AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Luke felt her stiffen and tilted her chin. ‘What’s the matter?’ he asked.
‘Verity…I thought you loved her,’ Genista mumbled. ‘She came to see me. She told me you wanted to get rid of me…’ Tears welled and fell, and were kissed away one by one, until the raging furnace which had turned to glowing embers in the aftermath of their lovemaking took fire again, and Luke’s explanation had to wait upon a deeply passionate kiss which left them both trembling with the renewal of their desire.
‘She got in touch with me when Philip went back to Marina,’ he told her then. ‘She told me she still wanted me; and subtly indicated that unless I played ball she would break up Philip and Marina a second time. I couldn’t take that chance. I had to play along with her, even though I was loathing every moment of it. She knows the truth now.’ His voice was very grim.
‘But you loved her once.’ The words had to be said, even though saying them drove them into her heart like sharp thorns.
‘No.’ Luke was emphatic. ‘I wanted her, and very badly, but I was never under any illusions about what she was. She was the one who announced our engagement, and then when I refused to co-operate she turned her attention to Philip—something for which I’ve never really forgiven myself. I knew what she was like, I knew the sort of predator she was. I could willingly kill her for hurting you, though.
‘Tell me you love me,’ he demanded roughly. ‘I still haven’t heard you say it—not properly…’
‘Funny,’ Genista teased, ‘I thought I’d managed to get the message over loud and clear!’
His sudden tension communicated itself to her, and she looked up, her heart beating swiftly at the expression in his eyes. She alone had the power to make this man look like this; to arouse his love and desire.
She lifted her hands to cup his face, revelling in the slight rasp of his skin against her palms.
‘I love you, Luke,’ she said softly, drawing his head down towards her, her lips parting tremulously in anticipation.
His harsh groan of satisfaction was stifled as their lips met. ‘I don’t intend to spend any more nights driving around the countryside for fear of what my longing for you might force me to do,’ he told her huskily, banishing for ever the faint shadow that he might actually have accepted what Verity had so blatantly offered him. And to think that all the time she thought he was merely assuaging his love for Verity with her, when in actual fact…She drew a ragged breath, laughing a little at her own folly—at their joint folly.
‘And the baby,’ Luke said unevenly. ‘I thought you must hate me and it—but the doctor told me how you’d begged him with your first words to tell you that you hadn’t lost it.’
‘It’s your child,’ Genista said simply, ‘a part of you. A reminder that you had actually wanted me…loved me…’
They both heard the sound of car tyres on the gravel at the same time.
‘The taxi!’ Genista exclaimed in horror, clapping her hands to her mouth. ‘I’d forgotten all about it!’
‘Leave it to me,’ Luke told her, reaching for his trousers. He smiled briefly as he reached the door. ‘Don’t go away, will you?’
‘What will you tell him?’ Genista asked.
Luke smiled again. ‘I shall tell him that my wife is staying here—where she belongs,’ he said softly. ‘And then I’m going to come back and show her how much I love her—if she’ll let me.’
Genista’s smile held the radiance of a rainbow after rain. As he went downstairs she leaned back against the pillows, her fingers laced lightly across her still flat stomach. Luke’s child! Her throat tightened with happy tears, and when Luke came back, she opened her arms wide to receive him, the past and its bitterness forgotten as together they re-avowed their love.
* * * * *
ISBN: 978-1-408-99901-1
BOUGHT WITH HIS NAME
© 1982 Penny Jordan
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A
.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
® and ™ are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.
www.millsandboon.co.uk
CONTENTS
