A Secret, a Safari, a Second Chance

by Liz Fielding

  He opened his arms and she came into them, laying her cheek against his shoulder. ‘I miss her so much, Kit.’

  Warm tears spilled against his skin as he held her and for a moment they were the only two people on the planet.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, pulling away much too soon, wiping her face with her hand. ‘I don’t know where that came from.’

  ‘I imagine that coming here has opened up feelings that you’ve been keeping bottled up for a long time. It’s not easy to admit feeling angry with someone who’s dead.’

  She lifted her head to look at him, tears clumping her lashes together. ‘Are you angry with Matt?’

  ‘When I saw him, afterwards, I just wanted to grab hold of him, shake him for being so stupid. Demand to know why he hadn’t trusted me...’ He shook his head. ‘The truth is that I was angry with myself for not being there, not seeing what was happening.’

  ‘You’re making a difference, Kit. People will live because of what you’ve done.’

  ‘I hope so.’ He looked down at her. ‘Are you done punishing the water?’

  She nodded, and they returned to the shade of their loungers.

  ‘So what are you reading?’ he asked, as she dried herself off and began to apply more suncream.

  ‘Under the Sea Wind.’ She looked up. ‘Rachel Carson.’

  ‘My grandmother knew her. She stayed at the beach cabin when she was on the island.’ He nodded at the bottle of sun lotion. ‘Do you want me to do your back?’

  She hesitated a moment. ‘If you wouldn’t mind.’

  He sat beside her.

  ‘Does your interest in a local author mean that you’re considering staying on the island?’ he asked to distract her as he slipped the straps of her costume over her shoulder and began to smooth the cream across her shoulders and down the deep scoop of her costume.

  ‘Nana died recently. I’m sorting out her cottage.’

  ‘She left it to you?’ Her skin shivered under the roughness of his touch. ‘Sorry about my hands. Your friend Peter might think I’m a playboy but the calluses tell a different story.’

  He offered her back the cream but as she took it she held onto his hand, stroking her thumb over two crooked fingers. ‘Not just the calluses. These were the fingers you broke on a round-the-world race. You had to lash them together with gaffer tape until they mended.’

  ‘You were watching?’

  ‘The whole world was watching. You could have died, Kit.’ She looked up, her eyes searching. ‘You must have known you wouldn’t win so why did you carry on?’

  The temptation was to shrug, as if it weren’t important, but this was Eve, who’d just opened herself up to him in the most intimate way. She deserved more than his usual casual brushing aside of the pain, hardship, loneliness of those months.

  ‘It’s the ultimate goal,’ he said. ‘Something I’d dreamed of since I was a kid. Sponsors want winners, or a story, and I knew that if I gave up, I might never have another chance.’

  And that, he thought, was why Matt had hidden the pain he was suffering. Because if he was seen as damaged, a liability, he might never get another chance to crew the ultimate yacht.

  ‘You gave them headlines they could only have dreamed of,’ Eve said, breaking into the uncomfortable realisation that there wasn’t a whisker between them... ‘Would you do it again?’

  His hesitation was answer enough and Eve let go of his hand, put on her sunglasses, picked up her reader and lay back in shade.

  Would he?

  Memory blurred the edges.

  In his head he knew there was pain, exhaustion, the same boring food over and over, but there was the exhilaration of taking the worst the elements could throw at you and winning through.

  He wouldn’t do it now but maybe, ten years from now, in a yacht he’d designed himself...

  * * *

  ‘Are you hungry?’

  Eve had been staring at the same page for what seemed like for ever. She had been warming to the idea that she had misjudged Kit. He was a kinder and more thoughtful man than she had given him credit for but, while he was home for now, he’d made it plain that he had no interest in the family business.

  His business was with the sea. Sooner or later the siren call of the ultimate challenge would be irresistible, and the next time Hannah would be old enough to understand.

  Would she be watching and waiting for her daddy to come home with terror? Or would she be hooked?

