One Wedding Required!

‘Hard day?’ she asked him sympathetically.

‘Tiring.’ He pulled a face. ‘I’ve had Birgitta on the phone from New York for most of the afternoon.’

‘And just who is Birgitta?’

‘She’s Karolina Lindberg’s mother. You met her—don’t you remember? She’s rather beautiful.’

Amber frowned. She met so many beautiful women every day of her life that she had sort of grown immune to them. But Finn, it would seem, had not. Not judging by the remark he had just made. It was his job to assess women on how they looked, but Amber found it oddly hurtful to hear the mother of one of his models described as ‘rather beautiful’. She forced herself to put on an expression of interest. ‘Tall? White-blonde hair? Used to be a model herself before she had Karolina?’

‘That’s the one!’

Amber forced herself to be generous. ‘It’s easy to see where Karolina got her beauty from.’

‘She’s a good-looking woman,’ conceded Finn. ‘They both are.’

Karolina was Finn’s latest signing and one of Allure’s biggest potential earners, a star in the making—the kind of woman who came around once every couple of years. If you were lucky.

It was difficult to pinpoint exactly what star quality was, but whatever it was Karolina had more than enough to go round. Six feet of exquisite white-blonde beauty, at sweet sixteen, she was a male fantasy come to life. Like her mother...

Amber narrowed her navy eyes, unaccustomed antennae alerted. ‘And isn’t there a Mr Lindberg on the scene?’ she enquired casually.

Finn shook his head. ‘Unfortunately, she’s just separated from Karolina’s father, and things are a little strained in the Lindberg family just now. Birgitta and Karolina are showing a distinct aversion to going back to Sweden. They’ve decided they want to be based in London.’

Amber felt unfamiliar fingers of fear whisper over her skin. ‘And what’s that got to do with you?’

‘Well, they want to use the company flat, for starters.’

‘Oh. I see.’

Like other leading model agencies, Allure owned a property solely for the use of its models—especially young and up-and-coming models, who needed a safe and cheap place to stay in the big city. For a nominal rent, the company flat could provide them with the security they needed. ‘Karolina and her mother want to live there?’ queried Amber. ‘Isn’t Birgitta a little old to be staying somewhere as basic as that?’

Finn shot her a narrow-eyed look and Amber thought how pale his face looked when contrasted against the dark hair. ‘She’s Karolina’s chaperon.’ He frowned. ‘Where else are they going to stay? It’s only Karolina’s second job—she hasn’t earned enough yet to put herself up in any of the London hotels. Not long-term. And you know how much they need reassurance and guidance at this stage, sweetheart’

‘And you give it them,’ she observed.

‘Well, that’s all part of my job.’

‘Sure.’ Amber gave an automatic smile, but her heart felt unaccustomedly heavy. ‘Just that sometimes I wish that we could have a little more time together, that’s all.’

‘You’re wishing away our success?’ he queried, a half-smile hovering around his lips. But it was a rueful smile.

Amber played with her engagement ring. ‘I just wish there was something in between having no work and having so much work you can’t think straight.’

‘But that’s life, business.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s all or nothing.’

He had struggled so hard to get to where he was today that Amber sometimes wondered whether he would be able to function normally without that struggle. Because Finn had had to fight every inch of the way to become the man he was today.

The youngest of seven children, Finn had come as a complete surprise to his brothers and sisters. And as a total shock to his mother—who had been in her late forties at the time of his birth and had thought her childrearing days were over. She’d been too tired to cope with the dark-haired infant’s vitality, so the afterthought had been brought up mainly by his eldest sister, Philomena—who had allowed him a lot more freedom than a strict mother might have done. As a consequence, Finn had grown used to quietly going about and getting what he wanted.

And what he’d wanted was success.

His good looks and natural grace had taken him out of the small Irish village of his birth and propelled him onto the international modelling scene like a rocket, at the age of eighteen—but he had soon tired of earning a living from his good looks. With a determination which was characteristic of the man, he had modelled when he could and laboured on the roads when he couldn’t, and by the time he was twenty-five had saved enough money to start his own model agency.

He stifled a yawn. ‘God, I need a drink.’

Normally Amber would have taken herself off and poured him one, but then normally he would have already taken her into his arms and kissed her very thoroughly indeed.

Which, so far, he hadn’t. So far all he had talked about was Birgitta and Karolina.

‘I wouldn’t mind a drink myself,’ she told him.

He blinked in surprise. ‘Okay. Wine do you?’

