Melting Ms Frost (43 page)

Which made it all but impossible to concentrate, to order the turmoil of her mind. All too soon she found she’d run out of things to put in the fridge, so started piling things into the cupboard in front of her instead, buying every second she could. She heard the creak of leather as Aidan moved, felt the heat of him as he came up close behind her in the small space.

‘Why?’

She froze with a jar of coffee in her hands, closed her eyes. ‘Because I panicked.’

‘That much was obvious.’ His voice was a deep rumble behind her ear. ‘I want to know the reason behind it.’

Annabel cleared her throat. ‘I heard a call come in, about the house – the one in Ireland. I hadn’t meant to listen but …’ She shrugged. ‘And when I realised you were going back …’

‘Yes?’ he prompted when she left the sentence hanging.

The last thing she wanted to do was expose herself, open up and leave herself vulnerable, but there was no point in trying to lie, not to a man who could read her so easily, who would relentlessly pursue the truth.

‘I was scared.’

‘Scared of what?’

Of how the thought of him leaving had turned her inside out, left every sensitive place exposed and raw. Of the strength of that reaction after so short a time.

‘Of myself mostly. Of what I felt.’

‘Turn around, Annabel.’

She shook her head. ‘No. I won’t be able to do this if I look at you.’

Thankfully, he didn’t force it.

‘Then tell me,’ he said in a low voice. ‘What did you feel?’

‘Things I had no business feeling.’ She clutched at the coffee jar and forced out the admission. ‘I – I didn’t want you to leave.’

Her words hung in the air for long seconds before he returned with a fair dose of irony. ‘So
you
left instead?’

‘I know. It doesn’t make sense. It
didn’t
make sense. I was confused.’

‘You were confused. Confused and distressed. You think I didn’t know that? After everything you’d been through you were in no fit state to think rationally about anything. But what about now? Are you still confused?’

Terribly. But she wasn’t going to admit it, she needed to be strong to get through this. ‘No.’

‘Good. Because I want to know clearly why the prospect of my leaving would have bothered you so?’

And if he thought she was going to give that much of herself away when it obviously didn’t matter any more, he was mistaken. ‘I don’t know.’ She shook her head stubbornly.

She heard him move, saw the black of his leathers out of the corner of her eye as he came to stand beside her. She kept her attention firmly on the coffee jar.

‘You do know, Annabel.’ His tone was insistent. ‘Was it because you wanted more?’

She swallowed but didn’t move. Didn’t speak.

‘What if I’d wanted more, too?’ He leaned in to utter in a hard voice. ‘Did you think of that?’

Her pulse pounded in her head. No. At the time she hadn’t thought of it, because she’d never been used to thinking about anyone but herself.

‘I figured if you were leaving, that you’d be glad to get your life back,’ she said. ‘You didn’t come after me, wouldn’t answer my calls, didn’t want to listen to what I had to say … and then you just left.’

‘I very nearly did come after you as it happens. I was so incensed, all I could think about was dragging you back, forcing you to open up to me. At least I had enough sense left to realise what a disaster that would have been. You didn’t need that then, you had enough on your plate.’ He let out a breath. ‘And once I’d calmed down, I couldn’t see the point in trying to pursue someone who considered me so easily disposable, someone who was willing to treat me with so little regard.’

Disposable? That he could even think something like that of himself made her feel terrible. For all that he’d left her feeling turned inside out and upside down, he’d also given her joy and safety and friendship when she’d needed it most – had been there for her when she’d had nobody else in the world. No matter how torn up she felt, she owed him for that at least.

She turned to face him at last.

‘I am sorry, Aidan. I really am. It was a childish and selfish way for me to behave after everything you’d done for me. I knew how wrong I’d been almost straight away – especially when I got back here and discovered you’d done even more than I could’ve imagined.’

He looked at her intently, eyes scanning her features and for once she hoped he could read the truth, the sincerity, there.

‘That reminds me,’ he said. ‘I have something for you in the other room.’

‘Something for me?’ She followed him back into the sitting room where he pulled a flat rectangular package wrapped in brown paper from inside his motorcycle helmet. Ripping the paper off, he drew out a photo frame and held it towards her.

