A large yawn took her by surprise and, deciding to forgo dinner, she settled on an early night.
Laughter, followed closely by an intense shushing noise, disturbed Gwen several hours later. A key fumbled in her front door and she was instantly awake.
“Thanksh, guys. I’ll be fine from here.”
Declan! A somewhat worse for wear Declan by the sound of him. A tiny smile played across Gwen’s lips as she heard a male voice firmly telling him to let them assist him to his room. By the sounds of him, he wasn’t in a much better state. She popped her head outside her bedroom door.
“What on earth have you been up to?” she asked.
Connor stood like a frustrated shepherd in her front entrance, a quizzical look of defeat on his face.
“It’s not my fault. I tried to stop them.” He put his hands up in surrender.
“You did?” The look of wonder on Declan’s face was a picture in itself. Gwen struggled to hide her smile as the man she assumed from his familiarly dark good looks was Mason, Declan’s older brother, with his back to the wall, slid down to sit on the floor.
“Hi, Gwen, gee, you’re pretty.” Mason smiled lopsidedly.
“Hello, yourself,” she replied. Good grief. How was she going to oust three Knights from her house? One was bad enough.
“Don’t worry about Mason, I’ll see him home soon.” Connor put an arm around Declan’s shoulders. “Let me get this one settled and we’ll be on our way.”
“I’ll help you.” Gwen moved to Declan’s other side and looped her arm around his waist. “Good grief!” she exclaimed as she breathed the fumes that emanated from him. “Did he drink a distillery dry?”
“Something like that.” Connor’s ironic response indicated his disapproval.
Together they levered Declan through his bedroom door and sat him on the edge of the bed. While Connor supported him, Gwen pulled the covers away from one side of the bed. After swiftly divesting his brother of shoes, jacket, shirt and trousers Connor rolled him face-down across the bed and tossed the covers over him.
“There, that should see him through the night. Kinda cute when he’s asleep, huh?”
She wouldn’t have credited it unless she’d seen it with her own eyes, but, yes, Declan was already sound asleep. But cute certainly wasn’t the first word that came to mind.
“You look like you’ve had some experience with this,” Gwen commented.
“Yeah, well, we’re all pretty good at it. Had a bit of practice with the old man after Mum died.”
Gwen walked with him to where Mason still sat, leaning at an odd angle and humming quietly to himself. Connor gave his foot a nudge.
“C’mon, Mase. Time to get up and get you home, too.” He offered his brother a hand and pulled him to his feet. “A Bullshot should fix Dec in the morning.”
“Bullshot?” It sounded painful.
“Kind of like a Bloody Mary, but with tinned beef consommé as well. Works a treat.”
“I’ll take your word for it.” Gwen pulled a face. It sounded dreadful. She watched as Connor controlled a weaving Mason back to the taxi waiting at the kerbside before shutting and locking the front door.
A worried frown creased her forehead. Would Declan be okay? What if he couldn’t breathe properly lying on his stomach like that? Gwen sighed. She had to check on him or she’d worry all night.
Light from the hallway spilled across him. She needn’t have been concerned—he’d rolled over onto his side. He’d pushed the sheets down, revealing the contoured muscles of his chest and arms. Gwen tiptoed into the room and stood at the side of the bed, listening for measured breathing. She couldn’t hear a thing. She leaned closer, her face almost right next to his.
A brawny arm moved with unerring accuracy and speed to hook her around her waist and pull her onto the bed to spoon up against the length of his body. Gwen tried to pull free but his arm was an unyielding band across her. She wriggled slightly, and discovered in the same instant that had been a bad idea. A very bad idea.
His arm slipped to her midriff and pulled her firmly against him. One hand slid beneath her dressing gown and lazily cupped her breast. Through her robe and his bedclothes she could feel the heat that poured from his body to scorch a line down her back.
