Pride After Her Fall

His personal life? She guessed that meant her. She moistened her lips.

‘I see.’

Did she see? Lorelei curled the fingers of one hand around her music device instead of around his hand.

Why, all of a sudden, couldn’t she reach for his hand?

Yesterday she wouldn’t even have thought about it. She wouldn’t have had to. Whenever he was beside her he held her hand.

‘I gather it will limit the time we can spend together?’ Her voice held none of the turmoil suddenly swirling in her belly.

‘I’ll be training intensively and then I hit the circuit.’ Nash spoke matter-of-factly. ‘This hasn’t happened at a propitious time. I wish it could be different, but it can’t.’

Lorelei had never thought about what it would be like to jump from a plane without a parachute. She imagined the landing would feel something like this.

There were so many things she could say. I don’t understand. Please explain yourself more clearly. Don’t do this. Please don’t do this....

But he was doing it. She looked into his hard eyes and knew beyond a shadow of a doubt he would do this to her.

‘I don’t want you to feel tied to me in any way.’

Lorelei tried to sit up but every bone in her body felt broken. Still, she had to get up. She couldn’t just sit here, stunned.

‘It wouldn’t be fair to you.’

From a long way away she was hearing an echo from the past. It was her father, explaining why she couldn’t live with him any more, that she was to go to her grandmother. She’d been thirteen years old. She hadn’t understood then. She had cried until she threw up.

But she understood now. She was a grown woman. She had lived in the world, had been swept away by feelings that fed her soul, and he had enjoyed some recreational sex.

‘How good of you to explain it all to me,’ she said, her voice more throaty than usual. ‘I suppose there is a reason we didn’t have this conversation several days ago?’

He was watching her stone-faced. ‘Things have changed. Several days ago I didn’t know we would need to.’

‘I see—and what has changed for you?’

‘I didn’t realise we’d be going any further than Mauritius.’

She knew he was right. She hadn’t thought beyond Mauritius, either. She’d just assumed everything would fall into place.

‘Lorelei, I know you’ve invested some emotions in our time together,’ he said almost carefully. ‘When we flew out I made some assumptions.’

‘Ah, oui.’ She clutched her music device and in that moment wished it were a weapon. ‘All the men I was supposed to have fleeced.’ The words stuck to the roof of her mouth.

‘Assumptions about myself,’ he growled.

For the first time she looked at him properly. He didn’t look like a man feeding her a line. He looked like Nash. Tense, brooding, not wanting to hurt her, but tearing her apart all the same.

After all, Lorelei, it’s not his fault he’s not in love with you. You made that little bed all on your own.

But he had been there with her. All the way.

‘You’re an extraordinary woman, Lorelei, and you deserve a lot better than a man like me.’

And just like that it was over.

‘Apparently I do,’ she said woodenly, hearing her voice as if it were coming from a long way off. ‘I really don’t know what to say.’

For the first time since he’d sat down beside her Nash looked unsure, as if they had taken a wrong turn somewhere and he was looking for the best way to circumvent the route.

‘I don’t necessarily want to end it, Lorelei. All I am saying is there are difficulties involved. I’ll be gone for long periods and my focus will be on the job.’

All the cold inside her chest pushed its way up into her mind. She welcomed it.

‘I’m saying I wouldn’t want you to feel committed to me.’

Lorelei blinked. Her eyes were the only part of her face she could move.

‘You really are a complete bastard, aren’t you?’

Those intense blue eyes flashed up, hard as agate, but his voice was soft as he acknowledged heavily, ‘Yeah.’

What more was there to say?

She didn’t know how to fight for this. How did you fight for something that had to be given freely? She didn’t understand him. She’d thought she did. She had seen in him from the very first such solidity. He had seemed impervious to the turmoil in her life, a strong hand she could hold as she righted herself.