After the Loving
Carole Mortimer

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

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Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

‘CONGRATULATIONS, Bryna,’ Frank Stapleton beamed at her. ‘By my calculations you’re just nine weeks pregnant.’

The fingers that had been rebuttoning her blouse after the examination began to shake. Pregnant? My God, she thought, that possibility hadn’t even occurred to her when she had made the appointment to see the man who had been her doctor ever since she came to London eight years ago. Pregnant? She couldn’t be!

‘I’ll give you an initial prescription for the usual vitamins,’ her doctor continued briskly. ‘I’m sure you can be relied upon to be sensible during these early weeks—good diet, a healthy amount of exercise, are very important at this stage. You——’

‘Are you sure?’ Her voice broke with the tension his diagnosis had put her under. ‘I meant,’ she hurried on at his frowning look, ‘I always thought—well, I wouldn’t want to—to tell anyone unless I’m one hundred per cent sure.’ She hoped she didn’t look—or sound—as anxious as she felt to have him tell her he couldn’t be completely sure that his diagnosis was the right one. At any other time in her life she would have been overjoyed with the news, and she knew Frank was aware of that, but she couldn’t be pregnant now.

Frank gave her a reassuring smile. ‘Believe me, Bryna, there’s no doubt. It’s amazing how many women ask me the same thing when I tell them the good news,’ he teased. ‘Even though they’re usually pretty certain of what my diagnosis will be before they come here.’

The last was said cajolingly, but she hadn’t known, hadn’t even guessed that the results of the tests the doctor had taken the previous week would reveal that this was the reason her body had decided to play tricks on her. All the experts claimed that emotional tension could cause the same result, and God knows she had been through enough of that recently!

‘Now as soon as you can I want you to get along and see a good obstetrician,’ her doctor advised. ‘I can give you the name of one if you would prefer——’

‘There’s no rush, is there?’ She was still too numb to think about things like that.

‘I shouldn’t leave it too long, Bryna,’ the doctor smiled, moving to sit on the edge of his desk. ‘You and the baby will need the best of care during the next seven months.’

Pregnant. It still didn’t seem real to her. It couldn’t be happening to her now!

She studiously finished buttoning her blouse so that the doctor shouldn’t see that he was more pleased by the news than she was, and picked up her bag ready to leave once she was fully dressed, a blush darkening her cheeks as the doctor raised surprised brows. She gave him a quick smile. ‘Unlike those other ladies who came to you, I have to admit to being a little—surprised,’ she revealed shakily. ‘You must realise why.’ She looked at him dazedly.

‘Of course I do,’ he patted her hand. ‘And as soon as you’re feeling a little less shocked I want you to give me a call so that we can talk about that. The only thing you need to know now is that you’re in excellent health and I’m sure you’re going to have a perfectly normal pregnancy.’

Nothing had been normal in her life the last few weeks, and her pregnancy could only make things worse. Its existence already did that.

‘Thank you.’ She swallowed hard. ‘I am a little dazed,’ she admitted tremulously. ‘I—I’ll call you later today,’ she added shakily, clutching her bag in front of her. As if a few hours were going to make any difference to the shock she had just received!

Frank nodded, smiling warmly. ‘I’m sure you’re bursting to tell someone your good news.’

By ‘someone’ she knew he meant the baby’s father. And that was where the problem lay.

‘Yes,’ she gave a tight smile. ‘Well, thank you, and——’

‘Don’t thank me, Bryna,’ he gave her a teasing smile. ‘I had nothing to do with this miracle, you and the baby’s father managed this all on your own!’

The trembling hadn’t stopped by the time she had walked through the reception area and waiting-room, across the car park, unlocked her car door, and sat inside, her head resting on the steering-wheel.

Pregnant! Years ago she had dreamt about this day, of knowing her child was growing inside her. Then her parents had broken the news that, owing to an emergency operation during puberty, she would probably never be able to have a child of her own.

It had been a bitter blow, days of crying, weeks of cursing fate for doing this to her, months of self-recrimination as she tried desperately to convince herself she was still a woman worth loving, years of telling herself she could still live a full life, her years as a model doing a lot for her self-esteem. And now, somehow, when she had only fleetingly glimpsed the happiness she could have, she found she was pregnant. With Raff’s child.

Raff. He was the last person she could tell about the life they had created between them.

She put her hand protectively on her stomach. Her child.

Dear God, how she wanted it!

But she would lose Raff if she had the baby.

She was losing him anyway.

The last thought came unbidden, but she knew it was the truth even as she tried to deny it. Each day Raff faded a little more away from her, until eventually he would tell her it was over between them. She was only surprised he hadn’t already done so; she had lasted much longer than his affairs usually did.

It still surprised her to realise she was the mistress of Raff Gallagher, a man who wielded much power in the City, both monetarily and personality-wise. The first moment she had seen him she had known he was a power to be reckoned with. But she certainly hadn’t expected to become his mistress within a matter of days!

He wouldn’t want this child she carried, she had no doubt of that. Raff had made it clear from the first that he was offering her no more than any of the other women he had had in his life the last ten years: passion and consideration, and the truth when he no longer felt either of them for her any more.

How could she tell the man who had made it clear he offered no commitment that they had made the biggest commitment of all, that of forming another life from their desire for each other? Once again she acknowledged that she couldn’t tell him. Which gave her only a matter of weeks with him before the child physically began to show on her slender figure.

Why bother to count in weeks when she knew Raff could end it in days? Maybe even today.

‘So will you talk to Daddy about it?’

Bryna blinked at the pretty girl who sat opposite her at the restaurant table. Lunch had been the last thing she had felt like after leaving the doctor’s surgery, but she had promised to have lunch with Kate, and somehow she had managed to drive herself to the restaurant. How, she didn’t know, not recalling the drive here at all, but she had already been seated at the table when Kate had breezed into the room five minutes ago, her hair a mass of glossy black curls, grey eyes gleaming with determination.

