Her voice sounds sad and heavy and it makes me turn my head to look up at her.  Is she sad about Roisin or because she just told me goodbye.

I can't tell but the look in her eyes is odd. Like there's something behind it, something she wants me to know but isn't sure if she should say it.  I wish she would fucking say it.  Maybe I'd have a single clue about what is going on here if she said it.

"Yeah, I probably should," I mutter before turning my head back round to gaze into the fire. The flames are graceful and slow-moving, and they comfort my eyes, which suddenly feel very heavy. 

She's right though, of course.  I should go home. Roisin would feel better if I was there. She needed me. Just like I needed her back then.  I should also go 'home' home and see Niamh and Ror, uncle Liam and aunt Breda — maybe even Mairead.  But there were lots of things I needed to do and should do.  It's just that throughout my life I'd never really been able to reconcile the things that I needed to do and should do with what I actually did. 

I should have asked her out that day in the cafe, but I didn't.  I should have asked Evelyn, who ran the art class, for Eloise's number so I could fix the things I hadn't done that day in the cafe, but I didn't.  I should have kept my mouth shut that day and not nagged my mum to take me to the fucking shops for a cone, but I hadn't done that either.  Mairead had thrown that at me for the first time when I was nine to remind me that everything was my fault.  Niamh had punched her for it but really what the fuck did I know? Maybe it was my fault.  Maybe everything was my fucking fault.

I should tell her about the first time I laid eyes on her for a start. What she had meant for me my entire adult life. How she had been a kind of counterbalance in a life full of bleak and shitty things.  I'd come to the conclusion that she'd been planted in my life at that point in my formative years in order to inspire me. To show me that perfection existed. Because surely if something as perfect as her existed then the world wasn't quite as bleak and shit as I'd always believed it to be. 

I should tell her how she'd been my muse without even realising it, without me ever really realising it.  I should tell her that I want her to leave him and come back to London with me because I can't imagine what my life would be now without her in it.

I should tell her I was in love with her. That I always had been.

Now I'm lying in her arms about to make the same mistakes all over again. But what could I do without knowing where her head really was? What should I do? It was to be her choice. She would have to choose.

Fucking hell, third chances don't happen. I never even thought I'd get a second chance.  It had occurred to me that I'd imagined her entirely. She couldn't have been like I remembered — as perfect as I remembered. I'd been wrong. I'm always fucking wrong.

She was more. More than my memory had been able to hold onto. I'd lost parts of her through the years mainly because it was impossible to remember everything about a person, even her. Even my mother was almost gone now. All that I had left was a faint memory of how she smelled, and how she used to stroke the inside of my wrist with her finger when she held my hand. If I tried really hard I could probably still remember the sound and tone of her voice.  Aunt Roisin's was similar, as was Mairead's, but my mothers had a deeper huskier tone to it that neither of theirs did.  My stomach clenches with something bitter.

Above me Eloise breathes softly and evenly, stroking her fingers through my hair. Her touch is comforting and it lulls me into an exhausted half-sleep. I feel content but after what she said I can't decide whether I should be depressed or not. Hadn't today been enough to convince her we were good together?  That I could make her happy? 

To me, it had been perfect. I'd done everything with her that I'd wanted to do. I'd made love to her when she'd woke up before we'd ate breakfast together. I'd watched her work all afternoon, her glasses on and her eyebrows knitted together in concentration as she'd tried to figure out some puzzle with her narrative.  

After I'd gone out for supplies we'd eaten lunch in comfortable silence, until I'd announced I was taking her out on a date tonight.  Even when she'd dragged me to a shitting Irish bar it had been perfect because it was with her.  Not that I had anything to compare it with, but I didn't want to compare it with anything. I didn't need to.  

Yeah, the date had been almost perfect. Right up until she asked me when the piece would be finished. That, I'd let get to me. I'd fucked her harder than I intended to for that.  For mentioning him.  For thinking about him.   I'd felt calmer after though.  Being inside her always relaxed and comforted me, made me forget things. 

