‘I know. I don’t want perfect,’ she said softly. ‘I just want perfect for me.’
‘And I’m not, is that it?’ David shook his head, his face red with anger as he stalked forward towards her. ‘You cannot truly be trying to tell me this is my fault.’ The last two words came out as a yell, and Zoey shrank back against the door.
‘No, no. That’s not what I’m saying.’
But David was past listening. He took another slow, deliberate step forward and Zoey found her hands moving instinctively in front of her as if to ward him off.
Calm down, Zo, she told herself, trying to keep her breathing even. It’s just David. Nothing to be scared of.
Except she was.
‘Do you know, there’s an actual support group.’ David’s voice was low and dangerous. ‘For your exes. For all the men you’ve tried to destroy with your cheating, lying ways.’
Zoey swallowed. She wanted to deny the cheating accusation but, after last night, how could she?
‘I... No. I didn’t know that.’
‘Oh, yes.’ Another step closer. ‘They reached out to me after I proposed to you. As soon as they heard you’d said yes. They keep tabs on you, you see.’
‘They’re spying on me?’ Because that was creepy as all get-out. How many of them were there? Did they meet up for coffee or something, just to talk about how awful she was? Zoey wanted to ask more questions but she suspected this wasn’t quite the time.
Still. The idea of a support group for men she’d dumped at the altar, or just before, was frankly terrifying.
What sort of an awful person was she, anyway?
‘They said they wanted to try and save other poor fools from their fate.’ David’s mouth twisted up in a sneer. ‘Of course, I told them this time was different. That I was different.’
‘I wasn’t planning on running out on you,’ Zoey said miserably.
David scoffed. ‘Oh, of course not. What was it you told me on our third date? When we talked about past relationships?’ He put one finger to his jaw as if trying to remember. ‘That’s right. You told me that all those other men hadn’t been right for you—and you weren’t right for them either. Funny how you were the only one to realise that—and not until you’d dragged them all the way to the altar with you. Tell me honestly, Zoey. Do you get a kick out of destroying men’s lives?’
‘No!’ Zoey’s eyes widened as his words hit home. ‘No, David, you’ve got it wrong. I didn’t... I never meant to hurt you. Any of you. I just... I couldn’t go through with it. It’s me, not—’
‘Don’t say it,’ David snapped. ‘I know this isn’t my fault. What I don’t understand is how you think you can keep doing this to people.’
‘Would it have been better to marry you knowing we’d both be unhappy?’ she asked softly.
‘Yes! Of course it would!’
Zoey blinked. ‘I don’t... I don’t understand.’
‘Because you’re just thinking about you.’ David spat the words out, his eyes filled with hatred where she’d seen love only days before. How could she have got this so wrong?
‘So explain it to me,’ she said.
‘Every marriage has, at best, a fifty-fifty shot, right?’ David said.
‘I guess.’ Of course, she suspected it was rather less if the bride ran away and slept with another man the night before.
‘So why not just give it a go? Would it have killed you to have just shown up for once? To not run when your stupid instincts told you to? To go through with what you promised for my sake?’ His hands moved as he spoke, growing more animated as he explained. He had to have been thinking about this all night, Zoey realised.
‘You would have wanted me to marry you even if I was having doubts?’ Serious doubts. ‘Why?’
‘Because at least then I wouldn’t be the laughing stock of my company, my family and all our friends!’ David yelled and the words echoed off the walls, making Zoey’s ears ring.
‘I’m sorry if you feel embarrassed...’ she started, but David wasn’t done talking yet.
‘Do you even realise how much was riding on this marriage? Why do you think I went to such lengths to make sure it happened? It wasn’t just for my sake—it was for the sake of the company. Mine and your parents’, for that matter. We had plans, Zoey.’
‘Wait.’ Zoey frowned, trying to make sense of his words. ‘You wanted to marry me because of Mum and Dad’s company? I was a business deal?’
David waved a hand to dismiss her incredulity. ‘Not only for that, of course. It was just convenient that our industries lined up nicely. The company needs a boost right now and your parents are hoping to take early retirement, so I could have taken it over and built it up ready for when my own father retires, and I become CEO of the whole empire.’
‘Not only for that,’ she repeated faintly. Then she felt the anger rising, her instincts screaming that they’d been right all along. ‘Was anything about this relationship actually about me?’
David rolled his eyes. ‘Of course it was. I wouldn’t have proposed if you weren’t beautiful, and good company—in bed and out.’
‘Or if you weren’t in love with me,’ Zoey pressed, but David didn’t even dignify that one with an answer. Zoey’s guilt started ebbing away, like water down a storm drain.
‘And, to be honest, the fact that you were a challenge—that other people said you wouldn’t go through with it—that only made me keener.’
Zoey tried to get her head around all the new information swirling around her brain. Tried to reconcile the man in front of her with the one she’d said yes to when he got down on one knee.
It seemed impossible.
‘So what you’re saying is that you wanted me to marry you, even if it would make me unhappy, just so you could do a business deal, show me off and brag about bagging the runaway bride?’
