Trusting a Stranger (6 page)

‘Ah, the wedding business,' he said.

He sounded sceptical. Hayley understood that. Many men were sceptical. Many grooms-to-be, too.

‘It's the business side of it that interests me more than the weddings,' Hayley said. ‘Taking photographs really is the only thing I'm good at. There are only a few ways to make it into a liveable income. And I didn't want to work for a newspaper and always be on the go chasing stories.'

He looked surprised. ‘You didn't? I had you figured for the type who would prefer that sort of adventure.'

‘I've nothing against adventure. I don't want it to be my whole life.'

Hayley thought about it for a minute. His quick judgements were intriguing, and a little irritating as well. Particularly when the judgements he made about her didn't seem complimentary.

‘Why did you think that of me?'

He shrugged, a movement of his shoulders that seemed to take in her and the whole of the kitchen, and the house beyond.

‘Well,' he said, ‘you're here, and that's no random accident of fate. You chose to come.'

‘You're here too.'

‘I don't believe in fate. And I'm not here on Tomasi business. I'm here because it's my home.'

‘Isn't that fate?' asked Hayley.

‘No,' said Ethan. ‘It's family.'

She had the sense that this meant a very great deal to him.

‘I didn't know anything about the Tomasis. Well, I've spoken to Alvaro over the phone. I didn't know he might shoot me!'

‘You could have guessed that they're trouble.'

Hayley didn't want to admit that she was less intuitive about people than him.

‘Maybe I did,' she said.

He got back to the tomatoes, this time moving to another chopping board and quickly dicing them. Hayley was beginning to get the idea that there was nothing the man couldn't do. He was a far more competent cook than she was.

‘Tell me about your work,' she said. ‘From the way you handled a gun earlier, I thought you were in law enforcement. And you're a great cook. Is there a tomato security squad at work hereabouts?'

Ethan laughed. ‘Corporate business,' he said. ‘I've learned to shoot a gun but only in defence. Until today, I've never needed to use it. How is your arm?'

‘It'll be better in a day or two,' Hayley said. ‘I've never been shot before but this is just like a graze really, and I've fallen off plenty of bikes.'

‘A bike riding wedding photographer,' Ethan mused. ‘And you won't admit to being the adventurous type. I suppose that means you must be romantic.'

‘Why must I be any type at all?' Hayley demanded hotly, before she realised he was mocking her again, although gently.

‘I'm not remotely romantic,' she insisted, a moment later.

He raised an eyebrow in her direction.

‘If anything, I'm the opposite of romantic,' she continued. ‘I've never even almost been married and I never will be.'

Now he looked downright disbelieving. ‘Every woman wants to get married,' he said. ‘Even Erica — even my wife — wanted to get married. She wanted to do it while hang gliding, but she wanted to do it.'

‘You got married while hang gliding?' Hayley asked.

She caught a glimpse of her reflection in the nearby window and realised that Ethan did not have a monopoly on sceptical expressions.

Ethan laughed, shaking his head. ‘Erica thought of it,' he said.

‘She sounds wild.'

‘She was.'

‘So you're divorced?'

‘My wife died.'

Hayley's hand flew to her mouth, and she gagged at the feeling of too much onion juice against her skin.

‘Oh! I'm sorry. How unforgivable of me to forget. I suppose this is the right time for me to say sorry.'

‘You don't need to say that. You were shot at this afternoon. It's hard to remember things when you're in shock. Anyway, it was years ago now.'

Ethan turned away and began heating some olive oil at the base of a large pan.

‘I am sorry though,' she was starting to say, as she wiped frantically at her mouth with one of the paper towels.

He turned towards Hayley and reached out for the onions.

‘Don't be sorry,' he repeated. ‘I'm intrigued by the idea of a wedding photographer who doesn't believe in marriage.'

Hayley shrugged but didn't explain any further. The conversation had become intimate enough already, considering it was between two people who were not going to mean anything to each other in the future. It wasn't like this was a date or anything, like they had any obligation to get to know each other.

