About Last Night

There. That’s what she’d been angling for. Her career, fixed. Her achievements, solidified.

She didn’t want it. Not this way.

“Richard, honestly, you don’t have to do that. I didn’t tell you all this expecting you to make a donation.”

Now you’re a liar, too. Nice, Talarico. Real nice.

“Of course you didn’t. It’s the least I can do for my new daughter-in-law. Consider it a wedd

ing gift—or as payment for that tour you’re to give me.”

He smiled then, Nev without the shark. She found a way to smile back, but it kind of broke her heart to do it.

Nev finally found Cath in the art room, where she and his father had their heads bent over a Michael Ayrton print. They were so engrossed in their conversation, they didn’t even hear him come in. He took the opportunity to watch them, pleased to see the two people he loved most in the world getting along.

His father towered over Cath, who looked gorgeous in a black skirt and a short-sleeved fluffy pink sweater that made her pale skin glow. She wore tall black boots he hadn’t bought for her. He’d have remembered those boots. The sweater said she was a sweetheart, but the boots promised she kept a whip in the closet. The boots were hot.

When she’d pulled them on this morning, he’d wondered if they were a statement of some kind. If they were, damned if he could translate it. Something had changed between them last night, but he didn’t know what it was. Cath had been skittish this morning, slipping out of bed to dress before he was fully awake and keeping more distance between them than usual as they toured the house.

He thought she loved him. Last night, in bed, he’d been certain of it. But this morning, nothing felt right. He kept catching her looking at him as if he’d just broken her heart, and he didn’t know why. He’d tried asking. She brushed him off.

The tour hadn’t helped. She’d made jokes that were just this side of impolite about the furnishings and fixtures. The sight of the ballroom chandelier seemed to jangle her nerves like fingernails on a blackboard.

If he wanted to get anywhere with her, he needed her to lower her defenses. That meant getting her out of this house and away from his family.

Nev cleared his throat, and Cath and his father looked up, startled.

“Nev! We didn’t hear you arrive,” his father said.

“I noticed that. I was beginning to think even the Blitz might not distract the two of you.”

Cath grinned. “You didn’t tell me your father had such a wonderful collection.”

His father was smiling, too. “You didn’t tell me your wife had such a good eye.”

Nev crossed the room and put an arm around Cath’s waist, gratified when she softened into his side. “You two are a match made in heaven.” He pushed his luck and dropped a kiss on the top of her head. She smelled wonderful, warm and spicy, like an orange studded with cloves. “I don’t want to intrude on your fun, but I was hoping to take Cath out for a while.”

“By all means,” Richard said, with a wink to Cath. “We’ll have plenty of opportunities to talk about art later on.”

“Where are we going?” she asked.

“It’s a surprise.”

He took her to Whipsnade zoo, where she fawned over the marmosets and made him buy her an ice cream even though it was windy and cool—not ice-cream weather at all. At the overlook, she sat between his thighs in the grass and ate her treat as they took in the view of Dunstable Downs, the rolling hills interrupted by patches of farmland and irregular groupings of trees. The whole world spread out before them, green and golden and blue. She called it “twee,” but he could tell she liked it when she turned to give him a sweet, creamy kiss.

Capturing her head in his hand so he could kiss her properly, he tried to push aside the unwelcome thought that this was the first and last time they would ever spend an afternoon in the countryside together. He kept catching himself thinking he’d inadvertently engineered a catastrophe, and soon—tomorrow, the next day, the day after that—the worst would happen, and he would lose her. And it would be his own fault.

He told himself he was being absurd. They’d been so close last night. They’d spoken plainly in the dark. She’d told him about her daughter.

She loved him. She hadn’t said it, but she did. Whatever happened, they would work it out.

He couldn’t make himself believe it.

They went for a curry, teasing each other over tamarind sauce and garlic naan. He drove her back to Leyton and made her wear the boots to bed.

All of it felt like stolen time, an end rather than a beginning. But he didn’t know why, and he didn’t know what to do differently.

Cath woke up to the sound of rain. She wrapped an arm around Nev’s back and snuggled into him, lazy and content. He stirred, groaned, and rolled over, his arms reaching out automatically to pull her against his side.