Forsaking All Others

It had all happened so quickly that she had barely had time to think. Jeremy had proposed to her just three days after Saskia’s party, and now, less than two months later, here she was, walking up the aisle in a romantic dress of white lace, on the arm of Saskia’s father who had stood in for her own to give her away.

She had tried to persuade Jeremy to wait a little—after all, she was only nineteen, and he was barely twenty-one. But he had brushed all her protests aside, sweeping her along on the tide of his own impetuousness—it was hard to believe that all this was really happening.

And then she glanced up towards the altar, and saw the two men standing there—so very much alike to look at, so different in every other way…Her heart gave a sudden thud, almost taking her breath away. She hadn’t seen Leo since the night of the party—he had been away on business—but she knew that Jeremy had written to him and begged him to come home in time to be his best man.

She hadn’t been unduly worried about his return—had managed to convince herself that it had been no more than her imagination, that reaction she had felt the first time she had seen him. But here it was again—a thousand times stronger. Those deep-set, agate-coloured eyes met hers, and she felt as if her bones were melting.

But it was wrong—it shouldn’t be happening. She was in love with Jeremy…wasn’t she? Confusion swirled in her brain as she stared at the two of them: Jeremy, so boyishly handsome, his eyes alight with happiness as he waited for his bride—and Leo, a faintly cynical smile curving that firm, sensuous mouth, the arrogant set of his wide shoulders reminding her that the downside of all that magnetic male charisma was a personality that expected to have everything its own way.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t exactly a good moment to pause for a little calm reflection—her slight hesitation had been noticed, and everyone was looking at her with avid curiosity. She could hardly request a postponement of the wedding on the grounds that she wasn’t sure if she was marrying the right man. And besides, Leo was engaged to the girl who was today her own bridesmaid—an engagement sealed with an enormous diamond that must have cost a fortune.

Drawing in a deep, steadying breath, she forced herself to go on. As she drew to Jeremy’s side he smiled down at her, taking her hand warmly in his, and she told herself it would be all right—it was just a last-minute attack of nerves. But she was glad to be able to hide behind the heavy lace fall of her veil as the vicar began to welcome the congregation, all too acutely aware of the man at the very edge of her vision…as he had been at the edge of her mind for the past two months.

Perhaps it was just that Jeremy had spoken about him so much—he was obviously very fond of his older cousin, maybe even a little in awe of him. It had been Leo, the captain of the most successful rugby team in the history of the school, Leo who had got a First at Oxford, Leo who knew everything there was to know about computers…

And, after all, there had been nothing in his behaviour that first night to suggest that he had been struck in the same way she had—he had shown nothing beyond a mere friendly politeness towards his fiancee’s best friend. And though she knew that her slender height and long blonde hair attracted a lot of male attention—not always the kind of attention she liked—she was certainly not vain enough to suppose that the effect would be universal. She was just being stupid.

The vicar was reciting the vows, and she repeated them in a whisper. Jeremy squeezed her hand encouragingly, smiling down at her, and she realised with a small stab of guilt that he had completely misinterpreted the reason for her nervousness. But she meant what she was saying—she really did. “Forsaking all others…”

And then Leo stepped forward to hand Jeremy the ring, and though she tried with all the strength of her will to resist, she couldn’t help but lift her eyes to his—to find him watching her, his dark gaze seeming to see right into her soul. He knew—even behind the thick lace of her veil she couldn’t hide from him. He had never even touched her, and yet she belonged to him…

At last the ceremony was over, and they all crowded into the tiny vestry to sign the register. As soon as they were inside, Jeremy caught her round the waist and swung her around in a wild polka, bumping heedlessly into the table and the walls, culminating in a deep, steaming kiss.

“Hello, Mrs Ratcliffe!” he proclaimed as at last he let her go.

She laughed, breathless, her cheeks faintly tinged with pink; at least everyone would assume her blush was one of bridal modesty—except, perhaps, for Leo. But she couldn’t risk letting herself glance in his direction—better to try to pretend that he wasn’t there.

Saskia, pretty as a picture in her pink bridesmaid dress, hurried over to help her straighten her veil. “Oh, isn’t it wonderful!” she declared, her sapphire-blue eyes dancing as she kissed her cheek. “Now you’re really almost my sister, instead of just my best friend.”

Maddy smiled; that was what she had always wanted—to be part of a family, to belong. And, though she knew that Jeremy’s family hadn’t approved of the speed with which it had all happened, now that they were married and they saw how happy Jeremy was they would surely come round to accepting her.

