Unwanted Wedding

‘Yes,’ she agreed. It was true. Guard and Edward were old business adversaries and, as her father had stated on more than one occasion, there hadn’t been a confrontation between the two men yet out of which Guard had not come the winner. ‘The mere fact that he knows how much Guard loves this place would only add to his pleasure in destroying it.’

‘We’re only talking about a business arrangement between the two of you, you know, some simple basic formalities which would enable you to fulfil the terms of the will. In time the marriage could be dissolved. You could sell the house to Guard and—’

‘In time? How much time?’ she had asked him suspiciously.

‘A year—a couple of years…’ Peter had shrugged, ignoring her dismayed gasp. ‘After all, it isn’t as though you want to marry someone else, is it? If you did, there wouldn’t be any problem, any need to involve Guard.’

‘I can’t do it,’ she told Peter positively. ‘The whole idea is completely ridiculous, repulsive.’

‘Well, then, I’m afraid you’ll have to resign yourself to the fact that Edward will inherit. Your grandfather’s already been dead for almost a month.’

‘I can’t do it,’ Rosy repeated, ignoring Peter’s comment. ‘I could never ask any man to marry me, but especially not Guard…’

Peter had laughed at her.

‘It’s a business proposal, that’s all. Think about it, Rosy. I know how ambivalent your feelings towards Queen’s Meadow are, but I can’t believe that you actually want to see Edward destroy it.’

‘No, of course I don’t,’ Rosy had agreed.

‘Then what have you got to lose?’

‘My freedom?’ she had suggested hollowly.

Peter had laughed again. ‘Oh, I doubt that Guard would interfere with that,’ he had assured her. ‘He’s much too busy to have time to worry about what you’ll be doing. Promise me that you’ll at least think about it, Rosy. It’s for your sake that I’m doing this,’ he had added. ‘If you let Edward destroy this place, you’re bound to feel guilty.’

‘The way you do for putting all this moral blackmail on me?’ Rosy had asked him drily.

He had had the grace to look slightly uncomfortable.

‘All right, I’ll think about it,’ she had agreed.

And ultimately she had done more than just think about it, Rosy acknowledged, as she dragged her thoughts back to the present.

‘The trouble with you is that you’re far too soft-hearted.’ How often had she heard that accusation over the years?

Too often.

But Peter was right. She couldn’t let Edward destroy Queen’s Meadow without at least making some attempt to save it. By sacrificing herself. A wicked smile curled her mouth, her eyes suddenly dancing with bright humour. Oh, how chagrined Guard would be if he could read her mind. How many women were there who would look upon marriage to him in that light? Not many. Not any, she admitted, at least not from what she heard.

Well, all right, so she was peculiar—an oddity who for some reason could not see anything attractive in that magnetic sexuality of his which seemed to obsess virtually every other female who set eyes on him. So she was immune to whatever it was about him that made other women go weak at the knees, their eyes glazing with awe as they started babbling about his sexy looks, his smouldering eyes, his mouth and its full, sensual bottom lip, his shoulders, his body, his awesome charismatic personality, his single state and the subtle aura not just of sexual experience, but of sexual expertise which clung to him like perfume to a woman’s body.

Oddly, the last thing that most of them mentioned about him was his wealth.

Well, she could see nothing remotely sexually attractive about him, Rosy decided crossly, and she never had. As far as she was concerned, he was an arrogant, sarcastic pig who enjoyed nothing more than making fun of her.

Only last month at a dinner party, when the hostess had been remarking to her that the male cousin she had had visiting her had begged her to seat him next to Rosy at dinner, Guard, who had overheard their hostess’s remark, had leaned over and said sardonically, ‘Well, if he’s hoping to find a woman somewhere under that mass of hair and that very unflattering outfit you’re wearing, Rosy, he’s going to be very disappointed, isn’t he?’

