‘Yup.’ She swallowed and glanced to him, her voice tight. ‘He’s gonna kill me later.’
He pulled himself up sharp. He was losing himself again. The personal taking over the professional. And she’d made it so painfully clear she didn’t want the former. He needed to get away from her, reset his mind and his body. He needed to prep himself for goodbye too, because this was it. His chest, his throat squeezed tight and he coughed, fighting against it, forcing it back as he focused on their audience.
‘Now, please enjoy your evening, everyone, let’s celebrate.’ He lifted his glass one final time. ‘To us all!’
Everyone toasted and immediately the buzz of conversation filled the room, their focus on one another freeing Todd and Malie to step away.
‘Excuse me,’ he said.
‘Todd,’ she said at the same time, turning to face him and blocking him in, ‘I—’
He looked past her and spied Tara’s parents, his escape. ‘Tara’s parents have been asking after you, they’d like to speak to you.’
He saw the briefest flash of disappointment, so brief he wondered if he’d imagined it, and then her perfect smile slid into place, ‘Of course.’
On impulse he rested his palm in the small of her back to lead her to them and instantly regretted it. She looked to him, her lips parting over a rush of air, the look in her eyes searing him to the core and then she looked away, and he followed her lead. But he couldn’t pull his hand away, it triggered such warmth, such dizzying contentment, none of which he had a right to feel. None of which was healthy to feel. In less than twenty-four hours there would be thousands of miles between them and this would be over before it had ever begun.
And still he didn’t pull his hand away.
‘Charles, Anne-Marie,’ he said as they neared the glowing couple. ‘You remember Malie…’
Malie smiled at Tara’s parents, trying to ignore the continued thrum of her skin from where he’d touched her seconds before, to ignore the echo of his speech replaying in her mind. It had felt like he’d been speaking directly to her at times, rather than about her. To have the courage to face up to life, to live, really live…
‘Of course, Malie, we’re so glad we get to see you again and thank you in person.’ Tara’s mum grabbed hold of her free hand, squeezed it between her fingers as she gave Malie a watery smile. ‘Although it doesn’t feel enough to simply say thank you. Tara’s like a different child now, she laughs again, she calls us out when we are too protective, when we argue, when we…’
‘Go easy, love, Malie won’t have any blood left in her fingers if you squeeze her hand any tighter.’ Charles softened his words with a loving smile and a comforting arm around his wife’s waist.
‘I’m so sorry, I’m just…’ She looked up to her husband and leaned into his hold, releasing Malie’s hand to place it on his chest. ‘We’re just so much happier.’
‘It’s true.’ Her husband grinned and looked to Malie. ‘We weren’t in a good place before this trip, we haven’t been for years.’
‘Ever since the accident,’ his wife said quietly.
‘Aye,’ he agreed. ‘Guilt is a nasty thing, we blamed ourselves, each convinced that the other blamed us too.’
‘I never blamed you,’ Tara’s mum said vehemently. ‘They were my hair tongs.’
‘And I should’ve changed the batteries in the fire alarm.’
They both went quiet, reflective, and Todd and Malie looked to one another, their expressions soft with understanding.
‘We argued so much,’ Tara’s mother said after a while, ‘about the small things as much as the big, and Tara, she just started to hang back, hide in the corner from it all, making herself invisible to us, but we didn’t see it, we couldn’t.’
Her husband squeezed her waist as her voice broke off on a tremor.
‘It took Tara, would you believe, to make us realize it,’ he added. ‘She stood up to us, like she was the adult who knew better.’
‘And she did, she was right.’ Tara’s mum nodded. ‘Thanks to you she had the confidence to do that, Malie. You brought her out of her shell, brought back our little girl. Thank you… really truly.’
Malie was stunned still, her head spinning. Making herself invisible to us. The words kept replaying over and over. Wasn’t that exactly what she’d done with her parents after Koa’s death?
Hadn’t she just hung back, hidden herself from them in the end? Taken herself away?