The champagne had made her thirsty for a soft drink, but she wanted to go through the whole togetherness thing of sharing a bottle with Finn. Tonight she needed some reassurance of their closeness. ‘Why not?’ She smiled.

She followed him out into the kitchen and put some heat beneath the chicken and rice while Finn opened a bottle. He was just about to throw the cork away when he noticed the empty golden-foiled bottle of very expensive champagne which was lying in the bin.

He raised his eyebrows. ‘Been celebrating?’

For some extraordinary reason Amber felt both defensive and indignant, though when she thought about it afterwards it was a question she might have asked herself, had the situation been reversed.

Though perhaps not with as much accusation in her voice.

‘Not really,’ she hedged, knowing his dislike of journalists and wondering what mad blip had possessed her to give an interview.

The dark eyebrows rose even higher. ‘Just consuming costly bottles of champagne on your own?’ he queried mildly.

‘Well, of course I wasn’t alone!’ she retorted, guilt making her sound much snappier than usual. ‘You must know by now that I’d never be able to drink that much on my own! Especially in the middle of the day!’

‘I don’t know anything, Amber,’ he contradicted stubbornly. ‘Since you seem determined to clothe your actions in secrecy.’

Amber’s blue eyes widened into sapphire circles. If it hadn’t been so preposterous, it might almost have been funny, but she had never felt less like laughing. ‘Clothe my actions in secrecy?’ she repeated incredulously. ‘Did you mean to sound like the lead role in a poor spy movie, Finn, or was it unintentional?’

‘Damn you, Amber O’Neil’ he said softly. ‘What the hell has been going on here today?’

This time she stared at him in utter confusion. What was happening? Why were they arguing? Why on earth was he talking to her like this? Suddenly Amber felt the shiver of misgivings as they trickled their way down her spine.

She had never known Finn be so prickly and confrontational. Oh, they had sparred often enough in the time they had been living together—and before that. Plenty of times. But humour and affection had lain behind those exchanges, while there was certainly no humour or affection lurking in the depths of Finn’s emerald gaze right now.

She bit her lip and wondered how to answer him, because now did not seem the right time to tell him that she had sold the story of their meeting to Wow! magazine.

And he looked tired, too. Dog-tired. For the first time since he had arrived home Amber took a really close look at him—noting the blue-black shadows beneath his eyes and the tension around his jaw. His nerves were clearly jangled and stretched, and she frowned. He had been working too hard; that much was apparent. For where was the cool, calm Finn who coped equably with most things which were thrown at him?

‘Ursula came round for a drink,’ she told him, and offered a silent prayer of contrition for the lie. It was necessary, she told herself firmly. She would pick a better moment than this one to tell him the truth. A time when she was sure he would give her that easy, familiar laugh of his and tell her that, no, she shouldn’t have done it—but that no real harm had been done.

‘Ursula?’ He frowned. ‘Your sister?’

‘I know only one Ursula.’

‘What was Ursula doing round here in the middle of the day? Drinking champagne?’

Amber rounded on him. Enough was enough. ‘There’s no need to make it sound as though we were up to no good!’ she told him furiously. ‘Some of the women that work in Ursula’s company go out to wine bars every single lunchtime!’

‘And do absolutely zilch in the way of work afterwards, I’ll bet!’

‘But it was my afternoon off!’ Amber pointed out, and to her horror she burst into tears.

Finn stared at her in amazement. ‘Amber—’

‘Shut up! Just shut up!’ she sobbed, and ran from the kitchen towards the bedroom.

She flung herself down on the bed, her shoulders shaking with the effort of trying to keep the tears back, but it was no good. Great rivulets came streaking their way in a salty path down her nose and into her mouth and she swallowed them down like medicine. She was just scrubbing at her eyes and sniffing back the last of her tears when she heard the door open quietly, and Finn began to walk towards the bed.

She held her breath, froze into total stillness, her body language screaming out a wordless message of rejection. But it was a message which he was clearly choosing to ignore, for he put his hand on her shoulder.

She tried to shake it off. ‘G-go away!’

‘You know you don’t want me to.’

‘How do you know what I want?’ she demanded.

‘Why don’t you tell me?’ he suggested tenderly.

‘Okay, I’ll tell you!’ She sat up on the bed, aware that she must look an absolute fright. Strands of golden hair were sticking to her cheeks like glue. ‘I want a little respect, Finn Fitzgerald—that’s what I want!’ Then tell him the truth about this afternoon, a little voice inside her head urged her. She ignored it.

