The Feisty Fiancée

by Jessica Steele

  'Too kind!' Oh, don't be snappy-you may never see him again. That thought was so unbearable, Yancie burst into speech. `You're thinner!' she said hurriedly, feeling more agitated than ever suddenly.

  She wished at once she hadn't said it, because her remark brought his eyes from her face to skim over her shape, a much too speculative look in his grey eyes as he fixed them on her blue eyes once more, and quietly remarked, `You don't appear to have put on a whole lot of weight, either.' And, acute as sessment not in it, he said, `Why is that, I wonder?"

  'We've both b-been-er-unwell,' she supplied in an endeavour to put him off the scent-love had walked in; her appetite had walked out.

  'How are you feeling now?' he enquired pleasantly.

  Pretty desperate, actually. But his pleasant tone, plus the fact that he had accepted her answer without further question, caused her to drop her guard in her relief, and it was chattily that she answered, You mean how long have I been having these hallucinations?' The moment the question was out, she wanted it back. She had now gone from merely nervous and agitated to panic-stricken. She had been hoping that Thomson had forgotten her claim to be his fiancee but, with those words `That's no way to speak to your fiancee!' clanging stridently away in her head all the while, she had just reminded him.

  In all probability he had never forgotten it, she realised, but-was it too much to hope that those words were not clanging so loudly in his head; that he might not have a clue what she was meaning with her talk of hallucinations?

  It was too much to hope for, she was very soon made aware. Because, whatever trauma Thomson had suffered from the accident, it had not impaired the quickness of his thinking, Yancie found. And he was right there with her when he questioned, `To claim to be engaged to me, do I take it that I proposed?' He paused, and then very quickly added, `And that you accepted?'

  For all he seemed tense as he waited for her answer. Yancie knew that he was playing with her-and she didn't thank him for it. `Oh, you proposed all right-but you're not engaged to me!' she answered snappily.

  His eyes narrowed slightly. `I make it my life's work to go around proposing to women?"

  'According to your mother, you've been engaged to Julia Herbert for months!'

  'Julia H…' Thomson stared at her disbelievingly. `My mother told you I was engaged to Julia Herbert?' he questioned, seeming stunned. But, collecting himself, he caught a hold of Yancie's arm. `I should have known that nothing is ever straightforward when it involves you, Yancie Dawkins,' he said at length. `Come and take a seat, and you can tell me all about it.'

  'You're busy,' she tried, but it seemed he'd got his determined hat on.

  'Business can wait!' he said firmly. `Things have been going on here of which I know nothing!' And with that he led her over to the comfortable-looking sofa.

  Yancie, by this time, was a trembling wreck. She had a feeling that what Thomson didn't know which he felt he should he resolutely found out. She wanted to flee, wanted to stay, wanted more time with him, even if it was just a mutual `It's been nice working with you' kind of time. But he was urging her to be seated, and, truth to tell, she was feeling rather feeble in the leg department.

  She saw a hint of a smile cross his features when she gave in and took a seat on the sofa, but noticed that he didn't turn his back on her, didn't take his eyes off her or give her a chance to dash for the door when he went to the intercom and told his PA, `I'm with someone, Veronica. See to it I'm not disturbed, will you?'

  Yancie stared at him. He needn't worry; she didn't feel capable just then of getting up and making a dive for the door. More so when Thomson came over and drew one of the easy chairs close up to her-and looked steadily into her nervous blue eyes.

  'I didn't know you were so friendly with my mother,' he commented.

  'I'm not!'

  'And yet you say you know her well enough for her to impart details of my personal life.'

  'I don't know her at all,' Yancie insisted. `She was just there one of the times I came to see you in the hospital.'

  'You came more than once?' he questioned sharply, that alert look in his eyes again.

  Had he remembered her coming to see him that day? She couldn't ask. Yancie was all at once feeling on very shaky ground. She needed to get out of there, and with her pride intact. And yet she couldn't go. And, she discovered, when she had been able to lie to him in the past, now, with his eyes steady on hers, to lie to him was totally beyond her.

