Meant-To-Be Mother

chapter NINE


AFTER taking a long cool early shower, during which she had thought herself in circles until she felt more confused than ever, Siena changed into her red velvet pyjamas and went downstairs to find Rick alone in his den, drinking a brandy and reading that morning’s sports section.

‘So why aren’t you out with your young man?’ he asked, not looking up.

‘He’s not my young man,’ Siena said, realising she had perhaps been a bit too vehement when Rick looked at her in disbelief.

She regretted sitting down when he folded his paper. ‘And why not?’

‘Because I never have young men in my life. Not in the way that you mean. I.I can’t.’ ‘Why can’t you?’

‘Because until recently I thought that relationship-wise I was little more use to any man than rat poison. And, though I’m not so sure that that’s the case any more, I’m still feeling pretty raw.’

She stared at her fingernails, cleaning out an imaginary speck of dirt.

‘I had a conversation with an eight-year-old this afternoon that made me realise how ridiculous it was that I have always blamed myself that Dad died that day.’

‘You what?’ Rick practically exploded on the spot, his newspaper rustling as it half fell to the floor in great flapping black and white sheets.

She glared at Rick, her thoughts, and memories, and emotions on high alert, all akimbo and mixed up and backwards since James had gone and kissed her and liked her and made her fall in love with him.

‘Come on, Rick. The day he died, the day I played truant from school and came home early and found him on his bed, so cold and so still. You blustered in and yelled—and I quote–“Now look what you have done”. But it wasn’t my fault, Rick,’ she said, looking her big burly brother dead in the eye. ‘It’s taken a lot for me to realise that. But that won’t make a lick of difference to my life unless I know that you realise it too.’

Rick opened his mouth to deny it. Siena let him take his time to gather himself. It had been some accusation after all. But then something inside him seemed to extinguish, leaving him looking every one of the twelve years older than her that he was.

‘He was sixty-five,’ Rick said. ‘He’d had heart problems all his life. And I am an ass if I ever made you feel that way.’

Siena could do nothing but stare at her big brother as the words she had longed to hear all her life spilled from his lips.

But, rather than wanting to throw them back in his face with a great self-satisfied, I told you so, she just let them wind around her like a long coiling rope drawing her closer to the brother who, until that moment, she had always looked upon as an unfeeling tyrant.

‘Dad died because he ate salami like it was going out of fashion,’ he said, his voice raw and rough. ‘He worked himself far too hard and never did a day’s exercise in his life. I am truly sorry if I ever made you think any different.’

He sat back and ran a hand over his eyes.

‘You were such a handful as a kid, Siena. You were so smart. So full of life. Hell, you still are. Yet you were throwing all that talent away on late nights with your friends and parties. And it pains me deep down that that’s what you are still doing with your life.’

Her eyes burned and she rubbed at them frantically. Now was not the time to fall apart. This was too important. ‘But I was only ever trying to get Dad to pay attention,’ she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

And you, she thought. I just wanted you to see me. To really see me, not just be angry with me. Not be disappointed …

‘I know,’ Rick said, lifting his face to look her in the eye. ‘I know. And I knew it then too. But you were his light. You were his everything.’

She knew it. Deep down she knew, though it had taken some convincing. But she also needed to know what she was to Rick too. Theirs had been the defining relationship of her childhood. This wasn’t really ever about her father; it was about the father figure sitting before her.

‘So why did you always tell me off if I wore mismatched socks, when he never once even lifted his voice if I came home an hour after curfew with smudged lipstick?’

‘We all have our own ways of loving, Piccolo. Mine is more forward. Verbose. Dad’s was to sit back and watch with wonder as his little girl grew into such a personality. He loved your energy and your spirit and chastised me daily for trying to clip your wings.’

‘He did?’ That she had never known.

‘You have to remember I was twelve when you were born, Piccolo. Twelve when my mother died. Twelve when you became the apple of my hero’s eye. You, who stayed out after curfew, who never tried in school, who pierced her belly at age fourteen and had a fake ID. And I was not much older than you are now when Dad died. Imagine yourself now, in the prime of your life, suddenly being lumbered with a teenager. When you become a parent, Siena, your own needs and wishes must come second.’

