One Wedding Required!

by Sharon Kendrick

  He moved to brush a lock of golden hair away from her face, and just the touch of him was as potent as it had ever been, but with trembling fingers she pushed him away, shaking the silken fall of hair in denial.

  ‘No! You mustn’t touch me.’ She nearly said, Not yet, but clamped her lips tightly together before the traitorous words could escape.

  He gave a lazy smile. ‘Honestly?’

  ‘Honestly,’ she told him, but she didn’t quite trust herself—not when he was standing so close to her—so she gingerly got up off the bed and walked over to the other side of the room.

  ‘Amber.’ He spoke softly.

  Amber turned round, wincing slightly at the bizarre circumstances of their situation. How the bed mocked her now. She had been so eager for his touch that she had been planning the best way to remove her clothes. When all the time... She looked into his eyes. ‘What?’

  ‘Tell me what you’re feeling.’

  She realised how they had lost some of their ability to communicate in the past months. How work and living had swallowed up everything so that there never seemed any time left. It was as though, once they had declared their love for each other, they had decided that no more work needed to be done on the relationship. And maybe now it was too late...

  ‘I’m feeling betrayed, if you must know. And disturbed by your obvious need to control me...yes!’ She saw the denial in his eyes and spoke before he could interrupt her. ‘Control me, Finn! And please don’t look so shocked. You wouldn’t tell me the truth about your illness, and you wouldn’t tell me the truth about your recovery! You’ve manipulated and played with my feelings—’

  ‘And I’ve explained why! I did it mainly to protect you!’

  ‘That doesn’t make it any better, Finn! I’m supposed to be your partner and your equal—not some child to be protected!’ she retorted. ‘But even if your behaviour concerning your illness was understandable—chivalrous, even—your need to control me has been going on for as long as you’ve known me.’

  ‘Oh, has it?’ He leaned back against the wall at that, with a gesture which managed to be provocative and casual at the same time, and her first thought was that he might be using his considerable sexual power to entice her into letting her anger just slide. It wasn’t until afterwards that Amber wondered whether or not he might have been feeling weary—because the fact remained that he had been a very sick man... ‘I’m sure you’ve got a whole list of examples,’ he drawled.

  ‘Too right I have!’ She regarded him steadily. ‘There was the way you tried to get me to resign from Allure, when you realised that your feelings for me were growing—’

  ‘Because I didn’t believe that we could have a successful partnership professionally and personally—I explained that! I thought that one or the other would suffer.’

  ‘And you didn’t want to risk your beloved business, I suppose?’ she challenged.

  He shook his dark head. ‘I didn’t want to risk my relationship with you,’ he refuted. ‘But it was all academic anyway, because you wouldn’t resign, would you, Amber?’

  ‘No,’ she agreed, and saw him smile. It was a ruthlessly melting smile, but Amber steeled herself against its power. ‘And anyway—’ she looked up at him from beneath the shadow cast by her lashes ‘—I proved you wrong, didn’t I?’

  ‘Yeah, you proved me wrong,’ he echoed softly. ‘You keep proving me wrong every step of the way, Amber O’Neil. Every barrier I’ve ever erected, you just swipe it right down.’

  Amber locked her lips together. ‘I’m not through yet!’ she told him fiercely. ‘You wouldn’t let me take the Cassini contract, either—would you?’ she reminded him, but he shook his head.

  ‘Oh, no, honey—you’re not laying that at my feet. You were the one who decided not to accept the contract—’

  ‘Because you told me that our relationship was likely to suffer—’

  ‘And that much was true.’

  ‘Well, why didn’t you give me the opportunity to find out for myself?’ she demanded.

  ‘The opportunity was there for the taking—you could have gone right ahead and accepted the job,’ he pointed out. ‘But what if I’d pretended that we could just carry on as normal—knowing how difficult it would be to sustain a relationship with you jetting all over the world? What then?’ His eyes blazed out their question as he stared hard at her.

