Roxanne Claire - Barefoot by the Sea

Misty-eyed, she nodded.

He stroked her hair, cupping her cheek. “You have no idea how much I would like to offer you something else.”

“There isn’t anything else, is there?”

“I’m afraid not.”

She closed her eyes, but it didn’t hide the hurt.

“You don’t want to live that way,” Ian said, mustering a truth he didn’t want to say. Then he couldn’t stop himself from adding, “Do you?”

For a long, long moment, she stood still and silent. In that time, the gnawing and angst in his gut dissolved completely, transforming into—hope.

Then she dropped her head against him. “How can I?”

Easily. Happily. In his arms and in his life forever. “You can’t,” he said. “I could never ask you to.” Except that in his heart, he had asked a hundred times. And every time, the answer was the same.

She looked up at him. “We have a little time left.”

“A week or two. How do you want to spend it?”

She smiled slowly. “Naked.”

“That can be arranged.”

“With you speaking in an accent.”

“Quite feasible,” he said with a pronounced British clip.

“And when we’re alone and you’re…inside me?”

He waited, not breathing, knowing what she wanted. With each passing second, he was more certain. She wanted a baby. And, good Lord, he would give her that.

“Tessa,” he finally said. “I can’t stand to have another child in the world that I don’t know. But if you really—”

She silenced him again with her hand. “I don’t want a baby, Ian.”

“Now, I know that’s a lie.”

“I don’t. That’s what I realized with the shell. I thought a baby would solve everything, but that’s not what I want at all.”

“Then what do you want?” he asked.

She smiled and let out the softest sigh. “The same thing you do…a family.”

His jaw loosened. “Then—”

Shaking her head, she put her fingers over his lips. “I can’t do that. I can’t live a lie or in secret. But I do want one other thing from you.”

“Anything.”

“When we’re alone, in bed, in…each other, I need to call you by your real name.”

He exhaled softly, unable even to think of the stupid amount of happiness that gave him. Instead, he kissed her pretty mouth and fell a little deeper in love with a woman he could have, but never keep.

She couldn’t avoid them forever. After several days and nights of lame excuses, Tessa finally accepted the invitation to meet her best friends for a quick drink at the Toasted Pelican. She arrived on her own, a little late, and headed straight to their favorite booth in the back.

The three of them were already deep in conversation with drinks, though only Jocelyn had anything with kick in it. The tension of their first real long talk had Tessa’s stomach in a knot of nausea. She couldn’t slip, not one little bit, not one word, not one hint.

Even though every night since she’d known the truth about Ian—John, John—she’d been wrapped in his arms, in his bed, in his real world as he’d opened up and shared everything. Each tidbit was a gold mine of discovery—he’d gone to Cambridge!—tarnished by the fact that she could never share this with her three closest friends. Every kiss, every night, and every morning she felt closer to him, all overshadowed by the fact that in a short amount of time he’d not only disappear from sight, but his very existence would be wiped away.

But she knew enough about how that man felt about his children to accept that fate.

“Well, look who crawled out of the sack for some girl time.” Zoe slid over and made room for her. “We were just talking about you.”

“Don’t you have anything better to do than gossip about my love life?”

“Actually we were talking about your wedding,” Lacey corrected. “And wondering if maybe we’ll be having a real one sometime soon?”

Yeah, they would. In a few days, as a matter of fact. “Not likely,” she said, looking around for a waitress.

“I don’t know,” Jocelyn said playfully. “I saw you two kissing good-bye the other afternoon outside the restaurant.”

“And you didn’t answer the door when I knocked this morning at seven-thirty,” Zoe said.

A good defense was her only offense. “Since when have you ever been up at seven-thirty in your life?” she demanded.

“I had a sunrise balloon ride to see off,” Zoe said. “And since I can’t go up until Junior is born, I had nothing to do and you were the only human I know guaranteed to be awake. Alas, no answer. I didn’t knock on John’s door.”

At seven-thirty? They’d been awake. Wide awake and making love. “I was in the garden.” Might as well start the lies now, even though that made her belly flutter. “Is there a waitress around? I need a drink.”

“She’ll be here,” Jocelyn assured her. “And you don’t have to lie, sweetie.”

As a matter of fact, she did.

“We’ve all been there,” Lacey said, a tad patronizing. “The first few weeks are the best.”

Zoe gave a loud tsk. “Speak for yourself, Lace. Oliver and I still have the glow and I’m knocked up.”

Tessa looked up to the ceiling. “Give me strength. And a drink.”

“All right, we’ll lay off.” Jocelyn turned a legal pad around so Tessa could read the twenty-seven line items on a classic Jocelyn Bloom To-Do list. “We have work to do.”

Thank God. “I don’t see any check marks or cross-offs, Joss.”

“Let’s get on that, then.”

Tessa agreed, grateful to read the list and follow the conversation to ideas for how to entertain the VIPs with spa treatments, balloon rides, and every luxury amenity they could dream up.

But all she could think about was Ian. The depth of his kiss this morning. The laughter in the shower together. The tender way he—

“You’ll need some kind of father-daughter moment.”

Tessa yanked herself back to the table. “What?”

“I went over the checklist on the AABC site,” Jocelyn said, pointing at item number nine on the list. “You know, to be sure we cover everything these consultants want to see in a destination wedding. Apparently, the father-daughter dance is huge to them.”

She felt the color rise and almost pumped a fist in relief when she saw the waitress and waved her over.

