The Morning After (5 page)

“It was a long flight,” Ethan admitted. He knew what John wasn’t saying. That his love scene with Dee was lacking in passion.

“Well, here’s the thing…”

“I know, John. The love scene stinks.” Ethan ran a hand through his hair. Frustration kicked hard in his stomach. Dee Macey was one of the most beautiful women in the world. He sure should be able to at least act as though having her golden flesh sliding against his was arousing. But as he’d held her close, he couldn’t help but notice the lack of chemistry between them. There was no tingle as his hand slipped over her golden skin. No frisson as their lips met.

There didn’t need to be, of course. He was an actor, not Casanova. But the indifference that he felt for an attractive woman was new.

Maggie had forwarded the messages she’d received while they were in Ireland to his cell phone, and he’d called Alison and cancelled Thursday night’s date, saying he was tired after the trip. The truth was that he couldn’t get Cara out of his head—much as he tried.

“Take a break, Ethan. Have some coffee, go for a walk; we’ll shoot again in ten,” John said. “Love scenes can be difficult. You just need to relax, forget we’re all here, and focus on making it look as sexy as possible.”

Ten minutes later, Ethan lay on the bed and pulled Dee on top of him again. He stroked a finger over her jaw line. Stared at her full lips and imagined an unpainted pair with a soft bow in the top lip. “You’re one hell of a woman.”

Ethan deliberately infused his gaze with the requisite amount of smolder, angled his head for the perfect camera angle, and kissed her.

It was going to be a long day.

****

Three little words meandered through Cara’s mind as she woke.
The morning after.
The horrors of yesterday were over. Today was bound to be a better day.

After all, there was no work to go to, no urgent demands on her time. The best thing about working in a secondary school in Ireland was the three months of holiday every summer.

Cara stretched her arms over her head, and gazed out at the sliver of blue sky visible through the gap in her new cream curtains. It was a new day. A new start. And despite the trauma of the day before, she was strangely at peace with her new reality.

Now that Michael has erased himself so thoroughly from her future, the nagging feeling of indecision clouding her mind had burned off like mist under the heat of the sun.

The long, lazy days of summer stretched out before her.

The past few months had been hectic. Her job in the secondary school was a challenge, and it had taken long months to gain the respect of her class of fifteen-year-old boys. Moving from home for the first time had been hard work too.

Her grandmother’s cottage had been run-down and unlivable in when she’d begged her parents to let her renovate it. She’d painstakingly stripped the old wallpaper from the walls, sanded the floors, and organized every aspect of its renovation in the scant hours she had free from marking books, and setting assignments.

Now it was finished.

And the long, lazy days of summer stretched before her with nothing to fill them.

She closed her eyes. Listened to the trilling of a bird outside the window.

A new sound swelled—an approaching car’s engine. She waited for it to fade, but instead the throaty roar grew louder as the car turned into her driveway. Then faded into silence. A moment later, the doorbell rang.

Cara glanced at her alarm clock. Nine-thirty. Normally she’d be half way through her first class. She should be up anyway. She climbed out of bed, pulled her dressing gown on, and went to let whoever it was in.

Her brother Ryan stood on the doorstep, clutching a newspaper.

“Hi, Ry…” Cara’s eyes widened at his frown.

He stepped and closed the door behind him without a word.

“What’s the matter?” she asked.

Ryan was quiet at the best of times, but was completely silent as he walked into the kitchen.

“Ryan!” Cara caught up with him, and grabbed onto his arm. “Don’t give me the silent treatment, you know it drives me crazy!”

“You haven’t seen the paper then.” Ryan threw the local newspaper down on the pine kitchen table.

Two photos covered the front page, under a large banner headline. ‘Crash Carrigan in Donabridge!’ In the first picture, Ethan’s fist connected with Michael’s jaw.

Cara reached for the newspaper.

In the picture below it, the photographer had managed to capture the moment when Ethan pulled her out of the Winnie The Pooh costume, although clever camera angles and editing had removed all evidence of the costume from the zoomed up photo. Her arm was around Ethan’s neck. His face was turned in to her throat in what looked like a passionate clinch. Her bra-clad chest was plastered against Ethan, and his hand cupped her bottom.

