Sinful Pleasures

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‘Of him getting married, naturally!’ exclaimed Anita, reaching across the table to tap Megan’s hand. ‘I want to be a grandmother, before I’m too old for it to be any fun.’

Megan sought refuge in her wine glass at that point. Despite her medication, she’d decided that one glass of wine wouldn’t hurt her, and she was grateful now for the diversion it offered. For all the room was air-conditioned, she was feeling uncomfortably hot suddenly. This was harder than she’d expected, and she hadn’t even met Ryan Robards yet.

‘Anyway, I’m sure you must be tired of me going on about Remy,’ Anita concluded, possibly putting Megan’s restlessness down to the fact that she was bored. She shook her head. ‘Tell me about your job. What is it you do exactly?’

‘Oh—I’m sure you’re not really interested in my work,’ said Megan hurriedly. ‘I believe Simon told you about the directory, and that’s all it is. My role is fairly simple; I’m just the gofer. I coordinate the designs, and deal with the printers and so on.’

‘I’m sure it’s not as simple as all that,’ declared Anita reprovingly, but, as if sensing that Megan didn’t really want to elaborate, she chose another topic. ‘I know your—father would have been very proud of you. You always were the apple of his eye.’

‘Perhaps.’

Megan wasn’t at all sure that Giles Cross would have approved of his daughter getting involved in a business that was so trivial—in his eyes, at least. He’d expected so much of her. Without her mother to mediate, it hadn’t been easy.

‘Well, whatever.’ Anita’s lips tightened. ‘It’s not as if he could have expected you to follow in his footsteps.’

‘No.’

‘There are so few women in the ministry—none at all here—and his work was very demanding.’ Anita frowned. ‘He put so much of himself into his work. Your mother said you were often on your own.’

Megan caught her breath. ‘We didn’t mind.’

‘You didn’t.’

‘Are you saying that my mother did?’

Anita sighed. ‘Laura was a wonderful, vital woman, Megan. Of course she minded.’ She paused. ‘Particularly as your father didn’t have to do as much as he did. All those missions to African countries, for example. Why didn’t he ever take your mother along?’

Megan stiffened her back. ‘She didn’t want to go.’

‘That’s not true. To begin with, she’d have gone anywhere with him to try and make their marriage work. The trouble was, he wouldn’t let her leave the parish. You must know your father preferred to travel alone.’

Megan swallowed. ‘What are you implying?’

‘I’m not implying anything, Megan. I’m telling you that your mother was not wholly to blame for what happened. If it hadn’t been my father it would have been someone else, can’t you see that? She needed company; companionship; love.’

‘She seemed happy enough until she came here.’

Anita gave a wry smile. ‘Oh, Megan, you’re a woman now. Can’t you understand what I’m trying to tell you? Your mother wasn’t—wasn’t the evil woman your father tried to make her. She was just lonely, that’s all.’

‘And your father took advantage of that!’ exclaimed Megan bitterly. ‘Oh, Anita, we’re never going to agree on this. Can we just—change the subject, please?’

‘If you insist.’ But Anita looked a little disappointed now, and Megan wished she’d been a little more forthcoming about her work. At least that was a safe subject, despite what she thought about her relationship with Simon.

‘Anyway,’ Megan continued, ‘Remy said you practically run the hotel single-handed these days. I think he said your father had retired.’

‘Oh, God!’ Anita took a deep breath, and then, as if she couldn’t sit still any longer, she got to her feet and paced about the room. ‘If only that was true.’

‘What do you mean?’

Megan was confused now, and Anita turned to give her a strangely bitter look. ‘You don’t know, do you? Remy never told you? Well, of course, he couldn’t. He doesn’t know the truth himself.’

‘Told me what?’

‘That his grandfather’s very ill?’

Megan shook her head. ‘No.’ She moistened her lips. ‘I—I’m sorry to hear that.’

‘Are you?’ Anita’s tone hadn’t altered, and Megan wondered why she was looking at her with such a wealth of emotion burning behind her eyes. ‘Yes. Maybe you mean it. For his sake, I hope you do.’

