Table of Contents

Cover Page

Excerpt

About the Author

Title Page

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

Copyright

“Admit it. Admit you want me.”

She tipped back her head, desperate to deny his words.

“Admit it,” Leo grated. “You have from the very first time we met.”

“I’m…not going to marry you,” Maddy asserted raggedly. “I’m not going to be used just for your convenience.”

“You won’t have much choice…And, believe me, I shall expect to get my money’s worth,” he added, letting his gaze slide slowly down over her in an insolently detailed appraisal, lingering over every curve. “Every last penny’s worth.”

SUSANNE MCCARTHY grew up in south London, England, but she always wanted to live in the country, and shortly after her marriage she moved to Shropshire with her husband. They live in a house on a hill with lots of dogs and cats. She loves to travel—but she loves to come home. As well as her writing, she still enjoys her career as a teacher in adult education, though she works only part-time now.

Forsaking All Others
Susanne McCarthy

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CHAPTER ONE

“THAT was Uncle Leo’s car!” Jamie glanced up from the hand-held computer game that was his latest obsession, his brown eyes alight with excitement as a sleek silver-grey Aston Martin appeared behind them on the quiet road that led from the suburbs of Stockport towards the contrasting wildness of the Peak District and overtook the elderly Escort Estate in one smooth manoeuvre. “Isn’t it super? It does almost two hundred miles an hour.”

“Does it really?” Maddy responded drily. “Pity the speed limit’s only seventy.”

“Oh, Uncle Leo never goes too fast,” her son confided. “Though he can when he’s in Germany—they don’t have a speed limit there, and I bet he really bombs along!”

“I expect he does,” Maddy conceded. “Remind me never to accept an invitation from him.”

Jamie returned her a scathing look. “You wouldn’t be scared would you?” he queried, with all the scorn of a bright eight-year-old for anything that could be thought remotely cissy.

“Yes, I would,” she confessed without hesitation. “I’ve too healthy a regard for my own skin to want to dash around at that sort of speed with only a tin box around me.”

Jamie chuckled with laughter, and turned his attention back to the challenge of the EcoWarrior, the tip of his tongue between his teeth as he zapped out the greenhouse gasses to repair the hole in the ozone layer. It had been a gift from his Uncle Leo, who owned the company that made it.

Well, at least forewarned was forearmed, Maddy reflected wryly. In fact, she ought to have guessed that he would be here—if she had allowed herself to think about him; but the habit of refusing to let herself think about him had become deeply ingrained over the years. She became aware that her hands were clenching the wheel a little too tightly, and made a conscious effort to relax them. She could cope with meeting Leo Ratcliffe again.

The telephone call from her sister-in-law had come in the small hours of the morning. She still wasn’t quite sure how she was supposed to feel. Jeremy, the husband she had walked out on nearly six years ago, was dead—killed in a skiing accident. Off-piste, of course, and in defiance of all the avalanche warnings; sensible caution had never been Jeremy’s strong point—he had always lived as if he believed himself to be indestructible.

Yes, she was sad—sad for the thought of what might have been, if only the spoilt little boy she had married had ever been able to grow up. And sad for a man who at least had known how to enjoy life—albeit with such magnificent selfishness—who suddenly was not there any more. He hadn’t even reached his thirtieth birthday.

She glanced down at the child by her side, his soft brown head bent in deep concentration over his game. So far he seemed to have taken the news quite well. But at just eight years old he was just getting to the age when a father was important to him—and whatever else she might have accused Jeremy of, she couldn’t deny that he had tried to be a good one. Once a month, regular as clockwork, he had arrived to take his son down to Hadley Park for his weekend visit.

Hadley Park…Of course—the beautiful old house, barely beyond the suburbs of Manchester but seemingly a world away, would be Jamie’s now. A wry smile curved her delicate mouth at the thought Jeremy, whose family had owned it for generations, had always seen it as nothing but a millstone, while she had loved it. Unfortunately, after death duties had taken their toll, there wasn’t likely to be much money left to keep it up, she reflected pragmatically. But it would be a shame to have to sell it.

The quiet roads out of Manchester had once been so familiar to her, and now they brought the memories flooding back. She hadn’t been back to Hadley Park since the day she had walked away from the wreckage of her marriage.

It had been a tough decision at the time, to strike out on her own with a small child in tow—she’d had no family to back her, and no marketable skills that she’d known of to earn her living. But her marriage had been going wrong virtually from the beginning, and finding out that her husband was sleeping with her best friend had just been the last straw.

She had often wondered why he hadn’t married Saskia in the first place. He had known her long before he had met herself—in fact it had been Sass who introduced them. And if not then, why not later? He had known that she would have willingly given him a divorce if he had wanted one, without any fuss or scandal. But perhaps he had had enough sense to realise that any relationship needed one partner, at least, to have their feet somewhere near the ground—he and Sass were far too much alike, both wanting to flit through life without any cares or responsibilities.

Looking back now, she could only shake her head in sorry amazement that she had been such a fool as ever to believe that he was cut out for marriage. Her only excuse was that she had been young, and Jeremy had seemed able to offer her something from which she had felt excluded ever since her parents had died—a sense of family, of being part of a world of warmth and brightness and laughter, of belonging…

And it hadn’t all been a disaster, she mused reminiscently. There had been some happy times, especially at the beginning. And she had her son. A small smile curved her soft mouth. No, she couldn’t regret everything about her marriage.

A new set of traffic lights had been installed at the crossroads, and she drew the car to a halt, pulling on the handbrake and tucking her thick wheat-blonde hair back behind one ear in a characteristic gesture. She wore it now in a neat jaw-length bob; it had been one of the first things she had had done when she had decided to leave Jeremy—to have her hair cut. It had amused her since to learn that most women did exactly the same thing when they were asserting their independence for the first time.

And she was independent, she reflected with some pride. The modest little house in Whythenshaw that she had managed to buy last year might not be Hadley Park, but she owed not one penny to the Ratcliffes. It was quite a struggle to keep up with the hefty repayments on the mortgage, but she had known from the start that she wouldn’t be able to rely on any regular maintenance from Jeremy.

Besides, she preferred to manage alone, however difficult it was—Jeremy’s family had never made any secret of their belief that she had married him for his money, and it was good to be proving them wrong. And she had discovered shortly after leaving him that she did have a marketable talent after all—arranging children’s parties.

It had begun when she had put on a very small party for Jamie’s third birthday, to help him make new friends in the playgroup he had just joined. It had been such a success that one of the other mums, who worked full-time, had asked her to do her little girl’s birthday party as well. After that it had snowballed, and then she had been asked to do grown-up parties too—even weddings. She was kept very busy, but she loved every minute of it—who wouldn’t, being paid to help people enjoy themselves?

The traffic lights changed to green and she turned left, driving on carefully through the village. Little had changed here, at least, she mused—the post office had closed, its windows boarded up, and the old-fashioned grocery had adapted itself grudgingly to the supermarket era, but after the cosmopolitan bustle of Manchester it had the air of having been locked in a timewarp for the past three decades.

The high stone wall that surrounded Hadley Park started just beyond the edge of the village. The massive wrought-iron gates stood open—in fact it looked as if the hinges were too rusted to allow them to close, she noticed as she drove through. There were more weeds and pot-holes in the drive than there used to be, too.

