She realised all of a sudden how thin the line was between anger and despair and stopped before the tears could break. She could see her reflection in the inset mirrors, her hair tumbled, her breasts heaving with outraged fury. And she could see Ross, who definitely was laughing, coming towards her with a very purposeful look in his eyes. Panic seized her throat.

‘And if you think for one second that I love you-’ she gasped.

‘Well,’ Ross drawled, grinning openly now, ‘I think it is a little too late for disavowals now, my love.’

‘Arrogant beast!’ Olivia glared at him, beating her clenched fist helplessly and with very little force against his chest.

‘Sweetheart,’ Ross said, trapping her hand and pulling her close. ‘I love you too.’

Olivia opened and closed her mouth silently, like a landed fish.

‘Perhaps we could talk now,’ Ross said, with scrupulous politeness, ‘unless it is too late.’

Olivia stared at him, knowing he was not speaking of the hour. ‘I do not believe that it is too late,’ she said huskily.

She licked her dry lips and watched, fascinated, as Ross’s eyes fixed on her mouth and darkened almost to black with desire. He was still holding her hand and her skin burned beneath his touch.

‘If you prefer to retire and would like me to send for your maid then I shall, of course, comply,’ he said, but his eyes gave her a different message.

Olivia freed herself from his grip and reached out with both hands to grab him by the lapels of his jacket. ‘Don’t you dare,’ she said, a second before his lips met hers.


When Deb awoke, the early morning light was pouring through the window and spilling across the bed. She was alone. She had already stretched out a hand instinctively and found empty space when memory returned to her and her spirits sank lower than a stone.

The night was over. It was time to go home.

She stretched and winced at the stiffness in her body and the unaccustomed soreness, the deep, tender ache inside her. It seemed to echo the ache in her soul. There was always a price to be paid.

The chinking sound of the harnesses came from below. Richard must be getting the horses ready to leave. She hurried from the bed and threw her clothes on haphazardly. She did not want to be naked when Richard came back. She did not want him to see her vulnerability now, in the bright light of day. Her mind could not encompass all the things that they had done. She did not want to have to think about it.

Nevertheless, she could not seem to help herself.

Deb sat down abruptly on the edge of the bed. A cold prickle ran down her spine and settled like a leaden weight in her stomach. Something was wrong and it was nothing to do with the night she had spent with Richard, nor the shockingly intimate and entirely pleasurable nature of their activities. Awareness had come to her during the night. She understood now the difference between how she had felt when she had found herself betrayed by Neil Stratton, and how she felt now. Both experiences, were they known, would bring her disgrace in the eyes of the world. Yet now she felt none of the shame that had dogged her for so long after her sham marriage was exposed. This time she had made her own choice freely and from something she had thought was physical desire. Now she knew how mistaken she was. Now she knew that she had fallen in love.

She let her hands fall into her lap and stared blindly out of the window. What an absolute fool she had been, thinking that she could dictate to Richard that she wished for a night of passion and then expect nothing to be different afterwards. The night had been all that she had wanted and more, glorious, blissfully fulfilling, but Richard had taken her soul as well as her body, and bound her to him with a love that could never be broken. She knew now that this was the man with whom she wanted to spend the rest of her life.

Looking back with the clear vision of hindsight, Deb could see that she had been falling in love with Richard for weeks. She had discovered so many different facets to a man she had once dismissed as nothing more than a society rake. She had agonised over his loneliness and cherished his tenderness. Yesterday afternoon they had spent a perfect time together, building intimacy upon companionship, deepening the feelings for him that she already possessed. They were feelings that she had held for him almost from the first. The dazzling attraction, the heated tug of desire were all as nothing to the things that she valued in him, the strength and the protectiveness and the humour and the intellect that teased and matched her own…She even had some half-remembered dream of telling him that she loved him…

She gave a little moan of distress, for there was no reason to suppose that Richard felt the same way. She had never asked him for his love, only his passion.

She beat an impotent fist on the bed beside her. She was a fool. She had held on so long to her mistrust and disenchantment that she had not been able to see when love had crept up upon her.