‘Anita!’ Megan’s hands gripped the arms of her chair. ‘What is it? What’s the matter? Why are you looking at me like that?’

‘He’s dying, Megan,’ replied the other woman tremulously. ‘That’s why I rang you, why I begged you to come. I’ve been carrying the burden alone for so long, and I—I need someone to talk to, to share the pain.’

‘But Remy—’

‘I’ve told you, he knows his grandfather is ill, but that’s all. I—I couldn’t tell him the truth. He and his grandfather are so close. He’s going to be devastated when he finds out.’

‘Oh, Anita!’ Megan got up from her chair then, and almost without thinking how her stepsister might react she went to her and put her arms around her. ‘Anita,’ she said again as the older woman clutched at her with desperate fingers. ‘I’m so sorry. If there’s anything I can do, you only have to ask.’

It was little wonder she had slept fitfully, thought Megan now, throwing back the sheet and sliding her legs out of bed. Such sleep as she had had had been punctuated by dreams of her father and mother, and her own encounters with Remy, who apparently was unaware of how ill his grandfather really was.

Biting her lower lip, Megan crossed the floor to the windows and, unlatching them, stepped out onto the balcony. Even at this hour of the morning the temperature was warm, and a little sultry, too, the clouds hanging over the horizon a lingering reminder of the rain that had come in the night. Megan had heard it pattering against the panes, and it had reminded her of how she and Remy used to go hunting for crabs after a storm when they were children. The pools that had dotted the shoreline had been a source of all sorts of exciting mysteries, with seashells and other flotsam capturing their attention.

Propping her elbows on the wrought-iron rail, Megan gazed out now at a view that was still disturbingly familiar. Beyond the paved walks and exotically planted gardens of the hotel, white coral sand edged an ocean that was fringed with foam. Seabirds swooped along the beach, always scavenging, and in the distance the tide turned to mist against the rocks. It was all inexpressibly beautiful—a tropical paradise that was no less magical than she remembered

Or was it?

Certainly, her father would have said it had its serpent. The wonderful holiday island he had found had turned into a nightmare for him. She knew he would not have approved of her coming here, consorting with the enemy. Even if Ryan Robards was a very sick man. That didn’t excuse his behaviour of years before.

Yet she couldn’t deny feeling a certain compassion for the man. She was not a vindictive creature by nature, and although she would not have chosen to see her mother’s husband again she did have sympathy for him. And, after all, before her parents had separated, she had regarded Remy’s grandfather as a kind of surrogate uncle. He had been kind to her in those days. Had his affection only been a means to get close to her mother, as her father had said?

Whatever, in the beginning, Megan had looked forward to their holidays in San Felipe with great excitement. She remembered the girls at the exclusive day school she had attended had all envied her those yearly trips to El Serrat. She hadn’t even been too upset when her father hadn’t always been able to accompany them, though later on she’d realised that that was when her mother’s affair with Ryan Robards had begun.

She’d been eight years old when she’d first come to the island, and almost fifteen when her parents had divorced. She had no idea how long her mother and Ryan Robards had been conducting their relationship; she only knew that her father had been the one who had been badly hurt.

What had always amazed her was how her mother could have allowed herself to become involved with someone like Ryan in the first place. All right, he was fun to be with, but compared to her father he was brash and insensitive, and lacking in any formal education. Indeed, in the early days of their relationship, Megan could remember her father laughing about some expression Ryan had used in error. He’d described the other man as a philistine, although Megan hadn’t understood then what he had meant.

Looking back, she conceded that there must have been more to what had happened than she’d imagined. No one gave up almost twenty years of marriage on a whim. She’d been far too defensive of her father to listen to any explanation her mother might have given her. She’d been totally prejudiced, she acknowledged, not prepared to give her mother a chance.

After the divorce, Megan had never gone back to San Felipe. She’d seen her mother from time to time, but always at some neutral location. Then, six years after Laura had married Ryan, she had developed an obscure form of cancer that was incurable. Although she’d been treated in a London hospital, and Megan had spent a lot of time with her, the looming presence of her new husband had prevented any real reconciliation being made.

