Shy Innocent In The Spotlight by Melanie Milburne
CHAPTER TWELVE
MACKBROUGHTHERlimp hand up to his mouth, pressing his lips to her fingers. His chest was tight as a drum, his lungs too cramped to draw in a decent breath. He blamed himself for not being vigilant enough. Elspeth had a life-threatening allergy and seeing her like that, struggling to breathe, was confronting. Not just confronting but terrifying. What if it had happened when they were out of reach of a hospital? What if she hadn’t brought her EpiPens with her? Over the last few days, he’d almost forgotten about her allergy. He’d been so caught up with spending time with her, making love to her, knowing their fling was coming to an end, as all his flings did.
But seeing her so ill had shaken him to the core. Making him realise he didn’t want their fling to end like all the others.
I want to stay with her.
He had grown close to her in a way he hadn’t expected, closer than anyone else he had ever met. Not just physically close but forming a deep connection that opened his heart to possibilities he had never considered before—possibilities he had never wanted to consider. He had never asked anyone to live with him before. That had always been a step too far. It reeked too much of commitment and he didn’t do commitment.
Almost losing her had shocked him into realising he had developed feelings for her. The sort of feelings that he had never felt for anyone else. He wasn’t ready to call it love, the sort of love that romantics went on about. But he cared deeply for her. Why else had he panicked as he’d never panicked before seeing her struggling for air? He couldn’t imagine not seeing her again. He had already extended their fling another day or two. What would it hurt to extend it a little longer? A little longer than he had ever done before? It would be a practical solution, a convenient arrangement that would give them a little more time to enjoy each other’s company. How much longer was not something he could answer with any definitiveness, which was unusual for him. But he didn’t put too much significance on that. He was not going to let things get out of control.
Mack shuffled his chair closer to Elspeth’s bedside and gently stroked her hair back from her forehead. Her face was pale, her features relaxed in sleep, and his heart squeezed as if it were in a cruel vice. His throat thickened, unfamiliar emotions rising in his chest. ‘I’m not going anywhere,’ he said in a rough whisper. ‘You’re stuck with me for a while longer.’
Elspeth woke a couple of times during the night when the nurse on duty came in to do a set of obs. And every time, she saw Mack sitting beside her bed, wide awake with his concerned gaze on her. Once the nurse left, Elspeth turned to him. ‘Have you had any sleep at all?’
‘No.’
She ran her gaze over his weary features. His eyes were darkly shadowed, his jaw was heavily peppered with regrowth, his skin looked paler than normal and there were fine lines around his mouth she had never noticed before. ‘You look terrible.’
‘Thank you.’ His tone was dry.
She plucked at the starched white sheet covering her. ‘I bet I don’t look too crash hot either.’
He grasped her hand and kissed her bent knuckles, his eyes meshing with hers. ‘You look as beautiful as ever.’
Her heart swelled at the tenderness in his gaze. ‘Thanks for staying with me. It’s usually my mum who sits there hour after hour.’
He suddenly frowned. ‘I should have thought to call her. And your sister. Do you want me to do it now or—?’
‘No, I’m quite safe with you and I don’t want to stress them.’
‘Will you tell them once we get back home?’
‘Maybe.’
‘I can see why your mother panics,’ Mack said, stroking her hand. ‘You scared the hell out of me.’ He swallowed deeply and added in a husky tone, ‘I’m not going to be game enough to let you out of my sight after this.’
Elspeth gave a lopsided smile. ‘You’re going to have to though, soon, aren’t you?’ She looked back down at the sheet she was toying with. ‘We’re having a fling, not a long-term relationship. Those were the rules. Your rules.’
There was a pulsing silence.
‘What if I wanted to tweak the rules?’
She looked at him in shock. ‘What do you mean?’
He grasped her hand even more firmly as if worried she would pull away. ‘I don’t want our fling to end just yet. I want to continue seeing you.’
Elspeth ran her tongue over her suddenly dry lips. He wanted to extend their fling? ‘What time frame were you thinking?’ For there would be a time frame, of that she was sure. He would not be offering her a for-ever relationship, a full-time commitment such as marriage. It was probably silly of her to expect it given they had only known each other such a short time. But a part of her longed for such a commitment from him anyway. For she knew how she felt, she was sure of her love for him. The trouble was knowing for sure if love was behind his offer, or simple lust. The health scare he had witnessed had created a sense of urgency and drama, which had probably coloured if not downright influenced his decision to extend their fling. Dramatic circumstances experienced by a couple often had that effect—made them draw closer together for a time—but it didn’t always last, not unless deep and lasting love underpinned it.
And how could she be sure it did?
