I rub my face into his chest. I’m glowing with exhaustion and echoes of new and impossible pleasure. I murmur, “something definitely happened to mine.” Drowsy, I peer up into his eyes, “but I heard the Island got its name from the huge poles all the men have here.”
“Hasn’t affected mine,” he tells me, “it’s this size all over the world.”
“My god,” I moan.
He hugs me and when we kiss, it’s as though we’re different people, meeting for the first time. Meeting with our lips. Our breath. Our heartbeats.
He asks if I’m up for a swim.
“Oh, yes!” without a thought, I’m up. I retrieve my bikini and the lovely silk wrap, and I’m straight in the sea.
In the water, I’m completely at home. I feel as if I really am a water baby and somehow never discovered or realized it.
In the moonlight, with the party on the beach still in full cry, and fireworks still crackling and flashing above, we swim the half mile across the bay. Some florescent flying fish skip over the silvery waves with us.
All the way around the point. We swim to a yacht and he helps me climb aboard.
Dripping on the rear deck in the moonlight, I look around, a little bit dazzled. He opens a set of double doors and leads me through a huge lounge, and forward to a beautiful bedroom suite.
“The master suite?”
“Actually, no. This is the best guest suite.” In front the suite has a deck of its own, where he feeds me champagne and tasty nibbles.
“So, you really are a billionaire?”
He laughs. “I am. But this isn’t my boat.”
I’m shocked. “So, are we pirates?”
He laughs again. “We could be. The Lady Don’t Ask is a luxury, sea-going yacht, but she’s Banger’s boat. We have his permission to board.” He cocks his head, “Well, I do. So you do by extension.”
“That sketchy bar must make him a lot more money than I thought.”
He laughs, “Banger only runs the bar because he loves it. That and to give Sunrise and Poppy something to not do.”
“Is he born wealthy?”
“No, he’s… well, I should let him tell you. You should talk to him, though.”
“Will he be coming back to the boat?”
He shakes his head as he advances on me. We make love again, on the deck, under the stars. Slowly this time. Taking time to fit to each other, feel ourselves into one another. Taste each other more.
“I love you, Amber,” he tells me, “You’re everything I need.”
I wake up in sunlight, wrapped in his arms. His smile is already on me, waiting.
He makes coffee, eggs and toast for breakfast.
“I need to see Banger and Dashiell. Not sure you met Dashiell last night. But you will.”
I look over my coffee cup. This feels like something that’s going to be permanent. I know what he said last night, but people can say things. I really feel like he might mean it though.
He’s way too old for me and everything tells me I really shouldn’t trust him.
I want to, though. So much it hurts.
He hugs me and when we kiss, it’s like a light goes on between us. Then, when we part, part of it stays with each of us. Am I drunk? I’m not used to trusting my feelings. But I’m not used to feeling this much, either.
“I’ll be looking for Banger in the bar or the Surf Shop, if you want to come find me.” He kisses me again, “Or, stay here. Wait for me. Chill. Kick back. I won’t be long.”
I explore the Lady Don’t Ask a little. I find a gorgeous study and I’m amazed to see shelves lined with romance books. Almost all of them by Magenta Hardwick. Whatever I would have thought about Banger, hardly seems the type for reading romance.
Looking closer, there are about half a dozen copies of each book, and all the spines are perfect, like the books have never been opened. Curioser and curioser.
After a little while, though, I decide to follow Jack. Jock. My man. My master. Ooh, I get a mini waterfall of thrills thinking of it.
Take care of yourself, Amber, I tell myself. Don’t let yourself go too easy.
The beach is covered in more bodies than usual, and way more of them are lying down, smeared with swirls and patterns of florescent color.
The bar of Surf Sup is cool and empty, apart from Sunrise, perched behind the bar and looking frail with a long drink. I ask if she knows where Banger is. She shakes her head.
“No worry. I’ll try the surf shop.”
“Wait… I…”
I hear her behind me, but I’m already headed for the store.
Poppy’s eyes widen as I step in. She’s standing by Jock. In front of him I can see fluffy, platinum blonde hair, on top of a long neck above a curvy, caramel golden back and shoulders, wriggling in a bikini.
Jock has an intense look on his face.
“Is this just your standard M.O., then?” I’m aiming for it to sound light. Teasing. Maybe like we were yesterday. But it comes out wrong. Forgetting the rule about when you’re in a hole, I go on. “You get curvy girls trying on bikinis?” I’m still not finding the lightness I’m going for. He’s looking serious, too. I keep trying.
How dumb am I?
“Did you tell her how she looks like your sister?”
He’s not smiling as he raises a hand. “Sorry, Amber, but you’ve got the wrong end of this stick. This is a gossip journalist. From TheShizzle, no less. They ran the worst muck-raking series about some friends of mine…”
The blonde, fluffy head turns, “Amber?”
“Kayleigh? When did you get here?” I’m starting to smile, but the black look on Jack’s face freezes my face.
“You know her?” he growls. “Oh, I get it. How can I be so slow?”
“What?”
“This is your friend, right? The one who so wants to meet Jack McCaber.” He’s seething. “This hack from the sleazy fucking gossip site, TheShizzle.” He gets up. “Okay, Amber. Ladies. I’ve been played. Well done.”
And like the wind, he’s gone. The slam of the door doesn’t even echo.
Chapter Nine
I didn’t take or return any of Kayleigh’s calls or messages. I know it wasn’t really her fault, but I couldn’t deal with it and, this time, she was the last person I wanted to talk to.