  It was a relief to look up and see that the pool had been deserted and guests were beginning to gather at the bar for pre-lunch drinks.

  ‘I didn’t realise it was so late.’ She closed her reader and dropped it in her bag. ‘I need to change.’

  ‘You will come back?’ he asked.

  ‘Will you come and find me if I don’t?’ She’d meant it as a challenge, but it had come out sounding more like an invitation. She wasn’t hungry, not a bit, but she said, ‘Just give me ten minutes.’

  She was halfway to the steps when she heard a splash.

  ‘What have you done to that poor man?’ Faye, perched on a barstool, asked as she passed.

  ‘It’s complicated,’ she said, without thinking, as they watched Kit, his powerful, sun-bronzed shoulders gleaming as he drove through the water.

  ‘On the contrary, that’s the simplest feeling in the world, sweetie,’ Faye said, with a little sigh.

  She knew that. Had once surrendered to that most basic instinct without a thought. It was thinking that messed with your head.

  * * *

  It was too early to call home and talk to Hannah, but Eve took a photograph of a monkey in a nearby tree and sent it to her with a load of kisses. By the time she returned to the terrace twenty minutes later, Kit was sitting on a stool, hair damp, but wearing a short-sleeved shirt and a pair of chinos.

  ‘What would you like to drink?’ he asked.

  ‘Just water,’ she said.

  ‘Still? Or will you risk a little fizz?’ His face was poker-straight but she knew when she was being teased.

  It had been so long since anyone had dared to tease her. Had held her. Had made her feel that she was not just Hannah’s mother, but a woman, and she smiled despite her determination to keep her distance.

  ‘I’ll risk the fizz,’ she said, but grabbed a vacant seat between Chrissie and a new arrival when they sat down to lunch. Kit raised an eyebrow but took a seat amongst the rest of the new arrivals and barely looked in her direction once.

  He left before she did, touching her shoulder lightly as he passed, his fingers brushing over the butterfly hidden beneath her shirt, but saying nothing.

  She watched him walk away but he didn’t look back. She didn’t see him again until, two hours later, he was waiting by the vehicle that would take them to the part of the reserve where they would walk with Buttercup and Daisy.

  ‘It’s just us?’ she said.

  ‘More than two and the elephants can get spooked. You have to book well in advance to have this privilege. Fortunately, it was part of the package you bid for,’ he said, offering his hand to help her up in the seat.

  ‘So how did you get lucky?’

  ‘Everyone else came in pairs.’

  The ranger who cared for the elephants had been at school with her and she hugged him, asked after his family, introduced him to Kit.

  By then, Daisy, always the most curious, lowered her head and touched her gently with the tip of her trunk.

  Eve put up her hand to rub it, murmuring softly as she rested her forehead on the great beast. Buttercup, not to be outdone, curled her trunk around her.

  ‘Is she hugging you?’ Kit asked.

  ‘Elephants never forget,’ Eve said, taking his hand, encouraging him to touch first Daisy and then Buttercup, telling them his name, reassuring them that he wouldn’
t hurt them.

  They touched him, responding with happy little snorts.

  ‘I think they can smell me on you,’ she said.

  ‘It’s vanilla,’ he said, looking at her, rather than the elephant. ‘The memory of it stayed with me for weeks.’

  For a moment Eve couldn’t breathe, then she managed a slightly shaky, ‘It’s more likely that you got a blast every time you passed a bakery.’

  ‘No, it was more complex than a cupcake.’ He glanced at her. ‘It was there after I caught you falling at the auction.’

  ‘It’s my perfume, Shalimar,’ Eve confessed. ‘My mother always wore it and she’d sometimes put a drop on my wrist. I bought a tiny bottle in the airport duty free on my way to school. I wasn’t allowed to wear it, but I put it on my pillow. With you it’s the sea that’s become part of you. With me it’s Shalimar.’

  ‘And like the elephants, I have never forgotten it,’ he said, taking her hand as they began to move off.

