Glass Slippers and Unicorns

by Carole Mortimer

  ‘Reed, there’s something about Jason I think you should know,’ she cut in forcefully.

  ‘The only thing I need to know about him is that he was too stupid to realise what a wonderful woman you are,’ he dismissed with a scowl. ‘His loss is my gain. But we have to go back a bit in this conversation,’ he frowned. ‘You really like my family?’

  The subject of Jason was far from over, she knew that if she were going to marry Reed. But she was content to settle the other misunderstandings between them before they broached the painful subject of Jason again.

  ‘I like them very much,’ she nodded. ‘My own parents are good people, too; they’re going to love meeting you.’ After the years of worrying about her, she knew her parents were going to be ecstatic that she had found happiness at last.

  ‘Marc’s right, you know, I am an idiot.’ Reed was angry with himself. ‘I took your aversion to talking about your home and family to mean you preferred being alone; the fact that for a long time you still didn’t date seemed to confirm it. Even when you told me what happened to the woman you worked with at the bank—’

  ‘Jayne,’ she put in dully.

  ‘That didn’t seem to be a reason to stop visiting your family.’ He shook his head. ‘So I assumed you just preferred to be on your own. I could accept that until this business with Chris blew up in my face.’ He looked grim. ‘I’d been hoping that once you got over the man who had hurt you, you would eventually turn to me, but the longer the thing went on in America the more I felt those invisible strings of family commitment I had been trying to avoid pulling me back there. It came to a point where I knew I couldn’t avoid them any longer, and when my mother decided to go on a cruise I realised it was a good time to go and sort the whole sorry mess out. I also wanted to get you away from Marc, if only for a few days. He’s an attractive son-of-a—’

  ‘I told you,’ she interrupted, ‘I like him very much as a friend.’

  Reed didn’t look mollified. ‘He’s been walking a dangerously thin line by dating you, and he knew it, too, damn him.’

  ‘He has a very warped sense of humour,’ Darcy smiled. ‘But no doubt he’ll fall in love one day just like the rest of us.’

  ‘I pity the poor woman!’

  ‘I think I rather envy her,’ Darcy said slowly.

  ‘Darcy!’

  She kissed Reed lightly on the mouth at the sound of his outraged growl. ‘I only meant that Marc has a great capacity for loving which he won’t allow to go free. I think there’s a lot more to him than he allows most of us to see.’

  ‘If there is he’s a better actor than I gave him credit for,’ Reed derided. ‘But enough about him,’ he grated jealously.

  ‘You were talking about Florida,’ she prompted indulgently.

  He nodded ruefully. ‘I wanted you to like my family, to get used to them in easy stages—’

  ‘Ease me into them.’ She nodded.

  ‘Yes,’ he admitted drily. ‘Instead of which you were thrown into the midst of them on our arrival like a tasty morsel to a pack of wolves!’

  ‘That’s too extreme, Reed,’ she chided softly. ‘Besides, maybe it was exactly what I needed to take me completely out of the world I had retreated into—’

  ‘Shock treatment?’ Reed derided.

  ‘Rupert told me that if I wanted to get completely better I had to meet life head-on, and I thought that by coming to London to live I had done that. Instead I’d just pushed all the unpleasantness to the back of my mind, made another “safe” world for myself here. I wasn’t really living, Reed.’

  He looked at her anxiously. ‘And you are now?’

  She nodded. ‘I’m getting there.’

  ‘I thought so today when you stormed into my office and told me exactly what you thought of me,’ he said admiringly. ‘You were like a lioness fighting for her mate. In the past you’ve always taken the passive way out, refused to fight even when you knew something was yours—as I am. I could have made love to you right there in my office if we hadn’t had such a shocked audience.’ He gave a self-derisive smile. ‘Roy now thinks I’m the biggest bastard he’s ever met!’

  ‘We’ll invite him to the wedding.’ Darcy snuggled against him.

  ‘You really will marry me?’ He looked down at her almost uncertainly.

