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The Baby Secret
HELEN BROOKS
Wedding night baby! It has been a dream wedding - followed by a night of unforgettable passion. Then Victoria discovered that her new husband, the man she adored, had betrayed her - after only one day of marriage! She packed her bags and left… .Zac Harding wouldn't let Victoria go. He was determined to find his missing bride and bring her home. Only, when he did, he was shocked to find that Victoria had a secret she was desperate to keep: their wedding night had resulted in a baby!She's sexy, she's successful… and she's PREGNANT!


“You’re my wife, Victoria. It’s legal.” (#u3d9d1e0b-6b84-5141-8786-24846a11da86)She’s sexy, she’s successful... and she’s PREGNANT! (#u2babfe46-5b4e-55a7-9e7c-1fe205b666fa)Title Page (#u16dd0096-8a14-5a23-b9a6-5cab42f21046)CHAPTER ONE (#u43171a30-69e0-5aba-b6d8-48148561b58b)CHAPTER TWO (#u2f4e85f8-cce6-5e77-8264-6236ccd6fefa)CHAPTER THREE (#u579bd540-1c4d-5d1d-bbfa-d34c4b862bf0)CHAPTER FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
“You’re my wife, Victoria. It’s legal.”
“We were barely married.” Victoria was aware her voice was higher pitched than normal. “It was only for a day.”
“And a night.” Zac’s gaze narrowed, and his cleanly sculpted mouth twisted in a sardonic smile as he added, “Don’t forget the night, Victoria. Annulment is definitely not an option.”
Victoria stared at him, her hand instinctively moving to her gently rounded stomach. As if she could forget that night....
She’s sexy, she’s successful... and she’s PREGNANT!
Relax and enjoy our new series in Harlequin Presents
about spirited women and gorgeous men, whose passion results in pregnancies...sometimes unexpected! Of course, the birth of a baby is always a joyful event, and we can guarantee that our characters will become besotted moms and dads—but what happened in those nine months before?
Share the surprises, emotions, dramas and suspense as our parents-to-be come to terms with the prospect of bringing a new little life into the world. All will discover that the business of making babies brings with it the most special love of all.... Look out next month for:
Expectant Mistress by Sara Wood
Harlequin Presents
#2010
The Baby Secret
Helen Brooks



www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
CHAPTER ONE
THE doctor’s examination was not rough, but Victoria’s tenseness still made it uncomfortable and she breathed a sigh of relief when it was over and the little man said, ‘You may get dressed now, Miss Brown.’
‘Thank you.’ She was too taut to smile.
Once seated in front of the doctor’s desk, the brilliant Tunisian sun outside the window mocking her gnawing anxiety, the dark-eyed, gentle-faced elderly man stared at her for a few moments before he said, his voice, with its heavy accent, faintly embarrassed, ‘Miss Brown, what made you think you were ill?’
Victoria stared back at him, her vivid blue eyes apprehensive as she answered, ‘I...I told you. I haven’t been feeling too well, sick and dizzy, and lately it’s got worse. I’ve been feeling very tired too, and... Oh, just generally ill. And then when I started to get constant nausea and couldn’t keep anything down . . .’
‘Yes, I see.’ He cleared his throat loudly and her apprehension increased tenfold. ‘Miss Brown, to the best of my knowledge you appear perfectly healthy,’ he said quietly, ‘but you do realise—?’ He stopped abruptly, moving one or two papers on his desk before adding, ‘You do understand you are expecting a child?’ He raised his dark eyes to her shocked face.
Victoria stared at him, too stunned to react.
‘Miss Brown?’ The doctor was clearly finding it awkward.
‘I’m not... I can’t be...’ She looked at him in total confusion. ‘I can’t be,’ she whispered bewilderedly, her eyes huge.
‘With your permission I would like to do a pregnancy test,’ Dr Fenez said gently, ‘just to confirm things, but I am sure that I felt a twelve-to-fourteen-week uterus. Now, you say you have only missed one menstrual period?’ he asked briskly.
‘Yes.’ Victoria nodded dazedly. ‘Although...’
‘Yes?’ he asked encouragingly. ‘You have thought of something?’
‘The last two weren’t normal, now I come to think about it. Hardly anything...’ She couldn’t believe this; he had to be wrong.
‘That can happen with a first pregnancy—the body takes time to settle into its new role. I take it this is your first pregnancy?’ he added carefully, his face bland and professional.
Victoria nodded, her mind racing. Pregnancy? Her first pregnancy? She had considered various possibilities over the last few weeks, from nervous tension to a growth of some kind, but not this particular kind of growth, she thought with a slight touch of hysteria. She couldn’t be; she just couldn’t. They had only done it once. That would be too unlucky, wouldn’t it?
‘Dr Fenez?’ She spoke out what was on her mind. ‘Can you get pregnant the first time you...?’ She waved her hands helplessly.
‘Of course.’ The little doctor nodded briskly, hiding his concern and surprise at the position this beautiful slender young woman in front of him was in. Not that it was the first time he had come across such a situation—in his long and varied career he had seen many things, especially in the last decade or so as western values had crept into his beloved country—but this girl was different somehow. She hadn’t seemed the type. But then there were no types, he reminded himself silently—his own family was proof of that Look at Kailia, his sister’s child—pregnant at sixteen and married within two weeks. His sister had nearly gone mad.
The pregnancy test confirmed the doctor’s diagnosis. Victoria was most definitely pregnant, at least three months, the doctor thought, so if she would like to check the date of her last normal period...?
The sun was high in a sapphire-blue sky when Victoria stepped out of the big white-washed building into the fierce heat of a Tunisian summer day, and she stood for a moment, gazing blankly around her, as she tried to gather her scattered wits. She was pregnant. She was pregnant. With Zac’s child.
She ought to be feeling horrified, upset, desperate, she told herself bewilderedly as she began to walk slowly along the dusty pavement, pulling her big straw hat over her sleek blonde hair as she did so. But she didn’t. She just felt amazed, totally astounded...but pleased. She paused, glancing up into the crystal sky as she searched her heart. Yes, she was pleased. She was. This baby would be all that was left of a love that had consumed her with its passion, but it was a million times more than she had dreamt of right up to a few minutes ago. Zac’s baby... She didn’t realise she was crying until the sun scorched the rivulets running down her cheeks, and then she brushed her face hastily, walking more briskly as she made her way home through the busy, crowded streets.
The little white domed house Victoria was renting was cool and shaded as she stepped through the front door, the mosaic tiles cold beneath her feet as she kicked off her flat leather sandals and padded through to the tiny kitchen at the rear of the property, where all was quiet and tranquil and breathed peace.
When she had first come here all those weeks ago now, she had been like a wounded animal seeking a hiding place in which to lick its wounds, she thought soberly, pouring herself a glass of the home-made lemonade she kept in the fridge. And the quiet little house, with its uncluttered plain interior and horseshoe-shaped stone steps leading down to the small, slightly sunken garden of sun-drenched grass surrounded by eucalyptus, orange and lemon trees and palms and flowering shrubs, had been like balm to her soul. She would have gone mad if she had had to stay in England another day. She would never forget the overwhelming relief she had felt when she had boarded the plane at Heathrow airport.
She drank the refreshingly cold and tart drink straight down and then poured herself another glass, carrying it through into the sitting room and opening the French doors into the garden before she sat down in the old rocking chair at the side of the windows. It was her favourite spot in the fierce heat of the day when even the shaded garden was too hot for her pale English skin, and she had sat for hours staring out into the brightly spangled vista, her mind going over and over the last whirlwind months since Zac Harding had blazed into her life.
She hadn’t done that so much in the last few days, she thought now, shifting slightly in the cushioned seat as the cramp-like pain she had been experiencing on and off for the last weeks made itself known. Her mind seemed to have become numb, frozen almost. Perhaps one could only take so much grief and pain without losing one’s sanity? Certainly every time she had pictured Zac with Gina she had felt she was going mad.
Zac Harding. She shut her eyes tightly, but still the tall, lean figure was there in front of her. Raven-black hair just touched with grey, dark, glittering eyes set in a handsome, aesthetic face that was all male—he had a presence that was devastating.
She had first seen him across a crowded room—the oldest cliché in the world, she thought with tired wryness—and from the moment their eyes had met she had known she would never meet another man who would stir her the way he did. It wasn’t just his smouldering good looks, stunning though they were, or the aura of wealth and power that surrounded him. She would have been able to resist that—she had in the past, hadn’t she? She’d come from a privileged background and had known other men just as wealthy and influential as Zac. But he was different. He had a magnetism, a dark, sardonic sensualness that was lethal, and women went down before it like ninepins. She’d gone down before it...