Cara’s hand flew to her mouth. “Oh!”

The caption under the second photo read, ‘Local Teacher in X-rated Embrace with Movie Star.’

Cara’s knees wobbled. She sank down quickly on a chair.

“What the hell were you doing, Cara?” Ryan’s thunderous expression showed he obviously hadn’t been talking to their parents. “Michael has asked you to marry him, and you’re getting your picture taken snogging bloody Ethan?” He strode from one side of the tiny kitchen to another. “In your underwear!” He stopped and glared. “What on earth…”

Cara stood up and crossed her arms. “Just you wait a minute, Ryan Byrne.”

Anger bubbled under the surface as she stared up at her older brother. She extended one arm, and pointed to a chair. “Stop looming over me and sit down.”

Ryan’s eyes narrowed. He pulled in a breath. Then with a half muttered growl, he jerked the chair from the table and sat down.

“Now don’t interrupt.”

Ryan’s mouth opened. He glowered, then closed it again.

“In this first picture.” She slapped the newspaper on the table, and turned it around to face her brother. “Rather than…” she read the caption aloud. “‘Ethan Quinn eliminates the competition,’ this should read, ‘Ethan Quinn stands up for a friend.’” She pushed back the hair that fell into her face, wishing she’d taken the time to tie it before she’d answered the door.

She pulled out a chair and sank into it before her wobbly legs gave out. “Ethan was having a drink with Sean when he saw Michael kissing another woman,” she said in a quiet voice. “He…” she gazed down at the photo. “Well, you can see what he did.” Her gaze flicked up to Ryan’s. “He was protecting me. Being the friend he’d always been.” She pulled in a ragged breath. “The papers…”

“And this one?” Ryan’s index finger jabbed at the photograph of Cara and Ethan glued together. “It doesn’t look innocent, Cara.”

“I was stuck inside a costume at the fair, and Ethan pulled me out.”

Her brother’s eyebrows rose. His expression said what his voice didn’t—that he didn’t believe her for one moment.

“I know!” She ran her knuckles over her jaw line, feeling the buzz of frustration eat at her insides. “It sounds ridiculous, but I was stuck in a Winnie The Pooh costume.”

Ryan blew air out through compressed lips in an audible scoffing sound.

“I was, Ry.” Cara frowned. “And it was so hot in there, I’d stripped to my underwear before climbing in. If he hadn’t got me out…”

“There are more photos inside.” Ryan flicked the pages to the middle.

Cara and Ethan, hand in hand on the red carpet. Her eyes shining, and her warm, intimate smile directed at him. Cara and Ethan in the cinema foyer, his arm around her waist, and his head close to hers as though whispering endearments.

Her parents had been standing directly in front of them both, but the camera angle didn’t show them. Despite the innocence of the situation she couldn’t help the clutch of reaction as she looked at Ethan’s image. He looked so caring. So involved. So, attracted.

They looked like a couple. In lust, if not in love. And the words that accompanied the photographs certainly seemed to be expanding on that theme.

Cara screwed her eyes tight.

“The chief handed it to me the moment I turned up this morning.” Ryan’s hand covered hers. “It’s the talk of the fire station. Which means it’s the talk of the town.”

Any hint of scandal could affect her job. She’d have to get the paper to print a retraction. Print the truth. Icy dread filled her gut. But to do that, she’d have to reveal that Michael was out with another woman. That even though he’d proposed to her, he wanted to sleep with someone else. That she wasn’t enough.

She looked at the picture of Ethan’s face so close to her own.

She could deny the fact that she was attracted to Ethan Quinn ‘til the cows came home. But no one would believe her. She couldn’t blame them. Not with the evidence in print before her very eyes.

“It’s not what it looks like, Ry.”

It was important that her brother believed her. His approval always had mattered. When her father brought her home from the garda station, Ryan, his mop of black hair every which way, had stumbled down the stairs and silenced her father’s harsh reproaches. She’d never forgotten the feel of his warm hand on her shoulder as he stood shoulder to shoulder with her. He’d told her parents that her drink must have been spiked. And the faith in his eyes as he helped her upstairs had brought tears to her own.