“Obviously your mother isn’t going to be here,” Lacey said, “but do you have some music we can play that reminds you of your dad?”

Your Cheating Heart? Me and Mrs. Jones?

“No.” She looked up at the waitress, head buzzing along with a roll of unexpected queasiness. All this lying was actually making her sick. “Just…an ice water,” she said.

“Nothing at all?” Jocelyn prodded.

“Water’s fine.”

“I meant with your father.”

“I don’t. I don’t…” Even have a father. “I can’t…”

“Honey, what is it?” Lacey asked, reaching across the table. “You are pale as a sheet and, oh my God, you’re shaking. What’s wrong?”

Her throat closed as she looked from one to another. “I’ve been lying to you.” The words actually felt good on her tongue, but, holy hell, now what?

They continued to stare, all of them waiting—for the truth.

“Well, that’s not like you,” Jocelyn said after a long, awkward moment. “Want to come clean?”

She did, but she couldn’t. “Um…I would, but I can’t.”

“You can’t.” Zoe leaned closer. “But you will.”

This was all it took? Fifteen minutes in the Toasted Pelican with her three best friends and she was ready to spill the beans? What kind of promise had she made? How flimsy was her loyalty to Ian? How could she expect to withstand the pressure when he disappeared and they demanded to know what happened?

“Tess.” Lacey squeezed her hand. “You know we’re here for you, no matter what.”

She nodded, grabbing hold of that absolute unassailable fact.

“We always have been and always will be,” Jocelyn added. “We love you, so no matter what you want to tell us, it’s okay.”

Tessa waited for the classic Zoe zinger but only got a heartfelt smile. “We’re your family, baby girl. And we don’t pass judgment on each other.”

It all welled up, erupting like a little emotional Vesuvius. “I have a secret,” she admitted with a catch in her throat. “And I don’t know how to tell you guys.”

Zoe moved closer. “You simply tell us. The same way we do everything.”

They were her family. They were the one real, true, forever family, these three beautiful, honest, trustworthy women and, by extension, their loved ones. They were all she needed, which was good, because they might be all she ever had.

But she could not betray her trust to Ian.

“I lied about my parents,” she finally said. “And I’ve been carrying around this secret since we met in college.”

They exchanged a look of surprise and all three, whether they realized it or not, closed in a little like a tight circle of support.

As Tessa looked around and chose her first words to finally tell them the secret she’d kept about her mother all these years, the only thing she could think was just how lost she’d be without these three women.

Tessa didn’t open her eyes but stayed suspended in that magic pre-dawn bliss when sleep fades but reality doesn’t quite crash. Ian’s arm braced her against his body, one hand flattened possessively against her bare breast. His morning erection nestled into her backside, his thigh pressed against hers, his breathing soft against the top of her head.

She could stay like this forever.

Except that she couldn’t.

Opening her eyes, she guessed sunrise about a half hour away based on the pale blue light sneaking between the cracks of the shutters. Without moving at all, she let her gaze drift down to the powerful forearm that locked her in place, studying each individual golden hair and the deep purple tattoo that swirled over his skin.

He’d teared up when he’d told her about all those nights in Singapore, when his personal hell drove him to drink and ink, as he called it. Even his lilting British accent hadn’t masked the torture he’d been through.

Life in a witness protection program was no picnic.

And yet…

Her heart climbed up its familiar path into her throat, as it did every time even the whisper of the possibility blew through her mind. He’d never really asked her to go with him—not like on-one-knee kind of asking—but she knew what Ian wanted. If she said yes, then…

She’d give up her life. She’d give up her gorgeous gardens and fabulous friends. Just thinking about the three women she considered “sisters” made that lump in her throat even bigger. When she’d told them the real story about her parents, it had been nothing but anticlimactic. True to character, Jocelyn was fascinated, Lacey was sympathetic, and Zoe called Ken Donnelly an asshat.

And that made it even more devastating to even think about leaving. How could she do it? Explain before she left? Write a note? Disappear? They’d move heaven and earth looking for her, and that was exactly what Ian didn’t want to have happen.

Their story was worked out, more or less. When Henry gave Ian the word—which could be any day now—he’d take off for Canada and Tessa would miss her lover, but blame his departure on wanderlust and her heartbreak on a bad choice of men. Quietly, the UK government protection people would have the secret marriage annulled and no one would be the wiser. The girls wouldn’t know the wedding hadn’t been “fake” because they’d sign the certificate away from everyone, with only the mayor as witness.

Then, Ian would go—somewhere—with his beloved Shi and Sam, and Tessa would…

“You’re upset.”

The words startled her, spoken by a man she’d have sworn was sleeping. “How could you know that?”

“Heart rate goes up.” He gave her left breast a soft squeeze; she’d forgotten he had his hand there. “Muscles tighten.” He rocked into her thighs. “And, of course, that heavy sigh was a dead giveaway.”

Had she sighed?

His hand traveled up her chest, over her throat, and rested on her cheek, stroking under her eyes. “At least you’re not crying.”

“Why would I cry?”

“Because you’re getting married tomorrow and the whole thing is a—”

She whipped around, not able to bear him calling it a sham or charade or fake-out one more time. “That’s not why I’m upset,” she said. “I know what we’re doing and why.”

He searched her face. That gentle, appreciative light in his blue eyes always made her feel like he was seeing her for the first time. And he liked what he saw. “Then what has you all tense?”