The Fiancé He Can't Forget

by Caroline Anderson

  That wasn’t what this night was about, Amy thought later as she lay awake beside him listening to the deep, even rhythm of his breathing. It was for old times’ sake, no-longer lovers reaching out to touch fleetingly what had once been theirs to love.

  She was under no illusions. After the wedding, Matt would be going back to London, and she’d be staying here, nursing her still-broken heart but with a little more tenderness, a little more forgiveness in her soul. He wasn’t indifferent. Clearly not. But their lives had moved on, gone in different directions, and maybe it was for the best.

  Maybe this was the way forward, for both of them. A little healing salve smeared gently over their wounds, kissing each other better.

  She shifted slightly, seeking the warmth of his body, and he reached for her again in his sleep, drawing her closer, their legs tangled, her head pillowed on his shoulder as she slept, until the first light of dawn crept round the edges of the curtains.

  He woke her gently, his voice a soft murmur in her ear.

  ‘Amy?’

  ‘Mmm.’

  ‘Amy, it’s morning.’

  ‘Mmm.’

  ‘You’re in my room.’

  ‘Mmm. I know.’

  ‘Sweetheart, everyone will know soon.’

  Her eyes flew open, and she sucked in a breath, the night coming back to her in a flood of memory and sudden awkwardness. ‘Oh, rats. Damn. Um—Matt, help me get dressed.’

  She threw the quilt off and starting searching for her underwear. Stupid, stupid… ‘Where the hell are my pants?’

  Pants? He nearly laughed. Try cobwebs.

  ‘Take the dressing gown on the back of the door—have you got your room key?’

  ‘Yes, of course. It’s—’

  In her clutch bag, which was—somewhere. She flopped back down onto the edge of the bed, dragging the quilt back over herself to hide her body from his eyes. Pointless, after he’d explored it so thoroughly, knew it so well in any case, but she was suddenly smitten with shyness. ‘It’s in my clutch bag,’ she admitted.

  ‘Which is…?’

  Good question. ‘Downstairs?’

  He groaned and rolled away from her, vanishing into the bathroom and emerging a few minutes later damp, tousled and unshaven. And stark naked, the water drops still clinging to his body gleaming in the spill of light from the bathroom door and drawing her hungry eyes. He flipped open his overnight bag, pulled out some jeans and boxers and a shirt, dressed quickly and took the room key out of the door lock.

  ‘What’s your bag look like?’ he asked briskly, and she dragged her mind off his body and tried to concentrate.

  ‘Cream satin, about so big, little bronzy chain. It’s got a lipstick, a tissue and the room key in it.’

  ‘Any ideas where?’

  She shrugged. ‘The edge of the dance floor? I put it down at one point.’

  He left her there, hugging her knees in the middle of the bed, looking rumpled and gorgeous and filled with regret.

  He knew all about that one. How could he have been so stupid?

  And why was she on the Pill, for heaven’s sake? Was she in a relationship? Or did she do this kind of thing all the time?

  Hell, he hoped not. The thought of his Amy casually—

  He swallowed hard and ran downstairs, to find that staff were already starting the mammoth clean-up operation.

  ‘I’m looking for a cream satin evening bag,’ he told someone, and was directed to the night porter’s office.

  ‘This the one?’

  He wasn’t sure, so he opened it and found exactly what she’d said inside. Well, if the room key fitted…

  He went to it, and it gave him immediate access. Her case was there, unopened, inside the unused room, and he carried it back to her.

  ‘Oh, Matt, you’re a star. Thank you.’

  ‘Anything to spare a lady’s blushes. I’ll go to your room,’ he said, ‘and if anyone knocks on the door, just ignore them. It’ll only be Ben or my parents, and they’ll ring me if it’s anything important.’

  He slipped his mobile into his pocket, picked up his wallet and did the same, then gave Amy an awkward smile. ‘I guess I’ll see you at breakfast.’

  She nodded, looking embarrassed now, her grey eyes clouded with something that could have been shame, and without dragging it out he left her there and went to the room that should have been hers, lay on the bed and let his breath out on a long, ragged sigh.