  'I came several times,' she confessed, and felt her heart go a touch crazy that his breath seemed to catch and a warm kind of look came to his eyes. But she was fearful she was reading more into his every word, his every look than there actually was, so went on hurriedly, 'Well-we were both in the same hospital though I doubt you'd have come to see me had you been the one who was mobile,' she added hurriedly. And was pleasantly contradicted for her trouble.

  'Don't doubt it for a moment,' Thomson assured her. `My first thought when I regained consciousness was you and how you'd fared.' Well, don't read anything into that, Yancie. You were his employee, remember; naturally he'd… `I was still wired up to various contraptions when I knew I had to see for myself how you were.'

  'You weren't well enough,' Yancie said softly, knowing she was in a meltdown situation again, even as she tried to rise above it.

  'I threatened to come and find you, just the same,' he replied, shaking Yancie rigid.

  'But-but you were all tubed up!' she exclaimed.

  'Which is probably why, a short while before you escaped your warders, they zapped me with something guaranteed to keep me quiet,' he transfixed her by saying.

  'You-you remember my visiting you that day?' The question wouldn't stay down this time as she clearly recalled how he'd teasingly spoken then of her warders.

  'You were wearing a pink silk robe,' he answered, and Yancie swallowed on a suddenly dry throat.

  'Do you-remember anything-else?' she asked jerkily, excusing, `You had just been heavily sedated so I don't suppose…'

  'I was fighting that sedation all the way,' he cut in, but he paused and, holding her eyes with his own, he said clearly, `I can quite well remember that I asked you to marry me.'

  Her heart wasn't merely pounding, it was thundering. She swallowed hard, and managed to find an uncaring smile as she replied, `Well, in those circumstances, I'll do the honourable thing and not hold you to it.'

  Thomson drew a long breath, and, leaning forward in his chair, he looked at her for long moments, and then plainly stated, `I would regard that as a very great pity, Yancie.'

  'Y-you-would?' Her voice had come out sounding all weak and feeble. Yancie took rapid steps to alter that. `Just how many fiancees do you want, Mr Wakefield?' she asked a touch sharply.

  'Only one. I'll have a word with my mother on the subject of her powers of invention.'

  'Don't bother on my account.' Invention?

  Thomson looked at her levelly. `While I'm willing to concede there's a vast amount I don't know about you, I think I've learned enough to know that you wouldn't have come here to see me today without some good reason. And while, I might add, you took your time in getting here I'll tell you now that all Julia Herbert has ever been to me is a friend.'

  'Your mother made the fiancee bit up?"

  'She did,' he answered. And, just as though he could see that her head was having a hard time coping, he urged, `Just take on board, Yancie, that I have never proposed marriage to anyone but you.'

  Oh, my-her legs had gone weak again. `Did you mean it?' She found enough nerve to ask, knowing she was just about going to die if he laughed his socks off.

  He did not laugh. If anything, he seemed nervous suddenly, and that surprised her. But after a moment or two he manfully admitted, `I took a long time getting there, a long time in accepting the feelings, thoughts, joy, that invaded my life on the day I met you.' He smiled and, leaning forward, he tenderly kissed her cheek. `Oh, yes, dear Yancie,' he said softly as he pulled back and loo
ked into her eyes. `Oh, yes, I meant it.'

  Yancie looked at him, tears welling up inside. He meant it! He meant it. Thomson had meant it when he had asked her to marry him. She wanted to throw herself into his arms. Wanted to hold her arms tight about him. But-she was nervous still. Nervous, and very unsure. 'Th-this has never happened to…' she broke off; she was saying too much! `I think I'm in a bit of a panic,' she confessed, loved it when he smiled and gently caught a hold of her restless hands. His touch warmed her through and through and gave her the confidence she needed to enquire, albeit huskily, `You spoke of feelings and things, on the day we met.'

  'That day you crashed into my life,' he murmured, and Yancie could read nothing but encouragement in his eyes as he recollected the event.

  'Leaving aside I didn't quite crash into you, though I concede it was a close thing,' she said, managing in her nervousness to find a smile, `you weren't so benign that day.'

  'Why would I be?' he countered. `There was I in my work-filled world, a man who didn't have time for nonsense, and there you were, in a place where you shouldn't be-naturally having very nearly caused an accident-and giving me a load of lip.'

