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Couldn’t this marriage be a stepping stone to some kind of better future?
‘Yeah, I’ll marry you,’ she said casually.
CHAPTER NINE
IT WASN’T A real wedding—so no way was it going to feel like one.
It was a line Amber kept repeating—telling herself if she said it often enough, then sooner or later she’d start believing it. Her marriage was nothing but a
farce. A solution to ease Conall’s conscience and set her up financially for the future. This way, nobody would have to lose face. Not her and not Conall.
But weddings had a sneaky knack of pressing all the wrong buttons, no matter how much you tried not to let them. Despite the example set by both her parents, Amber found herself having to dampen down instincts which came out of nowhere. Who knew she would secretly yearn for a floaty dress with a garland of flowers in her hair? Because floaty dresses and flowers were romantic, and this had nothing to do with romance—Conall had told her that and she had agreed with him. This was a transaction, pure and simple. As emotionless as any deal her Irish fiancé might cut in the boardroom.
So she opted for a dress she thought would be suitable for the civil ceremony—a sleek knee-length outfit by a well-known designer, with her hair worn in a heavy chignon and a minimalist bouquet of stark, arum lilies.
The ceremony was small. Her father, still in his ashram, had not been able to attend—and Conall had insisted on keeping the celebrations short and muted.
‘I don’t want this to turn into some kind of rent-a-crowd,’ he’d growled. ‘Inviting a bunch of my friends to meet a woman who isn’t going to be part of my life for longer than a few weeks is a waste of everyone’s time. As long as we give the press the pictures they want, nobody will care.’
But on some level Amber had cared. She tried to convince herself that it was a relief not to have to invite anyone and have to maintain the farce of being a blissfully happy bride. She told herself that she was perfectly cool with the miniskirted Serena and another of Conall’s glamorous assistants being their only two witnesses on the day.
But hadn’t some stupid part of her wanted Conall to take her into his arms when he’d slipped the thin gold band on her finger—and to kiss her with all the passion he’d displayed on that moonlit night in his country house? He hadn’t, of course. He had waited until they got outside, where a bank of tipped-off photographers was assembled, and it was only then that he had kissed her. From the outside it must have looked quite something, for he held her close and bent over her in a masterful way which made her heart punch out such a frantic beat that for a minute she felt quite dizzy. But his lips had remained as cold and as unmoving as if they’d been made from marble—and it didn’t seem to matter what she said or did, she couldn’t remember seeing him smile.
They had taken the honeymoon suite at the Granchester Hotel, even though Conall had an enormous house in Notting Hill, which Amber had visited just twice before. But both occasions had felt dry and rather formal and she’d felt completely overwhelmed by the decidedly masculine elements of his elegant town house.
‘I think it’s best if we stay on neutral territory for the first few days.’ His words had been careful. ‘It lets the world know we’re man and wife, but it will also allow us to work out some workable form of compromise as to how this...marriage is going to work.’ He’d paused and his midnight-blue eyes had glinted. ‘Plus the hotel is used to dealing with the press.’
The hotel seemed used to dealing with pretty much everything. Their suite was huge, with a dining room laid up to serve them a post-wedding meal, a vast sitting room, and a hot tub on the private and very sheltered rooftop garden. Rather distractingly, the king-sized bed had been liberally scattered with scarlet rose petals—something which had made Conall’s mouth harden as he’d walked into the bedroom, while pulling loose his tie.
‘Why the hell do they do that?’ he asked.
Amber paused in the act of removing the pins from her hair, relieved to be able to shake it free after the tensions of the long day, even though a feeling of apprehension about the night ahead was building up inside her. ‘Presumably they like to think they’re adding to the general air of romance.’
‘It’s so damned corny.’
Kicking off her cream shoes, Amber sank down on one of the chairs and looked at him, a trace of defiance creasing her brow. ‘So now what?’
It was a question Conall had been dreading and one he still hadn’t quite worked out how to answer, despite it looming large in his thoughts during the days since she’d agreed to marry him, while they’d waited for the necessary paperwork to go through. Hadn’t he thought she might phone him up and tell him she’d changed her mind? That she’d tell him it was insane in this day and age for two people to go through with a marriage neither wanted, just because they’d had casual sex and she had been a virgin?
There had been a big part of him which had wanted her to do that. Because whichever way you looked at it, he was now trapped with her for the next three months. Their relationship had to look real, which meant he’d have to be with her—as a new husband would be expected to be with his wife. And he didn’t do sustained proximity. He liked his freedom and the ability to come and go. He always demanded an escape route and a get-out clause whenever he was in a relationship. And this wasn’t a relationship, he reminded himself grimly.
He walked over to the ice bucket, which was sitting next to two crystal flutes and yet more scarlet roses, and pulled out a bottle of vintage champagne.
‘I think we deserve a drink, don’t you?’ he said, glancing over at her as he popped the cork.
‘Please.’
Trying hard to avert his gaze from the splayed coltishness of her long legs, he handed her a glass. ‘Here.’
Amber took the glass and studied the fizzing golden bubbles for a moment before looking up into his eyes. ‘So what shall we drink to, Conall?’
He sat down opposite, deliberately settling himself as far away from her as possible. What he would like to drink to wasn’t a request for long life or happiness. No. What he needed right then was to be granted some sort of immunity. A sure-fire way to stop thinking about her sensuality—a sensuality which seemed even more potent now that he’d sampled her delicious body for himself. He wondered how it was possible for a woman to be so damned sexy when she’d only ever had sex once before.
He felt his throat thicken, but he had vowed that he was going to forget that night and put it out of his mind. To push away the ever-creeping temptation to do it to her all over again...and again. He swallowed as he felt the hard throb of desire at his groin and the sudden distracting thunder of his pulse. ‘To an argument-free three months?’
She raised her eyebrows. ‘You think that’s possible?’
‘I think anything is possible, if we put our minds to it.’
