Chapter Seven

Adam threw his holdall on the sofa, pulling out the bottle of Merlot he’d found tucked behind the lifebelt on his deck, just where she’d said she’d left it. ‘Cheers, Sienna.’ He smiled cynically and headed for the kitchen to uncork it.

Dispensing with the glass, the bottle was poised at his mouth when his eye snagged on the wall clock. Ten-thirty. It was half past ten in the morning and he was about to go on a bender? Why? So he could lie about half-soaked, feeling sorry for himself? Which, it occurred to him, was his usual excuse for doing nothing about anything. It even had him seeing things that weren’t there. Trying hard to convince himself, once again, that it was all in his alcohol addled mind, he turned away from the ethereal form that seemed to pop up more and more often, insistent on doggedly haunting him.

Was he really going to get his boat up and running if he spent most of his day three sheets to the wind? Make plans and carry them out for once, he chastised himself. Do something about who he was, instead of not liking who he was and making damn sure everyone else did, too. You know what, sunshine, he addressed himself soberly, if I was Sienna, I wouldn’t have come near you with a barge pole.

To top it all off, it looked like Nicole wasn’t about to let Lily-Grace anywhere near him either, if the lack of messages over the last couple of weeks was anything to go by. Adam couldn’t say he blamed her. Was it likely she’d want a man who odd-jobbed for an income and had no assets to his name anywhere near Lily-Grace? Someone who spent what spare cash he did have on booze and his spare time flitting from woman to woman?

Dammit, he really did need to sort himself out, starting now. He re-corked the bottle. He’d have a beer maybe, later, but not wine, not at breakfast time. He had no breakfast, of course. Sherry had stocked up with every conceivable item that would keep a man happy, apart from food. But then, he was only supposed to be here on a come and go basis, wasn’t he? Sighing, Adam headed back for the front door, mentally calculating how much money he had actually got. Money of his own, that was. He’d rather starve than use the payment for services rendered from Sienna. So, did he have enough for a supermarket shop? Probably not.

Oh, no. He groaned inside, noting a car approaching as he walked to his own. Sherry. He hoped she hadn’t come with anything more than conversation in mind. After seeing Sienna’s not so cryptic note, as much as part of him wanted to say stuff it and carry on the way he had been, there was another part of him that just didn’t have the heart.

Fancying it might be a bit bad-mannered if he just climbed in his car and drove off, Adam waited. He kept his hand on his car door, though, hoping Sherry wouldn’t hang about.

‘Adam, hi!’ she said, through her open window. ‘I didn’t expect to find you here. I brought some things. Some food,’ she said, climbing out and retrieving carrier bags from the boot. ‘Just a few bits and bobs: bread for the freezer, bacon and eggs for the fridge. I thought you might need your energy levels topping up.’ She gave him one of her lingering looks, her eyes coming to rest belt-level. ‘Especially as you’re going to be here at odd times.’

‘Ah, about that, Sherry …’ Adam followed her to the front door.

Sherry looked at him expectantly, once inside.

‘I wondered if you would mind if I spent a bit more time here.’ Adam shrugged hopefully.

Sherry now gave him a quizzical look.

‘Just a few days.’ Adam took the bags from her and headed for the kitchen.

‘How so?’ Sherry followed him.

‘Nate, he’s, er … Well, he’s a bit prickly at the moment.’

‘Nathaniel, prickly?’ Sherry gawked, astonished. ‘With you? I don’t believe it.’ She set to stowing the shopping. ‘What did you do this time, Adam? It must have been something bad to rile Nathaniel. He’s generally so even-tempered.’

‘Erm, I think it was more a case of what we did,’ Adam supplied, a bit unfairly. Sherry was one of several women he’d entertained on the boat, but he hoped that might help persuade her to let him stay until he could sort somewhere else out. ‘The, er, noise we made attracted a little too much attention,’ he elaborated, as she glanced at him, still looking puzzled.