And then through the trees she caught her first glimpse of the house, and slowed the car to get a better look. She had almost forgotten how beautiful it was, set against a backdrop of rolling green hills that led up to the high, rugged tors of the Peak District in the far misty distance. Built in the reign of the first Elizabeth, the golden stone of its walls had been mellowed by centuries, and its roof-line was a jumble of gables and twisted chimneypots against the crisp blue and white of the February sky.

Jamie glanced up from his game. “Oh, we’re there,” he remarked, with the philistine unconcern of a seven-year-old for the magnificent heritage which had now passed into his small hands. “Great—I’m starving!”

Maddy laughed, and, putting the elderly car in gear again, she rolled it forward, bringing it to a halt beside the wide stone steps that led up to the front door. Jamie, sure of his welcome, scrambled out, skipping up the steps as the door was opened by a matronly woman in a flowered cotton overall, who greeted him with a warm hug.

Maddy followed him a little more diffidently, glad of her leather shoulder-bag to clutch on to. But as she climbed the steps the housekeeper looked up, her kindly face wreathed in smiles. “Why, Mrs Ratcliffe! I wouldn’t hardly have known you with your hair short like that! Come in, come in.” She held the front door wide open, ushering Maddy inside. “Such a nasty shock it’s been…Oh—I’m sorry…” She stopped herself awkwardly, glancing at Jamie, her eyebrows lifted in unspoken enquiry.

“It’s all right, Mrs Harris—he knows,” Maddy assured her quietly. “Thank you—it must have been an awful shock for you too.” The housekeeper’s eyes were still noticeably red, and she was clutching a rolled-up clump of damp paper tissue in her hand; she had known Jeremy since he had been Jamie’s age.

“It was.” Mrs Harris dabbed at her eyes. “I still can’t quite make myself believe it—though I know there hasn’t been any mistake. Well, young man,” she added, turning to Jamie and pinning a bright smile in place. “Guess what I’m going to do you for lunch. Your favourite—Welsh rarebit. I didn’t know what time you might get down,” she told Maddy. “And what with all the upset…”

“Of course,” Maddy assured her quickly. “I wouldn’t want you to go to any trouble—Welsh rarebit will suit me fine.”

“Mum, can I go down to the kitchen with Auntie Peggy?” Jamie demanded eagerly. “I want to see Mrs Tiggywinkle’s kittens.”

“Oh, there’s only one left o’them now,” Mrs Harris told him. “The rest we found homes for.”

A frown of disappointment crossed the small face, but it quickly brightened. “Which one did you keep?” he asked. “Was it the black one?”

“Of course—he’s yours.”

That news brought immediate delight. “I’m going to call him Sooty. Daddy said—” He stopped abruptly, remembering. “Daddy said it was a good name,” he finished, the wistful note in his voice tugging at Maddy’s heartstrings.

“It’s an excellent name,” she assured him gently—though mentally noting that she would have appreciated it if Jeremy had consulted her before bestowing the gift on their son. “Why don’t you run downstairs and find him? I haven’t seen him yet, and I’d love to meet him.”

“I rather think,” a dry voice spoke behind her, “this is the animal you’re looking for.”

Maddy turned sharply, catching her breath. “Leo…Oh, hello,” she managed, struggling to recover before anyone should notice the slip in her composure. “I…wasn’t expecting you to be here.”

She found herself subjected to a mocking survey from a pair of deep-set agate eyes—the same colour as Jeremy’s, she couldn’t help remembering, but lacking his openness and warmth.

“Hello, Maddy—nice to see you again. It’s been a long time,” he remarked, pointedly failing to mention that since he had passed her on the road, and his car was parked outside, she could have reasonably assumed that he was in the house. “You’d better come into the library—we have things to discuss. Jamie, take this little pest downstairs where he belongs,” he added, un-hooking the tiny kitten’s claws from the front of his shirt and holding him out to the boy. “He doesn’t seem to understand that I haven’t come here exclusively to provide him with entertainment.”

Jamie gurgled with laughter, not at all intimidated. “Thanks, Uncle Leo. Sorry if he’s been bothering you. I’ll take him down to the kitchen and give him a saucer of milk.” He took the kitten with care. “Look, Mum—what do you think of him?” he added excitedly.

“He’s cute.” She tickled the little creature’s ear, and he rubbed his head against her finger before opening his tiny pink mouth in a wide yawn. “But I think he’s tired now. Take him down and give him his milk, and then put him down to sleep for a while.”

The child nodded solemnly, cradling his precious bundle in his arms as he bore it away.

“Two coffees, please, Peggy,” Leo requested as he stood aside for Maddy to enter the library.

She stepped past him, just a little too conscious of him for comfort; she had always been too conscious of him, but she would have thought that after all these years she would be better able to handle it. It was probably just that she was to some extent in shock, and hadn’t been expecting to see him here so soon.

She glanced around the comfortable room, taking in the details that had once been so familiar, noting the small changes. “The grandfather clock’s gone.”

“Well spotted,” Leo responded, a sardonic inflexion in his voice. “I’m afraid you’ll find that Jeremy’s sold off quite a number of trinkets over the years—I hope there was nothing of special importance to you?”

“Not particularly.” She forced herself to meet his eyes levelly. “I didn’t know Jeremy had financial problems.”

He shrugged his wide shoulders in casual disregard. “When didn’t he have financial problems?” he returned. ‘Annual income twenty pounds, annual expen-diture twenty pounds eight and six…’ I’m afraid my dear cousin had little idea of economy.”

Maddy smiled wryly; she knew that had been true enough. Moving across the room, she sat down in the armchair beside the large fireplace—rather disappointingly occupied by a two-bar electric fire, instead of the glowing real log fire it seemed to warrant.

From beneath her lashes she studied the man opposite her, noting the details and changes in him, too. She hadn’t seen him since she had left Jeremy, but the years didn’t seem to have had much effect on him. There was a strong family likeness between the two men—but whereas in Jeremy the chiselled structure of high forehead and hard jaw had been somewhat softened by an easygoing nature and a taste for the good life, in his older cousin there was an uncompromising masculinity that was more than a little unnerving.

She could still remember the first time she had met him, as vividly as if it had been only yesterday. It had been Saskia’s twenty-first birthday party, and she had announced just a few days previously that it was also to be her engagement party…

“Maddy! Oh, I’m so glad you could come!” Saskia’s soft blue eyes glowed with gratitude as she threw open the front door and reached out an impulsive hand to draw Maddy into the house. “It wouldn’t have seemed the same without you here.”

Maddy laughed, shaking her head. “Don’t be silly—you didn’t think I’d miss your party, did you?” She held out a small parcel, wrapped in pretty paper. “Happy birthday.”

“Oh, Maddy—you shouldn’t have!” Saskia protested. “And you struggling by with just your grant…!”

“I can manage to fork out for the odd pressy for my best friend,” Maddy assured her, indulgent of her friend’s over-sensitive concern—it was something she still hadn’t grown out of.

Occasionally, when they had been at school together, she had found Saskia’s tendency to make a drama out of almost any minor incident more than a little irritating. But she had been too grateful for her friendship to let it come between them; all the other girls had looked down their noses at her, knowing that she only had a place at the expensive private boarding-school because her aunt was the deputy headmistress. They had had a thousand subtle ways of letting her know that she didn’t belong, never failing to notice if she was wearing one of their cast-off pieces of school uniform, always talking about the ponies their doting parents had bought them, and later their cars.

