Kiss Me on This Cold December Night by Charlotte Phillips

will have an up to date weather report. I’ll be right back.’
    How easy it had been to just let himself exist in this bubble the past few days. All the time, reality had been waiting just outside, ready to yank him back into its realm. He had family responsibilities, people relying on him. If he was fast enough he could still make Barbados in time for Christmas.
    As he left the room Ella felt a surge of stupid disappointment, anger at herself for feeling insignificant. She might be an attractive distraction for a short while but that phone call represented the real world for Tom. Something she wasn’t a part of either back then or now.
    Her heart flipped into hideous lurching freefall. And the worst of it was the humiliation because she was expecting this, had thought herself
prepared
for it. Of course he was going to be rebooking his flight the moment he was able to. For Pete’s sake, she was supposed to be pulling off
realist
here. What the hell was the disappointment about? Had she actually thought for one second he might have considered delaying his departure somehow, that he might have really been thinking of a way to factor her into his future plans? This was about sex, nothing more, she’d made that clear herself from the outset, how could she blame him for acting accordingly now?
    This situation was playing out in exactly the same way as it would have done the first time around if she hadn’t cut it short back then. And she had no one to blame but herself for letting it happen. She should have stuck to her no second rule.
    Had it really felt like they were a proper couple in this room? The magic dissipated the second he disappeared and she gathered up her cardigan and closed the door on the luxury suite where she didn’t belong. Had she really been fantasising that she might? She went back to her own twin room, picked up the stack of leaflets in the hotel information file and forced herself to focus on planning the following day’s outing. Solo this time. Maybe a trip on the London Eye? Or she could go to Knightsbridge and drool without spending at the jewellery in Tiffany.
    A swift double tap at the door and she crossed to open it. She took the leaflets with her in one hand, to let him see she was perfectly fine; she could do London tourist weekend perfectly well by herself, thank you very much.
    â€˜The airport’s open,’ he said the moment she opened the door, and her heart felt like it sank to the pit of her stomach.
    She caught her breath, made an enormous effort to arrange her face into a fine-with-me posture and stood aside to let him into the room.
    â€˜What time’s your flight?’ she said. She tried hard to pull off couldn’t-care-less in her tone of voice.
    â€˜Half past ten.’
    They had an hour or so then realistically before he would have to get to the airport for check-in. She swallowed hard, forced herself to nod. There was no point trying to deny it to herself, it was way too late for that now. She was in too deep. The déjà vu feeling of disappointment and inevitability churned in her stomach. She recognised it from last time and knew that any conviction she’d walked easily away from him last time was just a delusion. The only person worth denying her feelings to now was him.
    This was the end then. An end they both knew was coming, one that they’d been in agreement on right from the outset. She covered up her sadness by emphasising the practical and readied herself for his leaving in the only way she knew that worked. She began backing off.
    â€˜You’ll be wanting to get packed then,’ she said brightly. That was good. That sounded like she was absolutely
fine
with this. She forced her gaze away from his and automatically took a couple of paces back.
Distance
, that was what was needed now. Get some distance in there now, before he did.
    â€˜No, Ella, I won’t be wanting to pack,’ he said, his voice