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‘We’re separated, Art. We’ve been officially separated for over three months. I didn’t invite him here and I don’t want him here. He has no claim on me. And we both know that.’
‘You’ve put him up in Jacob’s old room.’
How did Art know that? ‘I know, it’s awkward, I realise that. And don’t worry, he’s going to a hotel tomorrow.’ She was also going to start the divorce proceedings. She’d held off on that until her return to Orchard Harbor – stupidly giving Dan false expectations in the process. But how could she have known Chelsea’s baby would end up being a phantom pregnancy? There was no point in waiting any longer, especially now there might be other possibilities. Alternatives to returning to Orchard Harbor once the summer was over. ‘But I didn’t come here just to talk about him, I came to talk about—’
‘I’m not worried,’ he interrupted her.
‘What?’ she said, surprised by the flat tone.
‘I’m not worried. What you do with your husband is your business.’
‘He’s not my husband.’ Why were they still talking about Dan, when she wanted to talk about them? About the possibilities she hadn’t even allowed herself to consider until this afternoon? ‘Not really.’
He shrugged, propping his backside on the bunk and crossing his arms over his chest. ‘This has got a lot more complicated than it was meant to be.’
‘Yes, I know. That’s why I wanted to see you. To talk to you.’ She crossed the small space, suddenly desperate to touch him. To see that lazy smile she’d become a little bit addicted to. Why did he seem so distant all of a sudden? This wasn’t the man who had leapt on her every night as soon as she arrived. Who hadn’t been able to tear her clothes off fast enough. Obviously Dan being here made her continued relationship with Art more problematic. But surely not that problematic. Dan had been her husband in little more than name for a very long time. She didn’t owe him any loyalty and she wanted Art to know that.
But how could he, when she’d never told him anything about Dan? She sucked in a careful breath. She had to tell him all of it. Not just her situation with Dan now, but what a pathetic doormat she’d been during most of her marriage.
‘Dan started cheating on me about two years after we were married.’ She swallowed down the wave of humiliation. This needed to be said, so Art would know her relationship with Dan had been over long before she’d come to Willow Tree Farm. ‘And he never stopped. I put up with it, because I think I had some warped idea that I could be better than my mum, that by not running from a bad marriage I could somehow make it better. I was wrong.’
Art raised a hand, palm up. ‘Ellie, that’s sad and the guy seems like a dick. But I don’t see how it’s any of my business.’
You don’t?
The flat tone, the dispassionate look on his face choked the rest of the agonising confession off in her throat. She tried to make sense of his attitude.
Why should she be hurt by his reaction? It shouldn’t feel like a blow. She was being paranoid. All he was saying was that her relationship with Dan had no bearing on his relationship with her.
‘You’re right. Of course, you’re right. And really I’m not here to talk about him. What I want to talk about is us.’
There, she’d finally said it, but instead of looking pleased, or even interested, his face remained blank. ‘What us? You mean the sex?’
‘No, not the sex, well, not just the sex, I mean…’ She was babbling and she knew it, but she couldn’t seem to get her thoughts to join up properly, the blank look on his face making the fear suddenly huge. And all-consuming. What was happening here? Because this is not how she had imagined this going, during the five hours she’d been waiting to talk to Art.
Then he reached down, gripped the hem of his T-shirt and yanked it over his head. The sight of his chest, deeply tanned, the muscles bunching in his pecs as he flung away the shirt, had an inevitable effect. Her sex warmed, the throb of arousal thick and potent. But much more potent was the throb of hurt when he unhooked the button fly on his jeans. ‘Come on then, let’s get on with it. We haven’t got all night.’
‘What are you doing?’ she said, even though it was obvious.
He glanced up, his fingers pausing on his flies, the penetrating stare one she recognised, from nineteen summers ago. ‘Getting naked, that’s what you’re here for, right? A guaranteed orgasm?’
The phrase that they had laughed about once sounded flat and accusatory now.
‘No, I didn’t. I came to talk to you,’ she said.
‘But we don’t talk, do we? All we do is shag.’ Art didn’t sound dispassionate any more, he sounded annoyed.
The humiliation became so huge it started to choke off her air supply.
‘But I thought… this afternoon.’
‘What about this afternoon?’ he said, as if she were talking in Mandarin.
The crippling sense of confusion and shame was nothing to the agony eating away at her chest.
All those things she’d come to admire about him so much – his strength, his stoicism, his protectiveness – none of it mattered, because as far as he was concerned, the only thing they’d ever actually shared was sex.
How could she have lost sight of that so easily? Was it the trauma of Dan’s surprise appearance? The confidences they’d shared at the pond that afternoon? Confidences that had clearly meant much more to her than they had meant to him.