I press my mouth to the freckle on her left hipbone and her fingers slide down my neck and begin to stroke and squeeze at my shoulder.  Go back home. How the fuck would that work exactly? It wouldn't. How can I leave New York without her? How can I leave her here?  With him. 

I know what'll happen too. I'll most likely drink or work myself to death.  On a positive note, losing her for the second time would do fucking wonders for my work, of that much I was certain.

Then I remember.

I haven't done everything I wanted to do with her yet. I lift my head and glance up and out the large windows behind us. The moon was bright and high and there was very little other light. It could work. I'd make it work.

When I sit up from her she gives me a confused look. Fucking hell, she looks incredible.  She always did after I'd fucked her.   Her hair frames her face; her cheeks pink and flushed against the pale flawless skin of the rest of her, the faint glowing light from the fire dancing off her body.  She really is a fucking masterpiece.

"Where are you going?" she asks.

I bring myself to my feet and stare down at her. "I'm going to get my camera and shove on some clothes. Then we're going outside."

"It's too late to go outside, and it's dark. What can you take pictures of in the dark?"

I give her a small smile, "You."

"Me?"

I nod slowly.

She practically springs up from the floor.  "Outside? You want to take pictures of me outside, naked?" She looks as shocked as she looked that day I asked her to take her dress off.  Shocked and a little turned on.

I give her another nod and bite my bottom lip as I imagine her outside, naked.

"Aidan, don't be ridiculous, what if someone sees? I can't," she shakes her head.

"And here was me thinking you weren't a prude?" I sigh.  She narrows her eyes on me and brushes a hand through her hair.  "We're surrounded by trees, no one will see," I add.   She holds my eyes a minute and then glances at the fire. She brings her hand up to her mouth to press her knuckles against her lips as she thinks about it, hard. 

I know what she's going to say before she says it.  I know she's going to say yes because I know she wants to say yes.  Like when she agreed to take off her dress.

I've come to realise that like me, Eloise has two sides of herself fighting for control of what she should do and what she wants to do.  I've known it since the day she kissed me, or maybe I knew it before that.  She does what she wants to do because she's listening to the part of her that's strong and wild like her grandmother.  When she doesn't do what she wants to do it's because she's convinced herself it's wrong somehow.

"If I get arrested for public indecency you had better have enough money to get me out?" She says looking at me.  I crouch down in front of her and take her chin in between my thumb and forefinger.

"Or I could just get myself arrested as well?"

She smiles, her eyes widening. "You'd get yourself arrested for me?  That's intermediate level romantic. You really are improving all the time."

I curb the desire to tell her I'd do anything for her and kiss her instead.  I part her lips with my tongue, and slide it into her mouth, tasting every part of it before pulling back.  When I do I find her eyes are closed and her tongue licking both her lips.  It makes my cock stir to life again. Later... I can have her later.  I need to do this.

"I'll be back in two minutes. Stay naked," I tell her.

She rolls her eyes on a sigh. "God, you get so bossy when you work. I'd forgotten about that," I give her a serious look and she brings her fingers to her head in a mock salute. "Yes Sir," she smiles before flopping back down on the floor, an excited and aroused look on her face.

The night isn't cold.  It's muggy and clammy, the air close and hot, the heat from the sun still leaching off the trees and grass and sky around us.  It smells faintly exotic, as is always the case when I'm anywhere new, completely unlike London or back home.  I carry the stool and my camera as Eloise, dressed in one of the oversized fluffy white bathrobes, follows behind me. 

"Maybe I should have put shoes on," she mutters. When I turn round she's stepping tentatively across the grass onto the large paving stones that lead down to the jetty.   I have an image in my head of what I want to do, but whether the light and the angle will work I honestly have no idea.

The small pier is lit by a tall, victorian-looking streetlight, which sits at the top of the steps illuminating the wooden structure jetting out onto the black lake. I stop at the top of the stairs and set down my makeshift tripod and turn to her.  She looks tense and a little nervous, her shoulders bunched up as she glances around us in all directions.

"No one can see," I say softly. 

