Читать книгу His Suitable Bride: Rafael's Suitable Bride / The Spaniard's Marriage Bargain / Cordero's Forced Bride - Эбби Грин, Kate Walker - Страница 9

RAFAEL didn’t know whether it was the hesitancy of the gesture or the implication behind it, but the result was explosive. One minute he was coolly playing with the notion that this woman, unexpectedly, might very well be the one who made sense when it came to settling down … and the next minute his body was reacting to a simple touch as if she were the first woman to have laid hands on him.

He didn’t stop to question his reaction.

Coffee was forgotten as he returned that tentative kiss with one of his own. He curled his fingers into her hair, tilting her head back so that he could plunder her sweet, eager mouth with his tongue, until her body curved against his. He could almost feel her heartbeat, and when eventually they surfaced for oxygen he held her back, breathing thickly,

‘Are you sure you want this?’ he questioned unevenly. Never before had he asked a woman whether she wanted to sleep with him. In that game called love—or rather, as far as he was concerned, lust—the rules were perfectly understood. It had always been a ritual, a courtship routine, the only difference being that the routine had never led to permanence.

How ironic that he should now give this woman the chance to back out when she was the chosen one.

He would also not be making the inevitable speech about not getting involved, about enjoyment without strings. He was filled with a strange sense of liberation. Also, the realisation that his mother had been right, that he had reached an age to settle down—and he counted himself fortunate that he was mature enough to view the situation in a cool-headed manner, to work out the most appropriate partner, thereby eliminating the possibility of failure. It was comforting to know that he could rationalise a relationship in the same way that he could rationalise a spreadsheet.

He wished that he had had that knowledge at his disposal all those years ago when he had leapt into marriage because of that non-existent, illusory and ludicrously overrated misconception called love. He wished that someone had told him then what he knew now, which was that there was no such thing as love. There was common sense, and that, above all else, was the lubrication that kept the wheels of a relationship turning.

Cristina looked at him with absolute conviction and nodded. She couldn’t help but be impressed by the fact that he hadn’t just taken what had been on offer, but had given her the opportunity to change her mind had she so wanted. How many men would have done that?

She half closed her eyes and this time, when his mouth touched hers, it was with devastating tenderness. She wrapped her arms around his neck and moaned very softly as he trailed kisses over her fluttering eyelids and damp cheeks before recapturing her mouth.

‘I think we should continue this in the bedroom, don’t you?’ he asked softly and Cristina sighed in wordless agreement.

Once there, she stared at him in open fascination as he began removing his clothes, and when he looked at her with wry amusement she blushed, but didn’t look away, and nor did he seem in the slightest bit bothered by her absorption.

Only when he was down to his boxer shorts did her nerves begin to kick in and she was overcome with sudden, horrendous shyness.

‘Don’t worry,’ Rafael murmured, oddly touched by the nervous, wary expression on her face. He walked slowly towards her, not wanting to frighten her. He was massively and unashamedly turned on, could feel his erection pushing up against the boxers, but he was going to take his time.

‘I’m not worried.’ Cristina chewed her lip, dragging her eyes away from that bulge, which was both a heady turn-on and a source of fear. ‘Okay, I am. Just a bit. I’m not … I don’t know …’

‘I’ll take care of you,’ Rafael said gently.

Cristina nodded gratefully, and continued staring at him, at his powerful, masculine beauty—the broad, brown shoulders, the narrow, tapering waist, the latent strength in his body that was visible every time he moved. There was something so graceful about him even though he was so impressively built. He was so much more experienced than she was, had had so many lovers. That was a little scary, as was the knowledge that all those lovers would have been as physically perfect as he himself was.

Cristina determined to put that out of her mind and focus instead on the extraordinary and exhilarating fact that he found her attractive.

‘I’ve never actually undressed in front of a man before,’ she confessed.

‘And it turns me on to think that I’m the first,’ Rafael told her truthfully. He would have liked to place her hand firmly on his erection, have her feel him, but he knew that he would have to wait for that, and he was happy to do that. He began undressing her and, as eventually skin touched skin, he was aware of her trembling apprehension.

Through the window, the ever-present London night-light filtered through so that they weren’t in pitch blackness.

He curved his hands to cup her breasts, which were still in the lacy bra that, in the half light, was like a tattoo on her skin. He knew that his breathing was unsteady, his body violently aroused by the lingering disrobing. Rafael had to steel himself against rushing, but it was damned hard taking his time, tracing a lazy outline of her breasts, when he wanted to rip aside that thin barrier of fabric so that he could lose himself in what they so barely contained.