It was that gleam of determination that warned Bryna she had better be more on her guard and pay closer attention to what Kate was saying; this young lady could be deviously charming when she chose to be! And lack of attention when Kate’s eyes were gleaming like this could have dire results. This young lady could be every bit as manipulative as her father when she was set on a course of action.

‘Talk to him about what?’ Bryna prompted guardedly, listening intently now.

Irritation flickered in the dark grey depths. ‘What’s the matter with you today, Bryna? You haven’t heard a word I’ve said since I arrived!’

Bryna gave a half-smile as Kate displayed another characteristic of her father: impatience with anyone who didn’t pay complete attention to what concerned them at any given moment. In the father it was part of his strength of character, in this eighteen-year-old girl it appeared merely petulant. But she didn’t doubt Kate would be every inch the matriarch in her later years.

‘Sorry. I—I’ve had a busy morning,’ she dismissed with a shrug.

‘Hm,’ Kate gave her a censorious look. ‘Well, I’d like you to talk to Daddy on my behalf about the idea of my sharing a flat with Brenda next term.’

Bryna’s brow cleared at the explanation. ‘I thought you’d already discussed it with your father and he’d said no,’ she returned drily, knowing all about the conversation between father and daughter, also knowing the outcome would be inevitable.

‘Not a definite no-more-discussion-on-the-subject no.’ Kate sat forward eagerly. ‘I’m sure that if you told him you think it’s a good idea he might be more—open-minded.’

Bryna wasn’t sure she did think it was a good idea. Oh, she understood Kate’s wish to leave the home she had shared with her family the last eighteen years, but she wasn’t altogether sure Kate was up to setting up home on her own just yet, especially with Brenda Sanders.

Kate had become friends with the other girl when she had started college the previous term, but Brenda seemed to have a different boy in tow each time they met, and the one time Bryna had been to the flat Kate proposed sharing it had been very untidy, with a sleepy-eyed, completely naked young man emerging from Brenda’s bedroom. That way of life might be Brenda’s choice, but for all her outward sophistication she was sure Kate was still very much an innocent. And her father would like her to remain that way a little while longer!

‘I don’t think my opinion, favourable or otherwise, would make the slightest difference to his decision,’ she told the younger girl coolly, sipping her mineral water, having realised just in time before she ordered her drink from the waiter that she shouldn’t really drink alcohol in her condition.

‘Oh, but I’m sure—— Oh,’ Kate broke off as realisation dawned. ‘You aren’t saying that your affair with Daddy is almost over?’

Candour, cruelly blunt or otherwise, was something neither of the Gallagher children lacked, neither Paul at twenty, or his young sister Kate. It was something Bryna had been made aware of the first time Raff had introduced her to his two children from his very young marriage and they had asked why she and Raff didn’t just live together and have an open affair, assuring them that they were both adult enough to accept the situation.

They might well be, but neither she nor Raff had wanted that close a relationship, she because she liked having her own home and independence, Raff because he never became that intimate with the women he was involved with, and both of them were happy to continue as they were. Or they had been.

‘I don’t believe it,’ Kate dismissed before she could answer her. ‘You and Daddy have been together for over six months now; that’s at least three months longer than any of the others!’

Tact and diplomacy seemed to be traits the Gallagher children hadn’t received when virtues were being given out!

Bryna was well aware of the fact that her affair with Raff had lasted twice as long as they usually did, just as she had been aware of his increasing irritability the last month or so, knowing it was only a matter of time now before he ended things between them.

Until today, until an hour ago, she had been grateful for each extra day she had lasted than his other women; now she knew she would have no choice but to end things herself if he didn’t do it soon.

‘All the more reason for him to feel enough is enough,’ she gave a tight smile.

‘I don’t believe it,’ his daughter scoffed. ‘Paul and I have been laying bets on how soon he would marry you!’

Bryna gave the younger girl a pitying look. ‘You should both know better than that.’

Grey eyes, so much like her father’s it was unnerving, looked Bryna over speculatively. ‘I somehow never expected the woman to turn Daddy down when he finally decided to take the plunge again.’

She turned away. ‘One has to be asked in order to give a refusal.’

‘You’re so beautiful, Daddy is sure to ask you soon,’ the younger girl said with certainty.

As if beauty had anything to do with it! Oh, she was well aware of her own looks, she had to be in the profession she had chosen to enter on leaving school eight years ago. She knew how well her long mane of white-blonde straight hair and wide, dark-lashed, violet-coloured eyes photographed, not to mention the slender length of her body.

Her looks had been her stock-in-trade for six years, and could have continued to do so for many years after that, but two years ago she had decided to open her own modelling agency, where her looks and appearance were still very important, but she no longer had to watch everything she ate, or look anxiously in the mirror each morning as she searched for those tell-tale lines on her face that would tell her the choice was no longer hers to make.

It had been a successful move, both financially and personally, and she had also met Raff through the agency. But while her beauty might have attracted his attention initially, it certainly wasn’t enough to hold his interest for any length of time; there had been too many beautiful women before her for her to ever believe that.

‘I don’t think so, Kate,’ she dismissed as gently as she could, liking the young girl for all her brashness. How could she not like the daughter who looked so much like the man she loved!

No ties, no commitment, they had said at the start of their affair, and Bryna had meant to keep to those rules. But it had been impossible for her not to fall in love with Raff, although she had taken care not to let him even guess at the emotion, knowing it would precipitate the end of their relationship. She had broken all the rules, but Raff had kept to every one of them, and she had no illusions why.

Would the child she carried look like him as Kate did? They were both tall, so the child was sure to inherit that trait from one of them, but Raff was so dark against her blondeness, and surely that would be the more dominant of the two. How strange to look at her child and see Raff in every glance!

‘Bryna? Bryna!’ Kate repeated impatiently at her second lapse into unattentiveness. ‘Are you sure? I mean——’

‘I’m sure. And I accept it,’ she huskily assured the young girl. ‘Now let’s order lunch, shall we?’ she added briskly as the waiter approached their table. ‘It hasn’t happened yet, and until it does we can enjoy each other’s company.’