  ‘You’re a grown woman, Amber!’ he continued. ‘And a responsible woman. You couldn’t just have opted out of a binding contract because it kept you away from your boyfriend! Think what that would have done for your reputation! Your pride. Everything we’d worked for.’ He gave a heavy sigh. ‘God, I’m damned if I tell you the truth and damned if I don’t, aren’t I? Just what do you want from me, Amber O’Neil?’

  She felt tears begin to slide down her cheeks. ‘I don’t know any more,’ she whispered brokenly, but it wasn’t quite the truth, and Finn was far too astute not to pick up on that.

  ‘So if I came over there to comfort you, would you accuse me of taking advantage?’ he mused.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Or trying to control you?’

  She shook her head. ‘No.’

  ‘What if I tried to kiss you?’

  She stared at him from between wet lashes. ‘I think I’d kiss you back.’

  ‘And do you think you’d enjoy it?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘In spite of everything that’s happened?’

  ‘Maybe because of everything that’s happened,’ she said, in a snuffly kind of voice. ‘Because I never felt this nervous the first time you kissed me.’

  ‘Nor me,’ he admitted.

  They stared at one another, and then he crossed the room and opened his arms to her, and she went straight into them without hesitation, like a bird flying in from the ravages of the storm.

  ‘Oh, Finn!’ she sobbed, and felt the wetness of his own tears against her cheek. ‘Finn!’

  ‘I know,’ he soothed shakily. ‘Believe me, I know.’

  It was several minutes—maybe longer—before he led her over to the bed and drew her down beside him, and as he began to reacquaint himself with her body she thought that he had never been this reverential, or this tender, before. His fingertips travelled over her face with wonder, seeking out each pore of her skin with the feather-light sensitivity of a blind man exploring new and wonderful territory.

  And for Amber it felt like the first time all over again—only better. Deeper, and somehow more sacred. But then they had come a long way to get where they were at that precise moment. She had been many things to Finn—his virgin lover, his assistant, his fiancée—but she couldn’t ever remember feeling quite this much his equal before.

  Never had his body felt so delicious next to hers as they laid each other bare. Just the sensation of his skin brushing warmly against hers felt so heart-stoppingly intimate that she felt she might die with the pleasure. And that was before he had touched her in any way which was at all sexual. Though, quite honestly, just the warmth of his breath against her neck felt like the most loving and erotic feeling she had ever experienced.

  She bit down hard on her bottom lip to stop it from trembling, and he must have felt the sudden tension in her, for he turned her face to his and there was a tender question in his eyes.

  ‘What is it?’ he whispered.

  ‘This just feels so amazing,’ she told him softly.

  ‘What does?’

  ‘Holding you.’ She tightened her arms around him to demonstrate. ‘Being here with you.’

  ‘You’re preaching to the converted,’ he told her unsteadily as he pushed her hair right back off her face. ‘So why the sad face?’

  ‘I just feel I’m poised on the brink of something,’ she admitted. ‘And I don’t know what it is.’

  ‘But you’re scared?’ he guessed.

  ‘Terrified!’

  ‘Me, too,’ he confided softly, and drew her hand across his chest to lay it on the warm ski
n over his heart. ‘Feel.’

  She felt the strong but rapid thundering of his heart against her palm and knew that, for all their previous physical compatibility, he felt this sensation of wonder as well. As if they were about to move into a different dimension of love altogether.

  He smiled as he lifted her hand away, turned it over and studied it, tracing one of the lines with a long finger.

  ‘And is it a long life?’ asked Amber shakily.

  ‘I was reading your heart-line,’ he amended, as he bent his dark head with gracious inclination to softly kiss a fingertip.

  ‘And?’

  ‘And it’s a very happy line.’ His face was serious. ‘I’m going to make damned sure of that.’

  But she gripped his naked shoulders and shook her head firmly. ‘We’re going to make sure of that,’ she corrected. ‘Our future is a joint responsibility.’

  ‘You make it sound so serious,’ he teased.

