The Honeymoon Prize

by Jessica Hart

  Emma took a sip of coffee and flipped open her notebook. ‘Now,’ she said briskly, ‘tell me how you and Max met.’

  She wanted to know everything—how long they had known each other, when they had decided to get married, their plans for the wedding—but the article clearly wasn’t intended to be an in-depth investigation, and after a while Freya began to relax. This wasn’t so hard. It was just a question of a bit of imagination and a few tiny fibs. Any minute now, Emma would hand over the tickets and it would all be over.

  ‘Right, I think that’s it.’ To Freya’s relief, Emma was closing her notebook. ‘It’s a pity Max couldn’t be here, but I think I’ve got enough to make a nice piece.’

  ‘He’ll be sorry to have missed you,’ said Freya with spurious regret.

  The words were barely out of her mouth when she heard the unmistakable sound of a key in the lock and before her horrified gaze, the door opened and Max came in.

  For one terrible moment, Freya couldn’t move.

  He hadn’t seen them yet. He seemed preoccupied, and there was a frown on his face as he dropped his keys onto the table by the door, but as he turned Freya did the only thing she could do.

  ‘Max! Darling!’ she cried, leaping up from the sofa. ‘You’re back!’

  Max actually recoiled a step as she ran across the room but she hoped that Emma wouldn’t have noticed. Flinging her arms around him, she pressed her cheek to his.

  ‘Please back me up,’ she muttered in his ear. ‘Please, please, please!’

  She could feel him stiffen, and groped for his hand. ‘Please!’ she begged him with a beseeching look before turning to face Emma.

  The reporter was on her feet, smiling in relief. ‘I’m Emma Carter from Dream Wedding,’ she said as she came towards Max with her hand outstretched. ‘I’m so pleased you made it back in time.’

  Max, faced with an outstretched hand, and with his left clutched in mute appeal by Freya, had little choice but to shake it.

  ‘I hope it wasn’t too much of a crisis at the office?’

  He glanced down into pleading green eyes. ‘No,’ he said cautiously, and was rewarded with a dazzling smile.

  ‘You must have been very surprised when Freya told you why we were coming today,’ Emma was saying chattily.

  ‘Surprised,’ said Max, ‘isn’t the word for it.’

  Emma seemed a little daunted by the woodenness of his expression. She was obviously used to people who were more excited by their forthcoming weddings, let alone by the chance of a free honeymoon.

  ‘I’ve just been hearing about all your plans from Freya,’ she said, ‘but I’d really like to ask you a few questions too.’

  ‘I just need a quick word with Freya first,’ said Max rather grimly, taking her wrist in a hard grasp. ‘Will you excuse us a moment?’

  ‘Yes, let me get you some more coffee,’ said Freya brightly over her shoulder, as he practically dragged her into the kitchen.

  ‘Would you like to explain to me what the hell is going on?’ he said savagely as he closed the door. ‘Who is that woman, and what is she doing in my apartment?’

  Freya rubbed her wrist where he had held her. ‘She’s from a magazine called Dream Wedding,’ she said, knowing that her only hope now was to make a clean breast of it. ‘She’s come to interview us.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I told them we were getting married.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Shh! Don’t shout, she’ll hear.’ Freya nodded her head warningly in the direction of the living room. ‘What are you doing here?’ she demanded in fierce whisper.

  ‘What am I doing here?’ he repeated incredulously.

  ‘I thought you were supposed to be at Pel’s?’

  ‘There was a signal failure on the line. I’ve been sitting in a tunnel most of the morning. I’m meeting Kate for lunch, so by the time I got there, I’d have had to turn round and come back. I decided it was easiest if I just came home. I was going to ring Pel and explain when you came hurtling across the room and threw yourself in my arms,’ he finished.

  ‘I don’t know why you don’t get a mobile,’ grumbled Freya as she put on the kettle. ‘If you’d had one, you could have rung Pel on that and then he could have rung me to warn me that you were on your way back.’

  ‘I’m sorry if my technological inadequacies have inconvenienced you,’ he said sarcastically, ‘but you still haven’t answered my question! Can you please tell me what’s going on and why you felt it necessary to tell that woman in there that we’re getting married when we both know that we’re not doing anything of the kind!’

