The Bridegroom's Dilemma

Skye continued, “There has to be more to it.”

“It wasn’t just sex,” Nick said harshly. “Do you really see it like that?”

“It wasn’t much more.”

Nick watched her walk away and ground his teeth in frustration as he asked himself why the hell he couldn’t just let Skye Belmont go. The thing was, he mused savagely, there was no way he could transform himself into the kind of husband she wanted.

So why, he asked himself, did he feel as if he’d let her down?

LINDSAY ARMSTRONG was born in South Africa but now lives in Australia with her New Zealand-born husband and their five children. They have lived in nearly every state of Australia and have tried their hand at some unusual, for them, occupations, such as farming and horse training—all grist to the mill for a writer! Lindsay started writing romances when their youngest child began school because she was left feeling at a loose end. She is still doing it and loving it.

The Bridegroom’s Dilemma

Lindsay Armstrong

MILLS & BOON

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CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

COPYRIGHT

CHAPTER ONE

‘LOOK at this! I don’t believe it.’ The middle-aged man lowered his newspaper and stared at his companion. ‘Skye Belmont and Nick Hunter have broken off their engagement only three weeks before the wedding!’

‘Doesn’t surprise me,’ the second man sitting at the pavement café said thoughtfully as he stirred his cappuccino. ‘Two very high-profile people, big egos, no doubt.’ He shrugged.

‘One very beautiful, high-profile person and she doesn’t act as if she has a big ego,’ the first man said with a sigh. ‘You know, Skye Belmont is the one girl I’d leave everything for. Those wonderful, laughing blue eyes, gorgeous figure, skin like satin, curly hair—I reckon she’s a natural blonde—and her legs are something to die for.’

His friend looked amused. ‘Wouldn’t we all? And they did seem like the perfect couple, but you never can tell.’

‘If he’s hurt her…’ the first man said pugnaciously.

‘Could be the other way around.’

‘Not Skye. She’s such a honey!’

‘Oh, well, we’ll probably never know…’

‘Skye, you can’t sit there all day, darling.’

Skye Belmont stirred and looked around her bedroom. She flinched visibly as her gaze fell on her beautiful wedding dress hanging up outside the wardrobe door then she glanced up at her mother. ‘If you must know, Mum, I wish there was a handy hole in the ground for me to hide in!’

Her mother sat down on the end of the bed and said gently, ‘You were the one who broke it off, Skye. For a lot of very good reasons, you told me. And all this interest and publicity will die down. Don’t forget, it was inevitable. Are you not the most sought-after cook-show host in town? And is Nick not—‘

‘The most eligible bachelor in town,’ Skye finished for her mother wearily. She laid her head back and two tears trickled down her cheeks. ‘Don’t I know it.’

‘Skye, are you regretting it now?’ her mother asked anxiously.

‘No.’ Skye licked the salty moisture from her lip. ‘But just between you and me, Mum, even though I know I can’t live with him and—all the rest, I guess I might always miss him.’

Iris Belmont looked concerned. ‘There’s an old saying: The devil you know…’ She raised a delicate eyebrow at her daughter as she left the saying unfinished.

Skye smiled faintly. ‘If there’s someone who can cope with the devil in Nick, it’s not me.’

‘You’re on the front page this morning, Mr Hunter,’ Florence Daley said as she slapped a sheaf of newspapers in front of her boss.

Nick Hunter removed his feet from his desk, his hands from behind his head and sat up with a sigh. He was six feet two with straight, short, almost black hair and eyes. Beneath the dark grey shirt he wore with a jade-green tie and charcoal trousers, his shoulders were broad and there was an air of suppressed energy about him despite the fact that he’d been lounging with his feet up, so immobile and deep in thought.

The rest of him was lean, rangy and unobtrusively powerful, but the most arresting thing was his face. You never stopped to wonder whether he was handsome, Florence thought, because there was so much vitality, humour yet strength in it. When he laughed, it was almost impossible not to laugh with him. When he raised an eyebrow with utter arrogance at you, you immediately felt demolished. No wonder she hadn’t been able to cope, the poor kid…

‘I suppose the whole world is wondering what kind of a bastard I am to have ditched Skye?’ he drawled, breaking in on her reflections.