But he had told her she was special. And, fool that she was, she had believed him. Victoria’s soft mouth tightened and she opened her eyes wide before shaking her head at her own stupidity. How could she have been so naive, so simple and trusting? she asked herself disgustedly. And it wasn’t as if she hadn’t been warned either. Everyone had said she was crazy to believe that Zac Harding could ever settle for one woman. And in the final event he hadn’t; she had been proved wrong and everyone had been able to nod their wise heads and tut-tut as her world had fallen apart around her ears. The few that knew, that was.
A sharp knock at the front door of the small, two-bedroomed house brought her out of her reverie like a douche of cold water. In the whole of the two months she had been here she had had no visitors, apart from William Howard who was an old and dear friend of hers and who owned the property, and he had popped over on two occasions from England just to make sure she was all right. He had offered her the use of his holiday home in the first dark days of her split with Zac, and she had accepted gratefully, needing desperately to get away from all that was familiar.
It had been a matter of principle that she pay rent for staying at Mimosa—the cottage was so named for the beautiful blossom in the surrounding trees in February and March—but William’s parents were due for a visit at the end of June, so Victoria only had another few days in her small sanctuary.
She had been dreading the return home and all it would entail, but now... Victoria’s hand rested protectively on her stomach for a brief moment on her way to the front door. Now she had a reason to be strong, a reason to pull herself together and concentrate on the future. And she would do it by herself—she would ask help of no one; she would forge her own destiny and carve out a place for herself and her child. Other women did it—within her own circle there were one or two friends who, by circumstances or design, were both mother and father to their children, but oh... She paused a moment before opening the door. She would have given the world for it not to be this way.
‘Hello, Victoria.’ Zac’s voice was quiet and silky-smooth.
She couldn’t move or speak, and she really wondered—for the merest of moments—whether the big dark figure in front of her was a product of her fevered imagination. She had thought about him, dreamt about him, tasted, sensed, felt him every single minute of the endless days and nights they had been apart, but the flesh-and-blood man was so much more powerful than her bitter-sweet memories. Devastatingly, frighteningly powerful.
‘Can I come in?’ He inclined his head towards the sweltering, dusty street behind him. ‘It’s hot enough to fry eggs out here.’
But still she couldn’t respond, and then, as she watched his mouth begin to say something that her ears didn’t seem to be able to hear, Victoria knew she was going to pass out. Her last sight of him, as the rushing in her ears became a dark tunnel drawing her down, would have been amusing in any other circumstances. The cool, imperturbable countenance changed, as though someone had flicked a switch, and there was sheer amazement and alarm on his face as he leapt forward to catch her in his arms.
When she came round she was lying on the flamboyantly embroidered sofa in the sitting room, and she opened her eyes to see Zac’s angry handsome face just inches from her own as he crouched at her side, his narrowed gaze tight on her.
‘You haven’t been eating properly.’ He was straight into the attack. ‘You must have lost a stone in weight.’
It was altogether too much, and Victoria didn’t know whether she wanted to laugh or cry. Instead she weakly expostulated, ‘What do you expect? I’m a normal human being, Zac; I have annoying things called feelings. I can’t turn my emotions on and off at will.’ She forced the tears back with superhuman effort
‘Meaning I can?’ he asked grimly, his lips setting in a hard straight line and his frown ferocious as he eyed her angrily.
But she wasn’t going to be intimidated. Not now, not ever, Victoria told herself shakily as she struggled into a sitting position on the sofa and Zac rose to his feet ‘That’s exactly what I mean,’ she agreed bitterly. And then, as the full horror of the situation dawned on her, she added through trembling lips as her chin rose defiantly, ‘And what are you doing here anyway?’
‘I was just passing by so I thought I’d call in,’ he said, with the cruel, cutting sarcasm he did so well. ‘What else?’
‘You weren’t supposed to know...’ Her voice trailed away as the midnight-black eyes blazed at her.
‘Where you were hiding?’ he finished caustically. ‘Oh, I’m fully aware of that, Victoria. No one knows that better than I. I’ve spent a small fortune trying to find—’ He stopped abruptly, taking a long hard pull of air before he said, his formidable composure fully restored and his voice cool, ‘Are you feeling better?’ He thrust his hands deep into the pockets of his trousers.
‘Better?’ For a split second she thought he was referring to the baby before she realised how ridiculous she was being. ‘Yes, yes, I’m fine now. It’s...the heat,’ she said quickly.
‘Is it?’ He glared at her, his dark eyes flashing over her slender shape and pale, drawn face in a razor-sharp scrutiny that did nothing for her fragile equilibrium, before he added insult to injury by stating flatly, ‘You look as though a breath of wind would blow you away.’ It wasn’t meant as a compliment.
‘Do I?’ She wouldn’t have imagined just a few minutes before that she could spring up from the sofa with such suddenness, but the white-hot fury that had her in its grip banished even the faintest remnant of weakness. ‘Well, now you’ve come spreading happiness and cheer, perhaps you’d like to leave? I don’t remember inviting you in in the first place,’ she added caustically.
‘You’d rather I’d left you sprawled in the doorway?’ he drawled derisively, his temper apparently quite restored.
‘Yes!’ And then, as the black eyebrows rose, she amended, ‘No. Oh, you know what I mean,’ she floundered angrily. ‘I was perfectly all right before you came.’ She glared at him, her colour high.
‘Were you?’
The mockery was all gone, his voice soft and low, and she shivered at its power over her, but her voice was firm when she said, ‘I want you to leave, Zac. I want you to leave now.’
‘I’ve only just arrived,’ he countered easily.
‘I mean it.’ She raised her chin, looking him full in the face.
‘Yes, you probably do.’ He looked down at her, the black eyes onyx-hard and very cold. ‘But we have things to discuss, Victoria, whether you like it or not.’
‘That’s where you’re wrong.’ In the past she had always rather relished the fact that he was nearly ten inches taller than her five feet six inches, but now it was merely daunting. ‘I have absolutely nothing to say to you except goodbye,’ she said flatly.
‘For crying out loud!’ It was a snarl of savage frustration. ‘What’s the matter with you? Listen to me, woman.’
‘Don’t “woman” me, Zac,’ Victoria said coldly, forcing her voice to betray none of the trembling that was turning her stomach over and over. ‘Save that form of address for—’ She found she couldn’t say Gina’s name and substituted, ‘Your other women.’
Part of her couldn’t believe she was talking to him like this and she doubted if anyone had before. Zac Harding was a law unto himself, a powerful, ruthless law which was dangerously self-sufficient and utterly without mercy for those who crossed him. He had terrified her when she had first met him all those months ago—terrified and fascinated and enthralled her to the point where she had been unable to imagine a world without him. And then she had thought she didn’t have to, she reminded herself painfully. Fool that she was. But she’d learnt her lesson well.
‘I refuse to have this conversation again.’ It was icy and overbearing, and so utterly him that Victoria wanted to stamp her feet and throw a tantrum in a way she hadn’t done since she was a toddler. ‘And you wall listen to me, Victoria, but for now—’ he eyed her white face and the trembling she couldn’t quite hide ‘—you need something to eat,’ he finished smoothly.
‘Eat?’ She stared at him as though he were mad. ‘I don’t want anything to eat for goodness’ sake, and I’ve told you—’
‘And I’m telling you.’ He crossed muscled arms over the wide expanse of his chest—a chest that was broad and hairy and wonderful to snuggle up to, Victoria thought weakly, before she slammed the door on that particular avenue of thought—and stood surveying her with narrowed eyes, his legs slightly apart and his body relaxed.
‘I’ve been travelling for I don’t know how many hours and I haven’t eaten since last night. I’m tired, I’m hungry, and my patience is at an all-time low, okay? Added to which you look as though a good meal would do you no harm at all. Now—’ he held up an authoritative hand as Victoria went to speak ‘—I promise that once we’ve eaten, and had that little chat, I’ll leave. There was no compromise in his tone.
‘I want you to go now,’ she repeated stubbornly.
‘No way, Victoria.’ It was final, and she knew him well enough to know that she could talk until she was blue in the face and they would still end up having that meal.
But she still persisted. ‘You’ve got no right to barge in here like this—’ She stopped abruptly as he rounded on her angrily, his dark eyes flashing fire and his face black with rage.