“It looks like you care for him,” Ryan said quietly.

“Well…” There was no denying it. “I do. He’s always been a dear friend to me, you know that.”

Ryan nodded. “But people won’t believe that’s all he is. Not when they see these.” He pointed at the photographs. “You look
involved
.”

The niggle of disquiet in Cara’s stomach solidified into a rock of fear. She had a job, a life. She couldn’t let that be in jeopardy, just because she’d accepted her best friend’s help when she so desperately needed it.

She pulled her wrap tight.

“I’ll call the headmaster to make an appointment to talk to him.”

Surely if she explained the situation this could all be sorted out. It was a storm in a teacup that would blow over long before school started again. She’d proved herself able to do the job, and had banished scandal from her life once before, she could do it again.

She saw Ryan to the door.

And wondered if later she should call Ethan.

Chapter Six

Two cars were parked outside the Donabridge School for boys as Cara’s mini slid into the parking lot. She picked her handbag off the passenger seat, cast a quick, final look at her reflection in the driver’s mirror, and climbed out. She’d dressed in her professional work pantsuit, and spent time straightening her hair to make the best possible impression.

Everyone knew the tabloids weren’t to be trusted, didn’t they?

Butterflies fluttered in her stomach. She’d worked so hard to get this job. As a newly qualified teacher, she’d been lucky to get it, especially in the current climate where there was such competition for every job going.

The heavy wooden door creaked as it yielded at her push. Then swung back with a whoosh, audible in the still silence of the empty hallway. Cara breathed in the scent of polish and stale air and started walking. High heels clicking on the smooth wooden floorboards.

Shadowy figures were visible through the frosted glass door of the headmaster’s office, and the muted murmur of conversation could just be made out in the moment before she knocked.

“Come in,” the headmaster’s voice called.

Cara pulled in a deep breath, and obeyed.

The headmaster, Mr. Mahon, stood from his mahogany desk as she entered, as did the head of the board of management, Father Delany.

Somehow her feet carried her as far as the desk. A new appreciation of students sent to the head to be reprimanded for causing trouble filled her. “Good afternoon,” she said, pleased that at least her voice sounded calm and cool.

All three took their seats.

The newspaper lay on the desk between them, a silent, damning indictment.

“Cara,” Mr. Mahon began. “Thank you for coming.” His smile faltered and died.

She’d been the one to call for the meeting. So she really shouldn’t feel like a naughty schoolgirl, but faced with the grim faces of the two people who could dictate her future, she couldn’t help the nerves that had her smoothing nervous hands over her thighs.

“Father Delany and I have spoken to the other members of the board,” Mr. Mahon said. “These photographs…” His voice trailed into silence.

His expression sent a flight of butterflies wild in her stomach. Cara clenched her hands in her lap. “These photographs tell a completely false story,” Cara said. “Ethan Quinn is an old friend who the papers have tried to insinuate is something more. The first photograph…”

“Where’s he’s assaulting a local man?” Father Delany interrupted.

Cara nodded. “He was defending my honor, Father. Michael had asked me to marry him, a fact I’d shared with Ethan. So when Ethan saw Michael in the nightclub with another woman…” She swallowed.

Father Delany’s eyes widened.

Cara struggled to continue. “Ethan behaved as a friend would. As either of my
brothers
would have.”

Mr. Mahon pointed to the second picture. “Yet he appears anything but brotherly in this second picture.” His mouth pursed in obvious disapproval. “And your lack of clothing...”

Father Delany’s grey head bobbed up and down. “This is the picture that causes us most problem, Cara. A teacher, barely clothed on the front of the newspaper, in such a compromising position…” His face reddened. “Well, it brings the school into disrepute.”

She could tell them about the costume, but the look of disapproval on both faces stilled her tongue. Somehow, before she’d even had a chance to fight her corner, the bout was lost.

“I’m sorry, Cara.” Finality rang in Mr. Mahon’s tone. “You’ve been an asset to the school this far, your love of books and your ability to teach isn’t in question. However, as a teacher, especially in a boy’s school, your ability to do the job has been seriously compromised by this photograph. We’ve already had a number of telephone calls this morning from parents.”