His taste in women had been formed from habit: leggy, rake-thin, exquisite clothes-horses with no spare flesh. They had looked good and had turned heads, but they had not felt like this. This woman’s body proclaimed her femininity, with all its curves and abundance. He ran his hands along her sides where her waist dipped in, giving her an exquisite hour-glass shape, and felt the waistband of her matching underwear. He slowly slipped his fingers under the elasticated waistband and felt her indrawn breath.

He knew that she would be wet for him, but instead he removed his hand and began to gently unclasp her bra, murmuring soothing noises into her ear.

The sight of her naked breasts filled him with a savage adrenaline rush. He couldn’t stop a groan of pure pleasure from escaping him as he cupped them and began massaging them, rolling his thumbs over her stiffened nipples, taking it very slowly until her rapid breathing slowed to low whimpers of satisfaction.

By the time he edged her towards the bed, she was more than ready for the feel of his mouth as it covered one of those tempting circles.

Cristina had been saving herself all her life for this, and it was glorious. She gazed down at his dark head nuzzling her breast and writhed, now closing her eyes, at the sharp, delicious sensations evoked by the feel of his mouth and tongue working against the sensitive bud. Her entire body was aflame with a weird, wonderful, exquisite pleasure that made her want more. She arched up and wriggled instinctively against that exploring mouth, guiltily ashamed of this unforeseen wanton side that was suddenly and shatteringly released.

She was desperate to rip off her briefs, unable to contain her own body’s response to his caresses.

As he left her breasts to trail hot kisses along her stomach, Cristina sat up and pulled him up to her. ‘What are you doing?’ she squeaked and he grinned with boyish charm.

‘Relax. I won’t be doing anything you won’t enjoy.’

Cristina wondered how she could possibly relax when he was about to touch her there, her most intimate place, with his mouth. She was unprepared for her electrifying response as he parted those delicate folds and began caressing her with his tongue. The glory of what she was feeling stopped all her incipient inhibitions dead in their tracks, and she began moaning as he continued to lick that wildly sensitised nub until she could feel her own inevitable climax approaching.

No! Even in her innocence, she knew that love-making should be a two-way process, and she limply tried to struggle up, but her efforts were useless against the inroads he was making with his expert lathering. She dropped back against the pillows, unable to do anything but watch his head moving between her thighs, and then she was lost in wave upon wave of shameless pleasure which had her arching back, crying out at the intensity of her fulfilment.

‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered, mortified at her lack of control over her own body.

Rafael, still recovering from the intensity of satisfaction he had derived from pleasuring her, gave her a bemused look. ‘You’re sorry?’ It dawned on him that regrets were beginning to sink in with her. She had been swept away on those notoriously unreliable wings of temptation and now she was fast recovering her senses. ‘Sorry about what?’ He levered himself up so that he was alongside her and, once there, he had to make use of all the will power at his disposal not to touch those breasts, which could drive a man wild with desire.

‘It … it shouldn’t have happened like this …’ Cristina whispered, truly devastated that a man of his experience had been doomed to end up with a partner like her, someone utterly clueless between the sheets. She could feel the onset of tears forming at the back of her throat, and she swallowed them down shakily.

‘Like … what? Do you regret what’s just happened between us?’ As confident in the bedroom as he was in the board room, Rafael now felt himself floundering in unmarked territory.

‘I don’t regret it,’ Cristina said miserably. ‘But … but I … It can’t have been very satisfying for you …’

Rafael almost laughed but he contained himself, suspecting that she might interpret such a response in the wrong light. Instead, he stroked the side of her cheek and smiled.

‘I have no idea what you’re talking about,’ he told her gently, which induced another watery smile.

‘I’ve read articles. Men like to be satisfied through full intercourse … if they aren’t.’ Cristina tried to remember what happened if they weren’t. ‘Doesn’t that lead to dangerous blockages? Or something.?’

Rafael felt his lips twitch and he cleared his throat noisily. ‘That’s not a consequence I’ve ever heard of before,’ he said seriously. ‘And I happen to be completely satisfied.’ He leaned forward and kissed her very gently on the lips. ‘Believe me when I tell you that your response to being touched was immensely gratifying, and I feel privileged to have … given you pleasure.’

