A Wedding To Remember

“Dee Why,” Rory answered.

It was one of a string of beaches running north from the head of Sydney Harbour, but that was as much as Joanna knew about Dee Why. She had never been here.

“This is where I live now,” Rory added, turning the car into a driveway lined with palm trees and artistic clumps of other tropical plants. It led to a row of private garages, separated by white brick archways.

Expensive architecture. Expensive landscaping. It fitted with the expensive car, yet Joanna had difficulty in coming to terms with this new image of Rory. “You’re taking me to your home?” she questioned sharply, struggling to accept the evidence that Rory could now afford the luxury of living in what was clearly a block of very expensive apartments.

“I’d like you to see it.”

He threw her a grin that somehow reflected the intimate understanding they had once shared. Joanna’s heart did a treacherous jig. While she was still berating herself for being ridiculously affected by what could only be a memory, Rory parked the car and alighted.

Joanna sat in a feverish quandary as he walked around to the passenger side. She had serious doubts about the wisdom of being alone with Rory in his home. The more sensible course was to demand they go somewhere else. Considering the effect of Rory’s grin on her, probably the most sensible course was to leave him right now before he managed to confuse and disturb her any further with the powerful attraction he evoked with increasing ease.

Yet an irresistible tug of curiosity undermined all common sense. She wanted to know how Rory lived now. When he opened her door, Joanna found herself stepping out and saying nothing.

Rory led her into a grand foyer where there were elevators and a staircase. The patterned mosaic of tiles on the floor had the stamp of class. A fountain streaming over an artistic arrangement of modern sculptures made its statement, as well. Wherever Joanna looked, money, and lots of it, screamed at her.

Rory smiled as he ushered her into an elevator, his blue eyes dancing wickedly with the memory of their last elevator ride.

“Don’t try it,” she warned.

“Perish the thought.”

He pressed a button and linked his hands behind his back in an unholy demonstration of harmless innocence, while the smile stretched into an irrepressible and madly tantalising grin.

If he thought these accoutrements of wealth were going to change her opinion of him, he could think again, Joanna determined in bitter resolve. Money was not going to change one thing between them. It hadn’t swayed her judgement in the past and it wasn’t going to sway it now. Only the person counted, not what he or she had in material possessions.

Nevertheless, as they rode up to the top floor, Joanna had the uneasy realisation she felt more acutely alive than she had for a very long time. It was as though every nerve in her body was tingling with awareness, and every sense was tuned to the vitality emanating from her ex-husband.

It made her ask herself why she never felt like this with Brad. The answer came all too swiftly. Brad was safe and completely predictable. Almost boringly predictable. Rory might be many things, but he had never, ever, been boring. He provoked extremes of feeling as naturally as he breathed.

What she had to keep reminding herself was that many of those extremes were bad, so bad that in the end she couldn’t live with them. And that was why Brad was better for her. There was probably a penalty for every choice one made in life, Joanna decided, and boring was definitely easier to live with than bad. At least she always knew where she was with Brad Latham.

Despite this furious reasoning, the rest of Joanna did not demonstrate any sense of conviction. Both physically and emotionally she was experiencing an alarmingly high degree of anticipation, which heightened further when Rory led her out of the elevator and into his apartment. Was she such a foolish masochist she enjoyed putting herself in danger with Rory Grayson? Joanna wondered.

Her feet stopped dead at the entrance to Rory’s living room, and all the churning mental activity came to an abrupt end. In front of her was the re-creation of the picture she had once cut out of the Home Beautiful magazine, the picture she had shown Rory as her ideal dream living room. And it was all here, perfect in every detail, stunningly mind-blowing in its fantastic reality.

The cedar ceiling, glazed Chinese sandstone on the floor, terracotta leather lounges, white walls, Aboriginal paintings, Persian rugs, wonderful pots and urns with magnificent ferns spilling over them, a dining table of gleaming cedar, and the leather upholstered Italian chairs she had so admired, all of it flooded with light from huge expanses of glass facing the sea. Doors led out to a covered terrace where brightly cushioned cane furniture was set amongst potted palms and more greenery climbing around the archways that framed the view.

Nothing had been missed.