  ‘I’m a lioness, remember.’ She growled low in her throat. ‘You’re mine now, Reed Hunter. And I’m keeping you.’

  ‘I think the family would lynch me if you didn’t marry me,’ he admitted ruefully. ‘They all think you’re wonderful. I have strict instructions not to return without you!’

  She sobered. ‘How are Chris and Diane?’

  He sighed. ‘Shaky, but the foundations are still standing. I’ve loaned Diane the money and she’s going to become Chris’s partner. They’ll make it.’

  Darcy felt her heart swell with love for this man at the way he had arranged to help Chris without stripping him of his pride; Diane would make a wonderful business partner for her husband.

  ‘Chris insisted on telling the rest of the family what he had done,’ Reed continued abruptly. ‘I admire him for that.’ His voice was gruff with emotion.

  ‘And the others?’ Darcy looked at him anxiously.

  ‘We’re a family, Darcy,’ he grimaced. ‘We squabble among ourselves, but Lord help any danger that threatens any of us.’

  ‘I can’t wait to be included in that loving warmth.’ She gave him a glowing smile.

  ‘You will be my family, Darcy,’ he told her intently. ‘You will always come first.’

  She knew that, was sure of his love when she learnt how patiently he had waited to court her; he wasn’t a man known for his restraint. There had been so many misunderstandings. But there was only one left of real importance now. She shied away from it, but knew it had to be faced.

  ‘What is it?’ Reed demanded sharply, searching the cloudy unhappiness of her eyes.

  ‘We have to talk about Jason,’ she told him regretfully.

  Anger flared in his eyes. ‘He isn’t important, Darcy—’

  ‘Reed, I haven’t told you all there is to know about him,’ she cut in forcefully, pulling out of his arms to stand up, avoiding his gaze as she thrust her hands into the pockets of her skirt. ‘You know that I worked briefly as a family helper.’ She could feel Reed’s tension now as he sat on the edge of his seat. ‘Well it was to a widower and his three children.’

  ‘Jason?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘He took advantage of you while you were working in his house—’

  ‘No!’ she heatedly denied the harsh accusation. ‘I—I wasn’t exactly working for him—’

  ‘You were living with him?’ Reed frowned darkly.

  ‘Yes,’ she confirmed raggedly.

  ‘But you—’

  ‘I was a virgin when you made love to me,’ she acknowledged impatiently. ‘I told you the reason for that.’ She moistened her lips. ‘I—The bank kept me on during my breakdown, I was classed as—sick.’ The memory was painful to Darcy. ‘It was a year before I felt able to walk in the door of the bank again—and I walked out again two minutes later. I couldn’t bear to be in there where it happened. I walked and walked after that, needing to talk to someone but sure everyone was sick of listening to me—’

  ‘I’m sure that isn’t true!’

  ‘Probably not,’ she acknowledged huskily. ‘But it didn’t help me at the time. Then as I walked around the lake in the local park I saw Vicky, Jayne’s oldest child.’ She swallowed hard. ‘She was only ten at the time, and I didn’t think she should be there on her own. I stopped to talk to her. Her grandmother had moved in to take care of them since—the last year, but she had fallen down and broken her hip, and was in hospital before going on to convalesce. Their father had to work to support them all, so Vicky and her younger sister and brother had become latch-key children.’

  ‘Then Jason is—’

  ‘Jayne’s husband,’ she revealed shakily, look
ing up at him challengingly, daring him to condemn her as so many people had when she had moved into the Summers’ home to take care of the three children and their father.

  Reed swallowed convulsively, breathing out raggedly before striding across the room to pull her into his arms and cradle her against his chest. ‘My darling. My poor, poor darling.’ His voice was pained in her curls.

  The tears flowed freely. ‘The gossip started straight away, speculation as to whether or not we had been having an affair before Jayne died, things like that,’ she told him shakily. ‘We weren’t!’

  ‘I know that.’