Cristina felt the sun burst through the clouds and this time her smile was full of shy warmth. He was a generous lover. Had she really expected him to be otherwise? Hadn’t she known, somewhere deep inside, that that would be the case? Hadn’t she known that this man, however wrong he might seem on paper, and however vastly different their levels of experience were, was right in every sense of the word?

Fate, she now thought, had seen fit to throw them together for a reason, and the reason was this.

She took his hand and placed it on her breast, and she loved as he drew in his breath sharply, as if in the grip of something over which he had no control. When he guided her hand to him, it was completely natural and when, after a blissful and leisurely foreplay, they made love, it was glorious. Wonderful. If she could have made time stand still, she would have done so. She would have liked to bottle the memory and kept it close to her for ever, so that she could breathe it in whenever she wanted.

‘What are you thinking?’ Rafael asked, propping himself up on one elbow and looking down at her.

‘I’m thinking that I’m normally in bed at this hour.’

‘You are in bed.’

‘In bed and asleep,’ she amended, laughing contentedly, the cat in full possession of the cream.

‘And would you say that you’re happy doing without your beauty sleep?’ he asked lazily. She had satisfied him beyond expectation. After her initial apprehension, because the unknown was always so much scarier than the reality, she had been sexily and mind-blowingly responsive, thrilling at each touch, whimpering with the enjoyment of having him lavish her fulsome body with caresses. There was not an inch of her that he hadn’t explored, and he had enjoyed every second of the exploration.

‘I think it’s made a very nice change,’ she said demurely, and then laughed when he took offence and nipped her on the neck. He placed his hand squarely between her thighs and worked her flesh so that his knuckles grazed that already sensitised area.

She would have liked to be more expressive on the subject, but a part of her was still finding it hard to believe that this magnificent man was really interested in her. There was also a part of her that was nursing a small thought which had taken root at some point during their very long and very languid love-making session. It was a thought that filled her with a warm glow and for the moment she wanted to keep it to herself because, after all, this was the first night they had spent together. What if he got bored with her? He seemed to have a short attention span when it came to women, but Cristina wasn’t going to dwell on that. Instead, she thought of how great it felt being in love, because she knew, with complete certainty, that she was in love with him.

Maybe he had had plenty of women in the past, maybe he had had an unhappy experience when he was young and foolishly married the wrong woman—but he was older now, and she liked to think that the very fact that she was so unlike the women who littered his past was promising.

‘“Nice” is such a non-word,’ Rafael chided. He replaced his hand with his thigh which he moved rhythmically between her legs.

‘That’s not your ego talking, is it?’ she teased, half her attention focused on what was going on with her body, which was stirring into arousal even though they had barely stopped touching each other for the past few hours.

‘We males are a fragile breed,’ Rafael returned silkily.

‘Perhaps I should say that it was earth shattering.’

‘Now that is a definite improvement.’ He cupped one heavy breast and then bent so that he could lick her nipple, which stiffened in immediate response. When he began suckling on it she gave a stifled groan and began moving against him, and this time they made love with hunger and urgency, their hands and mouths uniting as they explored each other’s bodies. She did to him what he did to her, tasting him and enjoying his hardness, every inch of it.

She finally fell asleep and woke to a room flooded with sunlight and no sign of Rafael.

But there was a note. The note informed her that he would be in touch, and she carried it with her for the remainder of the day. Just having it on her made her heart sing. She literally felt light-headed with emotion and when, the following day, she picked up her telephone to hear his dark, velvety voice on the other end of the line, it was all she could do not to tell him just how very happy she was.

And events over the ensuing three months moved at the speed of light.

Rafael, she discovered, was not a man who did things in halves. He wanted her, and she was more than ready to accommodate him. Playing hard to get was not in her repertoire of feminine wiles, even when Anthea, who had viewed the proceedings with jaundiced eyes, told her that Rafael didn’t appear to be the sort of man who would feel comfortable wearing an apron and putting out the garbage.

‘He’ll never have to wear an apron!’ Cristina laughed. ‘Why would he?’

‘What a lucky man,’ Anthea said wryly. ‘Most women expect their guys to share the duties.’

‘I really enjoy cooking,’ Cristina told her, hurt by the implication that she was somehow lacking. True, she knew that she held very old-fashioned values, but that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, was it?

‘And have you done much of that?’

