A Wish and a Wedding Read Free Page A

eyes.
    So, no use to turn to Livinia for protection and advice. Liv only saw what she wanted to see. Besides, Liv wasn’t her friend. Liv was that aberration in nature: a woman who was jealous of her own daughter; her only child. Just to make the derangement more reprehensible, having done it once, Livinia had taken a vow that she would never go through the trauma of pregnancy and childbirth again. In other words, she’d got the maternal instinct right out of her system first time off.
    â€œYou were a daddy’s girl right from the cradle.” It had been a frequent accusation, as if the two of them, mother and daughter, were in fierce competition for Michael’s attention. “After you were born he had no time for me.”
    Not strictly true. But close. Up until the age of twelve she had been the adored only child of a loving and admittedly overly-indulgent father. By then her father had been snatched away by a cruel fate, and a lecherous stepfather installed in his place.
    Yes, Victoria knew when a man desired her. Only Haddo, a god to her, had turned on her as though she were a tart off the streets—someone who had somehow gained unlawful entry to his bed, with him, six foot three, superbly fit, lying there helpless.
    â€œYou’re sixteen, Tori. A child. God, you’re still at school!”
    â€œMaybe I’ll quit!” she had flung at him, at that point pierced by terrible doubts. “So what have I done, Haddo? Please tell me. Have I broken some sacred code of honour? Some powerful taboo?”
    She’d hated getting the tribal treatment. She had argued her innocence, all the while fierce little tears pouring down her cheeks.
    â€œI can’t do this, Tori.” Haddo, breathing heavily, had put paid to her dreams. “You’re my cousin. It’s my job to look out for you—though God knows these days you’re making it bloody near impossible.”
    She had been driven to attacking him, pounding the hard wall of his chest. He had let her, as though it was too much trouble to stop her. “We’re not first cousins, Haddo. We’re not even full second cousins. Great-Uncle Julien and Great-Uncle George were half-brothers with different mothers. Why are you so appalled?” She had reached out to him again, surrendering to one last moment of weakness
    He’d held her off. “This can’t happen, Victoria. I don’t want to hurt you, but I’m going to take you back to your room. You’re beautiful—so beautiful! Your powers are staggering. I suspect they will only grow stronger. But I can’t—I won’t—let you try them out on me. No way could I forgive myself.”
    â€œOr forgive me either!”
    It was over. She had bitten off far more than she could chew.
    Disgraced, she had wrenched herself away from him, half sliding half falling off the high bed, blinded by the long riotous masses of her hair. How had she got such uncontrollable hair anyhow—and why red? Liv insisted her hair was just like her aunt Rowena’s, whom no one had ever seen.
    â€œYou know what you’ve done, don’t you?” She had rounded on Haddo in a sick fury. “You’ve given me a life sentence.”
    â€œDon’t be ridiculous” His voice, honed by privilege, had sounded unbearably well bred.
    â€œI hate you—okay?” She, on the other hand, had sounded as grim as she felt. “I’ve got to go home. I can’t be near you for another day.”
    He had made not the slightest attempt to dissuade her, nor sweetened it in any way. “That might be for the best, Tori,” he’d agreed. “I’ll organise it.”
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    It wasn’t until she was back in her own room that she began to cry her heart out, weeping until there were no more tears left and she fell into an exhausted sleep. The day that had begun with such golden promise had all of a sudden ended in ashes. Contrary