One Bride Required!. Emma Richmond

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ when the opportunity had come to see her again...

      Fate? he wondered. Preordained? He had no idea, but just before he had learned of his bequest he’d seen an article about her, about house-detecting. About how she tried to discover the origins of old houses. When the Manor had come into his hands it had seemed the most natural thing in the world to write and ask her to come and see him.

      Except she didn’t know it was to be him. He’d asked the executor of his aunt’s will to write to her, to make the arrangements without mentioning his name. And he shouldn’t have done that. But if she’d known who she was really coming to see she wouldn’t have come—might not have come. And perhaps that would have been best. You couldn’t go back, re-create the past, no matter how much you might want to. Too late now.

      The car door finally opened, and a woman slowly emerged.

      Phoenix Langrish.

      A woman who made the world stand still.

      At eighteen, she had been beautiful. At twenty-eight she was stunning. And she did something to his heart that no other woman had ever been capable of. Not because she was beautiful, because beauty only temporarily stirred the senses. This was something more.

      Delicate and feminine, with long dark hair held back in a clip that was inadequate to the task, wide brown eyes and a mouth that was made to smile.

      Unaware of being watched, she closed the car door and dropped the notebook she was carrying. Bending to pick it up, she dropped her bag, and as she straightened the small camera she was carrying around her neck caught on the door handle. Still clumsy. Still so very lovable.

      She gave a husky little laugh, closed her eyes, took a deep breath, untangled the camera, and turned.

      Never had a smile been wiped away so quickly, he thought, as she glared at him in shock. She was rooted to the spot, and her eyes widened until they could widen no more. She didn’t speak, just stood there, looking at him.

      ‘Hello, Phoenix,’ he greeted her quietly, and his voice was husky. As husky as it had been all those years before.

      ‘No,’ she whispered. Turning abruptly away, she trod in a rut, staggered, and caught the wing mirror for support. It came off in her hand.

      She stared at it, just stared, as though she didn’t know what it was, and then she shuddered, tried to pull herself together. She reached for the car door; he reached it first.

      ‘Don’t leave.’

      Her breathing unnatural, she looked at him. ‘You...I...’

      ‘Yes. I didn’t tell you it would be me meeting you because I didn’t think you would come. And I wanted you to.’

      She didn’t answer. Perhaps she couldn’t. Just continued to stare at him.

      As he stared at her. As he had all those years before in a crowded hotel foyer. Ten years had changed nothing. Even in an ill-fitting suit that looked as though it might have belonged to someone with a larger build she set his senses on fire. She’d had a wild freedom then, an exuberance for life. Awkward, enthusiastic, and totally without guile. Now she looked frightened, caged.

      ‘I find I don’t know what to say to you,’ he said quietly.

      ‘Goodbye?’ she proffered huskily.

      ‘No,’ he denied gently. ‘Come and see the house.’

      Taking her silence for an affirmative, which he knew it wasn’t, he removed the wing mirror from her hand, opened the car door and tossed it inside.

      ‘No,’ she argued hoarsely. ‘I...’

      ‘Please?’ Holding her arm, feeling the shivers that ran through her, the electric tension that he controlled rather better than she did, he led her round to the front of the house. Aware of every little breath she took, every little move she made, he asked, ‘What do you think of it?’

      She didn’t answer, merely stared unseeingly at the house in front of them.

      Turning his head, he slowly examined her exquisite profile, and, resisting the almost overwhelming impulse to touch that thick dark hair, he murmured, ‘Is it worth restoring, do you think?’

      ‘I don’t know.’

      Unable to take his eyes off her, he put one hand over hers, and she jumped nervously. ‘I am sorry, Phoenix.’

      Finally turning her head, she looked at him, and it was as if a shutter came down over her eyes, hiding her thoughts, her feelings from him. ‘Are you?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘For what?’

      ‘The deception.’

      She nodded, made an obvious effort to pull herself together, and returned her attention to the house.

      ‘So, what do you think?’

      ‘I don’t know. You’d need a structural engineer to tell you that. All I can tell you is what things are.’

      ‘Then tell me what they are.’

      ‘Why?’ she demanded raggedly. ‘Why now?’

      ‘Because I saw an article about you, and I suddenly found that I wanted to see you again.’

      She gave a bitter smile. ‘And never mind that I might not have wanted to be seen?’

      ‘Didn’t you?’

      ‘I don’t know,’ she said helplessly.

      ‘It would be a lucrative commission...’

      ‘That isn’t why you invited me.’

      ‘No, I was curious. Didn’t you know that curiosity was my besetting sin? And you’re even more beautiful now than you were then.’

      ‘Thank you,’ she said without inflexion. With an abrupt movement away from him, she announced baldly, ‘I’m going home.’

      Halting her, he asked, ‘Not even a little bit curious to see what’s inside? The article said it was your passion...’

      ‘So were you,’ she retorted without thinking, ‘and look what that got me.’

      ‘A degree,’ he answered. ‘A life. It wouldn’t have worked, Phoenix. Not then.’

      ‘No,’ she agreed.

      ‘And I never meant to hurt you.’

      ‘I know you didn’t.’

      They both stared at the house in silence.

      ‘The article said you were making quite a name for yourself,’ he finally murmured. ‘I’m glad.’

      ‘Thank you.’

      Such a flat little voice, devoid of meaning, but he could СКАЧАТЬ