  What a fool. All he’d done, all he’d proved, was that he’d never stopped loving her. Well, hell, he’d known that before. It had hardly needed underlining.

  He rolled to his side, thumped the pillow into the side of his neck and tried to sleep.

  How could she have been so stupid?

  She’d known seeing him again would be dangerous to her, but she hadn’t realised how dangerous. She pulled the hotel gown tighter round her waist and moved to the chair by the window. She had a view over the courtyard where they’d had their buffet supper, could see the bench if she craned her neck.

  Sudden unexpected tears glazed her eyes, and she swiped them away and sniffed hard. She’d done some stupid things in her life, most of them with Matt, and this was just the icing on the cake.

  She got up and put the little kettle on to make tea, and found her pills in her washbag and popped one out. Thank God for synthetic hormones, she thought drily as she swallowed the pill. Or maybe not, because without the medication to control her irregular periods, they would never have spent the night together.

  Which would have been a good thing, she told herself firmly. But telling him she was on the Pill was a two-edged sword. He probably thought she was a slut.

  ‘I don’t care what he thinks, it’s none of his damn business and at least I won’t get pregnant again,’ she said to the kettle, and made herself a cup of tea and sat cradling it and staring down into the courtyard until it was stone cold.

  And then she nearly dropped it, because Matt was there, outside in the courtyard garden just below her, sitting on the bench with a cup in his hand and checking something on his phone.

  He made a call, then put the cup down and walked swiftly across the courtyard out of sight. One of his patients in London needing his attention? Or Melanie Grieves, mother of the little twins they’d delivered on Friday night?

  Or just coming inside to see whoever he’d spoken to—his parents, maybe?

  Moments later, there was a soft knock at the door.

  ‘Amy? It’s Matt.’

  She let him in reluctantly and tried to look normal and less like an awkward teenager. ‘Everything OK?’

  ‘Yes. I’m going to see Melanie Grieves. Ben asked me to keep an eye on her.’

  She nodded. ‘Are you coming back for breakfast and to say goodbye to everyone?’

  ‘Yes. I don’t want to be lynched. Let me take my stuff, and I’ll get out of your way. Here’s your room key. Hang onto mine as well for now. I’ll get it off you later.’ He scooped up the suit, the shirt, the underwear, throwing them in the bag any old how and zipping it, and then he hesitated. For a second she thought he was about to kiss her, but then he just picked up his bag and left without a backward glance.

  Amy let out the breath she’d been holding since he’d come in, and sat down on the end of the bed. There was no point in hanging around in his room, she thought. She’d shower and dress, and go downstairs and see if anyone was around.

  Unlikely. The party had gone on long after they’d left it, and everyone was probably still in bed—where she would be, in her own room, if she had a grain of sense.

  Well, she’d proved beyond any reasonable doubt that she didn’t, she thought, and felt the tears welling again.

  Damn him. Damn him for being so—so—just so irresistible. Well, never again. Without his body beside her, without the feel of his warmth, the tenderness of his touch, it all seemed like a thoroughly bad idea, and she knew the aftermath of it would haunt her for ages.

  Years.
/>
  Forever?

  Melanie Grieves was fine.

  Her wound was healing, her little twins were doing very well and apart from a bit of pain she was over the moon. He hadn’t really needed to come and see her, he’d just had enough of sitting around in the hotel beating himself up about Amy.

  Not that he shouldn’t be doing that. He’d been a total idiot, and she really, really didn’t need him falling all over her like he had last night. And leaving the dance floor like that—God knows what everyone had thought of them. He hadn’t even asked her, just dragged her up the stairs and into his room like some kind of caveman.

  He growled in frustration and slammed the car door shut. He’d better go back, better show his face and try and lie his way out of it. Better still, find Amy and get their story straight before his mother got her side of it and bent his ear. She’d always taken Amy’s side.

  Oh, hell.

