‘I told myself that I did hate you,’ he agreed quietly. ‘It was the only way I could retain my sanity. I was sick with jealousy; so much so that it corroded my ability to see clearly, distorting my powers of reasoning. I couldn’t look at Simon without remembering how it had been between us, and how you had told me that it meant nothing, that it was Geoff Rivers you loved. But that last night we had together after we had been out for dinner.… Why were you so desperately anxious to leave that you had to go without a word to me?’
‘You were asleep. I wanted to tell Simon. It was what we had agreed… that I would leave. That evening you told your mother I was leaving.…’
‘Why did you let me make love to you that night?’
‘I…’ she floundered desperately looking for an explanation that wouldn’t give her away. ‘I.…’
‘You still love me.’ Scott supplied for her softly, watching the colour come and go in her face; the betrayal of her eyes. It was only when he exhaled that Philippa realised how tense he had been. ‘My mother told me,’ he said roughly, ‘but I didn’t believe her. I couldn’t. Philippa, how could you still love me after what I’ve done to you?’ He groaned the words against her throat, ‘You ought to hate me.’
‘The way you hate me?’ The words were husky with a pain she couldn’t conceal, but they had to be said.
‘The way I tried to hate you,’ Scott corrected still watching her, ‘I love you, Philippa.’
For a second she thought her heart had stopped beating, and then it started up again, quick jerky thuds that corresponded with her disordered thoughts. Was she imagining things or was this Scott actually telling her that he loved her? ‘Why do you think I was so ragingly jealous of any other man who came near you? Why do you think I leapt at the excuse to keep you here, when I should have let you go, finding you a job, forcing you to stay when you had made it plain that you felt nothing for me?’
‘You love me? But I didn’t know. I.…’ Her tears had stopped, and he reached towards her, placing his fingers against her soft mouth. ‘How could you not know?’ he groaned huskily, ‘I betrayed how I felt every time I came within a yard of you.’
‘I thought you were simply trying to torment me, to make me want you physically.’ She flushed a little, remembering how he had touched her and how she had responded, knowing that both of them had been blind mentally, although their bodies had sensed the truth.
‘Tormenting you?’ he groaned again. ‘Have you any idea of the agony I endured, wanting you, having you in my arms, responding to me, so… so eagerly and yet not loving me. It was torture. It stripped my pride to the bone and left me aching with pain, savage with the intensity of it. You gave me your body, but I knew all the time that you were holding aloof from me, keeping some part of yourself hidden.’ His voice was raw with a pain that found an echo in her own heart.
‘I had to,’ she said huskily, ‘I couldn’t let you see that I still loved you.’
‘So you let me think that you were sublimating your physical desire for Geoff, with me. Dear God, when you told me that I could have killed you.…’
‘I know.’
‘Mmm, you definitely drew blood there,’ he agreed softly. ‘No man likes to be told he’s being used simply as a stud. It’s apt to have a decidedly cooling effect upon one’s ardour.…’
‘I hadn’t noticed.’ She said it demurely and was rewarded with the brief warning pressure; of his fingers against her waist. ‘You were driving me insane. That night after we’d had dinner together I think I went a little crazy. I was determined to make you admit that you wanted me, only that wasn’t enough. I wanted you to want only me, and not just want, but love. When Mother told me that you did, I couldn’t believe it. That was when I decided I was going to force you to marry me. Once married I thought it wouldn’t take too long to break down the barriers and get you to admit how you felt about me, thus allowing me to admit how I felt about you, but I hadn’t taken into account how much I’d hurt you.’
‘We’ve both made mistakes.…’
‘Umm.…’ She sensed what he was thinking and said hesitantly, ‘I did think I was doing what was best for you, Scott, I knew how much you loved this place.…’
‘But never more than you,’ he said with a fiercely desperate anger, ‘Dear God, when I knew the truth, I couldn’t understand how I could have failed you; how you could ever believe that stones and mortar however precious could mean more to me than you did… than you still do. I had thought you guilty of greed; of betrayal… I’d told myself you were shallow, worthless, and that you’d taken me for a fool. When I discovered the truth I.… Tell me again that you love me.…’
‘Always.’ She said it softly against his mouth, feeling his body take fire from hers.
‘I love you so much.’ He groaned the words against her mouth, his arms tightening possessively around her. ‘You can’t know how much.… All these years I’ve dreamed about holding you like this. About turning back the clock and finding that it was all a mistake. I should have had more trust in you. I should have looked below the surface, but my grandfather had undermined my self-confidence so much that I never doubted that you did prefer Geoff to me. Forgive me?’ The words were muffled by the drumbeat of his heart against her, but they still had the power to dissolve the last of her doubts, melting them away to nothing, trust, love, longing, clearly revealed in her eyes as she lifted her head to look down at him.
‘Only if you forgive me,’ she responded softly, opening her arms wide to hold the hard warmth of him, knowing that later they would talk again but that now they would bind each other’s wounds, salving them with the physical expression of their mutual love.
Scott bent his head, his mouth hotly possessive against hers, this his first kiss to her as her husband, her love and the father of their child. ‘A new beginning,’ he promised softly. ‘Tonight we’ll expiate the past and let it die, agreed?’
‘Agreed. Love me, Scott,’ she begged softly. ‘Love me all the ways I’ve dreamed of you loving me in all the time we’ve been apart.…’
‘It will be my pleasure.…’
She laughed softly into his throat, stroking the hard muscles of his back and teased softly, ‘Oh? I thought it might be our pleasure.’
* * * * *
If you enjoyed this story by
NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author
PENNY JORDAN,