Page 68 of Coming Home to Sturcombe Bay
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“I love this pub. Look at those beams on the ceiling. I bet they’re real. in most pubs these days they’re just fake.”
Liam managed a smile, though the minute he’d opened the door he wished he had taken Annabel for a drink in the hotel after their dinner date, instead of coming down to the Smugglers.
He should have guessed they’d be there. They were gathered round the pool table — Paul Channing with his latest girlfriend, Ollie and Lisa Cullen, and Cassie with the Greek god.
Fortunately, he wasn’t in his budgie smugglers. He was wearing grey jeans and a sleeveless white T-shirt that showed off his wide shoulders, and now that his hair was dry it was a gleaming gold, flopping over his forehead.
He was laughing, showing a row of even white teeth. His laughter and his voice were loud, booming over the music from the jukebox, drawing the attention of everyone in the room, butthe beaming smile on his handsome face earned him a friendly reception.
“Who’s he?” Annabel asked, clearly impressed.
Liam shrugged. “I don’t know. A friend of Cassie’s I suppose.”
Who was he? The accent — and those budgie smugglers — suggested Australian. And he’d come all this way to see her — that must mean it was pretty serious. So she’d probably be going back with him. Maybe she wouldn’t even stay for Tom and Vicky’s wedding.
And he’d watch her go, knowing that it had been inevitable that it would end like that.
The place wasn’t so busy now that the high season was over so Liam had an unobstructed view as the guy dropped an arm casually around Cassie’s shoulders.
“And she wins again! Any more of you Pommies up for a little bet on the next game?”
“If you’re going to try to con us into betting against Cassie, forget it,” Ollie Cullen asserted on a note of dry humour. “We’ve seen how lethal she can be with a pool cue.”
A loud guffaw. “Too right, cobber. You don’t play my girl unless you want your balls handed to you on a plate.”
Liam forced his mind away from the image of Cassie and the guy on the beach, making the effort to tune in to Annabel’s conversation. She was telling him a very funny story about how she had fallen into a swimming pool on a photo shoot, in full evening dress, complete with diamonds.
“The wardrobe mistress was almost in tears, but the photographer thought it was hilarious. He got a load of shots of me, soaking wet, my hair all in rat’s tails. And would you believe it, that was the one the magazine published!”
He laughed. Over by the pool table, the Aussie guy was telling his own funny story.
“So I was surfing off South Straddie. You can get some real awesome breaks up there — four, five metres and more. I’m coming down the barrel when I completely mullered out. So I come up, spluttering my guts up, and I can feel something tugging at my swimmers, trying to tug them off. I thought my luck was in, but when I look round it’s only a chuffing dolphin!”
“What’s the biggest wave you’ve ever surfed?” someone asked amid the laughter.
He grinned broadly. “Eighteen metres.”
“What? But that’s . . . damned nearly sixty feet.”
“Sure is. Greatest ride of my life. And it wasn’t even in Oz — it was right here in Europe. Portugal — Nazaré, not too far from Lisbon. There’s a kind of off-shore gorge running out to sea. When the Atlantic swell hits it, it builds up to colossal heights. In the winter you can get a surf of thirty metres.”
“Surely no one’s ever ridden a wave that big?”
He laughed, loud and cheerful. “Not yet, mate — the biggest one anyone’s taken would be around twenty-four, twenty-five. But you can bet your bottom dollar someone will. Oh boy, what wouldn’t I give to catch one like that.”
He was like a giant Labrador puppy, boisterous and happy and keen that everyone else should be happy. Cassie looked happy too, her face lit up with laughter.
Liam took a long swallow of his beer. He should be happy for her. Well, at least he would try. If this was what she wanted — this rumbunctious, roistering Aussie . . .
Meanwhile, he had to decide what to do about Annabel. It had been a pleasant evening. She was easy to talk to, and certainly easy on the eye. But . . .pleasant? That wasn’t nearly enough.
Well, she’d be leaving in a couple of days, off on another glamorous photoshoot in Fiji. Although from what she’d toldhim, photoshoots usually weren’t all that glamorous, even in exotic locations.
Nevertheless, she’d be leaving. He’d tell her before she left, explain . . . Oh lord, not that trite ‘It isn’t you, it’s me’. He’d have to find better words than that.
Over by the pool table Cassie was laughing, but he wouldn’t let himself even glance that way. He drained his beer and smiled across the table at Annabel. “Shall we go?”
