Page 10 of His Wedding Day Revenge

To see first-hand where she had chosen to live in preference to life with him and, he thought, staring past her, with whom...?

‘Aren’t you going to invite me in?’ he asked her, even though it was obvious she wasn’t. Maybe she was wondering how she would explain him to the boyfriend or husband? The father of her child, whose existence he still couldn’t quite take on board.

‘I—’ Before she could think of an alternative to the blunt negative that she wanted to blurt, Draco, who was obviously not similarly inhibited by good manners, walked past her. It was a small space and Draco was not a small man.

Instinct made her close her eyes and try to make herself as small as possible, which was, she immediately realised, a pretty pointless exercise and not one that concealed the shameful fact the brush of his hard-muscled arm against her shoulder had sent deep ripples of desire through her entire body. The warm male scent of his body was lingering and making it hard for her to think clearly.

Loving Draco had always been insanity—wanting Draco, she corrected swiftly. The correction made it easier to breathe.

She might now know that marriage to Draco would have been a mistake and could never have lasted, but she was still scarily receptive to him physically.

Fact. Deal with it, Jane, she told herself, showing zero sympathy for this weakness.

How utterly and totally insane was it that she felt almost as bereft at that moment as she had that day she’d run away from the wedding?

Allowing herself a few calming hitches of breath, she turned and followed him into her small cosy sitting room, seeing the space through his eyes.

It didn’t feel very cosy. Cosy and Draco? No, definitely not!

She nervously twisted her hands, her skittering gaze drifting around the room, anywhere, quite frankly, than at him. She saw the home that Carrie and Robert had lovingly built together, imagining how it might look through his eyes. Draco wouldn’t see the items that had sentimental value, the repurposed thirties sideboard and the recovered rocker, he’d see cramped and slightly shabby.

The idea that he might be sneering made her skin prickle defensively. In the space of time it took her to pick up a toy that had fallen out of the toy box behind the sofa and replace it carefully her chin had gone up and she was able to face him with at least the illusion of confidence.

She had once been so sensitive to his moods that even the thought that she had said the wrong thing, worn the wrong outfit or used the wrong bloody fork would have felt like a failure, not good enough.

Well, this house was more than good enough and she would eat her food with her fingers and to hell with his distaste!

The moment the thought popped into her head she knew it was the wrong one because it brought with it the memory of an occasion when he had used his fingers to feed her a decadent creamy confection, she had sucked cream off his long brown fingers and—She stopped the destructive and criminally self-indulgent memory as she straightened up, one hand on her hip, her free forearm holding her hair back from her face as she delivered a look that said, Want to make something of the repurposed furniture? Because I will defend it with my life. She would defend every trivial detail of the home that had been made with love.

As their glances connected and held she had the satisfaction of seeing a startled expression slide across his lean features, followed by a slow speculative stare.

‘I like what you have done to the place.’

Her eyes narrowed—he hadn’t sounded sarcastic or sneery—but she only lowered her chin a fraction.

Draco could have done with lowering his head. It was almost grazing the low beams that Carrie had painted a warm shade of white to make the ceiling seem higher. Her friend had laughed at the time, saying it was just as well her husband was short.

The memory brought a lump to Jane’s throat and misted her eyes, and she blinked hard, not wanting to make an awkward situation worse by crying. It still happened at the most inopportune moments, the grief just bubbling up. She kept the moisture at bay through sheer force of will, determined not to look away.

White or not, the beams were not high, and Draco dominated any space, but the room’s proportions made his presence even more overwhelming. It wasn’t just a physical thing, not simply his size and sheer physicality, it was the restless energy he exuded.

He was not a relaxing person to be around.

Draco watched as she shook back her hair, which fell immediately into a fiery nimbus of bronze curls around her face and shoulders as she planted her hands on her narrow denim-covered hips and lifted her chin.

Jane took a steadying breath, hiding her grief behind a facade of defiant belligerence as she waited, determined she wouldn’t be the one to break the silence.

She had to wait an uncomfortable length of time.

‘You have changed,’ he said finally, his eyes on her stubborn chin and the militant light in her incredible eyes. Never during their relationship had she been confrontational—in fact there had been times when her little shrug of acceptance, her placidity, had irritated him. The only time she’d shown fierceness had been in bed, which he hadn’t objected to at all! There she had been fire to his dreams with her relentless fascination with his body and her utter lack of inhibitions.

She had never challenged him, she had never used tricks to manipulate him, unworldly to an almost unbelievable degree. Everything about her was the diametric opposite of his grasping, avaricious, conniving stepmother. She had never asked him for anything. In fact she had seemed uncomfortable with the gifts he had given her, politely grateful, but he had sensed her unease when he had filled a wardrobe with designer clothes.

Which made what she had done all the more incomprehensible!

Out of nowhere a memory surfaced, shaken loose perhaps by the perfume she was wearing now, the same perfume she had been wearing when she had pulled herself to her knees on the bed that was tumbled by their recent lovemaking and, pressing her small perfect breasts to his back, wound her slim arms around him and whispered that she loved him. Waiting, he knew, for him to return the sentiment.

Draco had not lied. He did not believe in love, love was the thing that had destroyed his father, but he thought he was gentle. The idea of hurting her had hit him on a level he had never recognised in himself previously or since.

---