“Ah, goody—you’ve brought your overnight bag,” Saskia cried excitably. “I’ll get Jepson to take it upstairs—Mummie’s put you in the room right next to mine. It’ll be such fun—just like rotten old Calderbrook, except without Miss Pikington stalking the corridors like something out of Alien!’

Maddy chuckled at the graphic simile. “Thank goodness for that! But I’ll take my bag up myself, if you’ll just tell me which room—I need to freshen up before I join the party.”

“Oh, of course—I’m sorry, I never thought of it.” Saskia looked stricken by such a lapse, but instantly brightened. “I’ll come up with you—I’m dying to catch up with all your news. How are you enjoying your teaching course?”

“It’s fun—especially the teaching practice. I had a class of six-year-olds this term—they really keep you on your toes!”

Saskia shuddered theatrically. “Ugh—rather you than me! Children aren’t my cup of tea, I’m afraid—the less I have to do with them, the better.”

Maddy glanced at her in surprise. “But surely you’re going to have some of your own when you get married?” she protested. “What about your fiancé? Doesn’t he want them?”

Saskia shook her head. “No, thank goodness!” They had reached the second floor, and a long, quiet corridor with a gleaming parquet floor. It must take ages to polish, Maddy mused—not that Saskia’s mother had to do it herself. Saskia threw open a door, showing Maddy into a spacious bedroom, beautifully furnished with reproduction antiques, with a thick-piled rose-pink carpet and matching velvet swags at the windows.

“The bathroom’s through there,” Saskia pointed out. “Is it OK?”

Maddy glanced around, her delicate mouth curving into a wry smile—it was about three times the size of the tiny little study-bedroom she had at college, and infinitely more elegant. “It’s fine,” she responded, barely suppressing the sardonic note in her voice.

Saskia bounced on the bed, as excited as a child. “Hurry up and get ready,” she urged. “I’m dying to introduce you to Leo.”

“Leo?” Maddy slanted her friend a teasing look. “It was all very quick, this engagement—how long have you known him?”

“Oh, ages! He’s practically family—by marriage, anyway. He’s been abroad for the past few years, though—he only came back at Christmas. So I grabbed him before he could get away again!” she added with a giggle.

“So what’s he like? Tell me all about him.”

“He’s in computers—he’s started up his own company,” Saskia told her, her eyes bright. “He’s fabulously rich—and he drives an Aston Martin!”

Maddy, brushing her long hair in the mirror, glanced past her own reflection to that of her friend. Saskia’s shallowness was something else she had grown to tolerate over the years, and she wasn’t really surprised to hear her describe someone in terms of his bank balance or the car he drove; but as criteria for choosing a husband they seemed to her to leave a lot to be desired. She was half inclined to feel a little sorry for the unknown Leo.

She looked back at her own reflection, wryly aware that beside the sensational moiré satin evening number Saskia was wearing her own simple black dress looked what it was—inexpensive, and several years old. But she so rarely wore an evening dress that it hadn’t seemed worth spending the money on a new one. Her only jewelry was the tiny gold locket her mother had left her, with miniature photographs of her parents inside.

At school, the differences between their backgrounds had never been quite so noticeable, she mused wistfully. It hadn’t been the money so much—though that had been the most obvious factor—but that Saskia had had a home, and a family—somewhere to belong. Maddy hadn’t had that since her parents had died—her Aunt Helen was her only family, the exclusive Calderbrook boarding-school her only home.

And, apart from the fact that they were both blonde, they were very different types. Saskia was a spring blonde, with baby-fine flaxen hair and a delicate, rosebud prettiness, while the image that gazed back at her showed rather stronger features—a chin that had learned to take life’s hard knocks, a nose that bordered on the aquiline, and eyes of a smoky grey. She was taller, too—though they probably still took the, same dress-size.

She gave her hair a last flick with the brush—she had grown it long because she couldn’t afford to keep having it cut, and it was now almost down to her waist—and turned to Saskia with a warm smile. “OK—I’m ready,” she announced breezily. “Lead on, Macduff!”

“Great!” exclaimed Saskia, skipping to her feet. “Come on, then.”

Together they descended the stairs to the ground floor. The sound of music and conversation drifted up to them before they reached it—more guests had arrived while they had been upstairs, it seemed. Maddy felt her stomach clench with tension; she had come for Saskia’s sake, but she knew she didn’t really belong in a gathering like this—as she had never belonged at school. She had always been the “charity girl”.

The house was large; the staircase descended in a sweep to an imposing entrance hall, with rooms opening on each side of it. As they reached the foot a devastatingly handsome young man in an immaculately cut dinner jacket that moulded an impressive breadth of shoulder stepped out from one of the rooms, and, catching sight of Saskia, immediately swept her up in a hug, lifting her off her feet and swinging her round.

“Sassy! The love of my life! You’re looking absolutely ravishing tonight—good enough to eat.”

Maddy watched, amused and somewhat relieved. She had been a little worried, hearing Saskia’s pragmatic description of her intended, that her friend had entered into this engagement for all the wrong reasons. But she was pleasantly surprised; no one could mistake the attraction between these two. It crossed her mind briefly that he seemed a little young for the high-powered businessman Saskia had described—but then computers was apparently a business for young whiz-kids, if the papers and television were to be believed.

Something made her sense that she was being watched, and she glanced across the hall. Another man had followed the first into the hall, and as she met his dark eyes an odd little shiver of recognition struck her, although she knew that she had never seen him before in her life—unless it had been in her dreams…But the next instant she realised why he had seemed so familiar—he looked so much like Saskia’s fiancé that he had to be his older brother.

The couple in the hall stopped spinning, laughing and breathless, and Saskia struck her fiancé a playful blow on the chest. “Wretch—you’ve made me giddy now. Anyway, I want you to meet my very best friend.”

Brown eyes, as mischievous and friendly as a puppy’s, smiled up at Maddy, and at once he let Saskia go, darting up the stairs. “Oh boy—you’re gorgeous!” he flattered outrageously. “Sass, you never told me your friend was so beautiful.”

Maddy blushed, laughing at his teasing—but a little wary, anxious not to appear to be giving him any inappropriate encouragement. She held out her hand, smiling up at him. “Hello—I’ve been looking forward to meeting you,” she said. “Saskia’s told me a lot about you.”

His dark eyebrows arched in surprise, and he chuckled richly. “Really? Not the truth, I hope, Sass? That’d ruin my chances before I’d even got started!”

Maddy flashed him a look of sharp discouragement, drawing her hand from his, but Saskia was laughing merrily. “Don’t be a loon, Jeremy—Maddy’s far too good for you.”

Maddy blinked at her in bewilderment. “Jeremy? But…I thought…”

“This is Leo.”

The other man had strolled forward, and Saskia linked her hands through his arm, holding on to him as if he was some kind of trophy. Maddy felt an odd sensation, like the twang of a loose guitar-string, way out of tune, deep in the pit of her stomach. But he was smiling up at her pleasantly, holding out his hand, and she put hers in it briefly.

“Hello, Maddy—I’ve heard a great deal about you,” he greeted her. “This young reprobate, for whom I have the misfortune to be frequently mistaken, is my cousin.”

It was easy to see how such a mistake could be made at a first glance—though not, Maddy concluded, at a second. Leo was older, though it was hard to tell by how much—five years, maybe? Both men were tall, though Leo had the advantage of maybe an inch or two—his shoulders were perhaps a little wider, too. They both had dark hair, almost black, but Jeremy wore his longer, curling around his ears—and he had the readier smile.