And, just like that, all of Siena’s indignation melted away. It flowed from her mind and off her shoulders and out the tips of her fingers, leaving her feeling as if she had run a marathon.

She thought again of her conversation with Kane on James’s bed, that small face looking up at her as though she had all knowledge of heaven and earth. And looking back at him all she’d wanted to do was protect him, keep him safe, do all she could to see that he was never hurt.

Be happy, she’d insisted to Kane. Don’t ride your bike without your helmet.

That was all Rick had ever done for her. He’d spent his own young adulthood trying only to protect her. She swallowed, the taste of the words I’m sorry too burning hot on her tongue.

‘Rick, I—’

‘It’s okay,’ he said, pulling his hulking form from his chair. ‘I know.’

As he passed, Rick kissed the top of her head, then left her alone, and she felt as if she had only just met him for the first time.

And as such she realised how much catching up she had to do and with so little time in which to do it.

After Kane had fallen asleep James sat slumped down into a sofa in the unlit lounge room. It was still sweltering hot and he could smell the scent of a coming storm on the air.

‘I was thinking of having a quick cup of tea before I head off,’ Matt said. ‘Would you like one? Hot? Iced?’

James nodded. ‘Whatever you’re having, thanks, mate.’

Hot? Cold? It didn’t really matter. It was all an excuse to get Matt to stay. He needed to talk. And somehow he knew that talking to his blog simply wouldn’t cut it this time.

Over the last months his blog had been helpful in getting his feelings off his chest, but now he needed someone to talk back. He needed answers.

‘You’ve got a whole new furrow in your brow that I haven’t seen before and for a guy with as many furrows as you that’s saying something,’ Matt said once he had settled.

James grimaced. ‘Furrows are distinguished, right?’

‘Unfortunately the best I could hope for would be distinguished; on you they’re just handsome.’

‘You think?’ James asked, the beginnings of a smile taking the tension from his forehead.

‘Don’t get me wrong, buddy. I wouldn’t have a clue. I’m only repeating what I hear around the traps.’

‘You been talking to Mandy again?’

Matt took a sip of his tea, but James saw the pink come and go in his friend’s cheeks. ‘Her, and others. Now, back to the subject at hand. I’m thinking this new furrow is all about the girl.’

‘You’d be thinking right,’ James said.

‘Siena’s into you, mate. That much is as obvious as the furrows on your handsome brow. Heck, even Mandy couldn’t wait five minutes after you left the school today before ringing me to chastise me for not giving her the whole picture about her.’

He was sure Matt was on the money there. The way she’d watched him when she’d thought he wasn’t looking. The way she’d found an excuse to spend time with him had been almost as feeble as the one he had found to spend time with her.

And then there was the way she had responded to his kiss. Her whole body had flickered to life, melting into him, her amazing energy wrapping itself about him like an electrical coil.

‘I kissed her,’ James admitted.

‘Whoa.’

‘I think Kane may have seen it.’ ‘Oh, boy.’

James leant forward, sinking his chin into his left palm, and ran hard fingers across his mouth. ‘And I asked her to stay.’

‘Man.’ Matt breathed slowly out. ‘I knew that you two were sparky together, but do you think you might be rushing this a little, buddy?’

‘I don’t have a choice. She came to town for a job interview. Her boss offered her a job in Rome. And tomorrow afternoon she has to give him her decision before flying home to Melbourne. I don’t have the luxury of dating, wooing, taking my time.’

‘She seems a right royal cracker of a girl, but are you sure she’s as far along on this thing as you are?’

‘I overheard her telling Kane that I am the greatest man she has ever known.’

Matt’s expression showed he wasn’t nearly as convinced by that statement as James had been.

‘She didn’t have to say that. She could have said any number of things; she could have said I was a cool dad or a nice guy, or cute as a button—she didn’t have to use those exact words.’

‘Is that all the evidence you have?’

