Wedding Wishes: A Wedding at Leopard Tree Lodge. Liz Fielding

      JOSIE pulled down a towel, wrapped it around her, opened the shower door, paused to take a careful look around.

      The bathroom was a myriad of reflected lights, stunningly beautiful, and there wasn’t a creepy-crawly, or even a friendly lizard, in sight.

      ‘You are such a wuss, Josie Fowler,’ she said as she dried off. Then she brushed her teeth, applied fresh make-up, used some wax on hair that had wilted in the steam and finally emerged, wearing the fishnet T-shirt she kept for evenings beneath a simple slipover, ready for the next round with her nemesis.

      ‘It’s all yours,’ she said to an empty room.

      Gideon was nowhere to be seen. Neither was Cryssie’s wedding dress.

      ‘Gideon!’ she yelled, surging out onto the deck.

      He emerged from the outdoor shower, dark hair clinging wetly to his neck, his forehead, wearing only a pitifully small towel—stark white against his slick sun-drenched skin—wrapped around his waist.

      Standing straight, he was so utterly beautiful that for a moment she struggled for words.

      ‘You shrieked?’ he prompted.

      She made an attempt to gather herself. ‘The dress…’ She swallowed. ‘What have you done with Cryssie’s dress?’

      ‘I put it out of harm’s way,’ he said. ‘In the wardrobe.’

      ‘Oh…’

      ‘What did you think I’d done with it? Tossed it into the trees for the monkeys to play with?’

      ‘No. Sorry. It’s just—’

      ‘Your responsibility. I heard you, Josie. This is your room and you’ve every right to keep whatever you want in it.’

      ‘It was just that you were so obviously disturbed by its appearance, angry even—’

      ‘Forget it,’ he said, so fiercely that she drew back a little. ‘Let it go, Josie,’ he said, rather more gently. ‘It’s not important.’

      Clearly it was. His dislike of weddings was obviously rooted in something rather deeper than an aversion to long white dresses. But it was equally obvious that he didn’t want to talk about it.

      ‘I realise that all this is nothing but a huge pain in the backside for you, Gideon—’

      ‘A little higher than that,’ he suggested, doing his best to make light of it by making fun of her.

      ‘Dammit, Gideon!’ she snapped. ‘This is really important to me. Sylvie has taken a huge gamble making me a partner and so far I haven’t been exactly trampled in the stampede of women desperate for me to plan their weddings. I have to get this right…’

      ‘Why?’

      ‘Why?’ she repeated, confused. ‘Surely that’s obvious?’

      ‘Why was it a gamble?’

      She sucked in her breath. He wasn’t supposed to ask that. She shouldn’t have said it, wouldn’t have let it slip if she hadn’t been so wound up. So desperate that everything should go without a hitch.

      ‘You’re motivated, enthusiastic and you care deeply that Cryssie’s big day is special,’ he pressed. ‘In her shoes, I’d rather have you than Cara’s scary Aunt Serafina holding my hand on my big day.’

      If Sylvie had been here, it was exactly what she would have said and she was forced to blink hard to stop a tear from spilling over.

      Not good. Determined not to lose it completely and blub, she took her eyes on a slow ride down that luscious body until she reached his feet. Then she shook her head.

      ‘Sorry, Tarzan, they wouldn’t fit.’ And, just to prove to herself that she was firmly back in control, she made herself look up, meet his gaze. Nothing had changed. He knew what she was doing and he wasn’t diverted. The question was still there…

      Why was it a gamble?

      ‘And, to be honest, embroidered, beaded satin slingbacks really wouldn’t be a good look for you,’ she added a little desperately.

      For a moment he continued to look at her, challenge her and she thought he wasn’t going to let it go, but finally he shrugged. ‘You think the beads would be pushing it?’

      ‘The bigger the feet, the less you want to draw attention to them,’ she replied.

      He looked down at her boots, lifted an eyebrow, said nothing.