When she brings her eyes back to mine she seems to relax, nodding a few times.  Her eyes look almost silver under this light - it amazes me how they do that, how they seem to change colour depending on her surroundings.  In natural daylight, her eyes were a soft pale blue. The less light there was the more the silver flecks stood out. The more artificial the light, the darker they appeared. 

"So, what are you going to do with me?" She asks with a small smile.  I raise an eyebrow and give her a perverted smirk. "Predictably filthy," she nods.  "I meant where do you want me?"  When I raise both my eyebrows this time she hits me on the arm but erupts into a soft fit of laughter.  "What happened to serious-at-work, Aidan?" she says when she stops laughing. 

"He's distracted by almost-naked, Eloise."

Her expression changes and she brings her hands to the front of her robe and very slowly unties it, letting the thing slide off her shoulders and down her body.  She catches it just before it hits the ground and as I reach out to take it from her she gives me a small seductive smile.

"So how distracted are you now?" She asks.  

I take a leisurely visual stroll down her body, running my tongue and then my teeth along my bottom lip as I take in the sight of her.  She looks hand carved.  Every ridge and curve of her body sculpted to absolute perfection.  The way her delicate pink nipples are hard and plump and screaming out for my mouth is a distraction of epic proportions. I've no words quite honestly. She never fails to stun me into silence.  There will never be a time when I'll look at her and not thank something I don't even fucking believe in for putting her in front of me. 

I can't let her go. 

"Pretty distracted," I admit, quietly. In fact, it comes out more like a growl. "But I'm a professional. Now go down the steps and walk to the end of the pier and stop.  Don't turn around."

She smiles again and takes a deep breath before turning away from me.  She takes the stairs down slowly and carefully and I have to bite down on my tongue to stop from groaning aloud at the sight of her walking away from me completely naked.  Her skin looks even paler under the moon, luminous and ethereal, and almost fluid in texture. A milky soft substance that could be liquid to the touch.  

I lower myself to the ground, placing the camera on the top step and lying flat on my stomach at the top of the stairs. The pier isn't very long, 10 feet at most, and by the side of it the small rowing boat rocks calmly.  There isn't a sound anywhere except for the faint noises of birdlife roosting in the dark of the trees and the soft padding of Eloise's feet across the squeaking wood. As instructed, she stops right at the end, hands by her sides and eyes facing straight ahead.  I drop my eye to the viewfinder and press my body into the ground as I set the shutter speed and narrow the aperture. 

The lake is pitch black through the eye of the camera, the sky only a few shades lighter, and then there was her.  Illuminated by the moon.  She made a stark white lonely figure.  No, that isn't right. Eloise didn't look lonely. She never looked alone. She always looked to me like she was fully capable and more than happy to be by herself.  She didn't need anyone else.  It was everyone else who needed her.   It was everyone else, me included, who longed to be in her orbit. 

Maybe because when she looked at you or smiled at you and became aware of you, it made you feel like the luckiest person in the world.  She had the ability to make you feel more important just by noticing you.  She made you feel like you'd achieved something by capturing her attention.  Perhaps it was only that I'd strived so hard for her attention, that the sense of accomplishment at having it is what I feel now.  

Suddenly I want to sit down with the prick and ask him if he feels that way about her too.  If he realises how lucky he is to have her and to have shared his life with her for however long it had been.  Then I remember that since he's fucking Nicole Weston he clearly feels nothing of the sort. Undeserving prick. Yeah, that conversation would last about thirty seconds before I cracked him one in the jaw.

"I'm cold, Aidan, how long have I to stand here? Are you really just taking pictures of my backside?" She complains without turning her head.

"Your arse is fucking incredible can you blame me?"

"It's not my favourite thing about myself but each to their own." She shrugs.

"What is your favourite thing about yourself?" I ask as I lower my eye again.  I take a couple of shots of her bum while she mulls over her response.

"The inside of my left arm between my wrist and my elbow," she says. "What about you?"

"I like your hip freckle and your nose crinkle but I have a whole list ranked in order and sorted by categories and subcategories.  I'll write them down for you later if you want."

