Page 29 of His Wedding Day Revenge

Telling herself fiercely that she wouldn’t, she didn’t register the toe of her sandal had caught in an uneven ridge in the paving until she had left it behind.

With a muttered curse of frustration, she turned back to retrieve it just as the moon slipped behind a cloud.

The sudden darkness was so profound that it was as if someone had switched a light off. She stood stock-still and waited for her eyes to adjust to the light or, rather, lack of it.

CHAPTER SEVEN

THEYDIDN’TNEEDto adjust. The moon reappeared, revealing the enchanting gardens and the fact she was no longer alone.

Her heart took a plunging dive before climbing into her throat, a helpless primitive shiver of awareness slithering down her spine, and she shivered, too shocked to even attempt to retreat. As if her secret thoughts had summoned him, Draco, the real flesh and blood one as opposed to the one in her head, was standing there a few feet away holding a wine bottle in one hand and her sandal in the other.

‘Is this where I see if the slipper fits?’

She took a step towards him and snatched it out of his fingers... For a second he didn’t release his grip. What was infinitely more disturbing was that for a second Jane didn’t want him to.

Balancing on one leg, she slid her foot back into the sandal, not taking her eyes off him the way you didn’t take your eyes off a dangerous jungle cat about to lunge.

You should be so lucky, mocked the voice in her head.

Though the analogy was not so far out. There was something quite...combustible about him, she decided, her eyes going from the bottle in his hand to his face again as she marvelled at the perfect symmetry of his features that were all dark shadow and light relief, like a starkly beautiful pencil sketch, his shadowed jaw adding to the edgy vibe.

‘What are you doing here?’ she began in a cranky voice that made his dark brows lift sardonically. ‘That is, it’s your home, of course you’re here,’ she said quickly, glad the shadows hid her embarrassed blush. ‘I just assumed you would be at the meet-and-greet supper.’

‘Me being the host?’

She nodded and he followed the direction of her gaze to the uncorked bottle in his hand. ‘The trick of good management is delegation, and I thought you’d be there.’

‘Looks like we were both wrong,’ she said, struggling to stop her gaze travelling over his long, lean length, and trying not to see the reckless gleam in his deep-set eyes that was probably connected to the bottle of wine he held.

She didn’t remember him ever drinking much.

‘Don’t worry, I’m not drunk, at least not yet.’

The words sounded almost like a threat. Their glances connected and the combustible quality of his dark gleaming stare made her stomach tighten and flutter.

His glance took in her damp hair, which was drying into a nimbus of fiery curls, before his eyes narrowed in again on her face. ‘Were you avoiding me?’

Her attempt at laughing off the suggestion sounded pretty feeble even to her own ears. ‘I could ask you the same question,’ she tossed back. Only she wouldn’t because that would have been absurd.

‘I should have gone tonight,’ he admitted.

She glanced at the bottle in his hand and arched a brow. ‘Celebrating?’

‘That remains to be seen.’

She refused to be ruffled or think about the hidden meaning in his words... Actually, was it so hidden? She suddenly felt queasy at the image of a warm body ready and waiting for him in bed.

‘Spare me the details.’

He laughed. ‘I have always thought the joy was in the detail.’

Jane, who had spent the last four years trying very hard not to remember the joy or the detail of Draco’s lovemaking, cleared her throat. ‘You still haven’t said why you didn’t go tonight.’

‘I don’t remember you being so... Actually, tonight is mostly experts, great people but they can be a bit...intense. There will be a more diverse group arriving tomorrow, more relaxed.’

A nasty thought was forming in her head. Was this all about revenge? Was she here so that he could see her humiliated, exposing her ignorance when she found herself among experts? A moment later she felt guilty for the thought. She had done enough online research to know that Draco’s green credentials were not some marketing ploy, that he appeared to have a genuine passion and if he had wanted to see her make a fool of herself he would have been there to watch.

‘I’m not an expert,’ she pointed out spikily, determined not to fall back into old patterns of behaviour. Her compliant silences were long gone.

---