Dara was intrigued at his sudden willingness to talk about his childhood. ‘You didn’t go to school?’
‘The schools around here were too common for my father. He believed himself and his family far too important. I had many tutors. All in the castle.’
‘That sounds rather lonely.’
‘I never knew any different.’ He shrugged. ‘It was just the way things were.’
Dara imagined the young boy she had seen in the photographs all alone, wandering the castle grounds. ‘Did your mother approve of your isolation?’
Leo walked further down the beach towards a small marina nestled into the cliff face. ‘My mother didn’t really have an opinion on very much.’
Dara followed closely behind him. ‘You seemed quite angry when I went into her bedroom today.’
‘Family history is not my favourite topic,’ he said, surveying the small dock.
‘I understand that.’ Dara understood all too well.
She watched as Leo stepped forward onto the rickety wooden pier. There was one boat tied up to a post. Wood rotten and black in some parts, it was amazing it hadn’t succumbed to the ocean already. She would imagine the weather could get pretty rough here during high tide.
Leo cleared a place on the dock so that they could sit and watch the sun sinking down into the sea.
‘What about you, Dara? Any skeletons in your perfectly organised little closet?’
She shrugged. ‘I suppose everyone has some event or relationship in their past that shapes their future.’
‘That was a very polite way of deflecting my question.’
‘I don’t have some sort of deep, dark secret, if that’s what you mean. My childhood was quite normal. No sob stories, no traumatic events.’
He turned to look at her briefly. ‘Well, then, what made you move away from such a perfect happy life?’
‘My career brought me here and I decided to stay.’
‘And yet you have never replaced Mr Ex-Fiancé? Did it end badly?’
‘Very few relationships end calmly and logically.’ She toyed with the hem of her dress, feeling uncomfortable at the turn this conversation had taken.
‘So what was it that made you decide you weren’t going to marry him?’ Leo asked.
She sighed, shrugging one shoulder. Clearly he wasn’t going to give up on this line of questioning any time soon, so she might as well give him something. ‘Dan was a very successful doctor—a highly regarded surgeon. Top of his field. He made it clear that he wanted the professional family set-up. You know...loving wife with dinner on the table, two darling children to kiss goodnight. He had all the details planned—including the name of the golden retriever we would have.’
‘Sounds very detailed. A match made in heaven, I would think.’
‘On paper, I suppose it was. I thought it was what I wanted. Thought it would make us both happy. But in the end I just didn’t tick all of the boxes.’
‘You couldn’t give him the golden retriever?’ Leo asked playfully.
Dara felt her breath catch in her throat, the memory of that day in the hospital crashing down on her.
‘I couldn’t give him children.’
Leo’s smile faded. ‘And that was a problem for him?’
She nodded. ‘I found out when we had been engaged for a little over a year. Three months before our wedding was planned. I had been feeling ill and I went into hospital for some tests. The doctors were beginning to worry that there was something sinister going on.’
Dara remembered her fear when nobody had been able to give her any answers for her strange symptoms. She’d been twenty-three. The doctors had never even considered that premature menopause might be the cause for her chronic headaches, insomnia, hot flushes. The day her doctor had sat her down and told her she was becoming infertile and there was no cure...
‘When I told Dan he was very understanding at first. The medical mind in him made him want to know all the details and consult some colleagues. We tried to salvage what few eggs I might have left, but it was too late.’
Leo laid a hand over hers and she fought the urge to pull away. He would pity her now—just as her entire family did. Poor barren Dara and her useless body. The old self-loathing threatened to overpower her.
She stood up quickly, shaking the sand off her dress in quick sharp movements.
‘What happened with your fiancé?’ Leo stood too, looking at her warily, as though afraid she would run away at any moment.
‘Isn’t it obvious?’ Dara shook her head, a harsh laugh escaping her lips. ‘He wanted a wife who could procreate. It was a pretty straightforward situation.’
‘He left you because of your condition? What a heartless bastard.’ Leo looked furious.
Dara sighed, looking out at the red-tinged sky. Leo didn’t understand how difficult things had been in the months leading up to her diagnosis. She had been ill with headaches every day, and deathly tired. And sex had been so painful they had stopped having any at all. It had felt as if every single trace of her femininity had died in the hospital that day, along with her hopes of ever being a mother.
Lying in her hospital bed, she had overheard her father speaking with Dan in hushed tones in the hallway outside. The two men who were both supposed to have loved her, talking about how she was ‘barren as the desert’ and what a shame it was as she was so beautiful—as if it had stained her in some way.
Leo looked appalled. ‘Did this Dan treat every woman like a prize mare or was it just you?’
‘He had a very clear plan for his life. We both did. I decided to offer him a chance to reconsider our relationship. It knew it wasn’t easy for him to be with me all those months. I was irritable all the time, and I had virtually no interest in sex. If he’d stayed with me he would never have fathered a child the normal way.’
‘Like I said— he was heartless,’ Leo said plainly, looking her straight in the eyes. ‘It’s not your fault that nature did this to you. You should never have been made to feel inferior.’
‘I was never very family orientated, but I suppose I always just presumed I would have children one day. Now that the choice has been taken from me I’m actually quite happy to focus on my career.’
She had her arms wrapped around herself. Leo felt the urge to embrace her, but decided against it. He now understood why she was so ambitious, so driven and serious. She had immersed herself in her career, moved to a new country—all in an effort to outrun her painful past. In a way they were quite similar.
This conversation had got far too deep for two people who had only met a few short days ago.
Dara looked at him, her expression