I see her shoulders move with a soft laugh.  "I meant about yourself."

"Oh right.  Well, I have a separate list for that. Actually, it's not so much of a list and more like a line from a good review I got once from The London Standard. Stand straight," I tell her and she does.  "Okay now turn your head, just your head, and look at me."

She twists her neck round over her right shoulder and smiles, but when her eyes meet mine the smile fades into something more intense and thoughtful.  It makes my chest do a weird tightening thing.  The look both scares me and makes me feel hopeful at the same time. It makes me wonder if she still thinks I should go home.  

For the next twenty minutes, she follows my instructions without a word of complaint.  Again proving she is, in fact, the perfect model.   In-between shots, new set-ups and poses she continues to give me that same intense look, the one that makes my heart rate speed up and my breathing feel precarious.   Though it occurs to me that she always makes me feel like that so why did this feel different?  

I'm not sure but it does somehow.  I return each look of them with one of my own.  Hopefully, one that conveys to her all of the things I'm too frightened to say out loud.

I vary the shots between angled ones from the top of the stairs, to angled ones from the ground up.  Then I place the camera on the stool and shoot downwards as she sits on the pier with her legs dangling off the side.  Unsurprisingly she looks perfect from all of them.  At one point I ask her to wet her hair and her body for me and she complies, leaning over the edge to cover her face and hair with handfuls of water.  The light is far better from some angles than others and I'm sure some of these will be completely unusable. Though it's not like I'm planning on using them for anything anyway. Except maybe crying over later. 

For the last set, I have her lie flat on the pier staring up at the camera. 

"Do you want the robe to lie on?" I ask, conscious of the rough well-worn wood against her soft skin.

She shakes her head, "No, I'm ok. They'll look better without."

I nod. They would. "After this set, we're done," I tell her as I lift the camera. I immediately curse the moon for not being brighter because I know instantly these ones would be incredible. They might still be. Maybe I should have shot her inside where I wouldn't have been so fucking constrained by the light.   Maybe I should do that anyway.  I want to film her too. 

Why did it feel like I was running out of time to do these things? 

Because she thinks you should go home. 

I stand over her, my feet on either side of her, and shoot the upper half of her body.  My mouth practically waters at the sight her breasts resting perfectly against her chest, nipples round and hard from the cold. As she gazes up at me she has that same expression on her face.  It's like the camera isn't there and she's just looking at me. 

"What are you thinking about?" I ask as I continue to click, stepping over her and walking around her to come and stand over her head.  "The way you stare into the camera is rare. Normally people who aren't professionals find it hard to relax as soon as they know someone's taking their picture.  You don't."

She smiles.  "Well, I think that has a lot to do with the photographer."

I move the camera away from my face and smile at her. "Well, I like taking photos of you."

"I like you taking photos of me," she whispers.

I hold her eyes for a long moment before bringing the camera back up.  I take a few more of her staring down the lens and then tell her to turn her head and focus on something else.  Light or no light these might be the greatest photos ever taken.  They could adorn album covers or prints that would sell the world over. But they never will. I'd never let go of them.

Then I'm done.

These last ones can't be bettered.  I'm certain of it. 

"How cold do you think the water is?" she asks as I help her up from the flat of the pier and wrap the bathrobe around her shoulders. 

"Fucking freezing." I pull the robe down and over her breasts, skimming my thumbs over them as I do.  She trembles slightly. 

"Scared?" She smiles up at me.

I frown. "You're not seriously thinking about going in there?"

She shrugs and turns her head to look out into the lake. "I've been staring at it for ages.  It's been calling to me. I feel like I need to go in."

"Eloise, you'll freeze."

She turns back to me. "Not if you come in with me I won't. Your body heat is abnormally high." Her mouth curls up at the sides showing straight white teeth. 

I stare at her dumbfounded for a moment before turning my head to look at the water.  Fuck sake. Water retained heat, right?  It was pretty fucking warm today.  So warm that I'd had to put the oversized table umbrella up while she was typing because I could see the tops of her shoulders and the back of her neck start to turn pink.