She tried to twist her head. Was he awake? No, the slow deep breathing that emanated from him indicated otherwise. It looked like she was stuck here for the night. Or at least until he loosened his grip. Gwen tried to ignore the charged pull of pleasure that his touch at her breast aroused. She had to try and get him to let go.
“Declan?” she whispered. No response but the warm rush of whiskey-laden breath against the back of her neck. “Declan?” she tried a little more loudly.
It was working, he was moving his hand. But not, unfortunately, away from the warm globe of her tingling flesh. His thumb had slipped up to stroke the sensitive bud of her nipple, the slow sweep creating a spiralling tension within her. A gasp caught on her lips as the drugging sweet sensation rippled through her body.
It had been too long since she’d felt like this. Too long and yet she’d promised herself that never again would be far too soon. But try telling that to the insistent beat of desire that thrummed through her veins, turning her insides molten with need. Need for him.
The past eight years fell away as if they’d never happened. In a single breath Gwen was transported back to when she’d gone to Declan’s apartment in the city, concerned by how withdrawn he’d been since the accident. Worried that he might do something stupid, something to hurt himself. She’d been driven there by guilt. Renata had died because of her. She should have stopped her adventurous friend—had foolishly thought that Renata would listen to her as the voice of reason when she suggested they go back. But she’d been wrong. Totally, fatally wrong. And then, when Renata had needed her most, needed her strength to anchor them both to that pathetically tiny ledge, she’d failed her again.
The stark lines of grief on Declan’s face when he’d answered the door had provided all the impetus she’d needed to attempt to console him. She’d opened her arms and he’d slid straight into them as if they belonged together. Even then she’d known it was wrong. That they were playing with fire. Tempting fate. But they’d each needed to forget, if only for a few hours, the horrific loss they’d suffered.
When their lips had met, hunger had flared with a voraciousness she’d never experienced before. But it had been the saltiness of the tears that tracked his cheeks that had been her undoing. At that point in time she’d have done anything—anything at all—to soothe his pain.
They hadn’t even made it to the bedroom that first time. Instead, he’d pressed her against the wall, ripping her panties away and pushing up her skirt until he’d had access to her inner core. And she’d let him—welcomed him. She’d wrapped her legs around his hips and whispered gentle words of encouragement until they’d both reached a swift, almost vicious, climax. They’d stayed there, locked in each other’s embrace, hard up against the wall, shaking with the after-effects of their joining.
It had created an addiction, that first coming together. A drug that needed to be purged from their systems as they’d loved through the night. Until the bleak honesty of morning had rent them apart. No one had ever touched her the way he had, or made love with such wild abandon. No one had ever given her such pleasure, nor such gut-wrenching desolation. She couldn’t do it. She wouldn’t survive. Not again.
“Declan! You must let me go.” A tremor of uncertainty quivered in her voice.
“Just wanna hold you…so lonely.” His words slurred and trailed away.
But something in her tone must have finally penetrated his mind as his arm loosened sufficiently for Gwen to free herself from his sleepy grasp and shoot to the edge of the bed. She forced herself upright and on shaking legs staggered to her bedroom where she closed her door, leaning back against the sturdy wood, desperate for something solid to anchor herself to.
Her brea
th dragged through lungs that were incapable of functioning. He was drunk, she rationalised. She had nothing to fear from Declan Knight. Her life, her plans, her security—everything was safe.
But what about her heart?
Eight
Declan’s heart pounded as he stood before the ballroom bay window. He couldn’t help but appreciate how appropriate it was that, given her love of historical homes, Gwen had chosen to marry in one of Auckland’s finest. The atmosphere imparted its own air of permanence, longevity and survival against the odds. And this marriage would need all the help it could get to survive the requisite six months to satisfy his father.
Mason fidgeted at his right-hand side but settled at an almost inaudible admonition from Connor. Declan fought a grin, strange that the baby of the family was the one hell-bent on keeping them in line these days.
