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Her eyes widened painfully; she stared at his shimmering golden body, the broad shoulders, deep muscled chest, the powerful arms, the slim waist, the long, bare legs, the feet moving gracefully through opaque blue water.
My God, he was beautiful.
Her heart was beating now, so fast it was frightening. She knew this feeling, the hot, sweet surge rushing through her. Desire so strong it made her light-headed. She had not felt like this since Tom died.
She had never felt like this about Tom.
Guilt overwhelmed her. She swayed, staggered, missed her footing on shifting pebbles and began to fall to her knees. Somehow she clung on to her crutch and stopped herself from falling.
When she was standing upright again she looked towards where he had been, but he was gone.
She blinked incredulously, looked in every direction, along the beach, across th
e rough grassland, into the trees, but there was no sign of him anywhere.
He couldn’t have vanished so fast. There was no cover in which he could hide which was not some distance from the sea; the rustling forest of bamboo, the long, sun-bleached grass.
What was going on here? Had she imagined seeing him? What strange, perverse instinct had made her conjure up his almost naked body, had sent that wave of passion running through her?
When she had recovered she walked down and stood in the sea, kicking the cool water with her unhurt foot, swinging the other one above the waves while she stared into the brilliant blue distance, eyes dazzled by sunlight. She had dreamt about him for years. But now she was beginning to see him when she was awake and she was forced to recognise that her feelings about him were not what she had thought they were.
She had been afraid of him, she had feared him, she had hated him.
None of those reactions had been what she felt, seeing him, just now.
Her mouth had gone dry, she had been on fire. Those dreams of him had not been of death – she had not been having a premonition, a warning, that she was going to die.
She had dreamt of him passionately, wanted him, so badly that it had been like dying.
Her love for Tom could not protect her from such raging, voracious feelings. Tom had been her friend for years before they got married. She had known him most of her life. They had been at school together, played, as children, grown up together.
Tom was a quiet, gentle boy and had not changed when he became a man. Nor had her feelings for him changed. Or his for her.
Oh, she had loved him, but without urgency or need, no hot desire, no flow of burning lava rushing through her body. Tom touched her deeply because he needed her. His own mother had died when he was a boy. Miranda had taken her place, protected him, cherished him.
That was the measure of their love – they were family, as well as friends – and Tom trusted her to take care of him.
But she had not been able to save him from drowning.
It made her guilt heavier to know that just before Tom drowned she had met Alex and instantly wanted him with all the violent necessity she had never felt for Tom.
She could not bear to think about it. She never had been able to.
She walked out of the sea and went back to put her sandals on, then returned slowly to the hotel.
Milo met her at the door of the dining room and showed her to her table with all the courtesy, reverence and attention he offered to guests with fortunes at their disposal. You would never have guessed she was only here to work, was a junior employee compared to him.
She liked him more every time she met him, and wished she dared confide in him, ask him for advice, but she could not talk to anyone about what had just happened.
‘Did you walk to the sea?’ he asked her as she sat down.
‘Yes. I paddled,’ she confessed, forcing a smile, trying to sound light-hearted. ‘Like a child.’
‘It is good to be a child sometimes. We all need to go back to our childhood now and then.’ He poured her a glass of chilled water from a bottle.
She looked past him. ‘What’s the procedure with lunch? Do I just go to the buffet table and make my own selection?’
‘You can, if you wish, but why not let me bring you some food? It would be easier than for you to stand in line to select your own food . . .’