‘Matt, she makes me smile,’ James said, letting it all out in a gush of words. ‘She makes me want to smile just by being with her. Heck, she makes me smile even when I don’t want to. Constantly. Every moment she is with me, nervous energy spilling from her until I too can’t stop fidgeting, and every moment she isn’t as I count down the moments until I can be with her again. Siena isn’t just a beautiful woman who takes my breath away. She’s my ray of hope.’

‘Well, then.’ Matt said, thinking on it very seriously.

‘Well, then?’ James repeated, desperate for his friend’s take on the whole situation.

‘Well, then, I don’t think you need for me to tell you what to do. You seem pretty hell-bent on doing it anyway.’

James’s shoulders tensed as he broached the one great stumbling block as he saw it. Distance didn’t frighten him, nor her skittishness, nearly as much as how his son would take the news.

‘What about Kane?’

‘What about Kane?’ Matt repeated, his eyes narrowing.

‘Shouldn’t he have some sort of say in all this?’

‘In who gets invited to his birthday parties? Sure. In who gets to play on his trampoline? No doubt. But in who you love? Because I think you are trying to tell me that you love this woman.’

He glanced at James, who gave him one sure—certain—nod.

‘Nope. Uh-uh. Kane doesn’t have a say there. Not even you can have much of a say in that one, buddy. And, if you’re looking for my take on all this, Kane could do with having such a cracker of a girl in his life nearly as much as you could.’

Matt tapped James on the knee, then gathered their empty iced tea glasses and headed into the kitchen, leaving James alone with his thoughts.

And the one thought that rose above all others was that when he had kissed Siena, she had kissed him right back.

It had moved him so much he had forgotten himself completely in her warm giving lips. He had forgotten all responsibilities bar kissing her until the end of time. And, when he had looked up and seen Kane at the window, he knew that his responsibilities had been blurred behind fear long enough.

Meeting Siena, knowing Siena, and, yes, loving Siena had only shone a bright big ray of North Queensland sunlight on what his responsibilities were.

To be happy.

For his son to be happy, well-adjusted, ready to be out in the world, he had to be happy first.

And to be happy he needed Siena.

He didn’t want her to look him up in six months’ time if she came back to visit her family. Contemplating six months between seeing her face, touching her hand, kissing her … His heart felt as if it was being ripped from his chest.

Talking it through with Matt, or writing down the multitude of conflicting feelings into his blog, wouldn’t solve the problem. He knew that now.

Confronting the problem head-on would be the only way through.

‘Matt, sorry to keep you so long again today. But I have a big favour to ask.’

Siena sat cross-legged on her bed reading her emails when she heard a knock at the front door.

Rick, Tina and the kids had gone out for their regular Friday night pasta at Tina’s parents’ place and Siena hadn’t been kidding when she’d begged off with a headache. So she sat still and waited for the door-knocker to leave.

But, a few moments later, Siena heard it again. And this time she realised it wasn’t a knock at the front door; it was a rap of pebbles against her bedroom window.

She hitched her pyjama bottoms higher and moved to the window, peering out to the moonlit suburban front garden to find James, standing in the middle of the yard with arms outstretched and a bunch of flowers in his hand with Rick’s big stupid Triton fountain shooting water into the air behind him.

Her head hurt from thinking all afternoon, and she knew that she had a big night of thinking ahead of her still. Surely the last thing she needed was for James to make some great romantic gesture to cloud things.

But she could hardly shoo him away. He was out there with flowers, for goodness’ sake!

Feeling like a character in a movie, she pulled open the window and yelled out in a stage whisper. ‘Stop throwing things or you’ll break the glass! Stay right there. I’m coming down.’

She ran from her room, down the stairs two at a time and out on to the front lawn, the cool grass squishing beneath her feet. She only realised she was in her pyjamas when James’s mouth dropped open.

‘Jeez Louise.’ He whistled, his eyes raking in the skimpy expanse of crushed red velvet and the crescent of exposed skin above the elastic of her trousers.

Doing her best to ignore the effect such a comment had on her libido, she stormed over to him, grabbed him by the bouquet-free hand and dragged him into the shadows of an overhanging willow tree at the side of the house.

