IT WAS NEARLY TEN O’CLOCK. Already the quivering sun was high in the sky, and soon the pale sand would be too hot to stand on in bare feet.
Glancing down, Max frowned. As a child, he’d been to the seaside twice—once with his mother and Paul, and once with his school. But it was a long time since he’d walked barefoot anywhere, except between his bathroom and his bedroom or to and from his pool. In fact, it might even be the first time he’d ever been on a beach without shoes as an adult.
But, unusual as that was, walking barefoot couldn’t really compete with some of his other more recent and less rational ‘firsts’.
Staring out across the bay, to where a couple of seabirds were bobbing peacefully on the water, he ticked them off inside his head.
Obviously getting married to a woman he didn’t love or trust took pole position. But a close second was buying those shares from her father. He’d never paid over the odds for anything and, looking back on it, there had been absolutely no need for him to do so. Although Emile had been maddeningly evasive and capricious, his demand had been modest in comparison to what he’d ended up offering for the shares.
Which brought him to another first—paying for a woman.
Beneath his dark glasses, his eyes narrowed. He didn’t like the way it sounded but, despite what he’d said to Margot, and told himself about why he’d married her, that was in essence what he’d done.
And then, of course, last night had been the first time he’d ever chased a woman—or at least followed one.
Watching Margot turn and walk away, he had been too angry to move, his head simmering with barely contained frustration that within the space of a heartbeat she had thrown their honeymoon and her ring back in his face. And what had she meant by him not understanding relationships?
He gritted his teeth. He understood relationships perfectly. He should too: he’d had the ultimate learning experience, watching his mother put her life on hold, waiting, hoping—and for what?
For nothing, that was what.
He took a calming breath. No, Margot was wrong. He did understand relationships. It was simple, really. If you didn’t ask you didn’t get.
A wave broke, spilling water over his feet, and he realised that in the time he’d been walking down the beach the tide had begun to turn.
He glanced down at his wrist automatically and frowned. He’d left his watch on the bedside table.
And left Margot sleeping in his bed.
He felt his muscles tighten, heat lapping over his skin like the tide on the beach. In bed, their quarrel had been forgotten, their bodies blurring in a passionate embrace that had shaken him not just physically but emotionally—for he never had felt that close, that committed before. But of course he’d never been married before.
Margot might be sleeping now, but she hadn’t slept much last night. Neither of them had. His lips curved upwards. In fact, her curiosity had almost killed them both. But as the dawn had crept into their room he had woken out of habit, and then…
Then he’d had two choices. Stay and wait for Margot to wake too, and carry on where they left off. Or get up and go.
A movement out in the bay caught his eye, and he saw that the two seabirds were squabbling over something—food…territory, maybe. Whatever it was, their battle was really not that different from his fight with Margot yesterday—every relationship was just a power struggle.
His mouth twisted. But his argument with Margot had been nothing in comparison to the conflict raging inside him when he’d woken this morning.
Stay or leave?
It had been a simple enough choice. Only for some reason he had never struggled so much to make a decision.
His pulse jumped in his throat and he felt an instant answering pulse in his groin. Obviously his body had been urging him to stay. Waking to find her legs tangled between his and her long, silken hair spilling over his chest had felt good—more than good. It had been intoxicating. And as he’d breathed in the scent of her he’d had to force himself back from an edge of almost primal, driving desire.
He stared not quite steadily down the beach, remembering how it had felt to run his urgent hands over her warm skin and feel the sweetness of her tight body gripping his. Watching her beautiful pink lips part and then melt into a half-pout of surrender, he’d lost control. She had been so responsive, so hot.
Even now the memory of the fierce directness of her gaze as he’d moved inside her was turning him inside out. Everything—all the bitterness, the lies, the anger, all of it—had ceased to exist. There had been only Margot, and finally she had been his.
So why had he got up and left?
He drew in a deep breath. He’d thought he had it all figured out. Buy the shares—prove the Duvernays wrong. Marry Margot—prove her wrong. Sleep with Margot—prove her wrong again. Feel better.
His muscles tensed. Only it had been he who had been wrong—times four.
He should have felt sated and complete, and physically he did. Only he hadn’t been able to shift a sense that something was missing, or maybe off-key.
He still felt like that now, and that irritated him, for he had no reason to feel that way. Margot was his wife and yesterday, and again and again this morning, she had become his lover, clinging to him, pulling him deep inside her body with a desperation that had matched his own.
