‘But in body,’ he insisted.

  ‘And if I wasn’t?’ she challenged.

  ‘Then I’d still want you. You’re like a fever in my blood.’

  ‘That doesn’t change anything. If I married you I would only have to look at another man to know the cruel edge of your tongue.’

  ‘That’s only because I love you.’ He sounded agonised.

  ‘But you’ve been like this from the start, ever since we first met.’

  ‘Because I loved you even then. I once told you to imagine I’d fallen in love with your screen test. Well, don’t imagine it any more—believe it. That’s exactly the way it happened. You’re the reason I’d finally decided to divorce Margaret, the reason I had to be a free man when I came over to England.’

  Stacy searched his face for some sign of mockery—and found none. She shook her head. ‘You have to be joking!’

  ‘It’s never seemed particularly funny to me. As you know, I insisted on choosing the person to play Kate myself. I looked at hundreds of screen tests, some of them good, some of them bad. But as soon as I saw you I seemed to go under. I even had them make up my own personal copy of it. Over the next few months I looked at it constantly, hardly able to believe the way I felt. What I did know was that if you felt the same way about me when we met then I had to marry you. Thank God I hadn’t actually asked Margaret for a divorce before she died, I would have felt as guilty as hell. But when I finally met you—!’

  ‘Yes?’ she asked breathlessly.

  ‘You were more beautiful than I ever imagined. I’d looked at that damn film so many times that when I saw you get in the lift that day I could hardly believe it was you. The costume was the same, and yet the girl inside it was of this era, a product of this modern permissive society. That was when the jealousy started,’ he admitted with a sigh.

  ‘Quite unnecessarily.’

  ‘Yes,’ Jake agreed softly. ‘But I couldn’t seem to stop myself. You have to remember that I lived with Margaret’s other men for so long that each man you came into contact with seemed to be a threat to me. That night Forbes tried to force you I felt murderous. And then when he taunted you on the film set—God, I hate his guts!’

  ‘So do most people. But I think his attack on me was partly my own fault. I should never have had dinner with him. I only did it to thwart you.’

  ‘Because you thought I was married.’

  ‘Yes,’ she nodded.

  ‘I don’t think I was completely over the shock of Margaret’s death, maybe I still felt married. Whatever the reason you shied away from me, completely.’

  ‘You’d lie about your identity,’ she reminded him. ‘I found that unforgivable.’

  ‘Yes. I’d seen you on film, but I couldn’t get to know the real you that way. I had no knowing whether my being Jake Weston would make any difference to how you feel about me.’

  ‘Make me more interested, you mean,’ she said dryly.

  He grimaced. ‘That backfired on me too. After that you seemed to find every other man in the vicinity worthy of your notice but treated me with contempt. I could have killed Forbes at the time, but in a way his treatment of you enabled me to get close to you again. My offer to keep other men at bay seemed a good idea at the time.’

  ‘Until you saw me kiss Matthew—a purely brotherly kiss, I might add. After that I needed protection from you. You—you almost—’

  ‘Almost took you as brutally as Forbes had tried to do. Yes,’ he admitted with a deep sigh. ‘I couldn’t control my feelings for you any longer. In some ways you seemed to be everything I had ever wanted, and yet I couldn’t reconcile myself to the fact that some other man had taken you first. I’ve never thought of myself as a possessive man, with Margaret as an example I couldn’t be, but to think of other men touching your body, loving you the way I wanted to, knowing every delicious inch of you,’ he shuddered. ‘I couldn’t take that. And then you told me I would be the first!’

  ‘And you didn’t believe me.’

  ‘But I wanted to! You’ll never know how badly I wanted to believe that.’

  ‘I almost told you how much I love you that night, but you misunderstood me again and thought I was going to say I loathed men.’

  He came towards her like a man in a trance. ‘You love me?’ he asked disbelievingly.