Was she in some way to blame for their estrangement? With each other and with her?
‘Malie, are you feeling OK?’
It was Todd, his voice reassuringly soft in her ear, his hand returning to her lower back, his touch warm and gentle and contending with her sudden chill.
No, she wasn’t OK. How ironic that Malie had helped Tara to find the confidence she needed to deal with her parents and the issues they shared when Malie herself couldn’t even do the same.
‘I just need to get some air.’ She looked back to Tara’s parents and felt her eyes prick with tears; she was so happy for them, so happy for Tara too, and she wanted them to know it. She didn’t want them to think her sudden shift in mood was down to them. ‘You don’t need to thank me. Tara is a wonderful girl and to know that I have helped you all is enough. She really is special, and you are lucky to have her, just as she is lucky to have you.’
She looked to Tara’s mum, to the tears that still welled in her eyes and pulled her into a hug. ‘Ask Tara to stay in touch, won’t you?’
Tara’s mum embraced her and then Malie turned to Tara’s father who looked like he didn’t know whether to embrace her too or shake her hand. She decided for him, pulling him into a hug and releasing him with a warm smile that matched his own.
She looked back to Todd. ‘I’ll be back shortly.’
‘I’ll come with you.’
‘No, it’s…’ She broke off at the look in his eye, she couldn’t reject him now, she didn’t have the strength for it. She needed him, she realized, more than anything in that moment… she needed him.
‘OK,’ she nodded.
His face visibly relaxed as he looked back to Tara’s parents. ‘Enjoy the evening – food will be out shortly, and I have it on good authority – that is, Tara’s – that the dessert is to die for.’
Charles chuckled. ‘Yes, she mentioned she’d helped you menu plan.’
‘Helped?’ Todd managed a laugh too. ‘I think she practically took over the kitchen.’
Tara’s parents beamed with pride. ‘Thank you too, Todd,’ Charles said. ‘Without the Foundation, heaven knows where we would be now.’
Todd cleared his throat and Malie could see the emotion trying to break free of his stoic expression. ‘You’re welcome.’
One last smile and Tara’s parents walked away, freeing them to do the same, Todd’s hand still resting in the small of her back as they weaved through the crowd and headed outside. The rain was still beating down and so they kept close to the house, to the shelter provided by the upstairs balcony and providing privacy to them, too.
‘Do you want me to bring you out some food?’ Todd asked gently.
She shook her head. ‘I’m not hungry…’ She gave him a quick look. ‘Sorry.’
‘What for?’
She’d meant for turning down his offer of food when she knew how much effort had gone into it all. But now she’d said it, it wasn’t about the food at all.
‘For everything,’ she murmured, wrapping her arms tight around herself as she looked out at the rolling waves in the distance, to the sheets of rain breaking the surface of the pool, and feeling the same unsettled force inside her chest.
‘You don’t need to apologize to me.’
Malie turned into him, her eyes on the crisp white collar of his shirt, his perfect bow tie, his cologne soothing her as she breathed it in and gathered the confidence she needed to be honest with him.
‘I never should have said what I did about your father. I didn’t… I
wasn’t… I was upset, and I lashed out.’
He wrapped his arm around her back pulling her up against him gently. ‘I know you were.’
He tucked her head beneath his chin and held her, the strength and warmth of his body forming a protective shield that she wanted so much to lose herself in.
‘You’re not mad with me?’ she whispered, her lips brushing against his shirt.
‘I was.’ His voice was low, husky with his own pain as it rumbled through his chest beneath her ear. ‘But I know you’re hurting too.’
‘Truth is, I didn’t realize just how much…’ She took a shaky breath. ‘It still doesn’t excuse what I said, it still doesn’t excuse the fact that I did it purposefully… to hurt you.’
She felt him tense beneath her and squeezed her eyes shut, hating her own honesty even though she knew it was the right thing to do.
‘Why would you?’
‘Because you scare me.’ She opened her eyes and made herself look up at him, to hold his gaze. ‘I needed to push you away before you… before you hurt me.’
