'I see my recently acquired reputation has coloured your view of me.' He didn't know how to explain without scaring her away completely. All he knew was that he had to tell her.
'Something like that, yes,' she said, and looked back up into his face. He wanted to lower his lips to hers and kiss her to prove she was the only woman he wanted. Could a kiss prove how much he loved her? The whole concept of love was totally new to him. Her eyelashes lowered over her eyes as she looked down, the long dark lashes sweeping against the pale skin in an alluring way.
'I was drowning in guilt and badly scarred. What woman would seriously want me? You are the only woman I have made love to since the accident.' Each word was raw, pulling at his heart as if being ripped from it, dragging out emotions he'd kept locked away, preferring guilt and self-pity. 'I wanted you so badly, Tilly.'
'You did?' The soft whisper caught his attention and he lifted her chin with his thumb and finger, forcing her to look directly at him. The blue of her eyes was shrouded in tears threatening to fall and he hated it that he'd made her cry.
But she wasn't fighting any more. She wasn't resisting what had sprung to life between them the very first moment their eyes had met. She was here in his arms-exactly where he wanted her to be. Those two huskily whispered words whirled round in his head.
'You are the only woman I ever wanted to stay after finding out about the accident, because you are the only woman I want. I love you, Natalie Rogers, and I intend to love you more each and every single day for the rest of my life-if you will let me.'
'I want to say yes.' She looked at him, a tear slipping from first one eye then the other. He caught them with his finger, wiped them away, cursing softly because he'd made her cry.
'But what?' He sensed the doubt, the reservations she was fighting.
'Jason breaking things off was my fault. I didn't want passion and he didn't want only companionship.' She looked down again, as if she was gathering her strength. When she looked back up her blue eyes glittered. 'I can't be who I was those two nights at the manor. That wasn't me. Nothing seemed real then.'
'Our passion was real.' How could she deny that sexy and passionate woman had been her? Every time she'd caressed him she'd set light to him. Every time he'd touched her the intensity of it had risen.
'Because we were different people, cut off from reality. I can't give you passion and excitement, just as I couldn't give it to Jason. I'm scared to.'
Anger simmered to the fore. Damn that man. 'What are you scared of?'
It wasn't making any sense. She'd given herself to him with passionate abandon. What had burned between them those two nights had been so hot it still fired his body now to think of it.
'Loving and losing.'
'Losing?'
'My parents,' she said quietly. 'The love they had for one another was so all-consuming. They only had eyes for each other, but it didn't stop them being wrenched apart. It didn't stop my mother's heart breaking after my father died.'
'Natalie, Natalie.' He pulled her against him, holding her tight and kissing her hair. He closed his eyes against the pain she must have felt as a child. A fluid flow of Italian left his lips and she pulled back to look up at him, her eyes moist with unshed tears.
'I can't be like that,' she whispered softly. He knew then she hadn't been able to love Jason because she'd been scared of the consequences. Joy at knowing she hadn't loved the man she should have married, that she didn't love him now, surged through him.
'You don't have to be.' He lowered his lips to hers, brushing his over the plumpness of hers and enjoying the sensation that fizzed to life. 'All I want is the woman who arrived at the manor, full of joy at the falling snow as I stood and watched her from the doorway. You just need to be you. The woman I love.'
'Do you really mean that?' Hope shone in her eyes and in his heart simultaneously.
'I want you in my life always, Natalie. I want to be with you as you rediscover your family. I want you to be my wife.'
Her gorgeous eyes widened and he laughed gently as he placed another light kiss on her lips. 'Your wife?'
'Yes, Tilly, my wife, and to prove it I will do it properly.' He stepped back from her, reached into his pocket as he lowered himself to one knee. He took hold of her hand in one of his and held the ring box out to her. 'Mi vuoi sposare, Natalie?'
'But we've only just met.' Despite the protest, she was smiling.
'Sì, and by next Christmas Eve we will be back at the manor for our wedding. There will be the biggest and most brightly decorated tree possible-and our families, so we won't be quite so alone.'
She took the ring from the box, a smile of wonder on her face, and he stood up and slipped it on her finger. It fitted perfectly. Yet another sign that they too fitted perfectly together.
'Sì, lo ti sposerò, Xavier.' Her acceptance in Italian warmed his heart more than anything and he crushed her to him with a demanding kiss. The woman he loved was going to be his wife.
EPILOGUE
TRUE TO HIS WORD, Xavier rented Wimble Manor for the next Christmas, requesting the biggest and most brightly decorated tree possible. He couldn't believe how lucky he was to have Tilly in his life and he looked at her as she entered the grand hallway. The wedding dress she wore was beautiful and the faux fur-lined hood of the cape framed her face, one that shone with happiness as she looked at him.
This time last year he had hated Christmas and anything to do with it. He'd thought he didn't deserve to marry and settle down, but now he knew he'd just been waiting for Tilly to waltz into his life.
'Hi,' his beautiful bride whispered, as she joined him where he waited for her among their close friends and family. There was a nervous tremor in her voice and he knew it was after what had happened almost two years ago, but there was no possible way he was going to turn his back on her. How could he when he loved her so completely?
'Sei bellissima.' He took the tips of her fingers and raised them to his lips, not taking his eyes from her once as a blush crept over her cheeks. 'You didn't bring the snow with you this time?'
She smiled up at him and whispered mischievously, 'Not yet.'
* * *
Tilly's heart swelled as her new husband kissed her for the first time. They were standing at the bottom of the stairs, next to a fantastically decorated tree that held pride of place in the centre of the large hallway. Exactly the same spot they had first shared a kiss and where Xavier had arranged for them to be married.
Around them applause sounded and she turned shyly to see her mother, her father's brother and his family and Vanessa, her maid of honour. It was a perfect day and soon it would be followed by a more than perfect night in the arms of the man she loved so tenderly yet so passionately.
There was a tinge of sadness because she would be leaving behind her mother and her best friend when she and Xavier moved to Italy in the New Year, but wherever he went she would go too. It was hard to recall that last Christmas had been so lonely and now, just one year later, she was married to the man of her dreams.
She smiled up at him. 'Thank you,' she whispered, and his brows quirked in that sexy kind of way she'd come to adore.
'What for, mia cara?'
'For arranging all this. When you told me you would organise the wedding, I never imagined this.'
'Wimble Manor is where I first met you, where I first fell in love.' He lowered his voice so their wedding guests wouldn't hear. 'And where we first made love. It will always be a special place.'
'I wish we were alone like that again.'
He pressed his lips to hers, sending a shiver of awareness down her spine. 'Soon, my beautiful bride, soon. Once our guests have gone, it can snow for as long as it likes.'