“So, do you really want to know why I married you?”

No! Lily’s heart pleaded with her to say it. To declare that, no, she didn’t want to know anything about it. Didn’t want to hear a word he had to say.

“It was the only way you would let me near you,” he said, so carelessly that for the space of a couple of heartbeats Lily didn’t quite register exactly what he meant. “And I wanted you so much that I was quite prepared…” He never finished the sentence.

“Get out, Ronan!”

“I told you you wouldn’t like the answer.”

No!

“But, Lily, if you want the whole truth it’s not me you should come to. If you want to know the whole story, then you should really ask your brother—if he’ll tell you….”

KATE WALKER was born in Nottinghamshire, U.K., but as she grew up in Yorkshire she has always felt that her roots were there. She met her husband at university and she originally worked as a children’s librarian, but after the birth of her son she returned to her old childhood love of writing. When she’s not working, she divides her time between her family, their three cats and her interests of embroidery, antiques, film and theater, and, of course, reading.

You can visit Kate’s Web site at www.kate-walker.com or e-mail her at kate@kate-walker.com.

Wife for a Day
Kate Walker

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER ONE

RONAN GUERIN looked down at the sleeping face of the woman in the bed and almost changed his mind about the whole thing.

Almost.

She looked so peaceful, so innocent, so damned beautiful. It was impossible not to recall the night he had just spent with her, the incandescent passion they had shared, and feel a pang of regret for the course he had started out on.

But then he remembered Rosalie, every bit as beautiful and just as innocent, and he hardened his heart. Firming his resolve, he reached out a hand and touched her shoulder gently.

‘Lily…’ he said softly.

At first there was no response. She was too deeply unconscious, too exhausted by a night in which sleep had been the last thing on their minds to hear. Refusing to let himself reconsider, to be weakened by the sight of her innocent appearance, he shook her slightly, watching as she gave a faint murmur and stirred, her eyes still closed.

‘Good morning, wife.’

Good morning, wife. The words reached Lily through the clouds of sleep that clogged her brain, making them sound vague and indistinct so that she frowned in drowsy confusion.

Wife?

It was as she moved languorously in the deep comfort of the bed, feeling the soft brush of the fine linen sheets on her naked body, that realisation struck home with the force of an arrow thudding straight into the heart of a target. Her eyes, wide and deep gold, flew open, meeting the steady, watchful gaze of the man who sat on the edge of the bed, his strong fingers still resting on her arm.

‘Ronan?’

Of course! How could she have forgotten, even for a second? How could sleep have wiped away the fact that this was the man to whom she had given her heart so completely that there was never a hope of getting it back—not that she wanted it. The man who, only the day before, had placed a gold wedding band on her finger as he vowed to love and honour her for the rest of his life.

Stretching luxuriously, she turned to face him.

‘Good morning, husband.’

Her smile, with its deliberate edge of sleepy sensuality, was directed straight into his intent blue-grey eyes, the angle of her head calculatedly provocative as it splayed the long blonde strands of her hair out around her heart-shaped face on the immaculate white pillows.

To her surprise, neither the smile nor the inviting gesture earned her the response she had anticipated. Instead, Ronan seemed strangely, almost worryingly distant. The strong-boned features under the silky dark chestnut hair were set in a way that made him look disturbingly remote and cold, light-years away from the ardent, passionate lover of the night before.

Memories of the indulgence of that night brought a rush of colour to her cheeks, and her tongue slipped out to smooth over the soft curve of her lower lip, as if she could still taste the burning kisses he had pressed there. A hot rush of sexual awareness mixed with a heady sense of very female triumph flooded every nerve as she saw the indigo gaze drop to follow the slight movement.

‘Husband,’ she murmured again, savouring the sound of the word.

Her body still ached faintly, and there were one or two tender spots on her skin, but she didn’t care. The pleasure she had experienced last night had been so totally new to her, so mind-blowing in its intensity, that she had been hard put to it to believe that she could feel it and not shatter into a thousand tiny pieces.

And it was something she very much wanted to enjoy all over again.

As she believed Ronan would too. In fact, when she had finally drifted into exhausted and satiated sleep, she had been convinced that she would wake to find herself firmly enclosed by the strength of his arms. That he would greet her with gentle kisses, rouse her body to demanding life, as he had done so easily the night before, his own muscular frame heating, tensing, hardening in matching response.

Which was why it was so disconcerting to find him now sitting beside her, looking so cool and indifferent—and fully dressed.

‘What time is it?’ she asked in some concern, recalling the flight they were due to make that day.

‘Just after nine.’

‘So early! Then what are you doing out of bed?’

Her full mouth formed a petulant moue of disapproval as she took in the clothes he was wearing. They were hardly suitable for someone about to set out on a long-haul trip to the tropical island he had promised would be their honeymoon destination. The immaculately tailored suit in a light grey silk, white shirt and conservative tie only added to her confusion, aggravating the sense of alienation she had experienced earlier.

‘Our plane doesn’t leave until three!’ she protested. ‘We’ve hours yet.’

Lily reached out and stroked his hand where it lay, broad and strong, with long, square-tipped fingers, on the pristine whiteness of the quilt cover.

‘Come back to bed,’ she murmured, her low voice pitched to entice.

An adamant shake of his gleaming dark auburn head was Ronan’s only response. His disturbingly shadowed gaze was fixed on the thick gold band that gleamed bright and new on her slender finger.

‘No?’

Incredulity sharpened her voice, giving a disbelieving lift to the single syllable. Was this the same man who had been so physically demanding, so insatiable throughout the night? The same Ronan as the one who had allowed her no rest until they were both limp with exhaustion, unable to move, even to breathe properly?

‘What is it, darling?’ Deliberately she lowered her voice to a husky whisper. ‘Have you gone off me already?’

That got a reaction, but not the one she had expected.

With a jerky movement, Ronan lifted his head so that his eyes once more met hers full on. Coolest sea-blue locked with the almost amber warmth of Lily’s perplexed gaze, and something deep in those eyes, some shadow darkening their limpid clearness, made her shiver in intuitive apprehension.

‘Gone off you?’ he echoed, his voice sounding as if it came from a throat that was painfully raw. ‘Never that!’

As if to emphasise the words, he accompanied them with a look so sensually appreciative, so blatantly carnal, that it was almost a physical caress in itself. But, just as Lily was about to relax back into the comfortable warmth of her sleepy sexuality, the realisation of a cold edge to that look, a glitter of something disturbing in his eyes was like the splash of icy water in her face, bringing all her defences to red alert before he even spoke again.

‘You turn me on just by existing, lady,’ he declared with disturbing harshness. ‘And you know it. I only have to look at you to want you so much that I feel I might die if I don’t have you. But that’s a penance I have to endure.’

‘Penance!’

That first tiny prickle of unease had now become a raging tide of discomfort. Every nerve stung with a tension that was like the pins and needles of blood returning to a numbed limb, but magnified a hundredfold.

‘I don’t understand!’

She couldn’t hide the tremor of her voice as she pushed herself upright in a panic, feeling far too vulnerable lying down.

‘Ronan? What is it?’

‘I want you, Lily,’ Ronan persisted, as if she hadn’t spoken. Each word was so cold, so clipped that Lily flinched away from them as if they were actually formed in ice as they fell on the sensitive skin of her exposed neck and shoulders. ‘But I’ll never have you again—ever. It was good while it lasted—perhaps the best—but now it’s over. I only waited until you were awake so that I could say goodbye.’

‘G-Goodbye!’

It couldn’t be true! She couldn’t have heard right. Either that or this was some appalling sick joke, one that she didn’t like at all. But she would never have believed that Ronan could be so hatefully cruel.

‘This isn’t funny, Ronan!’

‘Funny?’

His intonation said it all, Ronan knew. There was no need for further elucidation. But still he wanted to spell it out to her, setting out the details with a precise pedantry that made it plain his intent was to spare her nothing. He wanted her to know exactly what was happening, to understand what the experience of pain was truly like.

‘This is no joke, my darling. No joke at all. Believe me, I never felt further from laughter; I couldn’t be more serious. Our marriage, such as it was, is over—done with. I’m leaving today and I’m never coming back.’

He got to his feet, the easy, indolent movement somehow shocking when Lily contrasted it with the whirling frenzy inside her head.

‘I’ll let you decide when to serve the divorce papers.’

‘But…’

‘And now, if you’ll excuse me…’ The carefully formal politeness underlined the ruthless determination to give her no quarter at all. ‘I have a long drive ahead of me.’

