‘I see that I hurt you badly,’ he broke in. ‘It was as if I was saying that was the only test that mattered to me—it wasn’t that. But, yes, I accept the charge that at the time it was, or so I told myself, a reason to ask you to marry me.
‘It was only that night, when I got home to discover you’d left, that I was honest enough to admit to myself that I was using it as an excuse. Using it to excuse the fact that I’d fallen in love with another woman when I’d thought that not only couldn’t it happen to me, but that it shouldn’t.’
Francesca discovered suddenly that she was afraid to breathe.
‘Then I worked out why you’d left,’ he went on. ‘Because you’d seen through it all. And I knew what a fool I’d been. I saw, at last, that Olivia was gone from me for ever but would always live on in Jess. And I knew that her memory deserved better.
‘Those times we had, the good marriage, the things I learnt, deserved better than to be locked away in bitterness and a lifetime of regret; they deserved the final compliment of being able to go forward again, able to live and love again.
‘But most of all I saw that I’d fallen in love with you, Chessie, and I was desperately afraid that I’d lost you because all of this had come clear to me too late.’
‘Is …is this true?’ Francesca stammered.
‘Only too true. But there is one thing I may have overlooked.’
‘What’s that?’
He sat forward and clasped his hands. ‘I kept telling myself that you had to be in love with me. And all that day, while I was ferrying people, sick babies, dogs and cats to safety, even though I was still deluding myself about my motives, I was in sure of yours. I didn’t think it was possible for you to be so affected—so beautifully joyful and ecstatic—by sensation alone unless it had something to do with me, warts and all,’ he said, with a strange little smile.
Francesca closed her eyes and felt the colour pour into her cheeks. ‘Did I…? I did go over the top, didn’t I?’ she said hollowly. ‘It’s something I’ve never been able to cure myself of.’
‘Chessie,’ he said very quietly, ‘it’s my heartfelt desire that you never change—in bed or out of it. But you haven’t answered the. question.’
‘You haven’t asked me—’
‘Was I right in assuming you loved me?’
‘Do you mean you… you came down here, won over my father, told me you were the one I was going to marry and so on, without knowing how l felt?’
‘Well…’ He paused and their eyes locked. ‘I have no way of knowing it absolutely until you tell me, my darling Chessie.’
She trembled suddenly, put the back of her hand to her mouth and said indistinctly, ‘Oh, Raefe …’
He stood up and drew her to her feet. ‘Is it impossible to say?’
‘No—-it’s just that I never thought my feelings could be returned. I mean, I hoped—but— Raefe, I may not make a very good wife—’
‘Chessie, let’s just take one thing at a time—do you love me?’
‘Yes. Oh, yes …’ But she was trembling and shaking and her eyes were anguished.
He put his arms around her. ‘Thank heavens,’ he said, barely audibly, as he held her very close, and she could hear his heart beating. ‘So…’ he held her away and looked into her eyes ‘… why are you so upset?’
‘I don’t know—it must be reaction. And—there are times when I’m terrible, I know. Times when I’m a Valentine through and through—times when you’ll find me impossible, I’m sure, and—’
‘Chessie, stop,’ he said gently but firmly, and put a finger to her lips.
’But—’
‘No. Relax.’
She took a deep breath, then laid her tear-stained cheek on his shoulder. ‘I haven’t been well—perhaps that’s why I’m a bit emotional.’
He tilted her chin and smiled into her eyes—and all of a sudden she felt herself calming and starting to believe. He said, ‘You were never terrible—you were unique.’
‘Even when I all but—stripped?’
‘Even then.’
‘I thought you really hated me for that,’ she said huskily.
‘I tried to hate you. It didn’t work.’
‘You gave a pretty good imitation of it.’
‘I can see I still have a lot to answer for,’ he murmured wryly.
‘No! No,’ she repeated with a sudden glint of humour in her eyes. ‘I don’t believe in endless recriminations. I… just want to know that I can believe in this.’
‘Chessie.’ He looked down at her, and once again she was afraid to breathe because of what she saw in his eyes—the steady flame that told its own tale. ‘I’m bereft without you. I’m haunted by you everywhere I tum. I have visions of you that give me no peace and no sleep. And most of all I loved you best, if that’s possible, when the heat and the wear and tear of life at Bramble showed me a Chessie Valentine who was no longer a glossy golden girl but as brave, committed, still beautiful woman who would make the perfect partner for my soul as well as my body.’
‘Raefe,’ she whispered, ‘you’ve just convinced me. You’re the only man who’s ever been interested in that side of me.’
‘So…’ His gaze lingered on her mouth, then he looked into her shining eyes. ‘Will you marry. me, Chessie?’
‘Yes, please, Raefe. Yes, please…’
‘We didn’t have to do this,’ she murmured about an hour later, when he’d booked them into a luxury hotel.
‘Yes, we did. I want you on my own ground, not anyone else’s.’
‘So you’re going to be one of those territorial husbands?’ she teased.
