One Wedding Required!

by Sharon Kendrick

  Eager to kiss and make up, she held out her hand towards him, but he didn’t take it, just looked at her questioningly.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Please.’ It came out all wrong; she hadn’t meant to plead with him.

  He shook his head. ‘I’m not going to make love to you, Amber, not now and not here. I have work to do and I’m still angry.’

  She bit back her own furious response that everything always had to be on his terms, that they could only ever make love at inappropriate times if Finn wished it. ‘Oh, don’t worry, Finn,’ she told him proudly. ‘I haven’t been reduced to begging you to make love to me. I just want you to come over to the mirror and take a look at yourself.’

  He didn’t take her hand, but something in her eyes made him follow her over to the looking-glass, which was both large and cruelly accurate. The room was used for casting sessions. Clients would sit and watch while model after model streamed into the room, hoping to be chosen for the job. The mirror was designed to reflect every tiny detail, every pound gained, every wrinkle highlighted—and nothing could escape its brutally faithful eye.

  The two of them stood motionless in front of their reflections, until Finn met Amber’s troubled blue eyes with a question. ‘So?’ he queried.

  Amber screwed up her face in confusion. Was he blind? Or did he simply not want to see what was as clear as day to her? ‘Can’t you see how pale you look, Finn? And how tired? Or am I just imagining those dark shadows underneath your eyes?’

  ‘It’s almost Christmas, Amber,’ he told her, in a voice which was suddenly gentle. ‘Things are much madder than usual. And Jackson is away.’

  The gentle tone was her undoing, and Amber felt her mouth trembling so precariously that she had to bite her lips to stop it. In a minute she would start blubbing—and that would be the second time recently that it had happened. Much more and it would be starting to be a habit. ‘Yes, I know they are,’ she replied hollowly.

  He sighed, and then put his arms around her and rested his head on hers.

  She tried to shake him off. ‘Don’t!’

  ‘Don’t you like me touching you?’

  Her eyes were like dark sapphire stars. ‘Don’t be so bloody arrogant, Finn! You know darned well that I like you touching me—what I don’t like is arguing and sniping and that’s all we seem to have done just lately.’

  He let her go. ‘It’ll get better after Christmas when Jackson gets back,’ he promised. ‘Lots of quiet nights in—just the two of us.’ He brushed a lock of golden hair from her cheek and gave her his most irresistible smile, which almost countered the rueful expression in his eyes, and Amber wondered what was coming next. She didn’t have to wait long to find out.

  ‘But not yet,’ he murmured. ‘You haven’t forgotten that it’s the Prodigy party tonight? Remember? I said we’d pop in.’

  Actually, she had forgotten, but maybe that wasn’t so surprising, since all her time seemed to have been taken up with worrying about the state of their relationship just lately.

  Prodigy was one of the biggest perfume and make-up manufacturers in the business. Major big time, in fact. And their parties were legendary. Finn and Jackson’s agency had supplied them with Prodigy’s last two ‘Faces’, including their current one—the scrumptious and fragile-looking Karolina Lindberg, who was about to be launched on the inside pages of every glossy over the globe.

  Amber looked at Finn worriedly. ‘But my sister is coming round for supper.’

  ‘Can’t you cancel?’

  ‘No, I can’t cancel—quite apart from the fact that she’s been away for a couple of weeks, you know that Ursula doesn’t get many evenings out.’

  ‘That’s hardly our fault, is it, Amber?’

  She gave him a long, considering look, and in that moment felt angrier than she could ever have imagined feeling towards the man she had once thought could do no wrong. ‘I can’t believe you just said that,’ she told him quietly.

  He leaned towards her. ‘Why not, when it’s the truth? Your sister has carved out a certain kind of life for herself. She doesn’t go out on dates—well, that’s up to her, isn’t it? It’s her choice, no one else’s. And if she chooses to carry a torch for a man who is patently unobtainable, then that too is her choice—’

  ‘She is not carrying a torch for Ross Sheridan!’ contradicted Amber heatedly.

  Finn smiled triumphantly. ‘Oh, really?’ came his soft rebuttal. ‘Strange that you knew straight away who I was talking about!’

  ‘Ross is her boss—’

  ‘I was your boss,’ he pointed out.