As he strolled to the door Lily could only stare after him in stunned confusion. But even as her golden eyes were fixed on his retreating back her thoughts were turned inward, reviewing the events of the previous day—their wedding day—trying to see how the glorious happiness she had experienced then could have brought her to the emotional horror of this moment.

How was it possible that what had seemed like the realisation of her greatest dream could have changed so swiftly into the nightmare of knowing that that fulfilment now lay shattered at her feet?

How could she not have suspected anything? Surely there must have been some clue. Some moment when Ronan had let slip the careful mask of the happy bridegroom, the veneer of a man anticipating his marriage with the same sort of excitement and delight that had filled her own heart, and revealed his true feelings.

Because it had to have been a mask, she now saw. He could never have felt for her the way she had believed he did and then turn round and do this. And yet he had never seemed to be pretending. Certainly, she had never suspected for a moment that his feelings were anything but totally sincere.

So when had it all fallen apart?

No, it couldn’t be true! She had to be dreaming. She was trapped in a nightmare from which she desperately wished she could wake.

Frantically she pinched at her hand, her arm, praying that the small, self-inflicted pain would break through the trance that held her and force her into consciousness. But nothing happened. There was nothing to happen. She was wide awake, this private hell only too real.

And yesterday she had thought she had it all. That she’d found the true love she had looked for all her life.

Yesterday had been quite perfect. In fact the one tiny flaw she could remember had been the silly upset over Ronan’s hair…

‘Well, are you ready to take the longest walk of your life?’

George Halliday grinned down at Lily as he spoke, one hand adjusting the fall of his elaborate cravat. Above the silky material, his lined face was already beginning to redden in the unexpected warmth of early April sunlight.

‘The longest walk, Uncle George?’

Lily smiled enquiringly up at the man who wasn’t really her uncle but had acquired the name as an honorary title after years of friendship. George had held the market stall next to hers when she had first started out in her florist’s business. He had been there to help when she had moved her business into a small, rented shop, and he was the closest thing to a genuine relation she had had for years. So he had been the obvious choice to turn to when, with her wedding so very close, she had been unable to track down her missing brother and had been forced to look elsewhere for someone to escort her down the aisle.

‘I thought that was supposed to be the walk to the scaffold.’

‘Tradition might have it that way, my dear, but I can’t see it. I reckon that particular stroll must just fly by! But this one! Well, that’s a different kettle of fish altogether. Too much time to think. With every step you take you’re wondering whether you’ve done the right thing. He loves me…he loves me not…’

He mimed slow, stately steps forward with each phrase.

‘Oh, Uncle George! I don’t have to think, I know! I love Ronan more than life itself, and he loves me.’

‘Well, just so long as you’re sure. If you ask me, this was all a bit of a rushed job.’

His worried frown told her exactly what he was thinking, and she hurried to put his mind at rest on that score.

‘No, I’m not pregnant, if that’s what you’re hinting at. We haven’t even slept together yet. Ronan knew I preferred to wait. He understood…’

‘Then he’s a rare sort of man if he did,’ George declared with typical Yorkshire bluntness. ‘But that explains his haste to get you down the aisle, I suppose. If I was thirty years younger, and had a beauty like you wearing my ring, then I know I’d want to rush through the wedding pretty damn quick too. Every day I had to wait would seem like an eternity.’

‘Uncle George!’

Warm colour flooded Lily’s face from her slender neck right up under the coils of blonde hair that were topped by a delicate crystal tiara, and she lifted her bouquet of white lilies to try to conceal her blushes.

‘Now don’t you go coy on me, young madam! I know you’re twenty-six, and that’s quite old enough to know what I mean. Your Ronan would have to be dead from the neck down if he didn’t know what a treasure he’s getting in you.’

‘I think you can rest easy on that score,’ Lily assured him, some very personal memories starting up her blushes again just as they were beginning to ebb.

Ronan might have acceded to her desire to wait until their wedding night before they slept together, but that didn’t mean he had acquiesced easily, or waited with patience or restraint. They had come very close to breaking their resolution more than once in recent days, and she for one was more than thankful that theirs had been only a very short engagement. As it was, it would be barely two months from the moment they had met until their wedding day, and for Lily that was more than enough.

The sound of the organ beginning the familiar notes of the traditional ‘Wedding March’ brought her attention back to the present, making her turn towards the door into the church. With slightly shaky fingers she adjusted the sleek, elegant lines of her ivory silk dress, smoothing the long skirt down carefully. Then, lifting her head high, she turned a wide, confident smile in her companion’s direction.

‘Time to go!’

‘No second thoughts?’

‘None at all. You were right, Uncle George. Ronan is a very rare sort of man, and that’s exactly why I’m marrying him.’

The interior of the church looked every bit as beautiful as she had imagined when she had planned the designs for the floral arrangements, with creamy old-fashioned roses at the base of the stained glass windows and white freesias, lily of the valley and trailing ivy decorating the end of every pew. On the altar, two tall displays of lilies mirrored the flowers in her bouquet, their elegant height, creamy waxen petals and golden stamens making them look very similar to the traditional church candles one might have expected to see there.

But no real candles burned anywhere inside the old building. Lily had explained her feelings on that matter when she had booked the church, and the priest had understood perfectly. So the only illumination on the altar itself came from the soft light of the early spring sun that poured through the wide, arched windows behind it.

The next moment Lily’s gaze went to the man standing tall and straight before the altar, his tall frame lovingly enhanced by the perfect cut of his formal morning coat, and immediately she forgot everything else. This was Ronan, her fiancé, so soon to be her husband.

Her heart kicked sharply under the tightly boned bodice as her amber-coloured gaze drank in the power and strength of his long body, the straight line of his back and firm, square shoulders. His feet were planted firmly on the stone-flagged floor, his legs strong and steady, with no trace of the nervous tremble that had suddenly affected her own. The sun that slanted through the nearby window fell directly onto his head, making the burnished copper strands gleam amongst the silken darkness.

But that was when she noticed the change in his appearance that had made her do a double take.

His hair! Ronan had cut his beautiful hair! Where only the day before it had been thick and shining, with a strong natural wave, now the chestnut locks were clipped into an uncompromising crop that exposed the back of his tanned neck.

Lily had to bite down hard on her lower lip to hold back the small sound of disappointment that almost escaped her. She had loved to curl her fingers in that dark silk, and had looked forward to doing just that in the intimate privacy of their wedding night. Short-haired, he looked older, harder, the change in his appearance seeming to emphasise the dynamic, forceful side of his nature that had led to his reputation as a ruthless businessman but which she had rarely seen in her own dealings with him.

But she couldn’t say anything about it now. Already the priest had moved forward to begin the ceremony, and at her side Ronan had turned to face her. Every other thought fled from her mind as he took her hand in the warm strength of his and she saw the blaze of appreciation that flared in his eyes as he took in her appearance fully for the first time.

In that moment it was as if the church and the congregation had melted into one multicoloured blur. There was only herself and Ronan and the promises they were making to each other, the vows of love, honour and faithfulness for the rest of their lives.

And all the time, in the depths of that intent grey-blue stare, burned the evidence of a desire so strong, so ardent that it set up sensations and responses in her own body that were entirely inappropriate to their surroundings and the solemnity of the occasion.

But once the service was over, and they were at the reception in a nearby hotel, Lily couldn’t hold back disappointment any longer and she turned on Ronan reproachfully.

‘You cut your hair! Why did you do that?’

‘And happy wedding day to you too, my love,’ was the swiftly sardonic response. Ronan’s straight, dark brows drew together in a faint frown. ‘What happened to, I love you, darling husband. I’m so happy to be your wife?’

Hearing an unexpected and perturbing fervour behind his words, Lily caught herself up on what she had been about to say and substituted instead a careful echoing of his own phrase.

‘I love you, darling h-husband.’

To her consternation her tongue tangled round the word, turning it into a stumbling and gauche hiccup.

Was it real? Could Ronan really be her husband? After all the days of impatiently counting the hours, the nights of dreaming of just this moment, it seemed impossible that at last those dreams had finally come true.

‘I’m so happy to be your wife.’

‘Are you?’

It was there again, that worrying emphasis, a sharpness that edged his words with steel. His eyes were silver fire, seeming to want—to need—to drag the response from her, rooting it out of her very soul.

‘Are you happy? Truly happy?’

‘Of course I am.’ Reaction to the unexpected ferocity of his questioning put a small quiver into her voice. ‘Ronan, what is this, the Spanish Inquisition?’

‘I just wanted to be sure.’

‘Sure!’