Not that Megan had seen Ryan then, nor afterwards at her mother’s funeral service. She had been too distressed herself, too concerned about her father, who had taken his ex-wife’s death very badly, to pay any attention to either Ryan or Anita. Afterwards, after the cremation, she’d learned that Ryan had taken his wife’s remains back to San Felipe to be scattered in a garden of remembrance there. It had been the final bereavement so far as Giles Cross was concerned—the realisation that there was nothing left of the woman he had loved.

His death some six months later, in what could only be described as suspicious circumstances, had left Megan completely alone. She had been in her final year at college, and to learn that her father had died from an overdose of the painkiller he’d been taking for some time, and with whose properties he was perfectly familiar, had been the final straw. She’d dropped out of college after his funeral, and rented a cottage on the Suffolk coast, spending several weeks in total isolation. She’d been trying to come to terms with her life, trying to understand how a man who had loved God, and to whom he had professed such allegiance, should have become so depressed that he’d taken his own life.

Eventually, loneliness—and the need to get a job—had driven her back to London. The vicarage, where she had lived for most of her young life, had now been occupied by another incumbent, and the few possessions left to her had had to be rescued from storage. What little money her father had left had been used to furnish a small, rented flat in Bayswater, and she’d initially got a job in an advertising agency to try and put some order back into her life.

It was soon after that that she’d run into Simon Chater again, and their eventual collaboration had led to her leaving the flat and sharing a house with him. It suited both of them to project a united image, and the fact that they both had their own rooms was no one’s business but their own.

The sun had risen as she’d been musing, and, straightening, Megan stretched lazy arms above her head. There was no doubt she was feeling better this morning, but it was time to remove her scantily clad figure from public view.

She decided to have a shower and get dressed, and then take a pre-breakfast stroll along the shoreline. Anita was taking her to see Ryan at ten o‘clock, but that gave her plenty of space. She refused to admit she was looking for a diversion. Good Lord, Ryan wasn’t a monster, he was a very sick man.

By the time she had had her shower and dressed in cream silk shorts and a matching vest it was still barely seven o‘clock. Slipping her feet into soft leather loafers, she surveyed her appearance critically. She didn’t really want to wear make-up, but a touch of blusher and some lipstick seemed mandatory. She looked so pale otherwise, and she had no wish for her stepsister to suspect she hadn’t slept.

The lift hummed silently to the ground floor, and when she stepped out into the marble foyer she was surprised to see that there were already guests about Obviously, judging by their attire, they belonged to the indefatigable band of joggers who insisted on taking their exercise whatever the weather. For her part, Megan preferred to confine her activities to the gym.

Continental breakfast was being offered in the lobby in a small bar divided from the rest of the area by a vine-hung trellis, and, grateful to be anonymous for once, Megan helped herself to a warm Danish pastry and a cup of black coffee. Carrying them across to a small table, she settled herself by the window, deciding there were advantages to being here, after all.

She garnered a few interested glances from the men who passed her table, but for the most part she was left in peace. And it was pleasant sitting in the sunlight, with air-conditioning to mute the heat, munching on her apricot Danish and watching the world go by.

‘I see you couldn’t sleep.’

She hadn’t seen him come into the lobby, if indeed he had just arrived at the hotel, and his lazy greeting caught her unawares. Child-like, she had tom the pastry apart and saved the apricot until last, and Remy discovered her savouring the juicy item, her lips moist and her fingers sticky from the fruit.

‘Um—jet lag,’ she mumbled, stuffing the rest of the apricot into her mouth and licking the tips of her fingers rather guiltily. ‘Where did you come from anyway? I thought you said you lived in town.’

‘I do.’ Remy glanced behind him, then raising a hand, as if to impress her to stay where she was, he strode across to the buffet table and helped himself to a coffee. He was back almost before she had swallowed the remains of the apricot, swinging out the wicker chair opposite and straddling it, its back to the table. ‘I thought I might join you for breakfast.’