‘What the hell do you think you are you doing?’ Her lungs were tight with the extra work her pumping adrenalin was giving them.

She stared at the flowers—iceberg roses, at least a couple of dozen of them—though he wasn’t quite suave enough to have given them to her in order to give her hands something to do other than poke him in the ribs, as she was doing now.

‘When you left the house today you gave me the sense that you weren’t coming back,’ he said. ‘And I don’t think that I can let that happen.’

‘Oh, you can’t?’ She crossed her arms, staving off the thrilling shivers that were running up and down her body at his words.

‘I had planned to serenade you,’ he said, his mouth kicking into that half-smile that had made her half crazy for him in the first place, ‘if that was what it took to get you to see me, but it turns out you are easier than I had expected.’

Her hands dropped to her hips and she glared back at him. ‘I’m easy?’

He grinned and her giddy heart all but went kaput.

‘Easy? I don’t think any man in the history of time has had to put as much work into wooing a woman as I have. It has been very demanding attempting to get you to realise how much I think of you.’

Her hands dropped to her sides and all her self-fuelled anger fled. ‘You think of me?’

‘Siena, sweetheart.’ He took a step towards her. ‘Since meeting you I’ve thought of little else.’

He moved in again, taking her by the arms so that the flowers squished up against her sides, the soft petals and sharp stems creating the strangest sensation against her skin. Or maybe it was his nearness that was giving her such new sensations. But when she glanced up into his warm grey eyes, all sensation was lost to her.

‘James, I’m not all that special,’ she said, trying to drag herself out of the whirlpool of affection in his eyes. ‘Believe me. When one lives alone and has no responsibilities bar one’s occupation, that person can’t help but be fascinating to a person with the responsibility of the world on their shoulders.’

His smile deepened and she was all but undone. ‘You’ve got me there. With a child in your life the term responsibility-free time becomes a pipe dream.’

She swallowed and managed to gather her thoughts. ‘Are you really trying to sell that life to me, James? Because you really are making a hash of it.’

But he just shrugged. ‘I’ve realised I can’t sell it to you by having Kane butter you up, or plying you with beers in the sunshine, or taking you on long leisurely trips up to Kuranda. If this is meant to be I shouldn’t have to sell it to you as some sort of alternative to the glamour of Rome. You should want it despite the inducements.’

‘I like inducements,’ she said, glancing at the roses he was waving about. But he didn’t seem to get it. ‘Oh, just give me the damn flowers.’

Siena reached out a hand, flapping her fingers against her palm to hurry him up. James handed them over. Once she had them, she couldn’t help but bring the bouquet to her nose, burying her face in the familiar scent.

The roses weren’t just any roses. They were his, cut from his own garden, and they smelled as good as the one she had kept by her bedside. They weren’t glistening in fake dew like roses she had received from suitors before. They weren’t wrapped in layers of fabulous tulle and ribbon. Some were bruised, others had lost petals. But to Siena they were the most beautiful gift she had ever received.

‘They’re beautiful, James.’

‘Not nearly as beautiful as you.’

She could have laughed. It really had been some time since he had done this. But she couldn’t. The tone of his voice told her how true he thought his words. It wasn’t some line. It was a declaration.

But, after the topsy-turvy evening she’d had, a declaration was the last thing she was prepared to deal with. If she could somehow send him away until morning.

She looked up to find he was inches from her, the big bouquet the only thing between them. His grey eyes glittered in the moonlight, serious and intent, despite the banter he had kept up the whole time.

He was going to kiss her. Any moment now she was going to find herself enveloped in his warm, intimate embrace.

She swallowed down a sudden flash of trepidation. When she had left his house that day she had planned on not looking back, but that didn’t make a lick of difference to her determination if James had every intention of remaining in her future.

But for her that future was still a big blur. For the first time in her life she really had to look ahead and not back to the past. And as yet it was undecided. She had no clue what she was going to tell Max tomorrow.

Rome was all she’d ever wanted and it was within reach. But now she wasn’t entirely sure she wanted Rome for the right reasons. Had it been because it was her one great chance to live the life she really desired above all others? Or had it been because she wanted to prove herself to Rick? All these years she had defined herself by his opinion of her and now that had been turned on its head. And then there was James.