  She could tell that he did, that he had never thought it for a moment. ‘We all tried to ignore it, knew it wasn’t true. And then—then one night Jason said that as everyone believed it anyway, why didn’t we just go ahead and have an affair! He—He’s attractive enough, a nice man, I felt an obligation—’

  ‘Oh, Darcy!’ Reed’s tears mingled with her own as he held her to him fiercely.

  ‘He tried. It—I—He couldn’t do it. He cried afterwards, and as I held him I cried, too. It was all such a mess. We couldn’t even look at each other after that,’ she continued shakily. ‘The children were becoming sensitive to the tension between us, and I—I agreed with Jason when he said he thought it best if he got someone else in until his mother returned.’

  ‘And when you saw him again this time?’ Reed prompted gruffly.

  She smiled through her tears. ‘He told me he’s met a nice woman, she gets on well with all the children, and they’re getting married soon. She isn’t Jayne, but he loves her.’

  ‘I’m happy for him,’ Reed told her with feeling. ‘And for you.’

  She gave a choked sob. ‘I’ve been so afraid of telling you about him, frightened you would be disgusted by what I had done.’

  He framed her face with gentle hands as he looked deeply into her eyes. ‘Nothing you could ever do would disgust me, least of all what you tried to do for Jason. If it’s possible, I love you more than I did before.’

  ‘Hold me, Reed,’ she pleaded shakily. ‘Just hold me!’

  ‘For the rest of our lives,’ he promised.

  ‘What are you doing, Reed?’ she protested as he put his hands over her eyes.

  ‘Wait and see,’ he teased.

  After leaving Marc’s studio Reed had insisted on taking her back to his apartment. Darcy had teased him about showing her his etchings; with his hands over her eyes as he guided her inside she wasn’t so sure that that wasn’t what he was doing!

  ‘There,’ he said with satisfaction, removing his hands.

  It took her a few seconds to adjust her eyesight to the dimly lit room, the glow from the cabinet on the far wall seeming to be the only illumination. Darcy was drawn to it like a magnet.

  Unicorns, hundreds of them, made from glass, wood, plaster, each design different from the last, filled the entire cabinet.

  Reed’s arms came around her waist from behind as he bent to lay his cheek beside hers. ‘Unicorns have always been very special to me. Beautiful, unique, magical, like the woman I love,’ he murmured throatily. ‘I could only share the gift of one with someone like her.’

  ‘Everyone else knew that,’ she realised breathlessly, fascinated by the creature bathed in such mystical beauty.

  ‘You remind me of the unicorn.’ He kissed the creamy length of her throat. ‘But you’re real for me, so very real. May I?’ He slipped the necklace around her throat that she had flung down in front of him earlier.

  ‘Please,’ she said with feeling, understanding at last.

  He turned her in his arms. ‘Do you still distrust my gift to you?’

  He was giving her so much more than the unicorn, she knew that now, knew he was giving her the dreams and love that went with it. She reached up to gently caress his mouth with hers. ‘I love you, Reed.’ She looked at him with tear-filled eyes.

  ‘It’s all I’ve ever wanted,’ he told her shakily.

  They gazed into each others’ eyes, words no longer necessary as they made their vows for a lifetime.

  ‘I have another gift for you.’ Reed dragged himself back from the magical depths of her eyes with effort.

  ‘I only need you, Reed,’ she assured him throatily.

  Amusement lightened his expression. ‘You might need this on occasion!’

  Her eyes narrowed at his teasing. ‘What is it?’

  He moved to switch on the main light in the room, picking up a parcel from the coffee table to hold it out to her. ‘Open it,’ he invited softly.

  She looked at him suspiciously for several minutes but could read nothing from his expression. But he was enjoying himself at her expense, she knew that. And after the tension of the day a little levity would be welcome, although she didn’t reveal that as she warily unwrapped the oblong parcel.

  ‘Oh, Reed!’ She choked back her laughter as she looked inside the box.

  ‘Do you like it?’

  ‘I love it!’ Her laughter couldn’t be contained as she stared down at the beautifully made glass slipper.

  His arms moved about her waist. ‘I intend to take it along whenever we go out to dinner!’ he teased her.

