Hot Christmas Nights

by Rachel Bailey

  His hands cupped her cheeks, fingers spiking her hair, innocent almost. A new beginning, belied by his erection pressing hard against her. But when he groaned her name there was nothing innocent about the raw need winding through her, blurring her edges. Her breath stuttered, the ache in her core flared to life. So good to know how much she could still turn him on.

  “God, I’ve missed you,” she managed between kisses, surprised at how much she meant it. But she had missed him. Missed this. Missed this Danny. She knew the other paddlers would be here soon and she didn’t rightly care. Couldn’t think about anything other than melting into him again. She pulled him to the ground, out of view from the shore, her hand sweeping across his sculpted chest. Beneath her fingers was the steady heartbeat of a man she’d known soul deep. A man she’d loved with every fiber of her being.

  Her body was on fire anticipating his touch, heat swirled in her tummy, lower. Her nipples peaked as he crushed her ever tighter, deepening the kiss. His heat and his scent familiar, yet new. Powerful and strong, yielding and giving. And she responded the only way she knew how—by giving herself back to him.

  The kiss was a lifeline from then to now, a relearning, a renewal.

  It wasn’t just about wanting sex. It was about wanting him, the sharp dark guy who knew her thoughts before she did. Who lit up her heart with a smile. Who made her laugh more readily than anyone ever before. Or since.

  Her Danny.

  Danny boy.

  That was the old Daniel Wade. The one who’d broken her. The one who’d sent her away. Who was unreliable and at times unresponsive. Who refused to get help for a problem that was killing them both.

  The panic in her belly returned. This time it wasn’t light and bubbly and fizzing with expectation. It was flat and dark and ominous and tied gnarly knots in her stomach.

  Breathing hard and summoning every tiny bit of strength she could muster she pulled away from him, her heart beating a hasty no. Her head was muddled with what the hell is the right thing to do? She’d been so sure before but now she didn’t have a clue.

  “You okay?” His eyes were still blazing, but there was concern there now too, a softness. Something new, something old, something long forgotten. “I’m sorry, Emma, I shouldn’t have done that. But, hell, a man only has so much resolve.”

  “Danny…listen to me…you know when I said I had something to tell you? Well… I have…I think we should…” Oh, God. It needed to be said. She didn’t know who he was now, but she knew she couldn’t take a risk on him. Because that kind of love only came once in a lifetime and it was gone now. Everything had been tarnished with his drinking, by her selfish need to flee. Lost years. So much pain. How could they ever really find their way back to each other? “I have divorce papers with me. For you to sign.”

  “Whoa.” His eyes narrowed, he looked stunned. Shocked. “That was blunt.”

  She worked hard to keep her voice level. “I made a promise to myself that I’d be honest and open with you.” And things couldn’t go any further until she’d laid her cards in the table.

  “Well, you definitely kept that promise, Em. That’s for sure.” He scooted further away from her as if he’d been punched. Then he stood up, casting a long dark shadow over the sand, blocking out the sun. The shadow was mirrored on her heart, like a dirty smear. “You just let me do that and then you tell me you want a divorce?”

  “It can’t be a surprise, surely?”

  He smeared his fingers across his lips, wiping any trace of the kiss away. “Right now it is. Is it what you want?”

  “Right now I don’t know what I want. Everything’s been hazy since I got back.” Since I saw you. “Maybe it’s the jet-lag? I don’t know.”

  “Jet-lag’s a good excuse for a lot of things, Emma, but not for kissing someone.”

  “I thought I wanted a fresh start. We haven’t set eyes on each other for so long, it’s inevitable that we just finish off the paperwork and draw a line. The law says we have to be separated for two years before we can legally split. It’s just over that. I thought it was the right thing to do.”

  His mouth was tight, his eyes dark. “And now?”

  Her head was all over the place. One minute they were making out like teenagers underneath a bloody New Zealand Christmas tree of all things and now she was spilling her heart to the man who broke it.