‘Yes,’ his secretary said severely.

‘Not you too, Flo!’ He eyed Florence injuredly. She was in her early sixties, she always displayed a very prim and proper demeanour and, as his father’s secretary originally, she had known him since he was sixteen.

‘Me too, I’m afraid,’ Florence agreed. ‘I love Skye and I thought you did as well.’

‘Loving Skye and marrying Skye,’ Nick Hunter said meditatively, ‘are two different things. By the way, it was she who gave me my marching orders.’

‘I wonder why?’ Florence said with unusual irony. And proceeded to tell him. ‘You’re never here, for one thing! It would be like being married to a long-distance telephone. And you’re always doing difficult, dangerous things you don’t have to do—she’d never know when the father of her children would turn up as a statistic! Plus…’ Florence paused then went on with unusual vehemence, ‘Too many women are attracted to you and make fools of themselves over you.’

Nick had listened to this attentively but his dark eyebrows shot up at the last two observations. He said, with a grin, ‘Flo, I do think you’re exaggerating there—’

But Florence was in the grip of high emotion and would not be denied. ‘Nor does it become you to joke about it, Nicholas Hunter,’ she snapped. ‘The trouble with you is you’ve always had everything handed to you on a platter and you’re too used to dominating the life out of everyone around you.’

‘Is that what you think? That I tried to dominate Skye?’

‘Wouldn’t put it past you.’

They gazed at each other until Florence reddened suddenly and looked away. ‘Sorry,’ she said stiffly, ‘it’s not my place—’

‘No.’ Nick waved a hand. ‘You’re perfectly entitled to speak your mind. If nothing else it’s brought one thing home to me. As I’m going to feature as the villain of the piece, it might be a good idea to leave town for a while.’

‘You’re still…you’re being flippant,’ Florence pointed out frustratedly. ‘Didn’t she mean anything to you?’

It was Nick’s turn to look away and for a moment there was something entirely serious, even dark about him. But he broke the moment with a faint smile, and said almost gently, ‘Flo, I will always love Skye in a way. But, for reasons that matter only to the two of us, we would not suit. Surely it’s better to have found this out before the wedding?’

‘You need to get away for a while, darling,’ Iris Belmont said to her daughter over dinner that same evening. ‘Doesn’t this series of the show close shortly for a recess? That usually gives you three months before you start taping the next series, or something like that.’

‘Yes. But there’s still work to be done on the next series, my new book…’ Skye inspected her meal then pushed her plate away. ‘Sorry, I’m not hungry, Mum.’

‘You could work on your new book anywhere,’ Iris pointed out. ‘You might make even pick up some new ideas for it.’

‘I guess so. Look—’ Skye stood up ‘—I’ll think about it,’ she promised. ‘In the meantime I’m going to have an early night. Please don’t worry about me. I’m…I’ll be fine!’

Famous last words, she thought as she lay on her bed in the house she’d grown up in and had retreated to after breaking her engagement. She had her own flat not that far away but, apart from being alone, which her mother had insisted she shouldn’t be, being prey to the media hadn’t recommended itself to her.

It was a blue room, her bedroom in her mother’s house. Blue to match her eyes, frilly and appropriate for a little girl but not much comfort for a woman who had loved and lost Nick Hunter.

She let her mind drift back to how they’d met over a year ago. Cooking had always been her passion, a passion passed onto her by her mother. After her father’s death when she was twenty, she and her mother had invested their inheritance into a small, chic restaurant that had taken off overnight.

And one of their regular clients, a television producer, had offered Skye a guest spot on a cooking program. Before she’d had time to pinch herself, she often thought, she had her own show that worked on a tried, not particularly original formula but it had worked amazingly well. She went into the home of a celebrity, took over the kitchen and cooked their favourite dishes for them.