Ronan’s sudden and uncharacteristic need for reassurance sent a rush of delight and excitement through her, flooding her heart with renewed love for him. The thought that even a man as self-contained and assured as Ronan had proved himself to be could feel insecure where she was concerned spoke of such a depth of emotion that it brought hot tears to her eyes.

‘Oh, Ronan, how could I not be sure? I’ve just married the man I love in front of all my friends. Everyone I know is here…’

‘Except Davey,’ Ronan inserted almost harshly.

‘Except Davey,’ Lily agreed solemnly.

This time the tears that stung so sharply stemmed from a very different source. It would have made her day perfect if her brother could have been there.

‘I wish I’d been able to get in touch with him.’

‘So do I,’ said Ronan, with such feeling that Lily looked up at him in some surprise.

‘I didn’t know it mattered so much to you.’

‘Well, let’s just say that I would have preferred to have met your brother before today.’

His eyes drifted away from her to stare out across the crowded room, but Lily got the distinct impression that he saw nothing of the brightly dressed guests, laughing and chatting in small friendly groups. Slowly he drew a deep, uneven breath, and when he turned back to her his expression had altered in some subtle, indefinable way. And when he spoke again she had the strangest feeling that he was not pursuing the topic that had been uppermost in his thoughts.

‘After all, we’re not exactly well off for family, either of us. We’re two adults of not exactly ancient years, and yet we can’t muster even a single relative between us.’

‘I know…’

It was a sigh of sorrow and regret as her thoughts went to her own parents, killed in a tragic accident when she had been seventeen and Davey six years younger. They would have loved to be here today, to see her as a happy bride, and she had no doubt that they would have approved of this tall, handsome, successful, but above all loving man she had chosen as her husband.

Sadly, Ronan, too, was on his own. When she had asked him which of his relatives she should invite to the wedding, his reply had been short to the point of curtness.

‘No family. There’s no family, but I can give you a list of friends if you like.’

And the number of his friends had gone a long way towards making up for the shortfall on the family side, she reflected. Not only that, but some of them had already created quite a stir in this small northern town, one that would persist long after the wedding celebrations were over. As an extremely wealthy businessman, whose extensive interests amounted to an empire, Ronan had contact with equally rich and well-known people, many of whom were here today.

Not that she had had much of an opportunity to talk to any of them. Ronan had kept her very much at his side so that she hadn’t had much of a chance to get to know any of his guests. She could only hope that they wouldn’t hold it against her later.

A faint frown drew Lily’s fair brows together as she recalled her meeting with one of Ronan’s particular friends. His best man, Connor Fitzpatrick, had seemed rather distant when she had been introduced to him the day before, and he had subjected her to a disturbingly close scrutiny that had distinctly unnerved her. Hannah, her own best friend and chief bridesmaid, was having much more success with him now on the dance floor, some remark she had made earning her a wide, brilliant smile.

‘Why the black look?’ Ronan had caught the change in her expression.

‘I was just thinking that I get the impression Connor doesn’t really like or approve of me.’

Those steely eyes flashed swiftly in the direction of his friend, that hint of a frown returning just for a moment. But then a second later Ronan turned back to her with a smile that dismissed her fears as foolish and unnecessary.

‘What’s not to like or approve, little silly?’ he murmured softly. ‘To tell you the truth, he’s probably far more likely to doubt my own sincerity and motives in entering into this marriage. After all, I’ve hardly been the type to settle down until now, and, let’s face it, this was something of a whirlwind romance. You knocked me right off my feet and I haven’t been able to regain my balance ever since.’

Those words had reassured her at the time, Lily recalled miserably, reluctantly coming back to the present to find herself still staring at the door through which Ronan had just disappeared. But now they rang brutally hollow, overlaid instead by the cold, callous declaration that he was leaving and never coming back.

The sound of a door opening downstairs jolted her into movement. What was she doing sitting here like this, letting Ronan go? He was her husband! They’d been married for less than twenty-four hours. Was she going to let him leave without a fight?

Frantically she flung back the bedclothes, snatching up the mint-green wrap-around robe that lay on a chair beside the bed. Refusing to allow herself to dwell on the fact that the matching silk and lace nightdress which she had worn so briefly the night before now lay in a crumpled heap on the floor, where Ronan had discarded it in the heat of his passion, she yanked it on, tugging the belt fastened as she headed for the stairs.

The front door stood wide open, letting in the sunlight and the sound of birdsong. The cheerful noise stabbed at her, bringing home the contrast between its light-hearted notes and the dark sense of dread that dulled her own soul.

‘Ronan!’

He was already outside, standing by his car as he loaded his case into the boot. The sight made her heart thud against her chest in shocked recognition that he had meant what he had said. Even now, she had still held on to the weak thread of hope that it had all just been some sick, tasteless joke.

‘Ronan, wait!’

He ignored her, his dark head turned away, the set of his broad shoulders under the tailored jacket seeming to declare unrelenting rejection of her plea without a word being spoken.

‘Oh, please, don’t do this!’ She reached the steps from the main door as she spoke. ‘Ronan, you can’t do this to me. I won’t let you!’

Slowly, deliberately, Ronan reached up and slammed the lid of the boot closed. The dull thud it made reverberated inside Lily’s head, making her think fearfully of steel doors slamming in her face, or the sound of a clock sounding an hour she had dreaded.

But then he turned, and at the sight of his face all other thoughts fled from her mind, leaving it cold and hollow with dread.

This wasn’t Ronan! This wasn’t the man she loved with all her heart, the man she had given herself to, body and soul, only the day before!

It was as if some stranger had moved in, an alien, who had taken over Ronan’s body, ejecting his spirit and leaving behind only the shell of the man to whom she had given her heart. A stranger with the same burnished hair, the same devastatingly attractive features, the same lean, strong build.

But these were not the same eyes—not her Ronan’s eyes. They were cold and hard as tempered steel, lethal as a stiletto-blade, impregnable as metal shutters.

‘You can’t…’ she began again, but her voice had lost all conviction.

The look Ronan turned on her was wintry, bleak as the coldest November day.

‘I can do anything I want,’ he flung at her. ‘Just try and stop me.’

CHAPTER TWO

LILY did the only thing she could think of.

Heedless of the fact that she was wearing nothing but the green robe, and determinedly ignoring the bite of the gravel into the soles of her bare feet, she ran out into the drive and caught hold of the sleeve of Ronan’s jacket, clinging on to it tightly.

‘I won’t let you go until you give me some sort of an explanation! You owe me that at least!’

The words were swallowed back down her throat as she met the inimical blaze of his glare, his eyes burning translucent in the spring sunlight. Ronan shrugged off her clinging hold with a negligence that was positively insulting.

‘I owe you nothing,’ he declared, fastidiously adjusting the fit of his jacket before opening the front door of his car. ‘If anything, the debts are all on your side.’

‘On my… Oh, no, you don’t!’

Seeing that he was about to slide into the driver’s seat, she lurched forward once more, this time fastening her arms around his narrow waist from behind.

She realised just how big a mistake she had made as soon as her fingers locked together above the polished metal buckle on the narrow leather belt he wore. Now her hands were resting on the taut, flat plane of his stomach, her hold bringing her breasts and hips into close contact with the firm line of his back.

She had held him like this last night, only then he had been warm and approachable, not this glacially hostile stranger. He had been wearing only a towelling robe, having got up in the middle of the night for some reason. She had woken to find him staring out of the bedroom window and had crept up behind him, coming close and sliding her arms around him just as now.

But it had been so very different then. Then she had felt his immediate response, his sudden tension, the reaction of his body betraying his hunger for her with a speed that had made her laugh out loud in delight. She had pressed up against the width of his back, sliding her fingers under the loosely tied belt of his robe, sighing her pleasure as she’d encountered the warm smoothness of his flesh.

And Ronan had sighed too, a sound that was half a gasp of pleasure, half a moan of surrender as he’d swivelled round within the confines of her arms to gather her close to him.

But under these very different circumstances such memories and the cruel stab of pain they brought were a source of weakness. If she let them they would undermine her resolve. They had already left her vulnerable to Ronan’s immediate reaction, making it only too easy for him to break free from her hold with a force that sent her spinning away, crashing painfully into the side of the car.

‘I’m going, Lily,’ he declared harshly. ‘And nothing you can do will stop me.’

This was proving so much harder than he had anticipated. She had only to touch him and every nerve in his body set up a clamorous demand, tightening until there was an ache in his groin that pleaded for the release of pleasure that he had known the night before.

When he had started out on this, he had believed he could keep all emotion out of it. He hadn’t reckoned on wanting her so much. But he had to fight that base need. It would destroy him and leave his plan in ashes if he didn’t.

