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And it wasn’t just that release of tension that followed sex.
It was as if something deep inside him had shifted, unlocked, opened. But then he had opened up to her, she thought, remembering last night’s revelation. She glanced over to where he was lounging on his side, his head propped up on his elbow, one finger chasing flakes of laminated pastry around his plate.
Not that she saw Trip as in any way defined by his ADHD. It would take so much more than four little letters to sum up the man in front of her. But it made sense of that fizzing energy and force that seemed to radiate from him. And there were other things too that were probably explained by the neurological make-up of his brain, like his impulsiveness and those sudden bursts of intense focus.
It was a part of who he was, like Lucas’ ability to hear music inside his head, and she could no more imagine Trip being any other way than she could envision the ordeal he’d had in the jungle.
And what had she done? Nothing. Not a thing. She had sat and stared at the news bulletins. But it was as though her head had been filled with mist. Everything had been muffled, except her own voice inside her head telling Trip that she wouldn’t care if he never came back from Ecuador.
Those words had haunted her for weeks.
‘I shouldn’t have said what I said when you left. About not bothering to come back. I never wanted that, but you hurt me and I wanted to hurt you. So I said things that weren’t true.’
‘You said a lot of things that were true too.’ Now he stretched out a hand and took hold of her wrist. ‘I was selfish that day, and thoughtless and I hurt you and I hate that I did that. I wish more than anything that I hadn’t done it—’
He meant the way he’d ended things, she told herself quickly, not that he’d ended things. Although it would be so tempting to think that was what he wished when his eyes were holding her captive and there was no distance between them any more.
‘I wish I could change things, change the past—’
She could hear the regret in his voice, and another note she couldn’t quite put her finger on. But she understood only too well the anguish of remorse and wishing to have done things differently.
‘Not all the past,’ she said quietly.
Her skin tingled as he looked at her for another long moment. ‘You’re a good person, Lily.’
She glanced past him to the clock by the bed. It was Tuesday morning in New York. The second Tuesday of the month. Lucas would be talking to his therapist. Picturing him, scrunched up in a chair, she felt the crushing weight of her guilt. She wasn’t a good person at all, but, unlike Trip, her failings were not in the public domain because her father had used his influence to make the mess she had made shrink to the point where the consequences of her actions amounted to little more than a talking-to.
‘Too good for me,’ Trip continued. ‘And I know I messed up your plans, so I’d like to make it up to you.’
‘And how are you planning on doing that?’
Her abdomen tensed as he leaned forward and kissed her shoulder.
‘I have an idea. But I’m open to suggestions.’ She heard the smile in his voice and when he lifted his face, she saw that his eyes were bright with a heat that she could feel inside.
‘Let me hear your idea first,’ she said quickly, shivering as he bent his head and kissed the side of her throat.
‘I thought I might take you to England.’
‘England?’ His mouth was moving lower and she was finding it increasingly difficult to form sentences.
‘We could fly there today. You could show me around Oxford. I know how much you wanted to go, and I want to take you. Would you let me do that, Lily? Would you let me do what I want?’
He was sliding down the bed and now she felt his warm breath above the cluster of curls between her thighs.
‘Yes,’ she said hoarsely, and then he was parting her legs and she arched against his mouth and she couldn’t speak, couldn’t think because her mind was nothing but heat and hunger.
They arrived in Oxford the following morning.
After the open hills of Tuscany, the city felt hot and airless.
‘I forgot how many tourists there are in the summer,’ Lily said, gazing out of the window of the car at the people crowding on the pavement.
‘We’ll fit right in, then.’ Trip pushed back his fringe and pulled a ball cap onto his head. ‘We have a map too.’
She laughed as he produced it with a magician’s flourish. ‘I don’t need a map. I lived here for over a year.’
‘I know but it’s part of our disguise.’ He gave her one of those megawatt smiles then and she felt her heart contract. It would take more than a map and a ball cap to make Trip disappear into the crowd.