She was well aware that when her affair with Raff ended he wouldn’t be the only one to leave her life, that, fond as she had become of Kate and Paul, they could hardly keep up a friendship with one of their father’s ex-mistresses!

Kate gave her a frowning look once they had ordered their meal. ‘You don’t seem exactly heartbroken.’

Bryna gave rueful grimace. ‘Would it do any good if I screamed and shouted?’

‘Well … no,’ Kate admitted moodily. ‘But it might make you feel better.’

‘Believe me, it wouldn’t,’ Bryna drawled.

‘You’re always so cool and controlled,’ the girl rebuked. ‘Don’t you care for Daddy at all?’

Her heart felt heavy at the irony of that. ‘I don’t think you really want me to answer that——’

‘But I do,’ Kate insisted earnestly. ‘Daddy tells me that I shouldn’t even think about going to bed with someone unless I’m absolutely sure I’m in love with them, and yet Daddy isn’t in love with the women he goes to bed with.’

Bryna picked uninterestedly at the prawns she had chosen as her appetiser. ‘It doesn’t seem very fair, does it?’ she acknowledged, her cheeks pale beneath their light dusting of blusher.

‘He told me there’s a certain type of woman a man would never contemplate marrying,’ Kate added with a bitchiness unusual for her.

Bryna swallowed hard, recognising the accusation for what it was. Except that she knew Raff didn’t mean her. He had been her first and only lover.

After her parents had told her she could never have a child she had deliberately set out to attract men to the sensuous sway of her body, always drawing back before any physical commitment had been made, believing they would realise she wasn’t a complete woman if they ever made love to her. By the time she realised that wasn’t true she had earned herself the reputation of being icy and aloof. And the ice hadn’t begun to melt until she met Raff. If he had been surprised to find her virginity intact he had never said so.

The bitchy comment hadn’t been worthy of Kate, with her forthright manner and lack of guile. Bryna guessed that the girl was fond of her too, and would miss her when the time came.

‘He was right,’ she told the younger girl.

Only six years separated them in age, and yet at eighteen Bryna had already been mature beyond her years, scarred by what she believed to be her inadequacy. God, how she wished she could share the life growing within her with someone! Preferably Raff.

But that was out of the question. Her parents, then. She didn’t doubt for a moment that they would be overjoyed by the news, whether she had a husband or not; as Bryna was an only child they had given up any idea of ever becoming grandparents. Maybe instead of telephoning them she would go up to Scotland at the weekend and tell them in person; the look on their faces might be worth the long journey!

‘I’m sorry, Bryna.’ Kate gave a self-disgusted sigh at her intention to wound. ‘You aren’t what Daddy meant at all.’ She picked up her fork to eat her salmon. ‘I’m disappointed, that’s all,’ she grimaced. ‘I thought you would make a great stepmother.’

Raff had lost his wife, and Kate and Paul their mother, over ten years ago, but Raff gave the impression that the marriage he had entered into at only eighteen had ceased to be a complete success years before that. But both parents were devoted to the children, and while their marriage didn’t exactly sparkle it hadn’t been unpleasant either.

Paul and Kate obviously had very warm memories of their mother, and it warmed Bryna to know that Kate, at least, would have had no objection to her taking that place in her father’s life. If the situation had ever arisen. Which it never would.

‘Thank you,’ she accepted briskly. ‘Now, as a friend, would you hurry up and eat your lunch; I have to get back to work.’ She smiled brightly in the face of Kate’s pain at the deliberate snub; she couldn’t allow Kate to live under the misapprehension that there would ever be a happy-ever-after between Raff and herself. Raff was thirty-nine years old, with a grown-up family, and the thought of having to go through night-time feeds, teething, crawling, walking, the terrible-twos, and so on and so on, with another child, would throw even the self-confidently arrogant Raff Gallagher into a panic! It threw her into a panic!

Who would have guessed when she had walked into a restaurant very similar to this one six short months ago that this would happen?

She had been meeting Courtney Stevens, to discuss the use of six of her models to promote a new line he was introducing to his chain of fashion stores throughout Europe and America for the winter. He had proved every bit as charming as the advertising agency she was working with had told her he was.

Or warned her. She and Janet Parker had worked together before, and when the cynical Janet described a man as ‘charming’ it was like any other woman saying he was lethally attractive!

Courtney Stevens—or Court, as he had insisted she call him as they introduced themselves—was a blond giant of a man with a devilish charm glinting in deep blue eyes that were guaranteed to seduce even the most hardened of women. Bryna was charmed almost from the first moment, almost forgetting what she was there for as he deftly centred the conversation on her rather than the business she had come here to discuss.

‘We have to decide what models you would like to use,’ she had finally laughingly protested.

‘Well, we’re going to use the family pile,’ he dismissed drily. ‘For some reason my father bought himself a manor house in Kent and left it to me in his will; I’ve never had reason to use it until now. So as it means the crew will have to stay overnight down there, how about making one of the models a tall violet-eyed silver-blonde?’ He looked at her expectantly.

She couldn’t possibly feel insulted by the intimacy of the suggestion, and she laughed huskily. ‘I no longer work as a model myself.’

‘Couldn’t you make this the exception?’ His large hand covered her much slenderer one.

Her eyes glowed. ‘I’m afraid not.’

‘No?’ He looked as if she had dealt him a wounding blow. ‘Then how about joining me for——’

‘Would you like to introduce us, Court?’ interrupted a harshly rasping voice.

Court frowned his irritation up at the other man. ‘Not now, Raff,’ he protested.

‘Exactly now,’ the other man drawled.

‘Bryna, Raff Gallagher. Raff, Bryna Fairchild,’ Court made the introductions in a disgruntled voice. ‘A friend of mine,’ he told the other man pointedly.

‘I’m glad to meet you, Miss Fairchild.’ The man, who until that moment had only been a dark blue tailored suit, she could see out of the corner of her eye, and a rasping voice, lowered himself into the chair beside her.

