Forbidden Surrender

‘He doesn’t want to marry me, Sara,’ Marie interrupted.

‘Don’t be silly!’ Sara’s smile seemed to be fixed on her lips, a bright meaningless smile. ‘Of course he wants to marry you—’

‘No,’ Marie insisted softly. ‘And I don’t want to marry him. You remember what I said to you the night of my operation?’

‘A-about loving Danny?’ It hadn’t been mentioned since!

‘Yes,’ she nodded. ‘Well, I do. I always have.’

Sara gasped. ‘But—but Dominic!’ This didn’t seem to be making sense at all.

Marie sighed. ‘It’s a little complicated.’

‘A little?’ Sara scorned. ‘I can’t make any sense of it!’

‘You will, I’ll explain it to you. You see, Danny and I argued last summer, I can’t even remember why now. Anyway, Dominic took me out for a while to try and cheer me up. Then I fell down the stairs,’ she sighed. ‘Danny came rushing round to see how I was, but—well, even then I think I must have sensed there was more wrong with me than they first realised, and I turned Danny away. But he kept coming back, and then when I found out about my injury I knew I had to stop him.’

She swallowed hard. ‘With Dominic?’

Marie nodded. ‘But it was with Dominic’s consent. We never intended getting married, I just couldn’t agree to marry Danny knowing I was going to die. So Dominic and I became engaged, and Danny finally left me alone. You do see, don’t you, Sara? Danny would be hurt less that way?’

‘Maybe. But I think he should have been given the choice.’

‘No,’ Marie shook her head. ‘He would only have been noble, insisted on marrying me anyway.’

Sara frowned, trying her best to understand. ‘Where did Dominic stand in all this?’

Marie smiled. ‘Dominic is the best friend I ever had.’

‘Friend? But you haven’t been behaving as if you were just friends.’

‘All acting,’ her sister grinned. ‘Enjoyable acting, I’ll admit, but acting just the same. Then tonight he started discussing weddings for real.’ She frowned. ‘I couldn’t understand it.’

‘He loves you—’

‘No, he doesn’t,’ Marie laughed at the thought of it.

‘But—’

‘He really doesn’t love me, Sara, he just thought I wanted to marry him.’

‘He did?’

‘Yes, and that was your fault. Yes, it was,’ Marie insisted as Sara went to protest. ‘You told Dominic it was the thought of being his wife and having his children that had encouraged me to face the operation. What you said to me was that I had to think of being with the man I loved for ever and ever. And I did that—I thought of Danny.’

‘Danny?’ Sara gasped.

‘Yes,’ her sister smiled happily. ‘I’m going to marry Danny. And you love Dominic, don’t you?’

‘I—’

‘Don’t you?’ Marie quirked an eyebrow.

Sara licked her lips. ‘Yes.’

Marie nodded. ‘I told him you did.’

‘You did what?’

‘Don’t look so annoyed,’ Marie smiled. ‘He didn’t believe me.’

‘Thank God for that! Don’t you realise—’

‘He loves you too, Sara.’

She paled. ‘He—he what?’

‘He loves you,’ Marie repeated happily. ‘I had my suspicions, the way you kept avoiding each other and everything, but tonight I knew for sure.’

‘H—how did you know?’

‘He told me,’ Marie announced calmly.

Sara was beginning to wonder if she were hallucinating. Marie had only got engaged to Dominic so that Danny wouldn’t get hurt, the man she really loved, and Dominic had aided her in this plan. And now Marie was going to marry Danny after all, and Dominic had admitted to Marie that he loved her, Sara. None of it sounded very plausible, and yet Marie seemed very confident.

‘See?’ Marie held up her bare left hand. ‘No engagement ring. Danny is going to buy me one tomorrow.’

‘Oh, he does know about this, then?’ Sara mocked dazedly.