Читать книгу Royals: Wed To The Prince: By Royal Command / The Princess and the Outlaw / The Prince's Secret Bride - Leanne Banks, Robyn Donald - Страница 15

‘IT’S legal?’ Ashen-faced, Lauren stared at him.

‘According to my lawyer we could be on shaky ground if we assume it’s not binding.’ He spoke levelly, no emotions showing in either tone or expression.

Rallying, she exploded, ‘But there was no licence, no identification—nothing but the form that—that—’

‘Josef,’ Guy supplied helpfully.

‘That Josef had with him.’ She unclenched the fists at her sides. ‘It cannot possibly be legal.’

Guy’s broad shoulders lifted in a negligent shrug. ‘On Sant’Rosa, it seems, the ceremony and Josef’s form might be enough.’

Numbly Lauren walked across to the window, staring out at the picture-perfect garden, lushly subtropical, familiar and safe. The dog, Fancy, wandered across the lawn and spread herself out on the terrace in the sun, yawning prodigiously before curling up for another of her interminable naps.

Panic hollowed out her stomach, brought her brain skidding to a halt. Married to Guy Bagaton?

‘No,’ she said starkly. ‘I won’t accept it.’

‘Accepting it or not isn’t going to make a blind bit of difference,’ Guy stated with brutal frankness. ‘And it’s not certain; my solicitors are working on it. I thought you should know so that you can be prepared.’

‘Thank you.’ She took a deep breath and forced her brain into action.

Even if the marriage was valid, it would only be a nuisance. It would take time and money she couldn’t afford to sort out, but that was all. That had to be all; she couldn’t let memories of the time they’d spent together affect her—they certainly weren’t affecting him.

But if a journalist got to hear about it, there was a chance that someone might dig deeper to discover the secret at the heart of her life. She’d cope—but her parents had to be protected.

Taking a deep breath, she asked, ‘When will you know?’

‘Things are still confused in Sant’Rosa, but my solicitor is confident that he’ll get an answer within two weeks. I shall, of course, let you know immediately.’

She nodded stiffly. ‘Thank you,’ she said again.

Eyes narrowed golden slivers beneath heavy eyelids, Guy scrutinised her face. ‘However, if this gets out you may find journalists contacting you to ask about your escape from Sant’Rosa.’

Lauren’s stomach dropped. Before she could stop herself, she said, ‘Oh, God no! The last thing I want is the media poking around in my life!’

Black brows lifting, he scanned her like a predator assessing prey, yet his voice was idly enquiring when he asked, ‘Any particular reason?’

Careful, she cautioned herself. ‘Just an innate dislike of figuring in headlines.’

He observed casually, ‘Which is why I warned you. Don’t answer the phone—tell the housekeeper to say you’re not here.’

Logic kicked in just in time to stop her from panicking. ‘But surely public interest in a small war on a tiny island nation is already waning? I noticed there wasn’t much in this morning’s paper.’ She added with a smile that was a bit lopsided, ‘I’m sure they’d like to discover the identity of “the mysterious Englishman” who fought for the Sant’Rosans, although that must be stale news now too.’

‘Unfortunately some fools tried to shoot down a plane leaving the airport,’ he said bluntly. ‘It’s stirred up the whole hornet’s nest again.’

Lauren bit her lip. ‘I can’t imagine Josef will tell anyone what happened.’

‘It’s unlikely,’ he agreed, angular features hard and determined, ‘but there were other people in the terminal building that night.’

‘They wouldn’t have seen anything,’ she said evenly, thoughts milling uselessly around in her mind. Trying to convince herself, she added, ‘And the journalists will be war correspondents. Surely they won’t be interested.’

‘A reporter is always a reporter. Curiosity is their trade.’ When she stayed silent he went on, ‘It’s not exactly a death sentence if you appear in a headline or two.’

His choice of words startled her, but she told herself not to overreact. Even if someone found out about the marriage ceremony, it didn’t mean that they’d pry any deeper into her life. Even if they did—

‘If you’re worried about anyone discovering that we spent several days together on Valanu—’

‘No,’ she said too quickly. ‘Well, I’d sooner it didn’t star in a media frenzy, of course, but I’m sure they won’t be interested in that.’

Resisting a gaze that frightened her with its probing intelligence, she finished on what she fervently hoped was a throwaway note, ‘Of course you’ll look even more of a hero than you already are.’ She indicated a newspaper on the table.

Ignoring it, he shrugged. ‘It means nothing.’

That maddening flash of memory resurfaced, only to vanish, leaving her to stare into the face of a stranger—a stranger she knew more intimately than any other man.