  And, in the middle of all of this, she could still taste him, feel his heat. And it was so bloody unfair that walking away unscathed was never going to happen. “Now I’m trying to be honest with you, Danny. I’m confused.”

  “It’s Daniel now. No-one calls me Danny.”

  “I see. I’m sorry. Daniel. But we need to make some decisions.”

  “Is there someone else? Is that it? The kiss was just what? Thanks for the memories? You want a divorce so you can marry someone else?”

  Her heart lurched. No. Never again. “No, there’s no-one else. I’ve never wanted to marry anyone but you.”

  Before he could answer the sharp scrape of boats against shell had them turning round. After one last dark look Danny stalked away from her, the bubble of intimacy broken as he drifted towards the safety of their friends. She heard his tight voice as he spoke to Bas, saw the rigidity of his shoulders, a body taut with anger. Or frustration. Or disappointment. Or all three. “Glad you could make it. What took you?”

  “You want privacy, you only need to ask. No need to paddle halfway to Australia for some us time. We strategically stopped to look at some little blue penguins—thought you might need the opportunity, if you get what I mean. You can thank me later.” Bas winked and shoved a very soggy Santa hat into Daniel’s hand. “You lost this, buddy. Hey, what’s wrong? Problem?”

  Emma didn’t hear Dan’s answer, but she saw his back stiffen as he looked at Bas then reached into the kayak for the duffle bag of food.

  So she meandered towards the others, helped haul the rest of the kayaks up the beach and tried to maintain some sort of equilibrium. She’d been honest with him, as she’d promised herself. Starting fresh demanded that.

  But the plan was to start fresh alone. This was not the time for her to feel all wound up and pent up and frustrated as if he’d started a slow burn under her skin that was about to erupt any second. Because the whole point of this visit—apart from the wedding—was to end her marriage. Not rekindle it.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “So, give me the goss.” Megan plopped down on the coach seat next to Emma and gave her that all-knowing smile. Two vineyards down and she was what some people might call over-chatty. “If you don’t, I’ll make you sit next to my old Auntie Joyce for the rest of the evening, and she will entertain you with her last eight years’ worth of bowel movement history. Your choice.”

  Geez, Emma had forgotten how hard it was to keep secrets from these guys, especially after an afternoon comprising of six wine samples per visit. Twelve small drinks and the urge to confide in her friend was almost overwhelming. But some things were deeply private, and kissing Danny—Daniel—was definitely private. “Nothing to say. No goss.”

  “Really? So, yesterday you two were smiling and playing in the kayak. Next thing, you don’t speak to each other at the picnic and then…nothing? Really?”

  Not nothing. They’d stared grimly at each other across the bonfire. Paddled back with stony faces and Daniel’s eyes burning a hole in her back. Then she’d made excuses about a headache and left them all to it.

  “Again. Nothing to tell.” Emma folded her arms across her chest. She was not going to talk about Daniel Wade when he was up the front of the coach driving the damned thing. Worse, every time she glanced up at his rearview mirror she could see his brooding eyes. He was refusing to look back at her. They needed to talk.

  No—actually, she needed to leave this damned island regardless of how lovely it was and that her best friends and family were here and it felt a lot like…home. She hadn’t realized until she’d come back that there’d been a hole in h
er life that being with these guys filled. But she couldn’t spend the rest of her life living close to her ex. She’d die of sexual frustration. And spend every minute wondering whether she had, indeed, done the right thing. “I’m sorry, Meg, but there just isn’t anything I want to talk about where Daniel Wade is concerned.”

  “Sweetie, listen, you’re my Maid of Honor. You have to do everything I ask. And I’m asking…what went down on the beach?” The bossy bride bit her lips together and giggled. “I’m hoping it was Danny? Or you? Go you. I saw you both up near that old tree-very…er…secluded.”

  “No! Oh my God. No. No way. On the beach? With you guys arriving any second? No.” Not that it hadn’t crossed Emma’s mind when he was rubbing his hands over her body.

  “Interesting.”

  “What is?”

