“Okay.” Jules’s stomach tightened into a knot. This was it. This was where she learnt that Matt had an ex-wife, or possibly a current wife, and that for him, she’d just been a bit of fun. Ordinarily, she wouldn’t have cared. This was how she liked her romantic liaisons—no promises, no feelings, casual.

But that was before the beach when he’d wrapped her up in that beach towel and held her, before those sexy cheek kisses at Christmas, before the honest conversations and sleeping next to him, before a dramatic fall from a horse, throwing him into the path of a deadly snake.

For years now, Jules had liked things casual, but that was before she fell for Matt.

Damn it. I really am a goner.

Chapter 27

Chloe

“This is amazing!” Chloe had to shout above the sounds of the carousel, its music box trills as loud as any club she’d ever been to.

She and Archer were riding side-by-side horses, his going up as hers went down and vice versa. She was getting dizzy, but that may have been the two cups of Glühwein they’d had before the ride.

Winter Wonderland was “going off” as the Aussies would say, with thousands of fair-goers milling about the stalls, and the carnival rides blinking garish coloured lights and blaring tinny renditions of famous pop songs from the 80s. Archer had won her a particularly tacky stuffed reindeer with his shooting skills, something he credited to his time playing a sharpshooter in a gritty American Gulf War drama. The reindeer was perched in front of Chloe on her carousel horse; she’d named it Dexter, like Matt’s dog back home in Melbourne.

Eventually, the horses slowed, as did the carousel itself, and a booming voice asked them to exit on the left. Chloe wondered how there could be a “left” when they were on a giant circle, but she climbed off her horse and with Dexter under her arm, followed the others, including Archer.

Back on the thoroughfare, she noticed that the sun was nowhere to be seen and the milky light of twilight coloured the sky with a pale-yellow merging into a paler pink.

She stopped walking and grinned at Archer. “That was fun. I can’t remember the last time I went on a merry-go-round.” She earned a kiss for her enthusiasm and he slung an arm around her shoulder and pulled her close as they started walking again.

“Would you like to head back to the hotel now?” he asked, almost having to shout. Screams punctuated the air above them, and Chloe looked up to see a whirligig of a contraption, with people being flung from here to there in an instant. It looked like a blast.

Chloe tore her eyes away and looked up at Archer. Another ride, or more time alone with him? Maybe they could climb into that giant tub together? It was an easy answer. “Let’s go back,” she said.

“Oh, my god, are you Archer Tate?!”