This was not some exclusive playground for the rich and famous, more a place to totally unwind and get back to nature, a place where one could breathe fresh air, relax and revita-lise. It reminded Tammy that Fletcher had said he liked primitive places, preferring views of nature to cityscapes. This island wasn’t exactly primitive but it certainly wasn’t spoiled by civilisation.
Had he chosen it because it was what he liked and wanted to know if she would enjoy it, as well—a place to share or a place to divide? If he was jaded by a heap of gold-digging women wanting to dig their claws into him, as Celine had implied, maybe this was a test of whether she was attracted to the man or the money—no luxury penthouse suite this time around.
Hope swelled anew.
Five days did suggest serious feelings for her.
The two weeks sped by. Fletcher e-mailed her with more details about their trip. Their flight to Lord Howe was scheduled for 9:00 a.m. on the twenty-sixth. Since he’d be flying in from LosAngeles earlier that morning, he would meet her in the departure lounge. All she had to do was get herself and her luggage to the domestic terminal at Mascot, pick up her boarding pass at the check-in counter, and he’d be waiting for her.
She had a shopping frenzy, indulging herself with some very sexy lingerie and buying a stack of new casual clothes, mix-and-match sets so she could keep her packing light—only fourteen kilograms of checked baggage was allowed on flights to Lord Howe. The walking shoes were heavy so she decided to wear them, along with her new blue jeans, an orange singlet top, and the cute denim jacket with its floral pattern in tones of blue and cream and orange and dark red. She needed the confidence of looking good—of feeling bright and beautiful—when Fletcher laid eyes on her again.
He’d only ever seen her at weddings.
And the one morning after.
Dressed to the nines or naked, nothing in between.
When she left her apartment to catch the train to the airport on the designated day, her excitement over their imminent meeting was tempered by a rush of nervous fear that she wouldn’t live up to his expectations—or he wouldn’t live up to hers. This situation was completely different to their previous encounters. It brought on such an anxious state of mind, she found herself double-checking everything: the contents of her wallet, the train connections that had to be made, the time ticking by.
She arrived at the domestic terminal without any problem cropping up. At the check-in counter, all she had to do was identify herself and she was handed a boarding pass with the instruction to proceed to the departure lounge for Gate 24. It was a long walk through the terminal, past the airport shops, past the vast food hall, down a corridor lined with other departure lounges. She counted them off—sixteen, eighteen, twenty, twenty-two—trying to ignore the fact that her legs were getting more jelly-like with every step and her heart was thumping in her ears.
Twenty-four…
Her feet stopped dead when she spotted him. He sat in the middle of a row of chairs, reading a newspaper, his strikingly handsome face wearing an air of tired concentration. Travel weary, she thought, and marking time until he had to move again. It made her wonder how many airports he had waited in over the years and whether he’d truly be content to settle in Sydney once all the project business was done and travelling was no longer necessary.
He looked up and caught her watching him. The fatigue instantly dropped from his face. His eyes lit with pleasure. He dazzled her with a brilliant smile as he rose to his feet, folding the newspaper, discarding it on the chair. Then he was walking towards her, bringing to life again how tall and dynamically attractive he was. He wore black jeans and a black-and-white shirt, black Reeboks on his feet—anonymous kind of clothing but they didn’t make Fletcher look anonymous. They seemed to emphasise the innate force of the man.
Tammy didn’t think of moving herself. She was too focussed on taking in everything about him, feeling the strength of his drawing power on her, the acceleration of her pulse, the ache of yearning in her belly.
‘Don’t I rate a greeting?’ he asked, whimsically challenging her silence.
‘Just checking that you match my memory of you,’ she retorted, smiling to reassure him on that score. ‘It has been a while and this little jaunt to Lord Howe Island could have been a big mistake.’
His eyes twinkled wickedly. ‘I’m glad you took the risk.’
‘I’m glad you thought of me.’
‘I wanted a release from thinking of you, Tamalyn. Being with you is much more to my liking.’
‘I thought you were going to say much more to your taste,’ she said provocatively, fluttering her eyelashes as she dropped her gaze to his mouth. ‘Would a kiss be a rate-worthy greeting?’
He flashed his wolfish grin. ‘Let me rate it.’
She stepped forward, feeling positively petite next to him without the benefit of high heels. Nevertheless, it was a lovely sensual pleasure to slide her hands up his chest and around his neck as she raised herself on tip-toe. He didn’t wait for her to pull his head down to meet hers. His arms swiftly enclosed her in an embrace that almost lifted her right off her feet. Nor did he wait for her to initiate the kiss.
It was like he was claiming possession of her again, his mouth taking hers on the same intensely passionate journey they’d shared before—a kiss that searched and found the response he wanted, then revelled in the fierce desire coursing through both of them, the need to recapture and hold on to the explosion of feeling that made time and place irrelevant.
‘Is there a broom closet somewhere close?’ he muttered when his mouth finally broke from hers.
Laughter bubbled from her throat at how rawly desperate he sounded. She tilted her head back, her eyes teasing his urgent need even as she exulted in it. ‘I didn’t see one. Besides, that was supposed to be a greeting, not an incitement to find a broom closet at an airport. We do have five days of privacy ahead of us.’
His mouth twitched into an ironic smile. ‘It’s the thunderbolt effect. I forgot it was a greeting.’
‘Which you were supposed to rate,’ she archly reminded him.
‘Worth every minute I’ve waited,’ he rolled out with feeling.
She laughed again, joy rippling through her. It was great to be with him again. And she had five wonderful days more of him ahead of her. It felt so right. It had to turn out right.
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE flight to Lord Howe was less than two hours, and Fletcher spent the whole time drawing Tammy out about her life since they had last been together, fending off any questions about his own. She obliged him by prattling on about her work at the hospital, passing the final test that meant she would graduate as a midwife, the monthly luncheon with the gang of six.