LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

running after dreaming that Cara was locked in the house whilst it burnt to the ground and he couldn’t find any way to get her out.

      Even after he’d been up for a while and looked through his emails, he still couldn’t get rid of the haunting image of Cara’s face contorted with terror as the flames licked around her. Despite the rational part of his brain telling him it wasn’t real, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d failed her.

      Because, of course, he had, he finally accepted, as he sat down to eat his breakfast in the hotel restaurant before his meeting. She’d laid herself bare for him, both figuratively and literally, and he’d abused her trust by treating her as if she meant nothing to him.

      Which wasn’t the case at all.

      He sighed and rubbed a hand over his tired eyes. The last thing he should be doing right now was worrying about how he’d treated Cara when he was about to walk into one of the biggest corporations in Ireland and convince them to give him their business. This was exactly what he’d feared would happen when he’d first agreed to let her work for him—that the business might suffer. Though, to be fair to Cara, this mess was of his own making.

      Feeling his phone vibrate, he lifted it out of his pocket and tapped on the icon to open his text messages. It was from Cara.

      With his pulse thumping hard in his throat, he read what she’d written. It simply said:

      Good luck today. I’ll be thinking of you.

      A heavy pressure built in his chest as he read the words through for a second time.

      She was thinking about him.

      Those few simple words undid something in him and a wave of pure anguish crashed through his body, stealing his breath and making his vision blur. Despite how he’d treated her, she was still looking out for him.

      She wanted him to know that he wasn’t alone.

      That was so like Cara. She was such a good person: selfless and kind, but also brave and honourable. Jemima would have loved her.

      Taking a deep breath, he mentally pulled himself together. Now was not the time to lose the plot. He had some serious business to attend to and he wasn’t about to let all the work that he and Cara had put into making this opportunity happen go to waste.

      * * *

      Fourteen hours later Max flopped onto his hotel bed, totally exhausted after spending the whole day selling himself to the prospective clients, then taking them out for a celebratory dinner to mark their partnership when they signed on the dotted line to buy his company’s services.

      He’d done it; he’d closed the deal—and a very profitable deal it was, too—which meant he could now comfortably grow the business and hire a team of people to work for him.

      His life was moving on.

      A strong urge to call Cara and let her know he’d been successful had him sitting up and reaching for his phone, but he stopped himself from tapping on her name at the last second. He couldn’t call her this late at night without it meaning something.

      Frustration rattled through him, swiftly followed by such an intense wave of despondency it took his breath away. He needed to talk to someone. Right now.

      Scrolling through his contacts, he found the name he wanted and pressed call, his hands twitching with impatience as he listened to the long drones of the dialling tone.

      ‘Max? Is everything okay?’ said a sleepy voice on the other end of the line.

      ‘Hi, Poppy, sorry—I forgot it’d be so late where you are,’ he lied.

      ‘No problem,’ his friend replied, her voice strained as if she was struggling to sit up in bed. ‘What’s up? Is everything okay?’

      ‘Yes. Fine. Everything’s fine. I won a pivotal contract for the business today so I’m really happy,’ he said, acutely aware of how flat his voice sounded despite his best efforts to sound upbeat.

      Apparently it didn’t fool Poppy either. ‘You don’t sound really happy, Max. Are you sure there isn’t something else bothering you?’

      His friend was too astute for her own good. But then she’d seen him at his lowest after Jemima died and had taken many a late night call from him throughout that dark time. He hadn’t called her in a while though, so it wasn’t entirely surprising that she thought something was wrong now.

      ‘Er—’ He ran a hand through his hair and sighed, feeling exhaustion drag at him. ‘No, I’m—’ But he couldn’t say it. He wasn’t fine. In fact he was far from it.

      A blast of rage came out of nowhere and he gripped his phone hard, fighting for control.

      It was a losing battle.

      ‘You did it on purpose, didn’t you? Sent Cara to me so I’d fall in love with her,’ he said angrily, blood pumping hard through his body, and he leapt up from the bed and started to pace the room.

      His heart gave an extra hard thump as the stunned silence at the other end of the line penetrated through his anger, bringing home to him exactly what he’d just said.

      ‘Are you in love with her?’ Poppy asked quietly, as if not wanting to break the spell.

      He slapped the wall hard, feeling a sick satisfaction at the sting of pain in the palm of his hand. ‘Jemima’s only been dead for a year and a half.’

      ‘That has nothing to do with it, and it wasn’t what I asked you.’

      He sighed and slumped back down onto the bed, battling to deal with the disorientating mass of emotions swirling though his head. ‘I don’t know, Poppy,’ he said finally. ‘I don’t know.’

      ‘If you don’t know, that probably means that you are but you’re too pig-headed to admit it to yourself.’

      He couldn’t help but laugh. His friend knew him so well.

      ‘Is she in love with you?’ Poppy asked.

      ‘She says she is.’

      He could almost feel his friend smiling on the other end of the phone.

      Damn her.

      ‘Look, I’ve got to go,’ he said, ‘I’ve had a very long day and my flight back to London leaves at six o’clock in the morning,’ he finished, not wanting to protract this uncomfortable conversation any longer. ‘I’ll call you tomorrow after I’ve had some sleep and got my head straight, okay?’

      ‘Okay.’ There was a pause. ‘You deserve to be happy though, Max, you know that, don’t you? It’s what Jemima would have wanted.’

      He cut the call and threw the phone onto the bed, staring sightlessly at the blank wall in front of him.

      Did he deserve to be happy, after the way he’d acted? Was he worthy of a second chance?

      There was only one person who could answer that question.

      * * *

      The house was quiet when he arrived home at eight-thirty the next morning. Eerily so.

      Cara should have been up by now, having breakfast and getting ready for the day—if she was there.

      His stomach sank with dread as he considered the possibility that she wasn’t. That she’d taken him at his word and walked away. Not that he could blame her.

      Racing up the stairs, he came to an abrupt halt in front of her open bedroom door and peered inside. It was immaculate. And empty. As if she’d never been there.

      Uncomfortable heat swamped him as he made his way slowly back down to the kitchen. Perhaps she hadn’t gone. Perhaps she’d had a tidying spree in her room, then gone out early to grab some breakfast or something.

      But he knew that none of these guesses were right when he spotted her keys to the house and the company mobile he’d

Скачать книгу