His Wedding-Night Heir

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Because it was only when I saw you with another woman in your arms on our wedding day that I realised how deeply I’d fallen in love with you, and that it would kill me to live only half a life with you—knowing that I would have to share you. That it was her that you really wanted—not me—and ours was just a marriage of convenience.

Knowing, too, that any happiness I found would be a sham and a betrayal.

And that the only way I could retain my sanity—and my self-respect—would be to distance myself from you totally, utterly and for ever.

But to say the words aloud would be another fatal betrayal. She would be admitting that his pretence at wooing her had succeeded only too well, and that as she’d stood beside him and repeated her vows she’d been loving and longing for him with shy but passionate ardour.

And to let him know that she’d been such a pathetic, gullible fool was more than flesh and blood could stand. She could not bear such a stark humiliation.

Better, she thought, to endure Nick’s anger than his pity.

She had no idea, of course, if Vanessa Layton was still part of his life. If she was even now installed at Southwood Cottage, or whether she’d been supplanted by someone else.