Moving slowly, she went to the head of the stairs and started to descend to join Richard below. She did not spare a backward glance for the bedroom with its tumbled blankets or the bed where she had slept curled next to Richard and had experienced such ecstasy in his arms. She would never forget such pleasure, but they had made a bargain. She had wanted a false betrothal and for Richard to be her lover. He had given her both of those things. And now it was over.

Chapter Seventeen

R ichard left Deborah, at her request, at the gate of Mallow House. It was raining, the water running in rivulets from Deb’s hat and soaking into the velvet riding dress until she was drenched and shivering.

They had not spoken much on the ride back from the hunting lodge. When Deb had gone out on to the terrace the horses were ready and she had greeted Richard with a stiltedness that was completely out of character. She realised that Richard thought she was shy in his company now and her misery deepened when she saw the tenderness that this evoked in him. Everything felt wrong. She was being dishonest with Richard, she was not telling him how she felt, and yet she knew no other way, for if she weakened for a moment she knew that she would throw herself into his arms and beg him never to let her go.

He touched her wet cheek with gloved fingers when they parted.

‘I will call on you later, sweetheart,’ he said, and she nodded numbly. Later seemed a long time away and she wanted to wash and to sleep and have time to think what she would say when next she saw him.

Mallow House was very quiet as Deb let herself in and crept upstairs. It was a half past nine, but no one seemed to be stirring. Deb was too exhausted to question why. She shed her clothes and almost fell into her big bed. She had only awoken an hour before and yet now she felt exhausted again.


When she finally awoke the afternoon was advanced and there was a suppressed buzz about the house. Deb sent for hot water and luncheon in her bed, and heard without enthusiasm that Olivia and Ross had called and needed to see her urgently in the drawing room. She felt a little sick. It was inevitable that Clarissa Aintree was aware of her absence the previous night and if she had told Liv and Ross…Deb hoped fervently that they were not going to ring a peal over her, but she thought it very likely. She might be seen as a widow of previously unimpeachable reputation, but it still could not excuse such outrageous behaviour. They would be disappointed in her; even though no one else would know about her bad behaviour, Deb did not like the thought of incurring the disapproval of those closest to her. It added another weight to her heart at a time when she felt most vulnerable. She could not regret what she had done, for the night spent with Richard had been the most perfect, special and tender experience of her life, but now the night was over and the light of day was cold indeed.

She sat passively whilst Mary dressed her hair and then went down to the drawing room. Ross was pacing the rug before the mantelpiece, a deep frown on his forehead. Olivia was sitting upright on a straight-backed chair, her hands locked together, a look of deep distress on her normally serene countenance. Deb forgot her own preoccupations and hurried forward.

‘Liv?’ she said. ‘Has something happened?’

Olivia looked at her with a familiar expression of rueful affection and complete exasperation. ‘Sit down, Deborah,’ she said. ‘I have something to tell you.’


‘I did not know about the smugglers being out or about the muster,’ Deb said, white-faced. ‘I had not intended to worry anyone-’ She broke off as Ross gave an irritable sigh. She knew what he wanted to say-that she never thought through the consequences of her actions and, if she had, they would not now be sitting here contemplating the ruin of her reputation.

‘I cannot understand how you could be so indiscreet,’ he said.

Deb felt miserable. Looking back, she could see exactly how she had been so indiscreet, for she had given no thought to anything except Richard and her feelings for him from the moment that they had gone into the hunting lodge until they had returned that morning.

‘It is clear that you have never tried to arrange a romantic liaison, Ross,’ she snapped, angry at his condemnation and her own miserable feelings. ‘It amazes me that anyone ever manages to be indiscreet when they have a whole host of interfering relatives-’

‘Well, despite our interference, you have succeeded finely!’ Ross thrust his hand through his hair with all the pent-up impatience he could not express in words. ‘Really, Deb-’

‘Ross,’ Olivia intervened gently. ‘It is not so bad. Mrs Aintree has put out the tale that Deb was staying with us last night and if we back her up-’