  * * *

  Eve skipped the early morning game drive and had a lie in, sitting up in bed on the deck, putting together pictures Kit had taken of her with the elephants, planning to send them to Hannah. Afterwards, he’d handed her phone to the ranger and asked him to take a photograph of the two of them.

  They were standing with Daisy. She was making a fuss of Daisy and laughing, but Kit was looking at her in a way that brought a lump to her throat. In a way that she wouldn’t want anyone else to see. She knew she should delete it, but then the phone rang, making her jump. An unknown number. Normally she would have let it go to voicemail, but it could be a call from home. Hannah...

  ‘Eve Bliss.’

  ‘I hope I didn’t wake you.’

  ‘I...’ It was okay, no drama, just Kit. ‘How did you get this number?’

  ‘I sent a photograph of you with the elephants to my phone. We’re going to put up a board with pictures showing everyone who won a bid at the auction having a good time. That one is going to be a winner.’

  ‘What do you want, Kit?’

  ‘I kept an almond croissant for you, but you didn’t turn up for coffee this morning. I’m just being a good host and checking that you’re okay.’

  ‘I’m preserving my energy for the party. How was your evening? Did you catch any fish?’

  ‘You doubt it?’

  ‘Half a dozen men in a boat with a case of beer and basket of food. Oh, yes, I seriously doubt it. Was Peter there?’

  ‘No. He went into the city to collect his grandfather, but he sent a message to say that we’re having the trust meeting this afternoon, before the party.’

  ‘Well, that’s good news. You’ll be able to go home tomorrow.’

  ‘I could stretch to another day or two. I haven’t had a canoe trip yet and I’m told there are waterfalls that shouldn’t be missed. Would you like breakfast in your suite this morning?’

  She sighed. ‘You’re outside my suite, aren’t you?’

  There was a tap on her gate. ‘Service, Miss Eve.’

  ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake.’

  She closed her phone as Kit carried a tray across the deck and laid it on the table.

  ‘Coffee, orange juice, and since I wasn’t sure what you’d like I brought eggs Benedict, pancakes, and avocado on toast with poached eggs.’

  ‘That’s a shocking waste!’

  ‘I was hoping you’d say that. Will you come over here?’ he asked. ‘Or shall I join you over there?’

  ‘Go!’ she demanded. ‘Now!’

  ‘Can I take the eggs Benedict?’

  If she’d had anything to hand, she’d have thrown it at him.

  CHAPTER TEN

  KIT, CHECKING IN to update Brad, got a call divert to his sister. Again.

  ‘Hi, Laura. How’s Dad?’

  ‘He’s still struggling to find the right words. The stuff he’s coming out with is actually pretty funny. He and Mom are doing a lot of laughing.’

  ‘Yes, I got that when I called on Skype yesterday.’ Realising that she was struggling with tears, he said, ‘You know recovery from stroke is really good these days.’

  ‘It’s going to take months, Kit. He may never get it all back.’

  ‘Dad’s a fighter.’

  ‘I know. What are you up to?’ she asked with determined brightness, and he didn’t have to be there to see that she was making an effort to put on a smile. She was a fighter, too. ‘Apart from ruining Brad’s unusually good mood. Sitting around in the sun watching the wildlife?’

  ‘Pretty much,’ he said, looking down at a family of elephants playing in the river. ‘Hot-air ballooning, fishing, walking with elephants and today it’s the village elder’s birthday and I’ve been invited to the party.’

  ‘Working really hard, then.’

  ‘You can come with Dad next year. What have I done to upset Brad? Where is he anyway? I thought he never left his desk but I’ve yet to find him there.’

  Laura cleared her throat, meaningfully. ‘Lucy wanted something in town.’

  It took him a moment to process that. ‘Are you telling me that he left his office to take her to the store?’

  ‘When they came back from the boathouse she said, “Brad, I really need some of my special hand cream...”’ Laura put on a breathy I’m so helpless voice that was so unlike Lucy that he laughed. ‘You think I’m kidding? I’m telling you he was walking her to his car before I could ask him to bring me some chocolate.’

