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Colour rose in her face. ‘But I didn’t mean Patrick. You should have known that. I—I was speaking generally.’ She took a deep breath. ‘But I also ran away because I was embarrassed.’
His brows lifted. ‘You don’t think anyone believed the Wilding woman and Fiona’s vile father?’
‘No, I was thinking of Ted Jackson.’ She looked down at her glass. ‘I can’t imagine why he said—what he did. About us. Because there isn’t any us. I know that. Just you—being kind. You must have been mortified by his comments.’
‘No,’ he said. ‘Not in the slightest. Because he was only wrong about one thing. He claimed everyone knew that I was courting you. Yet it seems to have missed you, the one most involved, by a country mile, even now, when it’s been publicly pointed out.
‘Of course,’ he went on. ‘You may be trying to find a tactful way of saying you wouldn’t have me if I came gift-wrapped. But if not, maybe we could find some way of making this courtship slightly less one-sided.’
She said in a voice she didn’t recognise, ‘I don’t understand.’
He put his glass on the floor beside him. ‘Then try this.’ His voice was almost harsh in its intensity. ‘I love you, Octavia. I have done from the moment I saw you, and I always will. And I want to marry you and spend the rest of my life with you.’
‘But that’s not possible. We—we’ve only just met.’ She was trembling violently, her voice husky. ‘We hardly know each other...’
‘Darling, you met Patrick Wilding a hell of a long time ago, and dated him for months, but what did you really know about him?’
‘But you don’t—you can’t want me,’ Tavy said wildly. ‘Not when you sent me away the other night...’
‘What else could I do?’ Jago spread his hands. He said very gently, ‘Sweetheart, I wanted you like hell. You were a dream come true. But all the indications were that you were still in love with Patrick, and I couldn’t bear the idea that I might only be a surrogate lover.
‘Because there might have come a moment when you realised you were very definitely in the wrong arms, and I—I couldn’t risk that. It seemed safer—wiser to send you away until I could be sure that you wanted me and no one else.
‘Besides,’ he added carefully. ‘Neither the Vicarage carpet or a narrow single bed were the ideal options for the kind of seduction I had in mind. And since I was sure you weren’t on the Pill, my having no protection was an additional factor.’
‘Oh.’ Tavy was blushing again.
‘Oh, indeed,’ he said and sighed. ‘So I challenged you to take off your robe, knowing you wouldn’t do it, any more than you’d have walked naked out of the lake that first time I saw you.’
He smiled at her. ‘I walked back to the house in a daze that day, knowing that I’d be buying a home to share with you and no other.
‘When I came to the Vicarage the next day, it was to give your father a frank rundown on my past, outline my future, and assure him that my intentions were entirely honourable.’
Tavy gasped. ‘What on earth did he say?’
Jago’s smile became a grin. ‘He thought for a moment, then smiled and wished me luck.’
‘He didn’t mention Patrick?’
‘Not a word. He left me to discover that for myself and suffer the tortures of the damned as a result. I’d never been jealous before and I didn’t like it.’
‘Yet you let me think that Barbie was your girlfriend...’
‘In the vain hope that it might provoke some reaction. Yet you simply prepared her room as if her prospective arrival didn’t bother you at all, instead of grabbing me by the throat and demanding to know what the hell was going on.’
She said breathlessly, ‘But don’t you see—I was scared to ask! Scared what your answer might be. It seemed better, somehow, not to know. As if that could somehow make me less unhappy.’
He said huskily, ‘Oh, my dearest love.’ He rose and came across to her, drawing her to her feet and cupping her face in his hands. ‘Well, I’m prepared to take the risk. So, my wonderful, my precious girl, will you marry me?’
She slid her arms round his neck, feeling the dishevelled dark hair silken under her hands, smiling into the tawny eyes watching her with such tender intensity.
She said softly, ‘Put like that—what can I do but say “Yes—and yes”?’