‘What else do you think marriage is, Zoey?’ David asked, sounding astonished at her naivety. ‘It’s deals and trophies. Marriage is the ultimate status symbol. You have to marry someone who enhances your own position.’ He waved a hand in her direction. ‘You might not have much social standing or money yourself, and your job barely qualifies as a career, but your parents’ company makes up for that. Add in the fact that you’re beautiful and charming, and suddenly you’re of interest to people. But most of all you were a challenge. If I married you, people would know that I must have something other men didn’t.’
Zoey sank back against the door as if she’d been punched in the stomach. ‘That was why you wanted to marry me?’
‘Of course it was.’ David’s mouth twisted into a cruel, mocking smile. ‘Oh, Zoey. You didn’t really think it was love, did you? Nobody believes in that these days.’
I do, Zoey thought.
She knew that love was real—she’d seen it. And maybe she hadn’t been lucky enough to find it for herself yet, but that didn’t mean she had to settle for anything less.
And definitely not being a sign of manliness or a business deal for a guy like David.
Twisting her engagement ring off her right ring finger, Zoey held it out to David, who snatched it from her.
‘I’m sorry this didn’t work out,’ she said softly. ‘I’ll pack up my stuff and get out of your way.’
‘You do that. I’ll stay on here for the next couple of weeks, like we planned. Give you time to get out of the London flat too.’
Pushing past her, David left the room and Zoey was alone for the first time since the desert island.
She took advantage of the solitude to crumple to the floor and sob.
CHAPTER EIGHT
ZOEY LET HERSELF cry until the tears stung her sore eyes and her chest hurt from wrenching sobs. If Grace had been there, she knew her best friend would have rubbed her back, handed her tissues, whispered encouragement and told her to let it all out.
So she did.
And then, when it was all out there, a mess of a life in tears and snot and misery, she picked herself up, washed her face and forced herself to face reality.
Grace wasn’t there any longer to help her when she screwed up. To ask the important, searching questions that always led Zoey to her best path forward. Of course, if Grace had been there, Zoey wouldn’t be in half the mess she was. Grace would have spotted what David was truly after long before Zoey had.
And if Grace was alive there was no way she’d have slept with Ash in the first place.
Still. Without her best friend on hand, Zoey would just have to do the asking and the answering.
‘What do I want to happen next?’ she asked herself aloud. ‘I want... I want to go home. That’s easy.’ Except she didn’t have a home any more. She’d been living in David’s flat for months. So, back to her parents’ house it was.
If they’d still have her.
‘Worst case scenario, I find a hotel or something for a few nights until I can find somewhere—anywhere—to rent.’ She’d picked herself up from nothing before, she could do it again. As soon as she was back in the right country, anyway.
‘Okay, next question. What do I need to do to make that happen?’ She could ask Ash to help her change her plane ticket home for a flight today. He could probably help her with a transfer off the island and to the airport on the mainland too, given his connections at the hotel and in the travel industry generally.
She already had her passport and ticket in her hand when reality hit, and she sank down to sit on the bed.
Yes, Ash would help her. He’d do whatever it took to get her home safely, she knew that. And he’d do it as a friend.
Except...that wasn’t really all he was any more, however much she was trying to pretend otherwise. Sex changed things, whether they wanted it to or not. It was going to take some time to get them back to where they’d been before—if they ever managed it.
But that wasn’t the worst part. The worst part was that it would be so, so easy not to go back to being friends.
So easy to let Ash travel back to London with her, if he wanted. To suggest she stay the night in his spare room, in that awful sparse flat he barely even lived in, only for them to end up in his bed together, recreating their finest desert island moments.
And from there it would be a short step into friends with benefits territory. She’d be a mate and a warm body in bed whenever he was in town. And she’d never ask him for anything more, because she already knew he couldn’t give it.
It was good that Ash was getting back out into the world again, moving forward after Grace’s death. But it couldn’t be with her. Because she wanted so much more than that out of life.
Zoey knew—after one night or ten years, depending on how she looked at it—that it would be too damn easy to fall in love with Ash Carmichael. And it would break her heart when he couldn’t love her back.
Which meant, for now, she had to do it without Ash. She had to take charge of her own life and move forward without him, without Grace, without her parents, without David or any other members of the Zoey’s Exes Support Group.
Just Zoey.
Suddenly, the weight on her shoulders started to lessen, just a little. And the tears in her eyes were all dried up.
Maybe that was the key.
Maybe it was time to stop running away from her life, from her mistakes, and start facing them head-on instead.
She still wasn’t entirely sure what she was going to do when she got back to London. But she knew she would be doing it alone. For herself, by herself.
* * *
Ash was just finishing packing his case when Zoey knocked on the hotel room door.
‘How’s David?’ he asked as he stood aside to let her in. He scanned her face, taking in the red-rimmed eyes and dark circles, the pinched expression that made her look less like his Zoey, somehow. Less vibrant. Less alive.
He wanted to wrap her up in his arms and ask how she was, how he could make it better. And another, less civilised part of him really wanted to find David and hit him for making her look like that.