  ‘But he’s married!’

  ‘Ah.’ Finn’s eyes became guarded. ‘Married!’

  ‘Yes, married!’

  He shrugged. ‘But a gold band never stopped people having extra-marital liaisons, did it? As the history books have shown us time and time again—’

  ‘Oh, please, don’t be so cynical! Or so patronising! My sister would not mess around with a married man!’ she told him, so fiercely that he held his hand up.

  ‘Maybe she wouldn’t,’ he conceded. ‘And I certainly didn’t mean to cast doubts on her morality. But I’m not going to feel sorry for her, Amber, and neither will I pity her simply because she seems hell-bent on spending the rest of her life in isolation.’

  Which still hadn’t solved what to do about tonight. ‘Well, she isn’t planning to spend tonight in isolation—she’s coming round for supper with us. So what will I do about the Prodigy party?’

  ‘Why don’t you bring Ursula along with us?’

  ‘Really?’

  He shrugged. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Won’t they mind?’

  ‘Of course they won’t mind! And who knows? She might meet someone—though of course she could meet a Mr Universe, with brains and a fortune to boot, and she’d still find something wrong with him by virtue of the fact that he wasn’t Ross Sheridan.’

  Amber fixed him with a curious look. ‘You aren’t jealous of Ross Sheridan, by any chance?’

  Finn raised his eyebrows and smiled the kind of disbelieving smile which told Amber that he had never felt jealous of another man in his life. ‘Of course not I like Ross. I just think that both he and your sister are miserable—and if they’re not going to get it together then maybe she should stop working for him.’

  Amber thought that Finn was very good at discussing other people’s problems rather than his own. But then maybe, unlike Amber, he just hadn’t come around to realising that they actually had a problem. Because if a couple got engaged and then spent a big chunk of their time bitching at one other, then surely that didn’t bode well for their long-term future, did it?

  ‘Okay,’ she agreed, glad to have something else to think about. ‘I’ll ring Ursula and ask her.’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  IT WAS early evening when the front doorbell pealed out over the flat. Amber pressed the clip into the back of her earring and cast a final glance at herself in the mirror. A dark blue silk dress which matched her eyes, golden hair gleaming to her shoulders and Finn’s birthday sapphires in her ears. She looked sleek and expensive and very groomed, which was surprising in itself when she considered what she had been up to until a very short time ago.

  ‘That’ll be Ursula.’ She glanced over towards the rumpled sheets of the bed, where Finn was still sprawled—all honeyed flesh and strong, long limbs against the white linen. Her heart did its habitual contraction. ‘Are you getting up, Finn?’

  She saw his green eyes dance wickedly and shook her head with a smile, thinking that there was nothing like sex to put Finn Fitzgerald in a good mood. ‘And, no, that wasn’t an invitation! Merely an observation that if you don’t move that delectable body of yours out of bed pretty quick—then the party will be over before we get there.’

  ‘Who cares?’ he murmured sleepily.

  ‘I thought you did. You were the one who wanted to go to the Prodigy party—and I telephoned Ursula to tell her to dress up spec
ially. I think she’s quite looking forward to it.’ Amber cast a last look at her pink-flushed cheeks in the mirror. ‘Just hurry up, Finn,’ she pleaded. ‘Ursula’s at the door and I don’t want her to think we’ve just had sex—’

  ‘But we have just had sex,’ he protested as he sat up and stretched his arms above his tousled head, the picture of sleepy contentment. ‘That’s what couples who live together generally do, sweetheart. We’re not breaking any laws, you know.’

  ‘I just think it’s awkward for a single woman to have it thrown in her face—makes her feel out of it,’ said Amber tartly, wondering, not for the first time, whether her sister was still a virgin. ‘So hurry up, will you, Finn? I’ll give her a drink while we’re waiting.’ And she shut the bedroom door firmly behind her.

  Ursula was waiting patiently on the doorstep, and the two women kissed with the close affection of sisters who had endured a tough childhood and come through it relatively unscathed. Ursula lived on the other side of London and they tried to see as much of each other as they could—though Amber’s relationship with Finn had inevitably conflicted with this and their meetings were far less frequent these days. She just wished that Ursula could find a man of her own to love.