When I look at her she's doing the smile that makes my dick throb, that soft seductive smile that makes my body want to obey her every command.  I am actually doing this. With a sigh I walk back to the stool and sit down the camera, then I begin to strip out of my trousers.  She watches me for a moment before sliding the robe back off her shoulders again.

"I should maybe go in and get a couple of towels?" I suggest.  

When I turn round she's walking away from me toward the end of the little pier.  She doesn't answer me or look back and then with a swift smooth movement she raises her arms and dives gracefully down into the freezing black water.   

Something cold grips hold of me when she disappears underneath and I bolt to the end to wait for her to reappear, resolved to jump in if she doesn't come up in the next five seconds.  I pull off my T-shirt and toss it behind me just as she pops up out of the water.  She's about fifteen feet away breathing hard and fast.  "Jesus fucking Christ, Eloise," I snap, my heart thumping in my chest. 

"What?" She turns her body in the water and begins to swim back toward me.  "You coming in or not? It's really not that bad once you're in."

As my heart rate starts to slow back down I brush a hand through my hair and peer over the edge.  I can't see a fucking thing.  

"You can swim can't you?" Her breath is short as she comes to peer up at me.  She wipes her hand up over her face and hair and squeezes the end of her nose.

"Of course I can swim."

"Then what are you waiting for?"

I sigh and lower myself to sitting, hanging my legs off the end.  She takes hold of one of my legs, wrapping her arms around it pressing her mouth against the side of my lower calve.  "This was a stupid bloody idea," I grumble.

She smiles up at me sweetly, looking like some sort of sea temptress ready to drag me down to her lair.  I'd bloody go too.

"I know, but I promise I'll make it worth your while once you get in.  And the water's quite lovely."

My cock stirs as she gazes up at me through long wet eyelashes.  When I still don't move she lifts her head up from my leg.  "I let you photograph me naked, Aidan, for god sake.  Do this for me."

I give her a last long look and use my hand to lever myself into the water.  My last thought before I hit the water is the memory of a film I'd watched late one night about this lake.  One about a man-eating crocodile that lived in it.

Jesus fucking christ.

I'm suffocating. I'm being smothered to death by a million tiny ice picks.  Like fuck was the water quite lovely.  Along with the rest of my body, the remnants of the wine from dinner and my growing arousal are drowned instantly.  When I emerge from the ice-cold water I have no clue where I am or what day it is.  I open my eyes to find her floating next to me, smiling mischievously. 

"See, that wasn't so bad was it?" She laughs as she wades her arms through the water to keep herself afloat.

When I finally stop sputtering and wipe the water out of my eyes I shake my head at her. "You're insane."

A weird look skitters across her face before she nods. "But the upshot of that is that I can ascribe any emotion in a colour."

I frown, confused. "What?"

"Nevermind. So should we go for a swim?"

"I seriously thought this was about getting in, getting wet and then getting back out again."

She moves closer to me, wrapping her arms around my neck and pressing herself into my body. She's warm and comforting and she grazes against my frozen cock as she settles against me. I slide my arms around her moving my hand down her back to her arse, which I squeeze before pulling her into me. 

"Boring," she sighs. "You know, you always struck me as the wild, daredevil type," she smirks, clearly taunting me.

"That right?" I gaze at her mouth as she wraps her legs around my waist.  The water isn't that deep here, 5 and a half feet maybe, but we need to bounce slightly to keep our heads fully above it. 

"Mmmhm," she whispers moving her head closer to mine.  The space between her legs is still scorching hot, and gradually I feel myself begin to warm and heat under her. 

"Think you'll find I was the one who suggested shooting you outside, naked.  Telling me that's not wild and daring?"

"That's because you're a pervert, not a daredevil,' she whispers, lowering her mouth to mine.  She moans soft against my tongue and begins moving, grinding her body up and down the length of my cock. Even in pissing cold water in she feels perfect.  Against the tight wet heat of her, I feel my cock harden, straining, desperate to be inside her again.   

Like it knows it belongs there, like every other part of me belongs inside her.