She felt her eyes prick, the burn of tears so quick to return as she looked up into the eyes of the man who had come to mean so much to her and still, she couldn’t let herself have.
‘I would never hurt you,’ he said thickly, ‘surely you know that by now.’
‘I know you wouldn’t intentionally.’ She wet her lips, blinked back the tears so that she could see him clearly. ‘But I don’t feel strong enough to take that risk.’
He pressed his forehead to hers. ‘But don’t you see, Malie, together we’d be stronger?’
She closed her eyes again. ‘I don’t see, I’m too messed-up to see. In there, with Tara’s parents, I realized just how much I am to blame for what’s happened with my parents.’ She shook her head still feeling his own pressed reassuringly against her. ‘And I know you are right, that there are things I need to do, changes I need to make, to stop holding myself back from living my life.’
She felt the tears escape her lids, felt Todd’s fingers gently caress her chin as he raised his head and lifted hers to look at him again. ‘There’s time for all that, Malie, you can change things for the better, still live your life to the full.’
‘To big wave surf?’ She gave him a weak smile.
‘Precisely.’
‘And what about you?’
‘I’m going back to England after New York. I’m going to suggest to my father that we get our hands dirty together.’
‘DIY?’
He nodded, his eyes raking over her face, his hand on her back taking up a dizzying caress over her skin. ‘I think you’re right, it’s time we spent real time together, it’s time I gave up trying to change him and accept him for who he is.’
A bittersweet warmth ran through her as she lifted her hands to his face, her thumbs caressing his cheeks as she held his gaze; a thousand wants, a thousand words, so much trying to get out and not being able to voice a single one. Instead she kissed him – light, uncertain, testing his response – needing him to want her like she did him.
But he didn’t respond, he didn’t reject her, but he didn’t kiss her back either and she dropped back, her eyes searching.
‘And what of us, Malie,’ he said so softly she had to strain to hear. ‘Where do we stand?’
The one question she couldn’t answer, fear and love combining to keep her tongue-tied. She tried to kiss him again, telling him with her silence because she wasn’t ready to give that answer.
His body stilled, his head lifted further away. ‘Malie?’
‘I don’t know.’ She shook her head, her eyes pleading with him to understand. ‘I’m not ready for this. I just know I don’t want you to go, I don’t want to be apart.’
‘You could come with me, you wouldn’t need to worry about money, I could recruit someone to cover for you here, I could…’
She was shaking her head all the more now, resisting the urge to cover her ears and block out his words, to be tempted by them.
‘It’s not the money, the school, that worries me, it’s… it’s me, it’s this—’ She pulled his hand from behind her back and rested it over her heart. ‘Losing Koa…’ her voice cracked, ‘to almost lose my friends, too, I don’t think I could love you and survive if… if…’
‘Oh, God, Malie.’ He crushed her to him, his mouth feverish as he claimed her almost painfully, but she craved it, every nip of teeth, of the invasion of his tongue as he duelled with her own, the press of his fingers as he clung her to him. So desperate, so pained. She was drowning in him, in the sea of emotion, of everything she felt for him and more.
He broke away, his voice ragged. ‘Can’t you see I feel the same for you, that the idea of losing you would kill me, but to walk away and never see you again, to leave tomorrow and for that to be it…’ He shook his head, his eyes clamped shut and when he opened them again, she could see the torment firing in his glittering black gaze, feel his pain like her own. ‘That would be worse. To give up on us by choice…’
He couldn’t finish, instead he was kissing her again, hard, urgent and her hands were in his hair, holding on to him like she could never let him go.
She knew he was right, that somewhere in all he said was the truth. She wanted to be alone with him, she wanted to go to bed with him, she wanted them to have tonight regardless of what tomorrow would bring. She kissed him back with the all the love she felt inside, kissed him until the urgency was burning out of control, his hardness pressed between them as he turned her into the wall.
