The Bridegroom's Dilemma

by Lindsay Armstrong

  ‘Who’s talking about clinging?’ she managed to say although there were tears of anger and sorrow in her eyes. ‘I was talking about being in love and sharing—our lives. However, you’re right in one sense. I did mislead you.’

  He raised a sceptical eyebrow at her.

  ‘Skye Belmont, as you see her on television, is not the real me. It’s something I don’t fully understand myself and perhaps, with you, I’ve extended that persona. I think I always knew when you let me dangle for two months…’ She stopped and shrugged. ‘Well, that I should be all cool and confident.’

  ‘That’s not how you are in bed.’

  ‘No,’ she said thoughtfully, although something felt as if it was frozen inside her—her heart? she wondered.

  ‘Perhaps that is something we should take into account before we do anything—drastic,’ he drawled.

  ‘How good we are in bed?’ She swallowed again as his dark gaze drifted down her robe, resting on the outline of her nipples beneath the thin yellow silk then the slenderness of her waist bound by the sash and finally to the curve of her hips—hips, he often told her, like perfect peaches on a slender stem. ‘No, Nick,’ she said hoarsely. ‘For months I’ve…used that to…to blind myself to everything else.’

  His gaze was sardonic as it reached her eyes again. ‘Then what do you propose? Isn’t it a little late, Skye,’ he said with sudden savage impatience, ‘to have this dramatic awakening? Do you know what would happen if we did go back to bed?’

  She closed her eyes. ‘I’m sorry but I just can’t do it.’

  ‘Sorry?’ he repeated. ‘You’re the one with a wedding dress in your cupboard, a cake you made yourself, all your new honeymoon clothes, two bridesmaids—’

  ‘Stop it,’ she whispered, appalled. ‘You’re the one who has just told me you’re going to resist us having children to the nth degree.’

  ‘Skye, if it makes you happy, have them,’ he said wearily.

  ‘No, thank you, Nick. Not with you.’

  ‘Look, this has blown out of all proportion and I can’t believe you’ve made love to me time and time again with such joy—when all this was on your mind.’ He raked a hand through his hair and set his teeth. ‘When all these shortcomings of mine were niggling away at you!’

  ‘Neither can I,’ she said with a deadly sort of calm. ‘And I am sorry I didn’t understand and…look this in the face earlier. Goodbye, Nick.’ She pulled her engagement ring off and laid it on the counter.

  ‘Keep it,’ he said dryly. ‘Who knows? It might bring you some comfort when you’re not in my bed, just loving it.’

  Her eyes registered the sheer hurt of his words but she drew on a reserve of strength she hadn’t known she possessed, and left the ring lying on the counter. ‘Would you announce it? I think we’d be better doing that otherwise there’ll be endless speculation.’

  He laughed and picked up the ring to turn it between his long fingers. ‘There’s still going to be endless speculation, Skye, but if that’s what you really want?’

  ‘Yes. Thank you. I’ll go now.’

  His eyes captured hers. ‘There’s no reason we couldn’t still be lovers. We’re pretty good at that, whatever we may lack for marriage.’

  She bit her lip to stop herself from crying out in anguish and he stood watching her attentively, the stuff her dreams were made of, until she’d run into the reality of Nick Hunter. It was as if every time they’d made love or laughed together passed before her eyes, as if she were drowning, she thought torturedly.

  But remember this, she told herself. Remember his last words to you.

  ‘Not any more,’ she murmured, and turned away.

  The simple announcement had been in the paper the next morning. Today, she mused. Had she hoped there would be some attempt on his part to mend things? Of course. Had she hoped a lonesome night such as she had passed last night would change him? Yes.

  But no olive branch had come. Only a few formal lines on page three of the paper together with a photo of them in happier times. So it really was over and the sooner she came to grips with it, the better. Nick Hunter was not for her.

  She would go away, as soon as she could arrange it. She would take the cake to a hospital and she would even donate her wedding dress to charity…

  CHAPTER TWO

  THREE weeks later, Skye was pounding away at a laptop computer in her bikini beside a beach so perfect, most other people would have been lost in admiration for the view.