‘We can take it a day at a time,’ Mack said. ‘Just enjoy each other’s company as we’ve been doing.’
Elspeth was trying to figure out how such an arrangement would work in reality. He was based in Scotland, she in England. She had a job she adored, a flat she had not long rented. A year-long lease she had only just signed. How would her mother cope if she moved out of London? Judging by the number of missed calls and text messages she’d received from her, Elspeth doubted her mother would ever agree to her moving to Scotland. And could she even be sure she would get a position in another library, especially at such short notice? What exactly did Mack expect of her? ‘I don’t know, Mack...’ She softened it with a smile. ‘We live in different parts of the UK. I don’t want to quit my job or—’
‘I’m not asking you to quit, just ask for a transfer,’ he said. ‘We’ll figure the details out later but, for now, I want you to get well and at least consider moving in with me for a few weeks when we get back home.’
Her eyebrows shot up. ‘Move in with you?’
‘Why are you so surprised? It makes sense to cohabit for the sake of convenience. It’s way more practical than trying to conduct a long-distance relationship.’
But whose convenience was he talking about? It certainly wouldn’t be convenient for her, not unless he was willing to commit his whole heart to her. ‘I’m not sure I’m ready for such a big step...’ she began. Not unless she was sure his feelings for her were the same as hers for him. ‘You’re probably only asking because of what happened. It scared you and you think you need to take care of me, but you don’t. I can take care of myself.’
‘Why don’t you think about it for the rest of the day?’ he suggested. ‘We don’t fly home until tomorrow. You can decide then.’ He rose from the chair and pressed a kiss to her forehead, sweeping her hair back in a tender gesture as he straightened. ‘I’m going to let you sleep while I head back and have a shower and a shave. You should be ready for discharge by the time I get back.’
‘Okay.’ She sank back against the pillows with a sigh. ‘I’ll think about it.’
Mack walked out of the hospital with a spring in his step. The convenience of having her move in with him was his primary motivation for asking her. And he was confident Elspeth would agree once she’d had time to consider it. She was young and inexperienced, so it was a big step for her, but he didn’t want their fling to end any time soon and he was sure neither did she.
He stopped off to buy her a gift on the way back to the villa to lift her spirits. Her health scare had obviously deeply unsettled her, as it had him. His gut still churned as he recalled the harrowing moment at the café when she went into anaphylaxis. Her life could have ended then and there and that didn’t bear thinking about. He couldn’t imagine losing her. She had only been in his life such a short time—a matter of days—and yet he had developed feelings for her that he had not experienced for anyone else before. They were so unfamiliar to him he didn’t know how to describe them.
All he knew was, he wanted her with him for much longer than a casual fling.
The jeweller’s assistant showed Mack a diamond and sapphire ensemble of pendant, earrings and an engagement ring. He hadn’t asked to be shown an engagement ring and wondered why the woman had brought one out. Sheesh. The French were such romantics. He glanced at the ring with its winking solitaire diamond and deep blue sapphires and then back at the middle-aged woman serving him. ‘I won’t need the ring, just the pendant and earrings.’
The older woman raised her brows over twinkly raisin-dark eyes. ‘No? Maybe monsieur will come back for it another time?’
Mack gave a stiff smile. ‘C’est impossible.’
Elspeth came back to the villa with Mack later that day. He was attentive and solicitous with only marginally less fussing over her than her mother would do. He helped get her comfortable on a lounger on a shady section of the terrace and then brought her out a refreshing cup of tea and a plate of fresh fruit.
‘Here you go.’ He set it down next to her. ‘Is there anything else I can get you?’
‘No. This is lovely, thanks.’
He reached for something inside his white chinos’ pocket. ‘I bought you a little gift.’ He handed her a rectangular dark blue velvet jewellery case. ‘I hope you like them.’
Elspeth took the box with bated breath. The box was too large to be a ring box and she was annoyed with herself for even hoping a ring could be in there. She prised open the lid to find a beautiful diamond and sapphire pendant and matching droplet earrings. They were stunningly beautiful, quite easily the most gorgeous she had ever seen. She didn’t dare think about how much they had cost. Her twin was used to wearing ridiculously expensive jewellery, but Elspeth was not and wondered if she ever could. ‘Oh, my goodness... Oh, Mack, you shouldn’t have. I can’t accept these. They’re too much.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous. I want you to have them. Consider them a “get well” gift.’
Elspeth glanced up at him as a thought occurred to her. An uncomfortable thought that triggered a tiny flicker of anger. ‘Are you sure they’re not a bribe?’
He gave a sudden frown. ‘A bribe? What do you mean?’
