The Hired Husband. Kate Walker

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      In the doorway Keir stopped suddenly, dark head held high, deep brown eyes scanning the elegantly dressed crowd before him as a murmur of interest greeted their appearance. Surprised by his unexpected stillness, it was all Sienna could do to avoid cannoning into the broad, straight line of his back.

      Automatically her free hand came out to balance herself, closing over the tight muscles in his arm as she came to an uncertain halt at his side.

      ‘Perfect,’ Keir murmured softly, threading the word through with a dark cynicism that she had never heard from him before. ‘Now we look just like the model bride and groom on the top of that ridiculously over-decorated cake you insisted on.’

      ‘I…’ Sienna began but her muffled protest was ignored as Keir, having caught the eye of the waiting maître d’, gave a swift, curt nod as a signal to proceed with the reception.

      ‘Ladies and gentlemen…may I present to you Mr and Mrs Keir Alexander?’

      But that was too much. Sienna’s head came up sharply, turquoise eyes flashing repudiation of the announcement.

      ‘Mr Keir Alexander and Sienna Rushford!’ she pronounced, against the flurry of applause that had greeted the announcement. ‘I—’

      But the rest of her words were silenced, forced back down her throat, as, with a muttered expletive, Keir caught her in his arms, hauling her up against him as his dark head lowered, his mouth coming down hard on hers.

      ‘Keir!’

      His name was a spluttered sound of protest against his lips. It was all she could manage before he kissed her again, with even more ruthless determination.

      ‘Looks like Keir’s got a tiger by the tail, all right.’

      On the borders of her awareness Sienna heard one of Keir’s adolescent stepbrothers make the comment in an aside that was obviously meant to be heard, pitched as it was in a tone that carried clearly in spite of its apparent restraint. The malicious amusement in his voice was impossible to miss.

      ‘Let’s hope he’s not bitten off more than he can chew.’

      Against her slender length Sienna felt the tension that stiffened Keir’s hard frame, tightening every muscle into an unyielding wall that seemed to bruise her just to be pressed close to it. So it was almost impossible to equate what all her senses were telling her with the apparently sensual indolence with which he slid his mouth away from hers, trailing it softly over her cheek until his warm breath teased the delicate curves of her ear.

      ‘Do you want this to work or not?’ he whispered silkily, his words meant for her hearing alone.

      ‘Of course…’

      ‘Then kiss me!’

      ‘Keir…?’ Confusion clouded her eyes, made her voice just a shaken thread of sound.

      ‘Kiss me!’

      With a raw, uncontrolled sound in his throat, he closed hard fingers over her chin, wrenching her face up to his once more. But this time when his mouth touched hers it was with an unexpected, beguiling gentleness, a voluptuous tenderness that made her senses swim, her heartbeat slow to a heavy, languorous thud.

      Against her back, the strength of his arm was all that held her upright. Without its support she felt that she would melt away completely, sliding into a warm, honeyed pool at his feet. Her whole body glowed, heating the blood in her veins until she felt as if she was flooded with molten gold, a burning spiral of very primitive need uncoiling deep inside her. She wanted to feel Keir’s mouth all over her skin, not just on her mouth; she longed for the caress of his hands on parts of her body too intimate to be appropriate on this public occasion.

      It had been like this from the start, she acknowledged hazily with the little rational thought that was left to her. With Keir she no longer knew herself. She became a stranger even in her own eyes. In her place was a woman who had her own slender height, delicate oval face and thick fall of long dark brown hair, but who acted in ways she had never seen before.

      That Sienna rushed into situations that only months before she would have fled from, screaming in panic. Situations like this travesty of a marriage that was only for show, with no real foundation in fact.

      It was several long drawn-out seconds before the realisation that what she had believed to be distant thunder, or even the crazed pounding of her heart echoing inside her head, was in fact another, louder round of appreciative applause from their audience. A couple of the younger guests even added enthusiastic wolf whistles to the chorus of approval.

      With carefully feigned reluctance, Keir broke the embrace and turned a slightly rueful smile on her heated face. To the onlookers, it must have appeared quite genuine, but Sienna had sensed the careful judgement that had had him ending the kiss the full space of several heartbeats before he’d lifted his head. She had seen the calculating look he had directed into her glazed eyes, the triumphant twist to that wide mouth as it had abandoned hers, leaving her aching for more.

      Straightening fully, Keir slung a possessive arm around her waist as he turned to face the assembly of friends and relations.

      ‘I’m afraid my wife—’ a chorus of cheers greeted his use of the word for the first time since the completion of the marriage ceremony ‘—has strong feminist views that mean she insists on using her own name instead of adopting mine. Some of you may find that rather unromantic, but personally I have no problem with it. After all, when she indulges my every whim in everything apart from this…’

      A careful emphasis on the words ‘my every whim’ left no room for doubt as to exactly what other things he had in mind.

      ‘Who am I to deny her this one wish for independence if it means so much to her?’

      Milking the situation for all it was worth, he smiled down into Sienna’s flushed face, his appearance to all intents and purposes every inch that of the doting husband.

      ‘Don’t be embarrassed, darling,’ he reproved softly. ‘You’re amongst friends here. Everyone knows how we feel about each other.’

      Struggling against a crazy desire to kick him hard on the ankle, in order to let him know exactly how she felt about the charade he was acting out, Sienna forced herself to swallow down the anger she couldn’t afford to reveal. Painfully conscious of Francis Nash, standing just a few feet away from her, watching Keir’s fooling with an intently speculative air, she managed a rather sickly smile.

      But she knew that the curve of her lips wasn’t matched by the look in her eyes, which were flashing furious reproof and a warning of later retribution into Keir’s mocking face. He really was taking things way too far. Nothing like this had been mentioned in their agreement.

      But Keir appeared totally unmoved by the silent rage in her eyes. Instead, taking advantage of the fact that a waiter carrying a tray full of glasses of champagne had just come within reach, he appropriated one of the crystal flutes and held it aloft, dark eyes smiling knowingly down into hers all the time.

      ‘If you’ll indulge me,’ he declared to the surrounding audience, ‘I’d like to propose a toast. To Sienna—my beautiful bride, and the woman who has made me the happiest man in the world by becoming my wife today.’

      The man СКАЧАТЬ