‘I have every right,’ he stated with imperious authority. ‘I am your husband—or had that little fact slipped your memory?’
‘Only until the divorce becomes final,’ she countered swiftly. ‘And...and I’m not using my married name any more.’
‘That doesn’t make you any less married,’ he said with unarguable logic. ‘You’re my wife, Victoria. It’s legal.’
‘We were barely married.’ Victoria was aware her voice was higher-pitched than normal and strived desperately to bring it down an octave or two as she continued, ‘It was only for a day.’
‘And a night.’ His gaze narrowed as he saw his words register in her liquid, violet-blue eyes, his cleanly sculpted mouth twisting in a sardonic smile as he added, ‘Don’t forget the night, Victoria. Annulment is definitely not an option.’
As if she could forget. She stared at him, her face suffusing with enough colour to satisfy even Zac. She had been an innocent twenty to his experienced and far from innocent thirty-five, and he had taken her into a heaven that was indescribable. The wedding had been a fairy-tale one of white lace and orange blossom, despite the fact that it had all been arranged in as little as four months from the point at which they had got engaged, and every moment had been one of exquisite beauty and romance. But the night... The night had been one of unforgettable passion.
Victoria had been nervous when he had first shut the door of their hotel room, and they were alone at last. Nervous of her naiveté, of her potential inability to please and satisfy a well-versed man of the world like Zac, of her ingenuousness and lack of sophistication in the arts of love.
She had met Zac Harding the day after she had returned to England from Romania, where she had been taking a year out after A levels working in an orphanage before taking up her university place. She had been nineteen and untouched.
It had been her mother who had introduced them. Coral Chigley-Brown had thrown one of her little parties—ostensibly to celebrate Victoria’s safe return from that ‘awful place’, as her mother termed Romania, but really because Coral was the sort of social butterfly who found a different excuse for a soirée of some kind every week. Even now Victoria could picture the look of satisfaction on her mother’s pretty, expertly made-up face as she had watched Zac’s dark, glittering eyes narrow with interest on her daughter. She just hadn’t known her mother’s real reason for desiring an alliance between the Chigley-Browns and the Hardings. Not then.
‘Victoria?’ Zac’s voice brought her back from a dark place. ‘I presume this little idyll far from the madding crowd has a kitchen?’
‘A kitchen?’ She stared at him as though the words were foreign to her and then nodded towards an arched doorway. ‘Through there, but if you insist on staying for a meal I’ll see to it.’
‘Sit down; you look as though you need to,’ he said drily. ‘I’ll sort something out for us.’ He eyed her mockingly.
‘You?’ If he had taken all his clothes off and danced the conga she couldn’t have looked more amazed, Zac reflected somewhat cynically. ‘You can cook?’ Victoria asked weakly.
‘Yes, I can cook, Victoria,’ he said smoothly. ‘I can do a lot of things you are not yet aware of. Now, sit down and think nice thoughts, and once you are looking less drained we can commence battle. Okay?’
He didn’t wait for an answer, striding through the doorway into the small kitchen where she heard him beginning to clatter about like an army of chars among William’s pots and pans.
She needed to sit down if she were being honest, Victoria thought shakily, staring at the empty doorway one more time before making tremblingly for the rocking chair. It wasn’t just that she had skipped breakfast before going to the appointment with the doctor because she had been feeling ill, or the heat and feeling of nausea that were now combining to make her light-headed; it was...it was him, Zac. All her troubles were down to Zac.
He was right when he said there were lots of things she didn’t know about him, Victoria thought with painful honesty as she flopped down in the cushioned cane. Their whirlwind courtship and swift marriage had been very much a public affair, and they had hardly been alone at all in the preceding months.
Why hadn’t it occurred to her to be suspicious about that? she asked herself now. It was natural for newly engaged couples to want to be alone, surely, but Zac hadn’t seemed to want that. But then with Gina in tow, why should he? He’d had everything he wanted.
Lies, lies, lies—their whole relationship had been built on a pack of lies, and it had only been hours after their union that the house of cards had come tumbling down.
Victoria had been vaguely aware of the telephone ringing very early the morning after their wedding, and of Zac reaching out a hand and speaking quietly into the receiver.
She had heard him mutter something into the phone, and then, after sitting up abruptly, he had padded through into the sumptuous sitting room of the bridal suite at the hotel where they had held the reception, and continued the call on the extension in there.
She had still been half awake when he had come back into the bedroom and begun dressing, and her sleepy, ‘Zac, is anything wrong?’ had brought a reply of,
‘Just a business crisis I need to sort out with Jack before we fly to Jamaica this morning. Go back to sleep, darling, I’ll only be a few minutes.’
And, trusting, blind fool that she was, she had gone back to sleep, exhausted by the excitement of the day before and her consuming, wildly passionate and utterly thrilling initiation into the intimacy of married life. Had there ever been such a fool as she?
When she had next surfaced it was to Zac gently kissing her awake, his eyes dark and hot, but when she had held out her arms in an unspoken invitation for him to join her in the massive bed he had shaken his head slowly, softening the refusal with a laughing reminder that they had arranged to share breakfast with the guests who had stayed over at the hotel after the late evening reception. It made her squirm with humiliation now to think of it.
She had felt a little hurt before she’d told herself she was being silly. This was the first day of their lives together as man and wife—they had all the time in the world in which to share their love. But as she had dressed, Zac watching her with a strange expression on his dark, handsome face, Victoria hadn’t been able to rid herself of the impression that something was wrong even as she told herself she was being ridiculous.
He hadn’t been the adoring, besotted bridegroom of the day before, or the ardent, sensual lover of the night hours, a lover who had tenderly tempered his considerable sexual prowess to her nervous inexperience until she had been as wildly abandoned as he was. He’d been different. Something had changed, and she hadn’t been able to put her finger on it. He’d seemed preoccupied.
And then, shockingly, in the elegant, air-conditioned luxury of the hotel lounge, she had discovered why her husband of a few hours had refused her fumbling sexual advances that morning.
Zac had wanted to make a phone call before they went through to join the others for breakfast, and she had sat down in one of the deeply cushioned sofas to wait for him, glancing idly at a glossy magazine and reflecting that she had never imagined it was possible to feel so happy. But she felt loved, she’d told herself joyfully. For the first time in her life she felt really loved. Hers had been a privileged childhood in the material sense, but her parents had never made any secret of the fact that they hadn’t wanted a child and that she was an intrusion into their lives.
When she had been shipped off to boarding-school at the tender age of seven, it had been her nanny she had cried for—she had barely known her parents. And when her father had died three years later she had attended the funeral of a stranger. As she had gone into her teenage years she had tried to get to know her mother, but after countless cold rebuffs had finally accepted they were a million miles apart in everything that mattered.
Her mother was an avid socialite who used her considerable wealth for a life of pampered luxury, and who worried more about a chip in her nail varnish than starving children in the Third World. Victoria’s gentle, sweet nature was anathema to her mother—Coral saw it only as weakness and despised her for it.
And so, as Victoria had sat waiting for her new husband on this, the first morning of her new life, her heart had sunk slightly when that familiar voice had sounded at her elbow, saying, ‘Victoria? What on earth are you skulking out here for?’
There had been no real justification in Coral’s taking advantage of Zac’s generous offer to provide accommodation at the hotel for any guests who wanted to stay over for the night after the celebrations—she only lived a short drive away in a sumptuous apartment in Kensington—but it hadn’t surprised Victoria either. Coral was like that. She took everything she could and then some.
‘Skulking?’ Victoria forced a smile as she turned in her seat to look up at the hard, pretty face staring down at her. ‘I’m not skulking, Mother. I’m waiting for Zac,’ she said quietly.
‘Are you?’ Her mother paused, frowning slightly before she said, ‘You really ought to get in there with all the others and show them you don’t care, Victoria. It’s the only way.’
‘Don’t care?’ Victoria echoed confusedly.
‘Exactly.’ Coral’s voice was sharp and impatient.
‘Mother, I’m sure this conversation is making sense to you but I don’t have a clue what you are on about,’ Victoria said patiently. ‘What is it I’m not supposed to care about?’
‘You mean you don’t know?’ Coral sank gracefully into a seat opposite her daughter, crossing her legs and raising her chin slightly in order to show her profile to its best advantage to anyone who might be watching. ‘I would have thought Zac would have told you by now,’ she added disapprovingly, her eyes narrowing on Victoria’s beautiful, slightly bewildered face. It was a source of constant aggravation to Coral that such beauty had been wasted on someone who didn’t care for the social scene, and who didn’t—in Coral’s opinion—make the best of themselves.