  He dropped his head forwards and knocked it gently against the hard, leatherbound steering wheel. Such a fool. And his head hurt. Good. It would remind him not to drink so much in future. He’d thought he was sober enough, but obviously not. If he’d been sober—

  His phone rang and he pulled it out of his pocket and stared at the screen. Ben. Damn.

  He ignored it. He’d talk to Amy first—if he got to her before they did. If only he had her number. She’d probably changed it, but maybe not. He dialled it anyway as he turned into the hotel car park, and she answered on the second ring.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Amy, it’s Matt. We need to talk—we will have been seen last night. Where are you now?’

  ‘Oh, damn. In the courtyard. Bring coffee.’

  Stressed as he was, he smiled at that. He found a breakfast waitress and ordered a pot of coffee and a basket of bacon rolls, then went and found her.

  She was waiting, her heart speeding up as she caught sight of him, her nerves on edge. She couldn’t believe what she’d done, couldn’t believe she was going to sit here with him and concoct some cock-and-bull story to tell his family. Her friends. Oh, lord…

  ‘How’s Mel?’ she asked, sticking to something safe.

  ‘Fine. The babies are both doing well.’

  ‘Good. Ben and Daisy’ll be pleased.’

  Silence. Of course there was, she thought. What was there to say, for heaven’s sake? Thank you for the best sex I’ve had in over four years? Not to say the only…?

  ‘Any sign of the others?’ he asked after the silence had stretched out into the hereafter, and she shook her head.

  ‘No. I put my bag in the car. Here’s your room key. So—what’s the story?’

  ‘We wanted to talk?’

  ‘We didn’t talk, Matt,’ she reminded him bluntly.

  Pity they hadn’t, she thought for the thousandth time. If they’d talked, they might have had more sense.

  ‘You were feeling sick?’ he suggested.

  ‘What—from all that champagne?’

  ‘It’s not impossible.’

  ‘I had less than you.’

  ‘I think it’s probably fair to say we both had more than was sensible,’ he said drily, and she had to agree, but not out loud. She wasn’t feeling that magnanimous.

  ‘Maybe nobody noticed?’ she said without any real conviction, and he gave a short, disbelieving laugh.

  ‘Dream on, Amy. I dragged you off the dance floor and up the stairs in full view of everyone. I think someone will have noticed.’

  She groaned and put her face in her hands, and then he started to laugh again, a soft, despairing sound that made her lift her head and meet his eyes. ‘What?’

  ‘I have some vague recollection of passing my parents in the hall.’

  She groaned again. It just got better and better.

  ‘Maybe you thought I needed to lie down?’ she suggested wildly. ‘Perhaps I’d told you I was feeling rough? It’s not so unlikely, and it’s beginning to look like the best option.’

  ‘We could always tell them the truth.’

  If we knew what it was, she thought, but the waitress arrived then with the tray of coffee and bacon rolls, and she seized one and sank her teeth into it and groaned. ‘Oh, good choice,’ she mumbled, and he laughed.

  ‘Our default hangover food,’ he said, bringing the memories crashing back. ‘Want some ketchup?’

  ‘That’s disgusting,’ she said, watching him squirt a dollop into his bacon roll and then demolish it in three bites before reaching for another. The times they’d done that, woken up on the morning after the night before and he’d cooked her bacon rolls and made her coffee.

  He’d done that after their first night together, she remembered. And when she’d come out of hospital after—

  She put the roll down and reached for her coffee, her appetite evaporating.

  ‘So when are you off?’ she asked.

  ‘Tuesday morning,’ he said, surprising her. ‘Things are quiet at work at the moment, so I said I’d keep an eye on Mel till Ben and Daisy get back. They’re only away for two nights.’

  ‘Are you staying here?’

  ‘No. I’m going back to Ben’s.’

  She nodded. It made sense, but she wasn’t thrilled. She’d be tripping over him in the hospital at random times, bumping into him at Daisy’s house when she went to feed Tabitha—because if he was next door at Ben’s, there was no way she was going to stay there, as she’d half thought she might, to keep the cat company.