Except he knew that David wasn’t the wrongdoer in this situation. He and Zoey were.
At least, that was what he thought until Zoey sat on the edge of his bed and filled him in on their conversation.
‘Wait. He wanted to marry you for a business deal?’
‘Oh, not just that,’ Zoey replied airily. ‘He had worse reasons, don’t forget.’
‘To prove he could get what other guys couldn’t? To show you off as some sort of trophy?’
Zoey shrugged, her slim shoulders rising then slumping back down. ‘Apparently my talent for screwing up weddings and relationships is legendary.’
‘At least it is now David’s been telling everyone your personal history so he can brag about overcoming it,’ Ash muttered, the urge to punch rising in him again.
‘Yeah. I dread to think what stories he’s going to tell about me now.’ She sighed. ‘I can’t see me getting asked out on a date again for a while.’
‘Good,’ Ash said without thinking. Zoey shot him a look and he groped for an explanation. ‘I mean, maybe it’s for the best. You can spend some time alone, figure out what you want, before you get back out there.’ That sounded better than, Now I’ve seen you naked I’m going to be insanely and irrationally jealous of anyone else who ever gets the opportunity, up to and including your doctor, right?
‘Right.’ Zoey looked away as she answered and Ash forced himself to remember that she knew what she wanted. She just couldn’t ever seem to find it.
And David was, most definitely, not the man for her.
Could he be?
The thought brushed through his mind like the sea breeze, stopping Ash halfway through the motion of folding a T-shirt.
It was tempting, he had to admit. The idea of letting Zoey into his life as more than a friend. Of being what she needed.
Except he couldn’t.
She wanted true love, and he’d already given his heart away. Apparently death had a no returns policy.
He was too sad, too broken for Zoey’s exuberant search for love.
As long as there were no consequences to their night together...
He needed to talk to her about it. But how was he supposed to bring it up?
Hey, Zo, you know I’m an idiot who hasn’t had sex in two years and really only with my dead wife before that? Totally forgot about the existence of contraceptives as a thing. Appreciate that’s totally on me but still... Kind of hoping it’s one of those things you have covered...?
Given that he was dealing with a woman whose back-up plan to escape a wedding was climbing out of a window that was far too small for her, he wasn’t sure what the odds were on that one.
Still. They definitely had to talk.
‘What are your plans now?’ he asked awkwardly.
‘For dating?’ Zoey asked, looking confused.
Right. He’d moved on mentally from their previous conversation, but not verbally. ‘No. Well, yes, if you want to talk about that. But I meant more...now you’re not getting married today. You’re supposed to be having your honeymoon here, right? So, are you going to stay?’
Zoey shook her head so hard that her hair whipped round and caught him in the face as he sat down beside her on the bed. ‘Definitely not. David will, apparently—he’s paid for it, after all. So it’s probably best if I was somewhere else. You know, like the other side of the world. At least until he’s calmed down a bit. Besides, it’ll give me a chance to clear out my stuff from his flat.’
‘Where are you going to stay?’ Ash wanted to offer her his spare room, but he wasn’t sure she’d accept. And maybe she was right. Maybe they did need some distance between them for a little while.
‘With
my parents.’ She said it like someone else might say, In hell, and Ash decided distance was overrated anyway.
‘You could have my spare room.’
She gave him a small sad smile. ‘Thanks. But I’ll try Mum and Dad’s first, at least. If they’re still talking to me by the time they get home. It shouldn’t take me long to find a new flat anyway.’
It all felt wrong to Ash. ‘Want me to sort a flight home to London for you at least?’ What was the point of being heir to a luxury travel business if you couldn’t fix something like this for a friend?
But Zoey shook her head again, less violently this time. ‘I appreciate the offer, but I’ll sort it. This is my screw-up. I need to fix it myself.’
Ash frowned. ‘Hey, you didn’t screw up.’
She flashed him a disbelieving look. ‘I really did, Ash.’
‘You made the right decision for you and your future happiness,’ Ash corrected her. ‘Your timing might suck, but you still did the right thing in the end.’
‘I know,’ Zoey replied. ‘I mean, I knew it for sure when David told me all the reasons I should have gone through with the wedding anyway. He was the wrong man for me.’
‘I’d argue he’s the wrong man for anybody,’ Ash said. ‘But yeah, you’re definitely better off without him.’
‘Which is why I’m going to go and find someone to take me to the airport and get on the next plane back to London that my credit card can stand.’
‘You’re sure you won’t let me sort it for you?’ He couldn’t fix anything else in her world, but this one he could. If she’d let him.
‘Thank you, but no.’ She sighed as she got to her feet. ‘You know, I realised something. My whole life I’ve been looking for someone else to fix my life for me. Grace would take me in so I could escape my parents rowing. Then the two of you would support me every time I screwed up another relationship—relationships I was only in because I was looking for some man to give me my happily-ever-after. Hell, I even needed you to help me escape my own wedding. Not just to get me off the island, but to prove to myself I was right to leave by—’ She broke off, her cheeks pink, and Ash knew exactly what she wasn’t saying.
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