to know you better.’
I can’t help laughing. ‘And it totally backfired when Jess put me on your case and we were joined at the hip?’
He sniffs. ‘It was a challenge, and I haven’t come out of it very well.’
My heart is sinking. ‘But I thought you liked the wedding?’
‘The wedding couldn’t have been better.’ There’s another sigh. ‘It was the rest that was the disaster – I hadn’t counted on liking you so much.’
In the space where my heart should be banging there’s just a gaping void. I suspect my heart stopped dead when my stomach dropped through the floor. ‘You like me? Why the hell didn’t you tell me?’
Not that I’m ever going to get ahead of myself, but maybe this being a two-sided thing rather than a figment of my lust-brain explains my pulse racing at a million beats a second for the last six months every time I’ve come within a hundred yards of him. Why even touching him casually now feels like someone’s directing a flame thrower on my skin.
He clears his throat. ‘It’s much worse than that, Milla.’
‘Worse – worse how?’
He blows out a breath. ‘By the time I realised what was happening was more than over-excited male hormones with a mind of their own, it was too late … I’d already fallen in love with you.’
‘Excuse me? When was this?’
He’s shaking his head. ‘By Cally and Nigel’s wedding I was already in over my head. I tried to deny it, I went away and tried not to come back. But that didn’t work either.’
The unnerving thing is, he’s not talking about it like it’s anything good. Or even anything that actually involves me in the emotional sense at all. ‘It needn’t be a problem.’
He picks up Trump and hurls him along the beach. ‘If you’re saying that it’s because you have no idea how I feel about you. And why should you? That day on the beach when I tried to explain why I could never allow myself to be in love, I knew there was only one way out.’ He lets out a sigh. ‘So the thing is … I’m solving it in the way I always vowed I would if this ever happened to me and I couldn’t shake it off – by going away.’
I try not to let my legs give way. Then gulp in a breath. ‘But … Snow Goose … the harbour …?’
He blows out his cheeks. ‘Don’t worry, Snow Goose is staying. You get to keep your permit.’
I can’t believe he thinks that’s all I’m interested in.
As he goes on his voice is more level again. ‘My friend’s parents have a yacht moored up the coast north of Sydney waiting for their retirement. I’ve agreed to go over and skipper it for them until they feel more confident sailing it on their own.’
‘Sydney … in Australia?’ If I’m screeching, it’s because that’s a hell of a long way to go. I try to sound bright. And interested. ‘So, how many weeks will that take?’ If there’s a good side to this, at least he has no idea how I feel.
Nic’s voice rises in frustration. ‘Milla, this isn’t ten days in the sun. This is me removing myself from the problem until it goes away.’ As he stares out to sea, he’s calmer again. ‘I’ve agreed to six months initially. With an option to extend.’
‘Great.’ What else is there for me say? And I do it very brightly.
‘I’ve sorted the business here to carry on without me. It’s a traditional yacht, with no modern technology. We’ll be totally off-grid. Unplugged and out of reach. There will be absolutely no opportunity for me to relapse.’
Oh my days. Fuck, fuck, fuck. ‘Even better.’
‘I’m just really sorry … for involving you, for not telling you earlier, for being such a screwed-up mess … for all of it …’
I blow out a breath. ‘There’s nothing to apologise for. It’s not as if you ran out on me and broke my heart or anything hideous like that.’ Any collateral damage is all of my own making. That much is obvious; he’s kept this completely to himself. Fought it every inch of the way. He doesn’t ever intend this to involve me. And if I begged him to let me in, I’d be setting myself up for the biggest fall.
He shakes his head. ‘If I’d hurt you as well as all the rest, I could never have lived with myself.’
My mouth fills with sour saliva,