The plane landed with a bump.
Cormac stood up, slinging his attaché case over his shoulder. He handed Lizzie her handbag and she started in surprise.
‘Here you are, sweetheart,’ he said, and she stiffened. He smiled over her head at the flight attendant who’d been ogling him for the entire journey. ‘She’s always forgetting her things on aeroplanes.’
The attendant tittered, and Lizzie’s cheeks burned. ‘Ridiculing me to the staff before we’ve even stepped off the plane?’ she hissed. ‘What a loving husband you are…darling.’
‘Just teasing,’ he murmured, but she saw a new flintiness in his eyes and realised she’d scored a direct hit. Pretending to be a loving husband—a loving anything—was going to be difficult for Cormac.
Perhaps as difficult as it was proving to be for her.
A young pilot, smiling and speaking with a Dutch accent, met them as they stepped off the plane. The next half hour was a blur of customs, the glare of the hot sun reflecting off the tin roofs of the airport and giving Lizzie a headache. She barely had time to take in their surroundings before they were on a tiny plane, Cormac relaxed next to her, Lizzie’s hand clutching the rail.
It felt as if they were flying a kite.
The pilot grinned at her. ‘It’s small, but it’s perfectly safe.’
Right. She thought of all the accidents she’d read about in the papers that had occurred with planes like these.
This wasn’t part of the deal.
What deal? Lizzie asked herself. There was no deal. Cormac might have let her pretend there was a deal, asked her permission, but it was a joke. A farce.
There was simply Cormac’s will and her submission to it.
Why had she not realised that before? Had she actually believed she’d had some choice?
She closed her eyes. Cormac patted her hand, a caress that felt like a warning.
‘She’s just a bit nervous…and tired.’ She opened her eyes to see him wink at the pilot, who grinned. Lizzie gritted her teeth.
‘There’s Sint Rimbert now.’ The pilot pointed out of the window and Lizzie craned her neck to see.
Below them, the sea sparkled like a jewel and nestled in its aquamarine folds was a pristine island, magnificent and unspoiled.
For a moment Lizzie forgot the man next to her, and the role he was requiring her to play, and sucked in an awed breath.
A densely forested mountain rose majestically in the centre of the tiny island, framed by a curve of smooth, white sand, the clear azure sea stretching to an endless horizon.
A few buildings nestled against the mountain—cottages in pastel colours with shutters open to the tropical breeze.
‘It’s beautiful,’ she murmured.
‘Sint Rimbert is the jewel of the Caribbean,’ the pilot stated. ‘Untouched by crass tourism…and it will remain that way.’There was a warning in his voice and Cormac smiled easily.
‘Absolutely. And the Hassells are more than generous to even consider sharing this piece of paradise with anyone.’
The pilot nodded in agreement and said no more as he began his descent to the island.
The landing strip was a bare brown line of dirt, barely noticeable in its stunning surroundings.
As they stepped off the plane, the air enfolded her in a balmy caress, heavy with the sweet scent of frangipani. The sky above them was a soft, hazy blue, fleecy clouds scudding across its surface.
Lizzie breathed in the warm tropical air, felt it fill her lungs with a fizz of excitement and hope. As long as she could keep her cool—with Cormac as much as with everyone else—she’d be okay.
She could even enjoy this. Maybe.
She wanted to. She wanted to have a weekend to remember.
She might never get the chance again.
A man—short, balding and in his sixties—strode forward. ‘Mr Douglas! We are so pleased! So pleased!’ He stuck out his hand for Cormac to shake and Lizzie’s heart constricted. This had to be Jan Hassell, the man they were deceiving.
Stop it, she commanded herself. She was in too deep now; it was too late to feel guilty.
Hassell turned to her, beaming as he pumped her hand. ‘And this must be your wife…’ He paused, forehead wrinkling, and Cormac interjected smoothly.
‘Elizabeth. But I call her Lizzie.’ He spoke the name as if it were an endearment, smiling at her, his gaze a teasing caress.
Refusing to be baited or belittled, Lizzie smiled back, laced her slick fingers with Cormac’s. ‘Please call me Lizzie, as well,’ she murmured, shooting Cormac a coy smile. ‘Everyone does, although Cormac likes to think it’s his pet name for me.’
Jan clapped his hand in delight. ‘But you are so in love! You will have to tell me all about it. My wife, Hilda, will want to know how it all came about.’
More people to deceive. Lizzie hushed the whisper of her conscience. ‘Oh, that’s girl talk,’ she said with a little laugh. ‘Hilda and I will have to chat…I’ll tell her all of Cormac’s secrets.’ She smiled and Jan beamed. ‘I’m sure you two have a story, as well!’
‘Oh, we do,’ Jan assured her with a wink. ‘Now, you must be tired. Your things have been brought to my car…Come, follow me.’
He turned and headed towards a four-by-four parked near some scrub.
Cormac put his arm around her shoulders—heavy, warm, a warning. ‘Come on, sweetheart,’ he said easily, but his hand squeezed her shoulder. He murmured in a low voice, ‘Don’t lay it on with a trowel, Chandler. It’s a bit nauseating.’
‘I can believe that,’ she replied in an angry undertone. ‘Acting like you’re in love has to be completely foreign to you! Do you love anything but your precious designs?’ Smiling again, she laid her head against his shoulder, felt the tension in his muscles, in her own.
Every petty victory cost her something, as well.
Their luggage stowed in the back, Jan opened the rear door for them to enter.
Lizzie clambered in, hoping that Cormac would sit in the front with Jan.
He did not. He climbed in next to her, his large, muscular thigh pressed against hers, his arm around her shoulders once more, drawing her tightly to his side. She could smell his scent—the tang of soap and cedar and something indefinitely masculine, as well.
Jan beamed at them approvingly before taking the driver’s seat. As the Jeep left the airstrip, he told them a bit about the island.
‘As you know, Cormac, from our discussion, Sint Rimbert is a small island. There is only one village and a population of less than six hundred. We have a flying doctor, two shops and a post office. That is all.’ Jan spoke proudly and Lizzie guessed he was glad he’d held out against tawdry tourism for so long.
‘Taking the decision to build a resort was difficult,’ he continued as he drove the Jeep along a tarmac road, the thick foliage so close to the car that Lizzie could have reached out and grasped a fern or palm. She saw coconut and banana trees and even the curious, wizened face of a green monkey perched among the branches.
‘It is very important to us that the resort won’t disturb the local population,’ Jan said, ‘or the environment any more than necessary. This is not simply a money-making operation for us.’
‘Of course not,’ Cormac agreed. ‘And I am grateful that you have preserved this paradise for us. It would be my pleasure—as well as my duty—to continue to preserve it for those fortunate