She needed time to sort through everything she had learned about herself and the men in her life over the last couple of days. If James had simply not come, if he’d let her be for the night, who knew what decision she might have come to in the morning?

But in that moment all she knew was that she needed just a little more time.

His eyes lost all trace of a glimmer as he began to bend his mouth to hers, and the only words she could think of to stall him came out in a great rush.

‘James, I’ve been reading your blog.’

She had thought he had been hard to read, but in that moment she realised she had come to know that face so well over the last couple of days.

The tightening in his right cheek was a dead giveaway that he was affected. And the fact that the kiss that had been threatening did not eventuate was a pretty good giveaway too.

‘I saw it on the computer in your workshop that first day,’ she admitted. ‘And that night, after knowing about your wife, after you told me yourself about Dinah, I had to know everything. I couldn’t leave well enough alone. I thought I was never going to see you again, but still I just had to know everything. I tried to tell you I’m a snoop. I tried to warn you.’

Her voice faded as her mind skittered, wondering if she in fact wanted him to hate her for it, or if she wished she could take the words back. Had she known from the second they had met that it would come to this? Had she thought so little of herself that she’d read his blog in an effort to sabotage the relationship from the outset?

His throat worked as the news went down. A million thoughts flickered across his eyes as he obviously thought through the pain, the private moments, the intimate details he had revealed to his computer diary. She stared into his eyes, trying to figure him out, but his thoughts passed too quickly for her to catch.

A storm was gathering and it blew hot tropical air in its wake, rustling at the willow branches above them. The breeze may as well have been Arctic for what it was doing to Siena. With each passing second, Siena’s skin grew cold and nothing could prevent the chill enveloping her. She trembled, her chest ached, and the hairs on the backs of her arms stood to attention.

‘You read my blog,’ he finally said.

‘All of it.’ There was no point in lying to him any more. He could hardly think worse of her.

‘That first night?’

‘And since.’

He went pink. ‘My fault for leaving the damn thing open. Kane could have seen it.’

The moonlight had disappeared behind a bank of dark grey storm clouds and James’s eyes were too dark and hooded for her to have a clue how far back from her he had pulled emotionally.

But then the edge of his eye twitched and for a brief second she thought he might actually have been smiling! But how could he? Oughtn’t he to be mortified, angry, ready to tell her exactly what sort of terrible person she was?

But no. That was Rick. The Rick of old. And he’d only been that way out of circumstance and frustration and youth and mixed-up love.

There it was again! The crease in his cheek had joined the eye twitch. He was smiling. James was actually smiling to hear that she had gone behind his back and read his personal diary. How could he possibly be happy that she had done this?

But then she ought to have known that James would be different. Because James was different. Different enough from every man she had ever known that he made her feel more, and want more, and desire more from her life than she ever had before.

She suddenly wanted to throw herself into his arms and not let go. But she couldn’t. Not yet. No matter how far her hopes and desires had taken her over in these last few days, her conditioning was still fighting against them.

‘Since we are confessing tonight,’ he said, and Siena had the feeling he had moved even closer to her than he had been earlier.

She moved ever so slightly backward and her back bumped against the solid willow trunk.

‘Now is probably the time to let you know that I listened in at the door when you were talking to Kane about your mum.’

Before she could stop herself she let forth a great bellowing, self-aggrandising, ‘You what?’

She bit her lip, waiting for the noise to stop echoing in the suburban cul-de-sac.

He laughed so hard he had to lean his hand beside her head on the tree trunk. It was a great rolling uproarious laugh that she felt rumbling through her.

Siena thought back on all the things she had said to Kane, about her own private hopes and fears and self-doubt, and how much she had revealed about her elevated feelings for James.

No wonder he had come with flowers!

‘You were eavesdropping?’ she asked, her indignation obvious. ‘And remember you snooped through my PDA that first day too! I should have seen this coming.’

But James only laughed again. ‘You think you have any right to complain? You read my private blog. That’s way worse than eavesdropping. Fifty, sixty per cent worse, at least.’