He was laughing now, flattered by his cousin’s epithet. “He’s got the brains, but I’ve got the charm,” he confided to Maddy. “Hey, you haven’t got a drink yet. Come on, stick with me, babe—I’ll take care of you.”

She allowed herself to be swept away, into the hubbub of the party. Jeremy found her a glass of champagne, and began introducing her to people. He seemed to know everyone there, and clearly he was extremely popular—with the men as well as the women. Held at his side by a casual arm around her waist, Maddy felt as if she had been caught up in the sparkling aura of a flashing comet.

It was a wonderful feeling, as intoxicating as the sweet, bubbly champagne she was sipping. Everyone wanted to know her, no one seemed to care about her shabby dress—in fact it almost began to seem as if it was she who was the most stylish, they who were overdressed. Jeremy’s laughter was infectious, and his outrageous compliments flattering enough to cause even the most solidly grounded common sense to waver.

As dusk descended the garden was lit up with brightly coloured paper lanterns, strung from the branches of the trees. A marquee had been set up on the lawn, and a local band was playing loud rock music for people to dance to. Breathless, Maddy let Jeremy spin her round in a wild jive, her long hair flying, as his friends cheered them on.

She had never enjoyed herself so much in her life. It had always seemed as if she was out of step; at school she had been the charity girl, in hand-me-down clothes, while ironically at college she had found that the manners and speech she had acquired at school tended to set her apart from her peers, who were inclined to regard her as a snob. But tonight she felt for the first time as if she was really accepted.

The only fly in the ointment was Saskia; catching sight of her hovering beside the French window that led into the house, Maddy was surprised to see a petulant expression marring that pretty face. A stab of guilt struck through her; it was Saskia’s engagement party, and here was she—Maddy—at the centre of attention. As soon as she could, she slipped away from Jeremy’s side and hurried over to her friend.

“Sassy—what’s wrong?” she asked gently. She glanced around. “Where’s Leo?”

Saskia shrugged her slim shoulders in a gesture of sulky indifference. “In Daddy’s den—he had an important call from New York.”

“Oh, what a pity—spoiling the party for him like that,” Maddy protested. “Still, I suppose he had to take it if it was really important.”

“Oh, it doesn’t matter,” Saskia asserted dismissively. “You seem to be enjoying yourself, anyway. Watch out for Jeremy, though—he’s a devil. If you’re not careful you’ll end up as just another name in his little black book.”

Maddy looked down at her friend in astonishment—surely that couldn’t be a note of jealousy she detected in her voice? But then Saskia sighed wistfully, tucking her hand confidingly into Maddy’s arm.

“I don’t seem to have had a chance to chat to you all evening,” she protested plaintively. “And it’s months since I’ve seen you.”

“Oh, Sassy—I’m sorry.” It was quite true, of course—it was Saskia who had invited her, and it had been selfish of her to go off with Jeremy all evening. “Come on, let’s go inside for a little while,” she coaxed. “It’s a little quieter in there.”

Saskia complied willingly enough, but within a few moments of them sitting down in the spacious drawing-room Jeremy came in search of them. “So this is where you’re hiding,” he declared, perching on the arm of the settee beside Maddy.

Saskia giggled, unmistakably flirting with him. “Oh, Jeremy—we weren’t hiding. We just popped in here for a breather—it’s such a dreadful crush!”

“Rubbish!” he insisted. “Time enough when you’re middle-aged to take a breather—come and dance!”

Saskia jumped up at once, laughingly accepting the invitation—though Maddy had thought it had been directed to her. But then these two were clearly old friends. And Sassy deserved to enjoy herself—after all, it was her party. As Jeremy caught at her hand to drag her along with them she shook her head, smiling to soften the refusal, following them more slowly.

The far end of the terrace was in shadow, and she retreated there for a while, watching the dancing a little wistfully—without Jeremy at her side, it seemed as if she had become invisible again. That familiar tug of envy twisted inside her; she was on the outside, as usual, unable to get in. Even Saskia had only really been friends with her because she had few friends herself—most people weren’t prepared to tolerate that sometimes irritating affectation…

“Not dancing?”

She glanced up in surprise to find Leo Ratcliffe at her side. “Oh…No, not just for the moment,” she managed a little awkwardly.

“I found this in the drawing-room—I believe it’s yours.”

He held out a small, heart-shaped gold locket, and Maddy gasped in shock, her hand flying automatically to her bare throat. “Oh, my goodness—yes, it is! Thank you.” She took it from him, agitation making her hands shake. She might have lost it, and it was the only thing she had…“The clasp isn’t broken—I must have not fastened it properly. It was a good job it slipped off here—I might have lost it on the train…”

And never seen it again. The bleakness of that thought brought tears to her eyes, but she quickly blinked them back under cover of refastening the chain around her neck—being extra careful this time that it was fastened properly.

“It’s a pretty little thing,” he remarked, lifting it on his finger to study the fine flower pattern wrought into the gold.

“Yes…”

Suddenly she became aware of how close she was to him. There was a faint, musky, male kind of scent about him—not an aftershave, she was sure, but the unique scent of his own skin. It seemed to have a strange effect on her senses, and when she looked up she found herself gazing into his eyes. Deep-set brown eyes—not quite the same colour as Jeremy’s, she realised now, but a shade darker, and intriguingly flecked with gold…

“Leo! You said you’d only be ten minutes, and you’ve been gone half an hour!” Saskia’s petulant voice shattered the fleeting spell as she dragged Jeremy up the steps of the terrace. “Come and dance with me.”

He shook his head, smiling down at her indulgently. “In this crush? No, thank you. Come and get something to eat instead.”

For a moment Saskia looked rebellious, but then she smiled sweetly, tucking her hands into his arms and stretching up on tiptoe to put a kiss on his cheek. “All right,” she conceded, her sapphire-blue eyes aglow with adoration. “If that’s what you want.”

Maddy watched them walk away. Was that how it always was with them? They did whatever he wanted? She had quite been beginning to like him—almost, even, to envy Saskia a little bit. It had even crossed her mind to wonder why a man of such apparent intelligence would choose to marry a featherbrain like Sass—fond as she was of her, she could describe her in no other way. But apparently he was one of those men who wanted a sweet, biddable little wife, who would hang on his every word and think he was absolutely wonderful. She was aware of feeling just a little disappointed in him.

But Jeremy was demanding her attention, dragging her out on to the dance-floor. She did enjoy dancing, and she couldn’t help but enjoy Jeremy’s company. And as the evening drew on, and the music slowed, she found that she enjoyed being in his arms, and being kissed by him. And, if her mind occasionally wandered to thoughts of Leo, she could remind herself that Jeremy was every bit as attractive, and certainly more fun. And he wasn’t engaged to her best friend.

CHAPTER TWO

“WHAT…was it you wanted to discuss, Leo?” Maddy enquired, relieved to find that her voice was now completely under control again.

With a wave of his hand he indicated the piles of bills and documents on the desk and on the floor around it, stuffed into shoe-boxes and old brown envelopes—Jeremy had never had much patience with paperwork. “This. I’ve been trying to go through Jeremy’s papers and see if there’s anything that needs my immediate attention, but it’s the biggest mess I’ve ever seen.”

The note of censure in his voice stung her into sharp annoyance. “I’m sure there’s nothing that can’t wait another few days,” she retorted. “Why are you going through it anyway? Shouldn’t that be left to the executors of the estate?”

