‘Well, let’s just say that I would have preferred to have met your brother before today.’
His eyes drifted away from her to stare out across the crowded room, but Lily got the distinct impression that he saw nothing of the brightly dressed guests, laughing and chatting in small friendly groups. Slowly he drew a deep, uneven breath, and when he turned back to her his expression had altered in some subtle, indefinable way. And when he spoke again she had the strangest feeling that he was not pursuing the topic that had been uppermost in his thoughts.
‘After all, we’re not exactly well off for family, either of us. We’re two adults of not exactly ancient years, and yet we can’t muster even a single relative between us.’
‘I know…’
It was a sigh of sorrow and regret as her thoughts went to her own parents, killed in a tragic accident when she had been seventeen and Davey six years younger. They would have loved to be here today, to see her as a happy bride, and she had no doubt that they would have approved of this tall, handsome, successful, but above all loving man she had chosen as her husband.
Sadly, Ronan, too, was on his own. When she had asked him which of his relatives she should invite to the wedding, his reply had been short to the point of curtness.
‘No family. There’s no family, but I can give you a list of friends if you like.’
And the number of his friends had gone a long way towards making up for the shortfall on the family side, she reflected. Not only that, but some of them had already created quite a stir in this small northern town, one that would persist long after the wedding celebrations were over. As an extremely wealthy businessman, whose extensive interests amounted to an empire, Ronan had contact with equally rich and well-known people, many of whom were here today.
Not that she had had much of an opportunity to talk to any of them. Ronan had kept her very much at his side so that she hadn’t had much of a chance to get to know any of his guests. She could only hope that they wouldn’t hold it against her later.
A faint frown drew Lily’s fair brows together as she recalled her meeting with one of Ronan’s particular friends. His best man, Connor Fitzpatrick, had seemed rather distant when she had been introduced to him the day before, and he had subjected her to a disturbingly close scrutiny that had distinctly unnerved her. Hannah, her own best friend and chief bridesmaid, was having much more success with him now on the dance floor, some remark she had made earning her a wide, brilliant smile.
‘Why the black look?’ Ronan had caught the change in her expression.
‘I was just thinking that I get the impression Connor doesn’t really like or approve of me.’
Those steely eyes flashed swiftly in the direction of his friend, that hint of a frown returning just for a moment. But then a second later Ronan turned back to her with a smile that dismissed her fears as foolish and unnecessary.
‘What’s not to like or approve, little silly?’ he murmured softly. ‘To tell you the truth, he’s probably far more likely to doubt my own sincerity and motives in entering into this marriage. After all, I’ve hardly been the type to settle down until now, and, let’s face it, this was something of a whirlwind romance. You knocked me right off my feet and I haven’t been able to regain my balance ever since.’
Those words had reassured her at the time, Lily recalled miserably, reluctantly coming back to the present to find herself still staring at the door through which Ronan had just disappeared. But now they rang brutally hollow, overlaid instead by the cold, callous declaration that he was leaving and never coming back.
The sound of a door opening downstairs jolted her into movement. What was she doing sitting here like this, letting Ronan go? He was her husband! They’d been married for less than twenty-four hours. Was she going to let him leave without a fight?
Frantically she flung back the bedclothes, snatching up the mint-green wrap-around robe that lay on a chair beside the bed. Refusing to allow herself to dwell on the fact that the matching silk and lace nightdress which she had worn so briefly the night before now lay in a crumpled heap on the floor, where Ronan had discarded it in the heat of his passion, she yanked it on, tugging the belt fastened as she headed for the stairs.
The front door stood wide open, letting in the sunlight and the sound of birdsong. The cheerful noise stabbed at her, bringing home the contrast between its light-hearted notes and the dark sense of dread that dulled her own soul.
‘Ronan!’
He was already outside, standing by his car as he loaded his case into the boot. The sight made her heart thud against her chest in shocked recognition that he had meant what he had said. Even now, she had still held on to the weak thread of hope that it had all just been some sick, tasteless joke.
‘Ronan, wait!’
He ignored her, his dark head turned away, the set of his broad shoulders under the tailored jacket seeming to declare unrelenting rejection of her plea without a word being spoken.
‘Oh, please, don’t do this!’ She reached the steps from the main door as she spoke. ‘Ronan, you can’t do this to me. I won’t let you!’
Slowly, deliberately, Ronan reached up and slammed the lid of the boot closed. The dull thud it made reverberated inside Lily’s head, making her think fearfully of steel doors slamming in her face, or the sound of a clock sounding an hour she had dreaded.
But then he turned, and at the sight of his face all other thoughts fled from her mind, leaving it cold and hollow with dread.
This wasn’t Ronan! This wasn’t the man she loved with all her heart, the man she had given herself to, body and soul, only the day before!
It was as if some stranger had moved in, an alien, who had taken over Ronan’s body, ejecting his spirit and leaving behind only the shell of the man to whom she had given her heart. A stranger with the same burnished hair, the same devastatingly attractive features, the same lean, strong build.
But these were not the same eyes—not her Ronan’s eyes. They were cold and hard as tempered steel, lethal as a stiletto-blade, impregnable as metal shutters.
‘You can’t…’ she began again, but her voice had lost all conviction.
The look Ronan turned on her was wintry, bleak as the coldest November day.
‘I can do anything I want,’ he flung at her. ‘Just try and stop me.’
CHAPTER TWO
LILY did the only thing she could think of.
Heedless of the fact that she was wearing nothing but the green robe, and determinedly ignoring the bite of the gravel into the soles of her bare feet, she ran out into the drive and caught hold of the sleeve of Ronan’s jacket, clinging on to it tightly.
‘I won’t let you go until you give me some sort of an explanation! You owe me that at least!’
The words were swallowed back down her throat as she met the inimical blaze of his glare, his eyes burning translucent in the spring sunlight. Ronan shrugged off her clinging hold with a negligence that was positively insulting.
‘I owe you nothing,’ he declared, fastidiously adjusting the fit of his jacket before opening the front door of his car. ‘If anything, the debts are all on your side.’
‘On my… Oh, no, you don’t!’
Seeing that he was about to slide into the driver’s seat, she lurched forward once more, this time fastening her arms around his narrow waist from behind.
She realised just how big a mistake she had made as soon as her fingers locked together above the polished metal buckle on the narrow leather belt he wore. Now her hands were resting on the taut, flat plane of his stomach, her hold bringing her breasts and hips into close contact with the firm line of his back.
She had held