  ‘My Prince Charming!’ Her hands linked at the back of his head as she moulded her body to his, completely sure of his love with this last romantic gesture towards her forgetfulness.

  ‘I don’t think what I’m feeling right now could ever be included in a fairy tale!’

  She could feel his arousal against her. ‘Let’s go to bed,’ she invited.

  ‘You see,’ he grinned, ‘I knew you were made for me!’

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  ‘DARCY?’

  ‘Mmm?’

  ‘How much do you love me?’

  ‘I moved to America with you, didn’t I?’

  ‘And became aunty to Linda and Wade’s twins, Mike and Marie’s two, and Chris and Diane’s one point five, I know. But tell me how much you love me, Darcy.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Just answer the question!’

  ‘It depends.’

  ‘On what?’

  ‘On whether you’re after something or you’re leading up to an invitation to go home to bed.’

  ‘Both.’

  ‘Ah. In that case, I love you very much.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘Reed?’

  ‘Hmm?’

  ‘It’s five minutes since you asked; I’m waiting for the invitation.’

  ‘We can leave as soon as you’ve paid the bill for dinner.’

  ‘As soon as I have? But—Reed, do you suppose it’s catching?’

  ‘I hope not, I don’t think I’d look quite as beautiful as you do carrying around that lump.’

  ‘That “lump” happens to be our son or daughter!’

  ‘I know. And I love it already. I’m glad you forgot to take your pills—’

  ‘I didn’t forget anything, you were in charge at the time. And don’t think this diversion is going to make me overlook the fact that you’ve forgotten your wallet, because it isn’t!’

  ‘If you hadn’t been doing shameless things to my body just before we left home I wouldn’t have forgotten it!’

  ‘Are you complaining?’

  ‘Hell, no! God, Darcy, no one can say you don’t fight for what you want now!’

  ‘Only for the man who believes in unicorns and glass slippers and made me believe in them, too.’

  ‘You say the damnedest things! Let’s get out of here.’

  ‘Yes, Reed.’

  ‘I want you to say it just like that when we get home.’

  ‘Yes, Reed.’

  ‘Just like that, Darcy!’

  ‘As soon as I’ve settled the bill…’

  ‘Darcy?’

  ‘Mmm?’

  ‘Do you have both shoes on?’

  ‘If I don’t I’m sure you’ll deal with it.’

  ‘Your wish is my command.’

  ‘Really?’

&nb
sp; ‘Darcy!’

  ‘Yes, Reed.’

  * * * * *

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  THE SHEIKH’S BOUGHT WIFE

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  THE SHEIKH’S BOUGHT WIFE

  PROLOGUE

  ‘SO WHAT’S THE catch?’

  Zayed detected the faint ripple of unease which ran through his advisors as he shot out his silky question. They were nervous, he could tell. More nervous than was usual in the presence of a sheikh of his power and influence. Not that he cared about their nerves. On the contrary, he found them useful. Deference and fear kept people at a distance and that was exactly where he liked them.

  Turning away from the window which overlooked his magnificent palace gardens, he studied the men who stood in front of him—the guileless expression on the face of his closest aide, Hassan, not fooling him for a moment.

  ‘Catch, Your Most Supreme Highness?’ questioned Hassan.

  ‘Yes, catch,’ Zayed echoed, his voice growing impatient now. ‘My maternal grandfather has died and I discover he has gifted me one of the most valuable pieces of land in the entire desert region. Inheriting Dahabi Makaan was something which never even entered my mind.’ He frowned. ‘Which leaves me wondering what has prompted this gesture of unexpected generosity.’

  Hassan gave a slight bow. ‘Because you are one of his few remaining blood relatives, sire, and thus surely such a bequest is perfectly natural.’

  ‘That much may be true,’ Zayed conceded. ‘But until recently he had not spoken to me since I was a boy of seven summers.’

  ‘Your grandfather was undoubtedly touched by your visit as he lay on his deathbed—a visit he must surely not have been anticipating,’ said Hassan diplomatically. ‘Perhaps that is the reason.’