Callum hated the beach. However hard he tried, sand always got everywhere, and the sea was rarely warm enough to make swimming enjoyable. He couldn’t understand why Claire spent so much time down there, either with the kids or friends or simply on her own with a book.

As he sat alone in the kitchen, he wondered if a freezing swim was now exactly what he needed – to feel the surf crashing over him, washing away his thoughts, extinguishing whatever it was that had been ignited. Life was suddenly chaotic, out of control – exactly the way he didn’t like it.

Goddam that fucking girl!

The others had gone out while he sat and went over and over what had happened last night. He needed to get it straight, but he couldn’t remember it all. What he did know, though, was that Rain was entirely culpable for what had happened. What time had he gone to bed? He needed to get that right. Sometime after midnight, he reckoned. Asking Claire was tantamount to admitting he’d had a skinful (which he had), but the booze was only to numb the dull conversation. Why did they insist on dragging up the past continuously?

Whatever the reasons for Rain setting upon him like she did in the night and what happened next, he was certain it was all because of this stupid reunion – not to mention the pressure he was under at the hospital. A job like his didn’t leave room for this kind of thing. He had enough to deal with without teenagers throwing themselves at him.

Callum gathered himself, breathed deeply. He was a good man – a neurosurgeon with a reputation to uphold – and this was just a little blip. Everyone had one from time to time, didn’t they? No stupid girl was going to ruin his life, he was certain of that. He had a family and a career. He was solid. Solid as a fucking rock. She’d come into his room uninvited, made him take her clothes off – pretending to be helpless when she was clearly quite the opposite – and then forced herself upon him, refusing to leave. If it came down to it, it was her word against his.

At least the news of Patrick discharging himself had taken the heat off Rain’s whereabouts last night. How would he explain being taken advantage of by a teenager? No one would believe him. Not that the girl’s irresponsible mother seemed particularly bothered. Maggie was as stupid as her daughter. Always had been.

In fact, the only one he’d ever hit it off with in their group was Claire. From the moment he’d set eyes on her as a kid, he knew there was something about her, something rare and special, something untouchable that he’d… wanted. Had to have. Was it so wrong to notice her uniqueness when she was just a child? Back then their age difference had been too great, he knew that. But now, her at nearly forty, him approaching fifty… a decade was nothing.

Goddam! He thumped the kitchen table.

What had actually woken him? Had he even been asleep? He remembered soft skin and hair brushing the length of his naked body, alerting him to either the best dream he’d ever had, or that someone had actually got into his bed.

It certainly hadn’t felt anything like Claire.

Where had his wife been anyway? Some rubbish about not wanting to leaving Shona alone at the farm…

Callum forced himself to remember, go over all the details. He’d taken a coffee up to bed to help sober up, but the room was still spinning when Rain had come in. She’d not even knocked, had she? No. Of course she hadn’t.

Marcus…?

Seconds later, he’d felt a hand sweeping lightly over his body in the darkness – a hand that couldn’t take him quick enough, he decided. A hand whose delicious movements made him feel like the most desirable man in the world. A hand with the gentlest touch ever. Then he’d reached out and gripped her wrist, hearing her slurred voice.

Do you like me…?

He wasn’t even sure the words had been real or that she was even there, convincing himself that it could still be a dream, that he wasn’t actually doing anything wrong – let alone encouraging her.

You’re beautiful…

He felt himself respond to her touch – any man would react the same – and then he remembered the fullness of her lips on his neck, his ear, his mouth. She was so very sweet, her naked body folding lightly over his like the whisper of a silk sheet. He looked up at her, felt soothed by her in a way that Claire could never make him feel, until her young smile, flashing through the darkness, transformed into something else. A shocked look when she realised… but by then it was way too late.

‘Russ, come!’ Callum yelled. He scraped back the kitchen chair and stood up, whipping the dog’s lead from the hook by the door. Russ skidded to his master’s side. ‘Walk,’ he snapped, thinking it would have to be a bloody long one.