Miss Prim's Greek Island Fling

Audra wondered how she’d cope in that same situation. ‘She had you.’

He shook his head. ‘I wasn’t enough.’

The pain in his eyes raked through her chest, thickened her throat. ‘What happened?’ She knew his mother had died, but nobody ever spoke of it.

‘She just...faded away. She developed a lot of mystery illnesses—spent a lot of time in hospital. When she was home she spent a lot of time in bed.’

‘That’s when your uncle Ned came to look after you?’ His father’s brother was still a big part of Finn’s life. He’d relocated to Europe to be with Finn and Claudette.

‘He moved in and looked after the both of us. I was eleven when my mother died, and the official verdict was an accidental overdose of painkillers.’ He met her gaze. ‘Nobody thought she did it deliberately.’

That was something at least. But it was so sad. Such a waste.

‘My uncle’s verdict was that she’d died of a broken heart.’

Audra’s verdict was that Claudette Sullivan had let her son down. Badly. But she kept that to herself. Her heart ached for the little boy she’d left behind and for all the loss he’d suffered.

‘Ned blamed my father.’

Wow. ‘It must’ve been hard for Ned,’ she offered. ‘I don’t know what I’d do if I lost one of my siblings. And to then watch as your mother became sicker... He must’ve felt helpless.’

‘He claimed my father should never have married if he wasn’t going to settle down to raise a family properly.’

Finn’s face had become wooden and she tried not to wince. ‘Families aren’t one-size-fits-all entities. They don’t come in pretty cookie-cutter shapes.’

He remained silent. She moistened her lips. ‘What happened after your mother died?’

He straightened in his chair and took a long gulp of lime and soda. ‘That’s when Ned boarded me at the international school in Geneva. It was full of noisy, rowdy boys and activities specifically designed to keep us busy and out of mischief.’

It was an effort, but she laughed as he’d meant her to. ‘I’ve heard stories about some of the mischief you got up to. I think they need to redesign some of those activities.’

He grinned. ‘It was full of life. Ned came to every open day, took me somewhere every weekend we had leave. I didn’t feel abandoned.’

Not by Ned, no. But what about his mother? She swallowed. ‘And you met Rupert there.’

His grin widened. ‘And soon after found myself adopted by the entire Russel clan.’

‘For your sins.’ She smiled back, but none of it eased the throb in her heart.

‘I always found myself drawn to the riskier pastimes the school offered...and that only grew as I got older. There’s nothing like the thrill of paragliding down a mountain or surfing thirty-foot waves.’

‘Or throwing oneself off a ski jump with gay abandon,’ she added wryly, referencing his recent accident.

‘Accidents happen.’

But in the pastimes Finn pursued, such accidents could have fatal consequences. Didn’t that bother him? ‘Did Ned never try and clip your wings or divert your interests elsewhere?’ He’d lost a brother. He wouldn’t have wanted to lose a nephew as well.

‘He’s too smart for that. He knew it wouldn’t work, not once he realised how determined I was. Before I was of age, when I still needed a guardian’s signature, he just made sure I had the very best training available in whatever activity had taken my fancy before he’d sign the permission forms.’

‘It must’ve taken an enormous amount of courage on his behalf.’

‘Perhaps. But he’d seen the effect my grandfather’s refusals and vetoes had had on my father. He said it resulted in my father taking too many unnecessary chances. In his own way, Ned did his best to keep me safe.’

She nodded.

‘The way I live my life, the risks I take, they’re not conducive to family life, Audra. When I turned eighteen I promised my uncle to never take an unnecessary risk—to make sure I was always fully trained to perform whatever task I was attempting.’

Thinking about the risks he took made her temples ache.

‘I made a promise to myself at the same time.’ His eyes burned into hers. ‘I swore I’d never become involved in a long-term relationship until I’d given up extreme sports. It’s not fair to put any woman through what my father put my mother through.’

It was evident he thought hell had a better chance of freezing over than him ever giving up extreme sports. She eyed him for a moment. ‘Have you ever been tempted to break that contract with yourself?’