where the nipples left an erotic imprint against the wet fabric of her shirt. Unable to fight the impulse, he reached across and pushed aside a strand of rain-darkened hair that clung to her cheek.
The touch of his fingers on her skin made Mari tense; slowly she turned her head to look at him. The light contact felt like a brand at every point of contact and her skin tingled and burned.
‘Right, I’ll marry you but I won’t sleep with you.’
A slow smile of satisfaction spread across his hawkish features. ‘In my experience it’s always a good idea to keep business and pleasure separate, but let’s not include it in the vows.’
Mari flinched. Hearing him say vows made it seem more real. She felt as if she were living a recurrent childish nightmare of hers—she had stepped on a carousel that wouldn’t stop and let her off, it just carried on going round and round while she started screaming.
His smile died as he said softly, ‘The next time maybe...?’
She gave a bemused frown and shook her head, parroting in a flat voice, ‘Next time?’
‘Don’t all girls dream of the wedding dress?’
‘Not the groom?’
‘Let’s hope you find a man who hasn’t been put off the white-wedding thing by having been previously publicly humiliated by a wedding crasher. Oh, and while we are on the subject it’s not the best idea to start looking for Mr. Right or even a little light entertainment until after we have split up.’
Struggling to hide her embarrassment behind an air of amused indifference, she shrugged and asked, ‘Is that in the small print?’
He did not smile back, and there was a definite warning in his voice as he told her, ‘No, that part is in the big print. If it’s any comfort, you won’t be the only one condemned to eighteen months of celibacy.’
What was eighteen months when you’d already done twenty-four years? she thought, swallowing the bubble of hysteria that rose in her throat.
‘Still, I suppose eighteen months of abstinence is preferable to a lifetime of regret.’
She lost the battle to allow his cynicism go unchallenged. ‘I suppose the trick is to find the right person.’
He gave an eloquent sneer of contempt. ‘The trick is to enjoy the party but be realistic.’
His attitude continued to get under Mari’s skin. ‘So if you don’t believe people fall in love forever, why were you getting married?’
A muscle throbbed in his lean cheek as he gave a strange twisted smile. ‘Did I say I didn’t think people fall in love forever? My parents’ passion for one another is as strong today, I would think, as the day they met.’ And just as blindly selfish.
The idea of following their example had been the perfect incentive when it came to keeping his own passions under control.
She was bewildered by the aura of anger he was projecting. It had an almost physical presence in the enclosed space.
‘Well, that’s marvellous.’ She looked at him, struggling to read his expression. ‘Isn’t it?’
‘My parents’ love has not stopped them having affairs, but they always come back to one another. However the divorces were never amicable and the marriages always headline-making lavish.’
Her eyes widened. ‘How many times?’
‘Married three times, divorced twice...so far.’
‘That must have been hard growing up.’
The tentative sympathy was met with a hard look. ‘Put your empathy away, Mari. I do not need it. My grandfather brought me over from the Argentine to England when I was eight, up from that point he raised me, and then when Fleur came along he adopted her.’
‘Do you spend much time in Argentina?’
He shook his head. ‘Not now. After the death of her husband my grandmother moved back to her homeland, Spain. I spend some time there.’ He handed her a card. ‘My private number—ring me if you have any questions. So where shall I take you?’
‘I came in my own car,’ she said faintly. ‘So what happens...now?’
‘We get married. It’s not complicated.’
Mari swallowed. ‘When?’
‘I’ll be in touch.’
MARI WAS PACKING her bag when her mobile rang. Finding it under a pile of underclothes, she saw the caller ID and picked it up. Chloe had been her classroom assistant for two years now. She was one of the people Mari would miss most, along with the children. She had always felt she was one of the lucky ones. She loved her job and never woke up not wanting to go into work—now all that was gone.
She pushed the thought away—no time to look back and have regrets. ‘Hi, Chloe!’
‘Is it true? Have they really sacked you?’ Without waiting for a reply the girl continued indignantly, ‘Is that even legal?’
‘I’m on a temporary contract. It runs out at the end of the term.’ Not long ago there had been some pretty broad hints dropped that she might be offered a permanent contract at that point, but that was not going to happen now. ‘They are giving me paid leave until then and a good reference.’
Would Sebastian give her a good reference when their contract was successfully completed? She swallowed a bubble of hysteria and heard the younger girl say, ‘Well, I think it’s terrible. We all do, Mari—you’re the best teacher in the place.’
Mari felt her eyes fill at the tribute.
‘So what are you going to do?’
‘I thought I might travel a bit, take a trip.’ She kept it vague, as she had done the previous day when she had visited Mark, though Chloe showed a lot more interest in her plans than her brother had.
Mark had barely listened when she’d said that she needed to take a trip. All he could talk about were the arrangements for his transfer—his mention of her part in the change in his fortune had been lightly touched on.
‘I knew if you could swallow your pride it would be all right. I’ve no idea what you said to him, sis, but it worked, Seb has done the right thing.’
‘I didn’t say anything. How do you know it was him?’
‘Who else would it be? And don’t look like that.’ He’d sighed. ‘You always managed to ruin things with that guilt thing of yours. It’s win-win—he can go around feeling good because he’s dug his hand in his pocket for the poor cripple and, let’s face it, it’s not as though he doesn’t owe me. He put me here after all.’
Did he...? Mari’s innate honesty could no longer support the deception.