  ‘You look wonderful!’ Amber smiled, thinking that the well-cut black silk dress made her sister look extremely elegant ‘Good holiday, was it?’

  Ursula hesitated. ‘It was...interesting. I’ll tell you all about it in a minute.’

  ‘Come on,’ said Amber. ‘Let’s have some champagne. It is nearly Christmas, after all!’

  Ursula looked over Amber’s shoulder. ‘Where’s Finn?’

  ‘He’s just getting changed.’

  Ursula nodded absently and followed Amber into the kitchen, where she was reaching into the fridge for a bottle. ‘Don’t open champagne just for me, will you, Amber?’

  ‘No, I’m opening it for me, too!’ laughed her sister as she eased the cork out of the bottle with an explosive pop. ‘What’s up? Are you forswearing all booze?’

  Ursula shook her head. ‘I’ve been trying to lose weight for Christmas.’

  ‘Well, you look—’ Amber started to say, but Ursula interrupted her with a philosophical shrug.

  ‘No, don’t! Don’t say whatever it was you were going to say! I look as plump as a currant bun,’ Ursula said, with a stoicism she had acquired over the years. ‘And that’s the truth.’

  ‘You’re too hard on yourself,’ protested Amber, thinking how well the black silk looked as it undulated down over her sister’s generous curves.

  Physically, at least, the two sisters could not have been more different. Amber’s looks were head-turningly unusual—with her thick, glossy hair whose colour was almost impossible to define. Finn had once told her that it looked like golden syrup poured straight from the tin, but it had also been called ginger and Titian and even strawberry blonde. Her skin was pale, with golden freckles spattered onto a cute stub of a nose, and her mouth was full enough to be described as sultry. Apparently, she was the image of one of her great-aunts on her father’s side, whereas Ursula took after their mother and looked as Irish as could be—with her thick, black hair and the soft roses which bloomed in her cheeks.

  Ursula’s deep blue eyes and the long, sweeping dark lashes were the same as Amber’s, but all similarity stopped there. Amber had the kind of figure that most women would die for—leggy, narrow-hipped and slimwaisted, with lush breasts which seemed to defy gravity—while Ursula was unfashionably buxom. She often wished that she had lived in another age, when creamy flesh and cushioned shoulders and hips were seen as highly desirable and attractive. But she did not. Instead, she inhabited a world which had elevated thinness to an art form.

  She gave Amber a fond smile. ‘Perhaps if I didn’t have a little sister who was a top model then it wouldn’t make so much difference what my figure looked like!’

  ‘But I’m not a top model!’ objected Amber as she poured them each a tall glass of champagne. ‘I’ve just done bits of work here and there, because I’m not quite tall enough—’

  ‘And because Finn likes you where he can see you,’ put in Ursula wryly.

  Amber sat opposite her sister. ‘Are you saying that Finn is possessive?’

  Ursula glanced over at the Christmas tree. ‘I’m saying that he’s territorial. What’s his is his, and no one else’s—I guess that’s what comes of being the youngest of seven children. Though I have to admit I was surprised that he let you do that piece in Wow! magazine.’

  Amber nearly choked on her drink. ‘You’ve seen it?’

  Ursula threw her a questioning look. ‘Oh, Amber!’ she exclaimed. ‘Who hasn’t seen it? It’s on every newsstand in the country.’

  ‘What did you think of it?’

  Ursula screwed her face up. ‘Not a lot, if you want the truth. Oh, I didn’t dislike it or anything—it just seemed rather...silly, that’s all. Unnecessary.’ She looked over at her sister curiously. ‘Did Finn really make love to you in the bathroom before he proposed?’

  ‘But I didn’t say that!’ Amber yelped indignantly.

  ‘Well, either you implied it, or the journalist is good at concocting fairy tales,’ came Ursula’s dry response. ‘If it’s the former then I suspect you’re in big trouble with Finn, and if it’s the latter—’ and her eyes sparkled with mischief ‘—then it seems to me that you have a good case for litigation.’

  Amber closed her eyes. ‘Don’t! Finn’s absolutely furious.’

  ‘I’m not surprised! What in the name of God possessed you to do it?’

