‘You can’t live like that.’
‘I know,’ Alison said. ‘Which is why in a few weeks’ time I’ll have my own place, and won’t have to account for my every move.’ She gave him a smile, tried to move the conversation away, because he didn’t belong in that space. ‘It’s complicated.’ She gave a small shrug. ‘It doesn’t matter.’
Except it did.
It did matter, because when they were lying on his sofa and revisiting that kiss on the beach, only this time without Alison having her top on, when she should be able to close her eyes and just sink into him, she was all too aware that she was five minutes away from a call that needed to be made—a lie that she was willing to tell.
His back was against the sofa, his long legs holding her from falling, and there was a film coming to end of which they’d only seen the opening credits, and there was the bliss of privacy for them both. His mouth was on her ear and his hand was stroking her breast. Her hands, which had traced his chest, were stealing downwards now. They had left the balcony door open but neither the roar of the ocean nor his kiss in her ear could dull the call of duty. She wriggled back just a little, breathless and moist from his kiss. Yes, hell yes, she would lie for him.
‘I’ve just got to make a phone call.’ His mouth was in her neck and her body was in his arms and it was almost torture to pull just a little further away. She didn’t know whether to pull on her top and hamper an easy return to his arms, but neither did she want to shiver half-naked in his bathroom.
‘And tell her what?’ His question came as a surprise, not to Alison but to Nick. He shouldn’t ask, he told himself, because it was no business of his, and he shouldn’t really care.
He just did.
‘Nick?’ She shook her head, would not elaborate—was a little cross even as he thwarted her attempts to stop reality invading. ‘I won’t be a moment.’
‘Alison.’ He caught her wrist and even though she’d been half-naked in his arms, she felt stupid standing there with her top half exposed, could feel the blush creeping down over her chest as he asked questions a man like Nick shouldn’t have to. ‘You don’t have to lie for me.’
‘Who said I’m lying?’
‘They did.’ He pointed to her rosy breasts and somehow she almost managed a smile.
‘My mum’s…’ Alison swallowed, she truly didn’t want to land him with all of it; even Ellie, who had seen it all, struggled to fathom how rigid her mother could be. ‘She’s difficult.’
‘They often are,’ Nick said, and he handed her her top. ‘And with all she’s been through.’
‘She was the same before,’ Alison admitted, ‘though when Dad and Tim were there…’ She couldn’t really explain, but without further explanation Nick seemed to understand.
‘You weren’t in the full spotlight?’ When she nodded he continued, ‘So where are you tonight?’
‘Don’t worry about it.’ She tried blasé, tried casual, but Nick could tell otherwise and she knew it. ‘You really picked the wrong girl to have your torrid Sydney fling with.’
And he looked up at her and was silent for a moment because, yes, he had. He could see stains of hurt in her serious brown eyes and he didn’t want to add to them, except inevitably he already had. Already this was turning into something else, something bigger, something he hadn’t come to Australia for.
‘It doesn’t feel like a fling,’ Nick admitted.
‘It’s all it can be.’ Alison was practical, even if she was shaking inside.
‘Come on.’ He stood and looked around for his keys. ‘I’ll walk you home.’
‘It’s five minutes away.’
And he should say goodnight here, Nick knew.
End it here.
But Nick never went for the easy option, so he reached for his keys.
‘You’re not walking on your own.’
They walked back to Alison’s home in pensive silence, and he didn’t kiss her on the doorstep, because he knew she didn’t want him to, but as she let herself in her mouth still tingled from his and her body held the scent and memory of him. Her eyes must have glittered with stirred passion because Rose’s face screamed of martyrdom as she offered Alison a cup of tea. Even though she didn’t want tea, even though she wanted to go to bed and think of Nick and read the text he’d just sent because she could feel the vibration of her phone in her bag, that this time made her feel giddy with wanting to read it, she said, ‘That would be nice,’ and curled up on the sofa and took the mug from her mum.
‘I thought you were at a party.’
And instead of saying she had been, or offering the usual half-truth, Alison was honest.
‘We gave it a miss,’ she admitted. ‘We went back to Nick’s for dinner.’
‘He seems nice,’ Rose said, because after all he’d brought her baby home.
‘He is nice.’
‘How long did he say he was here for?’ Skilfully, so skilfully, Rose took the pin and deflated the bubble Alison was floating on. Carefully, lovingly, perhaps, she warned her daughter that this could never, ever be. ‘Nice-looking man,’ Rose said. ‘He must have broken a few hearts on his travels,’ she added, just to make sure her daughter got it.
‘I’m going to bed.’ Alison tried to keep her voice light.
She peeled off her clothes and read her text, which was hardly torrid, hardly from a man hell bent on getting in her knickers and promptly breaking her heart. It just thanked her for a nice day and a really nice night, that he’d enjoyed it.
She should stop this now, common sense said.
Just turn her back on his charm, because there really was no point.
She swam between the flags, certainly wasn’t into casual relationships, and that was really all it could be with Nick. In a few weeks he’d be off and she’d be left, and if she wasn’t extremely careful, Alison knew she’d be nursing a broken heart.
Actually, she already knew she would be.
He’d arrived in her life as blonde and as dazzling as summer. He just lit everything up and enhanced it all some more.
She didn’t get him, but she wanted to.
She wanted the little bit of him that was possible, because there was something about Nick that got her, something that was…just a little bit like the single word she sent back to him.
Same. x
‘I’M NOT stalking you!’
She grinned as she walked across the foyer to Emergency on Monday night and Nick joined her. ‘Amy asked yesterday if I could cover her week of nights.’
‘Oh.’
‘I got called in yesterday,’ Nick explained.
‘I didn’t see you on the bus.’
‘I drove. It was a last-minute thing. I didn’t know whether to ring and offer a lift…’ He admitted only a quarter of it—if the truth were told, he hadn’t known