He was right. They were just as bad as each other. Made for each other.

She shook her head and realised his hand was still resting beside her head. If she tipped her face sideways she would be able to snuggle into his strong wrist.

‘My reasons were altruistic,’ she said, her stubbornness fading as she felt the chill seep from her bones as his natural warmth enveloped her.

‘Mine weren’t,’ he said, his eyes now filled with a fire she had never seen there before.

And, pretty certain that she wasn’t in her right mind any more, she dropped the hand holding the bouquet to her side, reached up with her spare hand, grabbed a handful of his blue sweater and pulled him hard towards her.

It felt as though James had been waiting his whole life for this moment—the moment this woman was able to get past her stubbornness to make the first move.

He leaned in without resistance, his lips crushing against hers, hot, insistent, dissolving him from the inside out. Her skin was so soft and creamy, she tasted of toothpaste and heat.

Her other hand crept around his neck, dangling his now squished roses down his back as she pulled him closer and closer still, pressing her body against his. He pressed back and felt her breasts crushed against his chest.

Oh, Lord. She had nothing on beneath that soft top of hers. He took her around the waist, so thin, his hand burning against the hot skin of her lower back, his little finger diving beneath the elastic of those hot red pyjama bottoms.

She reached higher on tiptoe. Without those insane red high heels of hers she was so small. So delicate. So fine …

His whole body thrummed with excitement that they were actually together, and not just together, but kissing like he hadn’t since he was an oversexed teenager.

He stole a hand behind her head, diving into those tempting curls as he had wanted to since that first afternoon. He held her, gentle yet uncompromising. She was exactly where he wanted her, and he was sure that she couldn’t have pulled away from his loose grip for all the world.

He buzzed—until he realised that so did his pocket.

‘Your phone …’ Siena murmured against his lips.

‘Ignore it.’ He trailed kisses along the edge of her mouth, but he knew she was already pulling back.

‘James …’ she said, the word torn from her as she did what he couldn’t and pushed a hand against his chest, breaking the last tenuous strands of their luxurious embrace.

He stepped back, took a deep breath, rubbed a frustrated hand over his hair, then dived into his pocket for his phone.

‘It’s home,’ he said, his face contorting into a tight frown. What was Kane up to now?

But it was a message from Matt asking him to bring home milk.

He grinned. Matt had joked he would send a message in case James needed an out if it all went horribly wrong. Who knew that the message would come just as it had all been going so very right?

‘You should go,’ Siena said, her voice ghostly soft.

And James’s grin faded. It took some effort to look into her eyes as, for some reason, for the briefest of seconds, he thought she meant for ever.

‘Go?’ he repeated.

She nodded, her eyes wide and skittish.

He bit back a growl of frustration. He’d thought that they were finally on the same page, but she was looking at him not like he was the answer to all her dreams but more like the big brick wall in their way.

He took in a deep breath, centred himself, then took her spare hand in his. It was limp and unusually cool. He could feel she was shivering. He wanted nothing more than to drag her into his arms and not let go, but somehow he didn’t think that would help.

He had to be honest. To stop playing word games and tell her outright why he had come to her.

‘Siena, I have come here tonight to ask you to tell Max you can’t go to Rome. I would like you to stay.’ Here goes … ‘Stay for me. Let’s see how this thing between us could develop with some real time invested in it.’

Her eyes blinked up at him, moist and wide.

She swallowed, her thin throat obviously working hard.

‘That’s it?’ she finally asked.

Well, now, that wasn’t quite the reaction he’d been expecting. He’d thought himself indescribably brave in laying himself on the line like that.

But if she wanted more from him he wasn’t quite sure he had more to give, because even though Matt had told him to think about himself for once, he feared it would never be just about him.

What if she stayed and this thing between them never got off the ground? It would be his fault that she’d given up her dream job.

What if she stayed but was not looking for anything more than a fling and Kane became even more attached to her before she figured that out?

What if he thought he was ready for her, and found down the track that he wasn’t as strong as he thought he was? What if his feelings for her weren’t enough?

