A Suspicious Proposal

‘Is he? A millionaire, I mean?’

‘Too true.’ Janice sighed longingly, her rosy-cheeked plain face mournful. ‘It’s not fair, is it, that some lucky woman will get all that—wealth, a life of ease and comfort, and Xavier Grey to wake up to in the morning.’

‘He might be a real pig when you get to know him,’ Essie said flatly.

‘With all that he’s got going for him, I’d excuse him anything.’ Janice grinned back, just as the last note of music died away. The rest of the congregation took a deep reviving breath and savoured the blissful silence for a moment, before shuffling to their feet as the bridal pair emerged from the back of the church, their faces beaming.

The next hour consisted of endless photographs under the voluptuous blossom of the cherry trees surrounding the square of village green and, although Essie felt a little better in the fresh May air, it was still an effort for her to smile brightly and act normally when her stomach kept growling like a bear with a sore head. But the light spring breeze and soft golden sunshine had cleared her muzzy head by the time the bridesmaids were all back in the second wedding car, being transported to the wedding reception some five miles away.

There were more photographs in the elegant foyer of the luxurious hotel where the wedding lunch was being held—the foyer had its own miniature waterfall, which the photographers enthused over—but then they were all seated on the top table and Essie could kick off her shoes and relax back in her seat.

But only for a second. Then her eyes met the piercingly silver-blue gaze she had been avoiding for the last hour and a half, and she realised in that instant that she had been aware of Xavier Grey every moment of the time that had elapsed since that first shock of eye-contact in the church. He’d been watching her, and the quality of his scrutiny hadn’t changed—it was still derisive.

She stared back over the tables into the hard, aggressively masculine face, her deep violet-blue eyes betraying none of the apprehension and unease which was causing her heart to pound like a drum.

What was the matter with him? she asked herself as a waiter moved between them, breaking the eye-contact and allowing her to sink back again, her cheeks flushed and hot. He was acting as though he knew her, as though she had done something awful. Had he mistaken her for someone else? Was that it? It was certainly the only explanation that made any sense.

The meal, in spite of the lavish surroundings, was mediocre, but Essie managed a few mouthfuls of each course—enough not to bring any attention to herself, anyway. She was seated next to the best man, Charlie’s brother, who was married with a very pregnant wife he blatantly adored, and for most of the lunch he regaled her with the intricacies of antenatal classes and the baby books he had read, but in such a purposely amusing way that the two of them were convulsed with laughter every few minutes. And she made absolutely sure she didn’t glance Xavier Grey’s way again. But he was watching her. She just knew it.

The speeches over, the wedding cake cut and the drinks flowing freely was the signal for the radiant bride and groom to take the floor for the first dance, and Essie found herself misty-eyed at the look on Christine’s face as she gazed up at her new husband.

She was glad it had worked out for Christine, she thought warmly; she really was. Charlie had had something of a roving eye at veterinary college, and there had been times when Essie had been fearful he was playing fast and loose. But here he was, the devoted bridegroom, and Christine had fulfilled her dearest wish and was now Mrs Brown. A classic happy ending, and you didn’t get too many of those these days. She pushed the somewhat cynical thought aside abruptly, cross that she had let it surface on Christine’s wedding day, and took a long swallow from her glass of tonic water.

‘I’d go careful with that, if I were you.’

The deep, husky and very sexy Canadian drawl brought Essie’s head swinging round and then she froze, the smile dying from her face and her thought processes freezing.

Close up, Xavier Grey was even bigger than she had thought—six foot two or three easily—but it was the overall hardness of him that had caused her brain to stop. The rugged toughness of the uncompromisingly cold face, the lean, powerful body, the big-muscled shoulders all spoke of a male strength and power that was formidable. He looked hard-bitten and shrewd and unsentimental, and he scared her to death.

‘Careful with…?’

Her echo of his words was spoken unconsciously; all lucid thought was taken up with the frightening giant in front of her. But then, as he nodded again towards the glass in her hand and said, his voice cool and compelling, ‘Shouldn’t you try and remain compos mentis in case Christine needs you?’ she understood what he was insinuating. ‘Champagne is supposed to be sipped, not consumed in great gulps,’ he continued conversationally.