He sighed. ‘Shall we start this evening all over again?’

‘And how do you propose we do that?’ she asked him quietly, but the instant the words were out of her mouth she realised that they could be interpreted as provocation.

His eyes briefly flickered, and Amber immediately recognised the dark, gleaming shutters of desire.

He smiled as he gave a shrug of his broad shoulders, clad in their habitual black. ‘I don’t know, Amber,’ he murmured. ‘Any ideas?’

She knew what he wanted. What she wanted, too, if she was being honest with herself. A sizzling session of making up, which would banish the memory of their angry words and make everything seem all right again. But she was damned if she was going to lie back on the bed and start giving him the come-on, pouting and desperate, with no pride.

She quickly got up off the bed, and Finn frowned.

‘Where are you going?’

‘To the kitchen. I’ve left the rice and chicken cooking. Remember?’

‘So this is what an engagement means, is it?’ he taunted softly. ‘That you put supper before making love?’

Amber paused by the door, his words unsettling her. She found herself wanting to placate him, to run back over to the bed and start to massage the knotted tension from his shoulders in the way he so liked. And that would inevitably lead on to something else, in the way that massage always did. But that type of behaviour would consign her to a lifetime of being considered a doormat. She already had his supper ready and waiting for him every night—she sure as hell wasn’t going to start agreeing to sex when she most emphatically did not feel like it!

‘My behaviour isn’t unique,’ she countered quietly. ‘Before we got engaged you wouldn’t have dreamed of coming home and hurling accusations at me like that. You sounded like a bear with a sore head! No, worse!’

And she flounced out of the room before either of them had a chance to say anything else which they might later regret.

Her hands were shaking as she switched the gas off and took two plates out of the oven, where they were heating. She carried them through to the dining room, where she found Finn standing staring at the Christmas tree, its white candle lights reflected in the big glass windows which overlooked the park. There was a look of soft wonder in his eyes, some brief, faint glimpse of the innocent boy in the hard, handsome face of the man, and her heart turned over with love.

She put the plates down on the table. ‘Do you like it?’

‘You don’t usually put it up quite so early,’ he observed, his attention still caught by the bright glitter.

‘I couldn’t wait,’ she prevaricated, vowing to tell him about the interview. Tomorrow. ‘And you still haven’t answered my question. Do you like it?’

He turned to face her, his eyes as darkly and as beautifully green as the fragrant pine. ‘Sweetheart, I love it—it’s the most beautiful tree I’ve ever seen!’

‘You said that last year.’

‘Did I?’ he smiled.

‘Yes! And the year before!’

‘In fact, every Christmas we’ve spent together, even before we were officially a “couple”,’ he murmured, his eyes slowly travelling over her, looking at her properly for the first time since he had arrived home. ‘And how many Christmases is that, Amber?’

‘F-four,’ she stumbled, because the way his eyes were searing over her was sending her pulses racing. ‘Can’t you remember?’

‘I’m having a little difficulty with my thoughts just now,’ he admitted deliberately.

Now she was ready to play the game. There was no danger of the flat burning down and, quite frankly, the sight of the chicken congealing in its coconut and coriander sauce was making her feel slightly queasy. She just wanted to lose herself in his arms and forget about the hurtful things they had said. And the lie she had told him...

‘Are you?’ she asked, her voice husky.

‘Mmm.’

‘Why’s that?’

‘Because you’re distracting me, sweetheart, that’s why. I can’t seem to think of anything right now, except...’ His voice tailed off as his pupils dilated in a look of desire that made Amber feel positively brazen.

‘Except?’

‘Come here,’ he whispered.

Amber supposed that a more liberated woman than herself might have requested that he come to her. Because he was the one who had arrived home in such a foul temper,

She opened her mouth to say so, but something irresistibly compelling in the depths of those thick-lashed eyes made the words die hopelessly on her lips and she went straight into his arms.

He enfolded her in his embrace, rubbing his chin against the silky softness of her hair, and she felt his body come alive against her. It had always been like that between them. That instant. That overwhelming. Sometimes she worried that the physical side was almost too good between them—because if that ever faded, then would there be enough left to sustain them?

‘God—I want you, Amber,’ he groaned.

‘I’d n-never have guessed.’ She swallowed down her excitement.

‘So badly.’

She felt her pulse pick up speed. ‘So what do you want to do about it?’

