by Penny Jordan
‘I couldn’t handle it…couldn’t take it…I misjudged you, and I hurt you…but nothing like as much as I hurt myself.
‘And then I found out that there wasn’t anyone special in your life…that when I kissed you you melted in my arms and responded to me the way I’d always ached for you to do, but “you knew how I felt”, you told me, and I thought you were rejecting my love, telling me that, while you acknowledged a certain degree of physical desire for me, you didn’t love me.
‘But you’d kept the pig…my pig…the one I’d won for you, and when it got broken you cried and you kept the pieces. I started hoping then…praying. Why didn’t you tell me last night when we made love that you loved me? You told me everything else?’
She couldn’t help it—she felt engulfing her skin a blush that began at her toes and spread all over her body.
‘You can’t mean any of this, Gareth,’ she protested thickly. ‘I know you don’t love me. I overheard you years ago, complaining to your grandfather that my…my adolescent crush on you was a nuisance.’
She couldn’t look at him…couldn’t do anything other than suffer in the suffocating silence that followed her outburst.
‘You heard that?’
She nodded. ‘Yes, that’s why…that’s why I started avoiding you. I couldn’t bear it, knowing how much you despised me for what I felt…knowing how much of a child I must seem to you.’
‘Oh, Sybilla, no. It wasn’t like that. Oh, my darling, don’t cry…not if you want me to tell you what that conversation was really about. I promise you, if you don’t stop crying, I’m going to have to stop you by kissing you, and we both know what will happen then, don’t we?’
When had he moved so close to her that as she turned to look at him he was able to take her in his arms and hold her so that she couldn’t avoid looking at him?
‘What you overheard was only part of a conversation. A conversation during which I’d admitted to my grandfather how I felt about you…during which I’d acknowledged that I was aware of your growing feelings for me and how afraid I was of exploiting them. He had been warning me against that temptation…that danger…and I trying to remove some of the emotion from our discussion, making light of what we were saying. My describing your crush as a nuisance was a shorthand message between my grandfather and myself that was just a massive understatement of the true state of affairs. The truth was that I was terrified that in your artless innocence you might offer me what I so desperately wanted, and that I might, God forgive, take it and destroy your future along with my own because, at fifteen, you were much, much too young to make the kind of commitment I wanted from you.’
‘I can’t believe I’m hearing this,’ Sybilla told him in a wobbly voice.
He smiled tenderly at her.
‘Didn’t last night prove to you just how much I love you? If I didn’t say the words it was only because I so desperately wanted to hear them from you first, but then, when I realised I wasn’t going to do so…
‘I’m sorry if I hurt you. If I’d known… realised…’
‘Perhaps it’s just as well you didn’t,’ Sybilla admitted. ‘If I’d guessed then when I was fifteen…’She gave a tiny shrug and blushed again. ‘Well, I can’t deny that, illegal though it might have been, the emotional intensity of the moment could have resulted in physical intimacy, and you were right. I was too young…much too young.’
‘And now?’ he whispered to her.
‘And now I think I’m old enough to know my own mind…my own emotions. I have to admit it was a shock when I realised that I love you.’ She smiled as she saw the look in his eyes and then told him, ‘I did tell you, as well. Last night, when you were asleep. I couldn’t help myself. I was going to leave town…to go away somewhere and make a fresh start…perhaps that was why—at least partially why, anyway—I behaved so recklessly yesterday.’
‘Mm. You were reckless, weren’t you?’ he teased her. Then he added more soberly, ‘I’m afraid we’re going to have to have a very quick, very quiet wedding, my love. I can’t swear that you haven’t already conceived my child, and while I don’t give a damn who knows how much I wanted you and how impetuously, for the sake of your parents and our child I think it might be best if we used a bit of discretion.
‘With Gramps’s death… Well, let’s just say that a quiet wedding shouldn’t seem too out of place.’
‘You really think I might already be pregnant?’ Sybilla asked him breathlessly.
He laughed when he saw the expression on her face. ‘Well, if you feel like that about it, we could always…’
* * *
A good many people in the town announced that they weren’t in the least surprised to hear that Gareth Seymour and Sybilla were getting married. After all, they had known one another for years…had grown up together virtually. It was a pity, of course, that Tom Seymour couldn’t have been alive to witness the ceremony, but in the circumstances it was only natural that the pair should prefer a quick, quiet wedding.
After all, they both carried heavy responsibilities, his for the factory and hers for her business. They had no house to buy since they were going to live at the Cedars, and, if the few chosen guests who did attend the small wedding breakfast were surprised by the groom’s choice of a gift for his bride, she certainly seemed to find no fault with it.
As one woman remarked in surprise to her companion, ‘Good heavens…a pot pig…and when you think of that beautiful Dresden that Tom left her…’
‘Not one pig. There were two,’ her son pointed out to her. ‘There was a little one as well.’
* * *
‘Where on earth did you find it? Them?’ Sybilla asked her new husband later when they were alone, as she lovingly touched her wedding gift. ‘It’s exactly the same.’
