Amber went very still, feeling like a small child who had been reprimanded by a very severe teacher. And suddenly all her words were coming out in a haphazard rush. Words she’d thought often enough but never planned to say, in her determination to be the cool and casual Amber she knew she was supposed to be. ‘I’m fed up with being allocated a few hours in the morning before you go to work and then just sandwiched in at night, when you can be bothered to tear yourself away from the office and your beloved Serena. Weekends are better—but you still manage to spend a great deal of time working.’
‘Will you please lower your voice?’ he demanded.
‘No. I will not lower my voice.’ She sucked in a breath, aware that two worried-looking waiters were now hovering at the edge of the room and some of the lovey-dovey couples had gone completely quiet and were staring at them with mounting looks of horror on their faces as if registering that a full-blown row was escalating. This is what it’s like for me, thought Amber miserably, trying not to envy all those couples their closeness and unity, but failing to do so. This is what it’s like for me. This is the reality of my marriage.
And suddenly she realised how stupid she’d been. What was it they said? That you couldn’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. Just as you couldn’t make a real marriage out of something which had only ever been a coldly executed contract. Why even try?
Had she really thought she could endure three months of this? Of trying to just enjoy sex when all the time her heart was becoming more and more involved with this stubborn man and would continue to do so with every second which passed? She was a woman, for heaven’s sake—not a machine! She might try but she couldn’t keep her emotions locked away, even if her husband had managed to do so with such flair. Because he doesn’t have any emotions!
She leapt to her feet and some of Conall’s champagne slopped over the side of the glass as the cutlery on the table clattered. She saw the dark look of warning in his eyes but she ignored it with a sudden carelessness which felt almost heady.
‘I’m sick of being married to a man who treats me as if I’m part of the furniture!’ she flared. ‘Who always puts his damned work first. Who doesn’t ever want to talk about stuff. Real stuff. The stuff which matters. So maybe I ought to admit what’s been staring me in the face right from the start. It’s over, Conall. Got that? Over for good!’
She tried to tug the gold band from her finger but, stubbornly, it refused to budge. Picking up her handbag, she rushed straight out of the restaurant, aware of Conall saying something to the waiters as he followed, hot on her heels. She’d planned to hail a cab but she didn’t have time because Conall had reached her with a few long strides and was propelling her towards his waiting car—holding her by the elbow, the way she’d sometimes seen police do in films when they were arresting someone.
‘Get in the car,’ he said grimly and as soon as the door was closed behind him he turned on her, his face a mask of dark fury. ‘And start explaining if you would—what the hell was that all about?’
‘What’s the point in repeating it? It’s the truth. You don’t make enough time for me.’
‘Of course I don’t. Because this isn’t real, Amber.’ The bewilderment in his tight voice sounded genuine. ‘Remember?’
‘Well, if it isn’t real, then we need to show the watching world that there’s discord between us. We can’t just break up after our supposedly romantic whirlwind marriage without some kind of warning. We need to show that cracks have already begun to appear in our relationship and tonight should have helped.’
There were a few seconds of disbelieving silence.
‘You mean,’ he said, clearly holding onto his temper only by a shred. ‘You mean that the undignified little scene you created back there was all just part of some charade? That you disturbed those people’s dinner in order to manufacture a spat between us?’
Wasn’t it better to let him think that, rather than reveal the humiliating truth that she’d wanted to search for something deeper? That her stupid aching heart was craving the love he could never give her.
‘But it’s true, isn’t it?’ she questioned, biting her lip to stop tears spilling from her eyes. ‘There are cracks. It’s been cracked right from the get-go. All that stuff you said about me realising some of my talents was completely meaningless. You could have done the courtesy of having me sit in on the conference call with Prince Luciano about the Wheeler painting, but you didn’t. You didn’t even bother to mention the negotiations. To you I’m nothing but an invisible socialite who happens very inconveniently to turn you on.’
‘Well, at least you’re right about something, Amber, because you certainly turn me on,’ he said grimly. ‘And yes, I often find myself wishing that you didn’t.’
Something dark and heavy had entered the atmosphere—like the claustrophobic feeling you got just before a thunderstorm. But he didn’t say another word until the front door had slammed behind them and Amber thought he might slam his way into his study or take a drink out into the garden, or even shut himself in the spare room, but she was wrong. His gaze raked over her and she saw a flicker of something dark and unknown in the depths of his sapphire eyes.
He moved like a predator, striking without warning—reaching out for her dress and hooking both hands into the bodice. He ripped it open, the delicate material tearing as easily as if it had been made of cotton wool. Amber shivered because cold air was suddenly washing over her skin and because the expression in his eyes was making her feel...excited and he nodded as he looked into her face, as if he had seen in it something he recognised, something he didn’t like.
‘And your desire for me is just as inconvenient, isn’t it, Amber?’ he taunted. ‘You wish you didn’t want me, but you just can’t help it. You want me now. You’re aching for me. Wet for me.’
Her lips were parched as they made a little sound, though she didn’t know what she was trying to say. She could scarcely breathe, let alone think. Excitement fizzed over her skin even though she told herself she should have been appalled when her panties suffered the same fate as her dress and fluttered redundantly to the hall floor. Appalled when he started to unfasten his trousers, struggling to ease the zip down over his straining hardness.
But she wasn’t appalled.
She was relieved—for surely that was a moan of relief she gave as he eased his moist tip up against her and then thrust deep inside her. She gasped. Was it anger which made this feel so raw and so incredible as she ripped open his shirt to bare his magnificent torso? Or simply the frustration that this was the only way she could express her growing feelings for him? She could bury her teeth into the hair-roughened skin of his chest and nip at him like a small animal. And although he was giving a soft laugh of pleasure in response, she knew he wouldn’t be laughing when it was over.
He didn’t even kiss her and she knew better than to reach her mouth blindly towards his in silent plea. And anyway, there wasn’t really time for kissing. There wasn’t time for anything but a few hard and frantic thrusts. It was so wild and explosive that she gave a broken cry as her orgasm took her right under and his own cry sounded like some kind of feral moan—as if something dark had been dragged up from the depths of his soul. It was
only when he withdrew from her, seconds later—quickly turning his back so she couldn’t see his face—that she realised he had forgotten to use a condom.
He was breathing very heavily and it was several seconds before he had composed himself enough to turn around and stare at her and his eyes looked dark and tortured. He was shaking his head from side to side.
‘That should never have happened.’ His bitter words sounded as if they had been dipped in acid.
‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘Oh, but it does, Amber. It really does.’ His lips twisted. ‘I can’t believe I just did that. That we just did that. It was...it was out of control. I don’t want to live my life like that, and I won’t. This marriage was a mistake and I don’t know why I fooled myself into thinking it could be anything else.’
Amber stared into his eyes and saw the contempt written there, along with a whole lot of other things she would rather not have seen. Once before he had looked at her as if she were something which had been dragged in from the dark, and it was the same kind of look he was giving her now. But back then he hadn’t known her and now he did. It was rejection in its purest form and it hurt more than anything had ever hurt.