no repercussions that could come back and bite you on the arse in the future. She’d learned that from her parents, both of whom had failed epically on the no-consequences front, and there was no way she was going to repeat their mistakes. She’d made a clean break of it and walked away, no phone numbers, no addresses, no comeback.
Until now.
***
‘You remember me then,’ he said.
How could she not remember? One scorching night in her memory with nothing to taint it because she’d made sure she walked away immediately, before any of that could happen. She hadn’t hung around to listen to him backtrack and talk his way out of the situation. She knew better than anyone what one-night-stands turned into in the cold light of day, and there would be no awkward morning-after goodbyes in the cold for her as he exited her life as quickly as he’d entered it. She’d circumvented that completely.
‘I should have known it was you just from the complaining,’ she said, not looking him in the eye in the hope that he wouldn’t notice her blushing. ‘I’ve never met anyone else before or since who goes to eggnog parties. Still heading out to Barbados every year then?’
She saw his eyes narrow at that and another memory came from nowhere, filling in one of lots of fuzzy blanks that fitted around the not-so-fuzzy images of hot sex. He’d been negative about the Barbados Christmas back then too, while she’d been fighting down a spike of jealousy. Not about Barbados, although of course if someone ever happened to offer her a ticket there she would rip their arm off in her eagerness for a luxurious beach break. More about a Christmas filled with your entire family. Christmas 2008 had been particularly sparse for her on that front, though she was used to it now.
‘It’s a family tradition,’ he said. ‘The whole point is that you repeat it on a regular basis.’
Family had come first with Tom Henley, she remembered that too. And clearly it still did. One-night stands were meant to only be about sex, but there had been hours of talking too, lying awake with the soft background sound of the tide and the slant of moonlight in the velvet darkness of the seafront hotel room. Maybe that was why he hadn’t been relegated to totally forgettable in her mind. Sex was one thing, but they’d had more of a connection than just that. And maybe that was part of the reason she’d left, because she’d had a glimpse of what it could be like between them if there had ever been more than one night and it had been crystal clear at the time that one night was all it would be. No suggestion of more had made it to being verbalised by either of them.
When it came to leaving, all she’d really done was get in first.
He moved closer, not quite into her personal space but close enough to make her pulse jump. The intense expression on his face, as if he was remembering how she looked without her clothes, the way his eyes were fixed upon hers, the knowing smile touching the corner of his mouth, told her that hers wasn’t the only mind being treated to a hot rerun of their last encounter. The burn in her cheeks refused to stand down. She needed to get out of here, away from that boiling hot gaze that was making her stomach feel like it was melting.
‘So what are you doing in London?’ he said, an interested smile crinkling the gorgeous grey eyes. ‘How have you been?’
Oh my life it was beyond awkward. Her toes curled at his attempted polite small talk when surely his mind must be full of x-rated images from what happened last time they were in the same room. She glanced around her for an easy escape route and shifted her bag from one arm to the other, keeping her door key card in her hand as walked toward the curving staircase. He kept pace with her while she groped for a brush-off comment that would allow her to make a fast exit up the stairs.
‘It’s a long story,’ she said, in a closed tone of voice that she hoped would tell him she wasn’t remotely interested in relating it but he simply stood his ground and looked at her expectantly.
It was clearly going to take more than a hint to fob him off. She turned to face him.
‘I’d love to catch up but I’m meeting someone,’ she said.
***
A stabbing sensation deep in his chest felt like jealousy, but was clearly his pride kicking back in at her detached brush-off. Brief acknowledgement – check. Polite ‘hello,’ – box ticked. Tom Henley knew perfectly well that his next move should have been to continue with his stay at the hotel and let her do the same, keeping out of her way for the duration of his (hopefully short) visit. Separate ways well and truly intact.
That would have been the sensible next move, and the one suited to his life and to the way he thought he had categorised her in his head: fun evening, hot night, nice memory, no bearing whatsoever on the present.
Except that deep down he knew he was kidding himself.
Instead, the file in his mind that related to Ella Scott was unfinished business and it was her fault for simply disappearing. No contact, no saying goodbye. No woman had ever left him before or since and let’s face it, it wasn’t as if there’d been a shortage of opportunity. The demands of medical training combined with his regimented upbringing – boarding school, heavy on routine, heavier on expectations – had meant that the short-term relationship was the only type he had any interest in.
He knew absolutely zilch about her beyond her name and a bit of background. And the fact that there was a silky inch or two of skin just at her inner hip that was so soft against his lips it had driven him crazy. He tightened his grip around the smooth leather handle of his holdall at that particular thought.
After she’d left, he’d been plagued with doubt that their unbelievable night really hadn’t been all that great for her and this blow to his pride had bothered him for far longer than it should have done. Why should he care, as long as he’d had a great time? It wasn’t as if she was the first, or the last. And he’d intended on walking away himself just a few hours later, just not in the abrupt cut-all-ties way that she had done. He’d become so accustomed to being the one in control, the one who backed away, that her no-show had been a bolt from the blue. It simply hadn’t entered his radar for a second that she could walk away first.
Devon had been a stopgap for both of them. He’d been visiting a friend for a few days before his annual departure for the house in Barbados. She’d been on the Christmas break from her college course, working crazy hours in a restaurant on the seafront, making the most of the holiday overtime. Passing through, the both of them.
Instead of just leaving the encounter in the past where it belonged, it had remained a loose end in his mind. In the months that followed, his ears pricked up whenever he encountered a patient with the surname Scott, wondering randomly if it might be a relative of hers. Hankering after something he couldn’t have and didn’t need were diversions he couldn’t afford and he’d made an effort to push the what-if from his mind ever since. Tom Henley didn’t allow himself to be diverted from his path in life, not by anyone or anything. He hadn’t been raised that way.
Now he had a few days staring at four walls while he waited for the airport to reopen. No friends to visit; they were all doing their own usual Christmas thing. And when he eventually got to Barbados it would be the beginning of a new era as he stepped into his father’s shoes, the culmination of nearly thirty years of career preparation, and one which filled him with a crushing sense of being hemmed in.
With that prospect bearing down on him, the resurrection of a non-thinking, mind-blowing repeat of the most exciting, sensual encounter of his life felt suddenly like the Christmas gift to end all Christmas gifts. A brief respite before the walls closed
