His Wedding-Night Heir (Wedlocked!) Page 19

  ‘She’d been living on hope, waiting for a miracle, and suddenly it was all snatched away from her.’ He walked over to the window and stood staring down into the gardens below.

  Both of them, Cally realised, were staying well away from the bed.

  ‘I don’t think it even registered that it was our wedding day—not then, anyway,’ Nick went on. ‘She begged me to come and collect her, because she was in no fit state to drive home. It was the first time she’d really needed me, and I told myself I couldn’t let her down. That I’d be there and back before you knew it, and that anyway we had the rest of our lives to look forward to, when she had nothing. I convinced myself that you’d understand. That I might even earn myself some brownie points when I explained.

  ‘So, I called her doctor and requested him to meet us at the cottage. I also arranged for her car to be picked up and returned. When she’d seen the doctor I drove over to the pharmacy and brought back the sedatives he’d prescribed. I managed to persuade her to take one, and then go upstairs to lie down.’

  He gave her an ironic look. ‘The point, I guess, at which you arrived and drew your own conclusions. I don’t blame you for that, Cally. But you should have confronted me—given me the chance to explain. Not just run away without a word.’

  She didn’t look at him. ‘Didn’t Adele tell you she’d sent me to the cottage?’

  ‘Adele wasn’t at the Hall when I returned,’ Nick said. ‘I’d made it clear that I didn’t want either her, or the other resident witch, anywhere near the place for twenty-four hours, until we’d left on our honeymoon. She was supposed to be gone when we got back from the church. I simply thought she’d done as she was told.’

  He paused. ‘It’s time for the truth, Cally,’ he said slowly. ‘Why did you—just leave? Were you really convinced you couldn’t live with me—and was seeing me with poor Vanessa simply the excuse you needed? I—I have to know.’

  Her voice was unsteady. ‘I need to know something, too, Nick. Why did you marry me? Was I just the first available girl—someone who’d be grateful to be favoured by the glamorous Nick Tempest and who wouldn’t interfere in your life too much?’

  He turned to look at her, the skin taut over his cheekbones, anguish in his grey gaze.

  He said, ‘Cally, I fell in love with you the moment I saw you glaring down at me from the back of your horse that first day. I was severely tempted to drag you out of the saddle and ravish you in the bracken there and then. Instead I behaved incredibly well, and tried to ask for your grandfather’s permission. I told you that.’

  ‘Yes—but you never told me you loved me.’ She spread her hands almost helplessly. ‘Not even once. You never—mentioned the word.’

  He sighed. ‘My lovely one, how could I? Bad things were happening to you, one after the other, and making passionate advances to you seemed totally inappropriate—particularly when you were mourning your grandfather.’

  His mouth twisted. ‘I decided to wait until we had moonlight, and a beach, and maybe palm trees. And then I’d go on my knees and tell you exactly how much I loved you. Lay my heart at your feet.’

  He paused again. ‘Besides,’ he said carefully, ‘I thought I’d made my intentions—and my feelings—quite clear when we went on that picnic. That was the third part of my plan.’

  ‘You had a plan?’ She shook her head. ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘My sweet,’ Nick said gently. ‘You were so young, you almost broke my heart. So I told myself I had to take it easy. First—I had to get you to like me. Second—I needed you to trust me. I thought—I hoped—that I’d succeeded pretty well in both of them. Then, thirdly, of course, I wanted you to enjoy being in bed with me.’ He grimaced. ‘I told myself afterwards I should have made that my first priority. That everything else would have naturally followed.

  ‘But you didn’t hesitate to face me down that first day, Cally. So why the hell didn’t you confront me over Vanessa?’ His voice was suddenly husky. ‘I can only think it was because you didn’t care enough, and if that’s true, I don’t know how I’m going to bear it. How I’m going to be able to live the rest of my life without you.’

  She said softly, ‘I didn’t dare ask. I was too afraid of what your answer might be to take the risk. I just wanted to get away as far as possible and die, because you’d broken my heart. You see, I fell in love with you, too, Nick—that first day.’ A smile trembled on her lips. ‘And I’m sorry you decided against the bracken.’

  For the first time his own mouth relaxed into the ghost of his old grin. ‘On reflection, it was the right choice. Bloody uncomfortable, bracken. Sheets are infinitely preferable, and pillows—and you, my love,’ he added softly. ‘My wonderful, precious girl, wearing nothing but my wedding ring.’

  She walked slowly towards him. ‘Is that another of your plans—for the next hour or two?’

  Nick lifted her into his arms and carried her to the bed. ‘Make that a lifetime,’ he whispered.

  They lay holding each other and kissing. Savouring the brush and cling of each other’s lips—the sensuous play of tongues. Until kissing became no longer enough.

  Nick’s hands were gentle as he began to unfasten the buttons on the turquoise dress. Cally arched towards him so that he could remove it completely, then, as he too began to undress, slipped swiftly and easily out of her underwear so that when he turned back to her she was waiting, just as he’d described.

  Suddenly ridiculously self-conscious, she said, ‘Adele told me I’m getting as big as a house.’

