A Whirlwind Engagement

by Jessica Hart

'I'm not worried,' lied Bella, who in fact was furious with Josh. Why didn't he make things easier on himself by keeping out of temptation's way? If he wanted to make a fool of himself by following Aisling around with his tongue hanging out when anyone could see she was mad about Bryn, that was his problem, but he might at least think about how he was making her look.

  'I must say I admire you for being independent,' said one of her new friends from the beach. 'When I was engaged I spent my whole time trailing after my husband and doing the things he liked rather than what I liked, just because I was terrified of what he might get up to if I wasn't there to keep an eye on him!'

  'Oh, I never think about that.' Bella put a possessive hand on Josh's knee, which seemed like a suitably adoring thing to do until she felt his instinctive flinch. Mortified, she snatched her hand back. Why not stand up and shout that he didn't like her touching him?

  Tough, she thought. She was trying to act a role here, even if he didn't have a clue about how a fiancé behaved. Defiantly, she put her hand back again. 'I know Josh would never be unfaithful,' she told the others. 'Would you, sweetie?'

  Josh would hate being called 'sweetie'. It served him right, thought Bella. If he would just relax and behave naturally with her instead of recoiling at her slightest touch she might not have to resort to cute names.

  'No,' he said in a voice that sounded oddly hoarse. He cleared his throat and started again. 'Never.'

  Well, that was a bit better, Bella allowed grudgingly.

  Cassandra had put away her clipboard and had squeezed onto the sofa opposite. 'Did you get a chance to look at that magazine I gave you on the beach, Bella?' she asked, leaning across.

  'I did. It was very interesting.' Bella was rather embarrassed by the fact that she had been riveted by a copy of Bride that Cassandra had insisted on thrusting into her hands. She had always felt that it was vaguely unlucky to look at a magazine like that unless you were actually planning a wedding, but now that she had the perfect excuse to read it, it seemed a pity not to…

  'It had some great ideas, I thought,' she told Cassandra, and glanced speculatively at Josh under her lashes. Her hand was still on his thigh, and it was obviously making him tense.

  'I've been wondering whether we should go for a themed wedding,' she said. 'You know, the Arabian Nights or something. We could decorate the marquee as a desert tent with rugs and brass lamps, and I could have lots of veils. Josh could be dressed as a sheikh. What do you think, Josh?'

  'Over my dead body,' he said.

  Bella pretended to pout. 'Oh, I thought it would be fun to bring out your unconventional side,' she said. 'And it would be appropriate, too. You have spent a lot of time in deserts.'

  'I've also spent lot of time in England,' Josh pointed out, and Bella was secretly relieved to hear the crispness return to his voice. 'I'm quite happy staying in touch with my conventional side, thank you very much. A morning suit is as wacky as I'm prepared to go.'

  The very idea of Josh in a morning suit gave Bella a pang and she forced her mind away from imagining him in the local church where her parents lived, waiting for her to arrive-and there was no use pretending she hadn't picked out exactly the dress she wanted from Cassandra's magazine-and tuned back into the conversation.

  Cassandra was explaining how she was planning a traditional wedding, 'But there's going to be an overall sea theme. The bridesmaids and pageboys are going to be in little sailor suits, there'll be shells on the table and even the place cards are going to be decorated with starfish.'

  'Wow,' said Bella. Clearly behind Cassandra's fluffy exterior lurked the organisational abilities of a brigadier. 'When is the wedding?'

  'Not till next year. What about you?'

  Never, the way things were going. Still, she had better stay in her role, thought Bella, snuggling perversely into Josh and risking a kiss on his jaw. 'The sooner the better as far as we're concerned. That's right, isn't it, Josh?'

  'Yes,' he said abruptly, and then ruined what little credibility he had as a fiancé by literally shaking her off as he stood up. 'It's getting late,' he said. 'We should go and get ready for the reception this evening.'

  Aisling got to her feet as well. 'Yes, I'd better go too and wake Bryn.'

  Right. Why not announce to the world that they wanted an excuse to snatch a few more minutes alone?