  Or lazing in the aqua shallows beside its whiteness, perhaps snorkelling over the reef with its jewel-bright coral, or simply wondering what culinary delight was in store for lunch.

  Indeed, for her first few days on Haggerstone Island, way up the coast of Queensland within the Great Barrier Reef towards Cape York, Skye had done all of those things. Besides, the resort on this tropical island, with its beautiful New Guinea-style roundhouse, accommodated very few guests—part of its attraction and why she’d chosen it—and, until today, she’d been the only one.

  This had suited her perfectly as she’d tried to come down from wrapping up the show for the series, and come to terms with her break-up from Nick. And the sheer beauty of the place, as well as being so far away from civilization, had helped cocoon her from her emotional turmoil.

  There was nothing behind Cape Grenville, off which Haggerstone stood, but vast cattle stations. And the couple who ran the resort had literally carved it out of the wilderness themselves. So not only was it a cherished project of lovely taste and style, but the island and waters around it were home to them.

  Skye had gone fishing, snorkelling and crayfish-catching with them. She was on friendly terms with Tilly, their resident wallaby, she’d sampled her hostess’s marvellous cooking and spent the rest of her time relaxing in the sun or the sea.

  Her fair skin was now golden, her hair was even fairer and she knew she looked healthy. It had taken the news that another guest was arriving to make her realize that her cocoon was about to split open, and to wonder about her inner health. She would more than likely be recognized and, even if she wasn’t, she wanted no human contact at the moment other than the discreet, undemanding friendship she had with her hosts.

  Then it had occurred to her that if she could weave Haggerstone Island and its cuisine into her book, particularly the way her hostess used a cooking pit and different grids for different effects, she not only had a legitimate reason for being too busy to socialize, she also had something wonderful to write about from a culinary point of view.

  She later realized that it was impossible to be a recluse on an island with only three other people, but, most of all, quite impossible to quash Bryce Denver.

  He was twenty-six, a marine biologist. He was tall but looked as if he might not have lost all his puppy fat; indeed, he was exceedingly clumsy, like an overgrown puppy—out of the water, that was. He swam like a fish. He had red hair, freckles and a shy kind of charm.

  Half an hour after he’d landed on the adjacent island and been transported over the reef to Haggerstone by boat, he told Skye over lunch that he’d fallen in love with her when he’d first seen her on television and he’d breathed a sigh of absolute relief when he’d read about her breaking off her engagement to Nick Hunter…

  Something about her frozen expression must have got through to him, because he slapped his forehead suddenly, knocking over his water glass in the process, and he asked her with unmistakable sorrow if she could ever forgive him for being such a callous idiot.

  She assured him stiffly that she could, but made a resolve to get herself away from Haggerstone as fast as possible.

  She retreated to her room after lunch. The guest accommodation was in separate cabins and hers had a superb view over the water and the reef and was cool inside with wooden shutters at the windows. She sat down and started to write furiously.

  But at sunset the lure of the beach got to her and she wandered outside to watch an evening ritual she loved. The resident guinea f
owl settling for the night in a magnificent coral tree in front of the roundhouse, the one peacock walking amongst the old dugout canoes planted with vivid impatiens, the quality of light over the water and beach, the beautiful serenity of Haggerstone.

  She wasn’t surprised when Bryce Denver came up to join her as she sat on the beach but she was surprised to find him now a gentle, amusing companion.

  Perhaps it was the magic of the island that did it, she thought later. That gave him the belated tact to steer well away from anything personal, and gave her wounded psyche the balm to simply relax and go with the flow.

  At any rate, she went to bed that night no longer determined to leave. Bryce was not going to be a problem, she decided. She would stay at least until she’d perfected her piece on Haggerstone.

  Bryce was not a problem over the next days. As a marine biologist the waters, fish and coral around the island were the nearest thing to heaven for him. As a companion, he was rather like a younger brother despite being two years older.