‘I know,’ she said stiffly. ‘It’s just that I value my privacy.’

‘As do we all.’ He looked around the elegant, civilised room and said, ‘This house is a far cry from Valanu. Are you going to show me the beach?’

Baffled and hurt by the whip-flick of contempt in his words, she said, ‘Yes, of course.’

They went out into the mellow autumn sunlight, Fancy joining them with a frisk of her head. Guy crouched down to stroke the golden head with a skill that indicated familiarity with dogs.

Fancy, of course, adored him, wriggling with delight when he scratched in exactly the right place behind her ears. Well, the dog was female, Lauren thought with a queer twist in her heart. Acquaintance made, he stood up in a lithe movement, tall and strong against the green of the garden, and looked around him with an expressionless face.

Lauren scanned the bold, autocratic bone structure, skin tingling as though she’d brushed up against an electric fence. ‘If we are married—if the ceremony was legal—what can we do?’

‘Annulment on the grounds of non-consummation being out of the question,’ he said curtly, ‘I presume it will mean divorce.’

A pang of—bitterness?—ripped through her. Trying to regain some sense of control, she dragged in a deep breath and led the way down to the beach. She bent sideways to take off her sandals and dropped them on the grassy bank beneath one of the huge pohutukawa trees. ‘Surely it will be invalid everywhere but Sant’Rosa?’

Despising the pleading note in her voice, she clamped her mouth on more words. When Guy didn’t answer she swung around to face him.

He said coolly, ‘A marriage contracted legally in one country is usually legal in any other, unless it’s polygamous. Even underage marriages are not necessarily invalid.’

Lauren concentrated on relaxing her taut muscles as she walked beside him along the sand, pleasantly warm beneath the soles of her feet. A gull soared up in front of them with a shriek that sounded too much like derisive laughter.

‘Thanks for warning me,’ she said slowly.

Fancy pushed into her, offering comfort for an emotion she’d never understand—one even Lauren didn’t recognise.

Guy’s face was a handsome mask over his thoughts. ‘If anyone contacts you, simply refuse to comment.’ He waited before adding with exquisite suavity, ‘You needn’t, of course, be concerned that I plan to claim any marital rights.’

Colour scorched along her cheekbones. ‘I’m not,’ she said shortly. ‘Why didn’t Josef tell us it might be valid?’

Guy’s mouth thinned. ‘If you remember, he warned us that it might be valid only on Sant’Rosa. But what else was he to do? He’s a good bureaucrat—even with his world falling to pieces around him, he wouldn’t send you to another country without papers.’

Lauren’s teeth savaged her lower lip for a second. Faced with the horror of war, Josef had done what he could to save her from a similar fate.

She said on a sigh, ‘If you wanted to make me feel like a heel, you’ve succeeded. Is he all right?’

‘As all right as a man can be who has lost his oldest son,’ he said brusquely.

Lauren’s eyes filled with sudden tears. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said again, groping for a handkerchief to wipe her eyes and blow her nose. ‘Against that, I haven’t got much to complain about.’

‘Not a lot.’ His tone was so dry it could have soaked up a minor lake or two. ‘It’s not a disaster, Lauren; inconvenient, certainly, and with the prospect of some rather fulsome and irritating publicity if it gets out, but nothing to panic about.’

Head held high, Lauren said, ‘Of course. But I don’t consider myself married to you!’

‘That,’ he said calmly, ‘is entirely mutual. On reflection, our charming idyll on Valanu was rash, but hindsight is always wiser than foresight.’ He turned and examined the house, a sprawling white place mellow with many years of love and care. ‘If the ceremony turns out to be legal, I’ll contact you so that we can apply to whatever court has the power to have the marriage dissolved.’

‘Thank you,’ she said automatically.

Still with his gaze on the house, he said, ‘You have a very indulgent employer. Does he allow all his executives to take their holidays in his private hideaway?’

How did he know that Marc was her employer?

Then she realised what he was implying.

Cool distaste coloured her tone. ‘You’ll have to ask him that.’

‘I assume your fear of the media is in case your lover hears about your indiscretion on Valanu,’ he said, his pleasant tone failing to hide the steely edge in the words.

‘What?’

He said contemptuously, ‘Don’t lie to me. I know you are his mistress, since even before he married his lovely New Zealander.’

One of the first things Marc taught her was that losing her temper put her at an immediate disadvantage. With his advice in mind, Lauren had kept her cool when facing down unfriendly meetings, rejecting sexual harassment and dealing with carpet sellers in Middle Eastern markets.

