The Perfect Match (19 page)

She stood up, then walked over to Chrissie and embraced her warmly.

'Welcome to the Crighton family, my dear.'

The
Crighton
family. Chrissie opened her mouth and then closed it again.

'It's all right,' Ruth told her in a kind voice. 'We'll all understand if you choose not to acknowledge us as part of your family.'

'I just don't know what my mother is going to say about all this,' Chrissie exclaimed weakly.

'I expect you and Guy would like some time on your own now to talk over... every thing,' Ruth said, gently touching Chrissie lightly on the wrist and then giving her another warm hug as Chrissie stood up to leave.

Jon, too, hugged her before she left, and as she said afterwards to Guy when they were on their own in his home, 'They were both just so warm and welcoming.' She started to cry and Guy who had been getting them both a drink walked across the kitchen to catch hold of her and demanded gruffly, 'What is it...what's wrong?'

'Nothing,' Chrissie hiccupped into his shoulder.

'I'm just so glad that it's all over. I was so afraid that this would always haunt us, that it would always come between us...that you'd never be able to completely trust me.'

'Me
trust
you?'
As he bent his head to kiss her, the apology he was starting to make was muffled by the warm pressure of Chrissie's mouth against his, sooth-ing the pain of his guilt and remorse. 'First thing tomorrow morning we're flying to Amsterdam,' Guy informed her huskily once she had released his mouth,

'and it won't just be an engagement ring I shall be buying you. And while we're there we might as well add an eternity ring, as well,' he added, as he gently stroked her finger, 'because this time, my love, it is for eternity.'

'Yes, it is,' Chrissie concurred softly.

'May I see your rings? Oh yes, they are beautiful,'

Ruth's granddaughter, Bobbie, admired as Chrissie ignored the shower of rose petals one of the wedding guests was throwing over both her and Guy to step forward and extend her hand.

Chrissie had surprised herself by choosing not an antique ring as she had first intended, but a modern trio of rings, especially designed for her by one of Amsterdam's top jewellers. The heart-shaped diamond of her engagement ring had been chosen by Guy, and Chrissie had gasped over its breathtaking magnificence.

It only stopped short of being vulgar by just a heartbeat, she had told him at the time, but both the jeweller and Guy had argued and assured her that in com-parison with some of the solitaires they sold, it was, in fact, rather modest. The simple band it was set into had been specially made to interlink with both the diamond-studded, entwined-rope design of her white-and-gold wedding and eternity rings, whilst around the centre of the eternity ring ran an additional ring of perfect but more modestly sized individual diamonds.

'They all interlock and belong together, like the three of us,' Guy had told Chrissie tenderly when they had chosen the design. The three of them.

Her wedding outfit had been made in Chester, its simple cut and the richness of the heavy cream satin discreetly masking her growing pregnancy. That was why Chrissie had decided against a traditional wedding gown and opted instead for a full-length plainly cut dress and a matching full-length satin coat over it with a small train at the back.

'I'm not ashamed of the fact that I'm carrying our child,' she had told her mother proudly. 'But we
are
having a church wedding and I just don't feel that a traditional dress would be appropriate.'

'You'll look lovely, darling,' her mother had assured her as they studied the design Chrissie had chosen.

And of course she did.

More than lovely as Guy had already told her.

She smiled at him now, touching his arm to draw his attention to where her mother was standing with his sister, Laura, the two of them deep in conversation.

The fact that Laura and her mother had struck up such an immediate bond had been an additional bonus so far as Chrissie was concerned. It had been Laura who had taken charge when her parents had travelled south, insisting that they stay with her and her husband and very firmly dealing with her mother's reservations about how she might be judged.

'You are
not
your brother. You are yourself and people will judge you accordingly,' Laura had told her forthrightly.

And so it had proved to be. Several women who had been at school with her mother had made very warm overtures to her. Chrissie might suspect that Laura had had a hand in their warm welcome, but she certainly wasn't going to spoil her mother's pleasure in being remembered by saying so. And both Guy's family and the Crightons, as well, had made it plain that they considered them very welcome additions to their family circles.

Only Natalie had held herself rather aloof, and Chrissie hadn't been upset at all to learn that she had decided to move to London.

Her mother had received the news about their connection with the Crightons with the same astonishment as Chrissie, but what had touched Chrissie most of all was to overhear her mother remarking to Jenny the day before the wedding that she and Chrissie's father were definitely thinking of moving South when they retired.

'After all,' she had said to Jenny, 'it won't just be our daughter and son-in-law who are living here, but our grandchildren, as well.'

'If I didn't know better,' Guy teased her as they watched one of his teenage nieces flirting outra-geously with a gangly-looking boy who seemed more embarrassed than flattered by her attention, 'I almost suspect that you'd rather stay here than go to Barbados with me.'

'Only almost?' Chrissie teased him back. 'It's so wonderful to be part of a big family, Guy, to know that our child, our children, will be growing up with that advantage, but it's nowhere near as wonderful as knowing you love me,' she whispered huskily in his ear. 'And as for Barbados...'

'Barbados. Why the hell didn't I just book us a suite at the Grosvenor in Chester?' Guy groaned against her mouth as he bent his head to kiss her. 'Do you know how long that flight is?'

