Heartbeats in Moonlight

Chapter 13

Evie smiled. Perfect, she thought. Finally, details!

Time to throw in that bomb while they were reeling from the information about the kiss. "We were kissing when Henry, dad's assistant manager, saw us." Ella looked away as the scene replayed in her mind. Her first proper kiss, she remembered. Quietly she said, "I think David only meant to give me a quick peck on the lips!"

"But you snogged him!" Evie squealed in delight.

Ella's eyes rolled. "Thanks Evie."

"Sorry. But that's so cool. I'd never have the nerve to do that."

Amelia's mind raced ahead, but had taken a different route. "Is this something to do with that accusation?" Amelia asked softly.

"Henry started raving about David taking advantage of me!"

"So what happened?"

"I missed half of what Henry said because I was still recovering from that kiss. Then I heard Henry tell David that I was still at school. It had never occurred to me to tell David my age." Ella revisited that moment, when he realised he was talking to a school kid. He was not happy about that. She had thought about telling him she was nearly eighteen, but the whole situation blew up as more people pitched into the fracas.

"Oh dear."

"David physically backed off. I mean he actually took three steps back. Some twenty year old potential national league player doesn't want to be seen snogging a school girl!" Ella took a breath, "Henry kept going on, loudly, it was horrible. He said he was going to get my dad!" The commotion made a mountain of a molehill. Henry got hold of her arm and marched her away, leaving a trail of players following them who were yelling rubbish about Ella's behaviour.

"So is that why David is so cool toward you? He was embarrassed?"

Ella snorted. "He's frosty because guys who'd been at the previous camp said that I had hit on them at the last camp. They implied I did this at every camp."

"What?" Amelia squeaked.

"They implied I targeted David this time. They said all the guys knew I was available! That David was new and naïve and he obviously didn't know about my reputation."

"What?" Amelia squeaked again.

Ella roped in her fury as she remembered the uproar in her mind and in the public milieu. One second she was happy, kissing a gorgeous man and suddenly she was dropped into a vat of boiling oil. "I think the guys thought I was one of the groupies who came to watch them. They said they slept with me on the last training camp!"

"What?" Amelia screeched.

Ella squared her shoulders, she ran her tongue over her lips before she replied, "I am sure they thought I pretended to be older to get noticed by the new players. And I'm sure they didn't know who my dad was, until he walked straight into hearing two guys talking about the furore."

"Oh no!" Evie's eyes were practically out on stalks as she got to her feet and came to sit on the armrest of Ella's arm chair. "What happened?"

"Dad told everyone to simmer down." Not exactly what Dad did, he yelled at them to stop the ruckus! Ella toned down the situation in retelling, just kept to the basics and failed to tell them how long it took Dad to calm the commotion. "Dad told them to go back to their motel."

"And they went?" Amelia was not sure it would be that easy to calm arrogant players.

"Yes. Dad and I walked to the car." Ella replied feigning equanimity. "He asked me what was going on? And I told him everything."

"Everything?"

"Yes. I told him I kissed David. That Henry overreacted. It led to that fracas. And the other guys were obviously loyal to their team. That they said I had followed the team, that I was a groupie and came every year to the training camp!"

"You dad believed you." Evie gave her friend's shoulder a quick squeeze.

"Of course."

"Thank goodness for that." Evie muttered.

"Plus I had been at boarding school when they had the last training camp."

"Bet you dad had a talk with those idiots! How could they lie like that. Ruining someone's reputation." Evie gave Ella's shoulder another quick squeeze.

"I stayed away from the training ground after that first week." She looked over at Evie and Amelia. "We never saw each other after that, until I came here." Ella left out more. Surely that was enough details to appease Evie's curiousity.

"Oh dear." Amelia repeated.

"Dad said David was doing well, making his way through the ranks over the seasons. Dad liked him. Apparently David apologised to Dad, said he didn't know I was still at school, that he hadn't meant to take advantage, and that it was the first and last time he kissed me." Again, an abridged version of the events that followed that kiss.

"I am not sure whether to hug him or smack him!" Evie huffed.

Ella smiled wanly. "Don't worry. I have the same reaction! Anyway, I only found out he was living in this town after I'd bought the land. I wanted to be close to Wellington without actually living there, and I wanted to build something different."

"I told David he got it wrong. It just didn't add up for me." Amelia stated as various bits of the jigsaw fell into place. "You need to tell him."

"I don't think so." Ella got to her feet.

"But Ella..." Amelia began to protest.

"It's history.

"Enough about me." Ella looked over at Evie. "Given you all have the details about my infamous situation with David, lets move on! So what's this wedding all about?" She looked at her friend. "And why so quickly?"

Evie grimaced, not happy that they have turned the conversation to her recent situation. "It's complicated." It was worse. Her life was always complicated, but this was beyond complications.

"Well start at the beginning. We've got heaps of time." Amelia said as she watched Ella's face. Seeing the relieved in Ella's eyes, Amelia was now sure, Ella had not told the whole story about that situation.