Nicola gasped. ‘Your children, too.’
‘I know, I know. It was only a momentary impulse. But when you looked like that…’ He stopped and sighed. ‘I was confronted by another problem. I was going to have to let you go.’
‘Brett—’ her hand moved in his ‘—if I can believe what you’ve told me, can you believe what I told the Reverend Callam?’
A faint smile lit his eyes. ‘I’m beginning to have nightmares about the Reverend Callam.’ The smile died. ‘What did you tell him, Nicola?’
‘That while I may have been in love with you I wasn’t so young and immature as to let you see it, and that what it really amounted to was my pride wouldn’t let me show you.’
‘He—believed you?’
‘He believed me. Are you going to? Because if you’re trying to tell me I need longer to grow up, or something like that, I’ll die a little, I think. Two years is a very long time to be pretending… Oh, thank God,’ she whispered as he suddenly swept her up into his arms.
‘Happy birthday,’ he said softly, later—quite some time later.
‘Have I really made it?’
She was lying in his arms; they were lying together on the settee. Her robe was open and his hands were beneath it. He’d kissed her until she could no longer have a single doubt that this was a man who’d wanted her for two long years.
‘I asked you how you did it,’ she murmured, and traced the line of his jaw.
‘Kept my hands off you?’
‘Mmm…but I had the same problem,’ she confided. ‘So, whilst Tara may have given me the impetus to do it, it was only what I’d been secretly dying to do for so long.’
‘Kiss me?’
‘Yes, Brett,’ she said demurely, although her eyes sparkled with laughter. But she sobered abruptly. ‘Then I felt terrible.’
‘You didn’t know what I was going through,’ he commented. ‘Can I tell you what one of my worst moments was?’
She pillowed her head on her arms and he played with her locket, then his fingers slipped downwards. ‘Yes,’ she said, but with a tremor.
‘That night on the beach. I was seriously tempted to forget any promises I’d ever made because there was something about you in the firelight that was…’ He stopped, then held her hard.
‘You must—you were a mind-reader. Because I’d had this extraordinary fantasy, about a tent and just the two of us on a wild beach with wild animals…’ She trailed off ruefully as he lifted his head and looked into her eyes quizzically. ‘Well, you were the one who taught me about fantasies.’
‘There was another time that was an extreme test of my self-control.’
‘There was?’
‘Yes,’ he agreed gravely. ‘After that school presentation. When you were so annoyed, then so sweet and so amused to think how you’d surprised me. And you walked away from me down the drive, swinging your hat—I very nearly made this a very proper marriage in every sense of the word there and then. And that was before I kissed you for the first time, my darling Nicola—but this is no fantasy, is it?’ he said, suddenly sober.
She took her hands from behind her head and slid them round his neck. ‘No. Because I can’t wait to be taught how to make love to you, Brett. And if you ever have any doubts, will you think of this? The only reason I wanted to give you back to Marietta was because I loved you too much to think of you living with second best—and because of Chris and Sasha.’
‘Sweetheart,’ he said with an effort, then lifted her to a sitting position.
Her eyes widened.
‘Don’t look like that. There are just one or two formalities I’d like to deal with before—well, can you be patient for a moment?’
‘I…yes,’ she said.
He kissed her lips lightly and closed her robe. Then he got up and walked away. But he wasn’t gone long. He came back with a bottle of champagne and two glasses. He said, as he removed the gold foil and popped the cork, ‘I was going to wait for this, but I think we could do with it. Have a sip.’
She took the foaming glass and did as she was bid.
‘First of all—’ he sat down beside her and put his arm round her shoulders ‘—Marietta knows everything now. And in typical Marietta fashion she has made the necessary adjustments. You see…’
He paused and studied his glass. ‘Circumstance, and guilt about Sasha and Chris, made it look like a good idea for her to come back. But when I forced her to admit to herself that without those two things her career would still have taken precedence over us, she realised what I’d known for years—that the flame had gone out.’
Nicola took another sip, and blinked and sniffed.
‘And she sent you a message,’ he went on. ‘She said to tell you—and by the way, she connived at you being here alone with the kids, so you couldn’t run away from me.’
‘She did? I wondered about that!’
He smiled, and kissed the top of her head. ‘She said to tell you that she’d never felt more ashamed in her life than after what you said, and that now you wouldn’t have to worry about Chris and Sasha being with her, which they will be on a fairly regular basis. She also said—“Be happy, Nicky darling, with my sincerest blessings—I wish that for you more than anything else in the world. Not only because I love you, but because of what you’ve done for the kids.’”
Nicola burst into tears. He took her glass and held her close until the storm subsided, then dried her tears with his handkerchief.
‘Sorry,’ she said huskily. ‘But…but that’s Marietta for you.’
‘That’s Marietta for you,’ he agreed. ‘Have we finally laid to rest that—spectre?’
‘Yes. Yes. I mean, if you wouldn’t go back for the sake of Sasha and Chris…’
‘Exactly, but not only that. Most importantly because of you.’
‘I…’ She paused, then formed the words she’d never said. ‘I love you, Brett.’
‘Thank God,’ he murmured, and drew something out of his pocket.
‘What’s that?’
‘I was going to give it to you before we got married, but you objected rather strenuously.’ He clicked open a rather battered little leather box. There was a sapphire engagement ring in it. ‘It was my mother’s,’ he said quietly. ‘But you could have one of your very own if you’d like.’
She drew a trembling breath. ‘No. Oh, Brett, thank you so much. I’ll…I will always treasure it.’