It took all his strength to wrench himself away instead of turning and gathering her up in his arms, kissing her with the sort of hungry sensuality that took him with it into mindless oblivion.

Despair tore at Lily’s heart as she saw him slide into the driving seat and push his key firmly into the ignition. Despair combined with the feelings that now assailed her to make it impossible to think clearly.

She had known only one night of this man’s lovemaking, had spent just a few short hours in his arms, but her body knew his so intimately it was as if she was some slave of long ago, marked with her master’s brand. She had only to touch him and every sense sprang into vivid, throbbing life. Each nerve burned sharply, awakening, yearning, demanding the pleasure his caresses could bring.

Like a finely tuned instrument responding to the skill of a master performer, she had only to feel the warmth of his body, inhale the intensely personal scent of his skin, feel his heart beating under her cheek and she was lost. Able only to perform the tune that he decided to play.

But if she didn’t act now, and quickly, he would be gone, and she would never see him again. She didn’t doubt that he meant what he said; conviction was stamped into every hard line into which his face was set. The trouble was that she had no idea why.

A sudden blaze of panic brought a desperate clarity to her thoughts. An idea so crazy it might just work sprang into her mind, pushing her into action. Not giving herself time to lose her nerve, she swung round sharply and clambered up on to the bonnet of the Mercedes, gathering her inadequate clothing around her as she did so.

‘Lily!’ It was a bellow of pure rage. ‘Get off there!’

‘Make me!’

Just for a second, as the engine revved fiercely, she feared he might actually call her bluff and drive off with her still perched up there. Horrific visions of the powerful car speeding down the drive, making a few wild zigzagging turns designed to throw her off, filled her head, making her blood run cold. She had just reached the point where she was actually fearfully contemplating the damage that would be the result of a fall from the fast-moving vehicle on to the gravel, when Ronan took his foot off the accelerator.

The sound of the motor died abruptly. Lily barely had time to sigh with relief before the driver’s door was pushed open violently. Getting out, Ronan stalked towards her, white marks of fury etched around his nose and mouth.

‘Lily…’

When he finally stood beside her, hands braced on his hips, indigo eyes blazing incandescent with anger, it took all of Lily’s mental strength not to shrink back against the windscreen. Instead she forced herself to face him with what she hoped was a look of cool defiance.

‘You’re not making this easy for me!’ he declared through tightly clenched teeth.

‘I don’t want to make it easy! I plan on making it as difficult as possible for you to leave me, because I—’

‘Are you really so desperate that you’d beg me to stay when it must be painfully clear that it’s the last thing on God’s earth I want to do? That I obviously can’t stand the sight of you.’

‘But last night…’

‘Last night was last night. It was an appalling mistake—a mental aberration—and one I most definitely do not intend to let happen again.’

‘It didn’t feel like that to me!’

But then what experience did she have to go on? She had only had one other brief, unsatisfactory love affair, which had been more a relationship of the mind than any great physical passion. Kristian’s lovemaking had been comfortable, uninspired, and totally unexciting when compared to the fires Ronan could light inside her. Fires that she had never suspected could exist, whose sheer, elemental force had rocked her world, making her feel that she had lost her grip on everything she had formerly believed herself to be.

In Ronan’s arms she became another woman entirely. A wild, wanton, primitive creature, who met his passion with a hunger that matched and occasionally even outstripped it.

‘You wanted it every bit as much as I did!’ she flung at him. ‘You—’

‘Women aren’t the only ones who can fake it,’ Ronan shot back callously, making her thoughts reel with the cruelty of the gibe.

‘Oh, now I know you’re lying! There was nothing fake about last night—about any of it!’

If she believed that then he would have destroyed everything. All her precious memories of her wedding night. The night she had believed marked the beginning of the most wonderful part of her existence. The night she now feared would be the only experience she would ever have of married life.

She hadn’t even known about the house. That had been a surprise Ronan had sprung on her at the very last moment. When she had left the reception and got into the car with him, she had believed that they were heading for the airport and a plane ride to the honeymoon destination he had kept a closely guarded secret from her.

But, ‘There’s been a change of plan,’ he had told her as the last of the waving, cheering guests had disappeared from view. ‘Our plane doesn’t leave until three tomorrow afternoon.’

‘Tomorrow!’

Automatically, Lily had glanced back towards the hotel they had just left, thinking of the way, only half an hour before, she had been giggling excitedly with Hannah as they’d tried to guess just where in the world Ronan planned on taking her.

‘But where will we spend tonight?’

‘You leave that to me.’ A small, enigmatic smile had curled the corners of Ronan’s wide mouth. ‘I have everything under control. Just put yourself entirely in my hands and see what happens.’

Now, looking back at that moment, hearing those words again with the benefit of hindsight, Lily found that they made her shiver in spite of the warmth of the sun. Something about the way Ronan had spoken brought a sense of nausea to the pit of her stomach.

But last night, worn out by the excitement of the day, decidedly tiddly on champagne, and even more intoxicated by the thought of actually being Mrs Ronan Guerin, she had felt no such premonition of danger. Instead, she had wriggled sensuously in her seat, almost purring like a small, contented cat.

‘I can’t wait to put myself in your hands,’ she’d murmured, giving the words a distinctly lascivious intonation as she ran her hand up his arm, stroking from square shoulder to strong wrist and back again. ‘And I’m dying to get my hands on certain parts of you.’

This time she let her fingers slide down his jacket until they reached the strong line of his thighs. There, she walked them along the hard muscle that was stretched taut as his foot rested on the car’s pedal, moving slowly and deliberately inwards, smiling as she saw it bunch in instinctive reaction.

‘Behave yourself, witch!’ Ronan reproved laughingly. ‘You’ll have us off the road if you don’t stop that nonsense—Lily!’ This time the warning was more serious as she ignored his protest.

‘I don’t want to behave!’ Lily pouted with mock petulance. ‘I’ve had to behave myself for the last eight weeks, and it’s been intensely frustrating.’

‘And whose idea was that? As I recall, you were the one who insisted on waiting until our wedding day.’

‘And you agreed! But it is our wedding day now, so we don’t have to wait any longer. We’re legally married so I can do what I want. And I want to do this…’

Emboldened by the excitement that was building up inside her, she slid her fingers provocatively in between his thighs, her teasing smile growing wider as she heard his breath hiss sharply inwards in uncontrolled response.

‘Lily! Be a good girl, please.’

‘Oh, I’ll be good.’ The huskiness of her voice gave the words a very different meaning from the one he had used. ‘I’ll be very good. I plan to be the best you’ve ever known. So, wherever we’re going, why don’t you put your foot down? I want to get there just as fast as we possibly can.’

‘Your wish is my command.’

Ronan had suited action to the words, ramming the accelerator pedal almost to the floor, and the car had sped along the road out of town, heading for the countryside.

The unexpected warmth of the day had turned into an uncomfortably close evening by the time he steered the powerful vehicle off the narrow lane and up a winding, steep drive, coming to a halt before the impressive building at the top of it.

‘Wow!’ Lily could only stare in amazed admiration.

Built in a stone that had been mellowed by the passage of years, the house had an elegant porch supported on Grecian-style pillars and mullioned windows that reflected the glow of the setting sun. Over half of the front was covered in luxuriant ivy that extended over the roof of the large Victorian-style conservatory attached to one side. On the other side was a formal rose garden and at the back, seen through an archway, was the promise of an even more spacious garden, richly lawned.

‘What a gorgeous place! Whose is it?’

‘Yours—and mine.’

‘Ours!’ Lily was too stunned to notice the definite break between Ronan’s words. ‘But how?’

‘I bought it. Isn’t that how one usually acquires a house?’

‘Of course I know that!’ Lily aimed a playful punch at his arm. ‘When did you…?’

‘I signed the contracts last week. Oh, I know…’ He’d seen her expression and interpreted it with almost telepathic accuracy. ‘Connor said I should have consulted with you, but as soon as I saw the place I knew that you’d love it.’

‘And you were right.’

Lily let the fact that he had understood her so well ease the sharp sting that had come with the thought that he had autocratically taken charge of everything without a word to her. What she found harder to accept was the fact that his best friend had known about the house—her marital home—before she had.

‘Well, the two of us would have been far too cramped in that little flat of yours. This place is near enough to town for you to travel in every day and keep an eye on your business. After all, as the owner of Edgerton’s most up and coming floral design business you should live somewhere rather more elegant than a one-bedroomed box.’

‘And it’s not too far from the motorway, so you can get to and from London.’

