To Have And To Hold

‘Of course.

‘And didn’t any of the men at college take your fancy?’

Again she gave him an impish look. ‘No, it’s OK, Rhys, you don’t have to be jealous.’

‘There wasn’t even one man who interested you?’

She shook her head with certainty. ‘No, not even one.’

‘You’re incorrigible,’ he grinned.

Alix smiled back at him and moved closer, her eyes drinking him in. After two years he had changed little, although a line at the corner of his mouth seemed to have deepened. She put up a finger to touch it. ‘You’re starting to get a cynical line here,’ she said reprovingly.

‘It’s old age,’ he said flippantly.

‘Not experience?’

‘Experience?’ He raised an eyebrow at the note in her voice.

‘Of women.’ And she lifted candid blue eyes to meet his.

Rhys’s eyes narrowed. ‘What’s this—office gossip?’

‘Yes,’ Alix answered, unable to be anything but truthful with him.

She waited for him to deny it, but he merely sat back and said, ‘What have you heard?’

‘That women fall over you wherever you go.’

‘What?’ He gave a crack of surprised laughter. ‘You surely don’t believe that rubbish, do you?’

‘Why not? I think you’re fantastic so why shouldn’t other girls?’

‘Well, it isn’t true.’

Alix tilted her head to one side to look at him, all wide-eyed innocence. ‘You mean you don’t go out with other girls when you’re away?’

There was a slightly considering look in the grey eyes that met hers, but then Rhys grinned. ‘Somehow I don’t think you’d believe it if I said I didn’t.’

‘Of course I wouldn’t,’ she answered. ‘It wasn’t only economics I learned at college, you know. I understand that men have to—gain experience of life.’

‘Such worldly wisdom in one so young,’ Rhys mocked, making her blush and punch his arm.

‘You know what I mean,’ she scolded.

He smiled down at her, a look of tender affection in his eyes. ‘Yes, urchin, I know what you mean. And have you gained some experience of life?’

The colour in her cheeks deepened. ‘No. It’s different for girls.’

‘Not all girls.’

‘Perhaps not,’ she admitted. ‘But it’s different for me—because of you.’

Rhys gave a gasping sigh. ‘Alix! You shouldn’t do this! You’re putting too much onus on me.’

She gave him a steady, earnest look. ‘Do you want to marry someone else, Rhys?’

‘No, but——

‘Not Donna Temple?’

His brows drew into a frown. ‘Who told you about her?’

‘Everyone knows about you and her. Do you want to marry her, Rhys?’

The frown deepened for a moment, then cleared, and there was a definite note in his voice as he said, ‘No, I don’t.’

‘Or anyone else?’

Amusement was coming back into his eyes. ‘Or anyone else,’ he agreed.

Alix gave a smile of pure happiness. ‘So that’s OK.’

‘Is it?’

‘Of course. You promised to marry me over sixteen years ago, and I’m going to hold you to it. Besides, if you don’t want to marry anyone else, then you might as well marry me. Everyone thinks it’s about time you settled down.’

‘“Everyone” being my parents, I take it?’ he guessed shrewdly.

‘And me.’

‘But what if you meet someone else and fall in love?’

She shook her head in absolute certainty. ‘I won’t. I’m in love with you.’

That made Rhys frown again. ‘And what if I meet someone and fall in love with her?’

Alix gazed at him for a moment, then let a mock-savage look come into her face. Stretching her hands like claws, she said, ‘Then I’ll tear her eyes out and scratch her to pieces. I’ll boil her in oil and grind her bones to dust.’

‘Ugh! Nasty.’ Rhys shook his head as if in horror, but there was amusement in his face. ‘I take it you’d be jealous?’

‘Of course I would.’ She grew suddenly serious. ‘You remember the last time we saw each other, when I was eighteen?’ He nodded. ‘Do you remember what you said then?’

Rhys gave her a wary look. ‘No, but I’ve a feeling it was probably something as unwise as that incautious answer I gave to a four-year-old imp who pushed her way into my garden—and my life.’

She smiled, liking that, and leaned towards him so that he put his arm round her. ‘I wanted you to marry me, then—when I was eighteen, I mean, but you said I’d got to wait until I was no longer a teenager and ask you again. Well, I’m not a teenager any longer, Rhys.’

He pursed his lips, sighed and nodded. ‘I was right; it was an unwise thing to say.’