  Or moving in and renting it as they’d suggested, come to that. Not after last night’s folly. The last thing she wanted was to be bumping into Ben’s brother every time he came up to visit them.

  Daisy had stayed in her own house adjoining Ben’s until the wedding because of Florence, but she’d be moving into his half when they came back, and they’d offered her Daisy’s house. They wanted a tenant they could trust, and her lease was coming up for renewal, and it was a lot nicer than her flat for all sorts of reasons.

  It had off-road parking, a garden, a lovely conservatory—and the best neighbours in the world. She’d been debating whether to take it, because of the danger of bumping into Matt who was bound to be coming back and forth to visit them, but after this—well, how could she relax?

  She couldn’t. It would have been bad enough before.

  ‘Why don’t we just tell them to mind their own business?’ she suggested at last. ‘It really is nothing to do with them if we chose to—’

  She broke off, and he raised a brow thoughtfully.

  ‘Chose to—?’

  But his phone rang, and he scanned the screen and answered it, pulling a face.

  ‘Hi, Ben.’

  ‘Is that a private party over there, or can we join you?’

  He looked up, and saw his brother and brand-new sister-in-law standing in the doorway watching them across the courtyard.

  Amy followed the direction of his eyes, and sighed.

  ‘Stand by to be grilled like a kipper,’ she muttered, and stood up to hug Daisy. ‘Well, good morning. How’s the head?’

  Daisy smiled smugly, looking very pleased with herself. ‘Clear as a bell. In case you didn’t notice, I wasn’t drinking.’

  Amy frowned, then looked from one to the other and felt the bottom fall out of her stomach. Ben’s eyes were shining, and there was a smile he couldn’t quite hide. ‘Oh—that’s wonderful,’ she said softly, and then to her utter humiliation her eyes welled over. She hugged Daisy hard, then turned to Ben—just in time to see Matt release him with a look in his eyes she hadn’t seen since—

  ‘Congratulations, that’s amazing,’ he said gruffly, and gathered Daisy up and hugged her, too, his expression carefully veiled now.

  Except that Amy could still see it, lingering in the back of his eyes, a fleeting echo of a grief once so raw it had torn them apart.

  ‘So, when’s it due?’ he asked, going through the motions. Not that he wasn’t interested, but today of all days…

  ‘The tenth of May. It’s very, v
ery early on,’ Daisy said wryly. ‘I did the test this morning.’

  ‘Right after she threw up.’

  Matt gave a soft huff of sympathetic laughter. ‘Poor Daisy. It passes, I’m reliably informed by my patients.’ That’s right, keep it impersonal…

  ‘It’s a good sign,’ Amy said, her voice slightly strained to his ears. ‘Means the pregnancy’s secure.’

  Unlike hers. Oh, God, beam me up…

  ‘Changing the subject, it’s none of my business, but—’ Ben began, but Matt knew exactly where this was going and cut him off.

  ‘You’re right, it’s not. We needed to talk, there were a lot of people about. Amy slept in my room, and I went to hers.’

  At a quarter to six this morning, but they didn’t need to know that, and he was darned sure they wouldn’t have been up and about that early. But someone was.

  ‘Yeah, Mum said she saw you coming out of your room and going to another one at some ungodly hour.’

  Damn. Of all the people…

  ‘I went to get my phone so I could ring the hospital,’ he lied, but he’d never been able to lie convincingly to Ben, and as their eyes met he saw Ben clock the lie and yet say nothing.

  As he’d said himself, it was none of his business, and he obviously realised he’d overstepped the mark. He’d back him up, though, if their mother said any more, of that Matt was sure. ‘So how is Mel?’ Ben asked, moving smoothly on, and Matt let out a slight sigh of relief.

  ‘Fine. They’re all fine. I’ve been in to see them, and they’re all doing really well. She was keen to hear all about the wedding. I promised I’d take her some cake—unless you want to do it when you come back?’

  ‘No, you go for it. I’m glad she’s well. Thanks for going in.’

  ‘My pleasure. Did you order coffee or do you want me to do it?’