Or, just the opposite, what if they stayed together but his need for her always outweighed her need for him. Could he live like that? He knew that Dinah had always felt that way, but she had Kane to think about. But, now he was in the same shoes, could he?

‘That’s it,’ he said, his spine stiffening. ‘It’s the best I can offer you right now.’

Oh, God. He was trying.

Siena could see that. He was making her the best offer he could. It was a really sensible offer. For any regular girl, any together girl, it was a lovely offer.

But for this girl it wasn’t enough.

She loved James. She had fallen hard for his gentleness, his tenderness and his kindness and his wish to see the best in a bad situation.

But the problem was, he was the one who had started her thinking that she deserved more in the first place.

‘You asked if I was a huffer as a kid,’ she said, biting her lip so as to stop the completely irrational feeling that she was about to cry. ‘I still am a huffer, James. I’ve lived my own life for so long I am set in my ways. I’m stubborn. I’m a pain in the butt. And, just like Rick has said, I’m a born nomad. So thank you for your really sweet offer. But I’m afraid that it’s only the second best offer I’ve had this weekend.’

She was lying through her teeth. She knew it the minute the words left her mouth. His offer was so tempting it terrified her. She was so interested she could feel a definite wobble beginning in the region of her lower lip, especially when faced with the expression on James’s face. With every word she said his face closed down, all semblance of the smile evaporating until she wondered if she had only ever imagined it.

James was ready to call her bluff, to blurt out that he didn’t believe a word she was saying. The tears brimming in her eyes, the passion with which she had kissed him, even his own heart told him she was lying.

But there was no single logical reason he could think of why she would.

‘Right,’ he said, backing away. He glanced at his watch, not even seeing the face. ‘It’s late, so I should head back.’

He’d said what he’d come to say. He had bared his feelings for her as much as a simple cabinet maker without all that much experience in these matters could.

He’d brought her flowers, he’d thrown stones against her window, he’d told her that he’d thought of little but her since they’d met, he’d even felt himself lose a little bit of his soul to her when they had kissed.

But she didn’t want him.

A set of car lights hit them both, bathing Siena in a beam of light that showed her breathing was heavy, she clutched his roses to her chest so tightly her knuckles had gone white, her hair was a mass of curls and her lips were swollen from his kiss.

For a brief second his instincts told him that she loved him right back, but for some crazy reason was sending him away anyway. It took all of James’s strength not to haul her over his shoulder and drag her back to his place so he could spend the night showing her why she was wrong and he was right.

But then a fat drop of rain landed on the back of his neck. Followed by another and another. The storm had arrived and he had about twenty seconds to get back to the car before he would be drenched.

He took another step away and it felt as if he’d walked a mile. ‘Goodnight, Siena.’

He waited for her to give him something, to tell him why she had told Kane he was the greatest man she had known, to reciprocate his feelings, to grab him by the shirt-front with as much passion as she had only moments before.

But her lips did not move, even to tell him goodbye.

And, with that, he turned and walked away, his eyes blurred by more than the sudden driving rain.

Siena’s throat was clogged with fear and love and confusion and self-recrimination as she watched James run through the belting rain, get into his car and drive away.

She’d let him go. She’d actually been strong enough to let him go.

Well, she wasn’t going to get a minute of sleep that night so at least she had hours ahead of her to beat herself up about it.

The sudden tropical shower died enough for her to make a quick dash for the house. She kept running, up the stairs and into her room, where she threw herself on to her lumpy bed.

Her poor flowers looked even worse for wear than when he had given them to her. More had lost their petals and some had lost their heads completely. She didn’t blame them. She felt as though she’d lost hers days ago.

As she twirled them about she noticed there was a card attached. Curiosity got the better of her, as always, and she opened it to find a copy of the photo that had been taken of them on the Skyrail when they had smiled at the frog. He must have bought it on the sly when she’d been browsing in the gift shop for a present for the twins.

As she stared into the photo, in its silly rainforest-inspired cardboard frame, two single tears spilled from her misty eyes and down her hot cheeks.

In the photo she was leaning into James, smiling wider than she had ever known herself to smile. And James only had eyes for her.