by Emma Abbott
She shook her head, still disbelieving, her mind turning cartwheels, unable to take in what he was saying. Oh dear God, could it be true…?
‘I waited for you in that side room for fifteen minutes,’ he continued, ‘I thought that you must have been delayed somehow. Then I came out again and hunted for you everywhere. Finally I went up to your room – and saw that you’d gone. It felt like an elephant had kicked me in the guts. I thought I was going crazy. And then I heard from the concierge that you’d returned the jewels and run off into the night. If you’d only stayed I would have been able to tell you what I should have told you much earlier: Amber, I’ve been the world’s biggest idiot – and I want you to forgive me.’ He touched his thumb softly to her lips, shafting an impossibly bright ray of desire through her – as well as the sudden urge to weep.
‘You’ve prised open this impermeable heart of mine,’ he said in a raw voice, face working, emotion illuminating, animating his features, every trace of pride chased away. ‘I thought it was completely sealed up. I liked it like that. I suppose it’s all I’ve ever known. But it isn’t sealed up. I knew that, when I got to know you. You’ve become an obsession Amber. Ever since I first set eyes on you, I’ve thought of nothing but you.’
He brushed her hair out of her face. ‘I tried to fight it, thought, stupidly, that you were simply a complication I didn’t need. But that last week away from you, I realised something important: I was trying to fight a battle I couldn’t win, a battle I didn’t even want to win. There was never a contest. Do you see? It was so simple. I wanted to love you, and so I let myself. It was the easiest decision in the world. Only a dolt like me could take so long to realise it. The thought of never seeing you again just killed me. He took her hands. ‘What I’m trying, very clumsily, to say is… I love you. And I want you to marry me. Will you? Will you marry me Amber?’
The world had melted away, clarified to just Jack and her, to this moment, this empty, night-washed spot, this unbelievable, soaring feeling, which was the sweetest thing on earth. ‘Oh yes,’ she answered, once she was capable of speech again, between a mixture of laughter and tears. ‘Yes!’
He whispered her name, then reached down and kissed her once again, a kiss heavy with love and promise. Then he pulled her to him. She wanted to die of happiness there and then. Jack Ward was in love with her, wanted her to be his wife!
‘I warn you,’ he said, after a while, softly kissing her hair, ‘I’m not an easy man to live with. I’ve never shared my life with anyone else before. I’m moody, and I’m jealous – and possessive. Do you think you can you put up with me?’
She nodded. ‘I do. And I have a confession of my own,’ she whispered against his shoulder.
‘You do?’
‘I’m going to have our baby.’ She watched his eyes widen – and then, with a sweet stab of elation, she saw his face ignite with joy.
‘What?’ He took her by the shoulders. ‘What did you say?’
‘I worked out that it must have happened that very first night on the beach.’
‘You’re going to have my child!’ he said slowly, wonderingly, as if unable to quite digest the full, amazing, meaning of the words. Then he caught hold of her hands. ‘Amber, I’m such a heartless, selfish, self-obsessed fool! Can you forgive me? To think you went through all that, because of me…’ He stopped suddenly, his eyes darkening with concern. ‘And you… are you all right? Is everything all right? I mean, you’re not ill? If something is wrong you must tell me immediately.’ His face lit with sudden resolve. ‘First thing tomorrow I’ll have an appointment set up for you with my personal physician. You’re to have the top obstetrician in London, and the best care that money can buy. And of course you must take things easy, beginning from right now. I don’t want anything…’
‘Jack, everything’s all right’ she cut in, smiling at his concern, trying to repress the urge to giggle. ‘I’m young and strong. It’ll be fine. Women have babies all the time. That’s what our bodies are designed for.’
He shook his head in wonder, as if he couldn’t quite accept what she was telling him. ‘I’m going to make it up to you Amber. We have a lifetime together for me to make it up to you.’
‘And I’ll make sure you do!’ she laughed. And then his face grew serious once more, and he reached for her again.
Epilogue
Jack stirred and woke up. As he did every morning he immediately looked across at his wife, still sleeping in the bed next to him, red-gold hair framing her perfect oval face. His wife; that word still made his heart thrill. He lay and looked at her, feeling the familiar sharp kick of love, which always came as he watched her like this, utterly beautiful and vulnerable, lost to sleep.
He was the luckiest man in the world he thought again now, for the thousandth time.
Why had he battled against it, this mind-blowing, life-altering love for her? What had made him think, for even one second, that he would be better off battening down his heart, shutting himself off from her?
He knew now what that tiredness had been that had first propelled him to Guernsey. It wasn’t overwork, as he’d first, naively thought – the simple call of his body and mind for a little time away, recharging. It had been something much deeper than that. It was weariness of the soul, a fracture in the very bedrock of his being. The weariness that comes from a life of shutting yourself off from the world. From love. He had become, he had seen, cold and distant, shut-off, just like his father.
She had made all the difference. She, Amber, to whom he’d entrusted every secret of his soul. He hadn’t even known how empty his life was, how utterly meaningless, until she had come into it. Now he wondered how he had ever lived without her, what he would have done if, that evening on the terrace at Le Fourchet, she had turned him down.