  Spooning coffee mechanically into the cafétière, Freya bit her lip. ‘I entered a competition to win a trip to Mbanazere,’ she told him. ‘It just happened to be for a honeymoon so, of course, when I entered I had to fill in all sorts of details about my fiancé and…well, I put your name down.’

  ‘You did what?’ said Max, dangerously quiet.

  ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry!’ Freya hung her head. ‘I never thought I’d win. It was just a joke.’

  ‘A joke!’ A muscle was jumping savagely in Max’s jaw. ‘Why not put down Dan Freer’s name instead?’ he asked bitingly. ‘That would have been even funnier!’

  ‘I thought someone might recognise his name,’ she admitted.

  ‘It didn’t occur to you that someone might recognise my name? Or to wonder how I might feel at featuring in your pathetic little fantasy?’

  Freya winced. ‘I didn’t think you’d—’

  ‘No, you never do think, do you? You get an idea in your head and pursue it, regardless of the consequences or how your actions might affect other people! Dan Freer is just your latest obsession,’ he said contemptuously. ‘If you’re really so desperate to throw yourself at him, why not buy yourself a ticket and have yourself delivered to his door on a plate?’

  ‘Because I can’t afford the flight!’

  Freya’s brief flash of anger died as quickly as it had erupted. She sighed as she filled the cafétière, though she didn’t know why she was bothering to make coffee. Emma wouldn’t be staying once she realised that it was a pretence.

  ‘I didn’t realise we’d have to be interviewed. I thought they would just send me the tickets,’ she said miserably. ‘I should have known it wouldn’t be that easy. I always seem to make such a mess of things—career, relationships, money…everything, really. When Emma told me I’d won a ticket to Africa I thought that at last something was going right, and that I could do one thing that wouldn’t end in disaster.’ Her mouth twisted. ‘More fool me.’

  There was a silence. Max’s eyes rested on her averted profile for a minute before he looked down at his shoes.

  ‘Does Dan Freer really mean that much to you?’ he asked heavily at last.

  ‘I really want to go to Africa,’ said Freya, not looking at him. ‘I really want to take a chance. To go somewhere different and do something different, be somebody different, if only for two weeks.’

  She took a breath. ‘There are two tickets, Max. You could have the other one. You could use it, or cash it in, whatever you wanted. Emma’s got them in the other room. If we can just convince her that we really are engaged and planning a honeymoon together, she’ll hand them over.

  ‘Please, Max,’ she went on after a moment. ‘It would only take a few minutes.’

  Max sighed. ‘All right,’ he agreed reluctantly. ‘Against my better judgement! I’ll back you up until she hands over the tickets—but it had better not take too long,’ he warned. ‘I’m meeting Kate for lunch, and I don’t want to be late.’

  ‘You won’t be,’ she promised. ‘Thank you, Max!’

  Impulsively, she reached up and kissed his cheek, and then wished that she hadn’t. Her face tingled where she had touched his, and she was suddenly, disconcertingly, aware of him again.

  Clearing her throat, she picked up the tray with the coffee things. ‘In case she asks, we’re getting married on June the twent
y-seventh, at Chelsea Town Hall.’

  ‘That’s all right then,’ said Max with an ironic look as he opened the kitchen door for her. ‘I won’t be able to make a fool of myself when I’ve got all that detail to work with!’

  ‘Here we are!’ Freya smiled brilliantly as she carried a fresh jug of coffee into the living room. ‘Sorry about that. Just a little domestic crisis to sort out. You know what it’s like!’

  Emma had been getting restive. ‘If we could get on?’ she said with a touch of impatience.

  Freya sat on the sofa opposite the reporter and after a moment Max sat down next to her, close but not touching.

  ‘So, Max,’ Emma began. ‘Freya tells me that you’ve known each other a long time. When did you realise that she was special?’

  There was a pause. ‘She was always special,’ he said at last, and his gaze rested on Freya’s profile for a moment. ‘Spiky, but special.’

  ‘Spiky?’ Emma raised her brows.