For some reason just the sound of his voice as he cut in on their conversation had made her reluctant to look at him before, and as she glanced at him now she knew the reason why; it was like the moon eclipsing the sun. Court was the sun, open and uncomplicated, and Raff Gallagher was the moon, dark with secretive depths he allowed no one to enter.

She told herself she was being imaginative, and yet piercing grey eyes seemed to look into her very soul and see all that was Bryna Fairchild.

Raff couldn’t be called handsome, his features were too rugged for that, and yet he had something else that was even more effective, a compelling quality that overshadowed and obliterated every other man but him.

He appeared to be the same age as Court, in his late thirties, and yet the years had left their mark in the cynical twist of his mouth, the hardness of his eyes, and the grey wings of hair over each temple.

And from the moment she looked at him Court Stevens ceased to be anything but an attractively pleasant client.

‘Mr Gallagher,’ she greeted him coolly.

‘Please call me Raff,’ he invited gruffly. ‘I have every intention of calling you Bryna.’

Whether she liked it or not! she acknowledged ruefully. Of course she realised who he was now; anyone who was in business and hadn’t heard of Raff Gallagher was either a fool or doomed to fail. And she hoped she was neither of those things. This man was Midas, anything he touched, from property to industry, turning to gold.

‘Raff, why don’t you get lost?’ Court invited irritably. ‘Bryna and I have some business to discuss. Not that sort of business, you fool,’ he admonished as the other man raised disbelieving brows in Bryna’s direction. ‘Bryna runs the Fairchild Agency.’

The dark brow cleared. ‘I’ve heard of it,’ Raff drawled, turning to Bryna. ‘I apologise for the assumption I made just now.’

Being a model, Bryna had received her fair share of insults over erroneous assumptions of what her profession actually entailed, but never before had a man presumed that about her without knowing a thing about her!

She turned to Court Stevens with frosty eyes. ‘I really do have to go,’ she snapped. ‘Perhaps you could give me a call and we could get together to discuss this another time.’ She was probably walking away from a contract that could mean even bigger things for her agency if Court Stevens was pleased with the work they did for him this time, but she wasn’t going to stay around and be insulted by a man who acted as if he owned half of London—and probably did!

‘Now look what you’ve done!’ Court turned accusing eyes on the other man. ‘Will you just get out of here?’

It was testament to how deep the friendship was between the two men that Raff Gallagher didn’t take exception to the way Court had been trying to get rid of him ever since he had interrupted them. But at that moment Bryna was too angry to care how close the two men were, as she stood up to leave.

‘Please stay, Miss Fairchild,’ Raff Gallagher drawled as he stood up, the formality deliberate, she was sure. ‘And please accept my apology for interrupting the two of you. Game of golf tomorrow, Court?’

‘OK,’ Court sighed unenthusiastically. ‘But you’re starting with a handicap.’

‘Don’t I always,’ the other man mocked. ‘Miss Fairchild,’ he nodded dismissively before strolling across the restaurant to join two men at a table who had obviously been waiting for him.

‘He always wins, too,’ muttered Court. ‘Sit down, Bryna. Please,’ he persuaded.

She did so slowly, pointedly turning her chair so that she didn’t have to look at Raff Gallagher.

‘We became friends in our first week of boarding school after he bowled me out at cricket and I hit him with my cricket bat in the changing room,’ Court sighed. ‘I broke his nose.’

Bryna had noticed that slight bump on the hawklike nose, laughing softly now as she envisaged the two little boys glaring at each other across a cricket bat, both taking their aggression at being away from home out on the other. ‘Stranger meetings have formed just as strong a friendship, I’m sure,’ she teased.

Court smiled, his eyes brimming with laughter. ‘It wasn’t the fight that caused the friendship,’ he assured her. ‘What did that was the fact that Raff told everyone he’d fallen over and hit his nose. If he hadn’t I would have been expelled in my first week of school!’

Two little boys who had bonded a lifetime friendship through resentment and pain. Maybe Raff Gallagher did have some redeeming qualities after all. One just had to dig deep to find them!

She made a point of not looking his way as she and Court got down to the serious business of discussing the models. Nevertheless, she was aware of the exact moment Raff Gallagher stood up to approach their table before leaving.

Grey eyes delved into her soul a second time. ‘We’ll meet again, Miss Fairchild,’ he murmured as he bent over the hand he had lifted to his mouth, his lips cool and yet moist.

‘Give me a chance, Raff!’ Court complained.

His friend chuckled huskily. ‘The choice will be Bryna’s,’ he said softly, meeting her gaze once again with compelling intensity before taking his leave.

‘It’s a no contest,’ groaned Court resignedly. ‘It always is.’

‘I can assure you Mr Gallagher holds no interest for me,’ Bryna dismissed primly.

When she got back to her office a box containing a single red rose lay on her desk. There was no card with it, but she guessed that it wasn’t from Court; he was the type of man who would sign his name with a flourish to the accompanying card if he found a woman attractive enough to send her flowers.

Half an hour later two more roses arrived, half an hour after that another three, then another three, and another three, until by four-thirty she had the round dozen.

Her secretary/receptionist, Gilly, was agog to know who had sent them. When the man himself arrived at five o’clock neither woman was in any doubt as to who the sender had been. When Raff courteously invited Bryna out to dinner she had breathlessly accepted, her earlier antagonism forgotten; she had never met anyone quite like this man before.

She still hadn’t met anyone like him, and even when he was long gone from her life, she knew she would never meet anyone like him again.

CHAPTER TWO

‘KATE tells me the two of you had lunch together today,’ Raff said enquiringly as he sat down opposite her.

Bryna met his gaze guardedly, her heart skipping its usual beat as she looked at him, still affected, even after six months of knowing him intimately, by that compelling power that surrounded him. Tonight, dressed in black evening suit and snowy white shirt, he appeared even more devastating than usual.

‘That’s right, we did,’ she confirmed coolly, wondering where the conversation was leading to.