The smile faded as he remembered the last time Connor had done that and the condition he himself had been in. He should have crashed at Mason’s place. It would have been better all round and might have prevented the big freeze-off he’d had from Gwen since the morning after when she’d slapped a Bullshot in front of him, the crack of the glass onto the kitchen table ricocheting through his tender skull, then headed out into the garden where she’d worked for the rest of the day. When he’d gingerly slipped off to work she’d been at the very back of the property, and hadn’t even acknowledged his farewell, and by the time he’d arrived home from work she’d been asleep. Or at least been pretending to be.
He’d been determined to have it out with her last night. It was vital that today go smoothly and he needed her assurance that this frozen standoff wouldn’t impact on the day and the image they had to project. He hadn’t counted on her observing the tradition of not seeing the groom on the morning of the wedding. She’d gone to spend the night at Libby’s straight after the wedding rehearsal. A rehearsal he’d been late to thanks to the ongoing investigation into Crenshaw’s embezzlement. A forensic computer technician had tied up the computers for most of the day, but at least it was bringing them closer to discovering where Crenshaw had run off to.
Declan had discounted forcing a confrontation with Gwen at the rehearsal dinner. It was hardly the best place to discover what had driven his bride away. His bride. The notion rocked him to the soles of his shoes. After Renata he’d never imagined wanting to marry anyone, least of all Gwen. But circumstances had a way of dictating what happened in life, and this was only temporary.
Last night she’d avoided him as completely as she could while going through the motions of their ceremony. He’d had to hand it to the celebrant when Gwen had introduced him as her fiancé. The man had stuttered momentarily but had pulled it together and glossed over any questions about the sudden change in groom with faultless professionalism.
A sudden clench in his stomach brought the reality home. Within the next fifteen minutes, Gwen Jones would become Mrs Declan Knight.
“It’s not too late to back out, Dec.” Mason’s whisper earned him a powerful nudge from both Declan and Connor. “Hey, don’t pick on me—I was simply stating a fact.”
“Can it,” Connor said quietly. “She’s here.”
The bass drum pounding in Declan’s chest morphed into the full percussion section of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra as he turned and saw a vision hesitating at the door. Libby and another young woman he’d met for the first time last night smoothed Gwen’s gown, front and back, before taking up their positions in front of her.
The pianist settled at the baby grand struck the first notes of a popular Shania Twain melody, and Gwen began her slow walk towards him. Towards the beginning of their marriage.
A bittersweet shaft of pain struck him as he remembered his first bride. A bride who’d never quite made it to the altar. They’d rescheduled their wedding several times, each happy to coast along in the effervescent thrill of being in love with life and each other. So why hadn’t they stuck with any of their wedding dates? Why had they deferred the confirmation of their promise to one another so many times?
Declan watched Gwen as she drew nearer.
All these years he’d pushed aside the thought of her, of who she was, of what they’d done—telling himself it was because of the pain of the reminder of Renata. Of that fact that if it hadn’t been for her Renata wouldn’t have been scaling that mountainside, wouldn’t have made a bad judgement. Wouldn’t have slipped and nearly pulled Gwen down the mountainside with her, and wouldn’t have sacrificed her life to save her friend.
Her friend who now stood beside him as his bride.
Outwardly Gwen appeared pale and serene, although the slight tremor in the purple and white flowers she held gave mute evidence to her shaking hands. She was beautiful.
Sudden, shocking truth flooded his mind. Despite everything, he still wanted her as much now as he had that awful night when she’d been the only glimmer of light and hope in the dark days after the accident. The shattering discovery rippled through him, prompting Mason to mutter quietly, “Are you okay?”
No, he wasn’t okay, nor was he prepared to face the mind-numbing reality of the tidal wave of want that pulsed through his veins, filling his mind with the memory of how she felt in his arms. How she tasted on his lips. He had to pull it together—to get through the ceremony—before he frightened her away for good.