What had puzzled her at first was the metamorphosis that came over her when she was in front of the cameras. She’d always been a reserved person, her teens had been plagued by shyness and she’d had a very sheltered childhood. Yet on the small screen she came across as bubbly, worldly, humorous and able to make people laugh—and before long, at twenty-two, she’d been unable to go to the supermarket without being recognized.

She’d discussed this paradox with her producer and he’d pointed out that by all accounts Rowan Atkinson was a shy, reserved person. He’d also told her that it was her passion for her subject that gave her her onair confidence. And assured her that the way she dealt with her celebrities flowed on from it.

Off-screen confidence in some areas had also gradually flowed from it, she’d found, although fame and constantly being recognized had proved to be a bit of a problem. On the other hand, fame and a relative amount of fortune had seen her able to hire help for the restaurant, although her mother still supervised it, and had seen her first cookbook leap off the shelves.

Then, one day, it was in Nick Hunter’s kitchen that she’d found herself doing a show. Of course she’d heard of him. His father was reputed to be one of the wealthiest men in the country. His mother was a renowned psychologist. His sister designed couturier clothes and lived in Paris. He himself was second-in-command of the vast empire his father had carved mainly from minerals.

He flew his own plane around the country, had a passion for motor racing as well as speedboats and competed as an amateur. In fact anything fast and racy, including women, often appeared in the same context as Nick Hunter.

She’d been surprised, therefore, when he’d immediately divined her determination to be unimpressed by him behind the scenes. And more surprised when, by a mysterious process, he’d turned their on-air time into one of the best shows she’d ever done. Hilarious, warm and as if a certain chemistry existed between them as she showed him how to boil an egg.

She could even remember saying indignantly to her mother when they’d watched the show together, ‘How did he do that? He’s not the kind of man who impresses me at all.’

Her mother had looked quizzical. ‘He’s rather gorgeous, though. I mean physically,’ she’d amended hastily, discovering herself on the receiving end of a speaking look from her daughter.

‘He’s also a playboy if I’m not very much mistaken,’ Skye had said coolly.

‘Oh, to be sure. A right breaker of hearts, I have no doubt. Lucky you’re not an impressionable girl, Skye,’ Iris had added, but with a little twinkle in her eye that had caused her daughter to look affronted then start to laugh reluctantly.

‘OK—tall, dark and dangerously attractive,’ she’d conceded ruefully. ‘He still, well, puts my hackles up.’

What had further put her hackles up was to discover that the ratings for the Hunter show had been astronomical, causing her to be the blue-eyed girl of the station in more ways than one.

She’d remonstrated with herself over this state of mind. She was being ridiculous and, if anything, she should have bought the most expensive bottle of champagne she could find for Nick Hunter—only he’d got in first. With flowers and a lunch invitation.

Go! everyone had insisted. But what had made her go, she’d thought at the time, was a determination to prove to Nick that she could remain unimpressed by him.

Now, as she lay dry-eyed but miserable on her bed, she had to acknowledge that she’d probably been impressed from the first time his dark eyes had lingered on her. From the moment he’d unwound his tall, spare frame from a low armchair and run his fingers through his straight dark hair when she and the television crew had descended upon him.

And going to lunch with him that first time had definitely been a mistake, in hindsight, she also conceded.

Because he’d done nothing at all to cement her playboy image of him—the opposite if anything. He’d told her about his particular passion—for rocks, as it happened. He was a geologist, he told her, and, be they iron ore, gold, silver, tin or diamond-bearing rocks, he found them exceedingly fascinating. He’d also told her he was never happier than when he was prospecting, living in a tent somewhere.

Prepared for a sophisticated, seductive onslaught of some kind, she had relaxed unwittingly. Three hours later, she’d been unable to believe the time had passed so swiftly, or been so interesting.

And Nick Hunter had watched the slight confusion that came to her expression with a little glint of something she couldn’t identify at the time in his dark eyes.

Because he was aware that beneath her TV persona there lurked a different Skye Belmont; he had divined it at their first encounter when her beautiful sky-blue eyes had been distinctly cool. And, although he couldn’t put his finger on it, it had been enough to intrigue him. In what way could she be different underneath from all the other bright, worldly girls who littered his path? And if so—why?

