I shake my head. “It’s one year,” I say quietly. He narrows his eyes.

“I don’t understand; what’s one year?”

I don’t want to say it. I don’t want to say the words out loud. I don’t want to make it real. I want it all to just go away. I want it to fuck off and not be my life. It can be anyone’s, I don’t care whose, just not mine. But then who would I choose? Is there anyone in this world I would wish this pain on? I don’t think there is. I think I would rather just kill them, kill them so they didn’t have to feel like this. I was doing okay, tucked away in Byron, away from any reminders of my past life. I was getting my shit together, but now, with a few drinks in my belly and this man standing in front of me, the man who for some reason, I can’t get out of my head—or my heart, if I’m being really honest—now, I’m back to being a mess. I don’t know what I want. Nights like tonight make me think that I do want to live. I do want to move on. But I don’t want this pain, this ache in my chest, and it’s not just caused by the loss of Sean and Beau. It’s guilt, as well; guilt for my past indiscretions and guilt because I’m even thinking about moving on. Guilt, because on the one-year anniversary of my husband’s death, I’m in a hotel room with another man. And not just any other man. This man, Cameron fucking King, is the only other man outside of Sean and my family who I’ve ever loved, and that realisation is crushing me right now, suffocating me. Not tonight, I shouldn’t be thinking this, feeling any of this. Any other night, on any other date, I might be able to wrap my head around it all, but to finally accept this as absolute fact on December the first just goes to show what a bad person I am.

“What’s one year, Kitten?” I raise my eyes to his and study his face for a few seconds. He’s not perfect, not beautiful like Sean. His nose is probably too big, his eyes a little too small, he has flecks of grey in the stubble on his chin; so, why the draw, why the pull? Whenever we’re together, it’s like there’s a charge, a current that runs between us; it feels right but I know it’s wrong. It feels bad, but it feels so fucking good at the same time. He shrugs, letting me know he’s waiting on a reply.

“Sean died one year ago today. My baby died one year ago today, and here I am, one year on, alive and being the adulterous whore of a wife that I am. I’m here, in a hotel room with you, of all people. I’m with you.”

He steps towards me. “Oh, Georgia, I’m so sorry. I had no idea. Baby, I’m so sorry, so, so sorry.” He picks me up with no effort whatsoever and walks us over to the bedroom. He goes to the bed and sits me down on it, takes off his jacket, loosens his tie and toes off his shoes then removes mine. He sits on the bed with his back against the headboard and the pillows, then pulls me into his lap. I rest my head against his chest and just enjoy his presence. I don’t cry, I just sit quietly with my thoughts and my guilt, trying to sober up my drunk-again brain.

“Why are you here?” I ask after a while. “Why are you here in Australia?” His thumb is brushing up and down over the ridges of my spine, and I’m acutely aware of it. His other hand is splayed over my belly, and as usual when I’m with him, I feel protected. Funny how nothing’s changed. It would be around twelve years now since I first met him, and he has always made me feel safe, despite what I know about him and his ‘business’ dealings.

“I’m an investor in the club. I’m the biggest shareholder, as it happens.”

I’d only found out tonight that the club was called KLUB, and I now wonder if the K had anything to do with him.

“Is that why it starts with a K? Is that why they spelt it KLUB?”

“Yep, it’s made up of an initial from each investor, the K coming from King.”

I look up at him and smile. Doing my best Humphrey Boggart impersonation say, “In all the bars, in all the world.” He smiles and his eyes shine.

“You walk into mine… again.” I give a small laugh.

“That’s mad, you know? What are the chances of us both being in Australia at the same time?” He rubs his nose in my hair.

“We weren’t. I flew home from here last weekend; I was just getting into a car at Heathrow when I got your text. I was frantic. I was jet-lagged and thinking all sorts. Your brother was behaving like a complete prick and giving me nothing, and I didn’t know what to do.” I curl into him, getting closer, remembering my stupidity of last weekend. “I wasn’t supposed to be here tonight. I said I’d seen enough, wished everyone good luck and said I would be back after Christmas. Then when I found out you were here, I got off the phone, rearranged a few things and booked a flight back. I came to the opening tonight, and I was coming to Byron Bay tomorrow to find you.”

Oh, he was coming to find me.

“Why, why were you coming to find me?” He lifts my chin with his index finger so my eyes meet his.

“I needed to know you were okay. I needed to know if all the things you said on the phone last weekend were true. I know you were bolloxed and fucked-up, but you don’t just say that kinda shit. No one says that kinda thing without there being some truth in it.” He tilts his head forward so his forehead rests against mine. “You told me on the phone that you had told someone you loved me, that you’d always loved me. Then Sunday, when you were straight and sober, you told me you cared, that you’d always cared, that you still care. I just… I wanted to see you. I wanted to hear you say those things to my face.” He says no more, and I know he’s waiting for me to speak. He leans his head back into the pillows.

“I never gave us a chance, did I, Tiger? I was so obsessed with Sean that I couldn’t see what was happening right in front of me.” He deserves my honesty, even though I’m not sure if it’ll do any good now. I’m feeling drunk and brave, so I decide to tell him anyway. “I was attracted to you from the very beginning, Cam. Right from the start, you were the first bloke who made me want: made me want to be kissed, want to be touched, want to be fucked, the first one since I’d split up with Sean. But then when you found out who my dad was and got on the turn, I thought it was because you’d realised I was ‘that’ Georgia, the one they wrote about in the paper, the underage whore who broke the poor boy from Carnage’s heart. That’s why I threw the drink over you.”

He gives a small laugh. “Fuck, I’d forgotten about that.” He leans over and picks the hotel menu up from where I’d left it on the bedside table the night before. “You hungry?” I nod.  “I’m starving, what’s good?” he asks.

“The burger with the lot,” I reply. “I had one last night.” He tilts his head and looks at me.

“You were here, in your room last night, ordering room service?” I nod, mainly because I’m struggling to form sentences. “I was a few streets away in my hotel room, doing the same.” I make do, do, do, do noises, attempting to sound like the theme to the Twilight Zone.

“Spooky,” I whisper to him, and he slaps me over the head with the menu.

“Don’t take the piss, Kitten; it’s not nice.”

I sigh a big sigh and shake my head at him. “Cameron King, when are you gonna realise I’m not nice?”

He looks at me almost reverently as he tucks my hair behind my ear. “You’re nice; you’re just too hard on yourself, and you worry too much about what other people are gonna think or say.”

I ignore him. “Anyway, listen, you have to listen to my story. I need to tell you all of this.” No matter how hard I try, I slur nearly every word, and I can see Cam’s trying his best not to smile. “So, yeah, anyway, because I thought you thought I was a little whore, I decided to act like one. All those blokes, the different ones I used to bring into Kings every week or so, I was just trying to piss you off. I was just like… ‘yeah, well, you think I’m a whore, then I’m gonna act like a whore; just watch me. Just watch me, King, you fucker.’ And for six months, six whole months I did. And all the while, I wanted you to stop me; I wanted you to say something, to tell me to stop, ask me to stop, but you didn’t. You didn’t say or do anything, so I just kept bringing them in, week after week after week.”