In a daze she raised her hand to take the familiar photo of her and her father standing outside the White Harte.

‘I thought this had gone,’ she murmured as she stared at it, her voice cracking.

‘It’s actually a copy. The original was damaged beyond repair when the frame smashed. I found somewhere that was able to patch it up enough to make a decent reproduction.’ A brief silence fell as they both regarded the golden-hued picture. ‘I’m guessing the White Harte was the inn your parents owned?’

Annabel nodded. As hard as she tried to fight back the overwhelming rush of emotion, she felt the hot prickle of tears.

‘Thank you.’ Turning away from him, she made her way towards the bookcase, blinking rapidly to clear her blurring vision. ‘I don’t know what else to say.’ She stood the photo in its rightful place. ‘I don’t deserve this.’

Almost immediately, she sensed Aidan come up beside her, felt the touch of his fingers against her chin, the pressure increasing as he forced her to face him. She didn’t have the strength to fight him. Not without losing it completely. Instead, she kept her eyes lowered, trained on the strip of cream jersey visible beneath his open leather jacket, where she could see the steady rise and fall of his chest.

‘Annabel,’ he said in a voice much softer than it had been. ‘Look at me.’

God, he was going to leave her a jibbering wreck at this rate. She firmed her jaw. Raised her eyes. Fell into his gaze.

‘Tell me one thing.’ The fathomless silver held her riveted as he asked, ‘If you had the chance to do that day differently, would you?’

Now that she understood the hurt she’d caused to both of them? In a heartbeat. She swallowed and nodded.

‘Why?’ He dug deeper. ‘What’s changed?’

She blinked harder and gave a shrug. ‘Me, I think.’

His hand moved up from her chin to catch a tear that had formed on her lower lashes.

‘
A mhuirnín
, don’t cry now,’ he whispered, the steel in his gaze turning to molten silver. ‘That’s all I wanted to know.’

He lowered his head towards hers looking for all the world like he was going to kiss her. Annabel’s head spun. What was going on?

She put a hand against his chest to hold him away, instantly feeling the warmth of him seep through the wool and into her palm. Even though his breathing was steady, she discovered that his heartbeat wasn’t. It beat against the cage of his ribs like a wild thing caught in a trap. ‘What are you doing?’

His other hand came up to cover hers, pressing it tight against the firm contours of his pectoral muscle. For the first time since he’d arrived one of his lopsided smiles appeared. ‘I’m going to do what I’ve been dying to do for weeks – kiss you.’

Had she missed something? Her own heart thumped so fast it was a pounding echo inside her skull. Added to the spinning it wasn’t helping her to get a handle on matters at all. He wanted to kiss her? Goodbye? She didn’t think she could handle that.

She shook her head. ‘What’s the point?’ Surely only more upset could come from such a reminder of what they’d shared? To her horror she felt a tear break free of her lashes, but before she had a chance to swipe it away herself, Aidan’s thumb moved to stop it in its tracks.

‘The point?’ he smiled, stroking her cheek. ‘I can offer a few but they’ll have to wait. I have to kiss you first. I doubt you have any idea how difficult it’s been to stay away from you these past weeks. To give you the space you needed to think about what you really feel. I’ve thought of nothing but you—’

She tried to process the words but it was difficult to focus when he was looking at her like that, lowering his head. She should stop him. Letting those parted lips touch hers would only make an impossible situation even worse. But trapped by the captivating beauty of those eyes she was helpless to resist. Suddenly greedy for one last farewell kiss, whatever the cost, she stood there and let his warm, firm lips make contact, lightly at first, taking small tastes until her own parted and with a groan he came at her like a starving man, using tongue and teeth and lips to devour her.

The heat and scent of him washed over her as she melted against the wall of soft, warm leather and wool he made, giving back with everything she had, savouring every second to store in her memories. More tears escaped from between the closed mesh of her lashes to run down her cheeks, but she couldn’t do a thing to stop them. It was only when she thought her knees might give way that he started pulling back, finishing as he’d started, with small, light nibbles and tastes that gave them both time to catch their breath.

