Genie saw red and stepped forward, plucking the cigarette right out from the other woman's fingers and dropping it to the floor. She stamped on it and then looked back up, blazing.

'I never knew my mother,' Genie told her, shaking inside with red hot fury. 'And right now I'm just glad she had the decency to leave me with someone who'd love me rather than do her best to screw me up. And you know what? You've failed. Spectacularly. Getting away from you was the single best thing Abel ever did, because in spite of you he's managed to grow up into the best man I've ever known.'

All of the pent up emotion she'd held deep inside spilled out right there and then for them all to see.

'You failed because he's good, and he's kind, and he's decent,' she said, her voice ringing clear and strong around the foyer. 'You failed because he's funny, and he's honest, and he's loyal.' She moved closer. 'But most of all, you failed because despite your best efforts, he's happy, and he knows how to make other people happy.' Genie turned at the touch of his hand on her shoulder. The look in his eyes told her all she needed to know. 'He makes me happy, and he'll make Lizzie happier than she's ever been,' she said, feeling the younger girl move to stand at her other side.

They stood there united, Genie in the centre, Abel's arm around her shoulders, Lizzie's hand clutching onto hers.

'You can leave now,' Genie said, her blazing eyes daring their mother to defy her.

For a moment it looked as if she might, as if she were scrabbling around for something clever to say. In the end she said nothing, just shook her head and stalked out as if it had been her idea to leave in the first place.

Beside her, Genie felt Lizzie begin to cry, and she turned and wrapped her arms around the younger girl.

'Sshhh, it's okay,' she murmured, holding her tight. Abel wrapped his arms around the both of them, kissing the top of Genie's head, resting his chin on her, comforting her every bit as much as she comforted Lizzie.

'You lied,' Lizzie said, taking a seat with Genie in the cafe again a little while later. 'He is your boyfriend, isn't he?'

Genie's eyes followed Abel as he chatted easily with the guy behind the counter.

'No. He isn't, but I wish he was,' she murmured, as much to herself as to Lizzie. How very much she wished he was hers.

Lizzie rolled her eyes in that way that teenagers do, as if they think adults are the dumbest people on the planet. She'd cried herself dry back in the theatre and seemed to feel much better for it.

'Ask him then. I'm pretty sure he'd say yes.'

Genie smiled sadly. 'It's not as simple as that.' She shrugged, struggling to summarise what had happened between them in a way that was suitable for teenage ears. 'Stuff happened with us... it's kind of complicated.'

She looked up as Abel made his way across to their table with three mugs.

'Hot chocolate,' he said, sliding a mug topped with whipped cream and chocolate sprinkles towards Lizzie. She grinned, scooping up cream with her finger and licking it with her eyes closed blissfully. Abel placed a cappuccino in front of Genie then pulled up a chair and sat down.

'So, Lizzie. You're never going home again,' he said, right off the bat. Lizzie's eyes opened wide. 'Unless you want to, that is,' Abel added, as an afterthought.

Lizzie shook her head. 'Oh my G.o.d, no! But where will I go?' She squared her shoulders, suddenly frowning. 'Will I have to go back into care again?' she asked, still far more a child than a woman.

'No way,' Abel said, straight to the point. 'Come and live with me.'

Lizzie gawked. 'In Australia?'

Abel nodded. 'You'll like it. The sun shines, and I live on the beach.'

Laughter bubbled up from Lizzie's chest as she clamped her hands flat against her cheeks. 'Can I really?'

Genie smiled when Lizzie's shining, excited eyes moved between them both. She looked younger than ever without the heavy make-up that her crying session had washed away, and already well on the way with that big brother hero worship thing. Genie loved him for the simple way he took Lizzie's fears and squashed them beneath his boots, and envied the younger girl so much that she could barely speak.

'I'll be back in a sec,' she said, sc.r.a.ping her chair back and heading quickly for the safety of the bathroom to take some deep breaths and pull herself together.

Abel watched Genie walk away with his brows knitted together.

