Page 4 of His Wedding Day Revenge

Anticipated! He mocked himself. As if he had anticipated any of this. Why would he? Jane Smith was the past and Draco was a man who lived in the moment.

He could have rejected the flashback but some masochistic part of him allowed it to play out, the moments frozen in time, snapshots of the past, the day they met. Before that day, he would have mocked the idea that the touching of fingers could be erotic.

As he stared at the slim figure, the jeans and boots vanished and she was standing there in a cloud of silk and satin, looking at him with shimmering green eyes and then... The trance broke as Draco distanced himself ruthlessly from the undertow of emotions—anger, desire. And as he released the foot brake, and the car glided silently forward, tucking into a space, he welcomed the opportunity to prove that Jane Smith meant nothing to him.

Why should he need to prove to himself what he already knew?

Jane stood at the edge of the protest. She was aware that, on her back, Mattie, cocooned in a padded suit, had fallen asleep. His little head complete with bobble hat was pressing against her neck.

He wouldn’t be asleep for long. He’d need his next feed and—She stifled a yawn. She could really do with a nap herself. Mattie had been awake most of the night. Sometimes, actually quite often, it seemed to her that he sensed she didn’t have a clue what she was doing.

Or maybe he was just angry. She was angry, but Mattie...his loss was incalculable. One minute he’d had two beautiful, loving parents and now, because of a stupid accident, he’d got lumbered with her. She glanced around the clearing. Would anyone miss her if she left now?

It wasn’t as if the numbers were so few that her absence would be noticed. The cameras, which she had assiduously avoided, had drawn a bigger crowd than expected.

She had turned up at the office of the editor of the local newspaper demanding to be seen, her determination fuelled by righteous indignation and outrage, clutching the proof she’d waved at him, photos of the bulldozers and diggers, the utter devastation, on her phone.

She didn’t know what she had expected—an article, a regional radio mention possibly, but definitely not national news. Would she have marched in there if she’d known the name attached to the project that had chopped down the precious trees while the village slept was Andreas?

Jane liked to think she would have.

Andreas... Pathetic really that the name could still evoke such a visceral reaction. It wasn’t as if this little project would have registered on Draco’s radar. A few trees and up-in-arms locals were definitely below his pay grade!

I really hope it is, she thought. Drawing his attention was the last thing she wanted. She’d moved on.

The sobbing young woman who ran through a churchyard, sidestepped a security guard who looked as if he was about to rugby-tackle her and climbed over a fence, ripping the skirt of her wedding dress to shreds in the process, before she legged it along a cobbled side street—that person seemed like a stranger to her.

She could not imagine what a bedraggled sight she must have looked. The unexpected rain deluge had drenched her in seconds, and it was a miracle that someone had offered to help. God knew how the rest of that day would have gone if the driver of the big SUV with a loud noisy family inside hadn’t slowed to ask her if she needed help. Carrie, who unbeknownst to Jane had followed her out of the church, had arrived, breathless and dripping wet, while a tearful Jane was still trying to get her words out to the kind strangers.

The family had given the pair a lift to Carrie’s flat, where Jane had poured out her story, or rather dripped it out, while they’d sat draped in towels drinking wine out of mugs.

‘And you didn’t tell Draco about this?’ Carrie had asked.

Jane had shaken her head and did so now to disperse the memory. Why was she thinking about Draco so much lately? she asked herself crossly. Maybe it was becoming a mother to a motherless baby. The discovery that she wasn’t able to become a mother had been the reason she had run away in the first place.

She’d thought about writing to explain, but what was the point? He would never forgive her for humiliating him. No, his only reaction would have been relief before the next long-legged glamorous beauty drifted into his life, and not for long. His love life had a built-in revolving door... Not that I’m judging, she told herself with a sniff.

If he’d had a lucky escape, so had she. Watching from a safe distance over the last four years, she had found it pretty obvious that, even if her inability to give him an heir had not been an unsurmountable obstacle, the marriage would not have worked. When she’d been in thrall to him, so desperately in love with the idea of being in love, the future had just been some rose-tinted, lovely place.

When she’d looked back she had been shocked to realise that virtually all their conversations, such as they had been, had involved her trying to say what he wanted to hear. It had never even crossed her mind that he might be unfaithful, and if it had she would have told herself that if he ever got bored with her it would be her fault.

The entire situation had been a disaster waiting to happen. She thought about it these days as skipping the middle bit and getting straight to the end, less pain and disillusion all around in the long run.

‘Miss Smith.’

Jane blinked like a shocked baby owl as a reporter from a well-known nature programme appeared, backed by a cameraman.

Oh, God, she thought, pasting on a smile.

‘You must be pleased about the turnout today.’

She took a deep breath. ‘Pleased but not surprised that people care, that people are shocked and disturbed about this blatant act of environmental vandalism. Ten years ago a survey showed this area was home to four bat roosts, owls lived here and woodpeckers, and innumerable other wildlife have lost their homes. This is a protected habitat, there were tree preservation orders in place, the law was broken and for what? A quick buck!’

The reporter turned to camera. ‘That was Jane Smith, who alerted the authorities to this incident.’

Jane gave a deep sigh of relief when the reporter still talking to camera smiled at her, mouthing thanks before he set a new course for the vicar.

‘Oh, my, Henry is really enjoying his five minutes of fame,’ his wife observed as she joined Jane.

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