He tore his mouth away, his eyes blazing down into hers. ‘Malie… we need to stop… if you don’t want this, we need to stop now, or God help me…’
She shook her head, her eyes intent in his. ‘I don’t want to stop.’
‘I don’t think you know what you are saying.’
‘I do.’
Still, he hesitated. ‘And tomorrow?’
She wrapped her fingers around his neck and pulled him down to her. ‘Let us have tonight, tomorrow can wait…’
‘You said that before.’
‘But this is different.’
She tried to kiss him again, but he pulled back. ‘Come dance with me.’
She frowned at him. ‘Dance?’
‘I’m giving you time to change your mind.’
‘I don’t need time.’
He took hold of her hand and looked to the doors. ‘You’re upset, and I can’t take advantage of that.’
She closed the distance between them and palmed his cheek, turning him to look at her. ‘I may be upset, but I know I want this.’
He gave her a small smile but there was a sadness to it, an edge that took hold of her heart and squeezed so tight she couldn’t breathe. ‘Then you will still want it when the evening is over, and the guests have gone.’
‘But—’
He pulled her to him. ‘If I am to make love to you, Malie,’ he pressed a kiss to her lips, ‘it won’t be a hurried affair up against the wall here.’ He probed her lips with his tongue, a sweet invasion that had her thighs tightening against the thrilling ache. ‘It’ll be in my bed after everyone has gone.’ His mouth brushed against hers as he spoke. ‘So I can take my time exploring every last inch of you, imprinting each one in my mind.’
He trailed hot, barely-there kisses along her jawline, coming to rest at her earlobe which he caught in his teeth, his hot breath teasing at her ear canal. ‘If I’m only ever to make love to you once, I want it to be something you remember for a lifetime.’
She whimpered, her heightened senses colliding with the meaning behind his words and she clung to his shoulders, scared her knees would fail her.
‘OK,’ she managed softly. ‘OK.’
‘So, you’ll dance with me?’
She looked up into his eyes as she nodded, knowing that it was so much more than a dance she was agreeing to.
Nerves fluttered up in her belly as she laced her fingers through his and let him lead her back
inside, onto the dance floor. Around them people ate, laughed, danced, but they were hardly aware of a soul. Every look, every touch, every move they made was loaded with the promise of what was to come, and she forgot the pain, the sadness, the revelations. They were tomorrow’s concern.
Tonight, was about them, and them alone.
Chapter Twenty
TODD CLOSED THE FRONT door on the very last guest and stared at the wood, his palm pressed hard against it, his eyes closed. He half expected Malie to race up behind him, to tell him she’d changed her mind, that she had to leave too. But the hallway was silent save for his pulse racing in his ears.
Are you sure you want to do this?
He didn’t know. To make love to Malie, to know her, and to still have to leave…
Was he really strong enough for that?
His father hadn’t been strong enough to move on. When his mother had died, it had crushed him, destroyed the person he was. Not that he’d known his father before, but he’d heard stories, seen pictures, witnessed their happiness through the immortal images.
But after…
‘Todd?’
He opened his eyes to her soft-spoken call and turned. She stood at the bottom of the stairs, one hand resting on the balustrade, the other reaching out for him.
He raised his eyes to hers, to the unspoken question swimming in her depths. He may not be strong enough to move on tomorrow, but he knew he wasn’t strong enough to end this now. That he would take whatever Malie was willing to give and then…
That was tomorrow’s problem.
He closed the distance between them, entwining his fingers with hers and pressing a kiss to her lips. ‘Are you sure?’
She nodded. ‘More sure than I’ve been about anything in a long time.’
It was all the reassurance he needed to lead her upstairs, their footfall on the surface a delicate clip that sounded with the beat of his heart. He pushed open the double doors to the master room, the bed positioned to take centre stage and make the most of the floor-to-ceiling windows displaying the vista. He turned the lights on low to keep the rolling sea as the atmospheric backdrop to what was about to happen and turned to her.
Meet Me in Hawaii Page 25
