eskies loaded with cold drinks, play music, sit back and enjoy Mother Nature’s display for them. They completely tune out from news of the world and just live in the moment.’
He rolled the words out in a low, almost spellbinding tone that was soothing, like a physical caress that eased the last threads of tension in Elizabeth’s body.
‘We don’t do enough of it...living in the moment,’ he went on in the same seductive murmur. ‘Let’s try to do that tonight, Ellie. No yesterdays...no tomorrows...just each moment as it comes.’
‘Yes,’ she agreed, happy with the idea.
They sipped their champagne in silence for a while, watching the sun slowly disappear below the horizon.
‘My parents used to do this...have a sundowner together at the end of the day,’ Harry said, slanting her a reminiscent little smile. ‘What about yours, Ellie? Do they have a special time to themselves?’
She shook her head. ‘My mother died of cancer when I was nineteen. I haven’t seen my father since the funeral. He’s a miner and living with some other woman in Mt Isa. It was never much of a marriage. Mum more or less brought Lucy and me up by herself.’
Harry frowned at her. ‘Your father doesn’t care about you?’
She grimaced. ‘I think we were responsibilities he didn’t really want. Mostly when he came home on leave from the mine, he’d get drunk and we’d stay out of his way.’
‘What about when your mother became ill?’
‘He came home less. Didn’t want to be faced with what was happening to Mum. He said it was up to me and Lucy to take care of her.’
‘That must have been hard,’ Harry said sympathetically.
‘Yes. Though it was a special time, too. Like you said...living in the moment...because the last moment could come at any time so every good moment was precious.’
‘At least you knew that,’ he murmured, nodding understandingly before throwing her a wry little smile. ‘Mickey and I...we didn’t realise how precious those good moments were until after our parents were gone.’
‘I guess that kind of sudden death is harder to come to terms with,’ she said thoughtfully.
‘I don’t know. We didn’t have to see them suffer.’ He shook his head. ‘You were only nineteen. How did you manage?’
‘I was at business college so I could be home quite a lot. Lucy dropped out of school to look after Mum when I couldn’t be there.’
‘Did she pick up her education again at a later date?’
‘No.’ Impossible to explain that school had never been easy for Lucy. She didn’t like people knowing about her dyslexia. ‘She didn’t want to, didn’t need it to get work.’
‘But without qualifications...’
‘Lucy is adept at winning her way into jobs.’
‘While you’re the one with the steady career. That’s why she calls you her anchor.’
Elizabeth heaved a sigh. ‘This is a weird conversation to be having when we’re supposed to be enjoying a night of sexy fun, Harry.’
‘Oh, I don’t know. I’d call this an intimate conversation. We have all night to get to physical intimacy. We’ve been on the fringes of each other’s worlds for two years. I think I know Elizabeth fairly well—’ he rolled his head towards her, giving her his quirky smile ‘—but I want to get to know Ellie tonight.’
‘That’s yesterday, Harry. My childhood,’ she pointed out. ‘It’s not living in the moment.’
The blue eyes gathered the piercing intensity that always gave her discomfort. ‘Ellie is inside you right now,’ he said softly. ‘She’s the foundation of the woman you are. She directs your life.’
‘That’s ridiculous!’ she protested.
‘Is it? You’re the older child, the one who helped your mother, the one who protected your sister, the one who carried the responsibility of arranging everything when your mother was ill, when she died, the one who wants a man in her life who will never do to her what her father did to her mother, to his children.’
He was digging at her again—digging, digging, digging! In a burst of frustration, Elizabeth swung her legs off the lounge, sat up straight and glared at him. ‘I did not come up here to be psychoanalysed, Harry.’
He swung his legs down to the deck in a more leisurely fashion, his eyes holding hers in glittering challenge. ‘No, you didn’t. Ellie wanted to break out of the Elizabeth cocoon and fly free for once, didn’t she?’
She hated how he could connect everything up and be so damned right about everything! It made her feel naked in far more than the physical sense. In a purely defensive action, she snatched the bottle of champagne from the ice bucket, intending to refill her glass.
Harry took it from her. ‘Allow me.’
She did, letting him pour the champagne, though it made her feel he was taking control away from her, which wasn’t how she’d planned to have this encounter with Harry. ‘Do you probe into the lives of all your one-night stands?’ she asked waspishly.
He cocked an eyebrow at her. ‘What makes you think my life consists of a series of one-night stands?’
‘The way you flirt. Michael said you flirt with every woman. It isn’t just me.’
‘Flirting can be fun. It can be enjoyable to both parties. In a way it’s a search for that magic click which will lead to bed, but that doesn’t happen very often. When it has, I can’t recall one instance when it only lasted for one night. You’ve assumed something about me that isn’t true, Ellie.’
‘Well, this is only going to be for one night,’ she insisted, needing to regain the control that seemed to be sliding out of her grip.
‘Why?’
‘Because...’ She floundered, not wanting to say the whole idea had erupted from the fact his brother was going to be here with her sister and she hadn’t really looked beyond that painful circumstance. ‘I just don’t want to get heavily involved with you, Harry,’ she said evasively, wishing he would simply accept what she’d offered him.
‘Why not? You think I’ll let you down?’
Yes was on the tip of her tongue but he didn’t give her time to say it.
‘Did I let you down when you needed to cover up your distress over Mickey attaching himself to your sister? Did I let you down when you needed an escape from them? Have I let you down in fulfilling your requests this week, meeting what you wanted? Haven’t I shown I care about how you feel, Ellie?’
She couldn’t deny any of that, yet... ‘It...it fitted into your own agenda,’ she blurted out.
‘Which is?’ He bored in.
Her head was spinning from the pressure he