'Is she your girlfriend?' Lizzie asked, stirring the cream into her hot chocolate with a long spoon. 'Because I like her a lot.'

Abel dragged his eyes back to his sister. 'No. I like her a lot too though.'

'I don't get it. You like her. She likes you. What's the problem?'

He didn't know how to answer that. There were lots of problems.

'Just drink your chocolate,' he said, softening his words with a small smile.

Lizzie sipped her drink and then set her mug back down, still eyeing him speculatively. 'She's pretty though, isn't she?'

Abel sighed. Pretty didn't begin to cover it. She was his kind of beautiful, he knew that now. 'I guess,' he said, cursing himself for sounding even more juvenile than his kid sister.

Genie re-emerged from the bathroom and he watched her pick her way lightly back towards their table, arching her back to squeeze between two chairs, reminding him of how she'd arched beneath him over the lamp. His body kicked in, appreciating the memory more than he'd like to admit. She'd surprised him back there at the theatre today. More than that. She'd awed him, and she'd humbled him with her protective strength, turning herself into a G.o.dd.a.m.n warrior princess right in front of his eyes.

He'd come to London all those months ago expecting to teach it a lesson, and instead he'd been given a master cla.s.s in life skills by Genie Divine. She'd had her own unconventional upbringing, and she'd taken it on the chin, run with it, and turned it into a life full of glittering positives. She'd never known either of her parents, and yet she remained the most secure person he knew, forging her own path through life, unenc.u.mbered by the crippling need to compensate for the shortfalls of others.

If she could do it, then maybe he could too, and maybe in time he could teach Lizzie the same att.i.tude. Jesus, he hoped so. Reaching for his coffee he knocked back a bitter mouthful and looked away as Genie sat back down.

Lizzie hugged Genie tightly outside the cafe a little while later. 'Will I see you soon?' she said, her dark eyes hopeful when she stepped back.

Genie looked quickly at Abel and then back to Lizzie. 'I'm sure you will,' she said brightly, putting her bag over her shoulder. 'And you can always call me.'

Lizzie felt around in her pockets for her phone. 'I don't have your number...'

'I have it,' Abel said quickly, not quite meeting Genie's eyes. She didn't let herself remember how sizzlingly s.e.xy it had been, writing her number onto his bare skin. It seemed a lifetime ago now. Would she still have let things play out between them as they had, if she'd known? There wasn't really any question. It was hard to regret loving someone when they'd made you feel everything more brightly and deeply and fully than ever before. The stars were more dazzling, desserts tasted sweeter; life was just bigger and better in every way for having him around. She knew this with certainty, now that he was here, however fleetingly, once again. Things may not have turned out how she wished they would, but she'd never regret him, or forget him.

The tricky bit was learning how to live on the opposite side of the world from him without crawling into bed and staying there forever.

'Genie,' he dipped his head now to brush his lips over her cheek in goodbye. 'I'll call you,' he murmured, tucking her hair behind her ear. She looked down at the pavement, choked up, nodding.

'Okay.'

She watched him walk away, and grew lonelier with every step he took.

Abel noticed the bookshop just around the corner and steered Lizzie inside.

'What are we doing?' she said, twisting to look up at him.

'Buying you books.' She'd mentioned earlier that she loved to read. He was already looking out for any opportunity to do kind things for her, to give her some of the generosity and thoughtfulness that he knew full well had been missing from her so-called home life up to now. 'A girl who loves to read needs books,' he told her. He pushed her forward gently. 'Go choose some. As many as you like.'

He stepped outside, leaving Lizzie happily browsing the new releases. Pulling his phone from inside his jacket, he tapped out the words he hadn't been able to say.

'You were amazing today. Dinner tonight?'

She didn't make him wait. His phone buzzed within a minute.

Around the corner, Genie sagged against the wall with relief.

'Yes,' she typed, pressing send.

'G.o.d, yes,' she whispered, tipping her head back and watching the clouds scuttle across the sky. 'Yes.'

Chapter Nineteen.