Since the ‘unflattering outfit’ he referred to had been a very carefully chosen collection of several different layers of softly toning shades of grey, all determinedly hunted down in a variety of charity shops, carried home triumphantly and repaired and laundered, Rosy had shot him an extremely bitter look.

‘Not all men judge a woman on how she performs in bed, Guard,’ she had told him through gritted teeth.

‘Luckily for you,’ he had responded, not in the least bit fazed by her retaliation. ‘Because, according to all the gossip, you wouldn’t have the faintest idea what to do there.’

She had flushed, of course, the hot colour crawling betrayingly over her skin, not so much because of what he had said—after all, she was not ashamed of the fact that she was not prepared to jump into bed with every man who asked her—but because of the way Guard was watching her, because of the amusement and mockery in his eyes, because, oh, so shamingly and appallingly, just for a second, she could actually almost see him in bed with some anonymous woman, his body bare and brown, his hands stroking the woman’s paler, softer skin while she clung to him with small, pleading sounds of need…

She had blinked away the vision immediately, of course, telling herself that it must have had something to do with the sexy film she and a friend had been discussing earlier in the day.

She and Guard had continued their argument later in the evening, just before Guard had left with the extremely glamorous and elegant-looking blonde who was accompanying him.

‘Anyway,’ Rosy had told him, her small chin jutting out defiantly as she felt herself losing ground, ‘it makes sense these days not to have too many sexual partners.’

‘The present climate is certainly a convenient hedge to hide behind,’ Guard had agreed suavely. ‘Especially when…’

‘Especially when what?’ Rosy had challenged him.

‘Especially for you,’ he had told her blandly.

The return of his companion had prevented Rosy from saying anything else.

An arranged marriage with Guard. She must have been mad to let Peter talk her into such a crazy idea. But he had talked her into it and she couldn’t back out now. Did Guard want Queen’s Meadow enough to agree? Half of her hoped not. And the other half…

‘All right, Rosy, what’s this all about? And if you’re after another donation to that charity of yours, I’m warning you that right now I’m not feeling in the most generous of moods…’

Dumbly Rosy watched Guard walk into the hall. Her heart was beating so heavily it felt as though it was going to force its way through her chest wall.

She couldn’t remember ever, ever feeling so nervous before—not even when Gramps had found out about her sneaking out at night to go poaching with Clem Angers. She had had Guard to thank for that, of course, and—

Firmly, she brought her thoughts back to the present.

Guard was slightly earlier than she had expected, and if the sight of him wearing the expensively tailored dark suit with its equally expensive, crisp white cotton shirt had not been one that was already familiar to her, she suspected she would have found it extremely daunting.

But then Guard could be daunting, even when he was casually dressed, she acknowledged, and it wasn’t just because of his height, nor even because of those broad shoulders and that tautly muscular physique over which her female friends cooed and sighed so stupidly, either.

There was something about Guard himself—an air, a manner, a certain intangible something—that set him slightly apart from other men, made him stand out from other men, an aura of power and control, of…of sheer maleness, so potent that even she was acutely aware of it, she admitted. Aware of it, but not attracted by it, she reminded herself sharply. She could never be attracted by Guard; he was not her kind of man. She liked men who were softer, warmer—more approachable, more…more human, less…less sexual?

Nervously, she cleared her throat.

‘What’s wrong?’ Guard asked her drily. ‘You’re staring at me like a rabbit at a dog.’

‘I’m not afraid of you,’ Rosy retorted, stung.

‘I’m extremely glad to hear it. Look, I’m due to fly out to Brussels in the morning, Rosy, and I’ve got a briefcase full of documents to read before I do. Just tell me what you want, there’s a good girl, and don’t start backtracking now and telling me it isn’t important. We both know that there’s no way you’d get in touch with me if it weren’t.’

The irony in his voice made her frown slightly but he was watching her impatiently, unfastening his jacket, reaching up to loosen the knot in his tie.

As she focused on the movement of his hands, she could feel the knot in her stomach tightening.

‘Come on, Rosy, don’t start playing games. I’m not in the mood for it.’