They were all gathering around her—Saskia’s parents, and her brother Nigel, who was married to Jeremy’s elder sister Julia—kissing her and wishing her well. Even Julia managed some sort of smile, and a dry peck on her cheek, though it seemed to cost her dear; Maddy responded to her as warmly as she could—that was a relationship she was going to have to work very hard at.

And then Leo was there, slanting his cousin a teasing glance. “Do you mind if I kiss the bride?” he asked, an inflection of something Maddy couldn’t quite interpret in his voice.

“Of course,” Jeremy responded cheerfully. “Best man’s privilege.”

Maddy stiffened, every nerve-fibre in her body stretched taut as Leo turned to her, his hands resting lightly on her shoulders as he drew her towards him. A faintly mocking smile glinted in those agate eyes. “Jeremy’s a very lucky man to have such a beautiful bride,” he murmured. “No wonder he was in such a hurry to tie the knot.”

“Th—thank you,” she stammered, hoping he wouldn’t detect the agitated racing of her heartbeat.

He bent his head and his mouth brushed over hers, warm and firm, just as she had known it would be. Her heart creased in pain; she wasn’t supposed to feel like this—she wasn’t allowed to. Longing to have him hold her close, she drew back quickly, her cheeks deeply tinged with pink, her eyes unable to meet his.

Fortunately no one seemed to have noticed anything untoward—Julia’s small son Aubrey, frustrated at not being the centre of attention, had chosen that moment to throw a minor tantrum, and Jeremy was enjoying a bridegroom’s liberties with the chief bridesmaid, who was giggling as he kissed her.

With a supreme effort of will, she pulled herself together. It was just the excitement of the day, the crazy rush of it all, she told herself firmly—it really wasn’t surprising that she hardly knew if she was on her head or her heels. But she would be very careful from now on not to let Leo get too close—she wasn’t sure quite what it was about him that had such a disturbing effect on her, but she wanted no repetition of it.

Even so, it was a strain to get through the rest of the day—smiling for endless photographs, standing beside Jeremy at the entrance to the huge marquee that had been erected in the garden of his house, greeting an endless line of guests, most of whom she had never even seen before. She sensed that they were all looking down their noses at her, convinced that Jeremy had married beneath him; she was grateful to Saskia for being there, conspicuously loyal, telling everyone that they had been at school together.

Then there was the lavish wedding-breakfast, and the speeches, and then everything was swiftly cleared away so that the guests could dance to the music of a local band. As the afternoon wore on into evening Maddy began to develop a splitting headache; the marquee was hot and stuffy, and she was desperate for a breath of fresh air. Jeremy was dancing with one of his aunts, and no one noticed as she slipped quietly away.

The gardens of Hadley Park were beautiful—a little neglected in places, with trails of bright blue periwinkle growing wild among the flowerbeds, and honeysuckle scrambling all along the broken stone parapet that ran around the terrace at the back of the house, its sweet fragrance filling the air. The sky had turned a soft dark blue, streaked with high magenta clouds as the sun sank below the horizon.

Wandering into a secluded corner, she found a wooden pergola, covered with climbing roses. There was a rustic seat inside and she sat down wearily, closing her eyes. Her mind was a turmoil of confusion; had she been wrong to marry Jeremy? She had genuinely believed she was in love with him, and yet…Maybe she had let herself be swept up by his ebullient personality, feeling for the first time in her life that she was on the inside of one of those charmed circles she had always envied—and maybe she had mistaken gratitude for love…

A sound close by brought her eyes sharply open—as Leo stepped into the pergola. Startled, she jumped to her feet—and gave a little cry of horror as the puffed sleeve of her dress caught on a stray rose-thorn. “Oh…damn and blast it!” she muttered fiercely under her breath, twisting around as she tried to free herself.

“Hold still,” he advised in that dry, sardonic tone. “If you keep pulling at it like that you’ll rip it.”

Her heart gave an uncomfortable thud and began to race rapidly as he leaned close to her and carefully disentangled the delicate silk from the thorn. “Th—thank you,” she managed, hoping he wouldn’t notice the slight tremor in her voice. “I…just came out for a few minutes—I couldn’t breathe in there.”

“I wondered what you were doing out here all by yourself,” he remarked. “Beginning to pall already, is it?”

She glanced up at him in surprise, taken aback by the hard glint in those agate eyes. “I’m sorry?” she queried, frowning.

“I wonder if you will be?” he mused, deliberately misunderstanding. “Unfortunately I’m inclined to think it’s my impetuous young cousin who’ll be the one to be sorry. You know what they say—’Marry in haste, repent at leisure’. And you certainly married in haste.”

She glared up at him in indignant fury. “Yes, we did,” she retorted defensively. “But so what? Jeremy loves me.”

