The Bride's Secret

'What… what is it?' She was trembling, her overwhelming need for him making her voice throaty and her eyes wild. 'What's wrong?' What had she done to make him look at her like that?

He had drawn back a little, his eyes examining her face feature by feature. 'You were a virgin when we first met,' he said softly. 'Why was that?'

'Why?' She stared at him as if he had gone mad. 'Because… because I'd never met anyone… ' Her voice trailed away. What was this? What was wrong? 'I don't understand,' she whispered shakily. 'What has that got to do with… with now?'

'Anyone you loved?' he finished quietly, and now she knew there was something badly wrong. It was there in the darkly assessing power of his gaze, in the analytic scrutiny. Suddenly he was in lawyer mode, and it frightened her. 'Anyone you loved, Annie?'

'I suppose so,' she said warily, pulling herself into a sitting position with the sheet tight in her clenched fists against her breastbone. 'Why? Does it matter?'

'Yes, it matters.' He scanned her face with the laser eyes. 'And you're a virgin now, aren't you, Annie?' It was a statement, not a question, and she stared at him as her mind raced back and forth, a recollection—misty but becoming more substantial—causing her to freeze.

She hadn't said those words, had she? That faint echo that was reverberating in her head? She couldn't have…

'In the last two years you have seen no one, had no relationship of a personal nature at all. There have been those who tried—several—but you didn't want to know.' His voice sounded like a lawyer's now, his brain almost visibly putting two and two together and making… Making a number that spelled trouble.

'How do you know?' She forced antagonism into the gap between her and disaster. 'I could have—'

'Marjorie.' His voice was relentless. 'Marjorie told me.'

'Oh, Marjorie!' She tried for a dismissive laugh, her voice derisive. 'You mean to say you listened to Marjorie?'

'Yes, Marjorie. Who had no axe to grind, no reason to lie, who is in fact a gossip of the first order and would have been sure to repeat any tasty little titbit if there had been one. In fact you puzzled her, I could tell. She didn't know whether to admire you or feel sorry for you—'

'I don't need anyone to feel sorry for me,' she bit back quickly, stung to the core. 'I manage perfectly well, thank you.'

'We all need the warmth of human compassion at times, Annie,' Hudson said grimly. 'However much we try to hide the fact'

'And that's what you think I'm doing? Hiding the fact?' She prevaricated swiftly. 'You've no right to assume that.'

He didn't fall for the decoy ploy, going straight for the jugular instead. 'You said you loved me, just now, when you weren't thinking ten steps in advance.' The grey eyes had the consistency of liquid steel. 'You told me you loved me two years ago, and I believed it then too. I know it was the truth, here, where it counts.' He touched his chest, his eyes intent on her face.

'Hudson—'

'So if you loved me then and you love me now, and there's been no high life, no parties, no lovers… ' He paused, his eyes searching her face, which was the colour of lint. 'And no elusive fiancé either… ' he stated slowly, each word a revelation. 'There wasn't a man, was there, Annie? Hell, what a fool I've been. I wondered why I couldn't find him, why no one you'd been at college with had the faintest idea what I was talking about.'

'You didn't see my college friends?' She stared at him, horrified. 'You had no right to do that'

'I had all the right in the world both then and now,' he growled softly. 'You love me. I should have listened to my heart.'

'No, you're wrong; everyone says that when they're… they're… '

She went to twist out of the bed but his voice stopped her before she had barely moved. 'Stay still; stay right where you are, Annie, or so help me I won't be responsible for my actions.'

'Are you threatening me?' she asked tightly.

'Whatever it takes, sweetheart, whatever it takes.'

'This is crazy, Hudson,' she whispered faintly. 'Let me go.'

'No, it's me that's been crazy,' he said slowly. 'What a fool, what an incredibly blind fool I've been. I should have known you aren't capable of betraying me like that, but I let myself be persuaded. Me, of all people. Hell, I make my living going on gut instinct and fact, and I had neither in your case—merely words and more words. And the words didn't make sense even then.'

'They did; you're just determined to make a mystery out of this.'

'That night two years ago, when you agreed to marry me, you were happy—really happy. There was nothing, not a hint of anything being wrong. I should know—I've dissected that time often enough,' he added bitterly. 'And then, within hours, it'd all changed. What happened when you left me that night, Annie?' he asked softly. 'Because sure as hell something did. Something… catastrophic.' His eyes were boring into her soul.

This was too close—he was getting too close.

'And whatever it was it didn't stop you loving me.' There was a thread of something in the tightly controlled voice—joy? Relief?—that told her she had to finish this before it went any further. 'You loved me then and you love me now. Say it?'