  “You said, No way! On a beach? Not: No way! I want a divorce.” Megan’s voice was a little loud.

  Emma looked around, everyone else was singing along to the Christmas music coming through the speakers, thankfully no-one had heard the D word. She lowered her voice hoping Megan would do the same. “Yeah. And that too.”

  “Say it and mean it.”

  The wine took over. She had to talk this through with someone before she self-combusted. “Okay. Listen up: I kissed him. On the beach. Rather, he kissed me and I kissed him back.”

  Megan clapped her hands and grinned. “I knew it! And then…?”

  “Then I told him I want a divorce. But before we could talk any more you all arrived. Not the best timing.”

  “Like right now, girlfriend. Ooh, I really, really want to hear more, but we’ll have to continue this exciting installment later because we’re just arriving at the vineyard. But wow, you’re a dark horse. Kissing, eh?” The coach pulled left into a gravel driveway. Marshall’s Winery. Megan stood and hushed everyone. “Here we are. The last stop of the day and a lovely Christmas Eve dinner with all the trimmings. There may also be a Santa Claus…don’t forget to tell him if you’ve been good or bad, okay? Hop off, everyone, and enjoy.”

  Then Megan paused and flashed an apologetic smile to Emma. “Er…”

  “No. I’m not telling you any more. Let’s get off this damned bus. I want first dibs on choosing seats. Nowhere near you know who.”

  The bride-to-be grimaced a little and her shoulders hitched—never a good sign. “Yes. About that. I sent along a little seating plan in advance…so I’m afraid to say you two are together.”

  Great. Just bloody fantastic. “Are you trying to kill me?”

  “Honey, I’m trying to make you both see sense.”

  As she shuffled into the queue to leave the coach Emma bit back the words she wanted to say because it was Christmas Eve and the day before her friend’s wedding so she had to play nice. But after? There would be no stopping her. “So, why did you think wine tasting would be a good idea the day before you got married? Everyone’s going to have hangovers from hell.”

  “The ceremony isn’t until three, we have all day to recover. Besides, no-one held a gun at your head and said drink the chardonnay or else. Daniel didn’t have any.”

  Daniel, Daniel, Daniel. Always Daniel. As they stepped off the coach he was there, hand out to help them down. She didn’t look at him, she didn’t touch him. When they were safely inside and out of his earshot she whispered to Megan, “He didn’t drink because he’s the chauffeur for the day.”

  Megan looked at her and took hold of her hands. Emma felt a sermon would be imminent. And she wasn’t wrong. “Because he’s sober, sweetie, that’s why. Every day. For over a year. Twelve steps and everything. Once he’d committed to getting better he never missed a meeting. And we’ve tried to help him as much as we can, he calls us his Booze Buster team—thank God he’s got his sense of humor back. But he used to phone us most days at the beginning, when he was really struggling, just to talk things through. He doesn’t have to now. He’s really committed. You should give him a chance.”

  Okay, so it wasn’t a sermon, just another advert for the Danny cause. Was it possible for someone to change so much? Her heart squeezed at the thought of him phoning his friends, because his wife wasn’t around for him to call.

  But she’d changed too. Well, hell, she hoped she had, because looking back at that Rich-bitch list she hadn’t been a particularly nice person; shallow and spoilt and a little demanding. Her face flushed at the thought of how selfish she’d been and the pressure she must have put on Dan to provide for her emotionally and financially…when he’d been sick and trying to cope.

  Yeah, she’d changed so it was possible he had too. Except… “But I saw him drinking beer yesterday.”

  “I find that very hard to believe. He wouldn’t do it. He’s like a new man, but still partly the old one too, and let’s face it, the old one had very nice wrapping, yes?”

  Emma refrained from hitting her oldest friend over the head with her handbag but it was a close run thing. “Please, please stop this matchmaking thing. It’s getting messy.”

  “It’s been too long since I had you both in the same space together. I just need you to see sense.”

  “I already have, Megan. That’s why the papers are in my bag.”

  So this was going to be awkward.