"Fuck me," she commands, brushing her lips against my mouth. "Fuck me again, Aidan, please." 

I groan as she slides her hand down between our bodies and grabs hold of me, massaging it firmly between her fingers in soft tight movements.  Then, gripping onto my shoulders, she lifts herself up and pushes down onto me and I slide into her slick hot heat. Fucking hell.

"Fuck," I growl as I slide inside her.  She moans louder and sinks her teeth softly into the side of my neck, before sucking and kissing me there. Like everything she does, Eloise fucks me gracefully and elegantly, pushing and circling herself on top of my cock as she squeezes me from the inside. I'd never fucked anyone in water before her, in fact, there were a lot of things I hadn't done before her, but it was quickly becoming a favourite.  
Everything with her was becoming a favourite. I doubt anything would feel the same with anyone else. 

As I try and move us back to where the water is shallower and I can rest myself back against the wooden beams, her fingers continue to dig hard into my shoulders.  She weighs even less than nothing in the water, but I walk back very carefully across the lake floor, which is mainly soft and squelchy with the odd rock thrown in.  When I'm out of the water up to my chest, I stop and lean back, sliding my hands forward to grip the backs of her thighs.  She lifts her head from my neck and kisses me in long deep sucks on my mouth and tongue. When I change my thrusts, increasing my pace and force, her breathing changes immediately and the noises she's making get louder and almost desperate.  I'd put these noises up there with some of my favourite sounds in the world quite honestly.

"How does this feel?" I ask as I lick and nip at the hollow of her throat before moving my lips to her cheek.

"Good, so good.  Please don't stop."

I growl and thrust harder, pulling her deeper into me as I bite and kiss my way to her neck.   The desperation in her breaths escalates as she moans my name and tells me how good I am again.

"Am I better?" The question is out before I can stop myself.  I hear it spoken by a voice that sounds like mine and must be mine but I want to disown it immediately.  She pulls her head up and slows her movements but doesn't stop riding me. 

She looks confused.  Aroused and confused.  I'm about to tell her to forget it but something stops me and I keep my eyes on hers. I slow my movements but keep them deep, thrusting up and into her with force.

"Am I better?" I repeat. "Do I feel better inside you?" 

"Aidan... I...." she pants.  "Please don't."

"I want to know."

She moves her hands round to the front of my shoulders so that they're half gripping, half pushing at me.  I shift my own hands so that one is holding the bottom of her back, and bring the other up to wrap it around the back of her neck.  Then I pull her ear down to my mouth.

"I want to know if he fucks you as good as I do.  If he makes you come as hard as I do." My voice is low and a little angry as I continue to fuck her.  She moans quietly, desperately, and I feel her clench at me from the inside.  She begins to move a little faster, dropping her head into the crook of my neck. "Tell me, Eloise, tell me who's better."

Her body stills for a moment and her nails dig into me hard as I feel her body spasm, her insides clenching tighter with her orgasm. "You are," she whispers, finally.  "Everything is better with you, Aidan."

Her words draw the climax from me and I flood inside her.  I twist her head and kiss her hard, biting and sucking on the soft sweet cushion of her full bottom lip.  Everything was better with me. 

Well, I'll take that. 

Glad I fucking asked now. 

***

"I love waking up here," she mutters sleepily.   Her eyes are still closed and her lashes light and long on her cheeks.  I'd woken up before her again and watched her sleep again.  It was becoming a habit.  One I'm not particularly ready to give up. 

"So, wake up then," I say, stroking my hand down the outside of her arm.  I watch in fascination as a shiver runs over her whole body. 

She groans. "But I don't want to. That means we've one less day here."

"Think if we pulled our finances we could make Ted an offer?"

She smiles. "Not sure.  How much are they paying award-winning Northern Irish visual artists these days?" 

"Hmm, it all depends on how many bored housewives they can seduce into commissioning a piece of art from them." I chuckle.  Her eyes flip open and she punches me playfully in the chest.

"Your mouth is far too bloody smart, Foley."