Victoria stared at her mother, the little prickles running down her spine telling her she was about to hear something she didn’t want to hear. But still she said, ‘Go on,’ her voice steady.
‘Gina Rossellini—that second, or is it third cousin of Zac’s?—took an overdose last night. She was in the room next to mine and there was such a commotion at about four o’clock this morning. Stupid woman.’ The last two words were vicious. ‘It’s all for Zac’s attention of course. I know her type.’
‘Mother...’ Victoria shook her head slowly, her sleek fall of silver-blonde hair that was cut in feathered wisps down to her shoulder blades shimmering under the artificial lights of the hotel lounge. ‘What are you trying to tell me?’ she asked quietly, her stomach doing a mighty cartwheel. ‘Are you saying that there is something going on between Zac and Gina Rossellini?’
‘She’s been his mistress for years, girl; I thought you knew,’ Coral said irritably. ‘Everyone else on the planet does.’
‘I... How could I know?’ Victoria was suddenly aware of the moment in piercing detail—the subdued, discreet lighting overhead, the dusky pink carpet and luxurious furnishings, the faint perfume from the fresh flowers at the side of them—it was all stamped on her consciousness along with the horror of her mother’s next words that chilled her blood to liquid ice.
‘Well, it doesn’t matter much one way or the other, does it?’ Coral said matter-of-factly. ‘Your father’s mistress knew him long before I did and if you’re wise you won’t put anything in the way of this association continuing. A mistress is very useful, Victoria. She can take care of all that—’ her mother flicked a languid hand with a distasteful wrinkle of her small nose ‘—side of things which men seem to find so important. As long as she knows her place—as Linda Ward did—she can be an asset to you.’
‘Linda... Aunty Linda! You mean Aunty Linda was father’s mistress?’ Victoria asked faintly. She’d always known Linda Ward as one of her parents’ close friends, although her mother had always treated the other woman with a patronising condescension Victoria hadn’t understood until this very moment. ‘And you didn’t mind?’
‘Of course not.’ Her mother was clearly losing patience as she snapped, ‘All men have mistresses, Victoria, if they can afford them. For heaven’s sake open your eyes, girl. Of course one would prefer they have a little more control and discretion than Gina obviously has, but that comes of her having Latin blood, I suppose. Still, Zac’s mother was Italian so I suppose Gina suits him in certain regards. Men look for different things in wives and mistresses,’ Coral continued in the normal superior manner she adopted when talking to her daughter.
‘Mistresses are for certain...basic needs; wives are chosen for their social connections and pedigree, and for the continuation of the family name if so required . . .’
‘Zac...Zac isn’t like that,’ Victoria protested dazedly. ‘I don’t know what happened with Gina, but he isn’t still seeing her, I know it. And he married me because he loves me, not because of my name or standing or anything like that,’ she finished a trifle wildly, her hands clenching into two fists at her sides.
‘Pull yourself together.’ It was soft but deadly. ‘Don’t you dare cause a scene, Victoria. Of course Zac has a regard for you, but an alliance with the Chigley-Browns is also very useful to him. Your father’s business interests were very far-reaching, and there is already a deal going through to cement an alliance.’
‘I don’t believe you.’ Victoria glared at her. ‘I don’t.’
But her mother’s sharp ears caught the soft quiver in the brave protest, and her hard blue eyes that resembled cold glass were piercing. Coral sighed irritably, before she snapped, ‘I do hope you aren’t going to be difficult about all this, Victoria. For a grown woman of twenty you really are most childish. Zac spent peat of the night in Ginas’s room when he was called to her side—now face that and get on with things for goodness’ sake. I don’t know how many of our guests—’ ours? thought Victoria numbly ‘—are aware of the situation, but you need to handle this with the sophistication Zac will naturally expect of his wife.’
‘I don’t believe you.’ This time it was a fierce hiss, and Coral actually drew back in her chair, her light blue eyes wide with shock and surprise, as Victoria continued, ‘You disgust me, do you know that? You have always disgusted me, although when I was younger I couldn’t put a name to why. But you’re shallow, utterly selfish, and you don’t care about anyone but yourself. You’ve never loved me; I don’t believe you’ve ever loved anyone.’
Victoria rose as she finished speaking, glaring down at her mother with blazing blue eyes. ‘I’m going to find Zac now, and I know he’ll tell me it was all lies. We want to have a real marriage, something you couldn’t possibly understand.’
‘Victoria.’ Angry though her mother was, her voice still didn’t rise above a certain level, her control absolute. ‘Sit down at once and behave yourself. I’m ashamed of you.’
‘I’m a married woman, Mother, and your time of telling me what to do is over,’ Victoria said tightly. ‘I couldn’t believe the terrible scene you caused when I said I wanted to go to help the children in Romania, or the tactics you used to try and stop me going, but you failed then and you will continue to fail. I make my own decisions now; kindly remember that in future. And we will never agree on anything; I accept that now. We’re worlds apart.’
She was shaking so much as she walked over to join Zac that he couldn’t fail to notice, and as he finished his telephone call abruptly the thought did flash through Victoria’s mind as to why he couldn’t have used the phone in their suite.
‘Tory?’ It was his pet name for her and she welcomed the security of the intimacy for a moment. ‘What’s wrong?’ He took her arm as he spoke, moving her into a quiet corner as he held her against his chest before moving her away slightly in order to look down into her face. ‘Has someone upset you?’
‘My...my mother.’ Victoria breathed deeply, willing herself to remain strong. ‘She said things, things about you and...Gina.’
‘What things?’ His voice was expressionless and calm, but Victoria had seen the impact in his eyes and her heart stopped before racing on like an express train. There was something in this.
‘She said Gina was your mistress.’ Victoria pulled away from him now, standing straight and stiff as she looked intently into his face. ‘And that your business interests are forming a merger with my father’s. She said it’s all been arranged for ages.’
‘And?’ He continued to look at her with the poker face she had seen him adopt with other people in other situations. But not her. Never with her. With her he had been open and warm and tender... Black foreboding took all the colour from her face.
‘Isn’t that enough?’ Victoria asked tightly. ‘Is it true?’
‘Tory, let’s go somewhere more private to discuss this.’
‘Where did you go when you left our room last night?’ she asked with painful dignity, holding her slender body ramrod-straight. ‘Did you go to see Gina because she had taken an overdose?’
‘Victoria, I’m not prepared to discuss this here.’ The ‘Tory’ had gone, Victoria thought with grim discernment, and in that moment she knew whom he had been phoning too. Gina Rossellini.
‘Why did she do that, Zac?’ She ignored his furious frown with a regal composure her mother would have been proud of. ‘Was it because she couldn’t handle seeing you marry someone else? Because she’d thought she was going to be the one you took down the aisle, rather than becoming the one you kept on the side? And why did you marry me anyway? Were my connections better than hers? Have I swelled the Harding coffers?’ she persisted stiffly.
‘Is that what Coral told you?’ he asked grimly.
But he hadn’t denied it. He hadn’t denied it. She couldn’t believe this was happening to her. ‘Zac, are you, or are you not, dealing with the people who now run my father’s business interests for my mother with a view to an alliance?’ Victoria asked woodenly. ‘A simple yes or no will do.’ She stared at him desperately.
‘Yes.’ And he didn’t bat an eyelid. Not an eyelid.
‘And did you spend part of the night with Gina when she called you after taking an overdose?’ she continued flatly, her heart thudding as the nightmare escalated at his grim,
‘Yes, I did.’
‘And she is your mistress.’
It was a statement, not a question, and now his cool control was absolute when he said evenly, ‘We had a relationship once, Victoria. Past tense.’
She wanted to believe him. She couldn’t believe how much she wanted to—but she didn’t. ‘Why didn’t you tell me about her before, Zac? Especially knowing she would be here at the wedding?’ Victoria asked numbly. And she had actually liked Gina when she had met her, she thought with a stab of fierce self-disgust at her own credulity. She’d thought the other woman charming.
‘She wasn’t relevant to you and me,’ he said softly. ‘That’s why.’ He went to take her arm again but she jerked away tightly.
‘Wasn’t relevant?’ What planet was this man on? What planet were they all on? Victoria asked herself bitterly. And then she remembered something Zac had let slip a couple of weeks before, and she felt her heart crack and break into a hundred tiny pieces.