The other last person I wanted to talk to made it easier, because he didn’t call. I might have been tempted to call or message him but, of course, I didn’t have a number so I couldn’t. So that was that.
So I kept in my hotel suite.
From the files marked ‘careful what you wish for,’ I did get what I wanted.
Turns out there’s nothing quite like a broken heart to give you the space, focus, and inspiration to write a really cracking page-turning, tear-jerker romance. Three days in and I’ve got a killer outline and, I’m pretty sure, a blow-the-doors barnstormer of a first draft. What a shame I don’t have any prospect of getting it to an agent or a publisher.
Still, I’ll finish it. It will be my best yet. I’ve written two and successfully kept them so secret, nobody else has read a single word of them.
I’ll be leaving tomorrow. I think I’ll be equally sorry and glad.
Kayleigh and I will be okay. I’d say we’ve got over worse things, but it’s not true. We’ve got over other things, though. It’ll be alright.
I stop into Surf Sup for a last look and a Kings Pole Tonic for old times’ sake.
The place is practically empty. Sunrise is hiding in the corner behind the bar, in case a customer comes in. Her bright smile flashes when she sees me, but then she dashes away.
I take my regular table in the shade at the back. After a while, Poppy hurries in.
“Amber, sweet. Where you been?”
I smile.
She says, “Let me fix you a Slippery Pole Plunge, honey. Then you tell me everything.”
It’s great to see her warm smile. “There’s nothing to tell. I would love a Kings Pole Tonic, though.”
“Honey, I don’t do those.” She smiles again. “The Slippery Pole Plunge is all I know. No worry, though. Sunrise gone to get Banger. He’ll fix you up. You look sad, sweet.”
I’m about to say something but I don’t know what. She says, “It’s okay. I heard… well, something.” She puts a hand on my arm.
A male silhouette stands in the light at the edge of the palapa, then hurries to my table. “Amber,” Banger reaches for my hand. “You okay?”
“Of course.” I’m not. Obviously. But still.
“Would you come for lunch with me?” he looks around, over his shoulder, and he lowers his voice, “On the boat?” He looks in my eye. “We can talk there.”
“Do we have to swim?”
Banger takes me in a small boat. Seeing the Lady brings a stone to my chest.
Banger helps me aboard and tells me to walk around to the foredeck. Suddenly I’m feeling vulnerable. I’m glad he doesn’t ask me to go inside. The boat is even bigger than I remember.
There are two chairs on the deck and a little table. In one of the chairs, splayed in the sun in his kilt, is Jock. Jock. Whoever-the-fuck he is.
He looks up, and his face is stone. I look at him. The urge to run is overwhelming. Then I realize I can just jump. Dive off and swim back. Why not?
A hard silence hangs between us. Then I decide, fuck it. I’ll face it. Take it head-on. Not like me at all. I found big-girl pants without even knowing it.
“I’m sorry,” I tell him. “It’s true, I was trying to get a contact for you, and it was for Kayleigh.” I hold his gaze. And he holds mine. There it is. I feel like shrugging but I don’t this isn’t a shrugging moment. “In my defense, I had no idea it was you… if you know what I mean. Though it doesn’t really make any difference, I guess.”
“No, I’m sorry. It’s all my fault. TheShizzle isn’t really such a bad site. Some people I know got burned, but there was a reason. And I looked up some of your friend’s stuff. She’s actually a pretty fair journalist.”
I nod.
Then he says, “And, in my defense, you are the love of my life. You’re all I ever want and everything I need. I want you to be my lady and to have my children.”
“’Be your lady’? It sounds kind of formal.”
“It is. I’m a Laird. My wife becomes a Lady. Not that you aren’t a lady. But it’s a title. Lady. Will you?”
“What does it involve?”
“Marrying me. Will you? Marry me?”
“Oh. Hmm. Okay.”
He’s up like a sudden storm. I tell him, “One other thing…”
“What?”
“The other thing. The having your babies thing?”
“What?” he looks ashen. Terrified.
It’s too early for reliable tests, but I feel certain. “I think I’ve got one already.”
Epilogue
Amber was right. Of course. The next chieftain of the McCabers was already blossoming, protected inside her.
We were married in Surf Sup, Dashiell lent us his villa for a party after. We only stayed about half an hour. I took my bride to a tiny private cove, and we spent a week in hammocks, fishing and making sweet and savage love.
We doze and rest. With her in my arms, I feel like a new man. Like there’s a new light. I want to know why she was so angry with me. “What were you upset about? Was it me being wealthy or the fact I’d been called reclusive?”
She’s talking into my chest. “Neither. Both. I don’t know. It tuned out you weren’t who I thought you were.”
“You hated who you thought I was.”
“Right. And so now I have to get to know you all over. I need to find a whole new set of reasons to hate you.”
“I know you’ll find plenty and it’ll not take you long.”
She bites me again. A little harder this time. “Maybe it’s the fact you didn’t tell me who you were. You let me think you were a vagabond.”
“You weren’t at all keen to listen, as I recall. Anyway, telling people you just met that you’re a billionaire leads to all kinds of misunderstanding.”
“And I am. I’m your vagabond, Amber.” Her lips purse. She doesn’t like to be reasoned against, my queen. “Anyway,” I go on, “does it matter? I believe I’m a fair judge of character, Amber, and I think my instincts are right about you. You’d not have hated me less if I was stony broke. Or if you knew I was ten times as wealthy.”
“How rich are you?”
“Agh. Plenty. You’ll find out.”
~~
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