Genie climbed out of her cab in front of the same hotel where she'd met Abel way back when. If possible, she was even more nervous this time around than last time. She hadn't known him then, and she'd had an agenda.

Her only agenda tonight was to speak from her heart and hope that he'd listen.

She was early, mostly because she was running on anxious energy and couldn't bear to sit around. She'd dressed carefully and then changed twice, settling in the end for a long-sleeved black wrap dress and heels. It had been a close call versus turning up in jeans and tee shirt. She wasn't interested in dinner or small talk or candles. She just needed to hear his truths, to know whether she needed to try and work out how to live without him.

Would he be in the bar, like last time? Probably not, if Lizzie was with him. She walked across the marble floored reception and put her head inside the bar to check. A second later, the hairs on the back of her neck stood up. He was behind her, his hand on her elbow.

'Genie,' he said, and she turned to him, swallowing hard. He was alone.

'Where's Lizzie?'

'Upstairs. She's in the room next to mine with pizza, movies and a pile of new books. She looked all in, poor kid.'

'It's been quite a day for her,' Genie said. 'For both of you.'

He looked at her steadily. 'For all of us.' His fingers ma.s.saged her elbow. 'I thought we'd eat upstairs. Unless you'd rather...' he glanced around then stopped speaking when she shook her head.

'Upstairs,' she said, quickly. The kind of intensely personal conversation they needed to have wasn't for crowded restaurants or strangers' ears.

Abel's hand lay warm against the base of her spine as he led her to the elevator and stepped inside, leaning his back against the mirrors. Genie stood alongside him, her eyes on the ceiling as they both tried and failed not to remember the last time they'd been here. She could hear his breathing, slightly too fast, and only let her own breath out in a whoosh when the doors opened for them to step outside into the carpeted corridor.

Pausing for a second outside Lizzie's door, Abel leaned his ear towards it. 'All quiet,' he said, and then moved and opened the door to the next room along. Swinging it wide, he stepped aside for her to come inside with him.

'Are you hungry?' he said, throwing the key card into the pool of light on the lamp table.

Genie shook her head. 'Not a bit.'

He pulled a bottle of wine from the mini bar and poured a couple of gla.s.ses as she perched on the sofa. Taking a gla.s.s from his outstretched fingers as he drew near, she sipped from it gratefully, Abel sitting down beside her, not quite touching, but close.

How could it feel so weird and formal? They'd seen each other at their most exposed, yet they were as awkward as strangers. The air around them was heavy, loaded and tense, as if the whole place might go up if someone lit a match.

'I lied to you, Genie,' he said softly, breaking the silence.

She turned to look at him, braced for him to go on, not sure if they were on the verge of goodbye or the verge of forever.

'In the lift at the hospital, when I told you it was just f.u.c.king. I lied.'

Tiny little birds of hope fluttered behind her rib cage. 'You had your reasons.' Was she excusing him, or asking a question?

'Oh, I thought I did,' he said. 'I thought I knew you, but I didn't. I didn't know you at all. I was so h.e.l.l bent on separating you from your job in my head that I didn't let myself see the whole, real, beautiful woman standing right in front of me all along.'

He slid his gla.s.s onto the table. 'I see you now. I see you just as you are.' Taking her gla.s.s from her, he placed it next to his on the table then threaded his fingers through hers. 'I watched you handle my mother this afternoon, so brave and full of conviction, and I couldn't believe I'd been such a fool not coming back for you sooner. Every day back home I've fought the urge to catch the next plane. Your email... I came because of Lizzie, but I was always coming back for you anyway. I just needed to find a way to climb over my own stupid pride first. '

Genie stroked his fingers, studying them as he spoke, his words a balm over the lacerations that criss-crossed her heart. 'It was never you that needed to change, Beauty,' he said, choked up. 'It was always me.'

Genie turned to face him, and the expression in his eyes brought tears to hers too.