  He was sweet, she caught herself thinking once, and had to grimace because she knew enough about men to know he would not relish that tag. Nor might he have relinquished any dreams he’d woven around Skye Belmont, TV personality, but he was nice and they would be parting in a few days anyway. He to Cairns where he lived, she to Sydney.

  It was the thought of Sydney that suddenly lay on her mind like a bar. The last thing she wanted to do was go home, she mused.

  And that was why, in the end, when Bryce made an amazing suggestion, she agreed.

  ‘Only one more sleep,’ Bryce said regretfully over dinner, ‘after tonight, that is. I believe we’re flying out together?’

  Skye stirred and looked rueful. ‘I could stay here for ever.’

  ‘So could I,’ he agreed, ‘but I’ve had a thought.’

  Skye immediately looked wary instead of rueful.

  ‘I’m not going straight home,’ he said hastily. ‘A good friend of mine has a cattle station west of Cairns and next weekend is their annual picnic race meeting. It’s quite something,’ he said enthusiastically. ‘People come from hundreds of miles around for it and they sleep in tents, whatever—you would enjoy it, Skye.’

  ‘Not sleeping in a tent, I wouldn’t, Bryce.’ She grasped the first reason she could for nipping this suggestion in the bud although she quite liked camping.

  ‘Oh, no! I didn’t mean that. My friend makes up a house party at the homestead; it’s huge—the house, I mean! And he’s always delighted if I bring someone with me.’

  Skye sighed inwardly and reminded herself she’d known that this could be on the cards. ‘Bryce, look, you’ve been lovely company but there couldn’t ever be any more to it than that, for me.’

  ‘Because of Nick Hunter?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said honestly.

  ‘He must be mad!’

  Skye smiled wearily. ‘It was as much my fault as his but it…’ She gestured. ‘So I think I’m better off going home and I think you…are so nice, when the right girl comes along, she’ll thank her lucky stars she found you.’

  He grimaced.

  ‘I mean it,’ Skye said sincerely.

  ‘I still think you should come with me. I promise not to make a nuisance of myself but it could make an interesting chapter for your book. They spit-roast pigs and sides of beef, they make traditional damper and billy tea, they cook witchety grubs…’

  Unwittingly, Skye couldn’t help looking interested.

  ‘And there’s an awful lot of colour and activity,’ Bryce continued. ‘Real outback stuff—calf-roping, wood-chopping contests, a boxing tent—and I’m no mean hand with a camera. I’ve got some lovely shots of Haggerstone for you.’

  Pictures were the one thing Skye had worried about. She’d come unprepared to make a photographic diary of her sojourn. Truth to tell, although she’d brought her laptop, she hadn’t seen herself as being in the frame of mind to write anything constructive.

  And she knew Bryce did have an impressive array of cameras, underwater and others.

  She said uncertainly, ‘I’ll…I’ll think about it. But…’

  ‘I always keep my promises,’ Bryce said earnestly. ‘Although, one day, if you ever get over him, well, who knows?’

  Two days later, although she was still unsure of the wisdom of it, she flew to Cairns then on to Mount Gregory Station with Bryce Denver. He’d arranged a lift with a pilot friend of his who was flying to Weipa and who would pick them up on his return the day after the two-day race meeting.

  An hour or so after they landed, she knew she had not only been unwise but quite mad, and not on account of Bryce. Nick was one of the house party. Nick with a beautiful companion in tow.

  She should have suspected it when Jack Attwood, Bryce’s friend, and his wife, Sally, picked them up from the station airstrip in a Land Rover. Sally did a distinct double take, then asked in an awed but also slightly anxious voice whether Skye was who she thought she was.

  Bryce assured her that this was Skye Belmont but she’d rather not have any fuss made about it.

  Jack greeted her warmly, and said, ‘No, no, we—wouldn’t dream of it. Welcome, Skye, it’s a great pleasure, but…anyway.’ He stopped as if unsure how to proceed, then urged them all to get into the vehicle out of the blistering sun.

  On the way to the homestead, he gave them a tour of the race track with its tent population starting to swell for the two-day meeting beginning tomorrow. And he told them that this race meeting had been held on Mount Gregory since his great-grandfather’s time and had become a local institution.