‘Very territorial,’ he remarked, and began to undo the buttons of her jacket. He slid the silk off her shoulders and the jacket crumpled to the floor. ‘As well as crazy about you. Would you let your hair down?’
She complied, laying the pins on the end of the bed, and shook her head so the toffee-coloured mass whirled then subsided.
‘Mmm …’ He made no move to touch her as she stood in her bra and skirt before him. ‘It’s just as well we were in a church when I first saw you again.’
‘Is it?’ she said softly.
‘Oh, yes. Because even looking so…severely lovely as you were-’
‘Was I?’
‘Yes.’ His lips twisted. ‘With not a hair out of place, beautifully clothed and made up. Even—’
‘Make-up,’ Francesca said with a little imp of mischief dancing in her eyes. ‘That reminds me—I didn’t make myself up that night.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘That night of the beach_barbecue, when I accused you of…’ He paused.
‘Setting out to seduce you?’ she suggested innocently. ‘Yes, that night. It was Annette’s idea—she wants to be a beautician as well as a hairdresser and she begged me to let her do my face. I must say she has absolute magic in her fingers, and—’
‘I hesitate to interrupt you, Chessie,’ he said, and folded his arms, looking at her with several emotions chasing through his eyes. ‘But why couldn’t you have just told me this at the time?’
‘Ah, Well, you see…’ She paused and folded her arms. ‘That’s one of the problems I was talking about earlier. To do with being a Valentine. An inherent unwillingness, I’m afraid, to…well, to…’
‘Lower oneself to explain anything?’ he proffered.
‘Something like that,’ she agreed ruefully. ‘But it wasn’t entirely that.’
‘No?’
‘No,’ she said gravely. ‘There was a certain amount of gratification involved—at the fact that you had noticed.’
‘So I remember—do you know what I had to do after you left me alone on the beach that night?’
‘No.’ She looked at him enquiringly.
‘Go for a very long, strenuous swim, my dear Chessie. Which has happened to me twice now in our relationship.’
‘Well—is there anything I can do to compensate for that?’
He was laughing as he reached for
her, and it was warm and lovely as they laughed together and then quietened. And then he drew her down beside him on the bed, outlined her mouth with his finger, and bent his head to kiss her deeply.
Then they helped each other out of their clothes and made love until, for Francesca, that dark moon was replaced by star-shot splendour, and she could no longer doubt how much he loved her.
‘How is Jess?’ she asked a long time later, when they were still lying in each other’s arms because it would have been unbearable to be parted.
‘She’ll be restored by this news,’ he said quietly.
‘I…’ She trembled. ‘If you only knew how hard it was to leave her.’
‘I do.’ He pushed his fingers through the tangle of her hair, smoothing it off her cheek. ‘But I was the one who made you leave us. Will you come back, Chessie?’
‘Of course. Will you—marry me first? Or should we break it to her gently?’
‘I think we ought to marry each other as soon as possible.’
Her lips curved. ‘That has a every equitable ring to it.’
‘I’m glad you approve.’ His grey eyes rested wryly on her, then he pulled her close and buried his head in her hair. ‘I love you.’
‘You don’t know what it does to me to hear you say so.’ She ran her hand down the long muscles of his back.
He lifted his head abruptly. ‘I’m not entirely sure what I’ve done to deserve you, Chessie.’
‘Well, it’s actually more than your eyes and your hands. It’s—’ She stopped, the smile dying in her eyes as she saw the intensity that had gripped him. ‘It’s quite simple. It seems to me that I was made for you, that’s all.’
She felt him relax slowly and smiled lovingly into his eyes. ‘You were saying something ‘earlier—before I interrupted you—about it being just as well we were in a church?’
‘So I was—it was just as well because otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to keep my hands off you.’
She ran her hand through his hair, pushing it off his forehead. ‘I quite like the thought of that.’
‘Well, that’s just as well too—because it’s about to become an occupational hazard for you.’
‘An occupational hazard?’ she repeated, and chuckled. ‘Just think—even my father will be eternally grateful to you, Raefe. No more discontented daughter storming about the place, trying to learn the ropes.’
‘Ah, yes. I must tell you, though, that he warned me to make you happy—or else! In a very threatening manner.’
‘Did he really?’
‘Indeed he did, my darling Chessie. Nor was he the only one—my own sister told me I was an absolute heel.’
‘But I didn’t—’ Francesca stopped.
‘Didn’t you? Neither, I thought, did I,’ he conceded ruefully. ‘But the fact of, the matter is she decided almost right from the beginning that we were right for each other. Tahiti was only ever an invention to keep us together.’
Francesca gasped, then nestled against him, laughing helplessly this time.
‘So, in view of all this, may I take some steps along that path right now?’ he asked.
‘Make love to me again, you mean?’
‘Only if it would make you happy.’
She raised her eyes to his, and they were a deep, adoring blue. ‘You may.’
Accidental Nanny Page 15