“Oh, I’ve no doubt of that,” Leo drawled, an inflexion of mocking cynicism in his voice. “He’s written to me more in the past two months than he ever has in his life—every letter singing your praises. But I’m left in some doubt about you.” His eyes flickered down over her in icy contempt. “Some of my more naive relatives seem to think you’ve trapped him into matrimony by getting pregnant, but I think they’ve underestimated your subtlety.”

“I…I don’t know what you mean,” she protested, bewildered.

“Don’t you?” His smile was hard, not reaching his eyes. “Strange—I’m sure you’re a very clever girl. Clever enough to know that getting pregnant would have been exceedingly risky—besotted as he is, there’d be no guarantee that Jeremy would do the decent thing. So you played an even more old-fashioned trick; and very effectively, too—particularly with someone like Jeremy, who is regrettably not very good at being patient when he wants something. I just hope you feel the prize is worth the effort.”

“Of course I do!” Anger lent her voice a note of conviction it might otherwise have lacked. “I…love Jeremy—very much.”

He lifted one dark eyebrow a fraction of an inch—but it spoke volumes. “Well, there’s some reassurance in that, I suppose,” he conceded coolly. “Though whether it will stand the test of time—and harsh reality—remains to be seen.”

“Why shouldn’t it?” she demanded, her voice ragged.

He lifted his wide shoulders in a cynical shrug. “Well, for one thing there’s the matter of Jerry’s income. No doubt he’s given you the impression that there are money-trees growing here in the garden, but I’m afraid you’ll find that the true picture isn’t quite so rosy. Oh, there’ll be more than enough to keep you in a reasonable degree of comfort, given a little practical economy. Unfortunately he’s far too young to have any sense of responsibility.”

“Maybe that’s the way you see it,” she countered caustically. “But you could be wrong, you know—maybe he’s got more sense than you give him credit for.”

“Maybe,” he conceded. “But I wouldn’t put it to the test too quickly, if I were you.” Those hard eyes slid down quite deliberately over the beaded bodice of her dress to note the slenderness of her waist, his meaning insolently plain. “Let him have his fun for a few years first.”

Maddy glared up at him, her hand positively itching to slap that arrogant face. “That’s none of your business!” she protested hotly.

“Perhaps not,” he acknowledged, an unmistakable note of warning in his voice. “But I’m strangely fond of my young cousin—I wouldn’t like to see him hurt.”

She felt her cheeks flame scarlet. “What makes you think I’d hurt him?” she demanded, her voice taut with agitation. “I told you—I love him.”

“Do you?” The chill in his eyes made her shiver. “I wonder? I can’t help feeling that if you were really that much in love with him, you wouldn’t have been able to hold out quite so easily—you’d have gone to bed with him.”

This time she really did slap him—or at least she tried. But he was too quick for her, catching her wrist in a vice-like grip. Her eyes filled with tears of pain as his steely fingers dug into her dedicate skin. “Let me go,” she pleaded, all too acutely aware of the quivering response that was generating inside her; being so close to him, breathing the subtle musky scent of his skin, was affecting her in a way that she didn’t know how to control.

Those agate eyes were gazing down into hers, the amber lights in their depths seeming to mesmerise her. “Because you’re not quite the ice-princess you pretend to be, are you?” he taunted. “On the surface it’s all frosty dignity, but underneath the fires are burning—I can feel their heat.”

“No,” she protested, desperately trying to twist free of him. “You’re wrong…”

“Am I?” he challenged, drawing her closer against him, his arm sliding around her slender waist. “Then you won’t let me kiss you, will you?”

She caught her breath on a small gasp of shock, putting up her hand against his chest—but any intention she might have had to push him away melted as she felt the warmth of hard muscle beneath his white silk shirt. He laughed in mocking contempt as he recognised her lack of resistance.

“Now you’re showing yourself in your true colours,” he taunted, his head bending over hers.

His mouth was firm and sensuous, inciting her to respond, and her lips parted tremblingly as with unhurried ease his languorous tongue sought the soft inner sweetness, plundering in a deliberately flagrant exploration of all the deep, secret corners within. She closed her eyes, her head tipping back into the crook of his arm, melting in a honeyed tide of submissiveness, drugged by the musky male scent of his skin. She had been aching for this from the moment she had first set eyes on him—it had been an instantaneous reaction, far beyond the reach of reason…

But she shouldn’t be allowing it to happen…With a sudden rush of shame, she tried to pull back, but his hold on her hardened, his kiss becoming an insolent assault that she knew was intended to punish and humiliate. In a panic to get away from him, to deny the frightening power of her own desire, she deliberately sank her teeth into his lip.

“Bitch!” He let her go, anger flaring in his eyes. A small trickle of blood had appeared at the corner of his mouth, and she stared at it in horror.