Raff gave an inclination of his head, his mouth twisted into a rueful smile. ‘She seems slightly annoyed with you.’

She and Kate had parted a little stiffly outside the restaurant, the younger girl seeming to blame Bryna for the fact that her father hadn’t fallen in love with her!

Bryna shrugged. ‘She hoped I would talk to you about her moving in with Brenda next term,’ she told him truthfully.

His eyes became suddenly flinty. ‘And what did you tell her?’

She maintained her calm poise in the face of his obvious displeasure. ‘What do you think I told her?’ she drawled.

Raff relaxed slightly, his long length stretched out comfortably in the armchair. ‘I think you agree with me, that young lady is not the choice of flatmate I want for Kate.’

And what Raff wanted he invariably got, Bryna had found these last months. She was a prime example of that, in the past having been able to freeze off even the most ardent of men, and yet she and Raff had been lovers within days of their meeting. And far from feeling inadequate as she had always imagined she would, she had felt complete for the first time in her life! It had been the same every time they made love.

‘Perhaps not Brenda,’ she agreed. ‘But I think Kate is determined to get a place of her own, and she is over eighteen——’

‘I think I know what’s best for my children, Bryna,’ he bit out cuttingly, standing up abruptly. ‘We should be going now,’ he added curtly. ‘At the moment we’re politely late, any later and we may as well not bother!’

Despite the fact that the dig about their lateness was aimed at her she wanted to say ‘then let’s not bother!’ She wanted to be in his arms tonight, close to him in the only way he allowed any woman to be close to him. She had long ago ceased to be upset by the way he cut her out of showing any interest in his children’s activities; it was far from the first time he had done so. To her it only served to emphasise the transient role she played in his life.

And because of the child she herself carried inside her she didn’t suggest they miss the party, but slipped her arms into the coat he held out for her, the suede soft and supple against her body. ‘I’m sure Court won’t mind our tardiness,’ she shrugged lightly.

She wished he would smile, because it completely transformed his face when he did, alleviating some of the harshness, lending warmth to eyes the colour of slate, the harshness of his mouth softening as deep grooves were etched into the leanness of his cheeks.

Instead he nodded tersely. ‘After all these years Court has come to expect my rudeness,’ he said drily. ‘I wouldn’t want to disappoint him!’

The two men were still the unlikeliest couple to have found such an enduring friendship that Bryna had ever met, Raff being hard where Court was gentle, Raff blunt to the point of rudeness where Court was always kind. Bryna had even wondered, when loving Raff hurt too badly, why it couldn’t have been Court she fell in love with that day. But she hadn’t, and so the two of them had become friends instead.

‘What did the doctor say?’

Her smile faded as she looked up at Raff with startled eyes. ‘Sorry?’ she frowned, her hands shaking slightly as she held her coat around her as they braved the icy-cold early December winds to go out to the waiting Jaguar, the sudden chill not leaving her body even as Raff turned on the ignition and the burst of warm air filled the interior.

‘You told me last night that the doctor was going to tell you the results of your tests today,’ he explained raspingly. ‘You did keep the appointment, didn’t you?’ The lights on the dashboard illuminated his frown.

‘Yes, of course.’ Bryna huddled down into the collar of her coat, the chill seeming to have permeated her bones.

She inwardly bemoaned the fact that the intimacy of their relationship told Raff without words exactly when her body had failed her. She had assured him that it occasionally happened, although he had been aware that it never had in their previous four months together. When it happened again he had been the one to urge her to consult a doctor.

‘I’m anaemic, that’s all,’ she evaded. ‘It can have that effect. The doctor has given me some vitamins,’ she added truthfully.

Raff gave her a probing look. ‘You do look a little pale,’ he conceded.

She looked pale because she was still suffering from the shock of knowing she was pregnant; even the call to her parents telling them she would be home for the weekend hadn’t made the baby she carried seem more real to her. She was sure there would be visible signs of it soon enough, but at the moment, with her body still so slender, and no ill-effects such as morning sickness to cope with, she couldn’t help questioning the accuracy of the doctor’s diagnosis.

Except that she felt different emotionally, filled with a tranquillity and inner peace she had thought never to know. Maternal instinct had previously only been an expression to her, but now she knew exactly what it was, the completely unselfish love for a human being you just knew was inside you despite there being no visible signs of its existence.

‘Warmer now?’ Raff cut in on her musings. ‘You seem a little distracted this evening,’ he frowned as she raised questioning brows. ‘You shivered earlier, I wondered if you were warmer now,’ he explained.

‘Fine,’ she gave him a dreamy smile. ‘Isn’t it a lovely evening?’

‘It’s been raining most of the day and they forecast sleet for tonight,’ he drawled derisively.

Bryna blushed self-consciously. ‘I happen to like rain,’ she defended, her golden bubble firmly burst.

‘And sleet?’ Raff arched dark brows.

She realised it was ridiculous to expect Raff Gallagher to act like a giddy lover, but sometimes she wished he wasn’t quite so controlled and cynical all the time. It would be nice to sometimes relax with him completely and show him how much she cared.

But it was impossible with a man as armoured against the softer feelings as Raff was, and she knew it was only the child she carried inside her that made her hunger for that closeness now.

‘No,’ she conceded ruefully. ‘But maybe this bad weather is an indication that we’re going to have a white Christmas this year.’

‘And then you wouldn’t be able to get to your parents’ house for the holiday,’ he rasped.

‘No.’ She was tempted to tell him she wouldn’t mind that too much as she was going home this weekend anyway, but on their way to a party didn’t seem the appropriate time to tell him that.

‘Of course you’re welcome to spend Christmas with us if anything goes wrong with your plans,’ he invited smoothly.

If he had issued that invitation a few weeks ago she would have been tempted to accept no matter how out of place she felt at the time, but he hadn’t suggested it before, neither had he shown any sign of displeasure that they wouldn’t be spending the holiday together. ‘I don’t think so, thank you,’ she refused lightly. ‘Christmas is a time for families, isn’t it?’