“I am one of the executors,” he responded evenly. “You’re the other. We’ve also been named as joint trustees. Everything’s been left to Jamie, naturally—although you’re to have a lifetime annuity—and there are a few small gifts to the staff.”

“Oh…” A lump had risen to her throat, and her eyes filled up with tears; it was so sad to think of Jeremy drawing up his will, cheerfully expecting that it would be many years before it would be needed. And it was typical of his generosity to have remembered the staff—but why on earth had he had to make Leo her co-trustee?

The housekeeper’s arrival with the coffee gave her a few moments to regain her composure. She should have guessed, of course, that Jeremy would have wanted Leo to administer his estate; he had always looked up to his older cousin—maybe even been slightly in awe of him. And he hadn’t been aware that Maddy would have preferred not to have too much to do with him.

Leo brought over a small table, set it down beside her chair and put her coffee-cup on it before seating himself on the opposite side of the fireplace. “How has Jamie taken it?” he enquired.

“Oh…He seems OK. Well, you saw him. He’s old enough to understand, but not old enough to really take it in properly. He knows it means he won’t be seeing his daddy again, but I suppose it’ll be a while before the realisation sinks in.”

“Yes.” Leo’s voice had thickened. “It will be for me, too.”

“For all of us,” she mused sadly.

Leo’s cold laughter startled her. “Oh, come on,” he protested, on a note of cynical mockery. “Don’t start playing the broken-hearted widow. All it’s done for you is save you the bother of getting a divorce.”

“I beg your pardon?” Her eyes flashed with frosty indignation. “For your information, I was still very fond of Jeremy. And if I’d wanted a divorce, I could have had one years ago.”

“Not without Jeremy’s consent,” he countered. “You walked out on him, remember? As the guilty party, you could only sit it out for the full five years.”

She stared at him, struggling to regain sufficient control over her voice to answer him. “Don’t you think I may perhaps have had good reason?” she queried with fine understatement.

Those agate eyes were hard and unforgiving. “You knew what he was like when you married him,” he asserted disparagingly. “It didn’t seem to matter to you then. You just wanted the sort of lifestyle you thought he could give you—the chance to mix with the county set, go to all the country house parties. But marriage vows are for better or worse, you know—not to turn your back on just because things don’t turn out to be quite the bed of roses you were expecting.”

Maddy felt her cheeks go from white to deep scarlet. He didn’t know—Jeremy had never told him about Saskia. Of course not, she reflected wryly; even though that hopelessly misconceived engagement had ended inside of three months, Jeremy would have been reluctant to let his cousin know that he was having an affair with his ex-fiancée.

And she could hardly tell him now, she realised in the next instant; he probably wouldn’t believe her, and it would just seem to him that she was trying to off-load the blame on to Jeremy when he could no longer defend himself. Besides, what did it matter to her what he thought of her? Once, maybe—but that was a long time ago. Now she only had to think about what was best for Jamie. She had to work with Leo over the administration of the estate—it would be best if personal feelings didn’t come into it at all.

“What happened between Jeremy and I is none of your business,” she informed him, her voice stiff with dignity. “But neither of us particularly wanted a divorce—it wasn’t as if either of us was in any hurry to marry again. And besides, it was better for Jamie to leave things as they were. It was a perfectly amicable arrangement.”

He lifted one dark eyebrow in frank scepticism, but shrugged the discussion aside with a lift of his wide shoulders. “Well, I suppose it’s all somewhat academic now, anyway,” he remarked coldly. “It’s the future that we have to think about. I’ve made a list of the people who will need to be notified about the funeral arrangements…”

“Oh, have you?” she retorted in sharp annoyance. “Don’t you think perhaps you should have consulted me? I am the next of kin, you know.”

Anger, barely restrained, flared in his eyes. “Don’t get competitive about it,” he warned, his voice quiet with menace. “There’s only one person who’ll suffer if we make enemies of each other, and that’s your son.”

She drew in a sharp breath; was that merely a reminder, or a warning? But he was right, of course—they were going to have to co-operate with each other in order to ensure that Jamie’s inheritance would be worthwhile. And, more than that, it wouldn’t be good for him to have them arguing over his head; like his father, he seemed to have an inordinate regard for his “Uncle Leo”—most times after his monthly visits to Hadley Park he had had as much to say about Leo as about Jeremy. And the fact that Leo was the creator of his beloved EcoWarrior, as well as a number of other cult computergame figures, was enough to elevate him to the status almost of a demi-god.

Drawing in a long, steadying breath, she inclined her head in acknowledgement. “All right,” she conceded evenly. “May I see the list?”

He walked over to the desk and brought her back a sheet of paper, with a long list of names neatly written out in his handsome script—another way in which he had differed from Jeremy, she reflected, recalling her husband’s lazy scrawl.

“That seems OK,” she murmured; she knew most of the names on the list, and none of them were unexpected. She had known Saskia’s name would be on it, of course—she was family, her brother being married to Jeremy’s older sister Julia. Yes, Saskia would be there, weeping touchingly for her childhood friend—and Maddy would be the only one who would know that she was in truth an adulterous little bitch who had wrecked her best friend’s marriage.

“You’re sure?” Those deep-set agate eyes had noted the tautness of her jaw. “Is there anyone you think I—we—should add?”

“No, I don’t think so,” she responded coolly. “You’re suggesting that the funeral should be next week?”

“Yes. I would have gone for Friday, but it may be better to delay it, just in case there are any difficulties arising out of the inquest.”

“Why should there be?” she queried, surprised. “I thought it was a quite straightforward skiing accident.”

He shrugged his wide shoulders. “Almost certainly—but, nevertheless, the authorities will have to be sure that there was no question of…anything else. Like whether he was drunk.”

“Drunk? Don’t be ridiculous! Jeremy could be a little wild at times, but he never drank too much.”

“How do you know?” Leo countered, a hard edge in his voice. “What would you know of his state of mind these past five years—what would you care? You saw him once a month when he came to fetch Jamie for his visit and brought him back.”

She stared at him, her hands shaking slightly. “Are you saying that he’d become an alcoholic?”

He shook his head impatiently. “No, I’m not. But I do know he was unhappy. He was still in love with you—maybe if you’d still been around…”

“Yes?” Maddy’s jaw was clenched tightly in anger. “Maybe if I’d still been around, what? He might not have had the accident—is that what you were going to say? That’s it’s all my fault?”

“No, of course not,” he rapped back. “It just…might have steadied him down a little…”

“I already had one child to think about,” she retorted hotly. “I couldn’t cope with two.” Fulminating grey eyes clashed with agate; Maddy could feel herself trembling—it was rare for her to be so close to losing her temper, and it was a feeling she didn’t like.

She was the first to look away. Leo was right, to some extent—she had married Jeremy for all the wrong reasons. Oh, she had been deeply fond of him—but she had never been in love with him. She had let him spin her into a whirlwind romance, dazzled by his good looks and his charm, and by the aching need inside her to fill the loneliness of her life. And because the man she had fallen instantly in love with had already been spoken for.

But she had kept that last fact a secret for almost nine years. It had been a painful irony to learn, on returning from their crazy honeymoon jaunt around Africa, that Leo and Saskia had ended their engagement just two weeks after her own wedding.

