Forbidden Surrender (20 page)

‘No, I want you to do that. Tonight.’

‘Now?’ she exclaimed.

‘Why not?’ Marie shrugged.

‘Because it’s after twelve o’clock at night!’

Marie grinned. ‘I’ll make your excuses to Daddy in the morning.’

‘In the—! Even if I did go and see Dominic now I’d be back tonight,’ Sara claimed indignantly.

‘Of course you would.’

‘I would!’

‘I just agreed, didn’t I?’ Marie gave her a look of exaggerated innocence.

‘It was the way you agreed.’

Marie smiled. ‘I know Dominic.’

‘Do you indeed?’ Sara’s eyes flashed jealously.

‘Not like that,’ her sister laughed. ‘There was never anything like that between us. Now with you it’s different, he goes all tense and white about the mouth when he talks about you—so much so that once he gets you alone I know he won’t let you out of his sight.’

‘Okay,’ Sara sighed, ‘you convinced me. I’ll go and see him.’

‘Take my car.’ Marie searched through her handbag for her keys. ‘Daddy was going to buy you a car, but
now that you’re getting married I suppose Dominic will buy you one.’ She held out the keys with a mischievous smile.

‘Don’t jump ahead,’ Sara warned. ‘No one said I was getting married.’

‘You will be. Poor Daddy will be totally confused!’

Sara only wished she felt as confident about Dominic’s feelings as Marie seemed to be. Could it really be true, had Dominic just been pretending with Marie, could it really be that she was the one he loved? Only he could tell her that.

He answered the door to her himself. ‘Marie called me,’ he revealed deeply.

Sara gave an angry sigh. ‘I know she’s my sister, and I love her dearly, but she’s an interfering busybody.’

‘She just called to tell me to expect you, Sara, nothing else.’

‘Oh.’ She bit her lip nervously. ‘Can I come in?’

‘Of course.’ He opened the door wide. ‘Although if you do,’ he added huskily, ‘I doubt I’ll be able to let you out again.’

So Marie was right, she had to be. Sara looked up at Dominic with steady brown eyes. ‘I don’t want you to,’ she said softly. ‘I don’t ever want to leave you again.’

Dominic swallowed hard, seeming to sway where he stood. ‘God, I love you!’ he groaned achingly.

She fell into his arms, holding him so tightly her arms ached. ‘I love you, too,’ she choked, any last doubts dispelled.

He pressed featherlight kisses down her throat, his lips warm and fevered. ‘Marie told you everything?’

‘Everything,’ she nodded, raising her mouth invitingly. ‘I’m so sorry I ever doubted you.’

‘It was my fault for not telling you the truth. I wanted to—God, how I wanted to, but I couldn’t break a confidence like that, not even for the woman I love. And you are the woman I love, Sara.’ His mouth lowered to hers.

He was like a thirsty man in a desert, devouring her with his love and passion, his caresses heated, and he carried her over to the sofa. They lay close together, murmuring words of love between caresses, hours passing as if minutes, lost to each other as they frantically tried to convince each other of their love.

Dominic lay against her breasts, his arms possessive. ‘The first time I saw you I knew you were the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.’

‘You thought I was Marie!’

He shook his head. ‘I don’t think I did, not even then. I was excited just looking at you, and that had never happened with Marie.’

‘She assures me you’re only friends,’ Sara taunted, smoothing the darkness of his hair.

‘We are. Marie has always been like a kid sister to me, you were something else completely, right from the first. I become aroused just looking at you.’

‘Dominic!’ she blushed her confusion.

‘But I do. I want to love you, darling.’ He kissed her bare breast.

‘Yes.’

‘You said that once before, in exactly the same way—’

‘And you turned me down,’ she remembered with pain.

‘‘Because of your innocence! I was tied to Marie, by loyalty if nothing else, and it wasn’t fair to involve you when I couldn’t marry you.’ He caressed the soft curve of her breast with his tongue.

‘Did you want to marry me even then?’

‘I did, and I do. Will you marry me, Sara?’

‘Yes! Yes to marriage, and yes to—’

He put silencing fingers over her lips. ‘I can wait until after we’re married.’

‘Well, I can’t.’ She looked at him with love-drugged eyes. ‘I want to stay with you tonight, Dominic. Tonight and every other night.’

He gave a rueful smile. ‘Tonight I might get away
with, then I think we’ll have to wait until after the wedding. Otherwise your father might take a shotgun to me.’

Sara held him fiercely to her. ‘I’m so glad I came to England, so glad I found my father and Marie, and so very, very glad I found you. I love you so, Dominic.’

‘And I love you too.’ He picked her up and took her into the bedroom, to the first night of a lifetime of nights together.

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