  Already humiliated by Josh's brusque rejection, Bella's eyes flashed dangerously. He had pointedly not held out his hand to help her up and include her in his unilateral decision to go and get ready, but he needn't think that she was going to sit here tamely while he went mooning after Aisling. They had already had quite enough of a tête-à-tête "working", as they called it, in the bar.

  Bella's lips tightened and she drained her glass. She was here as Josh's fiancée, and that's how he should treat her. 'I'll come with you,' she said. 'I want a shower before dinner.'

  She took a childish delight in making him take her hand as they left the bar with Aisling, but the moment they were out of sight of the others, he dropped it abruptly. Bella hugged her arms miserably around her to give her hands something to do.

  They left Aisling at the door to her room, then walked across the grounds in tense silence. The sun was dropping down to the horizon, staining the sky pink and orange and there was a hushed, expectant feel to the air. Even the ocean seemed to have gone quiet as it waited for the night to fall.

  It was such a waste to be miserable in such a romantic place, thought Bella. Even if she and Josh went back to being friends, it would be better than this. They needed to relax and to talk, she decided.

  'Shall we walk along the beach?' she suggested, thinking that even Josh couldn't resist the appeal of a tropical beach at sunset.

  Apparently he could. 'I thought you wanted a shower?' he said.

  'I do, but there's no hurry.'

  'You should have stayed in the bar with the others,' he said, an edge to his voice. 'You seemed to be having a good time.'

  Bella was rapidly losing patience. 'I would have done,' she said tartly, 'but I haven't forgotten that I'm supposed to be here as your fiancée, and no self-respecting fiancée would be happy about letting her man stroll off into the sunset with another woman.'

  Josh made an exasperated noise. 'We weren't strolling anywhere. Aisling was on her way back to her room. You know that.'

  'I might do, but it doesn't look that way to everyone else. People are already commenting on how much time the two of you spend together, and we've only been here a few hours!'

  They had reached their room and Josh fished the key out of his shirt pocket. 'You just need to tell them that Aisling and I work together,' he said impatiently as he unlocked the door.

  'It would take more than that to stop them speculating,' said Bella, stalking into the room. 'I think they're beginning to wonder who exactly it is that you're engaged to. You certainly don't seem to want to spend any time with me!'

  'For God's sake, Bella, you're the one who said we've only been here a few hours!'

  'Look,' she said, unfastening her sarong, too cross by this stage to feel self-conscious about her body in front of him. 'I'm just saying that you don't seem to be a very convincing fiancé.' In spite of herself, Bella was unable to keep the hurt from her voice. 'You flinch if I touch you, jump at the chance to spend your days with another woman, and generally don't want anything to do with me. There's not much point in my being here if you're going to carry on like that!'

  They glared at each other until Josh suddenly blew out a breath and ran a hand through his short hair in a gesture of weariness. 'I'm sorry, Bella,' he sighed. 'You're right. I'm no good at pretending, that's all'

  Bella's exasperation evaporated at the defeated expression on his face. Josh's inability to keep away from Aisling might hurt her, but she knew just how he felt, didn't she?

  'No, it's my fault,' she said gently. 'I know it's a difficult situation for you, Josh. It's easy to say that you should get on with your life, and that ther
e's no point torturing yourself by being with the person you love when you know they don't love you and that you can't have them, but if you really love someone, you can't just give up like that.'

  She hesitated, wanting to put her arms round him, but not trusting herself if she did. 'I do understand, you know.'

  'It sounds as if you do,' he said heavily.

  'I hope this week isn't going to be too hard for you,' said Bella. She had thrown her sarong over a chair and dressed only in her bikini was looking through her case for a brush.

  Josh looked at her, warm and vivid and practically naked in the room with the double bed between them.

  'I think it will be,' he said. 'I think it'll be a lot harder than I ever expected.'

  Bella sat on the edge of the bed and threw her hair down over her face to brush it vigorously. In spite of all the lotions and potions she had spent a fortune on and which promised that her hair would be a silken, shining gold curtain at all times it had dried into a salty tangle.

