Society Secrets. Sharon Kendrick

saucepan in an apartment he would never see again. All bound for his new life in smart little navy shorts and an embroidered poplin shirt—his curls looking like a shiny black mop.

      ‘Doesn’t he look gorgeous?’ she said, her voice choked with quiet pride and the sudden savage wrench she felt at having to say goodbye to England.

      Casimiro glanced down at the infant, who was oblivious to the machinations of the adults around him. Whose life would never be the same again. He was making some primitive-sounding singing noises as he banged the spoon against the metal. His perfect skin had a faint olive tinge to it and you could see the chubby symmetry of each tiny limb. How was it possible that this child had sprung from his loins? Casimiro wondered disbelievingly as he felt a strange clenching sensation around his heart.

      Melissa watched them. For a moment, Casimiro seemed about to step forward—something in his body language suggesting that he might be about to pick Ben up—and Melissa willed him to make contact. Touch your son, she urged him silently—touch your son and begin to love him. But the moment passed and he seemed to change his mind, lifting his gaze to her instead. A gaze which seemed to her to contain nothing other than slightly cool censure.

      ‘He’ll need to get his hair cut before the wedding,’ he said.

      Hot tears threatened to spring to her eyes, but she blinked them away before they’d had a chance to form. Of all the things to say at the beginning of this new life with his son! It had sounded like a criticism of both Ben and her. He will not cut his curls, thought Melissa fiercely—but even she could see that having a row just before she stepped into the public spotlight was a bad idea.

      Instead she conjured up a faltering smile from somewhere and drew a deep breath. ‘So…this is it?’

      ‘This is it.’ He looked down into her pale, heart-shaped face—against which her eyes looked intensely green. Her lips were parted and gleaming, as if they wanted to be kissed, and suddenly he thought about all the many pleasurable opportunities that this marriage would bring with it. He would be able to make love to her over and over again, he realised—as many times as he wanted. As many times as she wanted…

      Leaning forward, he grazed his mouth almost negligently over hers, feeling her own tremble against the brush of his flesh. For a moment he kissed her deeply until he heard her make a broken little sigh, and when he pulled away from her it was to see the unmistakable disappointment which had clouded her eyes.

      ‘Oh,’ she whispered, unable to keep the note of frustration from her voice.

      As a demonstration of his power over her, it was perfect. Casimiro smiled—even though he was aching to possess her once more. ‘Didn’t you scold me the other day for trying to make love to you while our son slept next door?’ he chided softly.

      Instead, he withdrew a leather box from his pocket and flipped open the lid to reveal a diamond solitaire ring of such startling clarity and brilliance that for a moment Melissa couldn’t quite believe her eyes.

      ‘Is it real?’ She forced the joke out like trying to squeeze the last little bit of toothpaste from the tube, but there was no answering smile on his face.

      ‘Oh, it’s the real thing,’ he answered unevenly—because even he couldn’t deny its emotional significance. ‘It was my mother’s engagement ring.’

      ‘Your mother’s?’ A moment of memory took her right back to a time when he’d caught her crying over her own mother, when he’d offered her a lift to stop the rain getting in her cheap shoes. What wouldn’t she give for a moment like that now—in exchange for all the glittering jewels in the world?

      ‘A rare Calistan diamond,’ he continued, concentrating on the gem rather than on her question as he prised it from its velvet claws. ‘De-flawless and perfect. You will never wear fake jewellery again, Melissa.’

      But a chill passed over her heart as he slid the ring onto her trembling finger. She was about to get married to a man who saw her simply as a commodity—and it occurred to Melissa that she’d never felt so fake in her whole life.