‘You mean as if this really was a honeymoon?’ Imogen found her voice at last. ‘As if we meant those vows we’ve just taken?’

‘Yes,’ said Tom. ‘We’re not talking about forever,’ he added quickly. ‘As soon as we get back to London, we can forget about this time. We can pretend it never happened. But for now…now there’s just the two of us, and we can…we can love each other, just like we’ve just promised.’ He paused, looking down into her face, trying not to show how desperate he was for her to agree. ‘What do you think?’

Imogen’s fingers twined around Tom’s. It couldn’t last, he had said. We’re not talking about forever. She was going to hurt when it was over, when she had to go back to being his PA and greeting him coolly every morning.

But she was going to hurt anyway, Imogen realised. That was what happened when you fell in love with a man like Tom.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. She had wanted the perfect relationship. She wasn’t supposed to fall in love with a man who didn’t do love, who would give her two weeks and no longer.

But she had done it anyway, and wasn’t two weeks better than nothing? At least when they said goodbye, as they would in two weeks’ time, she would have some memories to treasure. That would be all she would have, Imogen knew. There was no point in hoping that the dream would last.

Find joy in each other, the celebrant had told them. She could choose that, or she could choose to be sensible.

Imogen chose joy. It would be temporary, like everything else she did, but it would still be joy.

And how else was she to resist him for the next two weeks?

Smiling, she tugged her hands from Tom’s to rest them flat against his chest and looked up at him. ‘I think it’s a very good idea,’ she said.

Tom stared at her for a moment, as if hardly daring to believe what she had said, and then his eyes blazed and an answering smile illuminated his face. Sweeping her into his arms, he kissed her fiercely, hungrily, and Imogen melted into him, warm and willing, her fingers clutching at his shirt to stop herself from dissolving with sheer pleasure as the heat washed through her.

Giddy with the glorious relief of being able to kiss each other, touch each other, the way they had wanted to all week, they sank down onto the cushions under the darkening sky, crushing the frangipani garland between them. The fragrance of the creamy yellow flowers enveloped them, while the boat rose and fell, and there was only the shush of water against the hull, the creak of wood and the occasional flap of the sail.

The crew talked quietly at the back, giving Tom and Imogen complete privacy, but they were aware only of each other in any case. Tom’s body was hard and heavy as he pressed her into the soft cushions, his hands sliding possessively under the yellow dress.

Imogen wrapped her arms around him and forgot everything else. She was sinking under a tide of heat. Every now and then she would surface, gasping, almost frightened by the need to touch him everywhere, feel him everywhere, and a tiny part of her would wonder if she was making a terrible mistake. But how could it be a mistake when his lips felt this good, when his mouth was this exciting, when his hands were moving over her, tracing wicked patterns of desire, and she was unravelling with the need for more, more, more…?

The stars were out above Coconut Island when they made their way back along the little jetty. Afterwards, Imogen could never remember exactly how they had got there. Ali must have taken them in the dinghy, she supposed, but all she remembered was the feel of the smooth bleached wood beneath her bare feet and the gentle slap of water against the posts. She was preternaturally aware of everything: of the silky dress whispering against her legs, of Tom’s warm grip on her hand, of her mouth still tingling, her body still thumping with desire.

It all looked so familiar, she thought as they climbed the veranda steps. It all looked exactly the same when it should be different. Everything had changed since they had walked down these same steps to see Ali waiting for them at the end of the jetty.

Then they had been boss and PA; now they were husband and wife.

CHAPTER NINE

EXCEPT that they weren’t, not really. Imogen’s steps faltered at the sudden moment of clarity.

Tom was behind her, nuzzling her neck as he guided her through the door and pushed her back against it so that he could kiss her again, his hands hard and urgent. ‘What is it?’

‘You…you don’t think we’ll regret this?’ she asked unsteadily, trying to hang on to the last shreds of rationality but it was hard when the feel of his lips on her bare shoulder was enough to make her inhale sharply.

‘We’re going to have to go back to working together,’ she reminded him with difficulty as he started kissing his way down her throat. ‘How are we going to do that if we…?’

‘How are we going to spend the next two weeks if we don’t…?’ countered Tom, smiling wickedly against her skin. His fingers had found the zip of her dress and were easing it down. ‘Let’s just forget work for now.’

Imogen shivered at the sureness of his touch. She had a hazy idea that it wasn’t going to be as easy as he made out, but she couldn’t think, not with his hands sliding over her, not with his mouth devastating the last of her defences, not with the heat pooling deep inside her. It spilt feverishly along her veins until she stopped trying to think at all and gave herself up to the deep, dark spool of desire, to the feel of his mouth and his hands and his lean, hard body.

The bed was wonderfully wide. It was like being cast away, with the deep thrill of knowing that they were completely alone. There was no one to see them, no one to hear them. There was just the two of them, entwined, where nothing mattered but touching and tasting and feeling.

‘Let’s just think about being here,’ whispered Tom in her ear. ‘Let’s just think about now.’

And so Imogen closed her mind to the future and did just that.

The days that followed stayed forever golden in Imogen’s memory. At one level, things went on much as they had done before. In the mornings they explored the reef, while afternoons were spent on the beach, swimming, reading or just lying in the shade and talking.