‘You had lunch with her recently,’ she stated slowly, searching her memory. ‘You said you were helping her buy an apartment, putting her in touch with the right people.’ And now she stepped back a pace, her violet eyes black with pain. ‘You were setting up a love nest, weren’t you? And this morning, this morning—’ She couldn’t express how his withdrawal from her when she had first awoken was affecting her. ‘I hate you,’ she said bitterly.
‘Victoria!’ He caught her arm as she went to swing away from him, forcing her to remain where she was. ‘Listen to me, for crying out loud. Listen. I can explain all this.’
‘You left me on our wedding night to go to her,’ Victoria said slowly, her voice flat but her eyes expressing her shock and horror. ‘You still care about her, don’t you? You still love her. When she called you, you went to her and left me.’
‘Victoria, I married you,’ he said with savage restraint, his fingers bruising the soft flesh of her arm. ‘I love you.’
‘Tell me you feel nothing for her. Tell me,’ she insisted hotly. ‘Tell me you didn’t buy her that apartment, that I’m wrong.’
And then his eyes flickered again and she knew he wouldn’t say it. Because he knew she would know he was lying.
‘I’m going back to the room for a while; I want to be alone,’ she said shakily. ‘I’ll join you and the others later.’
‘I’m coming with you; this has gone far enough—’
‘No.’ She interrupted his angry voice with a sharp lift of her chin and a straightening of her body. ‘I need...I need some time before I come into breakfast, and then...we can talk afterwards. I can’t now; I just can’t.’ Her voice broke then, and as his face twisted and he would have taken her in his arms she backed away so sharply she almost fell over. She couldn’t bear for him to touch her. She hated him. Oh, she hated him.
‘Please, Zac,’ she said with touching dignity, ‘if you’ve ever had any feeling for me at all, let me have a few minutes by myself. I feel you owe me that at least.’
‘This is crazy,’ he ground out furiously through clenched teeth. ‘Your damned mother wants shooting!’
‘I’ll see you in a few minutes.’ Her voice was dismissive, and she didn’t argue the point further, walking swiftly over to the lifts and entering the first one without turning her head. She had half expected him to follow, and by the time she reached their suite and realised he wasn’t going to something had solidified in her heart, making it feel like a ten-ton weight.
Their bags were sitting in the corner, packed and labelled for their month’s honeymoon in Jamaica, but Victoria took only her overnight case and handbag with her, leaving the hotel quietly by the back entrance through the kitchens to avoid Reception and the possibility that Zac might be there. Facing him again was unthinkable.
Once outside in the cool chill of the late March morning, she stood uncertainly looking from left to right along the side road bordering the rear of the hotel. She couldn’t go to their beautiful new house in Wimbledon, or her mother’s apartment in Kensington—they would be the first places Zac would look for her—and most of their friends’ and relations’ homes were out for the same reason. She bit her lip, her face desperate. And then it came to her. William. She could go to William.
William was the brother of one of her old schoolfriends, and she had known him since her first visit to her friend’s house when she had been eight years old and terribly shy. He had teased her, played with her, and never once led her to believe he considered an eight-year-old girl beneath his fifteen-year-old notice.
For the next few years Victoria had spent most of the holidays from boarding-school with his family. Her mother had been only too pleased to be spared the inconvenience of having her around—something Coral had made abundantly clear several times—and when Victoria was thirteen, and the family had moved abroad, William had stayed in England. He had a very modern bachelor pad with enough gadgets for a James Bond movie, and she had still continued to visit him now and again before she had left England for the year in Romania.
He had a high-pressured and absorbing job in the BBC, which meant he was out of the country for weeks at a time on some assignment or other, but she knew he had been due home from the latest mission the night before. He had sent a polite note to her a couple of weeks ago to say he regretted he was going to miss the wedding by hours. So, more likely than not he would be in, and, best of all, Zac had never met him. In fact she wasn’t even sure if Zac knew of the other man’s existence.
William had been in—very in as it happened—and once he had got dressed and the lady had left, insisting she had been due to leave in the next hour anyway, he had let Victoria cry herself into a frenzy and then out of it again. He had held her close, murmuring soothing nothings and asking no questions until she was calmer, at which point he had made a pot of very strong coffee and they had talked the afternoon away.
At the end of that time he’d offered her unconditional sanctuary for as long as she felt she needed it, with an additional invitation of the use of his holiday home in Tunisia which he’d recently inherited from his grandmother.
And she hadn’t seen Zac again.
CHAPTER TWO
THERE was a wonderful aroma drifting through from the kitchen, and as Victoria came out of the tangle of her thoughts she found she was sniffing the air like a child. He really could cook.
‘You look about twelve this morning.’
The deep, velvety soft voice from the doorway brought her head swinging round to see Zac watching her, his eyes very intent. She stared at him for a moment, and then shrugged carefully, her voice reserved as she said, ‘Looks can be deceptive.’ And in this case particularly so, she added silently. She was a grown woman with a child—his child—growing inside her. A bolt of something she recognised as fear shot through her, and she turned her head abruptly, hiding her face with the shining, silken veil of her hair. That piercing gaze was too perceptive by half, and it was one of Zac’s strengths that he used mercilessly.
Zac mustn’t know about the baby. Her mind was screaming a warning to her. In the dark days since their wedding she had come to realise she knew very little about the powerful, enigmatic man she had married so trustingly, but one thing she did know. He was the type of male who would fight tooth and nail for what was his, and he would certainly see this tiny being as belonging absolutely to the Harding empire. Her feelings would be incidental.
She had been raised in the care of nannies and chauffeurs and hired help and it had been miserable. She didn’t intend to let that happen to her child. And it was hers, all hers, she told herself fiercely. It was even her mistake that meant it had been conceived at all. She had decided to take the pill several months before, but in all the furore of the wedding she had forgotten that one, vital night, and a possible pregnancy had been the last thing on her mind when she had fled the next morning. She had just wanted to put as many miles between them as she could.
‘Come and eat.’ His voice was cool now, cool and hard, but she welcomed that. It emphasised that he was a stranger, that the man she had fallen in love with, the powerful, tender lover and fascinating companion, had been a figment of her wishful imagination, nothing more. Her Zac had never existed.
They ate at the tiny marbled breakfast bar that was just big enough to accommodate two plates, and Victoria had to admit that the light fluffy omelette and grilled fish doused in lemon and herbs were delicious. Zac had opened a bottle of wine he had found in the fridge, looking slightly surprised when Victoria insisted she only wanted a glass of orange juice but saying nothing.
But once the meal was finished and they had taken their coffee through to the sitting room he said plenty.
‘Well?’ Victoria had sat down in the rocking chair again but Zac remained standing, darkly brooding and slightly menacing as he leant against the far wall. ‘Have you punished me enough or do you intend to continue with this charade?’ he asked coolly.
‘Charade?’ It was only the thought of the damage black coffee would do to William’s tasteful furnishings that saved him. ‘You think this is a charade, a game, Zac? Think again,’ Victoria said tightly as she placed the mug on the table next to her before temptation overcame her. How dared he stand there and say that?
But he had seen her hand tremble, and now he said, his voice grating, ‘If you act like a child you should expect me to treat you like one. How could you leave like that, without saying a word? It was the height of stupidity.’
‘But I am stupid, Zac.’ Victoria glared at him, her pale skin stained scarlet and her jaw setting ‘I believed every word you told me, didn’t I? You can’t get much more stupid than that’
‘I have never lied to you,’ he stated with outrageous righteousness. And then, when she stared at him in furious disbelief, her mouth opening and shutting as she sought for a suitably cutting reply, he added, ‘I can see that you disagree with that.’
‘You...you said you loved me,’ she managed at last.
‘I do love you, Victoria.’ It was as cold as ice. ‘It was you who left me, remember? I didn’t go anywhere.’
‘And you think that unreasonable?’ she asked incredulously. ‘You leave me on our wedding night to go to someone else—’
‘I did not choose to leave you,’ he said calmly, as though that made everything all right. ‘I answered a distress call from a human being who needed help, because I was the only person who could.’
Of course you were, she thought with agonising pain—you were the cause of it in the first place. ‘You kept it a secret,’ she accused sharply. ‘You didn’t tell me what had happened although you had several opportunities. You weren’t going to tell me, were you?’
‘No, I was not.’ It was not the answer Victoria had expected; she had expected him to lie and perversely it hurt all the more that he hadn’t bothered to do even that. ‘There was no need for you to be bothered with such unpleasantness,’ Zac said coolly. ‘This was my problem, and as such I dealt with it as I saw fit.’