Megan’s eyes widened, but she tried not to let him see how his words had affected her. It was hard enough coming to terms with his appearance. In a beige silk shirt and the trousers of a navy suit, the jacket looped carelessly over one shoulder, he looked vastly different from the beachcomber she had met the day before. He looked—unfamiliar, she thought fancifully: dark, and enigmatic, and mature. And he was watching her with disturbing closeness, as if those tawny eyes could actually read her thoughts.

‘I’m flattered,’ she said, trying to keep her tone noncommittal. ‘But how did you know I’d be up?’

‘Jet lag?’ he suggested, turning her words back on her before taking a mouthful of his coffee. And when her brows arched in disbelief he gave a grin. ‘I hoped,’ he added, with rather more diffidence. ‘Of course, I didn’t think I’d be lucky enough to find you here.’

Megan grimaced. ‘Well, I admit, I never can adjust to the time change. I doubt I ever will.’

Remy folded his arms along the back of the chair and regarded her with a wry look. ‘Any minute now you’re going to tell me you’re too old to change. Come off it, Megan, anyone knows a five-hour time lag takes some getting used to.’

Megan shrugged. ‘If you say so.’

‘I do say so.’ He propped his chin on his wrist. ‘Did you have a pleasant evening after I left?’

‘Very pleasant, thank you.’ Although that wasn’t quite the description she would have used. ‘Your mother and I are old friends. It was good to see her again.’

‘I bet.’ But Remy’s expression was suddenly guarded. Then, as if overcoming some inner conflict, he said, ‘I wished I could have stayed.’

‘Yes.’ But Megan didn’t make the mistake of saying, So do I. She had no wish to rekindle those disturbing moments from the night before.

‘Believe it or not, I enjoyed our conversation,’ he continued evenly. ‘I guess you’re not what I expected, after all.’

‘Why?’ Megan was intrigued. ‘I thought you said I’d hardly changed.’

‘Physically, you haven’t, but I’ve decided you’re much nicer than you used to be. You were quite a little prig when you were younger.’

‘I wasn’t.’

‘You were.’ She suspected he was teasing her now, but she didn’t quite know how to deal with him in this mood. ‘You always thought you knew everything,’ he insisted. ‘I thought you were a smartarse, if you want the truth.’

Megan gasped. ‘Well, thank you.’

He grinned. ‘It’s my pleasure.’ He paused. ‘Of course, as I said before, you’ve much improved. You’re much more feminine for one thing. I’ll never forget those khaki shorts you used to wear.’

Megan flushed. ‘They weren’t khaki. They were fawn. And all the church Scouts wore them.’

‘Not the girl Scouts, I’ll bet,’ retorted Remy, laughing. ‘Of course, you always wanted to be a boy.’

‘I did not!’

Megan was defensive, but she couldn’t deny that she had been a bossy creature in those days. It came from being an only child, she defended herself. And the suspicion that her father had wanted a son.

‘Well, you weren’t exactly a little angel,’ she declared now. ‘You practically frightened the life out of me when you put that frog in my bed.’

Remy chuckled reminiscently. ‘It was only a little frog,’ he protested, but Megan wouldn’t have it.

‘When it jumped out of the sheets, I nearly died.’

Remy grimaced. ‘Well, thank goodness you didn’t. I dread to think what your father would have said if he’d known. Which reminds me, I never did thank you for not telling him. And you were a lot nicer to me after that,’ he added irrepressibly.

‘I wonder why?’ Megan pulled a face at him. ‘I’d forgotten what a disgusting little boy you were.’

Remy’s eyes darkened. ‘Have I changed?’ he asked with sudden seriousness, and Megan coloured.

‘I hope so,’ she said, trying to keep the conversation lighthearted, but Remy chose to put her on the spot.

‘I mean it,’ he said. ‘Have I changed a lot? I’m interested to hear what you think.’

Megan sighed, suddenly aware of the dangers of getting too close to him. ‘Of course you’ve changed,’ she said hurriedly. ‘You’re sixteen years older to begin with.’ She paused. ‘Your mother’s very proud of you, you know.’

Remy regarded her through narrowed lids. ‘Is she?’ he said carelessly. ‘Well, that’s some consolation, I suppose. But it doesn’t really answer my question.’ He grimaced. ‘I doubt your father would have been so reticent about what he thought.’