His Independent Bride: Wife Against Her Will / The Wedlocked Wife / Bertoluzzi's Heiress Bride

She swallowed defensively. ‘What the hell are you doing here?’

He shrugged. ‘You once gatecrashed my party, honey. I thought I’d repay the compliment.’ He watched her stiffen, and grinned. ‘Only kidding. I’m staying with the parents, so I’m here, courtesy of their invitation. They cleared it with your old man first. Didn’t he mention it?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘He didn’t.’

He said smoothly, ‘Then it must have slipped his mind.’ He paused.

‘It’s not really my sort of do, but I found I was extraordinarily keen to see you again.’

Her throat tightened. ‘Not a view I share.’

His smile widened into malice. ‘Not now, maybe, but once you couldn’t get enough of me—remember?’

She felt faint nausea stir inside her, but kept her head up. ‘No—I don’t.’

He sighed. ‘Sad how fickle women are.’ He wandered across and stood in front of her, looking her over from the smooth fall of hair brushing her shoulders, down to the slender legs revealed by the brief skirt of her dress, his gaze lingering on the first soft curves of her breasts, exposed by the deep square neckline.

Darcy moved restively under his scrutiny, and his eyes narrowed a little. ‘Also I gather I’ve been replaced in your affections by Em’s cousin Joel, of all people,’ he went on. ‘So that makes us almost relatives, flower-face. Doesn’t it?’

‘Not,’ she said, ‘as far as I’m concerned.’

‘Actually, I was convinced that Joel would stay single,’ Harry went on as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘Carrying his torch for my wife to the grave. And, as I’ve always found his “Rottweiler with a bone” act a bit of a bore, I suppose I should be grateful to you for turning his thoughts in a different direction.

‘Of course, Joel’s devotion to Em has never involved lifelong fidelity on his part,’ he added musingly. ‘On the contrary, he’s known as quite a connoisseur when it comes to bedtime. So your performance must have improved by several hundred per cent in the last couple of years, my pet. My congratulations.’

He gave her a long, lascivious look. ‘Fancy allowing me to extend your repertoire even further before the happy day?’

Her voice was suddenly thick. ‘You are revolting.’

‘No,’ he said. ‘Just a little curious, that’s all. You certainly weren’t much fun when I had you before. In fact, I was surprised you went to all those lengths to seek me out again afterwards. But maybe I’d aroused your curiosity too.’

Darcy’s face was ice. ‘Or perhaps I wanted to let your friends know exactly what kind of a bastard you were.’

‘Don’t fool yourself, sweetheart,’ he advised brutally. ‘Most of them would have been far more interested in watching me give you some more of the same. Only dear Cousin Joel decided to play knight in shining armour instead.’

Darcy put her glass down on a ledge with extreme care.

‘I’m afraid you must excuse me.’ Her tone was stony. ‘I need to get back to our guests. So will you let me pass, please?’

For a moment, he did not move. Then, to her surprise, he stood aside, waving her past him with a flamboyant gesture.

Darcy took one step, then another, only to find herself grabbed, his hands hard on her arms as Harry pulled her against him.

‘I’m one of your guests, sweetheart,’ he said thickly. ‘I need some entertaining too.’

Shock immobilised her. Turned her rigid. His face seemed to swim in front of her, the grinning mouth descending towards hers. Instinctively she closed her eyes to blot him out, as bile rose acridly in her throat.

Then, above the roaring in her ears, she heard Joel’s voice saying quietly, ‘Good evening.’

The punishing grip was suddenly released, and she stepped quickly back, stumbling as her heel caught on a tile, her eyes turning towards the doorway, where he stood, watchful and unsmiling.

Her heart seemed to lurch suddenly.

‘My dear Joel,’ Harry drawled. ‘I was just mentioning your capacity to intervene at exactly the wrong moment, and here you are again.’ He flicked Darcy’s chin with a casual finger. ‘Sorry, my pet. It seems that our little reunion will have to wait for a more auspicious moment.’

‘No,’ Joel said, without expression. ‘It will not. And don’t feel constrained to stay for the rest of the party,’ he added, walking slowly into the conservatory. ‘I’ll gladly make your excuses.’

‘You mean you’re throwing me out?’ Harry mocked. ‘I suppose it is one of your specialities, old boy.’ He paused, his smile calculating. ‘But all the same, there’s no need to lose your cool. Just because I had her first.’

Darcy saw Joel’s facial muscles tense, and his eyes go blank. Violence suddenly hung in the air like the smell of burning, so real and fierce that she almost choked on it.

‘Joel, no.’ Her voice cracked. ‘Please don’t. You mustn’t…’

As the silence lengthened, Harry walked jauntily past him, and disappeared. Leaving them alone together.

‘What’s the matter?’ Joel said at last, his voice of steel. ‘Afraid I might damage that pretty face of his?’

Afraid, she echoed silently—numbly. Yes, she’d been scared out of her wits, but for a very different reason.

She lifted her chin. Met the harsh blue ice of his gaze. ‘I know what you must be thinking.’

‘No,’ he said. ‘I don’t believe you do. At least I hope not.’ She swallowed, then tried again. ‘But it wasn’t as it looked. Really.’

‘No?’ he queried coldly. ‘You mean you hadn’t sneaked out of our supposed engagement party to be alone with him? And you weren’t in his arms, with your eyes closed, waiting for him to kiss you?’

She said huskily, ‘You really believe that I deliberately invited that?’

‘Why not? We can hardly pretend that you and Metcalfe don’t have unfinished business.’ His tone was molten. ‘But, apart from the fact that you’re nominally engaged to me, did you conveniently forget that he has a wife—a girl worth twenty of him—who’s about to give birth to their first child? Or did nothing matter to you but the passion of the moment?’

Darcy went on staring back at him, her head feeling suddenly hollow. Was it passion? she wondered. This feeling that you’d been smeared with slime? That you’d been made unclean? And that nothing would ever make it right?

Of course, she thought. That’s it. To Joel, I’ll always be suspect. The spoiled little tramp who chases other women’s men.

It would never occur to him that Harry was going to kiss me against my will. Or that it could have destroyed me.

His only concern is ensuring there’s no betrayal of the girl he loves.

The cousin who chose someone else instead of him.

It’s Emma that he wants to protect, her capacity for hurt that must be shielded at all costs. Not mine. Not ever mine. Because I only cause pain. I don’t feel it.

She felt a soft moan rising inside her, and bit it back.

‘The saintly Emma,’ she said, her tone light and hard, as she fought the unexpected, unwanted pain inside her. ‘No, I certainly wouldn’t forget about her.’ Or, my God, the torch you’re carrying for her. Harry was so right about that at least.

‘And that’s all you have to say?’ he asked harshly. ‘No excuse to make?’

She shrugged. ‘I could say a great deal, but what’s the point? And now that I’ve been tried and condemned all over again,’ she added defiantly, ‘maybe you’ll allow me to rejoin our guests.’