His jaw tightened. ‘Yes, I suppose so.’

The drive from Raff’s house to Court’s apartment was a short one, and Bryna was relieved to escape the suddenly icy atmosphere that had developed in the car after her refusal. She didn’t know what Raff was so annoyed about—his invitation had lacked warmth, to say the least! And it was also a little late in coming, when he knew she had made her plans weeks ago.

‘My favourite lady!’ Court greeted her warmly as soon as they were admitted to his apartment, kissing her lightly on the lips as he took her coat himself. ‘I thought you were never going to get here,’ he grinned at her. ‘It’s Raff’s fault you’re late, of course——’

‘Of course,’ the other man drawled coolly.

‘Only because you knew the sole reason I arranged this party at all was so that I could ask Bryna to dance and hold her in my arms for a while!’ Court challenged firmly. ‘Bryna?’

‘I’d love to dance,’ she accepted laughingly. The lounge of Court’s apartment was completely cleared of furniture, a dozen or so couples moving sensuously together in there to the sound of a romantic love song.

‘You look lovely tonight.’ Court looked down at her appreciatively.

Raff had told her the same thing earlier about the purple dress that made her eyes appear the same colour, but somehow Court’s compliment seemed less perfunctory. Or maybe tonight she was just looking for faults in her relationship with Raff; the pity of it was it was so easy to find them!

Court looked at her searchingly. ‘There’s a sort of glow to you … Oh God, I haven’t stepped in with my size tens, have I?’ he groaned as a blush darkened her cheeks.

‘Raff and I came straight here, if that’s what you mean,’ she told him. ‘I’m afraid it was my fault we got here late; I arrived late at Raff’s.’ Because of the telephone call to her parents, both of them concerned—if delighted!—at her sudden need to go home for the weekend. It had taken her some time to convince them that nothing had gone drastically wrong in her life to warrant the visit.

Court shook his head. ‘I’m surprised Raff hasn’t told you you work too hard.’

‘He has,’ she smiled. ‘But as he wouldn’t tolerate interference in his business neither will I!’

His friend chuckled softly. ‘No wonder he finds you so fascinating; all his other women were quite willing to forgo their own plans to pander to his whims!’

‘I sometimes wonder if you two love or hate each other!’ she mocked.

‘Love, of course,’ Court drawled. ‘Although if looks could kill I’d be dead now!’ he groaned as he glanced over Bryna’s shoulder. ‘Unless it’s you he’s upset at? Maybe he really didn’t like your being late earlier.’

He hadn’t seemed too worried at the time, but from the way he was glaring at the two of them now something had upset him! Perhaps he was still annoyed about Christmas?

He stood beside the bar in the adjoining dining-room, a drink remaining untouched in his hand as Rosemary Chater did her best to attract him to her fiery-haired beauty. For all the notice Raff took of her she might not have been wearing the most low-cut gown Bryna had ever seen, or been wearing that look of open invitation on her beautiful face. Raff’s gaze was fixed on Court and Bryna as they moved slowly to the music.

Maybe he really was angry about her refusal to spend Christmas with him and Kate and Paul, but with Christmas only two weeks away he had left the invitation late enough!

She smiled at Court. ‘No, I think it’s you he’s angry with,’ she teased him.

‘Well, I did beat him at golf today …!’

‘You didn’t!’ she laughed disbelievingly; Court had been trying to win a round of golf against Raff ever since she had known the two of them.

‘I did,’ Court grinned triumphantly. ‘Of course his mind didn’t seem to be altogether on the game,’ he admitted with some reluctance. ‘But who’s to say I haven’t always lost in the past because of pressures of work?’

‘I didn’t think Raff had any pressures of work now,’ Bryna frowned. Raff had employed a very capable assistant four months ago, and while she might not like Stuart Hillier very much, and found his smooth charm more than a little overpowering, she knew he was good at his job, and that he had taken over a lot of the pressure of the solitary reign over his business empire that Raff had previously refused to relinquish. Everything had seemed to be going so smoothly in that direction the last four months.

Court shrugged. ‘How should I know how well it is or isn’t going? He never discusses business with me. Maybe it wasn’t business worrying him at all, but he certainly had something on his mind.’

Her, and the fact that, despite their agreement that when the affair was over for one, or both, of them, they would admit that honestly, Raff seemed to be having trouble breaking the news to her. Maybe he did care for her in his own distant way and didn’t want to hurt her. He might even have guessed at some of the love she felt for him. But she was soon going to have to decide if she walked away from him with some of her pride intact, or if she waited the short time until he ended things once and for all.

‘Hey, have I said something I shouldn’t?’ Court frowned down at her concernedly.

Bryna shook off her mood of depression, knowing he had only confirmed for her what she already knew, smiling brightly to dispel his concern. ‘Shall we go and join him before Rosemary falls out of her dress completely?’ she suggested drily as the music came to an end.

Court groaned. ‘I’m afraid she had herself lined up as next in line to share his bed before he met you.’

And like a vulture the other woman was now circling, waiting for the affair to end, trying to give it a helping hand if she could! And she was certainly going all out to do that at the moment.

From the first Bryna had found the world of cynicism, bitchiness, and self that Raff inhabited a little overwhelming, although she was hardened to a certain degree herself from her years as a top-class model. But almost every woman she met clearly let her, and Raff, know that they wanted him too, only the fact that he showed no interest in returning their attraction giving her comfort during the last months.

Until now. Raff had ceased to look bored by Rosemary Chater, in fact as Court and Bryna moved to join the other couple he led the other woman on to the dance floor, seeming to enjoy the way her body instantly melded to every contour of his.

‘She can only cause trouble if you let her,’ Court spoke quietly at Bryna’s side, also watching the other couple with narrowed eyes.

Bryna turned to him with a grateful smile. ‘Then I won’t let her.’

He raised blond brows. ‘Is it as easy to dismiss as that?’