Oh, it was his problem all right! ‘You married me because you wanted to extend your business empire,’ Victoria stated with painful flatness, ‘and don’t bother to deny it; I know it’s true. You probably fancied me too, and I was malleable enough—stupid enough—for your purposes. You had planned to go on exactly as you’d always done, hadn’t you? I wouldn’t even have made a dent in your life. There was to be no sharing, no real commitment.’
‘That is all absolute rubbish and you know it,’ he said angrily. ‘I never lied to you, not once. If you had asked me about Gina, or the business deal with your mother’s attorneys, I would have told you as much as you wanted to know.’
‘That’s easy to say now,’ she shot back furiously, ‘but how could I ask about something I didn’t know a thing about?’ She had always considered herself a quiet, gentle, easy-going sort of person, certainly not someone who would ever contemplate doing another human being serious physical harm, but right at that moment, if she had had anything in her hands, she would have thrown it straight at Zac’s handsome, superior face. She wanted to hurt him. She wanted to really, really hurt him, and the knowledge shocked her more than she could express, acting like a bucket of cold water on the fire of her temper.
‘Did you buy that apartment for Gina?’ she asked now, her voice shaking. ‘Just a few weeks before we got married? Did you?’
‘I’m not answering that before I explain the circumstances,’ he said after a long moment of looking at her white face from which all colour had fled.
‘I think you just did,’ she whispered numbly, her eyes desolate.
‘Victoria, I had responsibilities I couldn’t walk away from,’ he bit back tightly. ‘Responsibilities that necessitated action.’
‘I know. Responsibilities to your mistress,’ she said dully.
‘No, to a member of my family,’ he growled deeply. ‘She is a distant cousin of mine, and her mother had phoned me from Italy to say that Gina had problems and needed help. I couldn’t refuse her.’
‘Did her mother know you were sleeping with her daughter?’ Victoria asked with uncharacteristic cynicism.
‘My affair with Gina ended before I met you,’ Zac said with rigid self-control. ‘And that is the truth, Victoria. I swear it.’
‘I don’t believe you.’ She stared at him with pain-filled eyes.
The words hung in the air for an eternity, and as Victoria wrenched her eyes from his and turned to stare out into the garden—anything to avoid looking at his face and seeing the look that had come into the dark eyes at her words—she focused on a small, flat, large-eyed lizard that had changed its colour to suit the large stone on which it was hanging by the tiny suckers on its toes.
How could life go on—the sun shine so brightly, the flowers and trees look so beautiful—when her world was ending? she asked herself silently. But she had to finish this now—it was even more important after what she had learnt that morning.
She had thought he was different, she’d believed he really loved her as she did him—and she had loved him, so much—but he was part of her mother’s world, not hers. She didn’t want to spend the rest of her life with a man whose values resembled those of her father. Her mother might have been able to handle it—in fact her mother had clearly relished it—but Victoria knew herself well enough to recognise she would destroy herself if she tried to do the same. The last two months had confirmed that if nothing else. But there was more, much more, she understood now.
And it wasn’t just Gina, or even the merger, big as those issues were. In all their months of being together, in all the magic and laughter and joy, he had never really talked to her, she thought numbly. She had been like a pretty little doll to him, an entertaining novelty he had picked up and decided to buy, and she had been too captivated and under his spell to see the warning signs. But they had been there. And now she was taking notice.
She wanted her child brought up in the real world, with real people. It wouldn’t be easy, but she wouldn’t ask Zac or her mother for a penny. She would work—she would get a job doing anything, and she would make it by herself. She wanted nothing more to do with their seedy little world. It was over.
‘Don’t do this, Victoria.’ Zac’s voice was as cold as ice. ‘You’re throwing away something precious because of hurt pride, that’s all. Let me explain; let’s talk it through from the beginning.’ And then, more urgently, he said, ‘It’ll be all right, trust me.’
‘It’s too late.’ She turned back to him then, her blue eyes with their long thick lashes shadowed with pain. ‘It’s all far, far too late. We should never have married, Zac. We’re worlds apart in everything that matters. And you know it too, deep down.’
‘The hell we are,’ he ground out in savage denial. ‘The hell we are. You’re my wife and I don’t let go of what is mine.’
He reached her in three angry strides, pulling her up out of the rocking chair and into his arms with a fury that was all the more intense for being suppressed, his mouth fastening on hers.
She was too stunned at first to fight him, and then, as she began to twist and turn in his hold, the smell and taste and feel of him began to spin in her head. She had been starving for this, physically starving for long, wretched, tear-filled weeks, and as he devoured her mouth desire rose hot and strong in her veins. But it would be madness to give in to it.
She still continued to struggle, the knowledge of her weakness where this man was concerned shameful and humiliating, but she was fighting herself more than him and she knew it. She was aware of the power in his muscled body, and also that he was using his strength to restrain rather than force her, but his mouth was hungry and urgent and inciting a response in the depth of her she didn’t want to give. Dared not give.
‘Don’t...don’t do this.’ Her voice was shaking and frantic.
‘Why not?’ He raised his head slightly, his eyes glittering and black as he moved her back against the white-washed wall of the sitting room. ‘I’ve been thinking of nothing else for weeks.’
‘I don’t want to,’ she protested tremblingly, moving her head as he tried to take her lips again. ‘And I don’t want you—I don’t.’
‘Yes, you do,’ he growled thickly. He was breathing raggedly, his body taut and his thighs hard against hers. ‘That night, our wedding night, was just a taste for both of us. I want more, much more. You’re mine, Tory; you’ll always be mine...’
She froze, the blood turning to liquid ice in her veins. Was this what the great love she had thought they’d shared had been reduced to? An animal mating, the satisfaction of physical lust, the possessor taking the possession he had acquired? He didn’t love her—he didn’t know what love was. None of his kind did. Her mind continued to race as he began to kiss her again.
He had bought an apartment for Gina just weeks before they had got married. He had gone to her, on their wedding night, the minute Gina had called. And there had been a big incentive for him to rush her down the aisle—a lucrative deal for all concerned.
He had taken her as his wife because she met all the criteria he had laid down for the future Mrs Harding, and because, as he had said more than once during their engagement, it was time he settled down and became a family man. He wanted children, and she was a suitable breeding machine. But he hadn’t been prepared to cut the tie with Gina in the last resort. And she hated him.
He couldn’t fail to notice her rigidity, and after a moment he swore under his breath, raising his head as he said, ‘Don’t fight me, Tory. You’re mine and you know it. You can’t win.’
Maybe not, but I can make sure you don’t win either, she thought numbly. ‘I want a divorce, Zac.’ As he moved back a pace, his eyes narrowing on her face, she raised her chin determinedly. ‘As soon as possible,’ she added, with such a note of determination in her voice he couldn’t fail to believe she meant business.
‘No way. It was almost lazy, only the fiery glow in his black eyes revealing the banked-down emotion. ‘No way.’
‘I mean it,’ she insisted with quiet dignity.
‘So do I.’ The desire which still had him in its grip was making his voice husky. ‘I told you, I never let go of what is mine. Not unless I want to, that is. And in this case I don’t.’
She almost put her hand protectively across her flat stomach as he spoke, before warning herself she couldn’t afford any instinctive gestures like that. Zac was nobody’s fool. She had to get back to England and then disappear again, until the divorce was through or the baby was born—whichever came first. And the fewer people who knew about the pregnancy the better.
‘You won’t be able to stop me divorcing you, Zac,’ Victoria said with a quiet bravery she hadn’t known she was capable of. ‘It will happen whether you want it to or not. No woman has to remain chained to a man she doesn’t love these days.’
‘Ah, but you do love me.’ It was supremely arrogant and devastatingly true, and Victoria kept her face blank only by the harsh training she had received throughout a childhood of hiding her feelings. Then, as now, she had known any weakness would be recognised and used unmercifully against her. ‘I was the first man to take you and I intend to be the last. Believe me.’
She couldn’t believe the double standards. ‘I take it you operate on the sentiment that a woman is like a flower with honey for just one bee?’ she said bitterly. ‘Whereas a man is able to go from flower to flower to flower? Is that it?’
‘I didn’t say that.’ He eyed her darkly, his mouth grim.
‘You didn’t have to,’ she returned smartly. ‘That particular male view has been expressed since the beginning of time; it’s not new. Men can play around all they like but the little woman remains at home as pure as the driven snow.’
