Sharon Kendrick Collection. Sharon Kendrick

      ‘Any suspicions came from me, and me alone. Catrin is an independent woman of the nineties, with her own career and her own life. Peter was just a part of that, I realise that now—and she neither asked for nor wanted anything more. He left her some jewellery and paintings, yes, and Catrin was content with that.’

      ‘Then why?’ asked Lola, gazing at him with a mystified expression.

      ‘Why seek you out with revenge in mind?’ He moved his shoulders restlessly. ‘That was just me and my arrogant, masculine pride—although at the time I preferred to see it as me protecting Catrin. In a way, I think I felt that I was helping her—as she had helped me all those long, hard years ago, when she brought me up.

      ‘I needed to know why my sister’s lover had passed her over to leave the most valuable part of his estate to an unknown young woman. I was seething with the injustice of it all! I don’t know what I wanted to do to you, Lola, but the moment I saw you I knew—’

      ‘Knew what?’ she prompted, her heart thumping like mad.

      ‘That any vague ideas I’d had of revenge were hopeless, because as soon as I looked into your shining, honest eyes I knew that all I wanted to do was love you.’

      ‘Was that all?’ She gave a soft, secret smile.

      He shook his head. ‘No, that wasn’t all! I discovered that I wanted to marry you, too. To settle down and give you lots of children. All the things I had never wanted before, and had never imagined myself wanting. And then I realised that the reason I had never wanted them before was because I had never met the right woman.’ He lowered his voice. ‘Until now.’

      Lola’s eyes shone with unshed tears as she realised that he was giving voice to words she had never thought she would hear. ‘Oh, Geraint,’ she whispered.

      ‘My parents’ marriage was at the mercy of economics,’ he told her gruffly. ‘Poverty is no basis for a lifetime of contentment. I think that’s what gave me the will to succeed—I was determined never to have to submit to the constraints of not having enough money to support a wife and children.’

      Lola blinked, mystified. ‘But you’re rich—and you have the air of a man who has been rich for a long time. There must have been women who have tempted you into marriage before now.’

      He shook his dark head. ‘Never!’ he contradicted her simply. ‘Because, conversely, I needed a woman who would love me even if I had nothing.’ His grey eyes were unwavering. ‘Would you love me if I had nothing to give you but my heart, Lola Hennessy?’

      Just for a moment she treasured that look he gave her, his narrowed eyes betraying a fleeting trace of vulnerability. But then he must have seen the love shining brightly in her eyes, for he grinned and stood up, then took her into his arms and held her very, very tight.

      ‘You know I would,’ she whispered huskily, ‘my darling Welshman!’

      He tipped her chin up with his fingertip. ‘And marriage, Lola? I want a good, strong marriage,’ he told her. ‘And it will be an equal marriage, too—I’m not too proud to cook and to bath babies. How do you feel about that?’

      Lola gazed up at him. What could she say? She seemed to have hitched her star to the original masterful man. But oh, she wouldn’t have it any different!

      ‘Well?’ he prompted.

      ‘Yes,’ she told him firmly. ‘Yes, yes, yes! Yes, I’ll marry you, yes, I love you—’

      ‘I’m going to make love to you,’ he interrupted with a small groan of desire. ‘Right now.’

      ‘We have a baby next door we’re supposed to be looking after,’ she reminded him in a shaky voice. ‘Or had you forgotten?’

      ‘No, I hadn’t forgotten.’ Geraint made a mental note to have Lola to himself for at least a year after they were married. Unless. . . ‘Are you pregnant, do you think, sweetheart?’ he asked her quietly.

      Lola shook her head. ‘No,’ she said half-regretfully. ‘I let you think I might be as a kind of way of getting my own back—to make you worried. Are you very angry, Geraint?’

      He smiled at her tenderly. ‘Angry? No! Relieved? A bit! Disappointed? A little. But we have years ahead to have our babies, Lola—if that’s the way God plans it.’

      Lola was so flooded with the feeling of being properly loved that she felt secure enough to confide, ‘It wasn’t just for revenge that I told you I might be pregnant, Geraint.’

      His mouth curved. ‘Oh?’

      ‘Although I hated what I thought you’d done I simply couldn’t resign myself to the thought of never seeing you again. I knew that if you thought there was the remotest possibility of me having a baby it would give you a reason to come back.’

      His smile broadened. ‘I would have come back anyway, my darling—I didn’t need a reason. Do you think anything could have kept me away from you, once I’d found you? I’ve spent my whole life looking for you, Lola, and I’m never going to let you go.’

      ‘Oh, Geraint,’ she sighed, her eyes filling up with tears.

      ‘Shh,’ he soothed. ‘My only regret is not telling you everything before we made love.’

      ‘You tried,’ she whispered.

      ‘Not very hard,’ he admitted. ‘I was too ensnared by you, too worried that you might refuse ever to see me again if you had an inkling of my original motive.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘What time did Triss say she was coming back?’

      ‘She didn’t, exactly.’

      He frowned. ‘Then do you think your mother might babysit for an hour or so—especially if I take you all out to dinner later to celebrate our engagement?’

      ‘We could always ask her.’ Lola gave him a questioning stare, although the look on his face was enough to make her start to shiver in delicious anticipation. ‘Why?’

      ‘Go upstairs and wait for me there,’ he instructed, a wicked glint in his eye as he picked up the telephone to punch out the number. ‘And in a minute I’ll show you exactly why.’

      ‘And you, being you, would never consider getting no for an answer, I suppose?’ said Lola, over her shoulder.

      The darkening of his eyes told its own story. ‘Never!’ Geraint replied, and he smiled as he began to speak to Lola’s mother.

      Look out for KISS AND TELL,

       next episode in the Revenge is Sweet series

       by Sharon Kendrick

      Triss Alexander, beautiful model, loving

       mother, with an axe to grind against her

       baby’s father—Cormack Casey.

      Coming Soon. . .

Kiss and Tell

       CHAPTER ONE

      WOULD he come? That was the question. A question which could only be answered by the man himself, all six feet four of him, with his unruly hair and his Irish eyes and that irreverent humour which always seemed to be lurking at the corners of a mouth just made for kissing.

      Triss shivered. She must just be patient, and wait. She had waited fourteen months, after all, so another few minutes were neither here nor there.

      In fact, what she should do was to make herself remember why she had split up with Cormack Casey in the first place.

      And after that she should force herself to recall every single one of his bad points, so that a miracle