  Actually, that wasn’t funny. He didn’t believe for a moment that the scene had gone down like that. Lucy might have said she was going to walk into town to get some hand cream, but that Brad had volunteered to take her bothered him.

  ‘Do you want to hear the gossip about your Miss Bliss?’ Laura asked, breaking into his thoughts.

  ‘She’s not my anything,’ he said, shutting his mind firmly against the word gossip. He knew what that was worth.

  He’d held this image of her in his head, his heart for so long and there had been a moment when he’d held her, kissed her, when it had seemed as if the wait was over.

  Nothing could be further from the truth.

  The falling-into-bed attraction was there, as strong as it had been that first night, but it was more than that. Just being with her was time well spent.

  He’d missed her first thing. Her smile, the easy banter. She’d sent him away with a flea in his ear for his cheek when he’d taken up breakfast, but it had been worth it for the vision of her, mysterious behind the gauzy mosquito net, lying back against a pile of pillows. Her shoulders bare but for tiny straps that held up whatever she was wearing beneath the sheet, her hair a tumbled mass of curls.

  Not his anything. But, if he was lucky, she might be his everything.

  ‘I have to go,’ he said. ‘Give my love to Mom and Dad.’

  * * *

  Kit loaded his contribution to the party in the back of one of the lodge’s vehicles and returned to Reception. Eve was standing in the reception area. She was chatting to James and she had her back half turned to him so she didn’t see him stop dead in his tracks.

  Her hair, a mass of loose curls, was glowing in a shaft of sunlight. It wasn’t the clear bright red he remembered, but the colour she used was fading out, leaving it the soft shade of maple leaves in the fall. Make-up subtly enhanced her eyes, drew attention to her mouth and she’d abandoned the shapeless khaki bush gear for the party. The simple, elegant moss-coloured linen dress that reached her ankles would, he knew, exactly match the green in her eyes.

  ‘Ready to go?’ James asked, as he spotted him. She turned and for a split second, before she closed it down, he saw his own heart leap reflected back at him and it took him a moment to find his voice.

  ‘Are these all yours?’ he asked, indicating the large number of bags at her feet.

  She lifted her shou
lders fractionally in an apologetic shrug. ‘I knew I’d be visiting the village, so I shopped for gifts before I travelled.’

  ‘Is Peter here?’ she asked, as he gathered them up in two hands. ‘I didn’t hear him arrive.’

  ‘James has kindly loaned me one of the lodge vehicles so I sent him a message to say that we’d make our own way to the village.’

  Eve raised an eyebrow. ‘Grabbing back a little bit of control, Kit?’

  Control? That was a joke. He was so out of control that, but for the touch-me-not force field around her, he’d be kissing the words right off her mouth.

  His sexy Red had given him a night he’d never forgotten. Eve, he realised, had become so much more. Beneath the sexuality that she’d done her best to mask was an intelligent woman who’d seen through his motive as easily as through a pane of glass.

  Eve, on the other hand, shimmered like a mirage...

  ‘It’s not about control,’ he said, pushing the disturbing thought away as he stacked her bags on the back seat. ‘It occurred to me that he wouldn’t be able to relax and enjoy the party if he has to drive us back.’

  ‘Actually,’ she said, as she climbed up into the passenger seat, ‘that’s extremely thoughtful.’ And his reward, as he started the engine, was to see the corner of her mouth lift in a smile. The real kind. She was fighting it, but she was losing.

  * * *

  Eve kept her eyes on the dirt road and Kit seemed unusually quiet. She’d sent him away this morning when having him stay, sharing breakfast with him, would have been a precious moment to remember.

  Kit was going back to Lucy and, for Hannah’s sake, they would need to be friends, or at least civil. The kiss could be excused as a response to the moment, but anything else could only lead to awkwardness, guilt.

  He’d be gone tomorrow, giving her a few days to get her head straight, think about how she would tell him about Hannah. How she was going to tell Hannah.