She closed the lid of the box with a little snap and handed it back to him. ‘I know what you’re doing. You want me to move in with you and this is a way to convince me. But I don’t want gifts.’
‘What do you want?’ His voice had a raw edge to it, but his expression was shuttered. And he ignored the box in her outstretched hand.
Elspeth put the box on the table next to the lounger, and then swung her legs over so she was in a sitting position. ‘I want more than expensive jewellery. I want to know how you feel about me.’
‘I told you how I feel about you. I enjoy your company. I like being with you. I care about you.’
Elspeth rose from the lounger to put some distance between them. ‘You barely know me, Mack. We only met a handful of days ago. And for part of that I was pretending to be my twin. How can you be sure you care about me, the real me?’
Mack stood and came over to her, taking both of her hands in his. ‘I know the real you. That’s who I’ve developed feelings for—you, only you.’
‘Are you saying you’re in love with me?’
There was a beat or two of silence. Too long a silence. A heartbreaking silence that told her all she needed to know.
‘I’m saying I’d like our fling to continue for as long as we both enjoy each other’s company.’ His expression remained inscrutable but she sensed a carefully restrained tension in him.
‘I know how silly this is going to sound but I can’t accept your offer,’ Elspeth said, pulling her hands out of his. ‘I want more than a let’s-see-how-it-goes relationship. I want more than someone to enjoy my company. I want more than someone to care about me. I want the sort of love that most people aspire to. But you’ve ruled that sort of love out. The love that binds two people together for a lifetime.’
He sent one of his hands through his hair in an agitated manner. ‘Isn’t it a little too early to be talking about marriage?’
She gave him a challenging look. ‘Would there ever be a time when you’d be agreeable to talk about it? You said you never wanted to settle down. You’ve already ruled out the possibility, so how can I wait in hope that you might one day change your mind?’
He walked over to the edge of the terrace, standing with his back towards her, his gaze focussed on the view of the abbey in the distance. ‘Marriage is not something I’m willing to discuss, now or in the future.’ He turned to face her, his face set in intractable lines. ‘I’m offering you a relationship for the time being. That’s all.’
‘I’m flattered by your offer but you’ll have to forgive me for declining it,’ Elspeth said. ‘If our feelings aren’t the same for each other, what would be the point? We’d be wasting each other’s time and, quite frankly, I feel I’ve wasted enough years of my life already. I need to take charge of my own destiny and not wait around hoping good things will come my way. I have to go out and find those good things. And one of those good things I most desire is to be loved for me. As I am, allergy and all.’
His dark eyebrows shot together. ‘You surely don’t think I’m holding back on marriage because of your allergy? For God’s sake, Elspeth, didn’t you see how worried I was about you? You almost gave me a heart attack collapsing like that. The thought of losing you is what triggered me into asking you to come and live with me. I want to take care of you.’
She slowly shook her head at him. ‘If I allowed you to do that, I would be simply exchanging you for my mother. I’m not your responsibility, Mack. I want to be much more than a liability you feel pressured to take on out of guilt. I want to be your equal, your partner in life, not a temporary interest that has no possibility of a long-term future.’
He muttered a curse word not quite under his breath. ‘So where do we go from here? You want out? Now?’
Elspeth gave a deep sigh. ‘I think it’s for the best, don’t you? Why prolong something that’s going to end anyway? You were only attracted to me because I was playing the role of my twin. That’s what first got your attention but that’s not who I am. I don’t wear designer clothes and exotic perfume and sky-high heels. I’m not a party girl who can work a room. I’m a shy and introverted homebody who doesn’t belong in your world. If we continued our fling, you’d soon get tired of me, I’m sure. I’d rather we part now as friends.’
‘Friends?’ His top lip curled, his eyes flashed, his jaw tightened. ‘I don’t need you as a friend.’
‘The thing is, Mack, you don’t need anyone, not in an emotional sense. You won’t allow yourself to.’
‘What do you feel for me?’ The question blindsided her for a moment, especially when it was delivered in such a blunt tone with zero expression on his face. He was like a robot, an emotionless robot programmed to issue commands but with no capacity to feel.
Elspeth knotted her hands in front of her body, wary of revealing too much of her feelings for him when there was no possibility of them ever being returned. ‘I’ve enjoyed being with you. You’ve taught me so much, not just about sex but life in general. I enjoyed this time here in Lagrasse, in spite of my health scare. I will always look back on our time together with...with fondness.’
His top lip went up again. ‘Fondness?’ His tone was cynical. ‘Is that all? And yet, here you are practically begging me to get down on bended knee and offer you a marriage proposal.’