Once the onions had browned, Ethan threw in the tomatoes and then a few handfuls of basil.

‘How does this taste?' he asked, passing her a little of it on a wooden spoon.

Hayley sipped the hot sauce gingerly. It was delicious.

‘Mmmm,' she said. ‘And it's so simple!'

‘The nicest things usually are,' said Ethan.

Then he leaned forward suddenly, one finger outstretched, and touched it against her lip.

When he moved back she saw his fingertip was streaked with red. Sauce. Ethan moved it to his own mouth and sucked it in. Sauce from her mouth, to his. The gesture seemed small but also almost painfully intimate.

Hayley felt her knees grow weak and had to lean against the bench to steady herself. What on earth was she getting into? As though aware of her discomfort, Ethan backed off.

‘The pasta's just about ready,' he said, pointing to the largest of his saucepans. ‘Do you want to set the table while I drain it?'

Hayley opened one of the glass-fronted cabinets behind him and pulled out some chunky white dinner plates.

‘Three?' Ethan asked, apparently puzzled.

Hayley nodded. ‘Won't Katy want to eat?' she asked.

‘Katy,' Ethan repeated. ‘Oh yes. Of course. I'll keep it in the fridge until she wakes up.'

***

As they ate quietly, Hayley found herself looking around the room. Like the rest of the house, it was simple but beautifully decorated. The walls had been freshly painted in a shiny white, the floors were bare boards polished to a dull sheen and covered with Persian rugs in surprisingly subtle colours. Everything from the light fittings to the silverware at the table was at once obviously expensive and elegantly unadorned. Whoever had decorated had very good taste.

She looked from the place setting to Ethan's face and regarded him for a moment. He was eating with relish, obviously appreciating the simple, tasty food as much as she did.

‘You look like you're sizing me up,' he said, noticing the direction of her gaze.

Hayley rested her knife and fork together on her plate and touched the corner of her linen napkin against her lips.

‘I've been wondering about a couple of things,' she admitted.

‘Yes?'

‘Well, there's your piano. Do you play?'

‘It was my mother's. And her mother's before that. Do you play?'

‘When I can. Like photography, it's a hard skill to earn a living from. And I've wondered who did the rest of your interior decorating. Everything else here looks a lot more modern than the piano.'

‘Interior decorating?' Ethan repeated, sounding surprised. ‘You mean who bought my furniture? I did that myself.'

‘You have good taste.'

His surprise intensified. Apparently, this was something he had never thought about before.

‘I just bought the furniture I needed. I like to surround myself with things I like.' He turned his head to one side, looking at her speculatively.

Hayley felt herself blush again. It was as though he were sizing her up, working out if she was something he might feel he needed and liked. The feeling of attraction between them, a feeling that had sizzled outside, and begun to send out sparks in the kitchen, was making her decidedly uncomfortable.

She was not ready for heat like this, not with a man who she had only just met, who she still had lingering feelings of resentment towards, because he might be one of those men who had ruined her father, and whom she was never likely to see again.

‘I think it's time for me to go to bed,' she said, standing. She didn't generally like doing what she was told and it was important to her that she did something, even if as small a thing as choosing a bedtime of her own volition.

‘The room on the second floor? Just past Katy's?'

He had explained to her that the little girl was still asleep, and often had early nights.

‘I'll walk quietly.'

He stood, gentlemanly, and held the dining room door open for her.

‘There's a bathroom next door with fresh towels and a spare toothbrush in the cabinet,' he said as they began to climb the stairs. ‘Help yourself to anything you need.'

They paused at her door, Hayley's hand on the knob. She was acutely aware of Ethan standing before her so closely that her eyes were level with his shoulders. He was warm and at once strong and secure, at home in this place that she had already realised was the perfect setting for him.

‘Well,' she said. ‘Goodnight.'