‘Mmm—seen enough? Because from the look of the clouds gathering there’s a storm about to break directly overhead. If we don’t get inside soon we’ll be soaked before we even reach the door.’

Ronan was quickly proved right. They had barely unloaded the cases from the car and deposited them in the black and white tiled hall when the first crash of thunder sounded, followed seconds later by the lash of rain against the windows.

‘Oh, that was close!’ Lily jumped exaggeratedly, huddling close to Ronan.

‘You’re not scared of thunder?’

‘Not me.’ She lifted laughing eyes to his disbelieving face. ‘But it was a good excuse to get myself into your arms so that I could do this…’

Drawing his dark head down, she kissed him long and hard, tantalising his lips open with small, seductive darts of her tongue. Her private hope was that this was all the encouragement he would need to take things further, but, although his response was satisfactorily passionate, he made no attempt to deepen the caress, instead easing himself from her grasp and capturing her wandering hands in one of his.

‘Enough of that! Don’t you want to see your new home?’

‘The bedrooms, perhaps.’ Lily’s smile was roguish. ‘The rest of the house will still be there afterwards… No?’ She could not believe it when he shook his head.

After weeks of abstinence throughout their admittedly brief courtship, she had been so sure that Ronan would be impatient to consummate their marriage. In her own mind, she had been absolutely convinced that they would barely get inside their room before he would make passionate love to her. But that had been when she had believed that he was taking her to a hotel room, not this lovely house.

‘Later.’ His smile grew when he saw her mutinous face. ‘Lily, I want this to be just right. I want everything to go exactly as I planned, so please, bear with me.’

A flash of lightning seared across the sky, illuminating the strong-boned features of his face and making his eyes gleam like silver.

‘Believe me, it will be worth waiting for.’

The words, the deep, intent voice in which they were spoken, and the burningly sensual look that accompanied them, all combined to send a shiver of delighted anticipation down Lily’s spine as her momentary disappointment fled to be replaced by a tingle of excitement.

He was right. Delaying now would only add to the pleasure of what was to come. They should pace themselves slowly, savour the anticipation, let their appetites grow until they could hold back no longer. They had all the time in the world; there was no need to pounce on each other like gluttons at a feast table, cramming tasty morsels into their mouths with indiscriminate greed.

‘I’ll hold you to that promise,’ she told him huskily. ‘But, until that time comes, I suppose I’ll have to settle for the guided tour.’

It was a large house, full of intriguing little corridors and unexpected corners, and by the time they had inspected every nook and cranny it was completely dark. The thunder had receded to a low grumble in the distance and the lightning no longer blazed across the sky. The ending of the storm had left quite a chill in the air, and when they returned to the elegant sitting room Lily couldn’t suppress a faint shiver at the noticeable drop in temperature.

‘You’re cold.’ Ronan frowned his concern. ‘Shall I light a fire before we have supper?’

Lily’s eyes followed the direction of his gesture towards the large open fireplace, topped by a wooden mantelpiece and framed by Victorian flowered tiles, and the shiver became more exaggerated, turning into a shudder of genuine fear.

‘No! Thanks,’ she added hastily.

‘But it is a lot cooler in here, and it would be romantic to sit by the light of the flames.’

The light of the flames…

In her mind Lily unwillingly found herself dragged back into the past. She could see another room, one so very different from the spacious green and gold one in which she stood. She could see the cosy, slightly shabby décor and furniture, the Christmas tree standing in one corner, the paper chains on the walls. And on the mantelpiece cotton wool had been arranged to look like a snow scene, with miniature houses, fir trees, Santa Claus and a tiny sleigh pulled by model reindeer.

Below, in the grate, the crackle of the log fire. Before its flames stood a small, fair-haired figure, his hand outstretched towards a candle, freezing at her cry of warning. She had managed to stop Davey that time. But later… Later there had been the sudden flare of flames licking at the cotton wool, catching on the chains, leaping to the curtains, and suddenly all was fire, all alight, all…

‘Lily?’

Jolted back to the present, she could only blink in confusion for a moment, until she realised who it was who stood before her, that it was Ronan who had spoken her name. And then it was an effort to force a smile.

‘No fire, thanks. It’s not that cold. All I need is a hot drink to warm me up—that and someone’s arms around me.’

Some day she must tell Ronan the full story of that terrible night. She hadn’t been able to bring herself to tell him exactly how her parents had died.

But not tonight. It wasn’t the time or the place. It would spoil the atmosphere, ruin this special evening she had waited for—for an age, it seemed.

‘Is there any food in this palace of yours?’

‘But of course. I told you everything would be perfect. Come with me.’

He led her across the hall and into the large farmhouse kitchen, which was the only room in the house they hadn’t yet visited. There, under covers on the scrubbed pine table, was a wonderful selection of all her favourite foods, carefully prepared and beautifully served on the finest china.

‘Help yourself.’

To Lily’s surprise she found that she was genuinely hungry. That morning she had been too on edge to eat anything substantial, and at the reception a blend of happiness and excitement had destroyed her appetite, so that now she was definitely ravenous. Picking up a plate, she selected several savoury treats and nibbled at them eagerly, nodding her thanks when Ronan set a glass of perfectly chilled wine on the table beside her.

‘This is wonderful!’ she exclaimed when her mouth was no longer full. ‘Everything tastes so good.’

Suddenly supremely conscious of the way he had seated himself opposite her and was watching closely, not eating anything himself, she looked across at him questioningly, meeting those intent grey eyes that now seemed so dark, their irises almost twice their normal size.

‘Aren’t you hungry? This Brie is quite perfect. Try some…’

Breaking off a small piece, she held it out. But, instead of taking the fork from her, Ronan leaned forward until his face was only inches away from hers, opening his mouth for the morsel as a hungry child might.

With a smile, Lily placed the creamy cheese on his tongue, then found herself transfixed, unable to look away, as he chewed, then swallowed carefully. His eyes didn’t leave hers as he let his tongue slide out and slowly lick the taste from his lips.

‘What else would you recommend?’ he asked, his voice newly husky, an octave deeper than before.

‘The bread…’

A small, crusty piece, liberally spread with butter, followed the cheese, but this time Lily used her fingers to feed him. Her heart kicked against her ribs as she felt the warmth of his mouth close about their tips.

‘Some smoked salmon…and asparagus…and…’

She chose the items faster now, not wanting to look away from him, her eyes returning swiftly to that darkly intent gaze while her fingers moved blindly over the selection of dishes.

Her breathing was becoming less controlled, heated and uneven, in time with the thundering beat of her heart. Her body felt as if it was bathed in the warm glow of bright sunlight instead of the cool light of the moon. And the tiny hairs on the back of her neck had lifted in instinctive awareness, bringing each nerve shiveringly awake.

‘Oh, and strawberries…’

This time he moved more swiftly than she had anticipated, and she felt the graze of his teeth on her fingertips. The sensation sent electrical pulses of reaction down her arm, making her shiver in a very different response from the one she had felt earlier. Her own mouth was dry, and she had to swallow sharply to relieve the constriction there. Her lips, too, were uncomfortable, and her tongue snaked out to moisten them gently, her heart turning over as she saw his cloudy gaze drop to follow the small, sensual movement before flicking back to her now flushed face.

‘Would you like some cream with that?’

Slowly she scooped some from the bowl, holding her finger just inches from his mouth, knowing what would happen.

Ronan smiled slowly, seductively. Then with deliberate care he leaned forward once more and took her into his warm, moist mouth, licking the rich cream from her skin before he sucked gently along her finger’s length. There could be no mistaking his meaning as he slid his lips up and down in a blatant likeness of another, far more intimate caress.

‘Ronan!’

Unable to bear the tension any longer, she leaned across the table, easing her finger from his mouth and replacing it with her lips. The already frantic pounding of her heart threatened her ability to retain any degree of control as she savoured the erotic mixture of the taste of the cream, herself, and the intense, totally personal flavour of Ronan on her tongue.

When at last they had to break apart in order to breathe, Ronan drew back slowly and reluctantly, dragging in a raw-edged breath, his darkened eyes locked with hers.

‘I think…’ he said, slowly and hoarsely, his chest heaving as if he had just run a marathon. ‘I think, my lady wife, that now is the time.’

And, getting to his feet, he held out his hand to her, strong, hard fingers locking with her paler, slender ones.

‘Come with me,’ he said, and it was part command, part awe-filled request. ‘Come to bed. I want you now.’