But how had Rory remembered it?

Had he kept the picture?

If so, why?

And why breathe life into her dream when it couldn’t mean anything anymore?

CHAPTER FOUR

“DID I GET IT RIGHT, Joanna?”

The soft question shivered through her. It was as though Rory was walking over the grave of their marriage, bringing it to life again. But it was dead. Dead! And Joanna didn’t know if it was terrible or wonderful, seeing this ghost of it in the fulfilment of one of her dreams.

She couldn’t look at him. She fought for a facade of indifference as she numbly accepted the glass of champagne he offered her. Her mind dazedly registered the fact he must have left her side to open a bottle, but she hadn’t been aware of it.

How much time had passed since her feet had faltered to a shocked halt? And why was Rory giving her champagne? Did he think he had cause to celebrate? Was he enjoying some ultimate sense of revenge in showing her that he now had what she had wanted?

“This must have cost you a fortune,” she said in a brittle voice, limply waving an arm to encompass the furnishings.

“The result was worth it, don’t you think?” he replied, still with that low throb of disturbing intimacy in his tone.

Joanna deliberately evaded giving a response, wary of revealing what she was feeling. Instead she asked, “How did you make so much money so quickly, Rory? It’s only been three years.”

“It’s because I can draw maps. Important maps. Or at least my computers can.”

“Maps?” Joanna frowned her bewilderment. “How is that connected to your market research?”

“With my demographic data bases, showing people’s requirements, I can demonstrate the most viable and strategic location where any business should be,” Rory answered matter-of-factly. “Do you realise how important it can be for a business to have that information?”

“Yes, but I still don’t understand how you could earn so much in so little time,” Joanna demurred, drawn into looking at him by his apparently blasé attitude towards his success.

His eyes gently derided the puzzlement in hers. “It’s not the time I spend on a job that’s important, Joanna. It’s the knowledge I have. A large corporation will spend half to a million dollars without blinking to access that data. It can mean the difference between failure and success. And I have a stranglehold on this market. I was the first into it, and no-one has been able to catch me.”

“So all the spadework paid off in the end,” she commented dryly.

His mouth twisted into a travesty of a smile. “Ironic, isn’t it? When we were married and together it was a struggle for me to survive in business from week to week. You had to support me. After you left me, it started to roll in in the millions, month after month.”

The open reference to their marriage stirred conflicting emotions. Joanna sought to hide them by lifting her glass of champagne in a toast to his achievements. “Congratulations, Rory. You’ve certainly done well for yourself.”

His eyes mocked the distance she was trying to keep between them. “Perhaps you did me a good service in walking out on me, Joanna. It concentrated my mind on making a success of something.”

“It must give you a lot of satisfaction,” she retorted lightly.

He lifted his glass and sipped the champagne before pointedly remarking, “Funny thing about money. When you don’t have it, you think it’s the answer to everything. When you’ve got more than you could ever possibly need, you find out there’s still something missing.”

Did he mean her?

She tore her gaze from the intense provocation in his and forced her legs to walk casually through the room. “But you must enjoy what you have here,” she said, indirectly seeking some clue to his feelings.

“Yes,” he answered, too briefly to reveal anything. He strolled past her, heading for a set of doors that led onto the terrace outside. “Sorry it’s such a grey day,” he tossed over his shoulder. “Normally this room is flooded with sunshine.”

To Joanna, it was a taunting reminder of what she had hated most about the apartment they had rented to keep living expenses to a minimum. The windows had been small and facing the wrong direction for any ray of sunshine to warm or cheer the place. She had stipulated to Rory that when they could afford to buy a home of their own, it had to have rooms with lots of sunshine coming in, and if possible, a view of...

“The view of the sea is better from out here,” he said, finishing her thought for her and gesturing an invitation to accompany him onto the terrace.

Joanna walked forward like an automaton, drawn almost against her will to see all there was to see, despite the inner torment it aroused. From the railing between the arches, there was a magnificent view of the sea and a long wide sweep of beach, as well. On a sunny day it would be glorious. Even now, with the sky overcast and threatening rain, it was still perfect to Joanna, precisely what she had dreamed of having.