He took it out of the box and slid it on in front of her wedding band. It fitted perfectly. He looked from it into her shining eyes and said, ‘There is one more convention we did away with at the time.’
‘What was that?’
‘A honeymoon. And before you worry about the kids—’
‘No,’ she said. ‘I mean, no, I won’t. And I can’t think of anything I’d rather do than be alone with you.’
‘Good. Not that we can go tomorrow—’
‘Why not?’
He laughed and kissed her. ‘It’s—well, it might take at least a day to organise.’
‘Then might I be allowed to show you what I’ve been bottling up inside me for longer than two years?’ she asked gravely. ‘Seeing that I’m not only twenty-one now, but your wife?’
He smiled down at her with his heart in his eyes. ‘I would be both proud and honoured, Mrs Harcourt.’
‘How often have I longed to do this?’ he said very quietly.
Her bedroom was almost in darkness, with only one bedside lamp on. Their clothes were scattered on the floor and they were lying on the bed. Brett had his head propped on his hand and he was just staring at her naked body, as if drinking it in. Then he raised his other hand and drew it down the curve of her hip.
She trembled finely, and touched her palm to his cheek. ‘You may never know—you said that to me—how much I’ve longed for it too. Perhaps…’ she smiled faintly, a wise little smile‘… was a little more grown up than you ever knew?’
He traced the swell of one breast, then the ot
her, and bent his head to taste her nipples.
She arched her body against him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, revelling in the glorious contact with the whole lean, strong length of him.
‘Perhaps,’ he said softly. ‘But you do understand why I held back, don’t you? I—’
‘Of course—your integrity is another reason why I love you so much,’ she murmured, and kissed his throat.
‘Then I have to tell you I can’t stand much more of this, my darling,’ he said into her hair.
‘Don’t,’ she whispered. ‘The freedom of my body is yours, Brett.’
He said her name on a suddenly tortured breath, and started to kiss her.
There was a surprise for her that morning, Saturday.
She got up very late—later than Brett—to find that the house had been transformed into a wonderland of white ribbons and silver balloons. To find Sasha and Chris dressed in their best clothes and about to expire from serious over-excitement. To find a champagne luncheon for at least twenty people laid out in the dining room and a magnificent cake with twenty-one candles.
‘But…but I thought you’d all forgotten,’ she stammered.
‘Nearly bust a gut getting them to keep the secret,’ Ellen said, and inclined her head towards Sasha and Chris.
‘I told you we wouldn’t tell, Ellen,’ Sasha reproved, and added to Nicola, ‘Daddy had it all under control—even when he had to be in Brisbane.’
Nicola turned to Brett. He held out his hand and she took it, managing to say huskily, ‘Thank you. I…thank you. I guess I’d better get changed.’ She looked ruefully down at her shorts and T-shirt.
‘May I make a suggestion?’ he murmured. ‘Why don’t you wear your wedding dress?’
So she did—although she didn’t wear the hat—and it turned out to be a lively party, with their best friends, Ellen’s family and the special delivery of a magnificent basket of flowers—from Marietta.
Nicola was still in her beautiful dress as the sun started to set and the last guests left. She and Brett were standing on the deck, hand in hand, watching the changing colours of the sea.
‘Happy?’ he asked.
‘More than you could believe.’
‘About last night…’ he murmured.
Nicola caught her breath and remembered their lovemaking—not that it had been far from her mind all day.
‘I was wondering whether it lived up to expectations, that’s all.’ He looked down at her gravely.
She stared into his hazel eyes and recalled being possessed by him with a need and a hunger that had surpassed all her expectations. But it had also touched a response in her so profound it had carried them both into territory where she would never again feel less than equal with this tall man. Never again not know that she was both his haven and his match.
And when they’d come down from the star-shot splendour that had racked them simultaneously, and he’d cradled her in his arms and smoothed her damp hair from her brow, smudged the tears of joy from her cheeks, she’d offered up a little prayer of thanks for the impulse that had taken her to see the Reverend Peter Callam those short weeks ago.
‘About last night…’ she said, equally as grave. ‘I can think of only one word to describe it.’
‘And that is?’ He raised an eyebrow.
‘Well, two. Absolutely awesome.’
‘My own thinking entirely, as it happens. It also happens that I haven’t given you your twenty-first birthday present yet.’
‘But I thought…?’ She glanced down at the sapphire ring on her finger.
‘No. That signifies something else, Nicola. This is—this is something I had specially made for you. At the time, I didn’t know whether I’d be able to tell you this, but…’ He paused, and put something into her hand.
She looked down to see a tiny gold key, studded with diamonds, on a fine chain.
‘Tell me what, Brett?’ Her voice shook because of what she saw in his eyes.
‘That without you to hold this key, the key of my heart, I’m lost and alone—darling, don’t cry.’
‘I’m not,’ she said tremulously. ‘Yes, I am. Oh, Brett!’ She went into his arms and he held her agonisingly close.
‘Were you ever wrong, Sash!’ Chris said in a stage-whisper as they peeped out of the lounge windows.
‘Well, I can’t be right all the time,’ Sasha replied reasonably. ‘Do you think they’re going to do this all the time now they’ve started?’ she added with a frown.
‘You were the one who gave them the idea!’
‘Come away, you two!’ Ellen commanded gruffly.
Brett and Nicola broke apart, then looked at each other and began to laugh helplessly.
ISBN : 978-1-4592-5192-2
HE’S MY HUSBANDI
First North American Publication 1999.
Copyright © 1998 by Lindsay Armstrong.
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
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
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