin.
“Saff!” His voice was torn from him and in that moment, she didn’t doubt that he had been genuinely worried. “Where the hell are you? I’ve been calling and calling and getting your damned voice mail.”
She swallowed. “I’ve gone away.”
A beat of silence. “You’re angry. I get it.”
She pulled a face. “Do you? Somehow I doubt that.” She ran her finger over another frond and then plucked it from the base of the tree. “So? What happened?”
She could hear his anxiety. He was a lawyer, and a damned good one. He was working out how much to reveal. Would the complete truth disarm his wife? Or should he drip-feed her the information.
“It was a mistake.”
Ah, excellent. Misinformation. He wasn’t going to admit to anything, then.
“How many times did you make this mistake?” She pushed, surprised by how calm she was able to sound.
“Not often.” He was employing his most charmingly reasonable tone.
So more than once, then. It hadn’t been the first time. Of course it hadn’t been, she thought with self-directed sarcasm. Affairs built up to the ‘let’s screw in your marital bed’ phase. They didn’t begin there, surely. “How did it start?”
“Baby,” his tone was designed to make her feel unreasonable. “This is not a conversation to be had over the phone. Come home. Let’s talk properly.”
“No.” She
squeezed it tight. Now the tears began to slide down her cheeks. She dashed them away but new ones simply took their place.
“No?” He was silent for a long moment. “Saffy, you’re the one I love. I’ve always loved you. Anita was … she’s nothing. Nothing to me. Let’s never speak to her again.”
“God!” She shook her head angrily. “You’re such an arse. She’s my best friend! I’ve known her forever. Did you have any idea what it would do to me to discover that the two people I love most in the world have been carrying on like this?”
“Of course I didn’t think of that,” he hissed. “I didn’t think at all. I was an idiot. A complete wanker.”
“Yeah, you sure as hell were. Jesus, we’ve been married two months! Two months! Was it going on before the wedding?”
He didn’t answer immediately and foul regret and suspicion brewed in her gut. “She was my maid of honor,” Saff intoned flatly. “What a bloody stereotype we are, huh?”
“Saffy, it doesn’t need to be like this. Just come home. Just let me explain.”
“There is no explanation. Only atonement.”
“What does that mean?” He begged. “I will do anything. I will do anything you want. I just don’t want this to be over. Please just tell me what I need to do.”
She stared, unseeing, at the sparkling ocean in front of her. “There’s nothing you can do. It’s all up to me.” And she disconnected the call then switched her phone straight off to prevent him from calling back.
She didn’t stand up straight away. Instead, she cradled her knees to her chest, and placed her head down on them for support, and she sobbed silently.
She didn’t know if it was grief over her husband or her friend, or anger at the betrayal and dishonesty, but she wept for the whole torrid mess that her life had become.
CHAPTER FIVE
“I’m telling you, Rocco, she’s a dream.”
His friend laughed down the phone line. “Now I see why you didn’t wish me to join you.”
Thad grinned. “You would definitely have cramped my style, man.”
“You met her the day of the funeral?”
“Yeah.” Thad stared at his emails and grimaced. There were hundreds that should have been dealt with, and not one caught his attention.
“How?”
“Long story,” he said, unwilling to share the details of their relationship, even with a man he thought of almost as a brother. “It was random. A thousand things could have gone wrong and we wouldn’t have met.”
Rocco was incapable of speaking for several long moments. “You’ve known her how long? A few days? And you speak as if this is some kind of fateful love-match.”
Thaddeus ran his finger over the keyboard slowly, thoughtfully. “Don’t be absurd. I’m not a fool. She’s not looking for anything serious and God knows, nor am I.” The denial felt heavy in his mouth, the words unnatural.
Rocco nodded, but an instinct in his gut was unsettled. “What does she do?”
“Do? You mean for work?” His smile was indulgent. “I have no clue.”
The suspicions grew. “And how old is she?”
“Mid-twenties?”
“Christ, Thad, do you even know her name?”
Thaddeus smiled triumphantly. “Saphire Arana, and she lives in Notting Hill.”
“Great, so you know her name and roughly her address,” Rocco murmured, scrawling both down in his notebook. “What else?”
“We have not spent time interviewing one another,” Thad hedged defensively.
“I bet I can guess how you’ve spent your time.” Rocco clicked the lid back on his pen. “Let me guess; she’s a classic Thaddeus super babe? Blonde? Big tits? Legs that go on forever? Skin the color of burnt sugar?”
“Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong,” he shook his head. Actually, except about her breasts, which were perfection personified. “She’s petite, with hair as dark as night, skin that’s the color of clotted cream and lips … God, her lips.” He sighed. “And her eyes … they are bluer than the sky on a crisp summer’s day. She is exquisite, Rocco. Exquisite.”
He pushed the lid of his MacBook down. How could he even think of work when Saphire was there? It was a waste of his time and energy. “And she makes me laugh,” he added as he stood.