Champagne? He’d assumed her sensible tonic water was champagne? Essie thought bewilderedly, closely followed with, How dared he anyway? And what was it to do with him if she drank bottles of champagne?

‘Look, I’m sorry but—’

‘I understand the hen party was a riot—’ the hateful, easy drawl was patronising ‘—but dancing on the table and being carried home from the pub is one thing, the wedding day is another. You were clearly toting the mother and father of a hangover in church; don’t you think you owe it to Christine to conduct yourself properly today?’

She stared at him, too flabbergasted to speak. It had been Janice who had overimbibed at the hen party the night before and had been carried home; but, as Janice herself had said cheerfully that morning, when they were climbing into their bridesmaid’s dresses, she had a cast-iron stomach and never woke with a hangover. ‘Of course, the parties at college are a good training ground,’ the other girl had admitted brightly, ‘and my evening job at the Sportsman’s Arms helps, too. Still, I’ll have to start watching it, I suppose. I did make something of a spectacle of myself last night, didn’t I?’

Essie had grinned at the frankly unabashed face in front of her and made some soothing comment—she couldn’t remember what, now. Janice was twenty years old, big, heavy, and not even her mother could have called her pretty, but there was a charm about the utterly unpretentious girl that was very endearing. And she had been comical the night before—hilarious, in fact. But suddenly it all didn’t seem so amusing.

Xavier Grey was smiling at her now, and his tone was definitely condescending when he added, ‘I understand you’re doing Theatre Studies at college, Janice? You’re hoping to go on the stage?’ His ice-blue eyes lingered on her mass of silky golden curls that would never be restrained, the huge violet-blue eyes with their thick, thick lashes and the perfect creamy skin.

Essie opened her mouth to tell him of his mistake a second before full realisation hit, turning her eyes dark purple. Xavier had clearly been informed of the antics of the night before by one of his relatives, and when he had seen herself and Janice he had automatically labelled her the giddy college student with the part-time job as a barmaid. And why? Essie stared at the strong-featured, vigorous face in front of her. Because she was the typical male perception of a blonde bimbo, that was why!

All her life she had been dogged by this particular mentality from a certain section of the opposite sex, and it grated—it grated unbearably, and never as much as now. There were some men who even seemed to take it as some sort of personal insult when they found out she was a darn sight more intelligent than them; that she had a brain and knew how to use it. She had got three straight As in her A Levels, and at veterinary college she had more than held her own with her male colleagues, in spite of weighing just nine stone and being five foot seven.

‘Go on the stage?’ She turned in her seat, the pale lemon satin of her dress and the fresh daisies threaded in the gold of her hair adding to the impression of a young girl barely out of her teens. That was another thing that always proved awkward, especially when she had been doing her veterinary training. It hadn’t been so bad at the surgery, with the domestic animals, but when she had gone out to the farms to deal with a poorly heifer or another of the large animals some of the farmers had been totally dumbstruck.

‘Or are your sights set even higher? Maybe Hollywood?’

Oh, yes, he definitely had her labelled as the hopeful little blonde starlet, Essie told herself savagely: all hair and breasts and cotton wool where her brain should have been. He’d be saying next he knew a Hollywood producer or something, and maybe she’d like to come out to the back seat of his car to discuss it. But no, not the back seat, she silently corrected herself in the next moment—nothing so tacky for Xavier Grey. It would be a full dinner and hotel room for this man.

He needed taking down a peg or two. The thought had been there from the first moment she had seen him but now crystallised into firm conviction. And, if he did but know it, he had given her the perfect opportunity to do just that, because, along with the unmistakable condescension, there was something else staring out of the dark male face and she had seen it in too many other men to doubt it. He fancied her. Physically, he fancied her very much, although it was clear he thought her mind was way, way below his notice.

‘Hollywood?’ Essie put a coo into her voice that was so hammed up that, for a moment, she thought she had overdone it. But he swallowed it, hook, line and sinker. ‘Little old me?’ She pouted slightly, allowing her full rosebud mouth to send out an invitation as old as time. ‘You’re teasing me.’

‘Not at all,’ he responded gallantly. ‘You can do anything you want in life if you’re determined enough.’

Oh, she was determined, all right—determined to teach Xavier Grey a lesson he would never forget!

‘You really think so?’ She let the full sweep of her thick dark lashes cover her eyes for a moment before raising them again to look straight into his face.