  ‘She could be a bit prickly at times.’ Max leant forwards confidingly. ‘She’d try and make you think that she wasn’t bright and funny and talented, but she never fooled me.’

  Freya listened to him in mingled indignation and admiration. His improvised departure from the script made her nervous, but she had to admit that he was convincing. He’d have her believing she was secretly talented in a minute.

  ‘So you’ve always been in love with her?’ asked Emma.

  Max glanced at Freya, who was drinking her coffee and trying to look nonchalant as if she had heard all this before. ‘You could say that,’ he said.

  ‘But you’ve only recently got together, isn’t that right?’

  ‘Very recently,’ he agreed, his voice so dry that Freya was sure Emma would look up suspiciously, but the reporter was busy scribbling in her notebook.

  ‘How did that happen?’

  ‘Didn’t Freya tell you?’ he asked cautiously.

  Emma flicked back through her notebook. ‘She said that she fell in love with you at her sister’s twenty-first birthday party,’ she said, squinting at her shorthand, and Freya squirmed on the sofa next to Max. She hadn’t banked on Max hearing any of this.

  ‘I think you’ll find that it was my sister’s twenty-first,’ said Max, and then he threw Freya completely off-balance by taking her hand. ‘Wasn’t it, darling?’

  She gulped, burningly conscious of his palm pressed against hers, the warm clasp of his fingers. ‘That’s right,’ she said huskily. ‘I…er…I explained to Emma that you went overseas straight afterwards, and it was only when I went out to Africa on holiday and looked you up that I realised you felt the same.’

  Max turned to Emma. ‘Freya is a great believer in making an effort on the relationship front,’ he explained coolly. ‘She’s not one to let a little thing like living on an entirely different continent put her off!’

  Emma looked a little perplexed by his tone, as well she might be, Freya thought. She could have no idea that Max was talking about her pursuit of Dan, although it was obvious enough to her.

  ‘Max is always saying to me, Thank God you came to find me,’ she put in hastily. ‘If I hadn’t gone out on holiday, we’d still be living on different continents, with different people, and we wouldn’t be nearly as happy as we are now. Would we, Max?’ she prompted with a warning look.

  ‘Oh, we’re ecstatic now,’ said Max, baring his teeth in a smile.

  A little puzzled, Emma looked from one to the other. ‘I loved the story of how you proposed on the beach under your favourite palm tree,’ she tried.

  ‘You remember that tree, don’t you, Max?’ said Freya, squeezing his hand.

  ‘How could I forget?’

  ‘I was telling Emma how you bought me a ring in the local market,’ she went on breathlessly, and showed him her free hand adorned with its cheap trinket, just in case he wondered what kind of ring he was supposed to have bought. ‘I said I didn’t want diamonds, I just wanted you.’

  ‘I used to dream of hearing you say that,’ said Max, and, lifting the hand he was holding, he unfolded it to press a kiss to her palm.

  There was an electric pause. Freya’s palm tingled from the touch of his lips, and when he looked up, their eyes met and locked, while her heart began to slam slowly and painfully against her ribs. Up till then, there had been an enjoyable tension in the snide digs they had been exchanging, but this was something different, and Freya found herself struggling suddenly to breathe.

  Emma cleared her throat. ‘I was going to ask if either of you were worried that it might turn out to be no more than a holiday romance after all, but you obviously aren’t!’ she said dryly. ‘You don’t seem to have given yourself much time for second thoughts, though.’

  ‘When something feels this right,’ said Max, ‘there’s no reason to wait.’

  It was lucky that he had answered, because Freya couldn’t have spoken if she had tried. Her palm was still throbbing, seared by the touch of his lips, and for some reason she wanted to cry.

  ‘I understand you’re getting married very soon,’ Emma went on.

  ‘Yes. At Chelsea Town Hall, on the twenty-seventh of June.’ The corner of Max’s mouth twitched as he managed to include the scanty information Freya had given him. ‘We can’t wait, can we, Freya?’

  ‘No,’ was all she could manage.

  ‘And I’ll bet you can’t wait to get back out to that beach for your honeymoon?’

  ‘That’s what Freya’s looking forward to most of all,’ said Max, a slight edge to his voice.