‘I never pretended that I was inexperienced, Victoria,’ Zac ground out irritably. ‘You knew when you married me that there had been other women before you. I was quite open about that.’
‘Before me, yes.’ She drew in a shuddering breath, the now familiar feeling of light-headedness and nausea rearing its head. ‘I just didn’t expect there would be any after me, that’s all. Look—’ she sank down into the rocking chair again, her head bowed as she tried to control the nausea ‘—we’re getting nowhere with all this and I’m not feeling too well; the heat and the different food has upset my stomach. Please go, Zac. I need to lie down.’
Her extreme pallor spoke for itself, and after an exasperated, ‘For crying out loud,’ Zac took a visible hold on his temper before saying, his voice quieter, ‘All right, I’ll leave you to rest. But Victoria?’ She raised her head at the tone, looking at him for a long moment as he surveyed her with narrowed eyes before saying, ‘Don’t think about disappearing again. Once I can accept, but twice would be a big, big mistake. Do I make myself clear?’ he added grimly.
Who did he think he was talking to—one of his employees? Victoria thought furiously, the adrenalin pumping hot and strong. She raised her drooping head a few notches and glared at him.
The anger carried her through the next few moments of Zac leaving, but it left her in a big whoosh when he turned on the doorstep, putting down his big black leather overnight bag that he had obviously slung into her hall some time during his arrival, and took her in his arms again, kissing her very thoroughly before raising dark, sardonic eyebrows at her flushed protestations.
‘I can’t help it,’ he said mockingly. ‘There’s something about this pale and interesting look that turns me on, especially with the new fiery part of you as an interesting contrast.’
‘I don’t want you to be turned on.’ She wasn’t at all sure it was the truth and that confused her still more. ‘Not now, not ever.’
‘Thanks a bunch.’ It was very dry.
‘I mean everything I’ve said today, Zac—’
‘No, you don’t,’ he interposed smoothly, before she could say anything more. ‘You want me every bit as much as I want you, but you don’t trust me and I don’t like that. I don’t like that at all.’
‘You don’t like it?’ She stared at him incredulously, unable to believe her ears. ‘Well, that’s just tough, isn’t it?’
He shrugged lazily, but Victoria had seen his eyes narrow and his mouth tighten. She hadn’t spoken to him like that before and he didn’t like it. Good. The man’s arrogance was past belief and she wasn’t prepared to take it a minute longer.
‘You’re really not going to listen to me, are you?’ he said thoughtfully after a tense few seconds had ticked by. ‘But you believed every word the dragon lady said.’
His nickname for her mother used to make Victoria smile but she didn’t feel like smiling any more. And now, in spite of the muggy, sweltering heat that had the dusty streets deserted and empty except for a few chickens pecking desultorily here and there, the temperature chilled to zero as he added, ‘And you ran to William Howard; you trust William Howard. Why is that, Victoria?’
‘William?’ In the shock of seeing Zac again she hadn’t thought to ask exactly how he had known where she was, but now her voice trembled as she said, ‘Did William tell you where I was? You...you haven’t hurt him—’
Now it was arctic conditions. ‘No, I haven’t hurt him,’ Zac grated with dangerous composure, his eyes lethal. ‘I wasn’t aware that there was any reason to, but I’m beginning to wonder. I found out where you were by other means; I have...contacts.’
Oh, yes, she was well aware of his ‘contacts’, Victoria thought bitterly. He had a small army of minions ready to jump at the click of his fingers, and money could buy anything—or anyone. She had heard him talk about ‘necessary research’ once—they had been at a party and one of his business colleagues had button-holed him about a prospective deal—and when she had asked him what he had meant, once the man was gone, he had smiled before saying, ‘I have people who find out things, Tory, that’s all. Things that other people might prefer to keep hidden.’
‘Private detectives, you mean?’ she had asked naively.
‘Something like that. And then he had changed the subject.
‘Why doesn’t Coral know this William?’ Zac asked sharply.
Victoria snapped back from the past as Zac’s voice cut into her thoughts. ‘My mother never took any interest in my friends,’ Victoria said tightly, ‘as well you know.’ Except you, she thought. My mother took a great interest in you from day one. And now she knew why. ‘Have you asked her about William?’ she added abruptly as the portent of his words made itself known. Silly question; of course he had
‘Yes, I have.’ The night-black eyes were boring into her brain. ‘He is the brother of a schoolfriend, yes? That is all that Coral knew. My...source informed me he was out of the country covering some disturbance or other in Saudi Arabia.’
‘That’s top-secret information,’ Victoria blurted out, shocked to the core. William had impressed upon her, on his last visit the previous weekend, that only very few people knew of his forthcoming, extremely sensitive and delicate assignment.
‘But he told you,’ Zac said very softly. ‘He told you, Victoria.’
‘Of course he did.’ She had meant that William had confided his whereabouts to her because she was an old and trusted friend who was living in his home—or one of them—and Victoria knew William had been trying to prevent her worrying if she was unable to contact him for a week or two. But now, as she stared into the menacingly dark face of her husband, she realised Zac had put quite another interpretation on her innocent reply.
‘Of course.’ His mouth was a hard, angry line, his black brows drawn together in a ferocious scowl. ‘Victoria, exactly what is your relationship with this action man?’ Zac asked with icy control. ‘And I want the truth, please,’ he added cuttingly.
‘My...’ He was jealous. He was jealous of William, Victoria thought numbly. And who was he to talk about truth?
‘You flew out to Tunisia in the middle of April,’ Zac bit out harshly, looking every inch his mother’s son as his glittering black eyes blazed his Italian blood. ‘Where were you for the two weeks before that when you fell off the face of the earth?’
He was questioning her morals? Victoria thought disbelievingly, white-hot rage beginning to bubble like a volcano about to explode. He was actually daring to suggest that she and William...
‘How dare you?’ she spluttered helplessly, utterly outraged.
‘Oh, I dare, Victoria. I most certainly dare,’ he snarled darkly, breaking into her loud, hissing protest with a fury that matched her own. ‘I’m asking you again—where were you?’
She glared at him, drawing herself up to her full five feet six inches as she tilted back her head and stared him straight in the eyes. ‘I was at William’s flat,’ she said icily. ‘Okay?’
‘I see.’ It was more ominous than any bellow.
‘No, you don’t! You don’t see at all,’ Victoria shot back tightly. ‘William has been absolutely wonderful to me, he always has been, but we’re friends, that’s all. Platonic friends.’
‘There is no such thing between a man and woman,’ Zac stated tautly, ‘especially a woman who looks like you. He would have to be made of stone, and I take it he is very much a flesh-and-blood man, right? A man who likes women?’ He added suddenly, evidence that he had thought of another possibility clear on his face.
‘Of course William likes women.’ Victoria was even more furious that Zac obviously considered the only way she and William had been able to keep their hands off each other was if William preferred men. ‘He’s very...’ Her voice stopped abruptly as she realised it wasn’t tactful in the circumstances to labour William’s masculinity. She stared at him as her mind went blank.
‘Very...?’ Zac rasped angrily. ‘William is very...?’
Oh, to hell with it. ‘Male,’ Victoria said a trifle weakly.
‘Is he?’ If ever two words were loaded, those two were. ‘And this very male man looks on you in the same way an aged uncle would?’ Zac continued with heavy sarcasm. ‘How old is he?’
‘Twenty-seven.’ Victoria’s tone clearly stated, Make of that what you will. ‘And I’m not prepared to discuss William with you,’ she added firmly, contradicting herself immediately when she said, ‘He, at least, has never let me down.’
‘I bet he hasn’t,’ Zac derided contemptuously, ‘but if you ever stay with him again you’d better book him a hospital bed at the same time. He’ll need one.’ He glared at her ferociously.
‘You wouldn’t!’ Victoria glared back, horrified. ‘How dare you threaten William? He’s never done anything to you.’
‘It’s not what he’s done to me that concerns me,’ Zac said with lethal intent. ‘And it’s not a threat, it’s a promise.’
‘I don’t believe this!’ She was so angry she could barely get the words out. ‘After all you’ve done, you have the cheek to object to William and me—’ She suddenly had a wave of light-headedness and stopped abruptly, her colour coming and going as she stared into the blazingly angry face of her husband.
‘William and you...?’ Zac pressed softly, his face making it clear he was thinking the worst from her sudden silence.