  Too late Stacy realised she had given herself away. There would be no turning back now, Jake wouldn’t let her go. ‘But it still wouldn’t work, Jake,’ she backed away from him. ‘I won’t become a prisoner of your love. I have friends, male friends—not lovers,’ she added hastily. ‘And I’m not going to give them up.’

  ‘Tell me you love me.’ He seemed not to have heard her impassioned pleadings. ‘Oh, God, Stacy, tell me you love me!’

  The agony in his voice was her undoing. ‘I love you, Jake. Oh yes, I love you.’ She went willingly into his arms, longing for the feel of his lips on hers, for the full arousal she could instantly feel in him.

  They were hungry for each other, their kisses heated, their caresses fevered. Jake was shaking by the time they drew apart, his breathing ragged as he fought for the control that neither of them seemed able to regain.

  ‘Marry me, Stacy,’ he groaned. ‘Please!’

  ‘But your jealousy—’

  ‘We’ll have to fight that together. I’m warning you that if you don’t soon say yes I’m going to make love to you right here and now, regardless of your flatmates.’

  ‘Perhaps if we just became lovers that would be best for both of us.’

  He looked angry. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Affairs aren’t as difficult to end as marriages,’ she said softly, evading his searching gaze. ‘My way you could be free any time you wanted to be.’

  ‘I don’t want to be free ever again. I can assure you that I’ve never been in love before, my marriage to Margaret was a mistake from start to finish. I know I’ve been unreasonable with you, but I love you so much, and I want to marry you. I want you for all time, Stacy.’

  He had used that word to her so many times before and yet she knew that this time he meant it in a different way. The wanting was his way of loving, of needing—and she could deny him no longer.

  ‘And my work?’ she asked.

  ‘I won’t stop you doing anything you want to do.’

  She was aware that at this moment he would deny her nothing, and she didn’t like his vunerability. ‘And children?’

  ‘Only if you want them.’

  ‘Oh, I want them, but do you?’

  ‘My child growing inside you,’ he said huskily, wonderingly. ‘Oh yes. And it will be a beautiful daughter, with her mother’s glorious red hair and sparkling green eyes.’

  ‘Or a son with his father’s arrogance and charm.’

  He laughed softly. ‘Do I have charm?’

  ‘When you want to have.’

  ‘And is my charm working now? Are you going to marry me?’ The lines of strain at his nose and mouth were back again, evidence of his tension. ‘Can you bear to live with a man who loves you so much it’s almost made him crazy with jealousy?’

  ‘I can, as long as he never forgets that I love him in return.’

  ‘You’ll never regret it,’ he promised as he once more claimed her lips.

  Stacy hoped she wouldn’t, but there was still that vague feeling of unease at the back of her mind.

  * * *

  They were married three weeks later, their honeymoon one of idyllic love on one of the Greek islands. Stacy had to admit to a certain amount of tension on their wedding night, but Jake had not hurried her at all, introducing her to all the pleasures of her body with a gentleness that had finally taken her by storm.

  After that night they had become slaves to the desire that engulfed them whenever their eyes happened to meet, the time of day and place seeming unimportant. They lived in a hazy world of eating, sleeping and making love, the outside world forgotten by both of them.

  The four-week honeymoon almost over, they had to begin to think of returning to the day-to-day pressures that still frightened Stacy whenever she thought about them. Here at the villa they had lived a solitary existence, needing no one but each other, but once they were back among other people she had no idea of Jake’s reaction.

  They would be flying straight to the house that had been prepared for them in the States, Stacy having decided to end her career rather than risk being away from Jake for weeks on end. She knew he was relieved by her decision, but he had in no way tried to influence her either way. In actual fact she had received many offers of work, the reviews and promise of her acting in the film bringing her many offers from people who once wouldn’t even have considered her.

  But marriage couldn’t be made to work with the couple constantly apart, and anyway, she wanted to be with Jake. His main work was done in America, but he travelled a great deal for his research and she wanted to go with him, beginning to know some of that jealousy herself that he possessed in too great a quantity.