‘I had a team of detectives scouring every street-market in existence,’ he told her mock teasingly. ‘Like this little fellow as well, do you?’ he asked, picking up the smaller of the two pigs. ‘You never know—he could be the first of many.’
‘Oh, could he? And what makes you think he is a he?’ she challenged. ‘He could be a she.’
‘Girl…boy…I don’t mind,’ Gareth assured her as he bent over to kiss her, murmuring dulcetly against her mouth, ‘Though I still think that Thomasina is a dreadful name to inflict on a little girl. And just because you promised Gramps—’
‘I promised him my first child was going to be named after him,’ Sybilla began.
‘Mm…so did I. Do you suppose he knew… knows?’
‘It would be nice to think so,’ Sybilla agreed tenderly. ‘Thomasina…perhaps we could make that her second name.’
She was still laughing when Gareth rolled her over on the bed and beneath him.
A beautiful mistake
Pregnant. Lauren Bradley’s heart stops—there’s only one man who can be the father and it’s not her late husband, the man everyone thinks is a celebrated war hero….
Ravaged with guilt at sleeping with his best friend’s wife, Paolo Donatelli closes his heart to Lauren forever. But in nine months’ time, the proof of their incredible night together will be there for the world to see.
Marriage is Paolo’s answer to avoiding more scandal, but it’s Lauren’s worst fear—she still bears the scars from the first time she said I do. Can she trust Paolo enough to reveal the truth?
Proof of their Sin
Dani Collins
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
EPILOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
NOT FOR THE first time in the last several weeks, Lauren Bradley wondered
where she should draw the line between becoming the bold, independent woman she’d always wished she could be and behaving like a shameless, demanding radical. Words like licentious, brazen and embarrassment trickled through her mind with increasing frequency as she walked that blurry border.
Unsurprisingly, when those hurtful words echoed in her head, they were always pronounced in her mother’s thin, distressed voice.
Flicking one long, brunette braid over her shoulder, Lauren silently told her absent mother to pipe down while she regarded the woman behind the counter of this exclusive hotel salon. The woman had just given Lauren the most excruciatingly polite brush-off and the habits of a lifetime urged Lauren to slink away in quiet disgrace.
But her heart was beating for two these days, knocking hard against the wall of her breastbone and bouncing back on a spine that had to harden to contain it.
Dare I? she wondered with a shiver of apprehension.
Oh, she knew she appeared to be just one more hick tourist come to New York looking for a posh hairstyle to take home as a souvenir, but this meant so much more to her than that. Lauren stood on the threshold of taking control of her life in a way she’d never imagined, but to do so meant shoving past the old Lauren who always smilingly took a backseat to everyone. If she didn’t dig deep and find her true spirit right now she might as well collect her luggage from upstairs and retreat to the empty rooms of her grandmother’s mansion where she could raise her baby with all the fear of drawing attention its mother had suffered most of her life.
No. Lauren locked her knee, surreptitiously putting her foot down.
She allowed the salon receptionist to finish the call she’d used to try to dismiss her. Ingrained manners were a pain that way. Besides, Lauren needed the extra seconds to gather her courage and manufacture a gracious smile for the woman who gave her a strained Still here? smile as she hung up.
“I believe there’s been a miscommunication,” Lauren said with the most warmly modulated yet implacable tone she could muster. “I’m attending the Donatelli Charity Ball this evening.”
The woman, a little younger than Lauren’s nearly twenty-five, widened her eyelash extensions with a fraction of respect. Exactly. Paolo Donatelli was a man who made every woman stand taller and suck in her stomach.
A zing of empowerment swept through Lauren. She was name-dropping, sure, but she’d never before had the gall to try it. Over her mother’s gasp of horror, she heard her grandmother say, Good girl! Clenching her fingers on the strap of her carry-all purse, Lauren added daringly, “You’re certain you have nothing for Bradley? Mrs. Ryan Bradley?”
Her mother would have a stroke over such audacity, but Lauren stood her ground, pronouncing the name with delicate precision because, honestly, what was the use in being Mrs. Bradley if she shrank from all it afforded her?
“Mrs. Bradley...” The salon hostess searched her book while her plucked brows came together in concern. “It sounds familiar—”
A stiletto-thin man appeared from behind the privacy wall of translucent bricks. Groomed to perfection right down to his buffed fingernails, he greeted Lauren with the warmth of an old friend, even though she’d never seen him before in her life.
“Mrs. Bradley, of course we have time for you. So good to see you out during what must be a very difficult time. May I express on behalf of myself, my staff, and in fact our entire country, how sincerely sorry we are for your loss. Captain Bradley was a true hero. If there is anything we can do to ease your pain and make up for his sacrifice, we are at your service.”
Now Lauren did feel like the most conscienceless snake oil salesman in the world, allowing the man to sweep her into the interior of the salon, minions scampering before him to remove traces of previous clients.
Guilt rose to tense her shoulders; there was still time to go back. All she had to do was turn and leave. People would stare but she could be gone in a matter of seconds.