Easy? She hated the way the other woman moved against Raff with deliberate seductiveness, but what could she do about it when Raff was enjoying it? She wasn’t a fool, to make a scene about what was, for all the sensuousness of movement, just a dance; she knew that would be the surest way to drive Raff away from her. He hated scenes—he had once told her his wife had caused several before the two of them decided to live together but go their separate ways, to have their own lovers.

‘No, it isn’t easy,’ she gave Court a tight smile. ‘Why don’t we go through and help ourselves to some of that lovely supper you’ve laid out in the other room?’ It was almost ten o’clock and she hadn’t eaten anything since lunchtime. So much for the doctor’s confidence that she would maintain a healthy diet!

‘Is everything okay between you and Raff?’ Court eyed her curiously as she nibbled uninterestedly on a sandwich.

Her eyes were overbright as she looked up at him. “’The Queen is dead. Long live the Queen."’ She looked pointedly at Rosemary Chater as she said the latter, too numb to even sound bitter.

Court looked much older when the boyish humour deserted his face. ‘Are you sure?’

Her heart was breaking, the tears threatening to cascade down her cheeks—and she was incongruously trying to work out how she could bite into the cold chicken leg she held in her hand, without choking on it! ‘Have you ever known him to behave like that in front of me before?’ She felt sick as she watched Raff nuzzle against the other woman’s silky throat.

‘Hell!’ muttered Court furiously as he followed her stricken gaze. ‘I’ll go and break them up——’

‘No.’ Her hand on his arm stopped him. ‘Would you please just get my coat and call a taxi to take me home?’

‘I’ll take you——’

‘This is your party, Court,’ she reminded him huskily, no longer able to look at Raff with the other woman. ‘The host shouldn’t walk out on his guests.’ She tried to sound teasing, but to her dismay she just sounded forlorn.

Court’s mouth tightened. ‘None of this lot cares about that, half of them wouldn’t even know I’d gone!’

‘I’d really rather go on my own, thank you,’ she refused as gently as she could, sure that if she didn’t get out of here soon she was going to make an absolute fool of herself.

Court looked as if he were about to argue again, but the pleading in her eyes silenced him. Bryna kept her face averted from the couple dancing as she and Court moved through to the entrance hall to collect her coat.

Raff had done to her what they had always agreed wouldn’t happen, publicly humiliated her by turning to another woman when the two of them had arrived here together.

Court put his hands warmly on her shoulders as he came to stand in front of her after helping her on with her coat. ‘If you ever need a shoulder to cry on …’ he told her affectionately.

‘I know I can call you,’ she gave him a wan smile. ‘You——’

‘Where do you think you’re going?’ rasped a harsh voice Bryna recognised only too well.

She took a second to regain control before turning to face Raff, blinking a little uncertainly as she saw the fury blazing in the depths of his eyes. ‘I was just about to leave——’

Cool grey eyes turned to Court. ‘You too?’ Raff bit out coldly.

Court met the challenge in his friend’s gaze unflinchingly. ‘I wanted to go with her, but Bryna insisted I stay here.’

Raff’s mouth twisted. ‘Running out on me, Bryna?’ he taunted.

‘I——’

‘Good God, man, what did you expect her to do?’ Court exploded. ‘Tap you on the shoulder while you were making love to Rosemary to tell you she was leaving!’

‘I wasn’t making love to her, damn it,’ Raff ground out, his hands clenched into fists at his sides.

‘Then you were doing a good job of acting as if you were!’ his friend accused heatedly.

Grey eyes flickered coldly. ‘Bryna?’

She swallowed hard, not enjoying being the bone of contention between the two friends. ‘I really think it would be best if I left——’

‘Then I’m coming with you,’ rasped Raff.

‘—and you stayed,’ she finished dully. ‘There’s no point in our both ruining our evening. “The night is still young,” and all that,’ she added brittlely.

Raff strode purposefully across to grasp her arm in his hand. ‘I said I’m coming with you!’

‘Maybe she doesn’t want to go with you?’ Court told him caustically.

His mouth tightened. ‘She came with me, she’ll leave with me.’

Bryna frowned up at him. Why was he doing this? Couldn’t he see this was a perfect way out for him, why drag out their parting any longer than they had to? But she could see by the inflexibility of his jaw that he was determined to leave with her.

‘Thank you, Court,’ she squeezed his arm reassuringly. ‘Raff will take me home.’

‘I’ll call you tomorrow,’ Raff told the other man gratingly.

‘Make sure that you do, and that it’s nice and early. Otherwise I’ll be the one to call you,’ Court warned in a controlled voice.

The heating system in the Jaguar was blasting out hot air, and yet Bryna still felt cold. Why was Raff continuing with this? Unless he was going to tell her now that they were finished? As if she didn’t already know that!

He accompanied her up to her apartment, neither of them having spoken a word since they left Court’s home, Raff’s expression harshly forbidding each time she had dared a glance in his direction.

She turned to him once she had unlocked her door. ‘I don’t think there’s any point in your coming in——’

‘Of course I’m coming in, Bryna,’ his voice was huskily soft, as he pushed the door open for her to precede him inside and closed the door firmly behind him.

Bryna felt nervous in his company, as if this were their first date and they were only a couple of inexperienced teenagers, her hands shaking slightly as she faced him across the lounge. ‘Rosemary will be waiting for you——’

‘No one is waiting for me,’ he told her gruffly, noiselessly crossing the lounge to stand in front of her. ‘It’s you I want, Bryna.’

Her eyes were wide with disbelief. ‘No—you can’t mean——’

‘I need your fire and passion tonight, Bryna,’ he groaned as his head lowered to hers.

‘But earlier——’

‘I was angry,’ he dismissed. ‘But I’m not angry any more. Now I just want to feel your silken legs wrapped about me while I bury myself in you!’

Their lovemaking was always different, sometimes fierce, sometimes gentle, sometimes so slow it drove the two of them insane, other times fiercely out of control. And tonight she knew Raff wanted it to be the latter, for both of them to be mindlessly lost in their passion for each other. And she wasn’t sure, after what had happened earlier, that she could give him the response he seemed to need.

