Between The Sheets by Colette Caddle

other. 'We'd like you to be god-father.'
    Gus stared at him. 'Really?'
    Tom nodded. 'Of course, who else would we ask?'
    'I'm honoured, really I am.' Gus patted his friend's shoulder awkwardly. 'Don't worry about me, mate. I promise that if I need to talk, you'll be the first one I call.' He grinned. 'Well, you or your wife.'
    Tom pushed him towards the car and turned to go back inside. 'See you tomorrow.'
    Gus felt fed up as he drove back to his new home. He'd always loved his time with Tom and Ashling but now it was proving hard to be with them. Their happiness was painful to witness and made him ache for Dana.
    He turned into the car park of the small, city centre hotel that was currently his home. Though he had a large suite with every facility he could ask for, he was already tired of living in such impersonal surroundings. He needed to find somewhere more permanent but it seemed such a huge step and he baulked at taking it. He knew that his life with Dana was over; that though he loved her as much as ever, he could never trust her again. But he couldn't move on, he realized, until he talked to her brother. Though Walter had been able to tell him where Ed was, Gus hadn't managed to talk to him yet. It seemed Ed was a photographer who travelled a lot and would be out of the country for several weeks.
    In the privacy of his suite, Gus threw his jacket over the back of a chair and walked to the floor-to-ceiling window that gave him a panoramic view of Dublin. He stared out at the vibrant city, its streets awash with people in summer clothes and sunglasses enjoying a relaxed Sunday afternoon. The Liffey sparkled in the distance but the beautiful view somehow served only to make him feel even more isolated.
    He had lived alone for nine years — well, most of the time — before meeting Dana and he'd liked it that way. But within two months of meeting her, he'd moved into her house in Rathgar and the following year they'd bought their first home together in Ranelagh.
    Dana had loved the house the minute she'd set eyes on it whereas Gus approved of it in a more objective way. With his professional hat on, he knew it was a good investment and, more important, in an excellent location. It was a lovely old house that had been built in the late nineteenth century. The previous owners had restored all its original features with taste and sensitivity, and yet he couldn't quite manage to fall in love with it. It was too big and too grand to feel like a family home, but their farmhouse in west Cork was a different matter altogether.
    A city boy through and through, Gus had nevertheless been completely blown away by the wild beauty of Cork. As the taxi drove him from the airport out to Bantry, he had become more bewitched with every passing mile. Given it was a miserable winter's day, that said a lot. When the driver had finally turned into the lane and he caught his first glimpse of the plain stone building with the shinning view of Bantry Bay in the background, Gus decided to beg Dana De Lacey to sell him the property. Before he even put pencil to paper, ideas were crowding his head of how it could be restored and embellished to maximize the views and create an idyll that would inspire creativity. It quickly became a labour of love when he fell for the owner as hard as he had for her house.
    It still stunned Gus when he thought about how quickly they'd clicked. They could discuss politics, have a laugh and talk avidly about every issue under the sun. At the same time, there was an unmistakable frisson between them; their attraction to each other was almost palpable. Gus had just turned thirty-four when they met and had been in enough relationships to realize that this was the real thing. He had proposed within weeks, seeing no point in wasting time, and, happily, Dana had agreed.
    Gus had hoped that they would spend most of their time in Bantry; it was the perfect place for Dana to write and he could easily commute to work in Dublin a