‘Being friends.’ Even to her own ears it sounded like an afterthought, and her own patheticness made her voice tremble with a mixture of rage and injured pride as she said, ‘It is your suspicious mind that has made up the rest. William is one of the nicest men I know, and certainly the most honourable. He’s kind and generous—’
‘Spare me a list of his virtues, Victoria, please,’ Zac grated with hateful sarcasm. ‘I’m amazed this paragon hasn’t got wings already. And whilst we’re talking about suspicious minds, might I remind you you are in no position to cast the first stone?’
‘You’re saying I’ve got a suspicious mind?’ Her voice had risen to a shrill shriek that made Zac wince. ‘After you—’ She couldn’t go on, she was too angry, and it was a few gasping breaths later before she managed to say, ’I’m not discussing this any more, there’s absolutely no point, but I can’t believe you just said that.’
‘One rule for you and one rule for me?’ Zac suggested icily. It was adding salt to the wound.
‘I’m going to lie down.’ Victoria drew herself up, her voice fairly coherent, which was a miracle in itself considering how she was feeling. ‘I’m...I’m feeling worse.’ Worse? She felt ghastly.
‘Whereas I, of course, am feeling great?’ came the sarcastic rejoinder. And then, when she didn’t venture a comment, he asked, ‘Do you want the number of my hotel?’
‘No.’
Victoria shut the door on his outraged face and just made it to the bathroom before she deposited the contents of her stomach into William’s bright blue basin.
CHAPTER THREE
‘AND you haven’t told him you’re pregnant?’
It was a full week later and Victoria was back in England, the crowded restaurant where she and William were having lunch packed to bursting with the élite of London’s high-fliers.
‘No, I told you. He was only in Tunisia overnight, and when he came back in the evening we just fought again. It...it was awful.’ Victoria wanted to cry but she knew she couldn’t—not in the middle of Radstone’s where her lettuce leaves and chicken must be costing William a small fortune. ‘I told him I was coming back to England and...and that I’d be renting a place.’ She hadn’t told William the full story—William, like Zac, had a healthy amount of fierce male pride, and she doubted he would appreciate being labelled the third part of a triangle.
It seemed she was less adept at hiding the truth than she had thought. ‘I take it he objected to you staying at Mimosa?’ William asked wryly with a lift of his dark eyebrows. ‘And even more my flat, no doubt. Well, I can understand that of course.’
‘But why?’ Victoria objected plaintively. ‘I told him we were old friends, and that our relationship was purely platonic, but he didn’t believe me. He...said that there was no such thing as a platonic friendship between a man and a woman.’
‘He was right,’ William agreed with a remarkable lack of heat.
It wasn’t what Victoria had expected, and her face said so.
‘Look, Blue-eyes—’ it was the nickname he had given her when she was eight years old and had stuck ever since ‘—you’re absolutely gorgeous, and I fancy you like mad, but I’ve always known you see me as a big brother and nothing more. So...’ He shrugged easily, his nonchalance hiding a pain which had plagued him for years and had taken more self-will than he had known he possessed to come to terms with. ‘That’s okay. I’d rather be in your life as a friend than out of it altogether.’ He shrugged slowly.
‘Oh, William.’ She stared at him, her soft heart immediately flooded with guilt. ‘You’ve never said... I didn’t know.’
‘Of course you didn’t, and it’s no big deal,’ he insisted easily. No big deal? She still had the power to floor him with one look from those big blue eyes. ‘I’m here for you, always, okay? And all the crazy, angry husbands in the world wouldn’t make me change my mind. My home is your home, Blue-eyes, whenever you need it. No strings, no bother. Now—’ he smiled at her as the moment became charged with emotion ‘—eat your lunch. You’re eating for two, remember, so you’d better pack away a double dessert to make up for the lack of nutrition in that thing.’ He poked his fork at her salad with manly distaste.
‘William...’ Victoria wriggled helplessly, her eyes tragic.
‘Eat, woman.’ And this time his smile was genuine. ‘It’s not the end of the world. I’m not going to die from unrequited love or anything like that. You know me—tough as old boots.’
‘I feel awful,’ Victoria murmured softly.
‘Well, don’t.’ And suddenly it was the old William, the William she knew—or thought she had known, she corrected silently. ‘I’m not exactly short of female company as you well know.’ He gave a leery wink to make her laugh, and Victoria obliged, although it was forced. Poor William. Poor, poor William.
She just hadn’t dreamt William felt like that about her, she told herself in amazement. Not in a hundred years. In fact she was beginning to think that the whole male population was a species apart. Why hadn’t he said something? She glanced at him now as he tucked into an enormous fillet steak with every appearance of enjoyment, to all intents and purposes perfectly relaxed.
Could she have ever felt that certain spark with William? He was certainly good-looking, with his wavy dark hair and brown eyes with little flecks of green, straight nose and smiling mouth. He was tall too, not as tall as Zac’s six feet four, but William was a good six inches taller than her and lean and fit with it. But he was right. She lowered her eyes to her plate and pecked at her salad. She did look on him as a brother. Loved him as a brother actually... But there was nothing romantic there.
‘How long does this morning sickness go on?’ William asked suddenly, and she glanced up to see a look of concern in his gentle eyes. ‘You’re getting as thin as a rake.’
‘A few more weeks yet, I think.’ She sighed wearily. ‘And I only wish it was morning sickness. With me it’s every hour of the day and night sickness, and then a bit. I was even sick in the middle of the night when I got up to go to the loo. And that’s another inconvenient something no one tells you about—my bladder has developed a life of its own,’ she finished plaintively.
‘Poor old love.’ But he was laughing and she couldn’t help a rueful grin back, which swiftly faded when he said, his tone serious now, ‘You do know you’re going to have to tell him sooner or later? It’s his child too, Blue-eyes. You can’t keep something like that from a man. This idea of disappearing is a non-starter.’
‘What’s this, the eternal brotherhood?’ she asked grumpily. But he was right. She knew he was right. And she also knew she was going to have the dickens of a fight on her hands once Zac knew she was carrying his child. But she wasn’t going to give in.
They left the restaurant arm in arm, and as always Victoria felt better for having talked to William, after crying most of the long, lonely night away, lying awake until the early hours.
She had moved into the tiny, one-bedroomed flat she was renting the day before, and amazingly it had been her mother who had been instrumental in her finding the little treasure of a place tucked away in Richmond. It belonged to the daughter of one of Coral’s bridge partners, apparently, who was away working in America for twelve months and had decided to rent out if she could get a suitable lodger. Victoria was considered suitable, and so that was that and she was installed before she knew it.
Victoria had been only too grateful to find somewhere so quickly—the three days she had spent at her mother’s apartment on her return to England had been more than enough for both women. And how Coral would react when she found out she was going to be a grandmother, Victoria didn’t even like to contemplate. She was barely speaking to her daughter as it was, and Coral had told her flatly—in the first minute of their meeting on Victoria’s return to England—that she considered Victoria totally responsible for the breakdown of her marriage.
As though he had picked up her thoughts, William stopped her on the pavement just outside the restaurant and enclosed her lightly in his arms, looking down into her face as he said, ‘How is your mother behaving in all this, or don’t I need to ask?’
‘About as you’d expect,’ Victoria said with justified bitterness. ‘Everything is all my fault and Zac can’t do anything wrong.’
‘She’s one on her own. It’s hard to believe—’
Victoria never did find out what William found hard to believe, because in the next moment, as she stood relaxed in his arms, her head tilted as she looked up into the face of this tried and trusted friend, a dark, cold voice at the side of them brought her jerking out of William’s hold as though something had bitten her. Which in a way it had, she thought shakily as her heart continued to beat like a crazy thing.
‘I hate to interrupt what is obviously a tender moment, but I want a word with my wife.’ Ice tinkled in every word.
‘Zac.’ Victoria stumbled backwards and would have fallen but for Zac’s quick hand at her elbow, which immediately returned to his side when she was steady, as though he couldn’t bear to touch her. ‘What...? How did you...?’ she stammered incoherently.
‘Let’s cut the “what are you doing here?” scenario,’ Zac grated with icy contempt. ‘I’m sure we can do better than that.’
He looked magnificent. That was Victoria’s first jumbled thought. Followed by, And angry. Definitely furiously, murderously angry. He was in a business suit, clearly having come from the office, and in spite of the rage that was turning the dark eyes into brilliantly black bullets and his beautifully chiselled mouth into a hard, straight line his control was absolute.
‘Zac, this isn’t a good moment,’ she began tremblingly.

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