  He was up in the villa now making telephone calls, only two days of their honeymoon left, and the thought of returning to work beginning to become a reality. They were business calls, so Stacy had opted to go down to the beach and sunbathe. Jake would join her when he had finished.

  She felt the heat of the sun on her back momentarily blotted out and the familiar rise of pleasure that Jake’s presence always gave her. ‘Hello, darling,’ she murmured sleepily. ‘Would you rub some oil on my back for me?’

  She had undone the single back fastening of her bikini top and squirmed with pleasure as she felt the soothing oil being smoothed into her golden skin. Then she knew only panic, her husband’s touch a familiar and intimate thing to her—and this wasn’t Jake!

  She rolled over, clutching her loosened top to her to stare into the pair of twinkling brown eyes that belonged to a boy she had never seen before. She struggled into a sitting position, glaring at the intruder.

  ‘You have to be English,’ he said with satisfaction. ‘I’m from Scotland myself.’

  Stacy gave him a chilling smile, longing to do up the fastening of her bikini top but unable to do so with one hand, and she daren’t let go of the front, it was the only thing that was keeping her decent. ‘How nice for you,’ she said sarcastically. ‘Did you know this is a private beach?’

  He shrugged, a boy of her own age, quite handsome in a youthful way, dressed only in a pair of cut-off levis. ‘I often come along here in my spare time. I work at one of the hotels further along the coast.’

  ‘Yes, well …’ she held on to her dignity with effort, her face fiery red. Couldn’t he see how uncomfortable she felt sitting here clutching her bikini top? If only he would go away and let her get dressed. If Jake should come out here now—She shied away from the thought, envisaging the shortest marriage in history. ‘This is a private beach and I think you should leave now.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because—’

  ‘Because her husband may not like you being here,’ Jake drawled from behind them.

  Stacy looked up in dismay, trying hard to gauge his mood, but his face was closed to her. Oh God, no! She closed her eyes, feeling the happiness and well-being drain out of her. Not now, she couldn’t lose him now, and all through a misunderstanding.

  ‘I didn’t realise you were married.’ The young boy looked at her almost accusingly.

  Jake came down on the sand beside her, dressed in navy blue swimming trunks, his body deeply tanned. ‘She doesn’t look old enough, does she?’ he agreed mildly, pushing her hand away to fasten her top. ‘Let me, darling. I’ve warned you about sunbathing like this.’

  ‘Yes, Jake.’ She searched his face for his reaction, but he turned away from her.

  ‘Oh well—’ The boy stood up, obviously deciding to cut his losses. ‘I suppose I’d better get back to work. Nice meeting you,’ he waved before leaving.

  To Stacy the silence between herself and Jake was oppressive. Oh, what an end to a honeymoon—the end of the marriage. She watched as Jake stretched out on the sand beside her, his hands behind his head as pillows, his eyes closed.

  ‘Jake …’ she broached tentatively.

  ‘Mm?’ He didn’t move.

  ‘Jake, are you angry?’

  His eyes flickered open at that. ‘Should I be?’

  ‘Well, no. But—’

  His eyes closed again. ‘Then I’m not.’

  ‘But—’

  He jack-knifed into a sitting position, all calm leaving him now. ‘I’m trying very hard not to lose my temper, Stacy,’ he said through gritted teeth. ‘Look at this,’ he held out his hands and she could see how they were shaking. ‘I came out of the villa to see that kid sitting on the beach with you, touching you as he rubbed oil on your back, and the old red tide passed in front of my eyes. I wanted to storm down here and beat hell out of him.’

  ‘But you didn’t.’

  ‘No,’ some of the tension seemed to leave his body, ‘I stayed up there for several minutes longer. I thought of the way we make love, the way you give yourself absolutely to me, the way you hold nothing back, and I knew that whatever that kid was doing here on our beach you were not encouraging him.’

  ‘Oh, Jake!’ Tears shone in her eyes. ‘I thought he was you. I nearly died when I realised he wasn’t. And then I thought—then I thought you—’

  ‘You thought I would come down here and go berserk,’ he finished for her, gently wiping away her tears. ‘And I very nearly did.’