Had Skye been privy to his thoughts at the time, she would have known that he also knew exactly how to reel her in… It was something she was later to throw up at him.

He’d ended the lunch on a friendly, casual note, made no reference to their meeting again and left her with an oddly intimate handshake. She hadn’t heard from him again for two months.

For the first week of those two months she’d been strangely insulated from just about everything, work included. Because she couldn’t get over how much she’d enjoyed Nick Hunter’s company, how ordinary it had been—yet not ordinary at all. He’d been witty, serious, he’d got her to talk about her opinions on books, films, politics, and had responded in kind. It had been like having lunch with a very good friend.

At the same time, though, there’d been this sudden awareness of him flowing through her. Not, at first, in a particularly sensual way but little things—such as how she liked that he was lean and rangy, she liked his hands and the way he smiled, his voice. It had only occurred to her after they’d parted that just once his dark eyes had rested on her in a way that was particularly adult.

It had been in the moment of confusion when she’d realized they’d spent three whole hours together. And that drifting gaze had, almost objectively, she thought later, seen through her clothes but, more, read her soul.

This discovery had caused her to shiver slightly for a reason she couldn’t explain, but the more she thought about it, the more she saw it as a danger sign—and the more everything about Nick Hunter started to plague her. Then the weeks had passed and her feeling of friendship, already eroded, had hardened into something she despised herself for but couldn’t help—sheer pique.

So the fact that he caught her completely unprepared two months after their lunch, and not as the result of him getting in touch with her, didn’t help her much.

She tried, as she lay on her bed, to resist being transported back in time to that meeting but it was useless…

‘Going my way, lady?’

The voice was the voice of her rather bitter dreams but it brought her up short in the act of stepping into a lift in a smart city hotel, on her way to a cocktail party to celebrate the release of a new wine.

She turned slowly with her heart suddenly pounding, and Nick Hunter was standing behind her, all the lean length of him clad in black: black open-necked shirt, black trousers and with his straight dark hair flopping on his forehead.

‘Oh, it’s you,’ she said unoriginally, although she wasn’t unhappy with the lack of enthusiasm in her voice.

‘Mmm,’ he murmured, letting his gaze drift over her in that disturbing way he had, ‘and a very beautiful-looking you, Ms Belmont. But cool. Distinctly cool…’

The word seemed to dangle in the air between them as she looked down at herself in some confusion.

She wore a short, bias-cut dress with a vee neck in a floating silk georgette over a taffeta slip. The cap sleeves were unlined, the colour was a beautiful Prussian blue with a shadowy dusky pink pattern on it and she wore silver high-heeled sandals. Her long, slender legs were bare and her fair hair was in its natural curly bob to her shoulders. She wore a minimum of make-up and her lips were painted a dusky pink. All she carried was a tiny blue purse.

‘Should I be any different?’ she asked, having used the moment to banish the confusion and starch her soul against this man, as their gazes caught and held again.

He smiled, as if with inner amusement that she might not be adult enough to be privy to, and said, ‘I thought we were friends? We certainly seemed to be the last time we met.’

Skye blinked, conscious immediately of the trap she’d fallen into, and for a moment her expression defied description.

This time Nick Hunter laughed softly. But at the same time he possessed himself of her hand. ‘Look, I’ve been overseas. For quite a bit longer than I’d originally planned, I’m afraid. Would it be too much to hope that we’re going to the same cocktail party?’

Skye opened her mouth, shut it then said, ‘I’m going to the launch of this new wine. I don’t know about you.’

He laughed again and ushered her into the lift. ‘I am now.’

She stared at him. ‘Do you mean…?’

‘Precisely,’ he drawled. ‘I intend to come to the wine party with you.’

‘But if you haven’t got an invitation—and what about the one you were invited to anyway?’

‘I never seem to have any trouble getting into parties whether I’m invited or not,’ he commented gravely. ‘And the one I was going to will be deadly dull in comparison—’

‘So why…?’

‘Because you won’t be there,’ he finished softly.