The journey up to the bedroom took far longer than Lily could ever have anticipated. On each step Ronan paused to kiss her, every touch of his lips growing deeper, more passionate as they moved higher. And with each kiss her breathing grew faster, shallower, setting her head spinning, so that she couldn’t think, couldn’t form a single coherent word inside her thoughts.

She could only feel. Feel the pulsing excitement that flooded every inch of her body. Feel the growing need uncoiling, growing, spiralling deep inside her. Feel the heat of her blood, the thud of her heart, the ache of need that made her breasts swell and the most intimate point between her thighs throb with yearning sensation.

It seemed for ever until they reached the room. A lifetime before Ronan kicked the door closed and gathered her up into his arms. Sweeping one hand through the silken fall of her hair, he held her head immobile with one strong hand at the nape of her neck, bringing his dark head down sharply, crushing her lips under his in one final, wordless declaration of the passion he could now hold back no longer.

Lily could only respond in kind. Straining her body against his in a relentless need to get closer, to feel as much as was possible of his hard strength against hers, she abandoned all control. At last she could release all the pent-up frustrations of the past weeks, open herself to the deep-felt need to know everything there was to know about this man, experience the full, elemental force of his lovemaking. Her mouth kissed, clung, urged, demanded, inciting him to an electric build-up of passion, opening the floodgates of need, fully content in the knowledge that she would never be able to close them again.

When the erotic contact of their mouths became inadequate, they broke apart, each breathing heavily, eyeing each other with a wild excitement.

‘Do I undress myself?’ Lily asked unevenly. ‘Or do you want to do it.’

‘Oh, I want to,’ Ronan assured her deeply. ‘I want to more than all the world. But I warn you…’

One hand came out, slid a tiny button on the front of her bronze silk blouse with a delicate slowness that had her wriggling in impatient delight.

‘I intend to enjoy every minute of it, every sight, every sound…’ The corners of his mouth quirked up in delight when an uncontrollable whimper of response escaped her as a second button slipped from its mooring.

‘Every scent…’

Lowering his proud head to the creamy curves his actions had exposed in the open neckline, he inhaled deeply, taking in the floral aroma of her perfume and the subtler, deeply personal fragrance of her skin.

‘And every taste.’

Hot and wet, his tongue snaked out, tracing heated, erotic patterns across her skin, dipping down into the scented valley between her breasts. As Lily moaned her response she felt him smile against her flesh, the tiny movement making her nipples swell in yearning response, their hardened peaks straining against the lacy confines of the cobweb-fine bra she wore. Ronan’s triumphant laughter shivered across her burning nerve-endings.

‘More?’

‘More!’ It was a choking cry of heartfelt longing.

‘More,’ Ronan echoed, taking that tormenting mouth down and across the slope of one breast, sliding the softness of his lips along its satin curve until they closed over the aching nipple, suckling strongly.

With a gasp of delight, Lily’s hands clenched in the auburn sleekness of his hair, holding him closer still, unable to get enough of this sweetly agonising pleasure. Her breath caught in her throat as she felt his teeth graze the sensitised bud, heightening her arousal even more with wicked expertise.

But a second later even that was not enough. While his attention was concentrated on one part of her there were other, equally sensitive areas that grew impatient, demanding the same voluptuous rapture.

And she was no longer content to be still. She wanted to feel him too, to touch his skin, explore every inch of his body, know him fully at last.

The silk jacket was clumsily tugged off and discarded carelessly on the floor, followed swiftly by his shirt and tie. The feel of the warm satin of his flesh under her fingertips acted like the flick of a switch, triggering off a wild yearning that had her flinging caution to the winds. Fingers trembling with need, she fumbled with the narrow leather belt around his waist, sighing her satisfaction as she pulled it free.

‘Steady!’ Ronan’s voice was thick and hoarse, sounding a note of warning against her throat.

‘Steady?’ Lily muttered in impatient response. ‘I want this— I want you!’

She was struggling to breathe, finding it almost impossible to drag enough air into her straining lungs. Every inch of her skin was burning up with hunger, heating her blood until it seemed to pool in a molten rush of heat and awareness between her thighs.

‘Well, if that’s what you want.’ It was a low, contented growl. ‘That’s what you shall have.’

She was lifted from her feet and carried towards the bed. He lowered her on to the covers and his mouth locked with hers again, the sensual intrusion of his tongue tangling with her own until she moved against him restlessly. Sliding down beside her, he moved fluidly against her, the pressure of his lean body making her crave more intimate contact with a desperation that was like a scream through every nerve-end.

Her clothes, too, had been discarded somewhere, she had no idea when he had actually eased them from her body. But now he leaned above her, propped up on one arm, looking down at her with passion-darkened eyes.

‘Tonight, my lady, you can have whatever you want.’

Later, that subtly emphasised tonight was to come back to haunt her bitterly. But for that night she had no sense of premonition, no hint of anything beyond her own pleasure.

‘Whatever…’ It was a sigh of sheer delight in the anticipation of what was to come.

‘But first…’

Turning away from her for a moment, he reached for the small foil-wrapped package he had tossed on to the bedside cabinet and ripped it open.

‘We don’t need…’ Lily began, but he silenced her with a gentle finger laid across her lips.

‘Oh, yes, we do,’ he insisted softly. ‘A child doesn’t come into my plans at all right now. I want you all to myself for a long time, without any such complication.’

All to myself. The whispered words sent of glow of sheer joy through every inch of Lily’s body, making her purr like a contented cat.

‘That’s fine by me.’

Lazily she let her fingers drift over the powerful muscles of his back and shoulders, sliding into the dark silk of his hair. Feeling its unexpected lack of length, the bluntness of the line at the base of his finely shaped skull, she frowned in sensual disapproval.

‘Why did you cut your hair?’ she complained softly.

‘Perhaps I thought it didn’t suit my new status as a married man.’

‘But if you knew how long I’ve dreamed of this moment, how I wanted to run my fingers through it…’

She suited action to the words.

‘Trace its path right down to your shoulders…’

The way his long body tensed, then jerked convulsively under her caress told her of the effect she was having, bringing a smile of dreamy triumph to her lips.

‘Along your back…’

Her forefinger trailed all the way down the strong, straight line of his spine and under the loosened trousers, moving teasingly over the tautly muscled buttocks.

‘Witch!’ Ronan growled. ‘You’re asking for trouble.’

‘Really?’

Lily rounded her eyes with mock surprise and shock.

‘Do you know?’ she murmured. ‘I think that’s exactly what I’m doing.’

Her wandering fingers moved to close over the waistband of his trousers. With Ronan’s willing help he was soon free of his only remaining clothing, a faintly shaken laugh escaping him as she explored his naked body without restraint.

Her hunger doubling with every second, she moved sinuously against his naked form, revelling in the abrasion of the curls of his body hair against her breasts, the warmth of his flat stomach next to hers. Lower still, the hard, heated force of his physical arousal lay like burning velvet against her thighs, making her yearn and ache with a hunger that could no longer be denied.

‘Ronan, please…’ she heard herself beg.

But Ronan had yet more skills in his repertoire, and he used them with the consummate artistry of genius, touching, stroking, kissing, taking tiny, sharp little bites at her skin. And when his knowing fingers found the warm, moist innermost core of her femininity she gasped out loud, twisting in total loss of control.

Frantic heat pulsed through her, radiating out from that aching spot deep at the heart of her being, and she knew nothing beyond that tiny focus, her whole thought process suspended in concentration on it. Each time she thought she could bear no more he found another variation on delight, another refinement of pleasure, and the intensity of her need increased until it was nearer to torture than rapture.

Only then did he slide over her, nudging her thighs apart with the hair-roughened strength of his. For a split second he hesitated, and she saw something flare in his darkened eyes that made her heart jolt in instinctive panic. But a second later the moment was forgotten as he entered her with a single fierce thrust, driving any chance of thought away for ever.

Lily lost her sense of time, of space, of being. She lost herself and became only one part of the whole they made together. Her hands clenched over the powerful muscles of his shoulders, her spine arching in desperate need to feel to the uttermost every urgent touch, every move of his body on hers. She was soaring higher and higher, spiralling wildly towards a blazing sun that would burn her up, leave her as nothing but ashes, and she didn’t care. All that mattered was reaching that peak of fulfilment.

As the final burning wave broke over her she heard a voice, ragged and hoarse, crying Ronan’s name out loud, and realised with a sense of shock that it was her own. The sound was so wild, so primitive she couldn’t recognise herself in it. Adrift on a heated sea of delight, she heard Ronan, too, cry out as he followed her into the oblivion of ecstasy.

