Sinful Affairs by Sharon Kendrick

Author:Sharon Kendrick [Kendrick, Sharon]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781460800843
Publisher: Mills & Boon Special Release
Published: 2011-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SIX

‘ALICE, darling, are you sure you’re doing the right thing?’

‘Mum, I’m positive!’ Alice stared into the mirror one last time as if checking to make sure that her eyes weren’t deceiving her.

Could that cool, dreamy bride who stared back really be her? The woman in floaty cream organza, a fragrant camellia weaved into her hair and a tight bundle of those same flowers waiting downstairs—starry against their dark, glossy leaves and tied with a length of silk-satin ribbon.

Was it the power of her wedding finery which had transformed her into someone who looked like a stranger to her, or was it the hope which still flared in her heart—that she and Kyros could live happily ever after? She turned away from the mirror. ‘Anyway, you like Kyros—you know you do.’

Her mother frowned. ‘Yes, I do like Kyros,’ she said dutifully. ‘But your father and I were aware how hurt you were when he went away the first time.’

‘Oh, we were both too young,’ Alice put in quickly, marvelling at the powers of self-deception and her own ability to rewrite history—to try to convince the world that she wasn’t making the biggest mistake of her life. As though Kyros walking away the first time had all been part of some grand master-plan! ‘Anyway, that was then—this is now.’

‘I understand that, dear,’ said her mother. ‘But this has all happened so quickly—and your father and I are naturally concerned for your happiness.’

‘But I am happy, Mum. I promise you that. I want nothing more than to be Kyros’s wife,’ said Alice huskily, the words spoken straight from the heart, and she saw her mother look momentarily mollified as she gave her hat one final adjustment.

The time between accepting Kyros’s unexpected proposal of marriage that night in Paris—to the morning of their wedding had passed by in a blur of organisation and arrangements. Part of her had wanted to just slip away and get married in secret—but she knew her parents would be heartbroken if she did something like that. And wouldn’t that be sending out the message that what they were doing was in some way shameful?

The first thing Alice had done had been to hand her notice in at work, which had been much harder than she’d anticipated—particularly as they had tried to persuade her to stay. The carrot of a directorship in a couple of years’ time had been dangled in front of her, but Alice hadn’t allowed herself to be tempted, her career suddenly paling against the dazzle of what Kyros represented and was offering her.

She’d arranged for a letting agency to find someone to rent her flat. That had been her safety net, a precaution taken in case it didn’t work out—that she had somewhere to come back to. Fleetingly, she found herself wondering whether most brides went into their marriages with such cynical eyes.

While she had shopped for clothes and chosen the menu and all the other seemingly endless details, which even the smallest wedding demanded,

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