‘That was worth the wait.’ Still holding her face between his palms, Aidan’s gaze followed the tracks of her tears as his thumbs swiped them away. ‘But if you’re thinking that was in any way goodbye, Annabel,’ he stated, eyes locking onto hers, ‘you’re wrong. Come and sit down, let me tell you about the house in Ireland – my plans.’

She let herself be led to the sofa where she sat and listened to him explain about his childhood fascination with Tully House, his dream of restoring it to its former glory which had been rekindled while he was convalescing from the stroke.

‘I decided to look into the situation with the owners, to see whether a new generation had finally been able to settle their differences and would be prepared to sell it. When I didn’t get an outright no in reply, what had started as an interest to keep me from going mad during the long months of painfully slow rehabilitation soon became an obsession. I opened tentative negotiations via their solicitors but even right up to the moment Niall called I’d had no idea whether my offer would be accepted.’

She looked at the photos he’d taken on his phone only a week ago. Apart from the façade, which looked largely intact bar a bit of romantic crumbling around the edges, the place was pretty much a wreck. Aidan was so animated showing her shots of roofless rooms, collapsed walls, gaping holes where floors should be, that his passion for the project was obvious.

He finally stopped long enough to draw a breath. ‘What do you think?’

What did
she
think? His ideas for the place were breathtaking and she thought she hated it. Hated it all with as much passion as he loved it, because it meant he was leaving.

‘It’s brilliant,’ she said with a forced smile, refusing to admit just how far she’d fallen by acknowledging that she was jealous of a building. ‘But I don’t understand why you’re telling me all this.’

‘I’m intending to make it more than a just a home – I’m putting together a planning application for a hotel. Nothing too grand, a dozen or so luxury suites and a top end restaurant. I aim to reinstate the old distillery too, start producing fine Tulaí whisky again. Between the consents and the licences and the restoration work it means that it will take years to get anywhere near completion.’ He turned to her a little more, reached out to curl his fingers around hers. ‘It will be years before I’ll be in a position to move there.’

Annabel watched a slow smile spread on his face, the curve of his lips as genuine as Annabel’s had been forced. ‘Years that we can use to see how crazy we can drive each other.’

Aidan watched Annabel’s face closely as she took in everything he was saying. Not surprisingly, she looked a touch shell-shocked. She also looked incredibly young and more than a little fragile. He’d caught her fresh-faced, with the faintest sprinkling of freckles visible across the bridge of her nose, and her long lashes fair above the dark smudges he noticed she was carrying under her eyes.

And that hair! He’d planned on playing things so cool the first time they came face to face, to remain detached until he’d had a chance to assess her feelings. But he hadn’t counted on that bright fall of rust and copper and spun gold framing her face like a fiery nimbus. He’d had a tough time trying not to let her see that he’d been a goner from the second she’d opened the door.

No, Flynn. You were a goner way before that.
From the moment she’d run out and taken a piece of him with her, he’d known he needed to get her back. He’d told her the truth about being angry. He had been furious enough to do something stupid if he’d chased after her the way he’d wanted to. At least he’d had enough sense to recognise that another desperate man trying to impose his will on her by brute force would be the last thing likely to help his cause.

Even knowing that she’d behaved the way she had through fear of her own emotions, he couldn’t deny that it had hurt after the enforced closeness they’d shared. But he’d realised that it would take more than a few days of intimacy to undo the defensive, insular habits she’d been cultivating for a lifetime.

So he’d tamped down the urge to follow her and forced himself to get on with his plans instead. But every day of the six weeks he’d managed to stay away, he found that everything he worked towards featured Annabel Frost somewhere in the picture. The waiting had been hard but he’d known he needed to be patient, give her the time she needed to recover from the shock of the trauma she’d suffered, and get her head on straight before she’d be able to see what it was that she wanted.

Because what he wanted wasn’t anything temporary or casual. What he wanted involved words like lifelong, serious, and commitment. Words he daren’t say out loud just yet. He realised he was way ahead of her in what he saw for their future, and hoped he’d have the opportunity to keep her close while he did everything in his power to help her to eventually reach the same conclusions.