‘You cheated on me?’ She’s up off the couch quickly, glaring down at me through the discomfort her sharp move has spiked. I’m about to be trampled, Ava-style.
‘Not exactly.’ I grab her hand and encourage her back down, not releasing her when she fights to regain possession of her limb. ‘We weren’t really . . .’ Fuck, how can I put it? ‘Exclusively dating.’
‘But we were seeing each other?’
‘I guess so. If that’s what you want to call it.’
‘Well, I don’t know, Jesse.’ She’s getting more and more irate, and I have no idea how to handle it. Usually I’d pounce right back at her. We’d spar with words, and then we’d make friends in the bedroom. ‘Because I can’t fucking remember, can I?’ she seethes.
‘Watch your fucking mouth!’
She recoils, disgust invading her face. ‘Excuse me?’
‘I don’t like it when you swear.’
‘Well, I don’t like finding out that my husband has cheated on me.’
Motherfucking God! I release my hold of her and sink my head into my palms, searching for some calm. I never dreamed we’d be going over this again. ‘Ava, I got myself in a bit of a state over what I felt for you. It wasn’t healthy, the intense feelings so soon. So I walked away from you. I drank, a lot, and I screwed two women. And I didn’t even finish, because all I could see was you. I spent two fucking days locked in my office wondering what the hell to do. Because you didn’t know about The Manor. You didn’t know about my history. You knew nothing, and I didn’t have a clue how to tell you.’ This is fucking knackering me out. All of it. ‘So I threw all of my energy into making you fall in love with me in the hopes that you would accept it all when I found the courage to tell you. And you did, Ava.’ I grab her hand, ignoring her startled expression and soldiering on. ‘You accepted me because you were as hopelessly in love with me as I was with you. You couldn’t be without me, either. You let me take the lead and you followed willingly. You let me lavish you with the attention and suffocation, because you knew it’s what I needed. You learned how to deal with me, Ava, and you are the only person in this world who can.’ My voice cracks. ‘And now I feel like you’re slipping away from me, and I don’t have a fucking clue how to make it right.’
She’s still, quiet, looking increasingly startled. The silence is unbearable. Excruciating.
‘Please, say something,’ I beg, pleading with my eyes as well as with my words. ‘I punished myself. You punished me. I can’t go through that all over again.’
‘You punished yourself? How?’
I’m quickly shifting in my seat, dropping her and raking my hand through my hair. My actions speak volumes, even if my mouth refuses to.
‘Jesse, how?’ she presses, a certain sternness in her demand.
Does she realise she’s reading my body language? For a woman who doesn’t remember me, she’s showing all the instinctive signs of knowing me. I wish I could appreciate that right now. I can’t. I’m just more terrified by the prospect of ruining my chances before I’ve even really tried.
‘I had myself whipped.’ I close my eyes as I tell her, unwilling to see the inevitable horror on her face. ‘It was either that or drink myself into oblivion.’
‘What?’ she gasps. ‘Whipped? By who?’
I don’t hesitate. Let’s get this horror show over with. ‘Sarah.’
‘Who the hell is Sarah?’
‘An old friend.’ I open my eyes and find Ava heaving before me. She’s furious. It’s a small blessing because it shows she cares. ‘You didn’t like her much.’
‘I’m not surprised!’ Pivoting, she walks to the French doors that lead to the garden and stands staring out across our land, arms folded over her chest. It’s cloudy out there. Dull. Grey. Miserable.
Apt.
‘Why would you do that?’ she asks.
‘I already told you. To punish myself.’
She remains with her back to me, though I see her shoulders rise. An inhale of shock? Or an inhale of strength? ‘And this Sarah. Your friend. Is she still in your life?’
I’m thrown back to last week, the moment when John told me she’d returned to London. The moment when I went to call Ava to tell her but got a call from the school instead. The moment when my world shattered. ‘No,’ I vow, because she isn’t. ‘She left, moved to the States when she realised there was only one woman in my life. You.’
‘That was good of her.’
Her curtness stings, but I accept that it’s all I can expect. ‘Sarah was my uncle’s girlfriend,’ I explain. ‘They had a little girl together.’
Ava turns to face me, all spite lost, astonishment replacing it. ‘But she was in love with you?’
I nod. ‘Uncle Carmichael owned The Manor before I did. I worked for him as a teenager. He introduced me to that lifestyle.’
‘Bloody hell, Jesse. Do your parents know?’
‘Of course. That’s why I didn’t speak to them for years. We only reconciled when you came into my life.’ I pat the couch next to me. ‘Ava, come and sit down with me, please.’ I don’t know if it’s instinct or a sense of duty, but she does, settling warily. ‘I’m going to give you a shortened version because, frankly, it’s so far in the past and there are so many other things I need to share with you, tell you, things that are more relevant to our lives now. Things that have made us happy. Things that have built us. Things that helped us get over the shitty stuff and brought us to now.’
‘But it’s all part of our story, good or bad.’
I can’t argue with that. ‘But it’s painful, Ava.’
She reaches over and takes my hand. It’s a natural display of comfort, and I’m so grateful for it. ‘Tell me.’
I rub into my weary eyes with my spare hand, squeezing my other around hers. ‘I was a twin myself,’ I begin, and she smiles softly, changing the hold of our hands so her fingers are laced with mine, moving closer. ‘My brother was the good boy. The achiever. I was . . . well, a pain in my parents’ arses, I see that now. I led him astray, and . . .’ Fucking hell, I can feel a vice squeezing my heart, air being drained from my lungs. ‘We were out one night. Drinking. It was my idea. I encouraged him. Jacob walked into the road.’
Her hand covers her mouth, realisation hitting her. ‘Jacob,’ she mumbles.
I nod my confirmation of our son’s name and my dead brother’s. ‘Mum and Dad blamed me for Jake’s death. I was a mess. I felt so guilty.’ Something tells me that I should hold back on my ex-wife and dead daughter right now. I’m already bombarding Ava with so much. So, right or wrong, I skip it and go straight to the beginning of my life at The Manor. Or the end of my life until Ava crashed into it. ‘I went off the rails. Took up residence at The Manor. Uncle Carmichael passed away, I inherited the place, and the rest is history.’
Her cheeks puff out, her head shaking slowly, disbelieving. ‘I don’t even know what to do with all of this.’
‘Do nothing. Say nothing,’ I tell her, pulling her closer. ‘When I met you, you pulled me out of the black hole I’d been trapped in for so long. You gave me new life and purpose. I felt good for the first time in years, and I wasn’t about to let you refuse me those feelings.’
‘So you got creative?’ Her eyebrow hitches a smidgen.
‘Yes. I swear, I’d never worked so hard to get laid.’
A small gasp followed by a playful slap of my upper arm prompts a little laugh from me, and as a result, Ava rolls her eyes, not being able to help smiling herself. I pull her onto my lap, and she doesn’t complain, coming with ease. ‘Was it good?’ she asks. ‘When you finally got me into bed.’ Her lips seal tightly, as if she’s bracing herself. She’s wondered this before. She’s looked at me and considered what it would be like to be intimate with me.
‘You mean against a wall.’
‘Huh?’
This is better. This is the important stuff. The feelings, the connection, the out-of-this-world sex. ‘At Lusso.’
Her frown is huge. ‘What’s Lusso?’
‘A complex on St Katharine Docks. You were the designer. I bought the penthouse. That’s how I heard your name and why I got you to The Manor. I liked what you did with it. Italian shit everywhere.’