Often Imogen was content just to sit and gaze at the sea, marvelling at the intensity of the light, of the blueness and the greenness and the pristine whiteness of the beach. She would inhale slowly, savouring the wonderfully clean, invigorating smell of sea and sunlight, feeling the heat in her nose, watching the way the breeze made the palms sway and sent their tattered shadows dancing over skin and sand.

She had never seen things so clearly before, had never been intoxicated by smell and touch and taste the way she was now. It was as if all her senses were supercharged with Tom at her side.

The laptop lay unopened now, as Tom succumbed to the dream-like atmosphere of the island. He liked to get up early in the morning, when Imogen was still asleep, and walk down to the jetty, when the light was pearly and the lagoon was quiet and still.

Imogen preferred the early evening. She loved washing off the tingling, salty feeling of too much sea and too much sun, and changing into something loose and comfortable. Tom would have made a cool drink by then, and they sat on the veranda together, watching the sun set. A hush fell over the island then, and in silence they watched the sky flush pink, deepening with astonishing speed to a blaze of orange and scarlet, while the sea shimmered and they both remembered standing on the sandbar, promising to love each other for ever in the same glowing light.

Once it had faded, the tropical night dropped with a speed Imogen could never get used to. It was the signal for the cicadas to start whirring and they would sit on, waiting for the bats to come swooping past the veranda and spotting the little geckos that darted up the walls.

Imogen wished they could stay on Coconut Island for ever. She loved the colours, the smell of the dried coconut husks on the beach, the hot wind that soughed through the trees and ruffled the surface of the lagoon.

Most of all, she loved being with Tom. She loved the long sweet nights, the mornings when he returned from his walk to wake her with drifting hands, the afternoons in the shade. She loved every moment when he touched her, every second that she could reach out for him and find him there.

But beneath the pleasure she took in every moment lurked the knowledge that it couldn’t last. Imogen tried desperately to forget that this time would pass but, just when she least needed a reminder, some stern, sensible part of her brain would put up its hand and point out that the days were passing and that before too long she would have to go back to the greyness of London in March. Back to the squash of commuters on the Tube, coats steaming with rain, back to dripping umbrellas and Monday mornings. Back to being Tom’s PA.

There would be no more nights together, no more lazy afternoons.

No more loving.

Imogen would push the thought away, but the days passed in relentless succession and suddenly it was their last evening on Coconut Island.

Leaning on the veranda railing next to Tom, she watched the sun setting in a blaze of crimson behind the reef.

I’m not ready, she wanted to cry. I can’t face this yet.

But she would have to find a way to face it, and to reassure Tom that she hadn’t forgotten what they had agreed.

She turned her glass between her fingers. ‘Funny to think this is the last time we’ll do this,’ she said.

It was the last time they would watch the sun set together. The last time they would sit in the dark and watch the bats swoop and dive. The last time they would listen to the insects ratcheting up their whirring, creaking, rasping chorus.

The last time they would make love in that big bed.

She had known this time would come, Imogen reminded herself, squaring her shoulders. It wasn’t as if it was a surprise. She had known all along that it would come to this.

‘This time tomorrow we’ll be back in London.’

‘Yes,’ said Tom heavily.

He ought to be glad. He would be going back to the office, back to where everything was straightforward and he knew where he was. He would be in control of his life again, not like here.

It was different here. The sun and the sea and the quietness had worn down his defences, and he had forgotten the lessons he had learnt so carefully-to guard his feelings, to keep control. He had let himself relax and lose himself in Imogen. It had felt so right at the time but now Tom was beginning to wonder if he had made a terrible mistake.

At the time, it had seemed a sensible idea. Why spend another two weeks feeling frustrated when they could come to an agreement as two consenting adults? It was all going to be so easy. They had a definite time limit. There would be no awkward discussions about when or how to say goodbye. The two weeks would end, and it would be over. Simple as that.

But he hadn’t counted on how quickly he would get used to Imogen, to her laughter and her warmth and the wild, unexpected passion that had ensnared them both.

He hadn’t counted on the way his body would crave hers like this. He had always been so controlled, and yet now he had this constant urge to touch her, to slide his hands over her and taste the sun and the salt on her skin, to feel her smile against his throat.

He wouldn’t be able to do that any more.

Tom tried to tell himself that it would be fine, that he would have work to distract him, but whenever he tried to imagine sleeping without Imogen’s softness curved into him, or waking early in the morning and not being able to turn to her, he felt something twist uncomfortably deep inside him and a bleakness crept into his chest.

‘Perhaps it will all feel different when we get home,’ he said, hoping that it was true.

‘I’m sure it will,’ said Imogen brightly. ‘It’s been lovely, but we both know it’s not real. Real will be going into work on Monday morning, and dealing with everything that’s happened while we’ve been away. We’ll be too busy to remember anything but the fact that I’m your PA and you’re my boss.’

She seemed very confident, thought Tom, but why wouldn’t she be? They had made a deal that this would be a time out of time. He could hardly blame her if that was how she was treating it. It had been his idea, after all.

The sunset was as spectacular as ever, but Tom didn’t even see it. He was confused and uneasy at the way everything was slipping out of control. How had it happened? When had he started to feel like this?