Breathing out unsteadily, he wondered why that thought should make his chest tighten?
But it was obvious, really, he thought with relief a moment later.
Even before he’d made his first million, few women—if any—had been out of his reach, and his reputation for playing hard to get was completely justified.
Only ever since he’d walked into the House of Duvernay headquarters his self-control seemed to have gone AWOL.
Yesterday he had been like a starving man, satisfying his hunger. His need to take Margot had been shocking in its urgency, and it had understandably caught him by surprise for he was used to being the one in charge both in business and emotionally. But today, he couldn’t pretend that it would be anything other than reckless to show her how much power she had over him.
And that was why he’d had to get up and leave this morning—to demonstrate some of that famed self-control.
So now they were all square. He’d proved his point. Why then was he still here, watching the wildlife and the waves? After all, this was his honeymoon.
Honeymoon—the word and all that it implied ping-ponged inside his head and, feeling his body harden, he turned towards the villa. And then he stopped. Glancing down at the outline of his erection, he breathed out slowly. Perhaps it might be a good idea to wait just a little longer…maybe cool off first. A quick swim would be the perfect way to damp down his libido and dull his senses before seeing Margot again, and it wouldn’t hurt to keep her waiting and wanting more.
Without giving himself a chance to change his mind, he tugged his shirt over his head, tossed it onto the sand and began wading purposefully into the water.
* * *
Margot woke to sunlight and the sound of waves. It took her perhaps half a second before she realised that she was alone, and that the Max-sized space in the bed beside her was empty.
Rolling over, she touched the pillow. It still had the imprint of his head, and she could smell his aftershave and the scent of his skin, and for some reason she found herself smiling.
It was stupid, really, to feel so happy—probably it was asking for trouble—and yet…
She breathed out slowly.
And yet the strain of the last few days seemed to have lifted from her shoulders. She felt not just spent, but serene, for now she was free to touch Max, and to taste him, to wrap her legs around his quickening body without guilt or shame.
Now that it had happened, she could admit that it had always been just a question of when, not if. But when exactly had it started?
Maybe in the car, when Max had thrown that curveball at her. She had been so angry and hurt. But then, at the villa, his ‘apology’—or at least his honesty following so quickly on the back of their row—had caught her off guard.
Her pulse twitched. Or maybe it had started before that. In the boardroom. Or perhaps when she’d walked past that newsstand in Paris and read his name.
Her name too now!
Max had left his watch on the bedside table and, glancing over at it, she frowned. It was almost midday and she wondered where he was.
Her pulse jitterbugged.
She couldn’t remember falling asleep, but she could remember the way he’d curved his hand around her waist, anchoring her to him. Could remember too the way that same hand had cradled her head as his powerful body had thrust into hers.
She had never felt so wanted, so desired—and, okay, it had been just sex, but it had been real. Nobody could fake that kind of passion, that kind of tenderness.
And didn’t that somehow change things a little between them? Perhaps they could be honest with one another on one level at least.
‘You’re awake.’
She blinked and, rolling over, she lifted her head and gazed up at him. Max was standing motionless on the deck outside the bedroom, wearing nothing but a pair of faded black shorts, an unbuttoned denim shirt and a pair of dark glasses. Droplets of water clung to the tanned muscular skin of his chest and legs, and his sea-drenched dark hair was moulded to the beautiful bones of his skull.
He looked cool and relaxed and impossibly sexy—like a photo shoot for a modern-day pirate—and as his eyes locked on to hers she felt something tug beneath her skin just as she remembered that she was naked. Her cheeks began to tingle and she felt suddenly shy—which was stupid, really. It wasn’t as though he hadn’t seen all of her already. And not just seen, she reminded herself, her heart jumping at the memory of how his hands had moved over that same naked skin he was staring at now.
As though reading her mind, he smiled slowly, the edges of his mouth curling up in a way that made her skin instantly grow warmer. Cheeks burning now, she tried to match his smile with a casual one of her own. But it was difficult to act naturally when all she could think about was what else that mouth could and was probably about to do.
Swallowing hard, she sat up and said quickly, ‘I didn’t hear you get up. I would have come with you.’
His gaze hovered over her flushed face, and then dropped to the tiny pulse beating at the base of her throat.
‘That’s okay. You needed to sleep.’
Tugging off his dark glasses, he stepped inside the room and walked slowly across the smooth wooden floor. He stopped beside the bed, and her pulse jumped in her throat as inch by inch his eyes drifted over her bare skin, slowly tracing the contours of her body.