Not that it would really have made any difference, she acknowledged. Leo had made it abundantly clear from the beginning that, like the rest of the family, he disapproved of his cousin’s marriage. She did have some sympathy with their view that at twenty-one he had been far too young, but nothing could have been further from their belief that she had married him in order to claw her way a few rungs up the social ladder.

Leo sighed, and shrugged his wide shoulders in weary impatience. “Perhaps this isn’t the best time to discuss it,” he conceded. “I understand you’ll be staying for a few days—Julia has arranged for you to have the Yellow Room. Jamie can go in the nursery, of course, as usual.”

“Thank you.” So Jeremy’s sister was here already, organising everything in her usual high-handed fashion. Maddy was surprised that they had even bothered to suggest she came down—between the two of them, they seemed to be making all the decisions. But then what else had she expected? They were, after all, Ratcliffes; everyone else was supposed to fall into step with them.

A tap at the door heralded the housekeeper’s return, to announce that lunch was ready. “Shall I bring it up to the morning-room?” she suggested. “You won’t want the big dining-room.”

Maddy was tempted to say that she would prefer to come down to the warm kitchen, but Leo had already agreed that the morning-room would be the most suitable, so she kept her mouth shut. But if he and his cousin Julia thought she was still the diffident young girl who had come into their family all those years ago, they could be in for a surprise. She had no intention of letting herself be pushed around—and no intention of letting them interfere in her son’s inheritance.

It was strange to be back, Maddy mused as she stood at the window of her bedroom, gazing out over the woodfringed parkland of the estate. The house was much as she remembered it—though she couldn’t help noticing that there were even more minor repairs that needed to be done, a few of them now becoming quite urgent if the fabric of the building was to be preserved.

It was a pity Jeremy hadn’t taken his responsibility to the family seat more seriously. She had tried to persuade him often enough, but it had usually led to an argument—he preferred to spend his money on cars and parties and having a good time. The income from the land that went with the estate—farm tenancies, mostly—had barely been enough to support such an extravagant lifestyle even then. His own father’s death, a couple of years before she had met him, had already taken quite a toll in death duties—a second charge now, not much more than ten years later, could well prove to be the last straw.

Which could mean that there was no alternative but to sell the house, or hand it over to the National Trust—if they would take it. But she didn’t want to do that—coming back here had reminded her of how important Hadley Park was to her. It was more than just a house—much more…

Unconsciously she lifted her hand to touch the tiny gold locket she always wore at her throat. It was the only thing that had come out of the fire that had destroyed her own home and killed her parents. She had been just twelve years old, and had survived only because of the odd irony that she had been in hospital having her tonsils out.

In that one night her whole childhood—all her memories, every photograph, every toy she had had since she was a baby—had disappeared. Without a history, she had always felt a strange, lingering sense of detachment, as if she was somehow a loose thread in the fabric of the human race—left dangling, not properly woven in.

It was a feeling that had to some extent gone away with the birth of her son, but she had never forgotten it. And now that she was back here, in the house that had belonged to his Ratcliffe ancestors for so many generations, she remembered how determined she had been that he should know that he had a history—it was here, in these old stone walls and the deep, solid earth that they stood upon. This was his birthright, and she was going to hold on to it for him—no matter what it took.

But she was going to have to think of a way to generate sufficient income to keep it going, she mused wryly. And that would be no easy task. It was rather too small, and lacked the kudos of real aristocratic connections, to attract many visitors if it were opened to the public. And she had no desire to fill the gardens with wild animals or fairground attractions.

As she stood there, gazing absently out at the garden as it waited for the touch of spring to ripen the green buds of the daffodils that grew in wild profusion in all the flowerbeds, her mind slipped back to that encounter with Leo. Seeing him again had brought back so many memories. She had thought she had put all that behind her, but, like lumber in the attic, she had never sorted it out properly, and now that the door had been opened again it had all come tumbling out…

It had all happened so quickly that she had barely had time to think. Jeremy had proposed to her just three days after Saskia’s party, and now, less than two months later, here she was, walking up the aisle in a romantic dress of white lace, on the arm of Saskia’s father who had stood in for her own to give her away.

She had tried to persuade Jeremy to wait a little—after all, she was only nineteen, and he was barely twenty-one. But he had brushed all her protests aside, sweeping her along on the tide of his own impetuousness—it was hard to believe that all this was really happening.

And then she glanced up towards the altar, and saw the two men standing there—so very much alike to look at, so different in every other way…Her heart gave a sudden thud, almost taking her breath away. She hadn’t seen Leo since the night of the party—he had been away on business—but she knew that Jeremy had written to him and begged him to come home in time to be his best man.

She hadn’t been unduly worried about his return—had managed to convince herself that it had been no more than her imagination, that reaction she had felt the first time she had seen him. But here it was again—a thousand times stronger. Those deep-set, agate-coloured eyes met hers, and she felt as if her bones were melting.

But it was wrong—it shouldn’t be happening. She was in love with Jeremy…wasn’t she? Confusion swirled in her brain as she stared at the two of them: Jeremy, so boyishly handsome, his eyes alight with happiness as he waited for his bride—and Leo, a faintly cynical smile curving that firm, sensuous mouth, the arrogant set of his wide shoulders reminding her that the downside of all that magnetic male charisma was a personality that expected to have everything its own way.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t exactly a good moment to pause for a little calm reflection—her slight hesitation had been noticed, and everyone was looking at her with avid curiosity. She could hardly request a postponement of the wedding on the grounds that she wasn’t sure if she was marrying the right man. And besides, Leo was engaged to the girl who was today her own bridesmaid—an engagement sealed with an enormous diamond that must have cost a fortune.

Drawing in a deep, steadying breath, she forced herself to go on. As she drew to Jeremy’s side he smiled down at her, taking her hand warmly in his, and she told herself it would be all right—it was just a last-minute attack of nerves. But she was glad to be able to hide behind the heavy lace fall of her veil as the vicar began to welcome the congregation, all too acutely aware of the man at the very edge of her vision…as he had been at the edge of her mind for the past two months.

Perhaps it was just that Jeremy had spoken about him so much—he was obviously very fond of his older cousin, maybe even a little in awe of him. It had been Leo, the captain of the most successful rugby team in the history of the school, Leo who had got a First at Oxford, Leo who knew everything there was to know about computers…

And, after all, there had been nothing in his behaviour that first night to suggest that he had been struck in the same way she had—he had shown nothing beyond a mere friendly politeness towards his fiancee’s best friend. And though she knew that her slender height and long blonde hair attracted a lot of male attention—not always the kind of attention she liked—she was certainly not vain enough to suppose that the effect would be universal. She was just being stupid.

The vicar was reciting the vows, and she repeated them in a whisper. Jeremy squeezed her hand encouragingly, smiling down at her, and she realised with a small stab of guilt that he had completely misinterpreted the reason for her nervousness. But she meant what she was saying—she really did. “Forsaking all others…”

And then Leo stepped forward to hand Jeremy the ring, and though she tried with all the strength of her will to resist, she couldn’t help but lift her eyes to his—to find him watching her, his dark gaze seeming to see right into her soul. He knew—even behind the thick lace of her veil she couldn’t hide from him. He had never even touched her, and yet she belonged to him…

At last the ceremony was over, and they all crowded into the tiny vestry to sign the register. As soon as they were inside, Jeremy caught her round the waist and swung her around in a wild polka, bumping heedlessly into the table and the walls, culminating in a deep, steaming kiss.