“I…I’m…sorry. I didn’t mean…to hurt you,” she stammered, pain twisting in her heart. “But you…shouldn’t have done that.”

“No, I shouldn’t,” he conceded on a harsh note of anger. “You’re the woman who stood at the altar with my cousin not more than a few hours ago, vowing to forsake all others. You didn’t manage to keep it up for very long, did you?”

She drew in a long, deep breath, struggling to control the ragged beat of her heart. “Please don’t ever touch me again,” she insisted with fierce dignity. “I’m Jeremy’s wife, and I intend to do everything I can to make him happy. I don’t care whether you believe me or not—time will prove that I mean what I say.”

And, turning him an aloof shoulder, she gathered up the rustling silk folds of her wedding-dress and hurried away, back through the quiet shadows of the garden to the safety of the bright, crowded marquee.

CHAPTER THREE

MADDY turned away from the window—but the guilty memory of that kiss still haunted her heart, as it had for almost nine years. She had known as she had run from the rose-walk that she had made a terrible mistake by marrying Jeremy—but as she had slipped back into the marquee he had spotted her, darting over to catch her up in his arms, and she had known that she couldn’t tell him.

She had tried—she really had—to make him happy. Maybe if she hadn’t got pregnant so quickly…But all too soon she had been suffering morning sickness that had lasted for most of the day, and then the discomfort of swollen ankles which had forced her to rest with her feet up for a good deal of the time.

She hadn’t seen much of Leo; after his engagement to Saskia had ended he had gone back to America for almost a year, and even after his return they had met only at family gatherings, where he had never been more than distant and polite towards her—she could almost have believed that that kiss had been the product of her own fevered imagination.

Sometimes she had wondered if Jeremy sensed something, try as she might to hide it from him. Maybe that had been why things had started to go wrong…? But no—it had been his unwillingness to face up to the realities of life, to the constant demands of a small baby, to the need to spend money on boring things like repairs to the roof instead of a shiny new car.

And ultimately if had been finding one of Saskia’s earrings on the back seat of his car, and his sheepish admission that he had been having an affair with her on and off for most of the time they had been married.

She had almost been expecting something of the kind, but that it had been Saskia had been the worst blow of all. Suddenly more than ten years of her own history seemed to have been cast into a different light, showing up all the glaring faults in that friendship that had been one of the few things she had had to hold on to. She had been able to forgive, but not to forget, and in the end they had agreed quite amicably that they couldn’t go on.

And now she was going to have to deal with all those unresolved feelings that had lain dormant for so long. It had taken her about two seconds to realise that Leo still had the same devastating effect on her—and only a little longer to realise that he still regarded her with the same thinly veiled contempt.

The sound of voices downstairs in the hall warned her that Jeremy’s sister had returned; she pulled a wry face, but she was going to have to face her sooner or later, so it might as well be now. Drawing in a long, steadying breath, she crossed the room and opened the bedroom door. At least she had the slight advantage of being the one descending the stairs—even when she had lived here, Julia had somehow always managed to make her feel as though she was an interloper in this house, that she had no right to be here. This time she was going to have to assert herself right from the beginning.

Jeremy’s sister was only a few years older than herself, but her imperious manner had always made her appear much older. Her voice, as she handed out instructions to Mrs Harris about what to cook for dinner, had the quality of cut glass. Halfway down the stairs, Maddy paused for effect, armoured with a cool dignity that nine years ago she would have given anything to possess.

“Good afternoon, Julia,” she greeted her, pleased to note that her voice was well under control.

The older woman glanced up, her expression registering a faint surprise. “Madeleine…!” She recovered herself quickly. “You managed to find the time to come over, then?” she enquired with stiff cordiality. “Is Jamie with you?”

Maddy refused to allow herself to be needled. “Yes, he’s here—he’s down in the kitchen, playing with his kitten.” With a flicker of surprise, she recognised the two children who had arrived with her sister-in-law. “Goodness, it’s…Aubrey and Venetia, isn’t it? How you’ve grown!”

“It’s a long time since you’ve seen them,” Julia reminded her with a touch of asperity. “Run along downstairs, you two,” she added briskly to the children. “And don’t make a nuisance of yourselves.”

Aubrey, the older of the two—he would be about ten now, by Maddy’s reckoning—slanted his mother a look of cool insolence that would have earned Jamie a good smack, and with a small shrug of his shoulders which implied that his mother’s injunction was insultingly juvenile for one of his mature years strolled away in the direction of the kitchen door. Venetia, meanwhile—a plain, dumpy child of the same age as Jamie—pouted and put her thumb in her mouth, clutching at her mother’s skirt.

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