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PROLOGUE
CHRIST, HE LOOKS HAPPY. And ‘happy’ isn’t generally a word that comes to mind when I describe my twin. Dedicated. Focussed. Intent. Determined.
But right now, looking at him with his bride and their son—a nephew I didn’t even know I had until a week or so ago—I feel as though I’m seeing Dim for the first time.
And why?
Because he’s married?
Jesus. I thought we were on the same side of the fence there.
Marriage is shit.
Love is shit.
There’s no such thing as happily-ever-after.
I feel my smile dropping, a grim frown taking its place. It hardly says congratulations, and yet I can’t help it.
We are both products of the same upbringing, and we’ve both always laughed—scorned, even—as our various friends took the plunge and dived into a life of matrimony. And we’ve met each other’s eyes with a knowing look when, within eighteen months or so, divorce bells have rung.
Please. Marriage is for—what? Fools? Because Dimitrios is no fool and, looking at him and Annie, I feel—something. Not a change of heart, exactly, but a belief in hearts, and their power to open to each other. There’s love between them, and there’s love for their son.
Except love doesn’t exist. My dad taught me that—taught both of us. It was a lesson I learned at a young age and it’s stuck with me all my life. Love is a lie, and the flip side of believing yourself in love is inevitable pain. So what the hell is Dimitrios doing? Why would anyone walk into that willingly?
I force my smile back into place just as Annie’s eyes slide towards me. She returns my smile, and then I look away again, guilty for the cynical direction of my thoughts. If Dimitrios is happy in this life—if marriage is for him—then I have no choice but to support him, even if I believe he’s making a monumental mistake.
Give me a choice of lovers in every city in which we have business, and never more than two nights with each, and I’m the happiest I’ll ever be.
CHAPTER ONE
‘MACALLAN, ON THE ROCKS.’ I tap my freshly manicured fingers against the top of the polished bar, sliding onto one of the stools, not daring to meet my own expression in the bevelled-edged mirror that hangs behind the service area.
I probably look exactly how I feel.
Frazzled and cross.
Fuck my fucking family.
I breathe out slowly, so my dark side-swept fringe lifts a little, landing with a soft thud against my brow. Why did I let my sister talk me into this?
‘You can’t not come home for Christmas, Jessica. It’ll kill Mum.’
Yeah, yeah. I’m a sucker and it’s Christmas—a time for family togetherness and all that schmaltzy warm, fuzzy crap that I usually love, but, ugh! This is the last place I want to be but, just like the good daughter I’m doing my best not to be, I stupidly boarded that plane and came back to Singapore. Except one hour with my parents, my perfect older sister and my sister’s creepy, sleazy, perfect-on-paper husband has reminded me exactly why I’ve made a life for myself in London. And despite the guilt trip my family tries to lay on me, London always will be home. It’s where I spent the first ten years of my life, and it’s where I feel most ‘me’. Plus, when I’m on the other side of the world I only have to see my family a few times a year.
Like this—Christmas.