“Hello, Mrs Ratcliffe!” he proclaimed as at last he let her go.

She laughed, breathless, her cheeks faintly tinged with pink; at least everyone would assume her blush was one of bridal modesty—except, perhaps, for Leo. But she couldn’t risk letting herself glance in his direction—better to try to pretend that he wasn’t there.

Saskia, pretty as a picture in her pink bridesmaid dress, hurried over to help her straighten her veil. “Oh, isn’t it wonderful!” she declared, her sapphire-blue eyes dancing as she kissed her cheek. “Now you’re really almost my sister, instead of just my best friend.”

Maddy smiled; that was what she had always wanted—to be part of a family, to belong. And, though she knew that Jeremy’s family hadn’t approved of the speed with which it had all happened, now that they were married and they saw how happy Jeremy was they would surely come round to accepting her.

They were all gathering around her—Saskia’s parents, and her brother Nigel, who was married to Jeremy’s elder sister Julia—kissing her and wishing her well. Even Julia managed some sort of smile, and a dry peck on her cheek, though it seemed to cost her dear; Maddy responded to her as warmly as she could—that was a relationship she was going to have to work very hard at.

And then Leo was there, slanting his cousin a teasing glance. “Do you mind if I kiss the bride?” he asked, an inflection of something Maddy couldn’t quite interpret in his voice.

“Of course,” Jeremy responded cheerfully. “Best man’s privilege.”

Maddy stiffened, every nerve-fibre in her body stretched taut as Leo turned to her, his hands resting lightly on her shoulders as he drew her towards him. A faintly mocking smile glinted in those agate eyes. “Jeremy’s a very lucky man to have such a beautiful bride,” he murmured. “No wonder he was in such a hurry to tie the knot.”

“Th—thank you,” she stammered, hoping he wouldn’t detect the agitated racing of her heartbeat.

He bent his head and his mouth brushed over hers, warm and firm, just as she had known it would be. Her heart creased in pain; she wasn’t supposed to feel like this—she wasn’t allowed to. Longing to have him hold her close, she drew back quickly, her cheeks deeply tinged with pink, her eyes unable to meet his.

Fortunately no one seemed to have noticed anything untoward—Julia’s small son Aubrey, frustrated at not being the centre of attention, had chosen that moment to throw a minor tantrum, and Jeremy was enjoying a bridegroom’s liberties with the chief bridesmaid, who was giggling as he kissed her.

With a supreme effort of will, she pulled herself together. It was just the excitement of the day, the crazy rush of it all, she told herself firmly—it really wasn’t surprising that she hardly knew if she was on her head or her heels. But she would be very careful from now on not to let Leo get too close—she wasn’t sure quite what it was about him that had such a disturbing effect on her, but she wanted no repetition of it.

Even so, it was a strain to get through the rest of the day—smiling for endless photographs, standing beside Jeremy at the entrance to the huge marquee that had been erected in the garden of his house, greeting an endless line of guests, most of whom she had never even seen before. She sensed that they were all looking down their noses at her, convinced that Jeremy had married beneath him; she was grateful to Saskia for being there, conspicuously loyal, telling everyone that they had been at school together.

Then there was the lavish wedding-breakfast, and the speeches, and then everything was swiftly cleared away so that the guests could dance to the music of a local band. As the afternoon wore on into evening Maddy began to develop a splitting headache; the marquee was hot and stuffy, and she was desperate for a breath of fresh air. Jeremy was dancing with one of his aunts, and no one noticed as she slipped quietly away.

The gardens of Hadley Park were beautiful—a little neglected in places, with trails of bright blue periwinkle growing wild among the flowerbeds, and honeysuckle scrambling all along the broken stone parapet that ran around the terrace at the back of the house, its sweet fragrance filling the air. The sky had turned a soft dark blue, streaked with high magenta clouds as the sun sank below the horizon.

Wandering into a secluded corner, she found a wooden pergola, covered with climbing roses. There was a rustic seat inside and she sat down wearily, closing her eyes. Her mind was a turmoil of confusion; had she been wrong to marry Jeremy? She had genuinely believed she was in love with him, and yet…Maybe she had let herself be swept up by his ebullient personality, feeling for the first time in her life that she was on the inside of one of those charmed circles she had always envied—and maybe she had mistaken gratitude for love…

A sound close by brought her eyes sharply open—as Leo stepped into the pergola. Startled, she jumped to her feet—and gave a little cry of horror as the puffed sleeve of her dress caught on a stray rose-thorn. “Oh…damn and blast it!” she muttered fiercely under her breath, twisting around as she tried to free herself.

“Hold still,” he advised in that dry, sardonic tone. “If you keep pulling at it like that you’ll rip it.”

Her heart gave an uncomfortable thud and began to race rapidly as he leaned close to her and carefully disentangled the delicate silk from the thorn. “Th—thank you,” she managed, hoping he wouldn’t notice the slight tremor in her voice. “I…just came out for a few minutes—I couldn’t breathe in there.”

“I wondered what you were doing out here all by yourself,” he remarked. “Beginning to pall already, is it?”

She glanced up at him in surprise, taken aback by the hard glint in those agate eyes. “I’m sorry?” she queried, frowning.

“I wonder if you will be?” he mused, deliberately misunderstanding. “Unfortunately I’m inclined to think it’s my impetuous young cousin who’ll be the one to be sorry. You know what they say—’Marry in haste, repent at leisure’. And you certainly married in haste.”

She glared up at him in indignant fury. “Yes, we did,” she retorted defensively. “But so what? Jeremy loves me.”

“Oh, I’ve no doubt of that,” Leo drawled, an inflexion of mocking cynicism in his voice. “He’s written to me more in the past two months than he ever has in his life—every letter singing your praises. But I’m left in some doubt about you.” His eyes flickered down over her in icy contempt. “Some of my more naive relatives seem to think you’ve trapped him into matrimony by getting pregnant, but I think they’ve underestimated your subtlety.”

“I…I don’t know what you mean,” she protested, bewildered.

“Don’t you?” His smile was hard, not reaching his eyes. “Strange—I’m sure you’re a very clever girl. Clever enough to know that getting pregnant would have been exceedingly risky—besotted as he is, there’d be no guarantee that Jeremy would do the decent thing. So you played an even more old-fashioned trick; and very effectively, too—particularly with someone like Jeremy, who is regrettably not very good at being patient when he wants something. I just hope you feel the prize is worth the effort.”

“Of course I do!” Anger lent her voice a note of conviction it might otherwise have lacked. “I…love Jeremy—very much.”

He lifted one dark eyebrow a fraction of an inch—but it spoke volumes. “Well, there’s some reassurance in that, I suppose,” he conceded coolly. “Though whether it will stand the test of time—and harsh reality—remains to be seen.”

“Why shouldn’t it?” she demanded, her voice ragged.

He lifted his wide shoulders in a cynical shrug. “Well, for one thing there’s the matter of Jerry’s income. No doubt he’s given you the impression that there are money-trees growing here in the garden, but I’m afraid you’ll find that the true picture isn’t quite so rosy. Oh, there’ll be more than enough to keep you in a reasonable degree of comfort, given a little practical economy. Unfortunately he’s far too young to have any sense of responsibility.”

“Maybe that’s the way you see it,” she countered caustically. “But you could be wrong, you know—maybe he’s got more sense than you give him credit for.”