  ‘But you didn’t, that’s the main thing.’

  ‘Mm, I suppose it’s a start.’

  It was more than that to her. She knew now that whatever pressures did lie ahead of them that together they would be able to work them out. Their love meant more to them than Jake’s jealousy ever would, and he would learn to control that too in time.

  Jake picked her up in his arms and began to stride back towards the villa with her.

  ‘What are you doing?’ she gasped.

  ‘The honeymoon isn’t over yet,’ he smiled down at her. ‘And I intend putting my brand of possession on you once again.’

  ‘Oh, Jake!’ she giggled.

  He lay down with her on the huge double bed they had shared the last few weeks, taking off her bikini with a familiarity that still had the power to make her blush. He devoured her body, his lips making her squirm with pleasure. ‘I don’t think the honeymoon will ever be over for us,’ he moaned throatily, kicking off the navy blue swimming trunks, the last piece of clothing to separate their naked bodies. ‘Oh, love me, Stacy. Love me!’

  This was where she belonged, where she would always belong. She cried her love for him as the waves of desire washed over them both, taking them to the heights.

  * * * * *

  If you enjoyed this story by

  USA TODAY bestselling author

  CAROLE MORTIMER,

  you will love

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  ONCE A MORETTI WIFE

  Stefano Moretti wants revenge from his wife, Anna, for leaving him. Her losing all memory of their marriage is his chance… He’ll seduce her, then publicly divorce her. But soon there’s something he wants more—Anna, back for good!

  Keep reading to get a glimpse of

  ONCE A MORETTI WIFE

  CHAPTER ONE

  HOW MUCH HAD she drunk?

  Anna Robson clutched her head, which pounded as if the force of a hundred hammers were battering it.

  There was a lump there. She prodded it cautiously and winced. Had she hit her head?

  She racked her aching, confused brain, trying hard to remember. She’d gone out for a drink with Melissa, hadn’t she? Hadn’t she?

  Yes. She had. She’d gone for a drink with her sister after their Spinning class, as they did every Thursday evening.

  She peered at her bedside clock and gave a start—her phone’s alarm should have gone off an hour ago. Where had she put it?

  Still holding her head, she looked around but saw no sight of it, then forgot all about it as her stomach rebelled. She only just made it to the bathroom in time to vomit.

  Done, she sat loose-limbed like a puppet on the floor, desperately trying to remember what she’d drunk. She wasn’t a heavy drinker at the best of times and on a work night she would stick to a small glass of white wine. But right then, she felt as if she’d drunk a dozen bottles.

  There was no way she could go into the office… But then she remembered she and Stefano had a meeting with a young tech company he was interested in buying. Stefano had tasked Anna, as he always did, with going through the company’s accounts, reports and claims and producing her own summary. He trusted her judgement. If it concurred with his then he would invest in the company. If her judgement differed he would rethink his strategy. Stefano wanted her report first thing so he could digest it before the meeting.

  She’d have to email it and beg illness.

  But, after staggering cautiously around the flat she shared with Melissa, holding onto the walls for support, she realised she must have left her laptop at the office. She’d have to phone Stefano. He could open it himself. She’d give him the password, although she was ninety-nine per cent certain he’d hacked it at least once already.

  All she had to do was find her phone. Walking carefully to the kitchen, she found a pretty handbag on the counter. Next to it was an envelope addressed with her name.

  She blinked hard to keep her eyes focused and pulled the letter out. She attempted to read it a couple of times but none of it made any sense. It was from Melissa asking for Anna’s forgiveness for her trip to Australia and promising to call when she got there.

  Australia? Melissa must be having a joke at her expense, although her sister saying she was going to visit the mother who’d abandoned them a decade ago wasn’t the slightest bit funny to Anna’s mind. The letter’s postscript did explain one thing though—Melissa said she’d gritted the outside step of the front door so Anna wouldn’t slip on it again, and asked her to see a doctor if her head hurt where she’d banged it.