God, don’t even think about it…
His eyes alighted on his mother’s diamond necklace and earrings, casually tossed on the bedside table beside her. He smiled, remembering last night. She had seduced him – the most delicious seduction he’d ever enjoyed. The glittering jewels had stayed on throughout, the only things, at the end, left adorning her voluptuous naked body. It was there that they belonged.
He had wanted to shower her with even more diamonds, still wished she’d let him buy her the huge, princess-cut diamond he’d planned to get for her engagement ring. But that wasn’t her style. Instead she’d insisted on a simple emerald. And, he had had to admit, she was right. It suited her unshowy personality – and matched her fabulous eyes.
He got up, careful not to wake her, and went to the open window, looked out over the wild Andalusian landscape beyond. He took in a lungful of the sweet, incomparable air. Air that reminded him of his youth – that carefree time when life had been for living wholeheartedly. As it was again now.
It had been important to bring her here, to Spain, to his grandparents’ vineyard: part of putting the past behind him, laying ghosts to rest, creating a new beginning – a beginning where he no longer blamed himself for his mother’s death.
She had taught him that. That he wasn’t responsible. She and Charlotte, their nine-month-old baby daughter. He understood now why his mother had thrown herself in front of the horse to save him. He would do the same for Amber or Charlotte, without a second’s hesitation.
And as for his father, he wasn’t angry any more, no longer bitter about the way he’d treated him after Penelope had arrived on the scene. And the discovery of his parent’s reprehensible treatment of Amber’s family no longer plagued him like it did when he had first discovered it.
He had learned to simply let it go. How could he possibly be angry, when he had everything a man could want?
‘What are you thinking?’ came her sleep-softened voice from the bed.
He turned. ‘Just that I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t have you in my life,’ he answered.
Her soft, kissable lips moulded into a smile. ‘You’d be busy being black-hearted Jack Ward, of course, se
lf-confessed disreputable buyer of businesses and devious seducer of women.’
He grinned.
‘But I’m glad you’re not. Because I don’t know what I’d do without you in my life either.’ She rolled over onto her side and yawned. ‘Have you heard Charlotte?’
He padded over and dropped a kiss on her forehead. ‘Not a sound. She’s asleep. It’s still early. Ysabel will see to Charlotte. We’re on holiday. Go back to sleep.’
‘All right, maybe just for a bit.’ She stretched comfortably, like a small animal, and closed her eyes again. ‘But not too long. I want to see the vineyard properly today. It looks so beautiful.’
He sat down by the window and watched her. He worried about her a little. Now, especially with the new baby, she always seemed to be on the go. He demanded a lot of himself, thrived on a hectic schedule, but didn’t see why his wife should have one – and had told her so. But his comments hadn’t gone down well. She had immediately vetoed his suggestion of a full-time, live-in nanny, and insisted on carrying on working several days a week, overseeing Le Fourchet hotel’s accounts – accusing him mock-seriously of wanting to wrap her up in cotton wool. He had been unhappy about it at first, but with time he had accepted it, come to understand that that stubbornness, that restless energy was part of the Amber he loved – she wouldn’t be the same without it.
At least she wasn’t running the hotel herself, had agreed to do the necessary work from the comfort of her office in the luxurious new London townhouse they’d bought. He couldn’t bear the idea of her leaving him to jet back to Guernsey every two minutes – it was bad enough when he had to leave her to go away on business himself, although he’d cut his travel commitments right back. The day-to-day running of Le Fourchet was now Amber’s sister Jessica’s department.
He looked out of the window at the wiry figure of his grandfather, making his way slowly across the garden to the river, where he liked to sit first thing in the morning. Once he died, Jack would inherit the vineyard. But he would pass it to Antonio, his cousin – his mother’s sister’s son. He had this land in his blood, and it was only right.
And it felt good to do what was right. The first time he had met Amber’s mother and sister he had made a point of apologising to them for what his father had done. Amber had been so worried they would judge her harshly for wanting to marry him – it was the only thing marring her happiness. But they had accepted him wholeheartedly into their small, loving family, had been incredibly touched and grateful at his gesture with Le Fourchet, and assured him that what his father had done had no bearing on him.
It was the least he could do. And he had been happy to do it: Amber’s happiness was now his.
Look at him: a married man, utterly in love with his wife, and the father of a child. Just a couple of years ago he would have laughed at the idea. But now it was all that mattered. And there would be more children, when she was ready. A whole houseful, which was what they both wanted. Yes, life was good.
‘I thought we were meant to be on holiday,’ came her sleepy voice again from across the room.
‘We are,’ he said, smiling across at her.
‘Then what are you doing over there?’ She pulled up the sheet, giving him an illicit glimpse of her creamy curvaceous body, those tantalising breasts, after childbirth still fuller than they had been before. He felt his body instantly gird into response. ‘Come back to bed.’
He crossed the room, slid in beside her, and pulled her to him.
The End