‘And you know the reason I couldn’t.’ She lay weak and pliant in his arms. ‘I don’t want to be your mistress, Jake. I just don’t want that.’ And yet she knew that if he chose to take her right now that was exactly what she would become.
‘I not asking it, you silly child,’ he chided gently. ‘I want you to marry me.’
‘No!’ she pushed against his chest. ‘You—you can’t mean that.’
He held her easily beneath him. ‘Why can’t I?’
‘Because I—You don’t want to get married, not after—not after Margaret.’
Her words acted as a douche to his ardour, and swinging his legs to the floor he began to button his shirt. ‘Do you know why I was originally late on the film set?’
She shrugged. ‘Something held you up in America, something personal.’
‘Very personal,’ he acknowledged grimly. ‘Margaret killed herself just before I was due to leave.’
‘Oh no!’ She could see how affected he had been by his wife’s death. ‘I didn’t know,’ she said gently.
‘I was planning to divorce her at the time. Oh, not that she knew about that, it was still just an idea. She didn’t kill herself on purpose, she just took one pill too many on top of one drink too many.’ He turned to look at Stacy’s hand as it rested on his thigh, picking it up to kiss her palm with probing lips. ‘And then I came to England and met you, fell in love with you—and all you seemed to be doing was pushing your other men down my throat.’
Stacy hung her head. ‘You said I reminded you of your wife.’
‘Under great provocation.’
‘Perhaps. But—’
‘You’re nothing like her, nothing at all! Will you please marry me, Stacy?’
She took a deep breath to answer no, but the words wouldn’t come. She wanted to be his wife, wanted that above all things. How wonderful to wake up in the morning and find Jake beside her for the rest of her life, to know he was her husband, this marvellous, fascinating man that she loved her own husband. But the reason for her leaving him in Cornwall still applied, his terri
ble temper when he thought her interested in another man.
She stood up, wringing her hands together as he watched her, a completely vunerable expression on his usually arrogant features. ‘It wouldn’t work,’ she said evasively.
Instantly he was on his feet in front of her. ‘Why wouldn’t it? You know everything about me that could possibly harm any marriage we have. Brad told me that he’d explained to you about Danny and Margaret.’
She smoothed his furrowed brow. ‘I was so sorry to hear about your son. He would have been my age by now.’
Jake shrugged. ‘I loved him, but it hit Margaret much harder than it hit me. I’m convinced that after he died she was on a course of self-destruction she just didn’t want to stop. Why wouldn’t our marriage work, Stacy? Am I so unlovable?’
‘No,’ she admitted shakily. ‘Far from it.’
‘Then why?’ He tenderly touched her cheek. ‘I love you, I want to marry you. What more can I say?’
She shook her head. ‘Absolutely nothing. And don’t think I’m not grateful for your love, but I—’
He shook her roughly. ‘Will you stop using words like “grateful” and “flattered”,’ he said disgustedly. ‘I want you for my wife. It would work between us, I’m convinced of it.’
‘It may do, until your next flare-up of jealous temper.’
He turned away. ‘So that’s it. I can’t help my jealousy where you’re concerned. It rises up like a red tide and takes over.’
‘I know.’
‘But that’s only because I’m so uncertain about you,’ he explained pleadingly. ‘God, you led me to believe it was Day you really wanted, and I still believed it until I saw him with Juliet last night. They told me they’re getting married soon.’
‘That’s right.’
‘Was everything you said about him a lie?’