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‘What do you think, Theresa? Are you afraid to ride with me?’
‘Are you trying to goad me?’
He laughed softly, his eyes crinkling at the corners. ‘Perhaps a little.’ He strode to the wall and removed two immaculate helmets, shiny and dark. ‘If you don’t want to ride, we can go in the car.’ He nodded towards the four-wheel drive. ‘You can’t reach as many places on the island, but it will still give you a good overview.’
Her lips tugged to the side as she considered the options. The problem wasn’t that she didn’t want to ride on the motorbike, it was how much she did. Suddenly the thought of straddling the powerful machine, her arms wrapped around Alex’s waist, pushed her senses into overdrive. Resisting him would be a Sisyphean task. So why, why, why did she start walking towards the bike, eyeing it as though it were some kind of irresistible dessert?
‘Promise you won’t tell my parents?’ she joked, earning a smile from him that made her feel as though the sun were shining all its warmth directly through her.
‘Cross my heart.’ He walked towards her then, helmet in hand, pausing a foot or so away, before lifting the helmet towards her head.
‘I can do it,’ she said, though in truth Tessa had no idea how to fasten a motorbike helmet.
He ignored her interjection, sliding the safety device onto her head and checking the fit. Even when he was satisfied, he didn’t step away.
‘I like doing your firsts with you.’ There was no humour in his voice now, only a deep, gruff intensity that flooded her body with awareness and heat of an entirely different nature to the sunshine warmth his smile had invoked.
It was an inescapable reference to the night they’d slept together, and she felt as though she’d been plunged into a river of lava. Memories assaulted her from every direction, but his words were a contradiction to the pain of those memories. He hadn’t liked anything about that night; he’d made that perfectly clear.
‘So what do I do?’ she asked, glad he couldn’t see her pink cheeks through the dark tint of the helmet.
He returned to the bench to pick up his own helmet and secure it, then moved to the bike, straddling it easily with his long legs. ‘Sit behind me,’ he said simply, then revved the engine to life, so the thrum of power reverberated in the pit of her stomach and she felt a rush of daring and excitement.
She was glad he wasn’t looking, because the motion of getting onto the seat was nowhere near as easy for her, particularly when she tried to keep her distance from him.
‘Grab on,’ he said, once she slid into place behind him, a leg on either side of his, so she was intimately aware of him regardless of how she tried to keep some small distance between them. ‘Or you’ll fall off,’ he added over the low throb of the engine, giving her little choice but to wriggle all the way forward and wrap her hands around his waist.
On second thoughts, perhaps they should have taken the car. At least in the four-wheel drive, she’d have had her own seat, and a whole console between herself and Alex. She was opening her mouth to say exactly that when he gave the engine another rev and drove forward, straight out of the garage and onto the driveway. From that moment, Tessa’s heart was in her mouth as adrenaline overtook her system.
There was a track she hadn’t noticed before, because it was narrow, carved between grass, but it took them away from the house, higher up, along the edge of the island, until white cliffs formed a sheer drop beneath them, and unconsciously she held on tighter, as the terrain grew more beautiful and more threatening, as fear warred with wonder, and she had to take deep breaths to calm her wildly firing nerves.
The bike hummed beneath her, and Alex’s warm, strong body was wedged at her front, so when she inhaled she caught a frustratingly light hint of his masculine fragrance and desire shifted through her at the provocation. Her hands pressed to his chest, feeling his strength and power, his muscular chest and steady heart, and as he steered, his arms brushed hers, so her mouth went dry and breathing became almost impossible.