For one stupid, long moment she was sorry she had insisted that her agreeing to stay was not the same as her agreeing to sex. Life had been a bit dull recently and if she was honest with herself, in coming here she had been after adventure as much as she had been after money to help with her father. If she had said something else, might she and Ethan be about to walk into this room, together?

She swallowed. Why was she allowing these thoughts, here where some trace of them might appear on her face? She wasn't the sort of woman that had one-night stands, and with her imminent departure back to Australia, and Ethan's pressing need to remain here, there was nothing else that they could have.

Ethan leaned towards her. She smelled his aftershave. Tangy and slightly woodsy, reminiscent of the cypresses through which she had prowled this afternoon. He brushed his lips against her cheek.

‘Goodnight,' he murmured.

Against her wishes, Hayley felt her body shiver, a movement that started in her cheek where Ethan touched her and spread down her throat and through her body until she swayed. She closed her eyes and gripped more tightly onto the doorknob. She did not like this. She did not like this control that Ethan seemed to have over her — or rather, that Ethan's body seemed to have over hers.

She did not like it at all.

She loved it.

No, she didn't.

‘Goodnight,' she said again, unnecessarily, as she twisted the doorknob around and pressed into the darkened room beyond.

A moment later, the light was on, the door was closed, and she was alone. Hayley leaned back against the wall and drew a deep breath as she considered her surroundings. It was a rather small room, built to the same dimensions, she suspected, as Katy's room, immediately downstairs. The walls were as white as in the dining room, and as freshly painted.

A wide, soft bed with fat welcoming pillows was covered with a throw of rough-woven white and pushed against the wall behind a spongy cream rug. There was a fluffy bathrobe draped over the end of the bed and a bookcase at its foot, once shelf bare apart from a clean glass and a bar of soap resting upon a fluffy green towel.

Ethan had obviously set this room up for guests, not necessarily for her. There had not been time today for all of this. Perhaps he was used to having people come to stay. Perhaps he was less of a recluse here than her experience so far had suggested.

Whatever it meant about his familiarity with guests, the details meant she could be comfortable.

Hayley was grateful for that as she slipped out of her skirt and blouse and into the bathrobe provided. Then she opened the door a crack and peeked out. There was no one around. Half-disappointed, she collected the towel and soap and made for the bathroom.

Only ten minutes later she was clean and ready to climb into bed. The room was warm, the window open. It was barred of course — Ethan was the most security-conscious man she had ever known, and now that she had heard the story about Katy, she understood why — but the shutters behind had been left open and, through them, moonlight streamed in widely over the floor. Far away, the ruins of an ancient amphitheatre were illuminated. She imagined the plays that would have been staged there once upon a time. All that ancient drama about good and evil and fate. The fate that Ethan said he didn't believe in.

Hayley had just pulled back the bed covers and felt that the sheets were indeed as soft as they looked when a piercing alarm rang out, splitting the evening.

Thump.

That was her foot on the floor. She span around, wide eyed and quickly retying the cord of the bathrobe that she had been about to let slide down off the bed. Then she ran for the door.

The light in the hall had already been turned on and was a straight, bright line beneath her door as she ran for it and flung it open.

There were footsteps, heavy ones, sounding on the stairs, going downwards and away from her. Ethan, going down to make sure Katy was all right.

Hayley darted along the hall, following.

She could hear the heavy footsteps moving on before her as she ran. Ethan wouldn't mind if she checked too, Hayley reasoned. He could hardly expect her to stay in her room while this was going on, still less that she might actually be asleep.

In a moment the footsteps would stop and another light would be switched on and she would hear the heavy wooden sound of Katy's door being opened.

But then the footsteps reached what must have been the landing below, and kept on going. Hayley paused at the lower, still dark hall, puzzled.

Katy's door was still closed. Katy's father was continuing to run.

It could only mean he had more information about the source of the alarm and was going there instead. Hayley regarded the closed door for another long moment. Ethan had said Katy was uninterested in coming down for dinner and that she was having an early night. The alarm was still shrieking. And the door was still closed.