I capture her hand and move across the bed and over her, pinning her arms above her head. "Yeah, but you fucking love it, Airens." I lower my head to kiss her but she turns her head and pretends to struggle for a bit before letting me capture her mouth. Her moan is soft and feminine and the sound of it settles something inside me. She has the ability to do that. Settle everything inside me. All of the emotions I'd managed to convince myself I didn't even feel.  She makes them manageable and ordered.   A look, a touch, a word. She makes a whole other set of emotions take their place. Everything is better with you.  

"I'm going to make breakfast. Hungry?" I ask, pulling back from her mouth.  She nods again, licking the taste of me from her mouth. 

"Starving actually," she smiles. 

"So many filthy thoughts... too fucking many," I sigh. 

"You are remarkably filthy."

"And you're remarkably fucking gorgeous first thing in the morning, tell me something I don't know." I lean forward to stroke my nose against hers. 

When I lift my head up her expression is dazed and a little distant.  She brings her hand up and begins tracing her finger slowly and softly around my mouth.  Starting in the middle of my top lip, she draws it clockwise around my mouth, watching her finger as it tickles its way around the edges of my beard.

"Why does it always feel like this with you?" Her voice is quiet and thoughtful as she stares at my mouth.

I try a smile but my heart is hammering hard beneath my chest. "What, you mean? Better?"

She lifts her gaze and looks into my eyes. Serious. "It feels like I'm... That this is where I should be. I don't understand it." She sounds genuinely bewildered.

Something weird happens to my entire body, it tenses and softens simultaneously as a loud bang goes off inside my head.  What the fuck am I supposed to say to that?   That it was supposed to be like this?  That this is where she should be?  That if she didn't realise that then I'd likely collapse in on myself? 

"I don't know," I say instead.  I drop my eyes to the freckle on her collarbone.  "I don't know anything.  I don't know what this will feel like tomorrow or next week.  I don't know what the fuck goes through your head when you're looking at me... or whether I even want to know."

She doesn't say anything for a long time.  "Aidan, I don't want you to think th—

"Are you still in love with him?" I cut in.  It's not the words I was expecting to hear myself say. Why the fuck do I care if she still loves him?  I really am a fucking sadist.  

"He's my husband." There's an odd look in her eye as she says this.  

"I'm aware of that, Eloise.  And what am I?   Am I just a distraction for you?" My voice is a little harder around the edges than I intend and I regret it immediately.  She doesn't look angry or hurt though and I soften my eyes on her.  

"Oh, you're a distraction alright," she says with a quiet sigh.  I can't tell how she feels about this. I don't know how I feel about this. She shifts and tries to move out from under my hold, but I press my body hard into hers to prevent her. 

"A distraction from what?"

She meets my eye again, her soft blue gaze burrowing into mine.

"Everything," she says.  "From the moment I laid eyes on you you've distracted me from everything.  Literally, everything."

I smile. "Could say the same about you/"

"Oh really?  The moment you laid eyes on me was when I insulted your work remember?' She looks embarrassed again like she does every time the subject comes up.  Oh if only she fucking knew about the first time I laid eyes on her.  But it wasn't the time to mention it.  We were making progress here. 

"Yeah, I remember." I press my hips into her, my dick nudging against the soft skin of her thigh.  "I wanted to drag you into the nearest bathroom, lock the door, and fuck your brains out for that." I lower my head and kiss the side of her neck, growling softly.

"Ah, so that was the look you were giving me?"

"You got that did you?" I place a soft nibble on her jaw.

"Well, I assumed the look was you telling me I was a rude ignorant bitch but good to know your come to bed eyes are similar," she giggles. "You might need to work on that."

I chuckle against her throat and kiss my way across her chest before I begin to move down her body slowly, flicking my eyes up to her face as I do. 

"I thought you were making breakfast?" She pants as I spread open her legs.

"I'm going to.  Right after I've eaten."

***

"Do you know you've made every single meal we've eaten together except one," she says as I flip over the pancake.  She's standing to my right piling coffee into the large silver coffee-pot, dressed in only the white shirt I'd worn to dinner last night. It's the best thing I've ever seen her in.  Even better than the green dress I fucked her in three days ago. 