  ‘Forget Adele, and her poison,’ he commanded softly. ‘And it’s not true, anyway. You’re only a very small cottage.’

  He looked down at her lingeringly, his fingers drifting over her newly rounded nakedness with a kind of reverence.

  ‘Oh, my darling,’ he whispered unsteadily. ‘Do you know how beautiful you are?’

  She wasn’t a beauty, and never had been, but she looked into his eyes and knew that was how he saw her. And that there were tears in the grey gaze adoring her with such tenderness.

  It was as if every dream she had ever had was suddenly true, and with a small, inarticulate cry she pulled him down to her, reaching for him, her hand clasping him, guiding him between her thighs—then inside her, into the sweet molten core where he belonged.

  Because she was so ready for him, and so very much more than willing.

  Her body closed on him. Held him. Then moved with him slowly and softly in the first steps of love’s dance. He treated her with infinite care, each powerful thrust of his body tempered with restraint. And she smiled against his mouth, making a few delicate adjustments, deliberately calculated to sabotage his self-control completely. Setting herself to wring every last atom of sensation from his strong male flesh.

  Because she wanted him back, her passionate, skilful lover, who’d taught her all the enticements of desire during those long, fierce nights together. And she wanted him unguarded, vulnerable, and wholly hers—as, perhaps, he had never been before.

  And at last, when both of them were driven beyond any limit they’d ever experienced together, she heard him sob her name as he spilled himself into her, and felt the glorious pulsations of her own release answering him.

  Afterwards, she cradled him in her arms, his head pillowed on her breasts, his hand softly stroking her abdomen. And they murmured together—words of love, words of forgiveness and absolution.

  There was a sudden note of laughter in her voice. ‘I wonder what the baby made of that?’

  ‘Probably thought it was being rocked to sleep,’ Nick returned with a sigh of utter contentment.

  ‘Mmm.’ She was silent for a moment. ‘Is it a relief to know you won’t have to pretend any more—about Vanessa?’

  ‘It has to be,’ he admitted. ‘There are some rough times ahead for her, and I want to be able to support her openly—although it will just be as a friend when her father’s around. My mother’s right. He’s one of the good guys. We shouldn’
t hurt him.’

  ‘No.’ She was quiet for a moment. ‘Nick—why were you with her today? You never said.’

  He said ruefully, ‘She was altering her will, because the previous one left everything to Tony, and she asked me to be one of the witnesses. It wasn’t an easy thing for her to do.’

  ‘No,’ she said, slowly. ‘Poor Vanessa.’ She hesitated. ‘Do you think that she and I will become friends? I can’t say she seemed to like me when we met.’

  Nick propped himself up on an elbow, his face serious. ‘Vanessa had to pick up the pieces after you left,’ he said quietly. ‘For a while there I was pretty much in self-destruct mode. So she sobered me up when I got drunk, and listened patiently when I tore myself in pieces over waking up next to some girl whose name I couldn’t even remember.’ He looked at her remorsefully. ‘I’m not proud of that period in my life, darling. My only defence is that I was trying to blot you out for ever. But, however hard I tried, the pain of losing you just got worse.

  ‘Vanessa was completely non-judgmental about it all—except once, when she told me frankly that it was unfair to take from women when I had nothing to offer in return. When I was simply using them because I couldn’t have the girl I loved. She said if I was fool enough to want you that badly, then I should go and find you. Move heaven and earth to get you back, in spite of what you’d done.

  ‘So it may take some time for her to come round. But she’ll be mortified when she finds out what Adele really told you,’ he added thoughtfully. ‘And it will explain a lot, so that might help.’

  ‘I’ll just have to convince her that I’m here to stay.’ Cally coaxed his head back to its former resting place, smoothing his dark hair from his forehead, then paused as she remembered something else. ‘Nick—why do you want the Dower House back, if it’s not for me? Was it just to get rid of Adele in case she made more trouble?’

  ‘That was certainly an incentive,’ he agreed. ‘But I have another reason—one that I intended to discuss with you. My mother feels that life in a tent in some rainforest is fast losing its charm as she gets older. Becoming a grandmother has developed far more appeal for her, so she’s considering a part-time post as a lecturer here in the UK. And she’d like to live in the Dower House—but only if you agree. She doesn’t want to crowd us.’

  She was smiling. ‘I think it’s a great idea. Our own built-in babysitter, no less. And perfectly used to dealing with a wilful small boy as well,’ she added dreamily. ‘How very useful.’

  ‘Which is unfortunate,’ Nick told her lazily, ‘because we’re having a sweet but stroppy girl.’

  She shook her head. ‘Boy first. Your son and heir.’

  ‘A girl,’ he said firmly. ‘Or it’s going back.’

  ‘Ah, well,’ she said. ‘We won’t argue the point. After all, you never know,’ she added thoughtfully, ‘it might be twins.’

  And, one snowy January morning, that was exactly what it was…

  ISBN: 978-1-4268-5786-7

  HIS WEDDING-NIGHT HEIR

  First North American Publication 2005.

  Copyright © 2005 by Sara Craven.

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