Pain clawed her so sharply that she lost control. ‘My life is none of your business,’ she said in a voice that should have turned the ground beneath them to permafrost.

Black brows climbed just enough to indicate Guy’s total and scornful disbelief. ‘When you invited me into your bed and your arms, it became my business,’ he said silkily.

Stabbed by a searing mixture of anguish and outrage, she said thinly, ‘That was an—an aberration.’

He laughed. ‘A very pleasurable one for me,’ he drawled.

‘I am not Marc Corbett’s mistress,’ she ground out.

‘It is an old-fashioned term, I agree. Do you prefer lover?’

Her lips tightened. ‘Neither.’ Trying to regain control of the situation, she went on, ‘Before I decide what to do, I’ll consult my solicitor. He might be able to find out something yours hasn’t.’

Guy stopped and looked down at her, narrowed golden eyes uncompromising in the stark framework of his face. ‘Get this straight,’ he said flatly. ‘You don’t decide—we’re in this together.’

Her mouth dried. ‘I didn’t mean that I’d make a unilateral decision.’

After a pause he said abruptly, ‘Tell me about your relationship with Marc Corbett.’

Guy watched the familiar blankness shut down her expression. When her tongue stole out to wet her lips, he had to rein in the lash of desire that cut through him.

She said quietly, ‘I don’t know whether I can trust you.’

Cold fury stirred beneath the desire. ‘I can’t, of course, force your confidence.’

She glanced up, pale eyes glinting and intelligent. After a long moment she said abruptly, ‘He saved my life.’

Astonishment replaced his anger. Whatever he’d expected to hear, it wasn’t that. ‘How?’

Muscles moved beneath the silken skin of her throat as she swallowed. ‘Just after I graduated from university I developed leukaemia.’

His blood ran cold. ‘Go on.’

‘I needed a bone marrow transplant, but they couldn’t find one to suit.’ She spoke dispassionately, as though it had happened to some other woman. ‘In the end we discovered that Marc was a perfect match. If he hadn’t been, I’d have died.’

The ugly clutch of fear fading, Guy said slowly, ‘I see.’ It was outrageous, unbelievable that this lovely, vital woman had been threatened by death.

Lauren stopped to pick up a shell. Keeping her gaze on its pearly sheen and intricate spirals, she said, ‘After that, I hero-worshipped him a bit.’

‘I can understand that.’ The crispness of his tone hid, he hoped, the questions seething through his mind.

How had her doctors found that Marc Corbett was a bone marrow match? Common sense told him that the man had probably enrolled on the worldwide register—but why? And surely donors’ names were kept secret?

Lauren looked at him with eyes so translucent it seemed impossible for her to hide a thought. ‘He told me that when I got better he’d give me a job if I wanted one and if I was suitable; of course I was delighted, and when I got the all-clear I fronted up. I had to go through the same process as anyone else, but I got in, and ever since then we’ve had a sort of—well, closeness. I try not to impose on it, but he’s a darling, and so is his wife, Paige.’

Guy’s mouth curved in an ironic smile. He liked Marc Corbett and respected him, but darling wasn’t a word he’d have used to describe the man.

Once again she lifted limpid eyes to his. Her voice rang true, she was looking him straight in the face, but instincts honed in the cutthroat world he’d made his own told him she was lying. Or at the very least, only revealing part of the truth.

Coldly, clinically, he decided that if her story was a front for an affair, it had the advantage of originality. Even if it was true, she could still be Marc Corbett’s lover.

As for her obvious affection for Paige Corbett, it wouldn’t be the first—or the last—time a woman had an ongoing relationship with the husband of a friend.

Lauren wondered uneasily what was going on behind those fabulous features, gilded by sunlight. Did he believe her? And had it been enough to satisfy him?

She found herself wishing she could trust him with the whole truth. If it had just been herself she might have, but in the end it wasn’t her secret.

She said brightly, ‘It’s an old story, and not one I’d like to get around. Some people say that if you save someone’s life you’re responsible for them forever afterwards; I’d hate people to believe Marc gave me a job because of some quirk of genetic good fortune.’

‘I can understand that,’ Guy said with a smile that blended irony with a hint of self-derision.

Sunlight conjured a shimmer of mahogany fire from his black hair. He dragged out a wallet from his pocket, scribbled something on a page of a small diary, and tore it out to hand to her. ‘In case you need me,’ he said.

Their fingers touched, and Lauren’s heart jumped.

‘And just to remind you how it was with us—’ he said through his teeth, and covered the three paces that separated them, drawing her into his arms.

