Love Islands…The Collection. Jane Porter
‘Where did you go?’
‘To my aunt and uncle’s farm in South Dakota. Every year for years. In the mornings my mum and my aunt would sew, and my dad and uncle would fix things, and in the afternoons they would all play bridge.’
Malachi nodded. ‘It’s a good game. Old-timers usually play a tight hand.’
Addie smiled. ‘Not just old-timers. I play a pretty tight hand too.’
‘But you didn’t? Play, I mean? You said, “they would all play bridge”.’
She stiffened. No wonder he was so good at poker. He missed nothing. Every glance, every word, every blink was noted and examined and weighed up.
She shook her head. ‘No. I used to help my aunt feed the animals, and then I’d do my piano practice on this old keyboard my uncle rigged up in the barn. To be honest, it wasn’t really that different to being at home—just quieter. Even quieter than in Wichita.’
‘I’ve been to Wichita.’ His face was calm, watchful. ‘It’s not Vegas, but it’s not exactly a ghost town.’
Picking up her glass, she took a sip of water, her cheeks suddenly warm. She had never told him much about her family. She hadn’t wanted him to know. Beside his glamour and raw animal energy, her home, her childhood, had felt so ordinary and she’d been embarrassed. But mostly she’d been scared. Scared that somehow he would see through her, past whatever it was that he thought he saw, and realise her ordinariness. For deep down she had never quite believed that he wanted her for who she really was.
She smiled. ‘Wichita is fine. It was my home that was so quiet. You see, my parents were already old when I was born. My dad was nearly sixty when my mum got pregnant. I don’t remember him ever being well. I always had to be quiet at home because he was sleeping, and I couldn’t have friends over to play.’ She smiled again, more weakly. ‘I think that’s why I got so good at the piano. My lessons at my teacher’s house were the only time I was allowed to be rowdy!’
‘Moving to Miami must have been a bit of a shock, then.’ He was smiling still, but his eyes on her face were serious.
She nodded, wondering where he was heading with that remark.
‘I suppose,’ she agreed. ‘But in a good way. I could be who I wanted to be. The real me. And Miami is such a warm, vibrant place. It’s like there’s a permanent party happening.’
The change in him was negligible. She might not even have noticed it but for the slight tightening of his mouth, the ripple of tension in his shoulders.
There was a small pause, and then he shrugged. ‘You can get tired of partying!’
She looked up at his face, wishing that there were subtitles running across his forehead to give her a clue as to what was going on inside his head.
‘I suppose you can,’ she said carefully. ‘I haven’t actually been to that many.’
He shifted in his seat, abruptly switching his gaze across the veranda to the rippling blue water.
‘I must have been to hundreds,’ he said softly. ‘My parents live to party. When I was a child, Henry, my father, kept a whole bunch of suites at the Colony Club. All weekend it would be open house. To get in, my parents just had to like you. My mother, Serena, once invited the boy who cleaned our pool because he could charm snakes.’
His face grew still and taut.
‘He had other charms too!’ He stared past her, then shrugged again. ‘But not enough to keep my mother entertained. So somebody threw him out of a window. He landed in the swimming pool.’ Glancing at Addie’s horrified expression, he smiled tightly. ‘I expect you’re grateful they didn’t come to our wedding now!’
She stared at him in silence. Yes and no. For a moment she considered asking him about their absence again, but the fierce dark glow in his eyes held her back.
‘Wow! They don’t sound like most people’s parents,’ she said finally.
His eyes narrowed. ‘They’re not. In fact I don’t really think of them as parents. Serena was only sixteen when she had me, and Henry had just been kicked out of Dartmouth.’ His mouth twisted. ‘You could say we grew up together. And now there’s a couple of calls I need to make, so why don’t you take a shower or go for a swim?’
Disconcerted, she met his gaze.But there was no mistaking the discouraging tone of his voice. Nor the shuttered look in his eyes. The conversation was over.
In the end she took the shower. An hour later she lay on the bed, gazing out of the window. It had certainly been an interesting day. So much had happened—what with all the travelling and her failed attempt to seduce Malachi on the plane. Only even that felt so long ago now, and suddenly far less significant, pushed aside by his unexpected and uncharacteristic revelations about his life.
Thinking back to what he’d told her about his parents and their partying lifestyle, she bit her lip. Would she be enough to keep him entertained? Her pulse slowed and, stifling a yawn, she breathed out softly. She didn’t have to be. This trip wasn’t about partying and crowds. He wanted peace and birdsong. And her.
Or he would once he’d finished making his calls.
It was a comforting thought. Or it might have been had she not seen him sitting and staring out across the water, gaze unmoving, phone lying untouched next to where his fingers restlessly tapped the tabletop.
She tried to make sense of it. But after an hour her brain and body gave in to the heat of the day and finally, swiftly, she fell asleep.
IT WAS THE light falling across her face and a feeling of not quite knowing where she was that woke Addie. Somebody had closed the cream-coloured blinds, but she knew without even pulling them open that it was morning.
Her stomach flipped over nervously and she kept her eyes closed, basking in the soft whiteness of the morning, delaying the moment when she would have to face the man lying on the other side of the bed. What exactly was the correct way to greet your estranged husband the morning after the night before?
Her cheeks grew warm. Except there hadn’t been a night before, because she’d fallen asleep instead.
She held her breath, wondering how he felt about that fact.
But there was only one way to find out and, gritting her teeth, she opened her eyes and rolled over.
Beside her the bed was empty. And not just empty. The sheet and pillowcase were perfectly smooth. Unless Malachi had slept several inches above the mattress, he hadn’t slept there at all.
Her heart gave a twitch as she noticed a paper rose on the pillow beside her. Unfolding it, she saw that it was a note from Malachi, written in his familiar bold, cursive script.
Sweetheart,
I’m sorry I didn’t wake you last night, only I thought you needed to sleep. I’ve got a couple of problems at work to sort out, but breakfast is all laid out so help yourself to what you want.
Terry is dropping round this morning, so if you need anything else ask him.
Malachi
PS—While I remember, the security pin is 2106. You’ll need it to open any doors or windows. You shouldn’t have a problem remembering it!
She read it again, and then twice more. Reading between every line, letter and punctuation mark. But the words stayed stubbornly the same, and finally she dropped the note onto the sheet beside her.
Of course she would remember the pin number. It