  'You know, I don't think you should give up,' she said, proud of how steady her voice sounded. 'I mean, it's obvious that Aisling still likes you a lot. She might be wrapped up in Bryn now, but he's such a prat, isn't he? I only talked to him for a few minutes, but that was enough to find him deeply irritating. And did you see how he was swanking around at Heathrow? I wouldn't be surprised if a week in his company is enough for Aisling to come to her senses and send him back to his wife-who is probably extremely glad to be rid of him!'

  Confident that she had her face back under control, Bella straightened and tossed her hair back over her shoulders. 'When that happens, she's bound to turn back to you,' she told Josh, who was standing looking out at the rapidly gathering darkness, his hands in his pockets and his shoulders slightly hunched.

  'So I just have to be patient?' he said.

  'If that's what you want.'

  He turned abruptly. 'What about you, Bella? I haven't been great company for you so far. I'm sorry.'

  'Don't worry, I understand, and it's fine.' She smiled brightly as she got up and began unpacking her case. 'I'm having a great time. Most of the people seem really nice, I'm staying in this fabulous hotel for free, and I've got a whole week to lie in the sun and read. What more could I want?'

  'Will?' suggested Josh.

  Bella froze for a second, then busied herself hanging clothes in the wardrobe. It made a good reason to turn her face away so that Josh couldn't read her expression too clearly.

  'We can't always have everything we want,' she said. 'Sometimes we just have to make the most of what we've got.'

  Josh thought about what she had said as he lay sleepless beside her that night. Moonlight slipped into the room through a crack in the curtains and laid a stripe across Bella, who lay on her front, her face turned towards the window and her hair spilling over the pillow. The light was a bright band, highlighting the curve of her shoulder, and grazing the edge of her mouth. It lit the soft line of her cheek and turned her hair silver before striping on across the pillow and up the wall.

  Was this the only way he could look at her properly now? Josh wondered in despair. When she was asleep?

  She had looked wonderful earlier at the reception laid on by C.B.C. to welcome everyone, but Josh hadn't been able to gaze at her the way he had wanted to do. There were too many other people around, too many others vying for her attention, too many of them standing between him and Bella.

  She had been wearing some kind of sleeveless red dress and yet another pair of absurdly fragile shoes. Josh didn't know very much about women's clothes, but he could see that the outfit made Bella the sparkling centre of the room. Amongst the muted colours everyone else seemed to be wearing, she stood out like a bright flame.

  Torn between pride and jealousy, Josh watched her flirting and charming her way around the room. Apparently it was all right for her to ignore him, he had thought sourly, remembering her earlier complaints.

  But it was hard not to admire her. She had been with these people less than twenty-four hours, and already she seemed to know everybody, and whether by design or not, had contrived to make firm friends with a number of the key people who would make the final decision about whether to award Josh the global contract or not. They kept coming up to Josh and telling him how nice Bella was, how pretty she was, what fun.

  As if he didn't know.

  He should have been pleased. He should have been grateful. He should have encouraged Bella. Josh knew all that. But all he really wanted to do was to push his way through the men thronging around her, grab her by the wrist and drag her back to the room. Instead he had to smile and agree that, yes, Bella was a very special person.

  The dinner after the reception was nearly as bad, and then there was sitting around in the bar to be got through. Josh found himself longing for the moment when he would have Bella to himself, but when they finally left to go back to their room, it was even worse.

  Once they would have laughed and compared notes about who they had met, and Bella would have conducted an extensive critique of what the other women had been wearing, the intricacies of which Josh had never really appreciated but which had always amused him. But now any attempt at conversation shrivelled in the air and the only sound to break the silence between them as they walked back to their room was the rasp of insects in the tropical darkness.

  They were both determinedly matter-of-fact about going to bed. Josh had looked out some old pyjama bottoms and Bella was wearing a nightdress she had obviously chosen for its lack of seductive frills but whose uncharacteristic plainness only emphasised the glow of her skin and hinted at the lushness of her body beneath.