But it wasn’t her name that was torn from his lips at the height of his passion. Nor was it any soft word of love nor expression of the pleasure that had possessed him. Instead it was a wild and husky sound that seemed to have been dragged from the depths of his soul.

‘Remember!’ he said. ‘Remember this, my Lily! Remember!’

Remember. Lily could only think hazily when the final storm had faded, ebbing slowly away like warm, sluggish waves lapping a sun-heated shore. Remember. How could she ever forget? How could there be any doubt that she would recall this first night of her marriage in every tiny detail?

Each moment of it was etched on to her brain, second by second, and while she lived nothing would ever erase them from her memory. Of course she would always remember. The whole experience had been totally unforgettable.

CHAPTER THREE

UNFORGETTABLE.

The word seared inside Lily’s head, making her feel chilled to the bone. If the nightmare into which she had woken was all that remained of her married life, how could she ever survive with those scenes of overwhelming passion engraved on her soul?

But she had to come out of her memories because Ronan had said something she hadn’t heard, let alone understood, and she could only blink at him in blank incomprehension.

‘I think we’d better talk indoors.’

Talk? Lily eyed him with wary suspicion.

‘Talk’ sounded hopeful. It made it seem as if there was some room for discussion, not just the unequivocal ultimatum he had handed out at the start.

But ‘indoors’ meant going into the house, and that meant getting down from her position on the car. That might be decidedly incongruous, possibly even close to looking ridiculous, but if it stopped him driving off, as he had obviously intended, then it was her only small advantage, and right now she intended to hang on to it.

‘Is there anything to talk about?’ she questioned edgily. ‘I mean, you present me with a fait accompli and then you say we can negotiate…’

She broke off sharply as she saw his dark head move in fierce negation, the coppery strands catching the sun with a disturbingly attractive effect.

‘No negotiation,’ he declared adamantly. ‘I just want you to listen…’

‘Then I’m not moving! You can talk to me right here.’

She tried to sit up straighter, needing to outface him. But the unwary movement on the polished metal proved her undoing. The silky robe gave her no grip, so that she had to put her hands down flat in order to stop herself from sliding ignominiously off on to the ground.

‘Oh, for God’s sake!’

Ronan’s fury was expressed in a darkly eloquent stream of violent curses as he strode forward sharply.

Lily had no time to guess at his plan, or to prepare herself in any way. An awkward, fearful squawk of protest escaped her as one arm closed around her shoulders, the other slid under her thighs, and she was lifted bodily from the car.

‘Ronan! Put me down!’

Her wild objection went unheeded. He simply tightened his grip, clamping his arms around her with the bruising effect of steel bands until she was incapable of movement, as he marched towards the house.

‘I never did carry you over the threshold,’ he muttered, the sardonic humour scraping her nerves raw as she, too, recognised in his actions the black parody of the old-fashioned tradition of the groom carrying his bride into their first marital home. Ronan kicked open the nearest door, striding into the elegant green and gold living room and dumping her unceremoniously into an armchair.

‘Now—oh, no you don’t!’

He reacted swiftly when she would have got to her feet in an attempt at escape. One strong hand fastened punishingly on her shoulder again, pushing her back into the chair and holding her there.

‘What sort of joke is this, Ronan? It’s not funny, believe me. I—’

‘No joke,’ he insisted harshly. ‘Do I look like I’m laughing?’

If the truth be told, Ronan reflected inwardly, humour had never been further from his mind. He just wanted this whole thing over and done with.

He had never expected her to fight so hard, or for so long. He had thought that by now he would be well away from Edgerton, his mission accomplished, leaving the shattered pieces of his so-called marriage well behind for Davey Cornwell to pick up, if he ever resurfaced.

Instead, he was still here, unable to get away. Lily seemed to have entwined herself around his life like a clinging vine, and, what was worse, he actually found himself starting to feel sorry for her. He had to get a grip on himself. Pity was an emotion he couldn’t afford to let himself experience.

‘Answer me one thing.’ The conflict he was enduring inside made his voice even harsher than he had intended. ‘Were you telling the truth when you said you liked this house?’

The abrupt change of tack totally nonplussed Lily. Even though she could see no reason for the question she could only answer it straight.

‘Of course. I love it; it’s quite beautiful. But…’

Ronan dismissed her confused question with an imperious wave of his free hand.

‘Then it’s yours.’

Hearing that, Lily felt that if she hadn’t been sitting down already she might actually have fallen. The ground seemed to have crumbled away beneath her feet, leaving her with nothing firm enough on which to stand.

‘But it must be worth a fortune!’

‘Something like that,’ Ronan agreed with supreme indifference. ‘But I knew that if I actually went ahead and married you there would be legal repercussions. I accept that I shall have to support—’

‘I don’t want your money! You know that’s not why I married you!’

‘Well, it’s all that’s on offer. There’s nothing else.’

‘But why?’

If his behaviour had been incomprehensible before, now it was totally beyond belief, making her shake her head in bewilderment.

‘Why did you marry me if…?’

She couldn’t continue, transfixed by a sudden wild, savage look in those translucent eyes. But the dangerous light that froze her tongue was belied by the indolent way he lifted his broad shoulders in a dismissive shrug.

‘Don’t ask, Lily,’ he warned. ‘You wouldn’t like the answer.’

Whatever bitter satisfaction he might derive from telling her the whole story, he had promised himself that that would be Cornwell’s job. Let Davey explain things, if he dared. Let him face up to just what it meant to have his sister’s life ruined, her future lying in tatters, because of his own wicked behaviour.

‘It’s not the answer that worries me!’ Lily retorted. ‘It’s the question and the fact that you’ve forced me to ask it.’

Dear God, please let him not see how much that last comment had affected her! Her stomach churned sickeningly, her head spinning dreadfully.

It was the casual lack of emotion that hurt more than anything. The way that he had kept the level of his voice relaxed, conversational, while hers came and went like a badly tuned radio.

Was this really the man she had promised to love and honour for the rest of her life? The man who had vowed the same to her only the day before.

Behind her a clock struck ten-thirty, and a cold, sharp knife stabbed at her with the memory of the way that at just this time twenty-four hours ago she had been coming back from the hair-dresser’s with Hannah, laughing and excited, her heart light with anticipation of the happiness ahead of her.

But she had felt nervous too, the full importance of what she was about to do always at the forefront of her mind. She hadn’t gone into her marriage lightly, while Ronan…

“‘Don’t ask” just isn’t good enough!’

Anger giving her a strength she hadn’t known she possessed, she pushed his hand away and got to her feet in a rush, flames blazing in the golden depths of her eyes.

‘You made certain vows yesterday, and so did I. I meant those vows, Ronan! Every single word of them! I wanted to love you and live with you, have your children…’

Had she finally got through to him? Certainly there seemed to be a change in his set expression, his head going back sharply, heavy lids hooding those steely eyes.

‘And I thought you meant them too! If you didn’t—if you got me here under false pretences—then the least you can do is give me some sort of an explanation. You owe me that if nothing else.’

‘I owe…!’

The dangerous undertone was positively terrifying, but Lily couldn’t afford to let herself be affected by it. She felt as if she was fighting for her life, which, in a way, she was. She was fighting for the life she had believed she was going to have, her future as a married woman—as Ronan’s wife.

‘I want an answer, Ronan!’

This time his gaze actually dropped from her face, as if he could no longer bear her furiously injured glare. Those slate coloured eyes lowered, slanted downwards, and then suddenly held, as if transfixed.

‘Ronan!’

‘Cover yourself up.’ It sounded thick and raw.

‘What?’

‘I said cover yourself up!’

It was only when his hands came out, closing on the front of the mint-green robe and yanking the two sides of it together, that she realised how her unthinking movement in leaping to her feet had wrenched at the already insecurely fastened garment, pulling it apart. Her neck and shoulders, the soft curves of her breasts were exposed to his darkened gaze, the creamy skin flushed, like her face, with a mixture of confusion and tension.

‘You may have distracted me that way last night,’ Ronan grated. ‘But not this time.’

‘And I may have let you paw me then,’ Lily flung back, pulling away from him as violently as she could while still preserving some small degree of modesty. ‘But never again!’

The memory of the feel of those beautifully shaped hands on her skin, on all the intimate pleasure spots on her body made her feel nauseous, and she struggled to erase all the hurt and distress from her voice, thankful to hear it sound as cold and brittle as she could wish.

‘Last night you didn’t call it pawing,’ Ronan told her with a cruel smile. ‘Last night you wanted all I could give you. You begged…’

‘Last night I believed that we were married!’

‘So you did.’ Ronan nodded coldly. ‘And that’s the real bottom line in all this, isn’t it, my darling?’