He navigated the bike along the clifftops, far enough from the edge that she never felt in any real danger—she trusted him—but close enough to show the stunning view and death-defying drop. After circumnavigating the perimeter of the island for some time—though time no longer had any meaning to Tessa and she couldn’t have guessed if they’d been five minutes or fifty—he reached a fork in the track and turned inward, taking them away from the edge of the island and towards a more wooded area. Olive trees grew wild, interspersed with citrus and bushes of geranium and lavender huddled chaotically wherever they could find land, so the grass was thin and dappled by only a hint of sunshine through the thick coverage of leaves. The temperature change was immediate, but Tessa barely felt it; her heat had very little to do with the beating sun. A movement to their right caught her attention and through the tree trunks she saw several goats, pausing in their grass chomping—another explanation for why it was so sparsely covered—to lazily regard the passing motorbike. Alex was driving with care, navigating a track that was mostly smooth but which, from time to time, presented a rock or branch, so Tessa had time to stare right back at the goats, smiling inside her helmet at their intelligent eyes and curious manner. Her hands moved of their own accord, feeling the ridges of his chest through his clothes, and she trembled because she wanted, all of a sudden, so much more.
The trees gave way once again to open grass and then another path along the other side of the island, but this time the cliffs dropped away, bringing them down to a small, perfect cove. Though it was difficult to track their progress, she’d guess they were directly opposite his home now, on the other side of the island. The patch of beach was like something out of a tourist brochure, with crisp white sand and rolling hills to shield it from view, creating the impression of being walled off from the world. The water was the sheerest shade of blue she’d ever seen, even for this part of the Aegean. He brought the bike to a stop, but didn’t cut the engine immediately, so it continued to rattle between her legs, beneath her, shooting barbs of awareness into Tessa’s body and making her want to act on the feelings that had been tormenting her ever since she’d arrived at his office and realised that whatever had driven her into Alex’s arms back then was still between them, just as urgent and undeniable. But Tessa wasn’t that woman any more. So much had changed in her life.
Despite the beating of a drum, convincing her that there was some form of inevitability here, just as Alex had said, Tessa fought that, dropping her hands away from him and flexing her palms. He turned off the bike then, and the silence, after the roaring of the engine, was almost overwhelming. Here, there was nothing but the occasional bird call and the gentle lapping of the water against the sandy shore.
‘Ready?’ he asked from in front of her, so she scrambled off the bike, trying to put physical distance between them as a defence against her treacherous thoughts.
‘Yes, please.’ Her response was prim, her face still hidden behind the helmet.
He removed his own first, and before he could reach out to do the same to hers she acted, curving her fingers around the equipment and sliding it off, relieved when it came easily.
He watched, his eyes skimming hers, and then he turned away, placing his helmet on the grass near the bike as he went. She did likewise. A few feet away he stopped walking to wait for her and she slowed a little, uneasiness coiling inside her belly.
She’d proposed this marriage because she’d wanted to fix the mistake she’d made in marrying Jonathan. Her parents had thought Alex would be the right husband for her, but they’d had no idea what had happened between the two of them. They had no idea that she’d offered herself to Alex and he’d rejected her—after taking her virginity. So instead she’d married a man they’d hated, who had subsequently dragged their family name through the press at every opportunity. Yes, she’d married Alex as a way of apologising to her parents, of saying ‘you were right’. But deep down she had to admit, just to herself, that she’d also married him because she wanted to be close to him again. She’d fought that knowledge, but standing here, staring at him as the sun bathed them both in its golden light, she could no longer hide from the truth.
She’d walked into this willingly. She’d wanted him the day she’d gone to his office and she wanted him now.
It terrified her, but it also excited her, just like the motorbike ride up here. Maybe the best things in life were always complicated and multi-layered?
‘Come,’ he commanded, holding out a hand. She eyed it warily for a second before, with a degree of fatalism, placed her own in his, shivering the moment their flesh met. It was just a simple holding of hands, but for Tessa, coming on the back of her realisation, it was so much more. It was as though they were saying their wedding vows all over again, even more so when their eyes met and locked and she felt, right in the centre of her heart, as though something was stitching back in place inside of her.
It was the magic of this place, that was all. The island stood on its own, unfazed by humanity and heartbreak, by hurt and dishonesty.
‘It’s beautiful,’ she said, because it was true but also because she needed to break the intimacy of their connection.