‘Oh,’ she said, smiling coquettishly as the penny obviously dropped. ‘We did a bit, didn’t we?’

‘A lot,’ Adam assured her. ‘I thought I might have to gag you at one point.’

‘Now, there’s an idea.’ Sherry took a step towards him, trailing a long fingernail across his chest. Adam eased back an inch. Sex really wasn’t on his mind right then, particularly the sort that resulted in physical injury.

‘So?’ he asked, mentally crossing his fingers.

‘Well,’ Sherry pondered, ‘I suppose it would be all right. But, whatever you do, if James asks, you’re paying rent. He throws a wobbly if I let girlfriends have a freebie holiday here. He’d go ballistic if he thought I was letting a man stay here for free. Let alone a man who makes love to me so spectacularly.’ Sherry lowered her eyelashes coyly, now rotating a fingernail around his midriff, as if choosing her spot.

Adam gulped, his mind boggling at what a ballistic husband with a shotgun would do if he did find out he was sleeping with his wife, spectacularly or any other way. He wouldn’t have any trouble choosing his spot. Adam had no doubt about that.

‘You don’t have to pay rent, of course.’ Sherry plumped for his jaw, her nail possibly giving him a closer shave than his razor had. ‘You can pay me in kind. And …’

She grazed the long red-painted nail slowly from his chin to his torso.

‘… as you are here.’

Crap! Adam caught her hand as she hooked the nail over his waistband. ‘Sherry,’ he said, wondering how to tell her he’d rather have a bacon sandwich without hurting her feelings, ‘I, er … It’s a bit early, don’t you think?’

‘What, for Mr Ever-ready?’ She looked at him as if he’d just announced he was celibate, and reached for the button on his jeans.

‘Sherry.’ He caught her hands firmly. ‘I’m really not up to it.’

‘Not up to it?’ She looked at him bemusedly. ‘I thought you were the local Casanova, ready to fulfil a woman’s every desire at the drop of a hat.’

‘I am, usually,’ Adam assured her, though he was definitely beginning to feel a little less ever-ready.

‘But not this morning?’ Sherry huffed up her magnificent breasts. But tempting though they were, Adam really didn’t have the heart. Even though Sienna had ‘hired’ him, and bloody well paid him – a surge of humiliation flashed through him – after making love with her, all this seemed tacky. Soulless, somehow.

Sherry planted her hands on her hips, clearly peeved. ‘So you wouldn’t be interested if I offered you a blowjob then?’

Ouch! That was below the belt.

Adam looked her over, noting that flicker of vulnerability in her eyes he’d seen once before, and felt like a complete heel. ‘I’d be more than interested, Sherry,’ he said softly, ‘normally. You’re amazing, truly. It’s just … I have the mother of all migraines coming on.’

‘Oh, no.’ Sherry knitted her brow sympathetically.

‘Sorry.’ Adam smiled weakly and massaged his temples. ‘I’d much rather take you to bed, but I really do think I need to lie down on my own.’

‘Poor you.’ Sherry brushed his cheek with her hand. ‘You should have said. I wouldn’t have stood here wittering on ten to the dozen, if you had. Go on, you go and tuck yourself up,’ she said, genuinely concerned, which made Adam feel even worse. ‘I’ll bring you some tea.’

‘No,’ Adam said quickly. ‘I, er, don’t think I fancy even that. I’ll just go and …’ He nodded towards the stairs, thinking he really might need to lie down. He’d just been offered a blowjob and he’d said thanks, but no thanks?

Clearly bored with Saturday morning TV, Lauren wandered into the kitchen to peer over Sienna’s shoulder at her PC. ‘He put his warm tongue where?’

‘Stop it,’ Sienna hissed, scrunching her shoulders forward to cover her screen.

‘What’s the matter with you? You’re writing a script,’ Lauren pointed out. ‘You’re not going to sell it if you don’t want people to read it.’

‘It’s not ready to share yet,’ Sienna said, her cheeks burning as she realised Lauren was still helping herself anyway. ‘I’m still trying to work my characters out.’