  ‘More than the wedding?’ asked Emma, surprised.

  ‘Oh, yes,’ Max answered for her.

  ‘Well, I can see that the honeymoon is going to mean a lot to you both. It’s such an unusual destination, and you told your story in such an interesting way, Freya, that we’d like to make it into a whole feature. Something a little bit different for our readers.’

  Emma leant forwards persuasively. ‘What we were wondering was whether we could send one of our photographers along to the wedding? He could take some pictures and I’d do a little bit about the wedding to follow up on the interview today. We go to print the following Monday, so we’ll be able to just get it into the next edition.’

  Max’s hand tightened warningly around Freya’s, and somehow she found her voice. ‘It’s a very small wedding,’ she said desperately. ‘Very private. We’re only having a few friends, so I don’t think there will be very exciting pictures.’

  ‘Oh, that doesn’t matter.’ Emma waved her objection aside. ‘It’ll make a refreshing change from some of the elaborate weddings we cover. I think our readers really just want to see you in your dress, and then relaxing with your friends afterwards. If the ceremony’s private, we could take some pictures on the steps when you come out.’

  ‘The thing is—’

  ‘And I presume you’ll be having a celebration with your friends? What would be lovely would be if we could get some pictures of you actually leaving on the honeymoon that you’ve won!’

  Emma looked from one to the other as if waiting for them to congratulate her on her good idea. ‘What do you think?’ she asked eagerly.

  Freya felt sick. They had been so close to getting away with it! It wasn’t fair, she thought, pulling her hand from Max’s. She had won the competition fair and square. Why couldn’t Emma just hand over the tickets instead of creating new obstacles. It was almost as if she knew they weren’t really getting married.

  ‘I don’t know…’ she said.

  Emma was clearly baffled by their reluctance. ‘You’d get to keep the photographs, of course. Professional pictures like those are worth quite a lot of money in themselves. There’s a lot of competition among other couples who want us to feature their weddings, you know, and the photographs are the big draw.’

  Freya looked at Max, who was sitting rigidly beside her and saying nothing. How was she going to persuade Emma that all they wanted was the honeymoon?

  Fortunately Emma s
eemed to have decided that they were simply struck dumb by their good fortune. ‘I know it’s a lot to take in,’ she said kindly as she got to her feet and handed them her card. ‘Why don’t you have a think about it, and let me know what you decide?’

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  AT LAST she was gone. Freya blew out a breath as she closed the door after Emma and leant back against it. ‘Now what am I going to do?’

  ‘If you’ve got any sense, you’ll give up the whole idea,’ said Max crisply, but he was looking at his watch and his mind clearly wasn’t on Freya’s problem.

  She stared at him as he picked up his jacket and keys. ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘I’m meeting Kate for lunch.’

  ‘But what about Dream Wedding?’

  ‘We’ll have to talk about it when I get back. It’s nearly one already, and I don’t want to be late.’

  Oh, no, they couldn’t keep his precious Kate waiting, could they? Freya stacked the coffee mugs in the dishwasher aggrievedly. Surely five minutes either way wouldn’t make much difference to Kate, and they could have sorted out this whole mess here and now. Instead, she was going to have to hang around waiting for him to come back from his lunch before she could decide what to do.

  Not that there was going to be much to discuss. It was incredible that Max had gone along with it as far as he had. All she could really do, Freya decided glumly, was reassure him that she wasn’t planning to drag him to the altar. There were limits to how far even she was prepared to go to get out of her rut!

  It was a pity, though. She had so nearly made it. Now, like everything else she did, the whole exercise had turned into a complete waste of time. Freya slumped on a sofa, a prey to self-pity. All that effort and nothing to show for it! She needn’t have bothered dusting the living room, or gone through the embarrassment of Lucy’s dinner party, let alone humiliating herself in front of Max all over again.

  Please, please, please, Max, she had been forced to beg. Freya shifted uncomfortably at the memory. Turning her hand over, she studied her palm, half expecting to see the imprint of his lips where it still throbbed from that brief, searing kiss. Who would have thought that Max could be so convincing? He had been much better than her. All he had had to do was take her hand, and she had gone to pieces.