‘Why the hell wouldn’t we?’ he countered.
She shrugged. ‘I’ve changed.’
‘Not that much.’
She bridled and looked daggers at him before swiftly veiling her eyes. ‘That’s what your mother tried to tell me. I’m just a souped-up version of the housekeeper’s daughter, in other words.’
‘I didn’t say that,’ he retorted. ‘Since when did you get so thin-skinned, Mia?’
She took a very deep breath. ‘I’m not,’ she said stiffly.
‘I can’t work out whether you want us to think you have changed or not.’
‘Don’t worry about it, Carlos,’ she advised coolly. ‘In fact, thank you for getting me a drink but I’d be happy if you went back to your friends. I have a lot to do still.’
‘Short of throwing me out,’ he replied casually, ‘which I doubt you could do, you’re going to have to put up with me, Mia, until I’m ready to go. So, why don’t you fill me in on the missing years? I’m talking about the years between the time you kissed me with considerable ardour then waltzed off to uni, and now.’ His grey gaze rested on her sardonically.
Mia went white.
‘I’m waiting,’ he remarked.
She said something supremely uncomplimentary beneath her breath but she knew from the autocratic set of his jaw that he wouldn’t let up until he got the answers he wanted.
‘All right!’ She said it through her teeth but he intervened.
‘Hang on a moment.’ He reached over and took her glass. ‘Let’s have another one.’
With the deepest reluctance, she told him about the intervening years. How her mother and father had retired and were living in the Northern Rivers district of New South Wales. How they’d started a small tea shop in a country town that was becoming well known, not only for the cakes her mother baked but the honey her father produced and the herbs he grew.
How she’d finished university, spent some months overseas; how a series of catering jobs had finally led her to taking the plunge and starting her own business.
‘And that’s me up to date,’ she said bleakly and added with irony, ‘how about you?’
He avoided the question. ‘No romantic involvement?’
‘Me?’ Mia drew her finger around the rim of her glass. ‘Not really. Not seriously. I haven’t had the time. How about you?’ she asked again.
‘I’m…’ He paused and grimaced. ‘Actually, I’m currently unattached. Nina—I don’t know if you’ve heard of Nina French?’ He raised a dark eyebrow at her.
‘Who hasn’t?’ Mia murmured impatiently. ‘Top model, utterly gorgeous, daughter of an ambassador,’ she added.
‘Yes.’ He nodded. ‘We had a relationship. It fell through. Today, as a matter of fact.’
Mia choked on a sip of her drink. ‘Today?’
He nodded.
‘Is that why you were late?’ she asked incredulously.
He nodded. ‘We had a monumental row just before we were due to set out—to be here on time.’ He shrugged. ‘About fifty per cent of our relationship consisted of monumental rows, now I come to think of it.’
‘Oh. I’m sorry,’ Mia said. ‘But that probably means a…a grand reunion.’
‘Not this time,’ he replied perfectly coolly, so coolly it sent a little shiver down Mia’s spine.
He was quiet for a time, rolling his glass in his hands. ‘Otherwise,’ he continued, ‘I’ve worked like a Trojan to fill my father’s shoes since he had that stroke. He died a few months ago.’
‘I read about that. I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t be. It was a release—for all of us, I guess. After the stroke he became embittered and extremely hard to live with. He was always a hard man. I never felt I was living up to his expectations before he became ill but even less so afterwards.’
He sat back and tasted his drink. ‘I’ve even branched out in new directions, successfully, but—’ he paused and shrugged ‘—I can’t help feeling he wouldn’t have approved or that he would have thought of a different way of doing things.’
‘I didn’t know him much,’ Mia murmured.
‘The thing is—’ Carlos drained his drink and looked out into the sunset ‘—I don’t know why I’m telling you this; maybe weddings generate a desire to understand things—or maybe monumental rows do it—’ he shrugged ‘—but I don’t know if it’s thanks to him and his…lack of enthusiasm for most things, including me, that’s given me a similar outlook on life.’
Mia frowned. ‘What do you mean?’
‘There’s something missing. Hard to put my finger on it, though.’
‘Maybe you’d like to take a year off and live amongst some primitive tribe for a change? Is it that kind of an itch?’
He grimaced. ‘Not exactly.’
‘Then it could be a wife and family you’re lacking,’ Mia said in a motherly sort of way and was completely unprepared for what came next.
He studied her for a long moment, his eyes narrowed and very intent. Then he said, ‘You wouldn’t like to take Nina’s place?’
Mia’s eyes widened and her mouth fell open. ‘What do you mean?’
‘You wouldn’t like to get engaged to me? Not that I was engaged to Nina, but—’ He gestured.
She swallowed, choked again on a sip of her drink and came up spluttering.
He eyed her quizzically. ‘An unusual reaction,’ he murmured.
‘No. I mean yes. I mean…how could you?’ She reached for a napkin from the trolley and patted her eyes and her mouth. ‘I don’t think that’s funny,’ she told him coldly.
He raised a dark eyebrow at her. ‘It wasn’t meant to be. I’m in rather desperate need of a—what should I call it?—a shield at the moment. From Nina and the whole damn caboodle of them.’ He looked irritated to death.
‘Them? Who?’ Mia queried with a frown.
‘The set she moves in, Juanita too, my mother and all the rest of them.’ He gestured. ‘You saw them all today.’ He paused, then smiled suddenly. ‘In comparison, the housekeeper’s daughter is like pure sweet spring water.’
Mia moved abruptly and went white to her lips. ‘How dare you?’ she whispered. ‘How dare you patronise me with your ridiculous proposal and think you can make me laugh about being the housekeeper’s daughter?’
‘Mia—’ he sat up ‘—it may be seven years ago but you and I set each other alight once—remember? Perhaps it didn’t mean a great deal to you, but it happened.’
‘M-may not have meant m-much to me?’ Mia had trouble getting the words out. ‘What are you saying?’
‘You ran away, remember?’
‘I…Carlos, your mother warned me off,’ Mia cried, all her unspoken but good intentions not to rake up the past forgotten. ‘She told me I could never be the one for you, no “housekeeper’s daughter” would be good enough to be your wife. She told me you were only toying with me anyway and she threatened to sack my parents without references if I didn’t go away.’
‘What?’