Every nerve speared by forbidden delight, Lauren froze. He looked down into her face, his own angrily intent. ‘No, you haven’t forgotten,’ he said in a raw voice.

And then he kissed her eyelids closed, his breath warm on her skin.

Pierced by erotic poignancy, Lauren’s defences crumbled into sand. This was what she’d been waiting for—this sense of rightness, of completeness…

His lips crushed hers in a kiss that obliterated all sense of time and space. Helplessly she melted into his arms and gave him everything he asked for, responding with feverish passion to his sensuous onslaught.

But although she wanted nothing more than to let this go on to its inevitable conclusion, she finally fought free of the consuming hunger to shake her head and drag her mouth from his, gasping hoarsely, ‘No!’

A fierce, possessive gleam fired his eyes. ‘But you were saying yes a moment ago.’

Even then she hovered on the brink of surrender until hard common sense forced its way through the mists of desire.

‘No,’ she repeated quietly, uncompromisingly, because she knew that she’d never be safe, that the only way to stop herself from falling headlong into infatuation was to end it now.

But oh, it was hard to say, with his strength and his heat seducing her, with the sexy, evocative aroma of his skin scrambling her brain, and his taste on her lips, in her mouth—when every cell in her body screamed for the release only he could give her.

His mouth hardened. ‘Why?’

‘Because I don’t want this.’ The lie hurt, and it hurt more that he knew it was a lie. ‘I find you very attractive,’ she hurried on, surprised at the clarity of each word, ‘but the idea of being married to you—if that’s what I am—is ridiculous. And I certainly don’t want an affair with you.’

She invested the final word with a flick of scorn, and saw it register on his face. He smiled, and as she shivered he freed her and stepped back.

‘Really?’ he said politely. ‘I can think of plenty of words to describe such a marriage, but ridiculous doesn’t come to mind. As for the affair— I thought we’d already had it.’

‘We spent a few days together,’ she corrected, gripped by intolerable anguish. Yet she had to send him out of her life. ‘I’m sorry, but a tropical fling is not expected to last beyond the tropics. I’ll always be grateful to you for saving my life, because I suspect that’s what you did.’

‘Stop right there,’ he advised with an inflection so deadly it chilled her into temporary paralysis. ‘If you’re telling me that you slept with me out of gratitude, I’ll just have to show you that you’re wrong. We made love because we wanted each other.’

‘Of course I did—we did!’ She struggled to clear her mind. ‘You know very well that I—that we—that it was mutual.’ She stopped and dragged in a jerky breath before finishing defiantly, ‘But it’s over.’

For a charged moment he surveyed her, his beautiful mouth hard against the chiselled angles of his face. Finally he drawled, ‘Then there’s nothing more to say,’ and turned away. ‘Goodbye, Lauren.’

Aching with a bleak sense of loss and pain, she watched him stride towards the thick row of trees that hid the helicopter pad. Fate and war had shackled them together until they could get free of this marriage.

Whatever she felt for Guy Bagaton couldn’t possibly be love; that involved much more than gratitude and great sex.

Only a loser would love a man who thought she was another man’s mistress, and she wasn’t a loser. She didn’t even know him.

Not really.

The sound of the helicopter’s rotor blades drove her to shelter beneath the overhanging branches of one of the great trees bordering the champagne curve of the beach. As she listened to the machine carry Guy away from her, she found herself thinking of all the ways she did know him…

Perhaps when people had forgotten about the war in Sant’Rosa, it might be safe to see him again. Without all this other baggage cluttering up their relationship, they could perhaps meet as ordinary people.

No. She’d sent him away.

And she’d do it again. When she’d asked her mother why, of all the people in the world, Marc’s bone marrow matched hers, Isabel’s admission of adultery had been shattering enough, but what had appalled her was her mother’s response when Lauren began to ask if her father knew.

After the first two tentative words her mother had interrupted fiercely, ‘He does now. Don’t ever speak to him about it. The stress could kill him.’

Lauren didn’t know how her parents had worked through this rough patch, but their love had held them together through the trauma.

When the steady thump-thump-thump of the rotors had died away, she went back inside and rang London.

‘How’s Dad?’

‘He’s fine,’ her mother said reassuringly. ‘How are you, darling?’

‘Fine too, but I’ve had an unsettling visit from the man who got me out of Sant’Rosa.’

Censoring heavily, she told her mother why Guy had come, ending with, ‘I think I’ll come home as soon as I can.’

‘No,’ Isabel said firmly. ‘You need that holiday, Lauren—your health isn’t anything to take lightly.’

