The reception was held at the same hotel as the ball had been, the room beautifully and lavishly decorated, and the champagne flowing freely by the time they arrived from having the official photographs taken.
Speeches and toasts were made, the cake was cut and the bridal waltz performed, cameras still flashing madly until it was finally time for Bryn and Mia to leave.
Gina had a tussle over the bouquet with several other young women but she was victorious in the end, although the bouquet she held proudly aloft was suspiciously short of a few blooms.
The ever-present journalists pressed forward as Bryn helped Mia into his car, their microphones outstretched. ‘Where’s the honeymoon going to be, Mr Dwyer?’ one of them asked.
‘How long will you be away?’ another pushed in.
‘No comment,’ Bryn said and closed Mia’s door. He waved to everyone before he got in the driver’s seat and leaning across gave Mia a long, sensual kiss for the benefit of the cameras.
Mia was already feeling a bit light-headed from all the champagne she’d consumed and his kiss made her head spin even more. She sank against him, her senses reeling at the erotic message being communicated by his lips and tongue.
He lifted his head and, smiling once more for the Press, he gunned the engine and they were away, balloons and tin cans and streamers trailing in their wake, the shaving-foam message ‘Just Married’ scrawled all over the back window.
‘How are you holding up?’ Bryn asked the silent figure beside him a few minutes later.
She sent him a rueful sideways glance. ‘My face aches from smiling all the time.’
He gave a soft chuckle of laughter. ‘Yeah, so does mine.’ He glanced in the rear-view mirror at the bouncing cans and pulled over to the side of the road to remove them, placing them in a rubbish bin on the pavement before getting back in behind the wheel and easing the car into the traffic.
Mia stared down at the two rings on her left hand. It hardly seemed real that she was sitting next to a man she hadn’t even met in person a little over a month ago. And now she was going on a honeymoon with him to his private retreat in the Queensland Sunshine Coast town of Noosa.
‘Do you think the Press will follow us?’ she asked to fill the little silence.
‘I shouldn’t think so,’ he answered. ‘I think now the wedding has come and gone their interest will die down. It has to. All they were really interested in was whether or not we were really getting married. No one thought I would ever do it.’
Mia gave her rings another twirl, not trusting herself to chance a glance his way. ‘Your great-aunt seemed to be very happy for you.’
‘Yes, she was.’ His eyes flicked to her briefly. ‘I guess I should thank you for playing the role so well. You must have acted the beautiful-bride part before. You were a natural.’
‘I’ve been to a lot of weddings,’ she said and then added in a self-deprecating tone, ‘besides, the priest tells you what to say. It’s hardly challenging. It’s like having an Autocue to prompt you.’
He smiled as he took the turn to the domestic terminal. ‘I guess the challenging bit is yet to come.’
Mia decided not to respond. She’d been steadily panicking about the bit to come all day and wondered how in the world she was going to negotiate her way through it.
Ever since she’d spoken with his great-aunt Mia had felt increasingly confused about her feelings towards him. She could still taste his kiss on her lips and it worried her that once they were alone she wouldn’t have the resolve to keep her growing attraction to him under control. He was hard enough to resist while she hated him. How much more tempting would he be if she started to like him?
But you do like him, the little voice in her head returned. She tried to block it but it kept on filling her head with nonsense.
You’re in love with him.
You want to spend the rest of your life with him.
You want to have his children.
She clutched at her bag with both hands, staring down at the rings on her finger that bound her to him.
It couldn’t possibly be true. How could she love a man who had destroyed her career with a few words he’d written, thinking nothing of it, as if it were a simple game of sport?
She was just falling under his sensual spell like every other silly woman who didn’t have a measure of self-control. She would just have to try harder to avoid becoming yet another of his conquests.
Falling in love with Bryn Dwyer was too dangerous.
Their relationship was temporary.
She had to remember that.
‘Come on, Mia.’ Bryn’s voice broke through her reverie as he opened her door a few minutes later. ‘Our plane leaves in forty minutes. We need to check in before the flight closes.’
The flight to Maroochydore took an hour and a half and Mia was glad that for most of it she had slept. She woke just as they were coming in to land, the lights of the coastal town situated on the south bank of the Maroochy River twinkling in the clear night air.
Bryn had organised a hire car for them and as soon as the luggage was collected he began the thirty-minute drive north to Noosa.
‘Have you been to Noosa before?’ he asked once they were on their way.
‘Yes, but it was quite a while ago, ten years at least. We came on a family holiday,’ she answered. ‘It might have completely changed by now.’
‘That’s what so nice about it up here,’ he said. ‘It never really changes. Sure, there’ve been developments up and down the river and along the coast, but nothing like the massive highrises on the Gold Coast. Noosa National Park is a great place to walk through. You can even do a beach crawl if you want. There are quiet, shady bays or great surf spots, so whatever your mood you can usually find somewhere to relax.’
‘I remember the national park. My sister Ashleigh hated the long walks my parents kept taking us on. Ellie wanted to stop and look at every bit of wildlife and I kept running on ahead, driving my parents crazy in case I got lost, which I seem to recall I did on more than one occasion.’
‘You must have been a cute kid,’ he said after a little pause. ‘I envy your family life. It must have been wonderful having such a loving environment to grow up in.’
‘It wasn’t always fun and games,’ she said. ‘I love my sisters but we fought a lot when we were younger. I guess all kids do.’
There was another lengthy silence.
‘I often wondered what it would have been like to have a brother or a sister.’
She looked at him. ‘It must have been very hard growing up without your parents.’
‘It was. But I learned to cope. My great-aunt did the best she could but I wasn’t the easiest person to be around at times.’
‘Do you have any photos of your parents?’
‘I guess I have them somewhere.’
‘Why don’t you have them out on show?’
‘I’m not the sentimental type,’ he said. ‘It’s in the past and I’m only interested in the future.’
Mia decided to step out on a limb. ‘Your great-aunt said you used to hide any photos of your parents when she put them out. Why did you do that?’
He gave her a hard little glance.