‘You should have left a message.’
‘Would you have called me back if I had?’
‘Of course.’
‘Sure about that? Because I don’t remember getting a reply to my email.’
Lily smiled and shrugged nonchalantly. ‘Well, I guess we’ll never know, will we?’
‘I guess not.’
‘So were you worried about me, Kit? Ah, that’s sweet.’
‘I wasn’t worried in the slightest,’ he said easily. ‘I merely wanted to talk to you. This seemed to be the only way of achieving that.’
‘I’m flattered.’
‘You should be. You were tricky to track down.’
‘I moved hotels.’
‘You moved islands.’
Lily took another gulp of her margarita. ‘Yes, well, these islands are small. My hanging around on Santa Teresa once my work was done might have looked a bit odd.’
‘It took me longer than I’d expected to find you.’
‘Are you after an apology?’
‘Would I get one?’
‘Not this time.’
Kit grinned that heart-fluttering grin of his and her stomach flipped in a way she didn’t like at all. ‘Didn’t think so,’ he murmured.
‘Couldn’t you have waited until I got back? I haven’t had a holiday in years.’
‘Patience isn’t one of my strong points.’
‘No.’ She paused and then gave it one last futile, she suspected, shot. ‘Is there anything at all I can do to make you go away?’
‘Not a thing.’
No, she hadn’t thought so. Lily sighed and resigned herself to the inevitable. ‘OK, fine. You win. But I’m not dressed for a chat.’ She certainly wasn’t ready.
He ran his gaze over her, so slowly and thoroughly that she felt as if he’d stripped her bare. ‘You look fine to me,’ he said, a little hoarsely she thought, ‘but perhaps you’re right. Maybe this isn’t the time or the place.’
Never and nowhere would be the right time and place in her opinion, but what could she do? On an island this size she’d never be able to avoid him, and hopping on the next available boat to the mainland wasn’t the answer because not only was running away immature, as Kit had just proved, he’d simply come in search of her.
Anyway, it would probably be fine. All they were going to do was talk, and talking never killed anyone, did it?
Besides, on one of the extremely rare occasions that Kit had flitted into her head over the last week she’d reflected that she’d been wrong when on her doorstep a week ago she’d told him they’d never been able to talk. Communication between the two of them had always been fine when there wasn’t much of import to communicate. The problems had only arisen when the stakes had been stratospheric, when emotions had run high and they’d felt exposed and vulnerable. It was then that they’d both gone into hiding and communication had become a four-letter word.
Tonight there wouldn’t be anything at stake. Kit might make her feel a bit on edge, and, God, he looked mouth-wateringly, spine-tinglingly hot in the white polo shirt, khaki shorts combination he was currently wearing, but she wasn’t emotionally involved. Not now.
And, actually, if he wanted to rake through the ashes of their relationship, that was fine with her because there were things she needed to tell him. Things she’d come to realise over the last five years. Things that she wanted to get off her chest and he ought to know.
She was much stronger than she’d been all those years ago, and wi