She swallowed hard. ‘Raff, I don’t know if I can. I don’t——’

‘Of course you can.’ He melded his body against hers, moving against her provocatively.

Yes, she could, because this would be their farewell. She couldn’t go through the pain he had made her endure earlier again, and so they would have this one last night together and then she would tell him it was over between them.

‘All right, Raff,’ her arms curved up about his neck as she relaxed against him, ‘make love to me.’

Asking Raff to make love to her was like standing in the way of a tidal wave, knowing it would knock her completely off her feet, cloud her brain until she couldn’t think or feel anything but him!

He was a man who rarely, if ever, lost control, and it took her breath away when he began to throw off their clothes as they stood together in her lounge. Usually they both had a leisurely shower, either apart or together, and then they would go to bed together. She had never known this wildness from him before.

But if he felt differently about their lovemaking tonight so did she, the child inside her, and the knowledge that this would be their last time together, making her own responses as wild as his.

He had a magnificent body, strong and lithe, with not an ounce of superfluous flesh anywhere. And as he stripped off the last of his clothing Bryna was able to see he was already fully aroused.

His hands entangled in her hair as he kissed her deeply, and she squirmed with delight as one of those hands moved to cup the fullness of one of her breasts. She had wondered at the increased sensitivity of her breasts in recent weeks, but now she knew they were making ready for her baby, and as Raff’s dark head moved down to allow him to capture one aching nipple into the moist cavern of his mouth she felt as if her child already suckled there.

But the flicking of his tongue and the sharp sting of his teeth were not the movements of a child nourishing, and her legs buckled weakly beneath her, drawing the two of them down on to the carpeted floor.

‘Don’t move,’ Raff instructed gruffly as she would have caressed him.

What followed was the most erotic and tortuous experience of her entire life. Raff kissed her from the top of her head to the soles of her feet, discovering pleasure spots that took her again and again to the edge of the sensual abyss he refused to let her enter, always drawing her back before she could attain release.

Finally she could stand no more, moving above him to take them both over the edge as she moved her body in rhythm with his, her nipples knowing the tug of his teeth as she bent above him.

The explosion inside her was greater than anything she had ever known before, and for a brief moment she felt blackness enshroud her, still feeling dizzy as Raff stood up to carry her through to her bedroom.

‘That was for us,’ he murmured as he gently laid her down between the covers. ‘Now this is for you.’

She had barely recovered from the previous onslaught when she felt him intent on arousing her a second time.

He was trying to drive her insane, she decided minutes later, her body writhing and sweat-dampened as she silently begged him to release her from the tortuous frenzy he remorselessly drove her to.

He poised above her, his expression fierce. ‘Now do you believe I want you?’ he rasped.

‘Yes,’ she almost sobbed. ‘But please, please, Raff,’ she let out a shuddering breath of need.

She had been made for him, she decided for what had to be the hundredth time, knowing even as the silken length of him thrust inside her that he would fit perfectly, that he always had.

And then she couldn’t think at all, her hips arching to meet his throbbing rhythm, groaning her own shuddering release at the exact moment she felt his warmth inside her.

As partings went, it had to be one of the most soul-shattering on record!

Raff was already in the bathroom showering and shaving when Bryna woke the next morning, falling back against the pillows with a relieved groan as she realised it was Saturday, and her flight wasn’t scheduled until later that morning.

Last night had been frightening in its intensity, Raff taking her once more before he allowed her to sleep, and her rest finally that of the almost unconscious, and this morning her body ached from the force of those fierce caresses.

Last night they had been closer than ever before, and Bryna dreaded having to tell Raff she thought it best if they didn’t see each other any more. But what real choice did she have?

He was smiling when he came out of the bathroom, freshly shaved, wearing only the black trousers to his suit, although they were a little creased from where they had been left forgotten on the lounge floor all night. His chest was bare and golden, the dark hair there sprinkled even more liberally with grey than at his temples.

He sat on the side of the bed, smoothing back her ice-gold tangle of hair. ‘I thought you were going to sleep all day,’ he teased indulgently.

She longed to turn her face into that hand, to shower kisses over his palm, to tell him how much she loved him, of his child that she carried inside her. Instead she drew back from him. ‘I’m going up to Scotland today to stay the rest of the weekend with my parents.’ It was an effort to keep her gaze on a level with him when his darkened angrily. ‘I think we should take that time to accept that it’s over between us,’ she added in a rush of emotion.

Raff drew in a harsh breath, his hand dropping back to his side. ‘What do you mean, it’s over?’ he rasped abruptly.

Bryna sighed. ‘We’ve both known it for weeks, Raff, so why fool ourselves any longer?’

He stood up forcefully, grey eyes blazing. ‘When did you decide this?’ he demanded.

She shrugged, sitting up against the pillows. ‘I’ve realised for some time——’

‘I meant, when did you decide to visit your parents?’ he ground out.

‘I telephoned them yesterday afternoon and made the arrangements——’

‘So you knew when we met to go out last night?’ he accused.

She blinked. ‘Yes. But——’

‘Then what was last night all about?’ His voice rose angrily.

Bryna swallowed hard. ‘Goodbye?’

‘Good——?’ His face darkened thunderously as he grabbed hold of her arms and pulled her up to him so that her face was only inches away from him. ‘Look at me and tell me you don’t want me any more,’ he ordered harshly.

For the sake of her pride she had to do it; she knew she would never be able to face their child if she allowed their relationship to deteriorate to the stage where they were no longer equal but she was just someone Raff came to when he wanted a willing woman in his arms.

She met his gaze steadily. ‘I no longer want you,’ she lied.

‘Damn you!’ he grated forcefully, releasing her so suddenly she fell back on the pillows, watching numbly as he pulled on his clothes. ‘Damn you,’ he said again before slamming out of the apartment.

With a shuddering sob Bryna’s body began to heave in racking waves of agony.

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