'We've still got the reception to get through yet,'

Chrissie reminded him demurely.

'Just you wait until I get you on my own,' Guy warned her.

'On my own?' Chrissie raised an eyebrow and pat-ted her gently rounding body teasingly. 'I don't think so,' she reminded him archly. 'By the way, I'm glad they've caught the gang responsible for those break-ins.'

'So am I,' Guy agreed, giving her a sombre look.

'I can't believe that I even thought in my dreams that you were remotely involved.'

'Shush.' Chrissie placed her fingers over his lips.

'It did all seem to fit into place and the gang did have a female member.'

'I don't deserve you,' Guy whispered tenderly.

Across the churchyard, Madeleine Crighton saw them laughing and witnessed the look they exchanged, the love they so obviously shared so palpable you could almost reach out and touch it.

Tiredly she looked away.

When she had been pregnant with both their children, Max had treated her not with tenderness and love but with acidic fury, reminding her that he had not wanted children, just as he had not really wanted her.

She started to make her way quickly through the crowd to where Jenny, Max's mother, was standing with the children.

Thinking about Max and their marriage was something Maddy tried very hard not to do these days.

Their marriage... What marriage? It was simply a worthless piece of paper, a legal document. Max didn't love her and she was beginning to question if he had ever loved her. He made her feel so worthless, so useless. In his eyes she felt unwanted, undesirable, and she was almost glad of the physical distance between them, the 'business' that had taken him to Spain.

Almost... A part of her still remembered how it had once been...how they had once been...just...

'Mmm...this is pure heaven,' Guy exclaimed contentedly as they lay on the bed of their holiday villa, the fan whirring soporifically above them as it cooled the hot Barbadian night air.

'Was it worth waiting for?' Chrissie teased him tongue-in-cheek as he raised himself up on one elbow.

He leaned over her, tracing the shape of her mouth with one fingertip, then lazily bending his head to kiss her naked breast.

'Oh, well worth waiting for,' Guy purred with the sheer satisfaction of a sensually satiated male animal.

And he was very much a male animal, Chrissie acknowledged as she watched him leave their bed and walk across the bedroom, his naked body gleaming in the soft, shadowy light. The combined warmth of the air and the heat of their passionately intense lovemaking had left a fine oiled sheen on his skin high-lighting its taut muscle structure. A feeling she was fast coming to recognise began stirring wantonly deep within her body.

'We never had time for this earlier,' Guy announced as he picked up the bottle of champagne. It was still in its ice bucket and he'd intended to share it before he took Chrissie to bed and they consum-mated physically the vows they had made verbally and emotionally to one another earlier.

Chrissie watched as he opened the bottle and poured them both a glass. She could watch him for ever, she decided contentedly. He had such masculine grace, such unconscious male arrogance and authority. He turned his head and saw her looking at him and she watched his eyes darken as he subjected her naked body to a far less inhibited and smoulderingly sensuous scrutiny than she had been giving him.

So much so that she could actually feel the colour starting to rise up under her skin. But she was pleased to note she was not the only one to be affected by the small exchange, because Guy's hand trembled slightly as he came back to the bed and handed her a brim-ming glass of champagne. A few drops of the golden liquid splashed onto her naked body but as she moved to wipe them away, Guy stopped her, caught hold of her free hand and then bent his head to lick away the champagne, his tongue tip doing impossibly erotic things to her nervous system as he teasingly inched closer and closer to her now very erect nipples.

'Mmm...' he murmured pleasurably, then put his glass down, cupped the side of her breast and started to gently suck on the tight nub of flesh he had been tormenting.

Chrissie could feel the excitement pulsing through her body as she tried to stifle her soft groan of pleasure, but Guy had obviously heard it because his caresses became more intense, more purposeful, and no longer merely playful.

She wanted him...oh, how she wanted him, but he deserved a little bit of punishment himself for the way he had teased her, Chrissie decided, laughter sparkling in her eyes as she deliberately tipped some of her champagne onto his body.

'What the...' Guy exclaimed, momentarily releas-ing her whilst she calmly put down her glass.

Firmly pushing him onto the bed, Chrissie informed him firmly, 'If you can't take the heat, then stay out of the kitchen,' before bending her own head and slowly and deliberately following the trickle of golden liquid arrowing its way along the valley that conveni-ently provided a pathway down the centre of his body, lazily lapping at it with her tongue whilst at the same time deliberately encouraging it to run faster and farther.

It gave her immense satisfaction to hear Guy groan-ing in much the same way as she had done herself as she forced him to endure her teasing love play. Later she decided that it was the leisurely lap of honour with which she had triumphantly circled his navel, first with tiny kisses and then with the moist tip of her tongue, which had been her undoing, because it was after that and whilst she was in pursuit of the errant drop of champagne still making its way down his body that she lost control of the game. Not that she minded. Who cared about victory when being defeated, overwhelmed, by their mutual passion and then mutual love could be so hotly and sweetly sat-isfactory?

Dawn was just beginning to pearl the sky with its translucent light when Guy finally drew Chrissie down against his body and groaned, 'Just think...

another three weeks of this. How on earth will we stand it?'

Both of them were still smiling when they finally fell asleep.

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