Looking up at him, she felt as if she was floating—and then her heart began beating against her ribcage as, dropping his sunglasses on the bedside table, he leaned forward and kissed her gently on the mouth. She arched her back, her lips parting, and she felt her insides start to melt as he deepened the kiss.
‘Sweet…’ he murmured against her mouth, and then he was kissing her again, such tender, slow kisses, as though they had the whole of their lives before them.
Which they did, she thought dazedly a moment later, as his hand cupped her breast, his thumb teased the nipple and she felt her body shudder in response.
In an instant he had stolen her thoughts, her identity, even her breath, so that suddenly she was panting. ‘Max, please…’
She reached up, blindly seeking more contact, expecting him to move, wanting him to touch her. But he didn’t move closer. Instead he ran his hand over her breast and up to her shoulder and then released her.
She stared up at him, her hands balling into fists, her body so hot and tight and tense she thought it would explode.
‘I thought—’ she began, but her words dried up as he turned and, picking up his watch, frowned down at it.
‘Baby, I need a shower and some breakfast. And besides…’ His gaze burned into hers and she felt her pulse leap. ‘Surely I more than satisfied your curiosity yesterday and this morning.’
Watching him unzip his shorts and push them down over his muscular thighs, Margot felt her stomach flip over. But not from desire this time. His words echoed ominously in her head, and suddenly she knew what he was getting at. It was that stupid, stupid remark she’d made in his hotel room, and clearly he’d been waiting for just the right moment to throw it back in her face.
She felt hot and dizzy, anger mingling with shame that she had actually thought Max had wanted her with the same desperate urgency with which she’d wanted him, when all the time it had just been about proving a point.
It might have felt real, but then Max was good at that, she thought savagely—good at making her believe what she wanted to believe. And she’d even given him some help, by listening to that tiny part of her mind that had wanted to be wrong about him, wanted to believe in the fantasy of their explosive sexual chemistry.
A rush of misery and helplessness broke over her, like one of the waves splashing against the shore outside their room. It was the same old story—a story that had started when she was a child, trying to defuse the tension between her parents, and then her father and her grandparents. She was so used to seeking out the good and ignoring the bad that it was almost second nature now for her to spin straw into gold.
Only she wasn’t a child any more, and nor was she a spectator. This was her marriage. Her life. And she wasn’t just going to stand by with a smile on her face while he played power games.
Her dress—her beautiful wedding dress—lay where Max had pulled it from her frantic body and, sliding out of bed, she picked it up and draped it over one of the cream-coloured armchairs that sat on either side of the doors to the deck.
Stalking into the dressing room, she yanked a pale blue embroidered sundress off the shelf. She pulled it over her head and, without even bothering to look at her reflection or brush her hair, she pushed her feet into some flip-flops and strode onto the deck.
Outside, the beach felt gloriously open and empty. Kicking off her shoes, she walked down to where the lightest imaginable surf was trickling over the sand like champagne foam.
Her mouth thinned. Actually, not champagne. She was sick of champagne. Sick of the whole wine-making world and everyone in it. Particularly Max.
She grimaced. Even just thinking about him and his stupid, mammoth ego made her head pound as though she’d drunk a magnum of Grand Cru.
She had thought that having sex with him would be the one true part of their marriage. Only now it seemed that it had been just as superficial and sham as the rest of their relationship—and not just in the present. The memory of what they’d once shared now felt unbearably tainted too.
And she only had herself to blame. She’d known what he was like. Or she should have. After all, what kind of a man blackmailed a woman into marriage?
Her stomach clenched. Sex might have made it feel more intimate and personal, but the truth was that this had never been anything other than a business arrangement—a merger of money and power and status. Anything else was just nonsense, concocted inside her head.
The sound of music and laughter broke into her thoughts and, glancing out to sea, she spotted a cruiser dipping through the water. On the gleaming white deck a group of men and women were dancing, their heads tipped back to the sun, swimsuit-clad bodies radiating heat and happiness.
She stared at them enviously. They seemed so at ease, so uninhibited, and in their loose-limbed freedom they reminded her of Louis and Gisele and their friends. She watched for a moment, lost in her own thoughts, and then, just as she was about to carry on walking, one of the men must have noticed her, for suddenly he was waving, and then they were all waving and calling to her.