‘Looks like your characters are having a thorough workout from where I’m standing.’ Lauren leaned closer. ‘Did he really do that?’

Sienna squirmed in her seat, embarrassed. ‘He’s a fictional character, Lauren,’ she informed her, doing her best to look pious.

‘’Course he is.’ Lauren smirked knowingly and read on – out loud, to Sienna’s mortification. ‘Thumb now expertly circling … sucking and tenderly biting. Was he? Tender?’ She glanced sideways at Sienna.

Sienna refused to elucidate, but she couldn’t quite hide her smile.

Lauren read on, ‘I won’t hurt you. If I do, tell me to stop. Okay? Aw, bless.’ She sighed dreamily, and read on, ‘Open your eyes, Melissa. I want to see you.’

Lauren sniffled. ‘I think I may cry. Melissa doesn’t suit you, though, Sienna. You need to change that. Shove over.’

Her bottom perched next to Sienna, Lauren blinked and peered closer. ‘Slowly increasing the pace, his eyes on hers, building the momentum, until he felt so incredibly deep … she whimpered, as he picked up the tempo, thrusting still deeper, and deeper… Bloody hell, Sienna!’ Lauren fanned her face. ‘He really does know what he’s doing, doesn’t he?’

Sienna answered with a long, wistful sigh.

‘Well, okay, I can see what you see in him, I suppose,’ Lauren conceded, then eyes wide, she read on, ‘… undulating … thrust for thrust … wanted him to enjoy it, even if he did get … PAID for it!’

Lauren paused. She didn’t say anything. She didn’t look at Sienna. Her expression tight, she continued to read instead, ‘pulled away from her, climbed off the bed, discarded the used condom and proceeded to get dressed.’

Lauren stopped, inhaled deeply, and then exhaled so hard her nostrils flared. ‘Bastard,’ she said, standing abruptly.

‘Lauren, it’s fiction,’ Sienna called as her friend stomped out of the kitchen, falling over a disgruntled Tobias in the process.

‘It’s not true, Lauren!’ Sienna tried again. ‘Lauren, where are you going?’

‘Electrodes,’ Lauren supplied. ‘I’m going to ask Nathaniel if I can borrow some from the workshop and then I’m going to find Adam and attach them.’

Adam waited until Sherry had driven off and then went back downstairs, now feeling incredibly guilty. He doubted Sherry would have offered him the use of the cottage if she’d realised he actually wasn’t interested in using it for anything other than sleeping in. He genuinely wasn’t either. He felt about as capable of drumming up the enthusiasm for sex as he could for swimming the channel.

‘Yeah, yeah, you can gloat,’ he addressed his ghost, which now seemed to be doing just that, ghosting his every bloody step. The sadness he usually felt emanating from her wasn’t so overwhelmingly intense, though, he noted. What did she want? Why did she seem to be appearing more and more through this whole mess with Sienna? A mess he’d created, but which, yet again, meant he was losing people he cared for. He sensed she needed something, but he still had no real clue what.

Blimey, he was talking to it now. Adam shook his head, and then addressed the product of his imagination again. ‘You’re not here,’ he told it, walking towards the mist, defiantly through it, and then stopping dead. He could smell her. Emily. He tugged his shirt to his face; breathed the unmistakeable scent of her. The perfume she wore. The same perfume he’d bought for her and which had clung to his clothes for hours after he’d seen her. Nuts. He was going nuts. There was no other explanation. She wasn’t here.

Adam could still feel her, sense her, watching him. He didn’t turn around.

He needed to sleep, he told himself firmly, but headed for the kitchen instead. He needed at least one night’s dream-free, Emily-free, unbroken sleep. Yet he knew he couldn’t sleep here. Taking advantage of Sherry’s hospitality under the circumstances would definitely be taking the proverbial. He’d have to find an excuse and find somewhere else, he realised. He should never have accepted the key, which in itself must have looked like some kind of long-term commitment, however loose a commitment, to Sherry.