  Skye felt a pulse of interest and excitement as she looked around. At the people, so many of them obviously outback types, at the horses, the colour, the dust, and the quaint ancient little two-tiered grandstand. It would make a perfect chapter for her book, she told Jack and Sally, if they were agreeable to her using Mount Gregory?

  Sally said they would be enchanted, and they all chatted away on the drive to the homestead, with that odd little moment of anxiety forgotten, by Skye at least.

  It came rushing back to her as she mounted the shallow steps to the veranda that ran around the vast old house. Afternoon tea was laid out on a long table and there were two couples enjoying it as they lounged in planter chairs.

  She stopped dead as she saw who one of the men was, sitting beside a lovely girl of about her own age with a sensational figure and long dark hair, and with her hand on his arm with unmistakable familiarity. As she stopped, she heard Sally take an audible breath behind her, and Bryce tripped.

  Jack broke the awful awkwardness of it in a way, he was later to confide to his wife, that was worse and definitely akin to putting his foot squarely into his mouth.

  ‘Skye,’ he said heartily, ‘you probably know this bloke better than we do!’

  Skye closed her eyes briefly but it was no mirage. It was Nick all right, in khaki moleskins, a red and white checked shirt, short boots, with his dark hair just the same and an unreadable expression in his eyes.

  It soon fled, that expression, to give way to the look of sardonic amusement he bestowed on his friend Jack Attwood, then become almost rueful as it rested on Skye.

  ‘Oh, dear,’ he murmured, ‘I left town because I’m everyone’s favourite villain and—so this mightn’t happen. I’m sorry, Skye, but I had no idea you were a friend of the Attwoods.’

  ‘I’m not,’ Skye heard herself say casually, and wondered where she was dredging the composure from. ‘We’ve only just met. It was Bryce’s idea. Uh—Nick, this is Bryce Denver. Bryce—Nick Hunter.’

  Don’t trip again or knock anything over, she pleaded silently with Bryce as she introduced them.

  But Bryce was perfect. He made the veranda with no further incident, held out his hand and said, ‘Great to meet you, Nick! Yes, it was my idea. Skye and I have just had the most wonderful holiday on Haggerstone Island and we couldn’t persuade ourselves to go home yet. So, here we are.’

  If the scars with
in Skye hadn’t been so raw and new, she would have laughed at the way Nick was momentarily floored. He went perfectly still and there was a glint of sheer disbelief in his eyes as they rested on her then flicked back to Bryce.

  But instead of laughing she found herself thinking two thoughts: why shouldn’t what was sauce for the gander be sauce for the goose? And had she meant so little to him, he’d waited barely a month before acquiring someone new?

  But that little frozen moment broke up like a kaleidoscope pattern shifting at the end of a tube. The girl with Nick got up and introduced herself as Wynn Mortimer, and the other middle-aged couple introduced themselves as Peter and Mary Clarke, neighbours of the Attwoods.

  Then they all sat down to afternoon tea.

  Skye wasn’t sure how she got through it but, of course, she should have known. Skye Belmont, television personality, took over. She even saw Bryce look at her once with a trace of surprise, and she realized that she’d been a somewhat muted companion during their days on Haggerstone.

  Nor could she regret it, when, not long into afternoon tea, Wynn displayed a high-powered personality. She was funny, she was extremely articulate as well as obviously sophisticated. She talked about her recent trip to Africa on a modelling assignment and had them all in stitches when she described a close encounter with five white rhino. She also revealed she was a champion water-skier.

  Just what he needs, Skye caught herself thinking cynically. Not someone who would love to cook for him, by the sound of it. Or ruin her figure bearing his children. At that moment, she happened to encounter Nick Hunter’s dark eyes on her.

  She felt a frisson run through her as he made no attempt to hurry his inspection of her denim pinafore shorts over a lovely dotted white voile blouse. Or her sun-lightened hair and golden skin, and her legs down to the pair of white sand shoes she wore.

  ‘You’re looking well, Skye,’ he said then, into a lull in the conversation.