It was impossible to hear what they were saying, but their excitement and enthusiasm was infectious, and without even realising that she was doing it she began waving back at them.
‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’
A hand gripped her arm and her body was pulled round sharply. Max was standing beside her, wearing a pair of swim-shorts. Her first thought was that he had changed clothes. Her second was that he was incandescent with fury.
She shook his hand off, her own simmering anger rising swiftly to boiling point. ‘I would have thought that was obvious. It’s called waving—’
‘Don’t give me that.’ He interrupted her. ‘It’s our honeymoon, and you’re standing out here on your own, waving at strangers. What if that had been a boat full of photographers?’
She glared at him. ‘It wasn’t. And even if it was, what I do or don’t do—including waving at strangers on boats—is none of your business. Now, if you’re done with throwing your weight around, I’m going to go for a walk.’
Staring down into her defiant face, Max felt his body tense with frustration. It was a feeling that was becoming increasingly familiar since Margot had re-entered his life.
Earlier, returning to the villa from the beach, he had felt the barriers he had so arrogantly created inside his head all but disintegrate as he’d caught sight of her glorious body, spread out so invitingly on the rumpled sheets. Thankfully he had succeeded in hanging on to his self-control by a thread, helped by what must surely have been the coldest shower he’d ever had.
But when he’d walked back into the bedroom his hard-won composure had instantly evaporated as he’d realised that Margot had simply upped and left without so much as a word. His mood hadn’t improved as he’d stalked stiffly through the villa. Not wanting to alert his staff to the fact that his wife appeared to have vanished, he’d been forced to pretend that he’d mislaid his phone.
He gritted his teeth. And now, when finally he’d tracked her down, not only was she completely unrepentant, she was clearly looking for a fight.
His eyes narrowed and, by holding his breath, he managed to hang on to his temper. ‘Actually I’m far from done. You’re my wife now, and if you’re expecting our marriage to be civilised—’
‘Civilised!’ Her gaze clashed with his. ‘You don’t know the meaning of the word. Do you seriously think it’s civilised to just take what you want and move on when you’re done—?’ She broke off as he started to shake his head.
‘So that’s what this is about? It was just a shower, Margot.’
The dishonesty of his remark made her breathing jerk in her throat. ‘Don’t do that, Max. Don’t treat me like I’m stupid. It was not just a shower. It was you making a point. And I will not let you treat me like some toy you can pick up and play with and then forget about.’
He frowned. ‘Are you insane? How could I forget about you? I’ve just spent the last thirty-five minutes looking for you.’
Her heart was trying to get out of her chest. ‘Well, you wasted your time. You might be my husband legally, but our marriage is just a business agreement. It only exists when we’re on show, in public—as you just proved to me.’
Max took a step towards her. A thread of fury was soaring up through his body like mercury in a thermometer. He felt breathless with anger and frustration.
‘Better that than only existing in the bedroom,’ he snarled, unable to hide his emotions any longer.
‘What is that supposed to mean?’ she snapped.
The air around them felt suddenly thick and dark and volatile, like a cloud of bees about to swarm.
‘You know exactly what it means. It’s the reason you didn’t want to marry me all those years ago.’
She glared at him. ‘I didn’t want to marry you because you only wanted my money. Or have you forgotten telling me that was why you proposed?’
His gaze didn’t flicker. ‘That was after you’d already let your brother do your dirty work. But the least you could do now is have the guts to tell it like it was.’
‘And what was it like, Max?’
His face hardened. ‘I was good enough for sex, just not for marriage.’
There was a short, sharp pause. Margot was staring at him as though he’d suddenly started speaking in a foreign language, but he wasn’t sure if it was what he’d said or the harshness with which he’d said it that had silenced her.
Margot stared at him in confusion. Her heart was thumping hard against her chest. She was shocked by his words. More shocked still by the fact that he obviously believed them.
Her mouth twisted. Or, more likely, wanted to believe them.
‘That’s not true—that wasn’t how it was! It wasn’t,’ she repeated, as he began shaking his head dismissively.
‘Really? Then why were you so worried about keeping us a secret? Oh, sorry, I forgot—’ his mouth curled upwards into a sneer ‘—you were waiting for “the right time” to tell everyone.’
Anger flared inside her. How dared he be so self-righteous? ‘Yes, I was. But what was your excuse?’ she snapped. ‘Because it wasn’t just me who wanted to keep our relationship quiet, was it?’