  Emma squeezed onto the long wooden bench beside the dinner table and nudged her… husband. It had been too long since she’d even thought of herself with any kind of relationship status, having consigned Danny to her past. She didn’t want to touch him but there was no choice in the matter. He shifted aside and made room giving her a forced smile. “Emma.”

  “Daniel—” She’d been about to apologize for last night, for the kiss and the bombshell, but he’d already turned his back and was talking to someone’s auntie’s sister’s friend on his other side. On Emma’s right was Lucy—a cousin, perhaps—someone from the other night who had smiled too sweetly at Daniel during the ball and question game, and was chatting animatedly to Bas’s brother. Which left Emma feeling a little like an outsider. She supposed she was now.

  She sat for a while looking down at her hands, wondering what to say and who to say it to, then checked out the venue. Reassuringly the vineyard hadn’t changed much in two years, although it had gone overboard with the decorations; there were festoons of colored streamers across the ceiling, a huge fir tree in one corner ablaze with twinkling lights and presents scattered underneath. Above the door there was plastic mistletoe which was being put to good use right now by Bas and Megan, who seemed to have no flicker of jitters tonight if the kissing was anything to go by.

  And there was an ache in the pit of Emma’s stomach as she watched them. There had been a time… And a man… Her man.

  He was here, so close. So dangerously close. In the small space his thigh was pressed tight against hers and she could feel the strength of it, the heat. And his scent wrapped around her, filling her with need and sending tingles of desire skittering across her skin. And despite everything; her promises, his anger, her sleepless night and the papers right there in her bag, she wanted to kiss him under the mistletoe too.

  She wanted the promises of sharing a bed with him tonight and tomorrow and… she’d lost that chance when she’d walked away from him in the throes of a devastating illness. Even though he’d commanded her to go. Even though he hadn’t wanted her to be part of his life back then. Even though walking away had been the only option she’d thought she had. He’d been ill and she should have understood that more than anyone. She should have stayed and fought for him.

  Worse, right now she wanted him to look at her the way Bas looked at Megan. The way Danny used to look at her.

  When she turned around he was looking at her and frowning. And, regardless of those brooding eyes, he was so damned gorgeous dressed in a dark collared shirt and smart trousers. With that soppy Christmas hat that had floated away from him yesterday stuck firmly yet shabbily on his head making him look somehow more cute, more endearing. More lethally sexy.

  She
didn’t want to touch him, but dammit all to hell, she did.

  Everywhere.

  “Thanks for doing the driving today, it’s made everything so much easier with us all together.” She tried to speak with a voice that wasn’t lust-filled. And failed. “I see you’ve got your Santa hat on again. It’s looking a little worse for wear. A little…floppy, if you don’t mind me saying.”

  “Floppy? No-one’s ever had cause to say that to me.” Daniel’s scowl dropped a teeny bit but the air hummed with discontent. “I don’t know what his fixation is with this hat, but once I’ve stopped being the Best Man I’m gonna shove it up Bas’s—”

  “Grinch,” Emma interrupted before Auntie Joyce across the table overheard. No point upsetting her on Christmas Eve. “I never did understand why you hate Christmas so much. You remember the first one we had in our house? You didn’t even want a tree.”

  “You did know, you just didn’t like it. We never had a fuss at home, growing up. It just wasn’t our way. Mum wasn’t much into celebrations. I can’t remember a time when we ever did anything like decorate a tree. That was what other people did.”

  He huffed out a breath. His single-parent mum had struggled with the blues for most of his life and there’d been little joy growing up in his house. He’d worn the stresses on her behalf, had left school early and gotten a job to support the family. Once his mother had died and his sister had her own life it was as if he’d had a new lease of life to follow his own dreams at last, so he joined the force.

  Some people might have wanted to make up for all that loss by being extravagant, not Daniel. At least not financially. He’d been charming and fun-loving and had grasped life in other ways, though; skinny dipping, beach picnics, snorkeling. “We couldn’t afford it, Emma. I was working double shifts to pay the mortgage as it was.”