“Maybe,” he conceded. “But I wouldn’t put it to the test too quickly, if I were you.” Those hard eyes slid down quite deliberately over the beaded bodice of her dress to note the slenderness of her waist, his meaning insolently plain. “Let him have his fun for a few years first.”

Maddy glared up at him, her hand positively itching to slap that arrogant face. “That’s none of your business!” she protested hotly.

“Perhaps not,” he acknowledged, an unmistakable note of warning in his voice. “But I’m strangely fond of my young cousin—I wouldn’t like to see him hurt.”

She felt her cheeks flame scarlet. “What makes you think I’d hurt him?” she demanded, her voice taut with agitation. “I told you—I love him.”

“Do you?” The chill in his eyes made her shiver. “I wonder? I can’t help feeling that if you were really that much in love with him, you wouldn’t have been able to hold out quite so easily—you’d have gone to bed with him.”

This time she really did slap him—or at least she tried. But he was too quick for her, catching her wrist in a vice-like grip. Her eyes filled with tears of pain as his steely fingers dug into her dedicate skin. “Let me go,” she pleaded, all too acutely aware of the quivering response that was generating inside her; being so close to him, breathing the subtle musky scent of his skin, was affecting her in a way that she didn’t know how to control.

Those agate eyes were gazing down into hers, the amber lights in their depths seeming to mesmerise her. “Because you’re not quite the ice-princess you pretend to be, are you?” he taunted. “On the surface it’s all frosty dignity, but underneath the fires are burning—I can feel their heat.”

“No,” she protested, desperately trying to twist free of him. “You’re wrong…”

“Am I?” he challenged, drawing her closer against him, his arm sliding around her slender waist. “Then you won’t let me kiss you, will you?”

She caught her breath on a small gasp of shock, putting up her hand against his chest—but any intention she might have had to push him away melted as she felt the warmth of hard muscle beneath his white silk shirt. He laughed in mocking contempt as he recognised her lack of resistance.

“Now you’re showing yourself in your true colours,” he taunted, his head bending over hers.

His mouth was firm and sensuous, inciting her to respond, and her lips parted tremblingly as with unhurried ease his languorous tongue sought the soft inner sweetness, plundering in a deliberately flagrant exploration of all the deep, secret corners within. She closed her eyes, her head tipping back into the crook of his arm, melting in a honeyed tide of submissiveness, drugged by the musky male scent of his skin. She had been aching for this from the moment she had first set eyes on him—it had been an instantaneous reaction, far beyond the reach of reason…

But she shouldn’t be allowing it to happen…With a sudden rush of shame, she tried to pull back, but his hold on her hardened, his kiss becoming an insolent assault that she knew was intended to punish and humiliate. In a panic to get away from him, to deny the frightening power of her own desire, she deliberately sank her teeth into his lip.

“Bitch!” He let her go, anger flaring in his eyes. A small trickle of blood had appeared at the corner of his mouth, and she stared at it in horror.

“I…I’m…sorry. I didn’t mean…to hurt you,” she stammered, pain twisting in her heart. “But you…shouldn’t have done that.”

“No, I shouldn’t,” he conceded on a harsh note of anger. “You’re the woman who stood at the altar with my cousin not more than a few hours ago, vowing to forsake all others. You didn’t manage to keep it up for very long, did you?”

She drew in a long, deep breath, struggling to control the ragged beat of her heart. “Please don’t ever touch me again,” she insisted with fierce dignity. “I’m Jeremy’s wife, and I intend to do everything I can to make him happy. I don’t care whether you believe me or not—time will prove that I mean what I say.”

And, turning him an aloof shoulder, she gathered up the rustling silk folds of her wedding-dress and hurried away, back through the quiet shadows of the garden to the safety of the bright, crowded marquee.

CHAPTER THREE

MADDY turned away from the window—but the guilty memory of that kiss still haunted her heart, as it had for almost nine years. She had known as she had run from the rose-walk that she had made a terrible mistake by marrying Jeremy—but as she had slipped back into the marquee he had spotted her, darting over to catch her up in his arms, and she had known that she couldn’t tell him.

She had tried—she really had—to make him happy. Maybe if she hadn’t got pregnant so quickly…But all too soon she had been suffering morning sickness that had lasted for most of the day, and then the discomfort of swollen ankles which had forced her to rest with her feet up for a good deal of the time.

She hadn’t seen much of Leo; after his engagement to Saskia had ended he had gone back to America for almost a year, and even after his return they had met only at family gatherings, where he had never been more than distant and polite towards her—she could almost have believed that that kiss had been the product of her own fevered imagination.

Sometimes she had wondered if Jeremy sensed something, try as she might to hide it from him. Maybe that had been why things had started to go wrong…? But no—it had been his unwillingness to face up to the realities of life, to the constant demands of a small baby, to the need to spend money on boring things like repairs to the roof instead of a shiny new car.

And ultimately if had been finding one of Saskia’s earrings on the back seat of his car, and his sheepish admission that he had been having an affair with her on and off for most of the time they had been married.

She had almost been expecting something of the kind, but that it had been Saskia had been the worst blow of all. Suddenly more than ten years of her own history seemed to have been cast into a different light, showing up all the glaring faults in that friendship that had been one of the few things she had had to hold on to. She had been able to forgive, but not to forget, and in the end they had agreed quite amicably that they couldn’t go on.

And now she was going to have to deal with all those unresolved feelings that had lain dormant for so long. It had taken her about two seconds to realise that Leo still had the same devastating effect on her—and only a little longer to realise that he still regarded her with the same thinly veiled contempt.

The sound of voices downstairs in the hall warned her that Jeremy’s sister had returned; she pulled a wry face, but she was going to have to face her sooner or later, so it might as well be now. Drawing in a long, steadying breath, she crossed the room and opened the bedroom door. At least she had the slight advantage of being the one descending the stairs—even when she had lived here, Julia had somehow always managed to make her feel as though she was an interloper in this house, that she had no right to be here. This time she was going to have to assert herself right from the beginning.

Jeremy’s sister was only a few years older than herself, but her imperious manner had always made her appear much older. Her voice, as she handed out instructions to Mrs Harris about what to cook for dinner, had the quality of cut glass. Halfway down the stairs, Maddy paused for effect, armoured with a cool dignity that nine years ago she would have given anything to possess.

“Good afternoon, Julia,” she greeted her, pleased to note that her voice was well under control.

The older woman glanced up, her expression registering a faint surprise. “Madeleine…!” She recovered herself quickly. “You managed to find the time to come over, then?” she enquired with stiff cordiality. “Is Jamie with you?”

Maddy refused to allow herself to be needled. “Yes, he’s here—he’s down in the kitchen, playing with his kitten.” With a flicker of surprise, she recognised the two children who had arrived with her sister-in-law. “Goodness, it’s…Aubrey and Venetia, isn’t it? How you’ve grown!”

“It’s a long time since you’ve seen them,” Julia reminded her with a touch of asperity. “Run along downstairs, you two,” she added briskly to the children. “And don’t make a nuisance of yourselves.”

Aubrey, the older of the two—he would be about ten now, by Maddy’s reckoning—slanted his mother a look of cool insolence that would have earned Jamie a good smack, and with a small shrug of his shoulders which implied that his mother’s injunction was insultingly juvenile for one of his mature years strolled away in the direction of the kitchen door. Venetia, meanwhile—a plain, dumpy child of the same age as Jamie—pouted and put her thumb in her mouth, clutching at her mother’s skirt.

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