  'You could have dismissed me for that,' Yancie murmured.

  'Which was the puzzling thing,' he said.

  'Puzzling?'

  'It was to me. I just couldn't think why I hadn't issued instructions for your department head to get rid of you.'

  'You sent for me instead.'

  'Fully intending to dismiss you myself,' he smiled.

  Her heart was racing. Surely there was a tender look in his eyes for her! `But you didn't dismiss me,' she reminded him, a little breathlessly.

  'Oh, my dear, dear Yancie, how could I? You'd entered my life, crashed into it, and brightened up my dull world.'

  She swallowed. `I did?' she questioned chokily-his dear, dear Yancie? She started trembling anew.

  'You did,' he replied. `While I'm still wondering what on earth I am doing not only using my valuable time personally interviewing you-and prolonging that interview-I find that you're making me inwardly smile so much, my intention to dismiss you never got said…' Thomson broke off, paused, and then distinctly said, `I realise now that you had started to get to me even then.'

  'Oh,' she mumbled, wanting more, needing more, much, much more. `What are you saying, Thomson?' She just couldn't hold back from asking. And, to her delight, discovered that he was in no mind to hold back. Not now.

  For, fixing her with that steady gaze, perhaps reading in her beautiful blue eyes her nervousness, her need to know, he said, I'm saying, sweet, dear, often aggravating Yancie, that when I was a busy, work-oriented man with no time for nonsense I got you as a driver, and my world as I knew it started to fall apart.'

  Yancie stared at him, her eyes huge. `What did I do?' she asked-and heard a whole list of what she had done.

  Though first Thomson leaned forward and placed a feather-light kiss to her mouth, and seemed reluctant to pull back. But, having done so, he began, with a smile, `You turned up late, took me on short cuts that turned out to be the long way round-not to mention running out of petrol while you were about it. You made me laugh-in spite of me telling myself that I didn't find it in the least amusing-you made me laugh. You beat me up. Gave my hotel room away and expected me to sleep in a chair. Got a fit of the giggles when…' he broke off, then added, `And life is so unutterably dull without you.'

  Yancie swallowed hard. `I'm a terrible person,' she whispered shakenly.

  Thomson gripped both her hands tightly in his, and, looking deep into her eyes, said, `So, is it any wonder that I've-fallen in love with you?'

  Her mouth fell open from the shock of hearing him say what she so wanted to hear. `Oh, Thomson!' she gasped tremulously.

  'It's all right, isn't it?' he asked quickly. `Hell, I'm so confident in the work I do-but this. I feel as shaky as some schoolkid.'

  'Yes, it's all right,' she told him quickly. `It's fine. I want you to love me.'

  'You do?'

  He still seemed tense, and hurriedly again Yancie replied, `It's what I want more than anything.'

  His eyes searched her face. `You've lied to me before-you're not lying now?"

  'Oh, Thomson, I'll never lie to you again!' she cried, feeling slightly astounded that he should need her reassurance.

  'Then tell me truthfully-what are you feeling for me?' he promptly wanted to know.

  And, when Yancie had always been a fairly confident person, suddenly, and quite ridiculously, she felt, experienced an overwhelming shyness to tell him of her love. `I…' she tried, but didn't make it. She tried another tack. `When you were in hospital and were so ill, I knew that if you died I wanted to die too.'

  'Oh, my darling,' he said hoarsely, and, as if he couldn't sit merely holding her hands any longer, he moved to the sofa to be closer to her, thrilling her by taking her into his arms. `Thank God you escaped with so few injuries.'

  'You asked about me?"

  'Repeatedly when you didn't come to see me again.'

  'After you'd asked me to…' shyness gripped her again.

  'After I'd asked you to marry me,' he finished for her.

  'I came the very next day-only I bumped into your mother guarding the door.'

  He shook his head, hardly crediting what she was telling him. 'I'd no idea that my mother had interfered. That you'd tried to visit me,' he owned. `I found out from Greville that you were getting on so well they'd allowed you to go home. That you went home without bothering to stop by my hospital room to visit me again clearly meant, I thought, that my proposal meant nothing to you.'