‘None,’ Cristina confessed. ‘I’ve offered, but—’

‘But he’s a man who prefers to dine out?’ In the time they had been working together they had become firm friends, and, although their ages were close enough, Anthea was streets ahead when it came to men. Normally Cristina would have paid great attention to what her friend said, but when it came to Rafael she would allow no criticism. Anthea, she thought, was jaded from the bad experiences she had had with men. She also was not privy to the man behind that forbidding mask: the man who treated her with respect and consideration, the man who made love to her, always making sure that her needs were met ahead of his, the man who, yes, guarded his thoughts, but still managed to laugh at the things she said, the man who’d told her that she was wonderfully uncomplicated, the man who had encouraged her football coaching, even occasionally taking time out to come and see her.

‘I’m just asking you to be careful.’ Anthea relented, seeing the anxious expression on her friend’s face. Cristina’s open, trusting nature was at once both a blessing and a curse, as far as Anthea was concerned. Yes, her heart was fashioned out of pure gold, but it was a heart that could easily be broken, and Anthea had visited too many dodgy characters in the past not to know that someone like Rafael Rocchi would not be in it for the long haul. Not with a girl like Cristina who, rich in her own right though she might be, was not the ornamental bauble he would eventually like to dangle on his arm.

She had even been on the Internet and found pages upon pages on him, including a wide variety of pictures which had almost universally featured him with just those ornamental baubles she had expected to find. She had kept all of that to herself, but in her head a very clear picture had been formed of the sort of man he was.

‘I mean,’ she suggested kindly, ‘Would it be the end of the world if you edged the conversation towards a future?’

Cristina, who had been mulling over that very question for the past couple of weeks, decided that yet again fate was at work, putting the thought firmly in the foreground.

She took more than usual care with her outfit that evening. Rafael had been away for the past three days, a flying visit to Boston. He was, he had told her over the telephone, really dying to see her. He was not averse to having long, sexy conversations with her on the phone, conversations that made her toes curls when she later recalled them. Cristina predicted that he would be in a very good mood when he came over.

They had planned on a meal out, as normal. After a flurry of trying different restaurants, they had now narrowed the field to a few of their favourites. Occasionally they skipped eating altogether, when the draw of the bedroom was simply too irresistible.

Today, however, Cristina had left work especially early to cook a meal. Fish, because she was still eternally watching her weight, and vegetables prepared exactly how she had been taught by their chef at home when she’d been growing up. Everything organic, of course, and everything bathed in a wonderful atmosphere thanks to some terrific smelly candles which she had found at a tiny little shop only round the corner.

As she took a last look at her reflection, liking the way the black dress cunningly hid what she still considered serious love-handles—never mind Rafael’s flattery to the contrary—she felt her stomach flip over with a sudden attack of nerves.

She had been blissfully happy. Rafael fulfilled every part of her. He was her sounding board and her soul mate, but Anthea’s blunt words of caution had managed to seep their way into her head, filling her with doubts. It seemed pretty early in the relationship for them to be discussing a future, but then again—and here she recalled yet more words of wisdom from one of the magazines she had devoured in the past—weren’t two people in love supposed to know early on whether they wanted to commit to one another or not? She was sure she had read somewhere that relationships could drift for years, going apparently nowhere, only for one of the partners to break it off and within weeks to be married to someone else.

When Cristina tried to think of life without Rafael, her mind went blank and she felt cold with fear.

That fear, she reasoned now, could only be assuaged if she took the bull by the horns and did as Anthea had suggested.

For a few seconds, waiting for Rafael, she was filled with self-righteous courage, but as soon as she heard him phone up to her, her stomach went back to its antics, and she was busily wondering whether the meal had been such a good idea by the time he knocked on her door.

All her thoughts were scattered to the four winds the minute she set eyes on him.

He had come directly from the airport, was still carrying his overnight bag, along with the black case. Outside the weather was beautifully mild for the middle of May, and he had cuffed the sleeves of his shirt to his elbows. He looked lean and bronzed and muscular, and she felt that familiar leap of excitement as she looked at him.

Then he bent and kissed her, taking his time as he always did, his mouth making promises he would fulfil later in bed.

Only after he had straightened did he glance behind her into the tiny hall.

‘What’s the smell?’