So when did he grow a conscience, he pondered as he opened the fridge, retrieving the bacon – and deciding he’d rather have a beer. When he’d made love with Sienna. Slept with, he corrected himself.

He’d thought he’d had everything he wanted, sex in abundance, no complications – though shotgun wielding husbands might come under the heading complication, he supposed. He could come and go as he pleased. Have a drink when he chose to. It suited him. So, why did his life feel so hollow? Adam reached for the beer. He’d stop at two, he promised himself. Why did this all feel so distasteful, and why did he suddenly want to see Lily-Grace, put roots down? Hadn’t his last attempt to do that almost destroyed him?

Wasn’t going to happen, though, was it? Nicole had obviously had second thoughts and women seemed only to want him for his body. Smiling ironically, he knocked back his beer. Must be worth having, after all, he supposed; the only part of him worth having. A conclusion Sienna had quickly come to. She paid him, for pity’s sake!

Stuff it. He downed the rest of the can. Who cared? You could love someone with your whole bloody heart and soul. He had. And look where that had got him. Hadn’t he found out the hard way that happy endings don’t exist? No, he’d stay as he was. He’d get enough money together and move on, get laid, not look back, somehow forget about Sienna. Wide open spaces. That’s what he needed, just him, on his own.

‘If you were hoping to pen a happy ending, I think your readers are going to be sadly disappointed, Sienna,’ Lauren said, grabbing up her Doritos big pack and heading off in her bikini to sun herself outside.

How does she do that? Sienna wondered. Eat everything and anything calorific by the big bagful and still fit in her teeny-weeny bikini? Sienna only had to lick the salt off a crisp and she gained ten pounds. Adam hadn’t seemed to mind how her body looked, though. Sienna sighed, a shuddery sigh, right down to her pelvis, which flipped then dipped exquisitely as she thought of his mouth exploring her deepest, most intimate places. Oh God, if only she could stop thinking about him. The panic clouding his beautiful chocolate-brown eyes when he’d thought he’d hurt her. How those eyes had darkened, smouldering with desire, as he’d buried himself deep inside her; his throaty, masculine groan as he came.

Sienna sighed wistfully again. ‘I am planning a happy ending,’ she called after her as Lauren disappeared through the door. ‘I’m thinking of getting my heroine to stowaway in his boat and sail off into the sunset with him.’

‘Being thrown overboard is not a happy ending, Sienna,’ Lauren replied.

Sienna sighed again, mournfully, and stared at her blank screen. She hadn’t got an ending. She hadn’t even got a middle. What she had got was writer’s block when it came to imagining the other women in her hero’s life. What Adam had done with her might not have been driven by passion-fuelled desire, but it wasn’t passionless. Naïve she might be, but she wasn’t wrong about that, Sienna was sure. She was struggling, therefore, to reconcile Adam-the-super-stud with the man who’d made love to her so sensitively. All of which gave her fodder for her script but, when it came to the writing, her mouth went dry, her stomach clenched, and her mind just couldn’t conjure it up. Her characters were copulating camels again. Damn. Sienna jabbed the off button on her PC without even closing her files. She’d take Tobias for a walk before going to work in the pub, she decided.

The man really was an enigma, wasn’t he? She pondered this as she pulled on her trainers. Bedding women all over the show, no doubt breaking hearts in the process, when he’d had his own heart so badly broken. No, she simply couldn’t reconcile the Adam she’d glimpsed in private with the cocky, carefree man he presented in public. She couldn’t save him. With his drinking, his womanising, it would be a hopeless task, but she was positive under there somewhere was a man worth saving, if only he’d realise it himself.

‘Come on, Tobias.’ She picked up her mobile, quickly deleted this morning’s string of upsetting texts from her ex, and reached for the dog’s lead. ‘Let’s go and walk off our frustrations.’ She’d have to walk a blooming long way, though, to walk off hers.