an enormous help.’
Gideon, the dull ache of unfulfilled lust competing with the hard frame of the sunlounger digging into his back for attention, was concentrating so hard on Josie that they didn’t stand a chance.
A woman had every right to change her mind and she didn’t have to apologise. It was obvious, from the moment he’d set eyes on her, that there had been something between them, that rare arc of sexual energy that could leap across a room on a glance. An exchange between two people destined to be naked together in the very near future. For a night, or a lifetime. Or not.
You were with someone else, or she was and there would be a shrug, an acknowledgement of what might have been.
On this occasion it had not just arced, there had been lightning and it was going to take a lot more than a shrug, a regretful look to make him forget how she’d felt in his arms. That look on her face as she’d scrambled to distance herself from him. Dismay, desperation…
It wasn’t what he’d done that had sent her running. It was what she’d come close to doing.
‘You’ve been very kind, Gideon,’ she said, her words, like her body, as stiff as a board.
‘Well, you know what they say. There’s no such thing as a free lunch.’ He lifted a brow, hoping to provoke her, get her to loosen up, let go. Get back the Josie who said exactly what she thought instead of what she thought she should say. ‘I imagine that surrendering your lunch wasn’t an entirely altruistic gesture?’
‘Not in the least,’ she admitted without a blush.
Better…
‘Which brings us to the larger problem of the bridal suite. What’ll it take to fix that?’ Then she did blush, possibly remembering his earlier comment about incentives.
Much better…
‘Nothing. It’s sorted.’
‘Really?’ She brightened.
‘We’re going to be room mates.’
Gideon saw the blush fade from her cheeks as she rose slowly to her feet.
‘Well, you and David have had a busy afternoon,’ she said.
He’d known that she wasn’t going to be happy about it and, under the circumstances, it didn’t take a genius to see what she must be thinking.
‘I’m sorry, but David and I went through the guest list to see if there was any way either of us could double up. But, like the Ark, everyone is coming to this wedding two-by-two. We are the only singles.’
‘You could leave,’ she pointed out.
‘I did consider it,’ he admitted. ‘I even made it as far as the bathroom, but it seems that the very thought of getting on a plane was enough to make my back seize up again.’
‘How convenient.’
‘You think I’m enjoying this?’
‘Oh, God, no,’ she said, her face instantly softening, full of compassion, and that made him feel like a heel because right at this moment he was enjoying the situation rather a lot. ‘I’m sorry. That was a horrible thing to say…’
He could have told her that she had an instant cure, but under the circumstances he thought it unwise and instead watched as, for the second time in ten minutes Josie struggled to come to terms with a situation she couldn’t quite get her head around.
‘Is flying a problem for you?’ she asked.
He laughed. He knew he shouldn’t but he couldn’t help himself. ‘Are you asking me if I’m afraid of flying?’
‘It’s nothing to be ashamed of,’ she assured him.
‘Have you any idea how many miles I fly each year?’
‘Well, no, but it’s a fact that the more miles you fly the shorter the odds become…’
‘Stop. Stop right there. I have a pilot’s licence, Josie. I own my own light aircraft. I stunt fly for fun.’
‘Stunt fly?’
‘It’s one of the extreme holidays my company offers.’
‘Oh. Right. It’s just that if the problem is psychological…’ She stopped. ‘No. Right.’ Then, ‘But if you can’t move, how are you going to move rooms?’ she asked.
‘I’m not moving anywhere. You’re moving in here.’
Josie frowned. ‘Say that again?’ she said, hoping that she’d misheard him, misunderstood.
‘You’re moving in here.’
‘Dammit, Gideon, you are not listening to me,’ she exclaimed, throwing her arms up in the air, walking around the deck in an attempt to expel all that pent-up emotion she’d been keeping battened down. Refusing to look at him. ‘This is Tal and Cryssie’s room. It’s all been planned.’
‘Yes, well, the first casualty of battle is always the plan,’ he said. ‘You—or rather Cara’s aunt—looked at the layout and saw privacy. Cryssie took one look and saw herself isolated about as far from civilisation as it was possible to be and her response was a firm thanks, but no thanks.’
‘What?’ Josie came to a halt. In front of her, at the water’s edge, a line of zebras raised their heads, looking for all the world like a row of startled dowagers at a wedding who’d just heard the vicar swear…‘But she had already approved everything,’ she said, turning back to face Gideon.
‘Maybe it looked different on paper. Whatever, she flatly refused to be “stuck out here where anything could eat me”.’
He put on a high-pitched girly voice and, despite the fact that she was already furious with him on a number of counts, would have happily throttled him at that moment, she snorted with laughter.
‘She didn’t say that.’
‘No? Ask her.’ Then he smiled too. ‘I really do think you’d have been better off with the petting zoo.’
‘It would have been my choice too, but it’s too late for that,’ she replied. ‘So where have you put her?’
‘She’s in the tree house nearest to the central lodge, which was, fortunately, vacated this morning. David has put the photographer and make-up artist who flew in with her next door.’
‘In my room? I close my eyes for ten minutes—’
‘Three hours.’
‘—and you move someone else into my room.’
‘You’d already accepted that you would have to surrender your room, Josie—’
True, but she didn’t have to like it.
‘—and the rest of the guests won’t have