“Friends and family, we are gathered here…”
Declan zoned out the celebrant’s introduction as he stood next to Gwen, concentrating instead on his bride. Her silver-blond hair was up in an elaborate display of loops and curls on top of her head, and a scattering of purple flowers were tucked here and there in its softness. More accustomed to seeing her with strands slipping and sliding from confinement to grace her slender neck, this style made her appear remote—untouchable and too controlled—although her chest rose and fell with rapid, shallow breaths, giving away her true state of mind.
The urge to reach out to her, to calm her fears, fought within him but he held his arms down, hands clasped lightly together at his back.
“Therefore if any person can show any just cause why these two cannot be married, let them speak now…”
Let them try, Declan challenged silently. This was too important to screw up now, no matter what his body urged him to do. He sensed Gwen stiffen as the celebrant paused for what seemed like an eternity. She lowered her eyelids, hiding the expression in them. Was she hoping someone would step up to the plate and stop the wedding? Maybe she hoped in her heart of hearts that Crenshaw would have realised the error of his ways and come storming in on his white charger. Declan fought back the ironic curl that played around his lips. Imagining Crenshaw on a horse was kind of stupid, in fact imagining the guy having an honourable bone in his body was plain ludicrous.
He drew in a deep breath and let his senses be calmed by Gwen’s gentle floral fragrance. Yeah, that was better. Yet a bitter taste lingered in his mouth as a question nagged at the back of his mind, begging to be answered. Did she still love Crenshaw?
“Now I ask you both, do either of you know of any reason why you may not be lawfully wed?” the celebrant asked, a serious expression chasing the humour from his eyes, then to Gwen’s barely audible “no,” and Declan’s distinctly more determined one, he gave a slow wink and a warm smile. “Let’s get on with the proceedings then.”
“Declan, will you have Gwen to be your wife? To live together as husband and wife, to love her, comfort her, honour and keep her, in sickness and in health, and forsaking all others keep only unto her, so long as you both live?”
Gwen’s eyes flicked up to his, a sheen of moisture blurring their clarity. Forsaking all others. Others like Steve Crenshaw. Was that what she was thinking? “I will.” He pitched his voice loud and clear through the room. Let no one be in doubt about this wedding.
The celebrant turned to Gwen and repeated the words. She stood, as still as marble, before replying softly, “I will.”
“Declan, please take Gwen’s han
d,” the celebrant instructed.
She passed her flowers to Libby and turned slightly to face him. His heart gave a twist. They were so close to success. He could almost smell it. A fine tremor ran through her as he curled her cold fingers around his. Echoing after the celebrant, Declan made his vow, all the while holding Gwen’s tortured silver gaze with his.
“I, Declan, take you, Gwen, to be my wife. To have and to hold from this day on, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death parts us. I give you my promise.”
One tear spilled from Gwen’s eye and tracked slowly, like a liquid diamond, down her cheek. She gripped his hand so tightly now his fingers started to go numb. In a muted, trembling voice she made her vow to Declan, managing to not quite meet his eyes while she did so. Declan sensed, rather than saw, Mason slide the two wedding rings onto the open book in the celebrant’s hands. A roaring sound in his ears drowned out the blessing of the rings. This was it. They were nearly there.
Reluctant to break the tenuous connection between them, Declan gave Gwen’s hand a gentle squeeze before reaching for her ring and sliding it onto her ring finger.
“I give you this ring as a symbol of our vows and with all that I am, and all that I have, I honour you.” A deep pull from inside made his voice rasp over the last three words. A pull he ruthlessly ignored.
Gwen gave him a startled look and a hot flood of colour rushed up his neck. Her hand was steady now as she reached for his ring and Declan endured the damning sense of déjà vu as he held out his hand to receive it. Only one week ago she’d done this very thing. A spiralling coil of tension wound in his stomach as she pushed the ring over his knuckle and in a hushed tone spoke the words that finally and completely bound them together. For the next six months, anyway.
“I now pronounce you husband and wife. Congratulations, Mr and Mrs Knight!” The celebrant beamed to the assembled guests and led them in a burst of applause, then leaned in toward Declan. “You can kiss your bride now.”
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