She swallowed and allowed confident hands to seat her. The elastic hoops were peeled off her two thick braids and then her new BFF was fanning his hands through her hair, picking up the strands that fell to her waist.
“This is your natural color, isn’t it? What a treasure. Your husband must have adored this mane.”
Lauren had thought he had adored her. Don’t ever cut it. Promise me, he’d said a thousand times. Everyone in her life had encouraged her to keep her hair long and Lauren, always the good girl, had complied.
“You’re not going to hide it by putting it up? What are you wearing tonight?” He weighed the kinked strands.
“I have a vintage Lanvin-Castillo. And no, I don’t want my hair up. I want you to cut it. Off.” New life. New Lauren.
He sucked in a gasp, meeting her gaze in the mirror with disbelief that slowly dawned into awe. “My dear, if I were straight, I would ask you to marry me.”
Lauren smiled as if men fell for her all the time, which was the furthest thing from the truth. “Sir, if I was the least bit interested in marrying again, I’d say yes.”
* * *
Three hours later Enrique was the best friend Lauren had never had. He insisted on coming to her room with one of the stylists from his salon where they helped her dress and put finishing touches on her hair, nails and makeup.
“I cannot wait to tell people I dressed Frances Hammond’s granddaughter. Look at you! It’s like it was made for you.”
Considering it was the last dress made for her grandmother and that she’d also been three months’ pregnant at the time, it didn’t surprise Lauren that it fit so well. The boned bodice that flattened her tender breasts was severely uncomfortable, but it did wonders for her usually modest bosom. She hid her wince and stepped into the matching satin heels. They weren’t as tall as current fashion dictated, but they were stitched to match the amethyst embroidery on the white silk of the dress and positively adorable.
Enrique carefully draped the dark violet stole over her bare shoulders, shaking his head with wonder. “Look at this detailing. What a time to be alive.” He set familiar hands on her hips, taking in the pink and blue pastes studding the elaborate chenille and floss that ended at her waistline. He didn’t seem to notice she was disguising a pregnancy behind the structure of the dress.
Good. The whole purpose of this exercise was to let the father of her baby know about his child’s existence before the rest of the world found out.
As Lauren absorbed the reality that she would be seeing Paolo again, a flood of excitement sent a subtle rush of heat and color under her skin. She saw it happen in the full-length mirror as she turned for a final look. It made her squirm internally with chagrin that she couldn’t stop the reaction. Always, always she reacted to that man and it was so wrong. Her thoughts of him almost tipped into memories of their night in Charleston and the sting in her cheeks ached with shame.
She tried forcing herself back into the cone of denial she’d occupied since The Morning After, but it was tighter than this dress. The lovemaking shouldn’t have happened, but it had. There were consequences. She had to face them.
Which meant facing Paolo.
To combat her reaction at the prospect of seeing him, she took a hard look at her appearance. Where her grandmother had been blond elegance, Lauren was dark with elfin features accentuated by her new hair.
What would Paolo think? Of the hair and the news?
She never knew what to expect from him. The first time she’d met him, at a bar here in New York five years ago, he’d been warm and admiring. The second time, at her wedding to Ryan half a year later, things had gone so wrong it had been nothing but chilly brush-offs after that. She’d been convinced he hated her and, after his nasty set-down at Ryan’s thirtieth birthday party, she had returned his antipathy. When Ryan had disappeared three months ago, however, she’d made one despairing call from Charleston and Paolo had material
ized before her. He’d revealed an incredibly tender side when he’d broken the news about Ryan with sincere regret, so protective of her he had whisked her to the privacy of his nearby penthouse.
Where he had made love to her with unexpected and abject passion.
So would he regard this baby as exciting and wonderful? Or would he be the iceman about it? Would he blame her? Or see her as something he wanted?
Oh God, was that what she was doing? Trying to make herself into something that could fit into his world? Suddenly she saw herself as she was: a rube playing dress-up, sidling out of her element with the intention of taking life by storm without possessing the capacity to actually do it. Her confidence plunged.
“Don’t look so terrified,” Enrique scolded. “You have every reason to hold your head high.”
Lauren couldn’t think of one person who would agree. Not her mother, certainly not her mother-in-law. Paolo hadn’t said a word to her since. That didn’t bode well.
Her stomach rolled with anxious fear and she automatically lifted a protective hand to her abdomen.
Enrique’s gaze followed.
Too revealing. She was falling apart.
“I haven’t eaten,” she offered, which was true. The baby deserved better. She ought to take off this costume and stay here for a proper meal and an early night.
“They’ll have a buffet at the ball, but will this tide you over?” Enrique’s assistant offered a candy from a roll of them.
Lauren stared with bemusement at that particular candy appearing before her at this particular instance. With a tremulous smile, she took one. As the O-shape and scorched-caramel flavor landed on her tongue, Mamie’s spirit came into the room.
Do it, chérie. Take a chance. Live your life.
Lauren took a deep breath and her flagging confidence rallied. She couldn’t let Mamie down.