In the Australian's Bed: The Passion Price / The Australian's Convenient Bride / The Australian's Marriage Demand. Miranda Lee

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      ‘All right,’ he said gently. ‘You always did have a soft heart, Angelina. I remember the day we found that bird with the broken wing caught in the vines. You cried till your dad promised to take it to a vet.’

      He was getting to her again. ‘I only have a soft heart for poor birds with broken wings,’ she countered crisply. ‘And poor people dying through no fault of their own. Not smooth-talking lawyers who go round trying to seduce old flames just for the heck of it.’

      ‘Is that what you think I’m doing?’

      ‘Come, now, Jake, you ran into me today by sheer accident. You haven’t given me a second thought all these years.’ Unlike herself. Even if she’d wanted to forget Jake, how could she when his eyes had been staring back at her on a daily basis for years? ‘Your dear old friend Dorothy is buying a place up here,’ she swept on. ‘You spotted me again today, liked what you saw, and thought I’d be a convenient lay during your weekends up here.’

      ‘That’s a pretty harsh judgement.’

      ‘I think it’s a pretty honest one. Please don’t try to con me, Jake. I won’t like that. Be straight with me.’

      ‘OK, you’re right and you’re wrong. I admit I haven’t actively thought about you for years. But that doesn’t mean I’d forgotten you. When I realised where I was going for lunch today, everything came flooding back. The way you made me feel that summer. The things that happened. I really wanted to see you again. I told myself it was just curiosity, or the wish to say sorry for being just a chump back then. But when I actually saw you, Angelina…when I saw you I—’

      ‘Please don’t say the world stopped,’ she cut in drily.

      He laughed. ‘I won’t. It actually sped up. At least, my pulse-rate did. Do you know how beautiful you are?’ he said, his voice dropping low again. ‘How sexy?’

      Don’t fall for all that bulldust. Keep your head, honey.

      Angelina could almost hear those very words coming from Wilomena’s mouth.

      ‘You’re not the first man to tell me that, Jake,’ she said in a rather hard voice.

      ‘I don’t doubt it.’

      ‘City men are amazingly inventive, especially when they’re away from home. The Ambrosia Estate has become a popular venue for conferences,’ she elaborated. ‘Lots of them pass through all the time.’

      ‘You sound as if you’ve been burnt a few times.’

      ‘Who hasn’t in this day and age?’ came her offhand reply. If he thought she’d jumped into bed with her fair share of such men, then all well and good. No way did she want him thinking he was the only man she’d ever known.

      ‘I’m sorry but I really must go, Jake. I was in the middle of something important when you called. I’ll see you on Saturday at the expo. I’m sure you can manage to find the right booth. Shall we say twelve-thirty?’

      ‘Noon would be better.’

      ‘Noon it is, then. Bye for now.’ And she hung up.

      Jake was grinning as he replaced his receiver.

      Alex, old man, he thought elatedly, come next weekend, you’re going to be history!

      CHAPTER SEVEN

      ANGELINA couldn’t stop titivating herself. If she’d checked her make-up and hair once, she’d checked it a hundred times.

      Not for the first time this morning, she hurried into the hotel bathroom so that she could stand in front of the cheval mirror that hung on the back of the door.

      The dress she was wearing was not casual. But she knew she looked good in it, which was the most important thing to her right at that moment.

      Light and silky, the sleeveless sheath skimmed her curvy figure, making her look slim yet shapely at the same time. Its scooped neckline stopped just short of showing any cleavage, the wide, softly frilled collar very feminine. The hem finished well above her knee on one side and dipped down almost to mid-calf on the other, as was the fashion this year. The print on the pale cream material was floral, the flowers small and well-spaced, their colours ranging from the palest pink to a deep plum, her favourite colour. She’d matched the dress with open-toed cream high heels and a plum handbag. Her lipstick and nail-polish were plum as well. Strong colours suited her, with her olive skin and dark hair and eyes.

      Her hair—which had been up and down several times so far this morning—was finally down, its natural wave and curl having been tamed somewhat with a ruthless blowdrying, but it still kicked up on the ends. Shoulder-blade-length, it was parted on one side and looped behind her ears to show her gold and pearl drops. A gold chain with a single gold and pearl pendant adorned her neck. The floral scents of her perfume, an extravagant one she’d bought during her last shopping trip to Sydney, was only just detectable on her skin. Angelina didn’t like it when a woman’s perfume preceded her into a room like a tidal wave.

      She stroked the figure-hugging dress down over her hips before turning round and looking over her shoulder at her back view. Her scowl soon became a shrug. Nothing she could do about her Italian lower half. She had wide hips and a big bottom, and that was all there was to it.

      Angelina turned back and looked with more approval at her front view. At least she had the breasts to go with the backside. They were a definite plus. Just as well, however, that her nipples were hidden by the wideness of the collar, because she could feel them now, pressing against the satiny confines of her underwired bra, making her hotly aware of how excited she was. How incredibly, appallingly excited.

      A small moan escaped her lips, Angelina stuffing a closed fist into her mouth and biting on her knuckles in an effort to get some control over her silly self. But she was fighting a losing battle. The truth was she was dying to see Jake again. She wanted to see that look in his eyes once more, the one which made her feel like the most beautiful girl in the world.

      Oh, she knew that he’d probably looked at a hundred different girls that way over the years. There were no end of lovely-looking girls here in Sydney, model-slim girls with more sophistication and style than she had. But no matter. She could pretend she was the only one, just for one miserable lunch.

      Surely there was no harm in that. Lunch was safe. They wouldn’t really be alone. Impossible for him to get to her sexually during lunch, no matter what his secret agenda might be. Sharing a meal was also a good opportunity to find out more about him.

      Her eyes went to her wrist-watch. It was ten-past ten, still almost two hours to go before noon. The minutes were dragging, but then, she’d been up since dawn.

      She hadn’t slept well, and she couldn’t even blame the hotel bed. She hadn’t slept well all week, her mind never giving her any peace. She’d been tormented by regrets and recriminations.

      Of course, in hindsight, she should have told Jake about Alex straight away last Saturday when he’d come back to the restaurant. And she shouldn’t have begun that silly charade, letting Jake think Alex was her boyfriend. No, not boyfriend. Lover. It had only made Jake even more determined, it seemed, to win her. She’d become a challenge.

      By Friday her nerves had been so bad that she hadn’t felt capable СКАЧАТЬ