"Two actually.  Last night I paid someone to cook for us. Kinda fancied the night off." 

She purposefully shoulder bumps me before sliding the coffee pot onto the machine and switches it on.  

Coming back to my side, she watches the batter bubble in the pan a moment before resting her head against my arm. We'd disagreed on every possible breakfast food until I'd suggested pancakes and her eyes had lit up.  As long as they come with butter and jam, she'd said.

"Is there anything you can't do by the way?" she asks. "You seem multi-skilled beyond belief sometimes."

"Lots of things I can't do."

"Like what?"

I pretend to think about it. "Walk on water, regenerate, fly, knit, eat marmalade,"

She laughs and the two of us stand in silence for a bit until I feel her hand slide around my waist, her fingers dancing across the bare skin of my stomach, her head resting against me.  I turn my head and kiss the top of hers, allowing the faint coconut scent of her hair to flood up my nose. 

"I really like it here," she whispers.

Me too."

"You were right last night.  We should just stay," she says turning her face into my arm. 

"Definitely think if we pitched in we could buy it."

She doesn't speak for a moment.  "I've been thinking about what would happen if I went back with you. To London," she says. My heart stops beating entirely. My breath freezes in my lungs and my throat closes up. I can't breathe. I'm afraid to talk. To say a single word that might knock her off track. "I've been thinking about how hurt he'd be and how much he'd hate me."

I take my time before answering, gathering my breath.  "Well, you know him a lot better than I do." I hope my tone is diplomatic. 

There are more bubbles in the batter now.  Time to flip. I want her to come back with me.  I don't care how much he hates her or how hurt he'd be. I don't want to think about her coming back with me too hard because it thinking about how it would feel when she didn't makes me feel sick.

"He'd despise me," she states. "And rightly so."

I don't know what to say to that so I say nothing.  She is thinking about leaving him.  The thought has crossed her mind.  Slowly, I turn to her and she steps back out from my body to look up at me. 

"Come back with me," I say. 

Bizarrely, I feel no cold drench of fear as the words leave my mouth. The words I'd wanted to say for days. I sound confident. The words forceful and strong as they cross the air between us.  I sound like I know what I'm talking about. I have no fucking clue what I'm talking about. 

Her mouth drops open and her eyes widen. 

"Aidan I—."

"I asked you earlier if you loved him. You didn't answer me.  Answer me now.  Do you love him? Are you still in love with him? I know he's your husband, Eloise, so please don't tell me that again. Tell me how you feel, what you want, whether you meant what you said last night about everything being better with me. Because if that's true then what the fuck is there to think about? It should be simple. For days I've tried to figure out where your head is, what this is, what I am to you, but I have nothing. So, I need you to tell me." I run out of steam and wait for her to say something.  She doesn't. And the look in her eye isn't doing a huge amount for my confidence. She looks nervous, guilty and uncomfortable.  "Eloise, just say it for fuck sake. I'm a big boy, I can take it."

I couldn't take it. I'm shitting myself. Why the fuck did I just ask it?  The only sound in the room is the music coming from some crappy music channel she'd stuck on when we'd come downstairs.  It's a song I'd heard a million times before in cafes and shoe shops.  The name of it escapes me now though. I don't want to remember it.

"Tell me. Do you love him?" I ask again. 

She continues to bite hard on her lip. Why isn't she saying anything? Is that a good thing? It's been hours since she said anything it seems.

"Well answer him, El, for fuck sake because I'd seriously like to know."

Her head snaps around immediately towards the sound of the familiar, nasal, cunt voice.  I take my time, staring her instead. At the side of her face, watching her expression transform and all colour and life drain completely from it.  

Then I turn to look at him.  

Ah, so he did have another expression other than smug, over-privileged prick.  Despite the look on his face, which from here seems to be a mixture of confusion, anger, and pain, I still feel my fists curl up by my sides at the sight of him. 

Well, this should be fucking interesting.