A Weekend To Remember. Miranda Lee

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СКАЧАТЬ bought it several years ago as a getaway. It was part of my divorce settlement.’

      ‘I see. Well, that explains why I didn’t know about it. You never talk about your marriage or your husband. Or you didn’t before I lost my memory,’ he muttered disgruntedly.

      Which was pretty true, although Jack did know that Dwight was a doctor. And she had told him one day about the apartment she lived in, which was right in the middle of Parramatta’s business district, and far beyond a secretary’s salary. It was in a fairly new and prestigious building; the lower floors were devoted to shops and offices, and the upper floors housed exclusive executive apartments.

      Dwight had bought one of these apartments only a couple of weeks before Hannah had left him. And had arrogantly—but stupidly, as it turned out—put it in her name for tax reasons. He hadn’t even had time to put tenants in when she’d walked out on their marriage and laid legal claim to it. It had given her a small amount of satisfaction that there hadn’t been a darned thing Dwight could do about it.

      As it turned out, it was an ideal spot for her to live, despite Parramatta being a long way from the northern suburb of Mosman, where she’d lived all her married life. Her boys, of whom she had joint custody, were only a short distance away at Kings College, and it was only a ten-minute drive from Parramatta to Marshall Homes’ head office at Castle Hill.

      ‘Have you brought me up here before?’ Jack asked abruptly, dark puzzlement in his voice.

      Hannah tensed. ‘No, I haven’t,’ she admitted.

      Jack glanced at his wristwatch, his head snapping up and round in surprise. ‘Good God, it’s almost eight o’clock!’

      ‘You’ve been asleep for hours. How are you feeling, by the way?’

      ‘I’ve felt better.’ His hand came up to touch the top of his head carefully.

      ‘You don’t feel nauseous, do you?’ the doctor had asked her to watch for nausea and vomiting as a sign of a more serious concussion, making her promise to take Jack to a hospital if that happened.

      ‘No,’ he denied. ‘Just headachy. It’s not nearly as bad as it was, though.’

      ‘Do you…er…still think it’s May, and not July?’

      “Fraid so. And I still can’t believe you and I are engaged,’ he added, shooting her a much sharper look. ‘Hell, Hannah, how and when exactly did that happen?’

      A wave of guilty heat filled her face, but she doubted he could see it. It was pitch-black outside, and the light inside the car was dim. ‘Er…only this week, actually,’ she said.

      ‘Yeah, right, but how did it happen?’

      Hannah decided that she had to take control before things got really sticky. ‘Look, Jack, I realise our engagement has come as a big shock to you. Frankly, it came as a big shock to me too. One minute you were just my boss, then something happened, and suddenly I just…we just…’

      Hannah wanted to groan her dismay. This was her taking control? Lord, why hadn’t she thought out a believable story to tell him? There again, was there a believable story to tell him?

      ‘We became physically involved with each other?’ he prompted.

      The lack of surprise in his voice sent her eyes jerking round to blink at him.

      ‘That’s not the part I can’t believe, Hannah,’ he said drily. ‘I always did fancy you.’

      Hannah swung her stunned eyes back on the road ahead, before she really ran into the truck in front of them.

      ‘It was our getting engaged that shocked me,’ Jack went on. ‘Or, more to the point, your agreeing to marry me. You’ve told me more than once you’d never get married again. Frankly, I always believed you wanted nothing more to do with men—in that way or any way at all! So what happened to change that?’

      She struggled to find her voice, but her mind was still reeling from Jack’s bald announcement that he’d always fancied her. She found it hard to believe—but why would he lie?

      This highly unexpected revelation gave a totally different meaning to the way he’d looked her over sometimes in the office. She’d always imagined he’d been mentally criticising her fashion senseas Dwight had done ad nauseam. Now she saw him undressing her with his eyes, and suddenly she was all hot and bothered.

      ‘Hannah?’ Jack persisted. ‘Tell me straight. How did this affair of ours start?’

      ‘I…I don’t know. I mean…Oh, God, I don’t know what I mean.’ She felt totally flustered now, yet she couldn’t pull back. The die was cast and she had to roll with it. ‘It…it happened the day my divorce papers came through,’ she invented shakily. ‘We…we…worked back late together that night. At one point I became upset. You comforted me and…and one thing just led to another…’

      ‘Are you saying I seduced you at a weak moment?’ he demanded disbelievingly. ‘Hell, I didn’t make you pregnant, did I? Is that why we’re getting married? Because you’re expecting my child?’

      Her face flamed as she blurted out, ‘No!’ in a panicky voice. This was becoming awful!

      Jack frowned across at her. ‘I presume by that you mean, no, you’re not pregnant.’

      ‘No, I’m not pregnant. And, no, you didn’t seduce me either. I…I wanted you to make love to me,’ she insisted, appalled at herself for letting Jack think that he’d acted dishonourably, then more appalled at the corner she’d backed herself into.

      ‘And once we went from friends to lovers, we actually fell in love?’ he suggested. ‘Is that what you’re saying?’

      ‘Not exactly.’ God, this was going from bad to worse!

      ‘Mmm. You mean it’s more a matter of compatibility and convenience than runaway romance and passion?’

      ‘I think it’s more a matter of stupidity,’ she muttered. ‘Look, Jack, I think our engagement was rather a rash decision, and I won’t hold you to any of it. We haven’t even bought a ring yet, so our engagement’s easily called off.’

      ‘But I don’t want to call it off,’ he said, astounding her all the more. ‘As I said before, I’ve always been attracted to you. And I like you more than any woman I’ve ever known. It was only your attitude to men and marriage that held me back from trying to deepen our relationship.’

      Hannah gave him a startled look before wrenching her eyes back on to the road, her heart racing madly. Dear heaven, where would this all end? It was becoming more crazy by the moment!

      ‘Frankly, my own attitude to marriage has been changing for quite a while,’ he went on thoughtfully. ‘I’d already come to the conclusion that one steady woman in my life would be much preferable to a series of semi-casual relationships. I don’t really have the time to romance one woman after another, and the type who’ll go to bed with you without romance was beginning to lose attraction for me.’

      Hannah refrained from rolling her eyes, thinking to herself that she doubted СКАЧАТЬ