Penny Jordan's Crighton Family Series. PENNY JORDAN

with her sensual demand.

      Right from the very first time, the sex between them had been so good, so right…. She had felt incredibly good about being so intimate with him, about being so open with him. It wasn’t only the love but, in many ways just as importantly, the trust she had in him that gave her a sense of security, a sense of being protected and safe that made it possible for her to be completely at ease with him sexually and emotionally, to be open with him about her needs as a woman and to be equally responsive to his needs as a man and it was this openness between them, this honesty, that for Olivia made their relationship so special and why she hated the way things had been between them over the past few days.

      The sense of closeness, of wholeness, of oneness she felt now in the aftermath of their passionately intense physical lovemaking had brought gentle, vulnerable tears to her eyes, and as she lay in his arms, a feeling of such love and happiness welled up inside her that she wanted desperately to somehow convey to Caspar just how much their love, their relationship meant to her. There was always, she knew, a sentence, a verbal commitment to him that whilst meaningless to others, would show Caspar just how much he did mean to her.

      She reached out to trace the shape of his jaw, his mouth, with her fingertips and told him softly, ‘Caspar … I do love you….’

      For a moment he looked startled … shocked almost, and then he was hugging her, holding her so tightly that she had to protest laughingly that she could hardly breathe.

      ‘At last … at last,’ she heard him saying exultantly. ‘Say it again Livvy. Tell me again….’

      ‘Say what?’ she teased and then happily complied with his demand, whispering the words first against his ear and then against his mouth. When she felt his lips moving against hers as he said the words back to her, the desire she had thought completely satiated started to burn again as they kissed and touched and then kissed and touched some more.

      ‘Mmm … that was wonderful,’ Olivia sighed blissfully as she snuggled up against Caspar.

      ‘That!’ complained Caspar mock-indignantly.

      ‘Very well, then you were wonderful,’ Olivia confided sleepily. ‘I’m so glad we’re not fighting any more,’ she added sombrely. ‘I saw Saul earlier. He seems to think that his and Hillary’s marriage is virtually over.’

      ‘Yes, I know,’ Caspar said, stifling a yawn.

      ‘You know?’ Olivia demanded, suddenly alert as she leaned up on her elbow and frowned down at him. ‘How do you know?’

      Something about the way he hesitated before replying and then looked away from her made her clench her stomach muscles and watch him warily.

      ‘I, er, Hillary told me when we had dinner together this evening….’

      ‘You had dinner with Hillary! You invited another woman out to dinner without telling me?’ Olivia demanded, spacing the words out carefully, all her earlier pleasure draining away as she stared at Caspar in shock. ‘Why didn’t you tell me? Why?’

      ‘It was a spur-of-the-moment thing,’ Caspar answered angrily. ‘For God’s sake, Livvy,’ he expostulated, pushing his fingers irritably into his hair, ‘it’s past two in the morning, and right now the last thing I feel like doing is being cross-examined as if I’m guilty of a major crime. You just said yourself how much you hate it when we fight and yet here you are—’

      ‘I’m not fighting,’ Olivia interrupted him tersely.

      ‘No? Then you’re sure as hell giving a fair imitation of it,’ Caspar retorted grumpily.

      ‘Caspar, we’re lovers, we’ve planned a future together. I wouldn’t go out and have dinner with another man and then not tell you about it.’

      ‘No, but you’re quite happy to change all our plans and have me looking a fool while you announce that you’re staying here and playing the dutiful daughter and niece, that it’s far, far more important to you than being with me, even though it’s been made plain to you that your sacrifice isn’t either necessary or wanted,’ Caspar came back with angry ferocity.

      Olivia sat upright in bed and stared at him through the darkness.

      ‘Caspar, I explained about that,’ she protested. ‘It will only be for a few weeks … I thought you understood … and tonight …’ She paused and bit her lip before continuing. ‘Tonight, when I told you I love you … I thought—’

      ‘You thought what?’ he interrupted her savagely. ‘You thought because you’d made the big sacrifice of finally committing yourself verbally to me that that made everything okay. That I’m dumb enough, besotted enough, to go away and wait patiently until you’re ready. Was that what tonight was all about, Livvy?’ he demanded bitterly. ‘Was that what all the passion … all the hunger, all the sex was for, to keep me quiet? Well, I’ve got news for you … it didn’t work.’

      ‘Caspar,’ Olivia protested, but he had already turned his back on her, hunching his body as close to the edge of the bed as he could.

      Well, let him sulk if he wants to, Olivia decided wrathfully. She wasn’t the one who had spoiled things between them. Not this time. No, Caspar had done that all by himself. Why hadn’t he told her that he’d had dinner with Hillary? And even worse, would he ever have told her if she hadn’t just happened to stumble on the truth?

      Had tonight’s seemingly passionate and intense lovemaking simply been a ploy on his part to make her come to heel … to make her commit herself to him verbally, to give him the words of love he wanted just so that he could use them against her in the kind of emotional power struggle she had so foolishly believed their love meant too much to either of them for them to enter into? And if she had been wrong about that, how much else had she been wrong about, as well? Did Caspar really love her at all? Quietly she, too, lay down, her own back firmly turned to him.

      ‘Olivia, have you got a minute?’

      Uncertainly Olivia looked across the kitchen at Caspar. She had woken early in anticipation of going into the office but Caspar wasn’t there beside her. Even as early as it was, he must have dressed and gone downstairs ahead of her, thus depriving her of any opportunity of talking privately with him in the comforting intimacy of her bedroom.

      ‘I’ve decided to go ahead and call the airline this morning,’ he told her tersely.

      An ominous sense of foreboding gripped Olivia. ‘Call the airline if you like, but I’d hoped we weren’t going to do that until we went back to London.’

      ‘We weren’t,’ Caspar agreed, emphasising the ‘we’ before adding grimly, ‘But then we weren’t planning to spend more than a few days here saying goodbye to your folks.’

      Olivia stared at him in dismay. ‘But, Caspar, that was before my father had his heart attack. Can’t …?’ She dug her teeth into her bottom lip, willing herself to stay calm whilst she begged, ‘Caspar, please don’t do this to me … to us … Caspar …’ Her voice shook so much she had to stop speaking.

      ‘Livvy … look, it isn’t too late,’ Caspar told her urgently, crossing the space between them and grasping her hands. ‘Tell your uncle you’ve changed your mind … that you can’t stay. I’ll get us seats on the first available flight and we—’

      ‘No … no, you know I can’t do that,’ Olivia protested, drawing her hands free of Caspar’s grasp. ‘Caspar, why won’t you understand?’ she pleaded, pressing her hands to her aching head. ‘I have to stay.’

      ‘No, you don’t,’ Caspar countered brutally. ‘You want to stay. You, Olivia, and no one else. Your uncle doesn’t want you here and neither does your grandfather. You want to stay because—’

      ‘Because it’s the right thing for me to do. My father—’

      ‘The right thing?’ Caspar laughed bitterly. ‘You already know my views on that subject,’