'You don't need to say these things,' she said, laying her hand against the warmth of his face, tracing over his cheekbone with her thumb. 'I've regretted that night a hundred times over, Abel. I pushed you, and I pushed you, and I had no clue how much I was hurting you. When I think of how you looked just before the ceiling came down...' she shuddered, hating the memory. 'I'm so, so sorry.'

He turned his lips into her palm and kissed it, resting his forehead against hers with his eyes closed.

'Don't,' he said. 'Don't say you're sorry. I don't want you to be.' He moved slightly, stroking his hand over her hair. 'I took what I wanted from you over and over again and then made you feel bad for it. I was just so f.u.c.king greedy for you that I couldn't think straight.'

He kissed her at last, a slow, trembling brush of mouth on mouth, the raw tangle of emotion and relief and l.u.s.t as powerful as a punch in the solar plexus. Genie melted into him, loving his arms as they moved around her to hold her close, loving his mouth as his tongue slid slowly across hers, loving his strength and his humility and his heart.

'I should have told you that I loved you in that elevator,' he went on, lifting his head to look at her. 'I knew it, but I didn't say it. I walked away from you, just like she said I would.'

Genie held his face between her hands. 'Don't ever say that again,' she said, urgently. 'Your mother was trying to make you feel bad to cover up her own shortcomings. I won't let you take those insults on your shoulders, Abel, you hear me?'

He heard her, and he believed her, because he loved the way she lived her life with clarity and optimism. His defences were on the floor, and his need to hold her was sky high. He didn't care if he got the showgirl or the backstage sweetheart anymore. He finally understood that they were two halves of the same glorious girl, and he needed her curves and her laughter and her sanity to make sense of his f.u.c.ked up world.

'Come to bed with me,' he said, his voice rough with the need for her to say yes.

Genie took both of his hands in hers and brought his knuckles to her mouth, grazing her lips across them with her eyes closed. Her tears washed between his fingers, and he flexed his hands and held her face up to his.

'Don't cry any more, Beauty,' he said, thumbing away her tears, drawing her onto his lap to lift her into his arms. Any other time she might have protested, ever the independent woman. Not this time. She let him carry her to his bed, and when he laid her down she pulled him down with her.

'Don't let me go,' she breathed, her fingers working the b.u.t.tons of his shirt free and pushing it away from his body. She was delicate beneath him, gla.s.s-like; he knew he could break her all too easily. He'd tried to break her spirit, and he'd nigh on broken her heart, and yet here she was, giving herself to him all over again.

She had the biggest heart of anyone he'd ever met and, crazily, she wanted to give it to him. They'd f.u.c.ked, and they'd fought, but they'd never made love like this. He'd never made love with anyone like this.

Opening her dress, he lifted her out of it, leaving her lying on his sheets in scant black lace. Knowing that they had all night and that neither of them was playing to win any more stripped away the previous urgency of their s.e.x, exposing the tenderness and yearning that lay beneath.

Unclipping her bra, he swept the lace aside and held both of her hands in one of his own loosely over her head. He'd seen her b.r.e.a.s.t.s before. He knew what to expect, so why did he feel as if he were looking at her for the very first time? The lushness of her curves sent the blood rushing to his brain, blotting out every last thought that wasn't about the girl beneath him.

'I love the way you look at me,' she whispered, and he lowered his head to kiss her, taking the warmth of her breath into his mouth as she sighed with pleasure. He slid his hand down the column of her neck as her tongue moved with his, her back curving into a graceful arch when his fingers covered the soft roundness of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s.

'You're so incredibly lovely, Genie,' he said, letting his usually guarded thoughts tumble out against her lips. 'So f.u.c.king incredibly lovely.'

He felt her body respond to his words, felt her emotions deepen their kiss into something close to sacred. Her hands slipped from his and went around his shoulders, stroking his back, holding him to her.

'I want you, Abel,' she said softly. 'I've ached for you, here.' She moved his hand over her heart, and then down her body, between her legs. 'I ache all the time. I think about you, and I want you, and I ache.'

He nodded, kissing her eyes when she closed them. He knew, because he ached too.