Island Fling to Forever

‘Solo stuff?’ Because that she hadn’t read anywhere online. ‘You’re planning on leaving The Swifts?’

‘No,’ Jude said, too quickly. ‘I’m not. I couldn’t. I just... I needed some time away, is all.’

‘And you picked La Isla Marina?’ Because, really, that was too much of a coincidence to not bear some investigation.

‘I heard someone talk about this place once. I can’t remember who, exactly. One of Sylvie’s friends, maybe.’

Sylvie. That would be Sylvie Rockwell-Smythe, Rosa’s ever-helpful brain for useless knowledge filled in. Jude’s beautiful, red-headed, heiress and model girlfriend. Exactly the sort of woman a celebrity like Jude should be dating.

Except, if he was here in paradise, and she was still in New York... ‘How is Sylvie?’

‘We split up,’ Jude said, shortly.

‘Ah. Sorry.’ There was that old talent for putting her foot in it, rearing up again. One day she’d learn not to just say the first thing that popped into her head. Maybe.

Jude shrugged. ‘I wouldn’t be.’

‘Like that, huh?’

‘Pretty much.’

Rosa sat back and surveyed him, taking in the changes the last three years had wrought on a face she’d known so well, once. He looked thinner. No, not thinner, exactly. Leaner. As if some stylist had decided to play up his pale and interesting aspect. But they couldn’t style away Jude’s broad shoulders, or the muscles in those arms.

But he looked tired. Worn down, maybe.

‘So. How’s fame going?’

‘Overrated.’ Jude met her eyes. ‘Haven’t you heard the latest? The entire of the continental US is talking about it.’

‘I’ve been kind of out of touch,’ Rosa admitted. ‘I was working on a story down in South America...wait.’ Hadn’t she read something about a book, somewhere? A kiss-and-tell sort of a book, all about Jude? Maybe Sylvie had something to do with that... ‘Is this about the book?’

‘Jude: The Naked Truth.’ Jude shook his head in disgust as he quoted the title. ‘That’s the one.’

Whoever had written it should have come and found Rosa. She could have told them plenty of secrets about Jude Alexander.

She wouldn’t have, of course. That was just one of the many differences between her and Sylvie. That and the fact that the other woman was a supermodel. And at five feet three and with too many curves, Rosa would definitely never be that.

‘I haven’t read it.’

Jude didn’t respond, and Rosa resigned herself to looking him up on the internet once she’d got her laptop hooked up to the island Wi-Fi. It wouldn’t be the first time, anyway. And Jude didn’t have many secrets from the media these days, it seemed to Rosa. She could probably download the eBook and know everything she wanted to about him in a couple of hours of reading.

Except she didn’t want to. Those books never told the whole truth, anyway. And she knew more about him than any pages could contain.

Or she had. Once.

Before.

She turned back to her father’s Scrabble tiles, and ignored the letters ‘s’ ‘e’ and ‘x’ to find something else to think about.

‘So. Been a while,’ Jude said, and Rosa looked up from her Scrabble tiles to take in the sight of him in the sunshine again.

He was too pale, she decided. He couldn’t have been on the island long or he’d have lost that grey pallor that came from too long spent inside with only his guitar for company.

But he was still every bit as gorgeous as she remembered. As she’d tried to forget.

Her fingers flexed, reaching for the camera that wasn’t hanging around her neck for once. She wanted to capture him here, now, in the moment. A comparison piece to the famous, laughing photo of him she’d taken three years ago. One photo in thousands she’d taken that month, but the one everyone remembered most. The one that had made her name. Kick-started her career, when The Swifts had hit the big time.

She’d been assigned to the up-and-coming band by a magazine she’d done some work for before, asked to follow them on tour for an in-depth photo piece with some interviews. Someone high up at the magazine had a feeling about them, she’d been told, and they wanted to get in there first, before anyone else.

Whoever that person was, they’d been right. And they’d changed Rosa’s world with that one commission, in too many ways to count.

If she hadn’t taken the job, she’d never have taken the photo that started her rise to the top of her profession, that gave her the luxury of picking and choosing jobs wherever she wanted in the world.

If she hadn’t taken the job, she’d never have met Jude. And if she hadn’t met Jude, she wouldn’t have spent three years taking any job that kept her away from England, Spain and New York.

‘Three years.’ As if he didn’t already know.

‘You look good.’

‘You look pale.’

Jude laughed, the first true emotion she’d seen from him since she arrived. ‘You never were very good for my ego, were you?’

‘You never needed me for that.’ He’d always had plenty of hangers-on and groupies, ready to tell him how wonderful he was, even back then, before The Swifts took over the music world. Gareth might have been the lead singer, but Jude was the mysterious lead guitarist, and that had its own appeal.

And he’d had Gareth to keep him optimistic. To keep him humble.

How had he coped without him?

She should have called. It was three years too late to be asking these questions. But back then...she couldn’t.

Rosa shoved the last of the Scrabble tiles aside and got to her feet. ‘I really should go and find my mother. Let her know I’m here.’

Jude inclined his head in a small nod. ‘Of course.’

She waited, just a moment, in case he was going to say anything more, but he was already studying his letters again. If those groupies could see him now—wild-child rock-and-roll star plays Scrabble. Wouldn’t they be disappointed?

Was she, though? Rosa wasn’t even sure. Already this trip home was nothing like she’d expected.

But she couldn’t be certain if that was a bad thing or not. Not yet.

She paused as she reached the archway leading into the villa.

‘Jude?’

He looked up. ‘Yeah?’

‘Did you really not know I’d be here?’

‘Honestly?’ Jude gave her a sardonic smile. ‘I would never have come if I did.’

Rosa looked away. Well. That told her.

And really, what else was she hoping for?

Shaking away the conversation with Jude, Rosa headed inside to find her mother. And some answers.

* * *

Jude watched Rosa go, then realised she’d stopped, just inside the archway to the villa.

Not that he cared.

He shouldn’t care.

He absolutely shouldn’t care enough to want to watch her every move.

Except...he did. Even after everything.