  ‘Well, it is serious,’ she agreed. ‘And so is this.’ She smiled with satisfaction as she slithered her hand down his spine to rest possessively on the swell of one hard buttock, and felt him squirm with pleasure.

  ‘That’s nice,’ he murmured.

  She moved her hand round and began to stroke him. ‘And this?’

  ‘That’s even better,’ he told her thickly, and blotted out all the pain with his lips.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  ‘OH, AMBER—you look just beautiful,’ sighed Ursula.

  Amber looked at her wedding-day reflection in the rather spotted mirror provided by the small Irish hotel they were staying in. She and Ursula had been having a whale of a time since they had checked into the Black Bollier three days ago. They had been given the biggest bedroom, breakfast brought to them in bed every morning by the eccentric owner, Alan Bollier, and had been treated to some good, old-fashioned Irish hospitality!

  ‘I feel beautiful,’ Amber said softly. ‘More beautiful than I ever felt in those few modelling jobs I did, where the photographer could always fiddle around with the pictures until you came out looking perfect.’

  ‘You feel beautiful because you’re loved so much by Finn?’ guessed Ursula, unable to keep the slight trace of envy from her voice.

  Amber looked up quickly. ‘I didn’t mean to crow—’

  But Ursula shook her head. ‘I know you didn’t—and I mean it from the bottom of my heart when I say that I couldn’t be happier for you. Both of you.’

  ‘I know that.’ Amber looked at the woman who stared back at her. The ivory silk-satin and organza wedding dress flattered her slender frame perfectly. She had let her hair grow, and today it was piled up on top of her head, with the silk-tulle of the veil flowing down around her shoulders like a creamy waterfall.

  ‘And Mother would be so proud to have you wear the dress she bought.’ Ursula smiled, but she was blinking rapidly as she said it

  Amber fiddled unnecessarily with the veil. Holly Lovelace had had the dress sent to her just as soon as she and Finn had announced the date of their wedding. ‘Did it look different when Holly wore it?’ she questioned.

  Ursula smiled again. ‘Totally. Although you’re both red-heads—she has much darker colouring than you. And you’re wearing your hair up, and the flowers are different. Holly’s in the church with Luke—looking disgustingly glowing and pregnant. She says the dress wouldn’t go past her thighs at the moment!’

  Amber hesitated. ‘And did you...did you invite Ross?’

  Ursula seemed to have some kind of lump in her throat, for she took a moment or two to clear it before she spoke. ‘Yes, I did, and he said thank you very much, and gave me the most gorgeous present to give you both, but he’s not coming.’

  ‘Not even at the last moment?’

  Ursula shook her head. ‘Not even at the last moment,’ she echoed quietly. ‘He doesn’t really like weddings.’

  Amber nodded, and picked her bouquet up, taking a brief moment to close her eyes with enjoyment as she breathed in the heady scent of the flowers. These days, she appreciated each one of her senses, as Finn had always taught her to do, but especially since his illness. She reached out to touch a petal, feeling its velvet softness against her fingertip as she looked at the posy. It was an old-fashioned bouquet—she had copied the one her mother had carried at her wedding.

  But then Amber and Finn’s wedding itself was an old-fashioned affair. Finn’s mother was too frail to travel far, and they had chosen to get married in Ireland, in the tiny village church which had married generations of Fitzgeralds.

  The church was jam-packed with Fitzgeralds now, and Finn and Ursula had managed to track down various members of the O’Neil family living in Ireland, and had invited them to the wedding. There had been a fine old party at the Black Bollier the previous evening, when Amber and Ursula had discovered cousins they had thought long lost. And meeting some of their father’s kin had given both sisters a new feeling of security, and of belonging.

  ‘We’d better go,’ said Ursula, with a swift glance at her watch. ‘Don’t want to keep them waiting too long—the priest won’t like it!’