Skye blushed and he watched the colour surge beneath her smooth skin, which had the effect of making her feel hotter than ever.

But as she cast around in her mind for a suitable rejoinder he grimaced, kissed her knuckles lightly and said, ‘Shall we be friends again?’

He was right. He was more than welcome at the cocktail party; the producers of the new wine were even old friends of his, and they lamented loudly that they hadn’t known he was in the country otherwise they’d have sent him an invitation.

And Skye watched, somewhat bemused, because Nick Hunter in action at a party was a sight to behold. Everyone seemed to know him and be delighted to see him. Including some very attractive women who hung on his every word.

But, after about an hour, he came back to Skye’s side and said for her ears alone, ‘I’ve had rather a good idea. Shall we go?’

She moistened her lips. ‘Where?’

He narrowed his eyes. ‘I wonder why I get the impression Skye Belmont has never lived a little dangerously?’

‘Believe me, I have,’ she countered. ‘Every time I go in front of a camera I might as well be white-water rafting down the Zambezi in crocodile-infested waters—that’s how nervous I get.’

His lips quirked and his eyes glinted with amusement. ‘You don’t show it.’

‘Perhaps not. I feel it all the same. The funny thing is, as soon as the cameras are rolling, I lose it. But—’ she shrugged her slim shoulders ‘—I am cautious by nature. So, before I make any commitment, how dangerously are you asking me to live at the moment, Nick Hunter?’ Her own eyes were a cool, amused blue.

His changed to reflect a glimmer of surprise but he was not to know that Skye had learnt a thing or two in the preceding hour. She had accurately perceived that he very quickly divested himself of women who could not hide their admiration of him.

‘All I had in mind was you doing something you’ve done for me before—cooking me dinner,’ he said. ‘Which was not dangerous at all, if you remember. And I happen to have a refrigerator stuffed with food—but you know how hopeless I am in the kitchen,’ he added helplessly.

Skye’s lips twitched. ‘Ah. But I was paid for that.’

‘Then could you consider this?’ He glanced around. ‘Little bites of food on toothpicks always leave me the same way. Starving,’ he said simply.

‘You could go to a restaurant,’ she pointed out.

‘When I know the best cook in town? That would be sacrilege,’ he said softly. ‘But, I give you my word, I’ll deliver you home all safe and sound.’

Skye hesitated but she couldn’t help laughing at his expression, which was an entirely false mixture of pleading and mournfulness. ‘OK.’ She shrugged. ‘I don’t know why I don’t always go out armed with an apron!’

‘This…’ he paused, looking somewhat put out ‘…happens to you often?’

‘Being lured to a man’s house under the guise of cooking him dinner? All the time.’

‘So I wasn’t being in the least original?’

‘Not one bit!’ she said blithely.

‘Bloody hell,’ he murmured. ‘I must be slipping. How often do you accept?’

‘Very seldom,’ she said seriously. ‘But you did boost my ratings the last time I cooked for you so I owe you one, Mr Hunter. Besides, I’d like to use you in my next cookbook.’

He looked comically put out this time. ‘As in how, Ms Belmont?’

‘As in what your favourite foods are, particularly with an international flavour, including favourite little restaurants you might have around the world. You can tell me all about it while I cook.’ She watched him serenely.

‘So this is very definitely a quid pro quo?’

‘Definitely.’

He shook his head. ‘You’re a hard woman, Skye. OK, I accept. Let’s go.’ Once more he took her hand and led her out.

For the next three months she often cooked him meals, although they never made any prior arrangements. He would simply ring her at work or at home and if she wasn’t free he’d say, ‘Bad luck. Maybe next time?’ And she’d agree without giving any intimation that it was getting harder and harder for her to be just a good friend of Nick Hunter’s.

Harder, also, to live with the thought that the last thing he would respond to was being pinned down in any way. It struck her, too, that the Skye Belmont she was presenting to Nick Hunter was her public persona, not the true girl who lurked beneath the surface and was a more serious, not-necessarily-admiring-of-the-worldliness-of-his-world girl.