‘This.’ His forefinger skated over the golden silk towards the zip-fastening at the front, brushing carelessly against her breast on its travels, so that she sucked in a painful breath of agonised longing.

‘Finn!’ This as he unhurriedly began to slide the zip down, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth as it tugged with resistance over the luscious swell of her breasts.

‘What?’

She briefly closed her eyes with helpless pleasure. ‘I don’t remember,’ she murmured, her voice sounding slurred—almost drugged—heavy and sweet as honey. He had taught her this, had taught her everything she knew about lovemaking, and he was a grand master. She knew what pleasures lay ahead. For Finn had shown her that anticipation was everything, no matter how long the preliminaries took. He had taught her to indulge her senses—all of them. Shown her that a cup of coffee would taste all the more delicious if you savoured the aroma first.

He eased the zip down to past her navel, so that her breasts, straining exquisitely against the ivory-coloured lace of her bra, were exposed to his hot and hungry gaze. ‘God, I’m glad you never reached the ideal height for modelling,’ he said suddenly.

Amber’s eyes snapped open. ‘What an odd thing to say! Especially at a time like this! Why on earth not?’

‘Because then, my beauty, you would have dieted all these succulent curves away and there would be no heavy mounds of silken breast for me to take in my mouth and suckle. No rounded belly on which to cushion my head—’

‘Finn!’ His words made her weak and dizzy with desire. She swayed like a sapling in the wind, and Finn had to catch her hips between his hands to support her.

‘Steady, sweetheart,’ he murmured appreciatively as he observed her instantaneous response to the things he was saying. ‘Steady.’

Words failed her. How could she be steady when his hands had begun working their magic in the secret places and crevices of her body?

‘Is this a new dress?’ he wanted to know as he eased it over her shoulders and it pooled with a silken whisper to the floor, and she was left standing in the ivory lace bra and matching knickers and the milky-sheened stockings.

His question let a little unwelcome reality seep into her mind. She had bought it to wear on Christmas Day, and then, when the photographer from Wow! had turned up, it had seemed the perfect outfit to put on. Because it was a Christmassy colour and also because there was something about new clothes which made a woman feel extra-confident...

Maybe now was the time to tell him about the interview—but Amber didn’t even give it a second thought, because by now Finn was ruthlessly rubbing at one of her nipples through the ivory lace, the pad of his thumb creating a soft, sweet sorcery that had her melting against him again. ‘Yes, it’s new,’ she sighed helplessly against him. ‘I bought it last week. D-do you like it?’

‘I’m not sure,’ he mused, as he eased a practised knee between her thighs and followed it with purposeful fingers. ‘I think on balance it looks better off than on.’

Amber gave a little yelp of pleasure as he skimmed a moist path along the centre of her panties, and she couldn’t have stopped her thighs from opening in mute invitation even if she had wanted to.

‘Do you like that?’ he queried unnecessarily.

She shook her head. Sometimes she resented him for this. For reducing her to such a boneless, shaking wreck within seconds of laying one seductive finger on her. ‘Hate it,’ she husked defiantly.

He gave a low laugh. ‘Oh, do you?’ He slid the panties down to mid-thigh, then stopped, and Amber realised that she had been doing a hell of a lot of taking and not much giving. She often felt shy about taking the lead. But that wasn’t really surprising, not when she stopped to think about it. For Finn had been making love to beautiful women since he was eighteen, while she had only ever known him...

With trembling fingers she lightly flattened the palm of her hand against his black jeans, to touch and incite the great throbbing swell of him. Then she began to falteringly unbuckle his belt, wondering whether she would ever acquire his smooth undressing technique, and he gave another low laugh of pleasure.

‘Oh, that’s what I like about you, sweetheart,’ he murmured, his voice sultry with pure elation. ‘The way you tremble and gasp with shock and excitement whenever I lay a finger on you. The way you touch me with hands which are both scared and eager. The way your eyes widen with disbelief when I fill you right up with every inch of me. You’re like a virgin every time we make love, Amber.’

‘Am I?’ For some reason his words fired her up with both rebellion and desire. Was she always such a predictable lover? Didn’t his words imply that she was somehow in awe of him? Gazing on him in wonderment, as if finding it difficult to believe that the great Finn Fitzgerald should be making love to her, poor little Amber O’Neil, from the wrong side of town? ‘But I’m not a virgin, am I, Finn? Because a virgin wouldn’t touch you here. Like this.’ And she boldly splayed her hand across the most elemental part of him and felt him buck beneath her.

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