‘Smell?’ Anthea’s words of wisdom were fading fast as he stepped past her and glanced up the stairs in the direction of the kitchen. ‘Oh, that smell!’ She clapped her hand to her forehead in a casual gesture. ‘I thought I’d cook. I know we’d booked to go out to that Italian, but all this eating out that we do … I’m not sure I’m getting the right balance of … um … nutrients anyway.’ He was heading up the stairs and she hurriedly followed him, cursing herself for the linen, the crystal wineglasses and the candles which were burning merrily away. Hardly the image of a meal whipped up by someone solely for nutritional purposes.

‘Anyway!’ she called up, shoving aside visions of him horrified by this show of domesticity, which he had not once suggested. ‘I thought I’d just …’ she caught her breath and watched him as he stood there in the small kitchen, surveying the carefully laid table, complete with the hateful candles … ‘.whip up a meal for us. Nothing fancy.’ She bit her lip nervously and hovered. ‘I don’t mind if you’d rather go out,’ she finished lamely, but when he turned to her he was smiling, a slow smile as though something had clicked in his head.

‘No way. Smells too good to pass up.’ He walked towards her and gathered her in his arms. ‘I didn’t realise that cooking was another of your specialities.’ Another tick in what had become a pleasingly traditional package. Cristina was a home-maker, and as far removed from the women he had dated in the past as chalk was from cheese.

Cristina breathed a sigh of relief. ‘I wouldn’t say a speciality.’

‘Have I got time for a shower?’ She had dressed for him. She had cooked for him. Normally those two things in combination would have had him running a mile, but with home and hearth on the agenda, they added up to just what he needed. A woman programmed to put her man first, a woman set in completely the opposite mould to that of his first wife. The fact that she turned him on was a distinct bonus, and he didn’t dwell on what would happen when his boredom threshold was breached. That bridge would be crossed when he came to it. ‘I don’t suppose you fancy another?’ His eyes swept appreciatively over her. He enjoyed showering with her, enjoyed their slippery bodies rubbing together under the fine, warm spray.

‘I’ll start with the meal.’ She remembered what Anthea had said about modern women expecting duties to be shared equally with their men. ‘You can come and help when you’re ready. If you want. I’ve pretty much done it all, as a matter of fact.’ She wondered where she was going with this. And now he was looking at her with that indulgent expression he sometimes wore, which she’d interpreted as the grown-up tolerating the antics of a kid.

She was ready with the starters by the time he emerged twenty minutes later from the shower, his hair still damp and swept back, and wearing a pair of jeans and a black tee shirt. He had never brought clothes to her house, but over time she had accumulated some, left and laundered and carefully put in one of the cupboards in the spare room. She had taken it, subconsciously, as a hopeful sign that he hadn’t removed them, but had dipped into them, taking it for granted that he would have one or two essentials on tap.

Rafael felt wonderfully relaxed. He made a token effort to do something with a bowl of lettuce leaves and some spring onions, but in the end contented himself with pouring them both a glass of wine and sitting down at the kitchen table so that he could watch her as she bustled around the kitchen, checking things and fetching crockery down from the cupboards.

He found her tide of chirpy chatter as entertaining as it was soothing. For someone who worked in a flower shop and did football coaching once a week, she always seemed bursting with news—things she had seen during her day, the random people she had chatted to, thoughts and plans that had flitted through her head and which she’d told him she liked to discuss with him. He was amazed that it didn’t irritate the hell out of him, but it didn’t. She was easily pleased and he found that he liked that. In the general scheme of things, the less easily pleased the woman, the shorter the relationship.

Now she was chatting to him about the starter, which was a combination of various seafoods in a spicy tomato sauce and served in a large glass bowl stuffed with crisp lettuce and tomatoes.

‘Am I boring you?’ she asked out of the blue, and Rafael looked at her quizzically.

‘Why would you ask that?’

‘Because I seem to be the one doing all the talking, and …’ She tucked her hair behind her ear and looked at him earnestly. ‘I just wondered whether you find it a bit dull listening to me rattle on about the silly things that happen in my life, when you’d probably much rather be talking about more important stuff.’

Rafael speared a prawn on his fork and held it out to her to nibble. She had a very sexy mouth and a very sexy way of eating food. She didn’t view it as a plateful of calories waiting to pounce. She enjoyed every mouthful of what she ate, and it was a turn-on just watching her.

This time, however, she shook her head and stared down at her plate for a few seconds.

‘I enjoy not talking about “important stuff’,’ Rafael told her. ‘I spend countless hours talking about important stuff. It’s great to get here and listen to you tell me about the latest drama in your life.’

