Socialite's Gamble

He stepped farther away from her and Cara’s palms felt instantly cold without his heat against them.

‘I’m not emotional, Cara. I’m never emotional about business.’

‘Aidan, I—’

‘I thought your career was important to you.’ He paced across the room, his normally loose-legged gait stiff in his agitation. ‘I thought the whole purpose of you being here was to save your reputation and impress your father.’

‘It was…. ’ Cara swallowed, her head swimming at the implication behind his less than enthusiastic response to her suggestion. ‘I just … I thought …’ What had she thought? That this had become real? That he returned her feelings? God, she felt like an idiot.

He was rejecting her. The man who always kept his promise had broken the one he had made to her….

Cara turned away and caught sight of her reflection in the glass windows. She was naked except for his shirt, but it wasn’t her attire that caught her attention. It was her hair. Brown. Like her eyes. It hadn’t been like that for five years. She’d been every shade of blonde. She’d been red, burgundy, black, pink….

She stared at her pensive expression, her neat hair.

She looked like a Stepford wife in training.

Wife?

A harsh sound of humiliation nearly broke from her throat. Aidan wasn’t offering her marriage. He wasn’t even offering her a real relationship. He had done her a favour in bringing her to Fiji. Then he’d decided to take some time out from his busy schedule and because he’d asked her to stay she had started spinning castles in the air.

Oh, God. She shook her head. It was time to reassert herself. Time to start living her life again. If she didn’t, if she went with him now and waited for him to end it with her … She shuddered as pain lanced her heart. Already it was unimaginable to be without him but she knew that feeling would fade.

How often as a young girl had she dressed in a pretty dress anticipating the arrival of her father at Chatsfield House and been quietly devastated when he had barely acknowledged her and kept on going. He’d never drawn her into a hug, or swung her in the air, or tugged her onto his knee.

She’d gotten over that, hadn’t she?

She heard Aidan curse behind her and she tried to clear the mental fog her mind wanted to curl up and die in.

‘You’re right,’ she said woodenly. ‘I don’t know what I was thinking.’

‘Dammit, Cara, don’t look at me like that. We can talk about this another time.’

Instinctively striving for calm, Cara knew it was time to grow a thick skin. ‘Talk about what?’

‘Look, I need a clear head right now and getting mired down in … this isn’t doing it for me.’

He said ‘this’ as if it was a different kind of four-letter word and it gave Cara the strength to finally face reality.

‘Well, this.’ She mimicked his tone lightly. ‘Meant quite a bit to me. More, clearly, than it meant to you.’

‘Oh, hell.’ He plunged two hands through his hair at once. ‘We agreed to keep things simple, Cara. Remember?’

‘By simple I take it you mean that I shouldn’t care about what happens to you?’ Her smile was hollow. ‘Sorry. I didn’t get that part of the memo.’

‘Cara, you’re a wonderful girl. You’re smart and funny and loyal and …’ His frown deepened. ‘You deserve to find someone special. Someone who loves you.’

Cara felt like someone had just punched her in the stomach. Could he make it any plainer that he wasn’t that man?

‘I agree.’ She strove for calm so that he wouldn’t guess that she felt completely numb inside. Physically and emotionally numb, her brain swirling like a plastic bag in a tornado. ‘So thank you for rescuing me and for the wonderful week. I wish you … I’ll just …’ She took a deep breath. ‘Grab my stuff.’

She didn’t hear him come up behind her in her room but she felt his frustration in the bite of his fingers on her shoulders. She welcomed the small pain because it gave her something to focus on other than the pain in her chest.

‘Cara, I just can’t handle emotional complications. I need a clear head.’

God, so did she. She needed a clear head to get over him.

‘I understand.’ It’s not me, it’s you. If it hadn’t hurt so much it might be funny. ‘And it’s fine. Really. I just forgot that I had promised myself I wouldn’t get involved with a man who proved my sister’s rule but I did. My fault, not yours.’

‘Rule? What—? Oh.’ His brow furrowed and then she saw the moment he remembered their earlier conversation about love and commitment. ‘That rule, right.’