Max breathed out silently. For a moment he thought about telling her the truth. That going public would have meant sharing her with her family, breaking the spell of that summer. And then he came to his senses.
‘Nice try. But next to you I’m an amateur when it comes to keeping quiet.’
‘What are you talking about?’ she said hoarsely.
‘I’m talking about when I asked you to marry me before. I gave you a ring. Do you remember what you did? What you said?’ His voice was steady, but a muscle was pulsing in his cheek. ‘No? Then let me remind you. You did nothing, said nothing. You basically acted like I’d embarrassed you.’ His eyes burned into her. ‘No, actually, like I’d embarrassed myself.’
She shivered. That wasn’t how she remembered it. In her head it had been a moment of shock, drowned out almost immediately by Yves’s arrival. Her brother had been white-lipped with rage at what he’d clearly thought was personal betrayal by a man he’d liked and trusted. He’d been angrier, though, with himself, for not protecting her, and so he’d been cruel and unfair. She should have stopped him, only…
‘I wasn’t embarrassed,’ she said slowly. ‘I was in shock.’
His mouth thinned. ‘Why?’ he demanded. ‘We’d talked about getting married—’
‘Yes, in the future.’ She stared at him, her pulse stop-starting like a stalled car. ‘But not right then. I was nineteen, Max. I was still at university. No, hear me out.’ She held up her hands as he started to interrupt. ‘You have to understand. I had no idea you were going to ask me. It wasn’t in my head. I wasn’t ready. I was young and…’ She hesitated.
They were heading into dangerous territory, and the thought of confronting what lay ahead made her want to crawl into a darkened room and roll up in a ball. But, looking up at the tense, set expression on his face, she knew that retreating was not an option.
She drew in a breath. ‘And I was scared.’
Max stared at her in silence. She was telling the truth. He could hear it in her voice, feel it stinging his skin.
‘Why would you be scared?’ He’d sounded harsher than he’d intended and she looked over at him. Hearing her breathe out unsteadily, he felt his stomach clench, for he could see that she was still scared now. ‘You were scared of me?’ The thought horrified him so much that he actually couldn’t speak any more.
‘Of you?’ She shook her head, eyes widening with horror. ‘No, of course not. I was scared of making a mistake, of doing what—’
As she looked up into his eyes he saw her face stiffen, as though she was doing some complicated arithmetic in her head, and then she bit her lip.
‘Oh, what’s the point? You wouldn’t understand.’
For a moment he thought about his own past, and his own private fears. And then he stopped thinking.
Reaching out, he took her hands. ‘I might,’ he said gently.
He felt her body go rigid, and for a moment he thought she was going to pull away from him, but finally she sighed.
‘Okay… This is going to sound crazy, and you probably won’t believe me, but when you proposed I wasn’t even thinking about us or the ring you’d given me. I was thinking about my mother’s engagement ring.’
Hearing the taut note in her voice, Max frowned. It did sound crazy, but for some reason he still believed her.
‘I know you probably don’t have much interest in celebrity gossip, but you might have heard about my parents?’
He nodded. He could remember his mother following the story in the newspapers, only he’d been too young to care. ‘Just the basics. They eloped, and later on your mum accidentally overdosed.’ He spoke gently, wanting to ease the impact of his words.
Her face stilled. ‘They eloped when she was nineteen. It was a massive scandal. Everyone was looking for them. They ended up hiding in Marrakech, in the house where Louis is staying.’
She smiled bleakly, and he felt something heavy settle on his shoulders at the flash of hurt.
‘They were so young and so beautiful, and everyone thought it was incredibly romantic. But it devastated my grandparents, and the reality wasn’t romantic at all.’
He felt her fingers tighten around his, and her smile faded.
‘They might have looked like the perfect couple from the outside, but honestly, though, their whole relationship started and ended with sex. It wasn’t happy or healthy—just compulsive…like an addiction.’
She looked up at him defiantly, only somehow her expression seemed to accentuate her vulnerability.
‘And that’s what you thought we’d be like?’ he asked.
Margot blinked, the directness of his question momentarily silencing her. ‘I didn’t think anything,’ she said finally. ‘I just panicked.’
For a moment she considered telling him the whole truth. That she’d loved him, and that he was still the only man she’d ever loved. But she’d laid enough of herself bare. Telling the truth now wouldn’t alter the facts. Max hadn’t loved her then, and he didn’t love her now.
