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Slowly he reached for her, each second a jewel, sparkling in the darkness. He kissed her, a delicious cocktail of tenderness and longing. Lucas knew her better than any man alive, and he could touch her soul if he wanted to. That kiss made it very clear that he did want to.
She was almost afraid.
Forget the almost. She was afraid. Losing Lucas the first time had broken her heart. Taking him back only put her in the firing line all over again.
* * *
She tasted of strawberries and champagne, and something warm and wild, which stripped away everything other than the urgent need to lie down beside her. He felt her tremble in his arms, and he told himself that was just the emotion of the moment. Then she hesitated.
He knew her too well. When Thea made up her mind to do something, she didn’t hesitate, not unless she was playing for time. She kissed him again, but drew back almost immediately.
‘What’s the matter?’
She seemed almost not to hear him for a moment. Never a good sign.
‘Nothing.’
He curled his arms around her, holding her tight against his chest. It was time for a bit of honesty. ‘You think this is a mistake, don’t you?’
‘Not necessarily.’ She didn’t move. ‘I’ve made worse.’
‘That’s good to know. What do you class as a worse mistake than sleeping with me?’
She laughed quietly. ‘There are lots of mistakes worse than that.’
‘Yeah, right.’ Something was wrong. Something that she wouldn’t talk about. ‘Tell me, Thea.’
‘Tell you what?’ She tried to pretend that she didn’t know what he was talking about.
‘You know. Tell me.’
She was on her feet now, stepping over the stone kerb of the patio and onto the grass. Thea always had liked walking barefoot on grass. She took a couple of paces and then turned back towards him. ‘Nothing. There’s nothing.’
‘I don’t believe you.’
Something about the way she was meandering back and forth on the grass in front of him, like a broken doll, drove Lucas to his feet. He tried to catch her hand but she spun away from him, stretching her arms out, as if she were a wraith that could melt into the cool night air.
‘I’m an ex-con. You know that?’ There was a sad, mocking tone to her voice. Something that spoke of unbearable misery.
He could back off and hope she snapped out of this… No. He’d backed away once, when her friends had told him she didn’t want to speak to him. That was a mistake that Lucas never could—never would—repeat.
‘Thea. Stop it.’ He took her firmly by the shoulders. ‘Stop it now. Nothing’s so bad that you have to walk away from me. There’s nothing you can tell me that I won’t understand.’
‘Maybe I don’t understand.’ She was shivering now in the chill of the night, but her eyes were focussed on his face. The Thea who had retreated from him was battling her way back to the surface.
‘Then perhaps I can. Give me a chance, and I won’t let you down.’ He wrapped his arms around her.
‘I’m cold, Lucas.’
‘Come inside, then.’
She followed him through the kitchen and into the sitting room, curling her legs underneath her as she sat down in a chair by the fireplace. She seemed to be holding herself together, and Lucas hoped that she wouldn’t draw back at the last moment.
‘When I went to Bangladesh, I knew I had to go back. It’s a place of so many opposites. The people there…there’s so much that they need, and yet in some ways they have more than we do.’
‘And you did. Go back?’
She nodded, staring at her hands in her lap. ‘Yes, I did my two year foundation training in Leicester, and I went back. I worked in a TB clinic in a rural area near Dhaka for two years. It was harder than I could ever have imagined, and more rewarding than I could have ever dreamed.’
