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She felt her mood lift. It was hard not to feel hope in the face of nature’s beauty, but her hope was tinged with confusion as the cool morning air washed away the last shreds of sleepiness and the light breeze blowing in off the water tugged at her hair. Gwen closed her eyes and lifted her chin, letting the breeze blow the heavy strands back from her face while the floor-length robe she had pulled on flapped against her bare legs.
There was nothing to hear but her heartbeat and the soft swishing murmur of the waves as they hit the white sand. The utter peace and serenity of her surroundings contrasted dramatically with her internal chaos of churning emotion.
The truth was meant to set you free, wasn’t it?
She opened her eyes and gave a tiny self-mocking laugh that floated away on the breeze. Truth was overrated, especially when the truth of her feelings for Rio was simply tearing her apart.
Or was itdenyingthem that was doing that? asked the voice in her head. She shoved the question away, convinced it had more to do with self-preservation than rationality. That if she gave those feelings a name it would give them a power over her.
Last night they had made love...no, not made love,had sex, she reminded herself. Truth, she decided, wiping away a silent tear that was tracing a salty path down her cheek, wasdefinitelyoverrated.
The tide had started to turn while she stood there and she jumped backwards as the water washed over her feet. She supposed she ought to go back. Ellie might wake soon and Rio... Would he wake and miss her or would he be relieved she’d left the bed to avoid the awkwardness of any morning-after pillow talk?
Perhaps he wouldn’t feel awkward at all? Perhaps last night meant nothing to him except as a temporary convenience, because they were both there, available and willing? She threw up her hands and turned her back on the sea. God, when had life got so complicated?
Since you fell—
She choked off the thought, strangling it before it formed as she stormed up the beach. The spurt of temper had only got her as far as the steps when she stopped.
Before she saw Rio she needed to decide how she was going to play this. How did he feel about last night?
Did she want last night to happen again?
Her white teeth ground together as a wave of disgusted impatience with herself washed over her. Why was she even asking these questions when she already knew the answers? Rio had not made it a secret in the past that all he wanted from any woman was no-obligation sex. He didn’t do exclusivity or long term, and he didn’t want permanent ties, but fate had introduced a game-changer to his life in the shape of Ellie who, against all the odds, he was clearly already madly in love with.
The only thing Rio was committed to was being a father to his new-found daughter. It would be dangerous for her to assume anything else had fundamentally changed between them.
The question remained—did she want last night to happen again, knowing that for him it had been as basic and uncomplicated as simply satisfying a carnal thirst?
No, she didn’t want it, but, God, sheneededit. She was still wearing the memory of last night’s lovemaking like a second skin. It felt like a dream but the ache in several parts of her body told her it was all too real. A deep shudder ran through her at the skin-peeling intensity of it, the sheer overwhelming pleasure that had made her feel she was about to lose consciousness.
Without her realising, her steps had taken her right up to the beach house, which in the sunshine was now lit up by the golden light bouncing off the expanse of glass. She blinked in confusion. She still hadn’t decided what she was going to do. She supposed she had to ask herself what price she was willing to pay for the exquisite pleasure of being back in his bed, albeit temporarily.
He’d share his body but was that enough for her? Did she even want what he would only ever give grudgingly, which was a deeper connection between them? He would no doubt say that they were now and always connected by their child, but Gwen wanted more than that and only a fool would fall for a man who was incapable of giving anything of himself beyond his body.
She had always sworn that she would never settle for a man who could give her any less than everything. She wanted love, and she wanted to be in a man’s heart, not just his bed, but she also wanted Rio. Because she alreadylovedhim.
She was a fool.
‘This is impossible!’ she yelled loudly enough to drown out her own thoughts, and luckily there was no one to hear her other than the gulls drifting on warm air streams above her head.
She squeezed her eyes tight shut and clenched her hands, wishing with all her might that she could look at Rio and not feel so damned...needy!
Her eyes flew wide as a noise from inside the main living room, loud enough to penetrate the closed door, made her start, a noise that was the unmistakable sound of breaking glass.
Responding to a protective instinct deeply embedded inside her, Gwen was already moving, her first thought inevitably to check on Ellie. Even though logic told her that her daughter was safely tucked up in bed, even though she knew she’d turned up the volume on the monitor beside her bed so high that it would have woken someone in a coma, let alone a sleeping Rio!
In a few breathless seconds she had flung open the silent sliding doors and stepped inside. Her panic receded, the thud of her heartbeat slowing, when she spotted the cause of the noise. Shards of a tall cylindrical, dramatically hand-painted glass vase that had sat on a lamp table to the right of the grand piano were now scattered across the terracotta-tiled floor.
His broad back to her, Rio was bent over picking them up, swearing fluently in Spanish as he did so and paying scant regard to the fact that they looked razor sharp.
‘Be careful,’ she warned, alarm sharpening her tone. ‘You’ll cut yourself.’
At the sound of her voice Rio straightened rapidly and spun around, several shards of glass in one long-fingered hand. He looked struck dumb by the sight of her standing there. For once he was the one acting thrown by her presence, though displaying more shock than the situation warranted, it seemed to Gwen.
A frown flickered into her blue eyes as his dark stare swept upwards from her feet. She couldn’t put her finger on it but he was acting very strangely. Perhaps his behaviour was linked with the previous night? Was he regretting it already?
The thoughts were flitting through her head when their eyes finally connected. The hand she had slid into her heavy chestnut hair to pull it back from her face fell down by her side.