His tone took the words to a point a million miles away from an endearment.

‘So, do you really want to know why I married you?’

No! Lily’s heart pleaded with her to say it. To declare that, no, she didn’t want to know anything about it. Didn’t want to hear a word he had to say.

If she had had any hope of salvation earlier, when she had run after him, it had died a slow and painful death. If any such illusion had bolstered her up, giving her the determination to jump up on the bonnet of the Mercedes, then there was none left now. It had all evaporated like mist before the sun, leaving her weak and defenceless, vulnerable to anything he might choose to throw at her.

But rationally she had to know. She couldn’t accept it as the truth unless she heard it from his own mouth. And so, in spite of herself, and against the pleading protests of her wounded heart, she found herself nodding, forming a whispered, ‘Yes,’ with parched lips.

There was no way he could tell her the truth. Not when she looked at him with those big golden eyes, seeming for all the world like a wounded fawn trapped by the hounds and totally at the end of its tether. Silently he cursed her missing brother, wishing with all his heart that he could get his hands around Davey Cornwell’s throat and press hard.

But he had to say something. Something monstrous enough to make her let him go and stop her coming after him—for her own sake as much as for his own.

‘It was the only way you would let me near you,’ he said, so carelessly that for the space of a couple of heartbeats Lily didn’t quite register exactly what he meant. ‘And I wanted you so much that I was quite prepared…’

He never completed the sentence. Without even forming a rational thought, Lily lifted her hand and lashed out violently. The crack of her palm making painful contact with his cheek sounded disturbingly loud and brutal, its echoes seeming to linger in the sudden silence that followed.

Ronan swallowed hard, just once, then directed that fiendish smile straight into her blazing eyes.

‘I told you you wouldn’t like the answer.’

‘You bastard!’ It was low, fiercely controlled, filled with all the malevolence she could summon up.

Just for a second a flare of something dangerous in his eyes made her fearful of retribution, but then abruptly he seemed to recollect himself, and shook his head slightly.

‘I think I deserved that,’ he said, with a shocking calmness that rocked her sense of reality. ‘Do you feel better now?’

‘I could hardly feel any worse!’

At this moment she couldn’t even see why she had ever loved him, or convinced herself that she did. Because surely she must have been bitterly mistaken, totally self-deceiving. Surely she could never have cared for a man like this.

But the Ronan she had met and fallen in love with hadn’t been like this.

No!

Ruthlessly she crushed down the weak thought, refusing to let it take root in her mind. The Ronan she had believed herself in love with and the fiend who now stood before her were one and the same man. To think anything else was to weaken herself, to give him a chance to hurt her all over again. ‘Get out, Ronan,’ she said, and was glad to hear that her voice was as coolly controlled as his own. He could be in no doubt as to the strength of her conviction.

And to judge by his expression he knew only too well that she meant what she said.

‘Get out and don’t come back.’

‘If you remember, that was what I had planned in the first place. You were the one who dragged me back.’

‘Well, I’d rather die than do any such thing now. All I want is to see the back of you, once and for all.’

‘Which suits me fine. Goodbye, Lily, I wish I could say it’s been fun.’

He sketched a small, mocking bow before turning on his heel.

Mutely Lily watched him go, past knowing what she felt, torn between relief and bitter despair. He was almost at the door when he paused and slowly turned back.

‘You were right, of course, darling. I am a bastard. But perhaps you should ask yourself how I came to be that way.’

‘I don’t care! I don’t want to know—I don’t want to know anything about you! For one thing, how would I be able to tell what was the truth and what was lies?’

‘The truth.’ It was a harshly cynical laugh, totally devoid of humour. ‘Oh, yes, the truth. Well, Lily my love, if you want the whole truth it’s not me you should come to. You see, that question you were so upset about is only one small part of things. If you want to know the whole story then you really should ask your brother—if he’ll tell you. Now this time I really am going.’

And this time she let him go. She had to. There was nothing else that she could do.

As she stood and watched him walk away, saw him climb into his car and start the engine with a roar that spoke of a mood far removed from his usual calm control, the clock in the hallway struck the hour again.

Lily dug her teeth down hard into her bottom lip, refusing to let the tears fall until Ronan was out of sight.

It was twelve o’clock. At this time yesterday she had stood on the steps of the church, smiling and happy, her brand-new husband at her side. She had been his wife for just twenty-four hours and now it was all over.

High above her head, the sun was shining in the clear blue sky. It was a perfect spring day. A perfect day on which to start what should have been a perfect married life. Instead it was the day that marked the end of her marriage before it had even begun.

CHAPTER FOUR

‘ASK your brother…ask your brother…’

Ronan’s parting shot became a nagging refrain in Lily’s thoughts over the next four days.

‘That question…is only one small part of things. If you want to know the whole story then you really should ask your brother—if he’ll tell you.’

She would if she could. But she had no idea where Davey was, or even if he was still in the country.

When she and Ronan had set the date for their ill-fated wedding, she had done everything she could to track down her missing brother, but with no success. All leads had turned into dead-ends, and his former friends were as much in the dark as to his whereabouts as she was. It was as if Davey had vanished off the face of the earth.

The absence of her brother from her life had been a source of distress to Lily for over three years now. Ever since the day of his seventeenth birthday, when she had returned home to find his room uncharacteristically neat and tidy, his wardrobe empty of the jeans and tee shirts that were the only clothes he wore. But it had been when she had discovered that his guitar had gone that she knew things were serious.

Davey’s beloved Gibson Les Paul, paid for with the earnings from many hours of paper rounds, Saturday jobs and, in the last year, lessons that he had given to other young aspiring musicians, was like a part of him. If he had it with him, then it meant he wasn’t coming back in the near future.

And if she had had any doubts or hopes left, then the note she found on her own pillow had dispelled them all: “Gone to make my name and fortune. Look out for me on the telly very soon!”

And he had signed it, as he now signed everything, scorning the family name he thought too childish for a would-be rock star, with the single initial ‘D’.

Second only to her parents’ untimely deaths, Davey’s desertion had hit her hard. With time, the pain of his abrupt departure had only faded into an aching sense of loss, not vanished altogether, and she lived with the feeling of there being a gap in her life that no one else could fill.

And Ronan had known that. Known it and yet kept his thoughts on the matter to himself.

Because now, with one of those bitter ironies that haunted her thoughts by day and kept her from sleep by night, it seemed that Ronan was the one person who had had any contact with her brother in the time since he had left home.

‘If you want to know the whole story then you really should ask your brother…’

It could mean only one thing. Davey, wild, foolish Davey, had done something to bring down Ronan’s fury on his head, spark off this burning need to hurt and destroy. But what could be so bad that it had resulted in such a terrible revenge?

Just what had Davey done?

She would have to start her investigations all over again. Go back and check every lead, every contact, however vague. Once more she would have to try and find her errant brother, but this time her search would be so much more important. It would be given that added edge by the devouring need to find out just how he had become involved with Ronan and what had happened as a result.

But first there was something else she had to do, something she dreaded but knew she couldn’t avoid. She couldn’t hide away here in this house for the rest of her life. Sooner or later the news would leak out that her marriage had failed before it had even begun, and she could just imagine what sort of stories would be concocted to explain her personal tragedy.

The longer she waited before showing her face, the worse it would become, and she had always believed that if she had something unpleasant to do it was best to get it over and done with.

She gave herself the week of what should have been her honeymoon to hide away in the lovely house. To lick her wounds and weep the tears she vowed she would never show in public. And when that week was up she gathered together the shattered remnants of her self-control, cobbling them together into the closest she could come to a sort of armour to put around herself, and prepared to face the world again.

But she wouldn’t have been human if she hadn’t felt the need for some support, a back-up team to help her over the worst. And so, acting quickly before her nerve failed her completely, she dialled her best friend’s number first.

‘Hannah? It’s Lily. I’m afraid I’ve got some really bad news…’

She could only hope that the story would be a nine-day wonder.

That hope was not to be fulfilled. Four weeks after her return to work, the small town was still buzzing with the story of the marriage that had never been.

‘It’s not fair!’ Lily complained to Hannah, when her friend called at the shop on her way home from the school where she taught History. ‘You’d think something else would have happened by now to take the heat off me.’

‘But that’s just the point,’ her friend commiserated dryly. ‘Nothing does happen here, so your misfortune was God’s gift to the local gossips. And really you can hardly blame them. After all, Edgerton had never seen such excitement as there was over your wedding. You’ve got to admit that Ronan isn’t exactly typical of the sort of man we see around here.’

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