‘I don’t have a dramatic life, Rafael. You do.’

‘On the contrary.’ He finished his starter and stood up to clear the table. ‘I listen to stockbrokers and bankers and lawyers discuss technicalities of management buyouts and takeover bids and foreign currency markets. Hardly drama.’

That sounded pretty dramatic to Cristina, whose mind seemed to shut down the second it was presented with a financial problem. Anthea had turned out to be a godsend in that area, handling all the accounts efficiently and expertly. Normally she would have chattered away to him about her lack of ability when it came to sorting out money matters. He’d often teased her about that. But now, on her pressing bandwagon of trying to find out where they were going, and with Anthea’s warning words ringing in her ears, she lapsed into anxious silence.

‘What did you talk to … your other girlfriends about?’ she asked eventually, and he frowned at her.

‘How am I supposed to remember?’ She seemed to be lost in a little worried world of her own, so he fetched the fish from the oven and gestured for her to remain seated while he dished out. ‘Now.’ He sat down and looked at her steadily. ‘What’s this all about?’

Now or never. She took a deep breath and reminded herself that she had never been the sort of girl who was willing to be dangled on a string, waiting for a day that might never arrive. She had old-fashioned principles, and already she was in the process of jettisoning them by sleeping with Rafael when she had no real idea where they were heading. She had fallen instantly and madly in love with him and, while that love was glorious and uplifting, it had also cleverly ambushed a lifetime’s worth of romantic convictions and beliefs.

‘Rafael … I really need to know where we’re going. I mean,’ she continued hurriedly, ‘I never planned to get involved in a relationship that was going nowhere.’ Underneath the kitchen table, she wrung her hands together and mentally told herself that she was absolutely doing the right thing. ‘I’ve told Mum and Dad about us, and they haven’t said anything, but I know that they don’t approve. This may sound silly to you, but …’ Those amazing blue eyes were narrowed on her and she didn’t have a clue what was going on in his head. She had seen that look a few times when he had taken work calls in her presence, that inscrutable, shuttered look that lent him an air of chilling foreboding. Directed at her, she felt her stomach spasm into painful knots as she desperately tried to hang on to her courage.

‘But …?’

‘But I haven’t been brought up to sleep my way through a series of meaningless relationships.’ Another lungful of air. ‘I …’ She almost slipped up and told him that she loved him, but she bit back the words which, even more than the carefully planned meal, would have guaranteed him running scared within seconds. He had not once mentioned love, and she wasn’t going to ask for declarations, just for the hope that they could progress the relationship in the right direction.

‘And that’s a good thing,’ he surprised her by saying. He leaned across the table towards her. The first time he had proposed marriage, he had done it in style—bended knee, his mother’s engagement ring. That marriage had been an illusion. This, however, was reality and there would be no foolish romantic gestures. ‘I don’t expect you to continue sleeping with me, assuming the position of mistress. I knew that the very first time we slept together it was a matter of great significance for you.’ He paused. ‘I would never disrespect you, nor would I disrespect your parents by stringing you along. Which is why I think we should get married.’

‘Get married?’

‘Of course.’

This wasn’t what Cristina had imagined, not as a marriage proposal nor, for that matter, as a likely outcome for her conversation with him. Gradually, though, his words sunk in. Not only was he prepared to offer her hope that their relationship was more serious than she could ever have dreamed possible, but he was proving it by doing the one thing he had spent years avoiding! It might have been a bit flat as far as proposals went, but he wasn’t given to sweeping emotional displays, and wasn’t this her dream come true? Her fairy-tale ending?

She smiled tentatively and he took her hand and idly played with her wedding finger. ‘So … is that a yes?’ he asked softly.

‘It’s a yes!’

‘Good.’ Rafael sat back, satisfied. ‘In that case, a ring is in order. I think it’s safe to say that we might as well enjoy a brief spell of calm before our families are let loose.’

That funny, flat feeling was gone as her imagination took wing and began to soar. A ring! She would be sporting an engagement ring! And would be marrying the man of her dreams! How much better could life get?

She went across and flung her arms around him. ‘Does that mean,’ he drawled, ‘That you’re offering yourself for dessert?’

‘Just making the most of this brief spell of calm, as you ordered,’ Cristina laughed. ‘And, in case you’re still hungry, you can have whatever dessert you like …’