  Amber shook her head. It would be selfish to tell her sister that her actions had been motivated by feelings of insecurity. What patience would Ursula have if she came out with a statement like that? When she had a lovely home, a job she enjoyed and Finn’s ring on her finger—what on earth was there to be insecure about? ‘Brainstorm,’ she said evasively.

  ‘Which of you is having one?’ came a deep velvet voice as Finn came into the room, looking, thought Amber hungrily, good enough to eat, in his dark dinner suit and whiter-than-white shirt.

  ‘Hello, Ursula,’ he said, and bent to kiss her on the cheek.

  ‘Hi, Finn.’ Ursula smiled up at him. ‘Amber was the one having the brainstorm—when she did that terrible interview for Wow!’

  Finn didn’t react at all; not a flicker of emotion crossed his face as he helped himself to a glass of soda. ‘Well, that’s the very last interview she’s doing, isn’t it, sweetheart?’

  Behind her fixed smile, Amber gritted her teeth. It was one thing deciding for yourself that you didn’t want to do something—but quite another altogether for someone else to tell you not to in that polite, but very controlling way! Still... ‘Absolutely the last.’ She nodded obediently.

  Finn sat on the arm of one of the chairs and turned to Ursula. ‘So how’s work?’

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘And Ross?’

  Ursula didn’t miss a beat. ‘He’s fine.’

  ‘And the wonderful world of advertising?’

  ‘Would you believe that’s fine, too?’ said Ursula lightly, sending Amber a wordless plea.

  Amber shot a warning glance in Finn’s direction before smoothly changing the subject. ‘And you don’t mind coming to this party for an hour or two, do you? They’ve signed up one of our newest models, so it’s a bit of a duty visit.’

  Ursula shook her head. ‘I don’t mind at all—I don’t go out enough, I know that. Everyone tells me often enough! But it’s great to get the chance to talk before we go because, actually, I’ve had some very exciting news.’

  In view of what she and Finn had been discussing earlier, and seeing the sparkle in her sister’s deep blue eyes, Amber jumped to entirely the wrong conclusion. ‘Don’t tell me that Ross is getting a divorce?’

  A pin-drop silence followed this remark, and Amber was just about to stumble her apologies when Ursula cleared her throat, desperate to change the subject and glad that she had a le
gitimate reason for doing so.

  ‘Not that he’s told me!’ she joked bravely. ‘No, my news is far more exciting than that!’

  ‘Then tell,’ murmured Finn.

  ‘Well, you know that you and Amber are having a Valentine’s Day wedding?’ Ursula began, but something in Amber’s face made her falter. ‘Y-you are, aren’t you?’

  ‘Apparently,’ said Finn tonelessly. ‘Did you read that in Wow!? Or maybe in another publication I’ve yet to hear about?’

  Ursula ignored Amber’s beseeching look, quickly realising from the atmosphere that she was treading on eggshells. Whatever she said was bound to be the wrong thing, so maybe it was best if she simply told the truth. ‘Well, I did read it there, yes, Finn—and I’ve already told Amber that I thought it was a foolish and ill-advised article.’

  Finn nodded, narrow-eyed and wary. ‘Thank God that someone in the family can see sense!’

  ‘But Amber had already told me about the Valentine date—she said you’d mentioned it once. Anyway, you’re going to have to change it. Which is why I’ve brought you this!’ She smiled as she fumbled around in her oversize handbag and withdrew a crumpled-up article cut from a newspaper. She smoothed it out and spread it on the space on the sofa next to her, and both Amber and Finn leaned over to look at it with interest.

  ‘It’s a wedding dress,’ said Finn slowly as he looked down at the picture of a full-length dress cut from ivory duchessne satin. It was a stark and yet subdued gown—the simplicity of the design softened by the buttery texture of the luxurious fabric. Finn had an eye for beauty which was not easily satisfied, but it was satisfied now. ‘It’s absolutely exquisite,’ he murmured appreciatively, and looked at Ursula with a question in his eyes.

  ‘Yes,’ agreed Ursula, but her eyes were fixed unwaveringly on her sister. ‘It is.’

  Amber had gone as white as a snowdrop. It was several moments before she could speak. ‘Mother’s dress,’ she breathed in disbelief. ‘It’s Mother’s dress!’