Trouble in Paradise (Romantic Suspense, Completed)

Epilogue - Part 1

The shimmering sea stretched out in front of me, azure blue. A small sailboat floated past on the horizon, no haste, no hurry. The captain had all the time in the world. I trailed a hand over the edge of the sunlounger, letting a handful of near-white sand slip through my fingers. The sun beat down relentlessly from a cloudless sky as the straw umbrella over my head fought to keep me shaded.

My iPad pinged. I had a lot of emails to answer these days, but at least I could do it from some of the world's most stunning locations. I was just about to send a reply when a shadow fell over me.

"A beautiful woman should never be alone."

The voice was Russian, and the man it belonged to had to be at least seventy, although his budgie smugglers would still have looked dodgy on a man half his age. I struggled up to a seated position.

"Uh..."

"I'm having a party on my yacht. Please, join us?" He gestured to the row of scantily clad women lined up behind him.

Six months had passed, but nothing had changed. We might be in the Maldives rather than Egypt, but the men didn't get any less sleazy, they just got richer.

A growl from my side saved me from having to answer. "She's taken."

The Russian guy put his hands up in a half-hearted apology and backed off, trailed by his half-naked harem. Phew.

I shuffled across so Adam could sit beside me. He hadn't put a shirt on. Good.

"I love it when you go all caveman on me."

He nuzzled into my neck, dropping a row of sweet kisses across my shoulder.

"I can't leave you alone anywhere."

The tablet fell into my lap as I turned to kiss him. So far, his security team had done an excellent job of keeping the beach clear of paparazzi, but unfortunately, Russian oligarchs were beyond their remit.

"Then don't."

"Are you finished there?" He gestured at the iPad. "Because I've got something I'd like to do before we go out for dinner with the others."

"And what's that? Do you want me to run through your lines?"

"No."

"Give you a hand with your positioning?"

"No."

"Advise on wardrobe choices?"

He picked me up and threw me over his shoulder, and I grinned like an idiot as he carried me up the path to our villa.

"Ah, you want me to help with your fitness training."

"Keep your mouth shut, sweetheart. At least until we get inside."

I leaned on Adam's arm that evening as we climbed up the steps to the restaurant. Hopefully the other patrons wouldn't notice I was having trouble walking. Adam had introduced me to the pleasures of the reverse cowgirl, and I couldn't get enough of it.

He guided me through the door, one hand on the small of my back. Even though I was used to it now, his touch still made me shiver.

As did a lot of things about Adam. I was a mess of goosebumps. Thirty degrees Celsius, and people kept asking if I was warm enough.

Oh, I was warm enough, all right. Quite hot, in fact.

We'd eaten at Monty's a few times since we arrived on the island, and the food never failed to disappoint. The relaxed atmosphere reminded me of our time in Egypt, back when we'd just been Callie the schoolteacher and Adam the drifter.

How things had changed since then. In just six short months, my life had gone from mundane to extraordinary.

Had I truly found my paradise?

Women the world over would say yes, but I couldn't shake that niggling feeling that something wasn't quite right.

Adam had come home late on a couple of occasions, including once when he said he was staying overnight with a friend. But the friend was a fellow actor, and he'd been pictured falling out of a nightclub with a Z-list starlet at three a.m that same morning.

Then there were the times he hung up the phone when I walked into the room, and the emails he carefully shielded from my view.

Was he as into me as I was into him? Days like today, I'd say the answer was absolutely. But could it last forever?

Dammit, I needed to stop thinking about this before it consumed me. It wasn't easy, though. Bryce's betrayal had left me with trust issues, and Bryce had been a frog compared to Adam's prince.

Just enjoy your dinner, Callie. Focus on the good things.

Like Kat coming tomorrow. I'd been looking forward to her visit since she told me her plans two weeks ago.

"Mo's legs are well on their way to being fixed now," she'd said. "And we could both do with a break from the British winter. What better way to get it than to come and see my best friend in the whole world?"

I'd jumped at the idea. Secretly, I got a bit lonely while Adam was busy filming. The movie business sounded glamorous, but in reality, it was just a whole lot of standing around while the director kept changing his mind. I'd spent a few days on set, but people kept staring at me. Not just the crew, but Adam as well. Then he forgot his lines and the director got cross.

Yes, I was better off keeping out of the way.