‘Nor did I. I mean, I just wanted to get some experience and live a little—do something a bit different before starting university. You know that. How many times did I tell you that—?’ She’d very nearly said falling in love, but an innate sense of self-preservation held her back. Not once had he ever told her what he felt for her. She had only deduced from the way he looked at her and touched her, and laughed at the things she said, and when she teased him. ‘That meeting someone wasn’t part of my agenda either. The unexpected happens.’
Did it? Not to him. Never to him. He had endured a childhood that had been riddled with the unexpected—all of it bad. Top of his list of things to avoid was The Unexpected, but she was right. What had blossomed between them had taken him by surprise. He drew her against him and searched for the right words to explain just why the future staring them in the face would be one they each faced on their own.
‘I shouldn’t have given in, Sarah.’
‘Shouldn’t have given in to what?’
‘You know what. To you.’
‘Please don’t say that,’ she whispered with heartfelt dismay. ‘Are you saying that what we did was all a big mistake? We’ve had so much fun! You don’t have to be serious all the time.’
Raoul took her hand and kissed the tips of her fingers, one by one, until the radiant smile reappeared on her face. She smiled easily.
‘It’s been fun,’ he agreed, with the heavy feeling of someone about to deliver a fatal blow to an unsuspecting victim. ‘But this isn’t reality, Sarah. This is time out. You pretty much said it yourself. Reality is what’s in front of us. In your case three years at university. In my case …’ The world and nothing less. ‘A job. I really hoped that we wouldn’t have to have this conversation. I hoped that you would see what’s pretty clear to me. This has been great, but it’s … a holiday affair.’
‘A holiday affair?’ Sarah repeated in a small voice.
Raoul sighed and ran his fingers through his too-long hair. He would get rid of it the second he made it back to civilisation.
‘Don’t make me out to be an ogre, Sarah. I’m not saying that it hasn’t been … incredible. It has. In fact, it’s been the most incredible three months of my life.’ He hesitated. His past had never been something he chose to discuss with anyone, least of all a woman, but the urge to go further with her was overpowering. ‘You’ve made me feel like no one else ever has … but then I suppose you know that …’
‘How can I when you’ve never told me?’ But it was something for her to hang onto.
‘I … I’m not good with this kind of emotional drama. I’ve had a lot of emotional drama in my life …’
‘What do you mean?’ She knew only the barest of facts about his past, even though he pretty much knew everything about hers. She had waxed lyrical about her childhood—her very happy and very ordinary childhood—as an only child of two parents who had always thought that they would never have kids until her mother became pregnant at the merry age of forty-one.
He had skirted round the subject aside from telling her that he’d had no parents, preferring to concentrate on the future which, as time went on, suited her very well—even though any mention of her in that future hadn’t actually been voiced. She liked the thought of him forging his way with her at his side. Somewhere.
‘I grew up in a foster home, Sarah. I was one of those kids you read about in the newspapers who get taken in by Social Services because their parents can’t take care of them.’
Sarah sat up, lost for words. Then her natural warmth took over and she felt the prickle of tears, which brought a reluctant smile to his lips.
‘Neither of your parents could look after you?’
‘Just the one parent on the scene. My mother.’ It was not in his nature to confide, and he picked carefully at his words, choosing to denude them of all potency. It was a trick he had learnt a long time ago, so his voice, when he spoke, was flat and detached. ‘Unfortunately she had a problem with substances, which ended up killing her when I was five. My father … Who knows? Could have been anyone.’
‘You poor soul!’
‘I prefer to think of my background as character-building, and as foster homes went mine wasn’t too bad. Where I’m going with this …’ For a second he had to remind himself where he was going with it. ‘I’m not looking for a relationship. Not now—probably not ever. I never meant to string you along, Sarah, but … you got under my skin … And all this didn’t exactly go the distance in bringing me back to my senses.’
‘All what?’
‘Here. The middle of nowhere. Thrown together in the heat …’
‘So nothing would have happened between us if we hadn’t been out here?’ She could hear her voice rising and had to control it, because she didn’t want to wake anyone—although there was only one other English speaking person on the compound.
‘That’s a purely hypothetical question.’
‘You could try answering it!’
‘I don’t know.’ He could feel the hurt seeping out of her, but what could he do about it? How could he make it better without issuing promises he knew he wouldn’t keep?
Frustration and anger at himself rushed through him in a tidal wave. Hell, he should have known just by looking at her that Sarah wasn’t one of those women who were out to have a good time, no strings attached! Where had his prized self-control been when he had needed it most? Absent without leave! He had seen her and all trace of common sense had deserted him.
And when he had discovered that she was a virgin? Had that stopped him in his tracks? The opposite. He had felt unaccountably thrilled to be her first, had wanted to shout it from the rooftops. Instead of backing away he had rushed headlong into the sort of crazy quasi-romantic situation that he had always scorned. There hadn’t been chocolates and jewellery—not that he could have afforded either—but there had been long, lazy conversations, a great deal of laughter … Hell, he had even cooked her a meal on one occasion, when the rest of the crew had disappeared for the weekend to camp on the beach, leaving the two of them in charge.
‘You don’t know? Is that because I’m not really your type?’
He hesitated just long enough for her to bitterly assume the obvious.
‘I’m not, am I?’ She slung her legs over the bed, kicking away at the mosquito net and finally shoving it aside so that she could crawl under it.
‘Where are you going!’
‘I don’t want to be having this conversation.’ In the darkness she hunted around for her clothes, located them, and began putting them on. An old tee shirt, a pair of denim shorts, her flipflops. ‘I’m going outside. I need to get some air.’
Raoul debated the wisdom of following her for a few seconds, then leapt out of the bed, struggling with his jeans, not bothering with a shirt at all, as he watched her flying out of the room like a bat out of hell.
The bedroom was small, equipped with the most basic of furniture, and cluttered with all the bits and pieces of two occupants. He came close to tripping over one of his shoes and cursed softly under his breath. He shouldn’t be following her. He had said all there was to say on the subject of any continuing romance. To prolong the conversation would be to invite a debate that would be stillborn, so what was the point? But watching her disappear through the bedroom door had galvanised him into instant, inexplicable action.
The house was a square concrete block, its front door accessed by sufficient steps to ensure that it was protected