‘Of course. Look at Christine and Essie,’ Xavier said quietly, sliding into the seat Charlie’s brother had recently vacated when he had gone to sit with his wife and her parents, once the dancing had started. ‘They would have been very much the exception to the rule, even as short a time as a couple of decades ago, but more and more women are becoming veterinary surgeons now. Of course, others are more suited to less…physically demanding careers,’ he added softly, his eyes moving over her delicate loveliness again.

‘You think Essie looks the part, is that it?’ Essie asked with determined innocence, opening her eyes very wide. ‘She is quite strong.’

‘I’m sure she is.’ Xavier glanced across to where Janice was dancing an energetic foxtrot with one of the guests, her thick-set, strapping frame straining the pale lemon satin to excess. ‘And perfectly suited for her chosen profession, as you are for yours.’

Oh, you utter, absolute male chauvinist pig, you. Essie had to look down quickly before he saw the blaze of anger in her eyes.

‘Would you care to dance?’

He had clearly taken her action as a form of coquetry—she could read it in the slightly amused, resigned note hidden in the deep voice—and now she raised her eyes again, pushing back the soft curls that had fallen about her face as she said brightly, ‘That would be lovely, thank you.’

‘The pleasure will be all mine.’

The flirting was obvious but circumspect, Essie thought cynically, rising gracefully to her feet after slipping her shoes on. She had to admit that, for all his rugged hardness, he was a smooth devil when he wanted to be.

She was aware of more than one frankly envious pair of female eyes following her as she made her way to the dance floor with Xavier’s hand in the small of her back, and wondered what all those women would think if they knew what she was about. But they didn’t: and, more importantly, neither did Xavier Grey. Of course, it would only take one person to call her by name for her little ruse to be brought out into the open, but hopefully she could continue it for a little longer. It was going to be so sweet to see the look on his arrogant male face when he realised he’d been taken for a ride.

And few of the guests knew her. She hugged the thought to her as she turned and allowed him to take her into his arms. When she had met Christine at university, the two of them had become immediate best friends, their delight when they were both accepted for the same veterinary college exuberant. But she had only visited Christine’s family once or twice in the intervening years, due to the fact that she—unlike Christine—did not have well-to-do parents supporting her. She had needed to work every minute she could at weekends and in the holidays to pay the innumerable expenses involved in the training for the career she loved so passionately. So it might be a while yet before her deception was discovered by the big hard man holding her close.

Too close. She looked up past the massive width of his shoulders and the silver-blue eyes were waiting for her, their expression unfathomable.

Essie smiled, but coolly this time, easing herself from the large, lean frame as she said, ‘I’m sorry, I don’t think you told me your name?’

There was a momentary flicker of surprise in the narrowed gaze—which Essie counted as a small triumph; he had clearly assumed everyone knew who the great Xavier Grey was, she thought nastily—before he said, ‘I’m sorry. How remiss of me. I think I must have assumed your aunt and uncle would have told you the names of the new contingent added to Enoch’s family.’ His tone was wry. ‘My name is Xavier Grey and I am totally at your disposal.’

Far more than he thought, right at this moment. Essie smiled sweetly.

‘Hello, Xavier Grey,’ she said with honeyed charm.

‘Hello, Janice.’ He was out to seduce, all right. The deep voice was seriously sensual, and Essie could have giggled if it weren’t for the sudden alarms that had gone off all over her body. He was too good at this, that was the trouble, she told herself quickly, and in this particular instance that suggested a great deal of experience. The warm, smoky tone of his voice, the mellowing of that harsh, rugged face and the deliciously tempting smell of his aftershave all spoke of a dedicated wolf in sheep’s clothing. Well, perhaps not his aftershave, she admitted to herself in the next instant; that was probably just part of the man himself. But the rest… It was a definite practised, tried and tested come-on and no doubt had rendered Xavier dividends in the past. But not today, and not with her.

She nestled back against him, trying to ignore how perfectly her head fitted under his chin and how it felt to be in the arms of a virile, powerful man like him, telling herself she owed it to all the other women in the world to teach him that all cats weren’t grey in the dark. But the touch of sanctimonious self-righteousness was swiftly dispelled by her innate honesty. She was doing this for herself, no one else and he deserved it; he really did.