A streak of anger rippled down her spine. ‘What you offered me was a proposition, one that’s probably not unlike the one your father offered to his mistress. I suspect he kept her going for years with false promises, fanning her hopes with each little gift when he visited, making her think that one day, her dream would finally be fulfilled, that they would live happily ever after. But it didn’t happen, did it? He was unable to love either her or your mother the way they wanted to be loved.’
‘Please do not bring my father into this discussion.’ His words came out through thinned lips, his tone embittered, his gaze diamond hard.
‘We both have father wounds, Mack,’ Elspeth said, softly, realising it with a flash of insight. ‘We were both let down by our fathers, betrayed, rejected and abandoned by them. But that doesn’t mean we have to live our lives frightened of others betraying, rejecting or abandoning us. We have to be courageous enough to ask for what we want, to not be afraid to embrace it when it happens to come our way. To not short-change ourselves in the fear of losing the one thing we crave above all else—love.’
Mack strode back to the balustrade of the terrace, his hands gripping the stone with white-knuckled force. His back was rigid with tension, his shoulders hunched forward as he fought for control. ‘All right.’ He turned back to face her, his face still devoid of emotion. ‘I’ll change our flights for this evening. There’s no point staying another night when you’re so keen to leave.’
‘You don’t have to do that, Mack. One more night won’t—’
‘On the contrary, I do have to do it. I’ll book your flight for London. I’ll fly to Edinburgh. We won’t have to see each other again after today.’
He turned and walked down the steps leading into the garden, disappearing from sight before she could think of a single thing to say. But what could she say that hadn’t already been said? Wasn’t it easier, less painful this way? A clean cut was better than a long drawn-out goodbye.
There was next to no conversation between them on the way to the airport later that day, but there was a surfeit of tension. Elspeth could feel it pulsing between them in the air in invisible waves.
As they were waiting for their flights to be called to the gate, Elspeth looked up at him. ‘Mack? Please don’t let us end this way.’
His expression was set in tight lines, his mouth a thin line. ‘It was your choice to end it. Not mine.’
‘You’re being unfair. I don’t want to end it with any bad feelings between us. The least we could do is part on good terms.’
‘All right, then.’ He offered her his hand in a formal handshake. ‘Goodbye. I hope you have a pleasant flight.’ It was the sort of thing he might say to a stranger he had just met, or a business associate he had nothing in common with other than work. Not the sort of farewell one would say to one’s lover, a lover who had shared his bed, his body. He was her first lover. Her first love. Her only love.
Elspeth slipped her hand into his and tried to ignore the tingle his touch evoked in her flesh and the arrow of pain in her heart that this was the last time she would feel his touch. A wave of grief swept over her, making tears sting at the backs of her eyes and a lump rise in her throat. ‘Goodbye, Mack. Thank you for everything you’ve done for me. I really enjoyed getting to know you.’
He was still holding her hand, his gaze shuttered. ‘You’ve got your new EpiPens with you?’
She patted her tote bag with her free hand. ‘Yes.’
His gaze drifted to her mouth, his throat rising and falling over a tight swallow. ‘Right, well then, I’d better let you go. Your flight is due to board any second now.’
Elspeth pulled her hand out of his and forced a smile. ‘Right. Don’t want to miss it.’
He seemed to hesitate for a long moment, just staring at her without speaking. But then, he took her by the upper arms and pulled her close and planted a brief but firm kiss to her lips. ‘Stay safe, m’eudail.’ His voice had lost its brisk impersonality and instead was deep and husky.
‘I will.’ Elspeth turned to join her departure-lounge queue but when she glanced over her shoulder, Mack was gone.
Mack strode down the concourse of the airport to his own departure gate willing himself not to look back. He never looked back when he left a fling. And that was all his relationship with Elspeth was, wasn’t it? A fling. A fling that hadn’t gone the way he’d wanted and that stuck in his craw in a way he didn’t like. He was usually the one who decided when a relationship was going to end. He liked the sense of control it gave him to have the power to pull the plug when it suited him. He didn’t like surprises and Elspeth rejecting his offer to move in with him was an unpleasant surprise. A shock, a gut-wrenching disappointment that he couldn’t explain other than it had thwarted his plans. He had envisaged a few weeks, possibly months of being together, enjoying the passion that had fired between them. He wasn’t the settling-down type, marriage was not and never had been in his plans. He had no wish to commit to one person for the rest of his life. His mother had done that and it had all but destroyed her to find the object of her love had betrayed her in the most despicable way. Love had destroyed his mother as it had Clara and to a lesser degree Daisy, his half-sister. It had certainly contributed to the wayward behaviour of his brother, which had continued to this day. Loving someone gave them the power to hurt you, to wound you, to destroy you.
And he was not going to allow anyone to do that to him.
Ever.