  Amber laughed, her heart pattering with nerves and excitement as she looked at her sister, who was wearing a dress and jacket in palest blue silk, with a widebrimmed hat to match. ‘You look beautiful too,’ she told Ursula softly. ‘No, you do,’ she added, before Ursula could contradict her. ‘Stunning!’

  Ursula smiled. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘But I wish you’d agreed to be my bridesmaid,’ said Amber wistfully.

  ‘I know you do. And I’m too old and too fat and too much of a realist to want to stand behind my model sister!’ came Ursula’s truthful reply. ‘Besides, it’s a far greater honour to give you away—especially as it’s usually a man who performs that role.’

  And Amber uttered a silent prayer that Ursula would one day find a man of her own—a man she could grow to like and respect and love as much as Ross Sheridan. ‘Let’s go,’ she said.

  It was only a short walk to the church from the hotel, on a summer’s day that was more blustery than golden, but Amber didn’t need sunshine to make her day complete. The sunshine was all in her heart, radiating out of her, she felt as though it were coursing round her veins and spilling onto the ground where she walked.

  She had never seen a church so full, and yet the only person she really saw was Finn, standing tall and proud as he waited for her at the altar. Amber paused just for a second to stare at him.

  He had sold out his share of Allure to Jackson—and Amber had been neither surprised nor perturbed at his decision. A career he had once seen as exciting now seemed superficial. His illness had changed Finn forever, and he no longer viewed the world in the same way.

  He had turned to her one day and declared passionately that, ‘I want to do something that counts, Amber!’

  She had needed no explanation, no justification. ‘Then do it!’ she had urged.

  Recognising a man with natural dynamism, the hospital where he’d lain so sick had invited him to sit on the board, and Finn had accepted the honour with pleasure. He also had complicated plans for some of his investment income to benefit charities with which he could identify strongly—and this was also as a direct response to his illness. But, in the wider picture, Amber suspected that the only way Finn could really do something which counted would be to enter the political arena... She just didn’t want him to ever work himself into the ground again.

  Did he sense that she was in the church? Or was he merely impatient to begin? Whatever the reason, he turned round and looked at her, and the emerald light from his eyes dazzled brighter even than the sudden ray of sunlight which shafted in through one of the high windows.

  The organist struck up the march and Amber and Ursula exchanged one final glance as they began to walk slowly towards Finn.

  Near the back of the church sat Holly and Luke—Holly with her hands folded serenely over her swollen belly.

  ‘Ouch!’ she said.

&nbs
p; Luke’s blue eyes crinkled. ‘Baby kicking again?’

  ‘There must be a stronger word than kicking,’ Holly moaned. ‘Pulverising, perhaps. I’m going to end this pregnancy black and blue—I just know I am!’

  ‘Must be a boy,’ he observed, with a grin.

  ‘Don’t be so sexist!’ she reprimanded. ‘It could just be an exceptionally strong girl!’

  Luke laid his hand over hers and waited until he felt the heel of his unborn child thrusting against the green voile of his wife’s dress. ‘Have I told you lately how much I love you?’ he murmured.

  ‘Well, you have,’ Holly whispered. ‘But you can keep telling me. Only maybe not right now—because here comes the bride!’

  It was a tiny church, and yet the path to Finn seemed to last forever. Afterwards, Amber could scarcely remember saying her vows, remembering only that some of the words had seemed unbearably poignant, especially when they got to the bit about ‘in sickness and in health’. Even when he’d slid the simple gold band on her finger it had all seemed a bit of a blur through her tears.

  In fact the bit she remembered best was when the priest had cleared his throat and announced, somewhat reluctantly, that, ‘You may now kiss the bride.’

  Finn had lifted the veil from her face and stared at her for a long moment, and Amber had seen the love shining from his eyes and had known then that, whatever else life threw at them, they would come through it. A lifetime of living and loving with this man.

  Now that was the best bit!

  ISBN : 978-1-4592-5169-4

  ONE WEDDING REQUIRED!

  First North American Publication 1999.

  Copyright © 1999 by Sharon Kendrick.

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher. Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.