Looking back to that devastating moment when his world had imploded, Max felt his chest tighten painfully as for the first time he contemplated a different version of events. And a new and unsettling realisation that he might not only have misjudged Margot all those years ago, but completely overreacted.
‘Why didn’t you tell me about your parents before?’
She shrugged, and the resignation in that simple gesture made his breath catch in his throat.
Looking down at her feet, she began digging her bare toes into the sand. ‘I suppose I didn’t know if I could trust you.’
He frowned. ‘Is that why you kept us a secret?’
She didn’t answer for a moment, and then slowly she shook her head. ‘Maybe at first. But not later. Then I wanted it to be just you and me. I love my family, but they can be so demanding.’
‘You mean your father?’
Margot stared at him. For a moment she’d actually forgotten that Max had met Emile. She gave him a weak smile. ‘I hear you woke him up.’
Max grimaced. ‘I paid for those shares in ways you’ll never know.’
He was attempting a joke, trying to lighten the mood, but she couldn’t shift the memory of his accusation.
She bit her lip. ‘You were wrong, Max. I was never ashamed of you. I just knew that if I told my family they would complicate things. It’s what they do.’
He stared down at her, his eyes glittering strangely. ‘And what do you do?’
‘Me? I’m a fixer-upper.’
That was an understatement. She seemed to have spent most of life problem-solving for her family, and with a tiny wrench of doubt she wondered what would happen if she just stopped. Was that why they loved her? For what she could do for them, not who she was.
Swallowing the lump of misery in her throat, and fearing she had given too much away, she shrugged. ‘I make it all look perfect—which with my family is practically a full-time job. They might look flawless from the outside, but my father is living proof that appearances can be deceptive.’
Max hesitated. For a moment he stared at her in silence, as though working something out in his head, and then, taking a step closer, he pulled her into his arms.
‘True,’ he said slowly. ‘But sometimes things are what they appear to be. Like the chemistry between us. That’s real. You can’t fake it, or pretend it doesn’t exist.’ Gently he reached up and stroked her hair. ‘You were right about this morning. I was trying to prove a point. Only unfortunately I’ve just ended up proving what an idiot I am.’
He stared down at her, trying to make sense of everything that was going on inside his head. Coming down to the beach, his anger had been hot and righteous, but now her honesty, and the courage it had taken for her to be so honest, made him feel angry with himself. Margot was not the person he had thought she was. She was not selfish or self-absorbed. On the contrary, she seemed to have spent most of her life sacrificing herself to the demands of her family.
Breathing out softly, he slid his hand under her chin and tilted her face upwards. ‘Why do you think I changed my mind about going back to France?’
Margot stared at his face in silence, not understanding why he was asking her that question now, and wondering where the conversation was heading.
His grip tightened. ‘Because I want you as much as you want me, Margot. More than I’ve ever wanted any woman. I didn’t want a honeymoon just because of what people might say if we didn’t have one.’ He smiled faintly. ‘I think you know me well enough to believe that I can hold my own in the world.’
She nodded mutely, her heart hammering in her chest as his smile twisted.
‘But clearly I haven’t given you reason enough to believe that changing my mind was not an act of complete thoughtlessness. So let me make it clear now. Changing our plans wasn’t supposed to upset you or your family. But I know now that it did, and I’m sorry. For not talking to you about it first. And for being a jerk this morning.’
Lifting her hand to his mouth, he kissed it lightly.
‘I know I haven’t covered myself in glory these last few days, but I’m not a monster.’ He stared down into her eyes. ‘It’s not too late to fly back. If that’s what you want, then tell me and I’ll make it happen.’
Margot bit her lip. It was an olive branch, or maybe an attempt at reparation…
‘You’d do that? For me?’
His fingers closed more firmly around hers. ‘Of course. You’re my wife. I’m not in the habit of making empty promises. I made vows, and I meant them.’
She wondered what he meant by empty promises, but something in his expression warned her that now was not the time to ask him.
It’s not too late to fly back. I made vows, and I meant them.
Gazing up at him, his words echoing inside her head, Margot was torn. Part of her wanted to make things right with her grandfather. But Max had apologised, and he’d admitted that he wanted her. That the attraction between them was special. For a moment she was in a daze, but as she caught sight of her wedding ring she made up her mind.
‘I want to stay. But I’d like us to talk to my grandfather and Louis.’
His expression didn’t change, but he wrapped his arms around her, pulled her closer, and she felt his heart beating unsteadily.
‘Then that’s what I want too,’ he said softly.