  Josh waited on the veranda, listening to the insects and the murmur of sea, and trying not to think about peeling that nightdress off Bella, while she spent what seemed like hours in the bathroom. His turn took a couple of minutes and, by the time he came out, she was in bed, the sheet pulled up to her chin.

  'Are you cold?' he asked stiltedly. 'I can turn the air-conditioning down if you like.'

  'No, I'm fine.'

  Tightening his jaw, Josh threw back the sheets on his side and got in. He could lie without touching Bella at all, but he was desperately aware of how close she was.

  'Are you ready for me to switch off the light?' he asked in a voice that didn't sound like his at all.

  'Yes, thanks.'

  One click, and the room was plunged into darkness, with just the sound of the air-conditioning rattling into the silence.

  Josh cleared his throat. 'Well, this is odd,' he said.

  'I know.' Bella sounded grateful to him for breaking the silence. 'It's lucky we're such good friends, isn't it? Imagine what it was like for Phoebe and Gib. They ended up sharing a bed with someone they didn't really know at all. It must have been really awkward.'

  Josh wondered how it could possibly have felt more awkward than it felt now, lying next to Bella and knowing that whatever he did he mustn't reach for her.

  'Lucky for us,' he agreed dryly.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Josh hoped that things would get easier as the week went by, but they didn't really. The days weren't too bad. He spent most of his time diving, and in the evenings he was careful not to be alone with Bella if he could avoid it. She was always the centre of a big group anyway, so that wasn't a problem.

  That meant that there were only the nights to get through. Josh told himself to treat them as an endurance test, like sitting out a blizzard halfway up a mountain, or carrying a heavy pack through the jungle when there were leeches insinuating themselves into your socks and you hadn't slept for three nights. If he could survive those, he could survive this.

  Of course he could.

  Aisling provided the most effective cover for his feelings for Bella, and Josh stuck as close to her as he could. It wasn't difficult. Bryn had turned out to be obsessive about deep-sea angling, and while Josh and Aisling were diving, he was out on a boat, strapped into a chair, and wrestling with, acco
rding to him at least, monster fish. In the evenings, he would relive his exploits in second by second accounts of his machismo to anyone who would listen.

  Josh noticed that Aisling looked a little tight-lipped at times, and often manoeuvred to a join the table where he and Bella were sitting rather than sit alone with Bryn, and he began to wonder if Bella's theory was right and that Aisling's passionate romance was wearing thin already.

  'I told you so.' Bella was almost snappy when he mentioned it to her. 'It must make you feel better.'

  Better? Josh was puzzled for moment before remembering that he was supposed to be still in love with Aisling.

  'Oh…yes, yes, it does,' he lied.

  'Obviously all those hours you and Aisling spend diving are paying off,' said Bella with a brittle smile. 'I'm very happy for you.'

  'You don't sound very happy.'

  'No, well, it's hard to feel very happy about being dumped on the beach every day while you and Aisling go off together,' she snapped.

  Josh looked at her in surprise. 'You said didn't want to go diving,' he reminded her. 'You said were having a good time.'

  'It's not much fun being an object of pity for everyone else on the beach!'

  He frowned. 'What do you mean?'

  'You know what I mean, Josh!' said Bella angrily. 'I know you want to be with Aisling, and that's fine, but you might give some thought to what it's like for me stuck here all day. Everyone thinks we're about to split up.'

  'What?'

  'Of course they do! They see you with Aisling, never with me. We never do anything together.'

  Bella was appalled at how close she was to tears. She had been trying so hard not to mind when Josh went off with Aisling every day. Nor had Aisling's growing impatience with Bryn been lost on her.

  Any day now, Aisling was going to realise what she had lost when she left Josh for Bryn. With Josh so clearly still available and keen to get back together, she wouldn't hesitate to say something to him, and then what was going to happen to her! Bella wondered. She would have to try and be happy for Josh but she wasn't sure that she would be able to bear it.