‘I feel perfectly normal again,’ Lauren assured her. Well, apart from worrying about journalists, the marriage, and obsessing about Guy. ‘But if some reporter finds out about this wretched marriage they’ll probably come looking for you.’

After a silence in which her mother absorbed the implications, Isabel responded with even more firmness, ‘So we will just ignore them.’

Lauren said bleakly, ‘They might start digging around.’

The hesitation at the other end of the line revealed that her mother had already thought of that. ‘They won’t find anything,’ Isabel said finally, her voice taut but confident. ‘If this false marriage does come to light, it will be a three days’ wonder. Ah, darling—your father’s just come in.’

Lauren waited tensely, smiling as her father’s voice echoed across the world. ‘Stay there,’ he commanded. ‘By the way, what’s the man who got you off Sant’Rosa like?’

‘Forceful and formidable,’ Lauren said lightly. And judgemental.

‘Would I like him?’

She laughed. ‘Yes, I think you would. You like Marc, don’t you?’

‘Very much,’ he said gruffly. ‘Mind you, Marc saved your life, but then, this man might have too. When this bit of a fuss is over, I’d like to shake his hand. Stay there and finish your holiday, Lauren. I want to see colour in your cheeks when you come back.’

‘Yes, Daddy,’ she said in mock obedience, and heard him guffaw and say goodbye.

He endured his condition like a soldier, gallantly fighting the limitations it put on his life. She said her goodbyes to her mother, and with stinging eyes rang through to the person who handled her travel arrangements. Whatever her parents said, if the marriage ceremony with Guy ended up in the media she wanted to be at home, not stuck on the other side of the world.

Frowning at the skyline of Singapore through the hotel window, Guy swore succinctly under his breath.

The man on the other end of the telephone said drily, ‘At school I used to envy you the ability to swear in five languages. Now I can swear in twenty. But I still can’t pull the birds like you.’

In a level, cold voice Guy said, ‘Bloody tabloids.’

‘They have a place in life.’

‘Bottom feeders. Any idea when it’s due to break?’

He could almost hear his friend shrug. ‘Tomorrow,’ he said succinctly. ‘They’ve got a tasty little piece—the dramatic circumstances of the marriage and that it might turn out to be legal, as well as the insinuation she might be Corbett’s mistress. He’s always good for copy, and it’s always a coup to get the sights on someone as news-worthy and cunning at avoiding we poor hacks as you are. Naturally they want to make the most of it.’

‘Naturally,’ Guy said lethally, fighting back the urge to kill someone. ‘How did you find this out?’

‘I have friends in high places,’ his friend the war corespondent said airily, adding with a muffled snort of laughter, ‘Or low places.’

‘OK, Sean, thanks a lot. I owe you.’

‘Don’t worry, I owe you more. After all, you once saved my miserable life.’

‘Forget it,’ Guy said briefly, and hung up.

He stood for a long time frowning into space before reaching for the telephone again. With the time distance it would be eight in the evening in New Zealand.

As he dialled a number he recalled the way the sun had shone through the window of Marc Corbett’s house, collecting in Lauren’s hair so that it fell like a river of molten obsidian around her face, somehow giving a soft, pearly glow to her milk-white skin.

Skin like satin against his hand…

As Mrs Oliver wasn’t in the house, Lauren picked up the receiver. ‘Hello,’ she said carefully above the noisy thud of her heart.

‘Can anyone overhear what we’re saying?’

Guy! ‘No.’ Marc had made sure the communications system was incapable of being bugged. Cold foreboding knotted her inside. ‘What’s happened?’

‘I have it on good authority that the news of our marriage is about to explode onto the front pages.’ He waited while her hand clenched on the receiver, then asked sharply, ‘Are you there?’

‘Yes.’ She said crisply, ‘Thank you for telling me. I’ll ring my parents straight away and let them know.’

‘Do they know about the marriage?’

‘Yes.’

‘Sensible of you to tell them,’ he said calmly. ‘When do you go home?’

‘I’m leaving tomorrow.’

He asked for the details of her airline and arrival time, then said, ‘I suggest you change your booking to get off the flight in Rome.’

‘That’s being paranoid,’ she said brusquely. ‘I’ll be fine. No one will be expecting me anyway—the airline won’t tell anyone when I’m due in, and my parents are the only other people who know. They’re certainly not going to confide in any nice, inquisitive journalist.’

‘Fair enough,’ he said calmly. ‘Have a safe flight home.’

And he hung up.

Blinking back stupid, unnecessary tears, Lauren put down the receiver. She felt like an animal in hiding, every sense strained to the point of pain while wolves closed in on her.