  'No!' she protested, and they just seemed to kiss quite naturally.

  'Wonderful medicine,' Thomson breathed.

  'You never thought to try and get in touch with me?' Yancie asked, not caring about anything any more. She was here with Thomson, the man she loved, the man who, incredibly, loved her.

  'Would you, sweetheart? You hadn't come to see me again. Two days I waited, watching the door, my heart leaping every time it opened, hoping it would be you. I thought, when you didn't come, that I had your answer. After a few days of waiting I couldn't take any more-I switched hospitals.'

  Her anguish for him sent her shyness flying. `Oh, Thomson, I do so love you!' she cried and as joy broke in him so Thomson gathered her close up to him once more. Held her close, and kissed her, held her, pulled back so he could read the truth in her face, in her eyes, and he kissed her again.

  'When did you know?' he asked, holding her still, but seeming to want to know everything about her.

  'I suspected it that night I was late picking you up, the night we ran out of petrol,' she began, feeling then she could tell him anything, so confessed, 'I'd been delivering a parcel to the mother of one of the mechanics. She lives in Derby.'

  'Not too far away,' Thomson teased; oh, she did love him so. `Even if you did get me all knotted up inside that you were late and might have had an accident.'

  'You-were worried?' she asked, staggered.

  'Going silently demented,' he owned. `Later I had a chance to hold you safe in my arms. I knew you were getting to me in a big way when I felt I wanted to keep on holding you safe.'

  'Back then!' she exclaimed.

  'Before then, if I'm honest,' he answered.

  'Oh, be honest, please,' she invited.

  Thomson grinned, a wonderful grin. Her heart turned over. `What can I tell you, Yancie mine? Shall I tell you how I tried to convince myself I had no interest in you-yet found you were in my head more and more?"

  'Yes, please,' she sighed.

  He laughed, kissed the top of her head, and went on, `Even when I was telling myself it wouldn't do, thinking about you all the while, that I'd have another driver-other drivers had the wrong-shaped head, the wrong-shaped hands on the wheel. But even as I was telling myself that I'd be better off with a driver who wasn't impudent, with one who wouldn't lie to me, one who wouldn't cause me to get plastered in far
m yard mud-I was having to face that other drivers didn't have the power to make me laugh-in spite of myself.'

  'Did I do that?'

  He nodded. `Life has been so unbearably flat without you,' he revealed.

  'Oh. Thomson,' she cried tenderly.

  'You're here now,' he smiled. `I can't quite believe it, but you're here. Those jealous moments of pure torture…'

  'Jealous!'

  'Jealous,' he smiled down at her. `How dared it come nipping away at me when I was supposed to be thinking only of business, when you-looking absolutely stunning, may I say?-came into the same restaurant with some male and…?"

  'You were jealous?'

  'I wasn't calling it by that name, but was well and truly out of sorts that when I'd imagined you having a solitary dinner back at our hotel-I should have known better than to expect you to do the expected, of course you come into that restaurant laughing away with some man who was obviously smitten."

  'I've known Charlie most of my life-he's just a chum.'

  'I know,' Thomson smiled. But went on, `The next I knew, you were on the way to charming the heart out of me at breakfast the next morning.'

  Was this delightful, or was this delightful? `Don't stop there,' she begged, and was beautifully, and quite breathlessly, kissed for her trouble; then, looking fairly delighted himself, Thomson was pulling back.

  'I wasn't having that, of course.'

  'My charm?"

  'Your charm,' he agreed. `I was, naturally, determined not to be charmed by you.'

  'Naturally,' she laughed.

  'When I caught myself looking at the back of your neck on the way home, and found I actually had a desire to kiss it,' he owned, to her further delight, `I knew I was going to have to take some drastic action.'

  It all fitted in. `Which is why you asked for any driver but me?' she questioned, remembering how, in particular, he had asked for Frank that time.

  'I was in denial,' Thomson confessed. But went on to admit, `After a week of not seeing you, I caved in.'

  'You missed me?"

  'It was starting to hurt.' Yancie knew that feeling. `I should have accepted that Cupid had got me that night I recognised one of the company's Mercedeses outside a party I was looking in at.'