Bridal Bargains

ght her everything there was to know about making love but now she knew differently. A soulless slaking of lust that he dared to call emotion had not shown up in his repertoire before.

Nor had it prevented her from almost toppling into its cold, murky, thick depths. She started to shiver she was so cold suddenly, hating herself—despising him.

On the other side of the door Xander had frozen again, eyes closed, face locked into a taut mask of self-contempt. He did not want to believe that he had just done that. He did not want to remember the pained look on her face when she’d said what she said.

Pregnant. He flinched. What had he done here? How had he allowed three weeks of damn near perfection sink as low as this?

Marcel Dubois. The name arrived in his head like a black taunt.

No excuse, he dismissed. No damned excuse for doing what he had. The hand he used to scrape through his hair was trembling. Grimly he made for the stairs with a sudden dire need to wash the shame from his skin.

Nell was just trying to find the strength to stand up when the telephone on Xander’s desk began to ring. She thought about ignoring it but something stronger than good sense pulled her like a magnet towards it and had her lifting the receiver off its rest.

When your life shatters, it really shatters, she thought blankly as a soft, slightly husky female voice murmured, ‘Xander, darling? Is it all right for us to speak?’

The receiver clattered as it landed back on its rest. Pale as a ghost, Nell turned and walked to the door and out of the room then out of the house.

The piece of driftwood stood where she’d left it. Why she picked it up she hadn’t a single clue but she hugged it to her front as she walked around the side of the house and took the path that would take her up the hill.

CHAPTER EIGHT

TWO hours later, dressed for his trip to London in tailored black trousers and a crisp white business shirt, Xander gave up trying to locate Nell on foot and decided to take to the air instead. His mouth was tense, his lean face set and severe. He left an anxious-looking Thea standing by the pool, wringing her hands.

‘Why did you have to fight with her?’ she’d scolded him earlier. ‘She’s a good girl, Alexander. A trip to London to see her papa would not have put you out.’

The ‘good girl’ part was still cutting into him. The fact that Thea had overheard just enough of their fight to draw her own conclusions did not help his riddling feelings of guilt as the helicopter blades wound up, disturbing the hot morning as he took to the air.

Sat huddled on a rock hidden beneath the deep shade of a tree close to the spot from the one they usually dived from, Nell listened as the helicopter flew overhead.

He was going—leaving her here despite everything. Why she thought he might have a change of mind now he knew her suspicions about the baby she didn’t know—but she had thought it.

Her eyes flooded with hot, helpless tears.

Vanessa. She shivered, feeling cold despite the fierce heat of the day. Perhaps his urgent business in London was really urgent Vanessa business. No wonder he’d become so angry when she wanted to go with him. What man wanted a wife along when he was looking forward to enjoying his long-standing mistress?

She hated him for treating her like this. She hated herself for falling so totally under his spell when she had known—known that Vanessa was always there, hovering like the black plague in the background. A sudden husky, tear-thickened laugh broke from her aching throat. Face it, Nell, she told herself. You are the one he hides away like a mistress while Vanessa gets to play the very public wife!

Sweeping around the rocky headland, with deft use of the controls Xander swung the helicopter round to face the island then began to search the tiny cove.

She had to be here somewhere, he told himself grimly. Where the hell else could she go?

Dark glasses shading the brightness of the sun from his eyes, he checked the water first for sight of her but there was no sign of a Titian-haired mermaid swimming alone down there.

Teeth flashing white on a hiss of relief because if she was feeling anywhere near as bad as he was feeling she was in no fit state to swim alone, he switched his attention to the shore. He’d already checked the other side of the island, checked the paths through the trees without a single sighting of her. A viscous curse aimed at himself for introducing her to his boyhood collection of hiding places had led him on a wild-goose chase on foot. From up here it was like looking for a butterfly in a forest. If he did not spot her soon then he was going to panic. He could already feel it clawing at the inner tissues of tension racked across his chest.

What if she had decided to swim? What if she had been crazy enough to strike a direct line right out to sea? He swung the craft around, eyes scanning the glistening blue ocean for a sign of one wilful idiot with a desire to drown herself just to make him feel worse.

Don’t be stupid, he then told himself. Nell isn’t that stupid. And he uttered another curse as he swung the helicopter back to face the island then set it crabbing along the shoreline. She might hate him right now but not enough to risk killing herself—and their unborn child.

Their unborn child. A baby! He was still struggling to come to terms with the shock. His beautiful Helen was going to have his baby and he had never felt so wretched about anything in his entire life!

What had he done? Why had he done it? Jealousy was not an emotion he was used to. Women were jealously possessive of him, not the other way round!

Women, he repeated and let out a scornful huff of a laugh. Woman in the singular, he corrected. One tough, teasing, exquisite creature that fell apart in his arms on a regular basis yet still protected her bloody Frenchman!

What was he doing out there? Nell wondered as she watched him hover then move and hover again. Then enlightenment dawned. Why it took so long to sink in that he was looking for her she had no idea but, hugging the piece of driftwood to her, she lowered her head over it and squeezed her eyes tight shut and willed him to go away.

As if her wish was his command she heard him move further along the coast and for some totally indefensible reason the tears flooded again. She wouldn’t cry—she wouldn’t! she told herself forcefully as she listened to the dying whoosh of the rotor blades until only stillness filled the air.