Page 135 of Modern Romance Collection February 2025, 5-8

‘I understand.’

‘No, you don’t.’ She took a deep breath. ‘So...okay. I can see why it’s happened. But didn’t you at any point think enough was enough?’ An expression of dawning horror spread across her face. ‘I told you... Oh, God, I told you that I wanted to kiss you...!’ She groaned, her face contorting into a grimace of sheer mortification. ‘I told you I was a virgin!’ Swamped by the weight of sheer humiliation, she covered her eyes. ‘I tried to kiss you...’

He watched as her head dropped and her shoulders hunched.

‘Do you actually think that I didn’t want to kiss you back? That it didn’t...?’ He raked a hand through his dark hair, and the words were seemingly dragged out of him against his will as he continued in an uneven voice that reflected the strength of the emotions surging through him. ‘Hell, Clemmie, itkilledme not to kiss you. And then I did—’ he said, realising as he broke off that that action had put thenormalhe so wanted them to return to out of reach...maybe for ever.

Her head came up, and her eyes were instantly caught and held by his. The dark, burning heat in his gaze sealed the contact.

‘You know what I think, Clemmie?’

‘I’m sure you’re going to tell me.’

‘I think we’re both guilty of self-delusion.’

‘Speak for yourself.’

‘I am. I’ve been dodging the fact that I want you because I was afraid of the fall-out. I didn’t want to mess up what we already had. But it’s out there now, so we have to deal with it.’

I want you.

The raw statement sent a primal shudder through her body.

He wanted her.

But he lied to you,the voice in her head countered coldly.The way your dad lied time after time to your mum, and your mum believed his lies.

‘I don’t want to deal with this...this is just too much,’ she whispered. ‘I want things back to the way they were.’

‘I think you want me more than you want that.’

The awful part was he was right.

She fixed her gaze on some safe, blurry point over his shoulder as if it was a lifeline as she fought off the suspicion that on some level she had already known the truth. She had known that it was impossible they were engaged, but she had gone along with it because she’d been enjoying living the fantasy.

She couldn’t blame everything on the concussion—though that would be nice. The fact was, there had been some glaring inconsistencies in the timeline of their engagement staring her in the face the whole time. She was worried that she hadn’t wanted to see them.

‘The doctor said there might be a trauma I don’t want to remember?’

He nodded.

‘Do you know what it is?’

‘No. I thought it was maybe just being in the hospital where your sister... That is the place where she was...’ he hesitated ‘...treated?’

‘Same hospital, different building. The old children’s ward was replaced by a new building ages ago. It isn’t that specific hospital...it’s any hospital. It’s the smell. The...’

She paused and sucked in a breath before shaking her head. There were too many painful memories she didn’t want to revisit.

Playing with her twin and then later, when she was too tired and too ill to play, sitting beside her on the narrow bed, not wanting to let her go when it was time to go home.

The cycle of Chrissie’s hospital treatment and then coming home, and the hope that had seemed to last for ever.

But then came the day when Chrissie had never come home.

The survivor’s guilt had never truly left her.

Chrissie had been the brave part of her—the dominant twin. It made no sense even now that strong Chrissie was the one who had succumbed to that evil disease.

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