Rocco, in all their years as mates, had never heard Thad describe a woman in such a way. And because their friendship scored deep in both men, and because Rocco felt a concern over Thad’s state of mind given the recent bereavement he had suffered, he knew that he had to do something to protect his friend.
Gorgeous, available women didn’t just fall into men’s laps in their hour of need. Something was wrong with this little situation, and Rocco knew, even as he hung up the call, that he would not rest until he’d found out what it was.
* * *
It was set a little further down the shoreline than the jetty his speedboat was moored to. A second boat was anchored just off-shore; bigger and far more prestigious. Saphire wasn’t much of a fan of boats, but her father and husband had both enjoyed their fair share of time on luxurious yachts. She knew from information she’d gleaned from their conversations that the boat in front of her was a top-of-the-line craft.
“What is this?” She murmured.
“You didn’t want to go to Athens,” he said simply, holding her hand as she stepped into the small motor-boat.
Her eyes flew to his.
“No, I didn’t.”
“Relax,” he smiled at her as he crouched beside the engine and pulled it to life. It hummed with power; it took only a minute for it to cut through the shallow waters and pull them alongside the bigger boat.
“You want me to climb up there?” She said uncertainly. Her tummy was in knots; it had nothing to do with this man, for once, and everything to do with the mess that was waiting for her back home.
“You’re not going to claim to be afraid of heights, are you?” He teased.
She sent him a droll look. “I’m not afraid of anything.”
“That’s my girl.”
More pain. She wasn’t his girl. She never would be. “I’m not dressed for anything other than this boat,” she warned him, as she hooked a bare foot onto the lowest rung of the ladder and begun to climb up. Though she’d taken one of his work shirts and wore it like an over-sized dress, cinched at the waist with one of his belts. It was almost a passably fashionable ensemble.
“You are dressed perfectly, from where I sit,” he teased, enjoying the view of her rear as she got to the top of the ladder.
“Perve,” she called over her shoulder. She winced when she saw a man in uniform standing with his hand extended, to help her onto the deck. “Thank you.” Her cheeks glowed fire-engine red. She ran her hands down the front of her dress and kept her eyes trained on the ocean. The sun was setting, casting the sky in shades of purple and silver.
Thad climbed up with an easy athleticism and then stepped aside, so that the man in the suit could climb down and take the small boat back to shore.
“Oh, he’s not staying?” She asked with a lifted brow.
“No.”
Pleasure purred inside of her despite the distressing phone call she’d made that morning.
“I think I’m glad,” she said, reaching down and weaving her fingers through his.
“I am a selfish man, and I am definitely not willing to share you, agape mou,” he promised darkly. And his words spawned a realization in her soul. Would he feel betrayed by the choices she’d made? Would he resent her for using him to take revenge on her no-good husband?
She looked at him properly and it was then that the candles caught her eye. Dozens of little lights twinkled from the bow of the boat, each encased in a glass jar. An ice bucket and a picnic rug in the middle, with a bottle of champagne and two glasses.
“You said we were going for a walk along the beach,” she laughed unsteadily, her heart tripping over itself.
“We did,” he grinned.
“And you
said this would just be sex,” she added, but her pulse was firing and the fever in her blood had nothing to do with the proximity of his gorgeous body and everything to do with the thoughtfulness of his gesture.
“I’m sure we can find time for that too,” he promised, wrapping one arm around her shoulders and pulling her towards him. He held her tight to his chest and kissed her on the top of her head, then slackened his grip so that he could guide her towards the rug.
“The view from here is incomparable.”
She sat down on the picnic rug, her slender legs kicked out in front of her, crossed at the ankles. He poured a flute of champagne and handed it to her, then sat down beside her.
The outlook was, indeed, exquisite. The boat was facing away from Thad’s island, towards the mainland. But dozens of little islands dotted the way, like beacons in the night. She sighed as a surprising sense of contentment settled around her shoulders.
“So this whole island is really yours?” She asked after they’d sat in contemplative silence for a little while.
He dipped his head forward in agreement.
“What else is on it?”
“Nothing. Wilderness. It’s quite perfectly untouched.”
She lifted a brow. “Your grandfather never thought of developing it?”
“What for?” He asked quietly. “He was as rich as Croesus and did not need the money. This place is special for us. Him and me. And his father before him. It is a place to come to and be centered.”
“A bolt-hole,” she said with a tense smile. That’s exactly what it had been for her.
“Of sorts,” he agreed.
“It’s strange to hear you speaking like that. I mean, you’re this incredible businessman but you have a place to go and be centered. That’s kind of cool.”
“Cool?” He laughed. His conversation with Rocco came flooding back to him. “How old are you?”
“Twenty six.”
He concealed his smile with effort. “Mid-twenties?”
“Yeah, that’s what I said. Twenty six. Why?”
“I just realized I did not know.”
Seasons of Sin: Misbehaving in summer and autumn... (Series of Sin) Page 5