She said, 'Because then I thought she was Barbie.'
He was very still suddenly. 'And if she had been? What then?'
She said, stammering a little, 'Well, it would have explained why you wanted to buy a house in a quiet backwater like this. To make a fresh start-with her.' She made a performance of looking at her watch. 'But I've taken up quite enough of your time.'
'No,' he said. 'You could never do that. And I think you know it.' There was a note in his voice that she found unnerving. 'Now let me ask you a question. Why did you run away after the meeting if it wasn't to Patrick?'
'You really thought I'd want anything more to do with him?'
'Why not?' He shrugged. 'Sometimes people go on loving the wrong person, in spite of everything, and though they know it will lead to misery. You told me so yourself.'
Colour rose in her face. 'But I didn't mean Patrick. You should have known that. I-I was speaking generally.' She took a deep breath. 'But I also ran away because I was embarrassed.'
His brows lifted. 'You don't think anyone believed the Wilding woman and Fiona's vile father?'
'No, I was thinking of Ted Jackson.' She looked down at her glass. 'I can't imagine why he said-what he did. About us. Because there isn't any us. I know that. Just you-being kind. You must have been mortified by his comments.'
'No,' he said. 'Not in the slightest. Because he was only wrong about one thing. He claimed everyone knew that I was courting you. Yet it seems to have missed you, the one most involved, by a country mile, even now, when it's been publicly pointed out.
'Of course,' he went on. 'You may be trying to find a tactful way of saying you wouldn't have me if I came gift-wrapped. But if not, maybe we could find some way of making this courtship slightly less one-sided.'
She said in a voice she didn't recognise, 'I don't understand.'
He put his glass on the floor beside him. 'Then try this.' His voice was almost harsh in its intensity. 'I love you, Octavia. I have done from the moment I saw you, and I always will. And I want to marry you and spend the rest of my life with you.'
'But that's not possible. We-we've only just met.' She was trembling violently, her voice husky. 'We hardly know each other...'
'Darling, you met Patrick Wilding a hell of a long time ago, and dated him for months, but what did you really know about him?'
'But you don't-you can't want me,' Tavy said wildly. 'Not when you sent me away the other night...'
'What else could I do?' Jago spread his hands. He said very gently, 'Sweetheart, I wanted you like hell. You were a dream come true. But all the indications were that you were still in love with Patrick, and I couldn't bear the idea that I might only be a surrogate lover.
'Because there might have come a moment when you realised you were very definitely in the wrong arms, and I-I couldn't risk that. It seemed safer-wiser to send you away until I could be sure that you wanted me and no one else.
'Besides,' he added carefully. 'Neither the Vicarage carpet or a narrow single bed were the ideal options for the kind of seduction I had in mind. And since I was sure you weren't on the Pill, my having no protection was an additional factor.'
'Oh.' Tavy was blushing again.
'Oh, indeed,' he said and sighed. 'So I challenged you to take off your robe, knowing you wouldn't do it, any more than you'd have walked naked out of the lake that first time I saw you.'
He smiled at her. 'I walked back to the house in a daze that day, knowing that I'd be buying a home to share with you and no other.
'When I came to the Vicarage the next day, it was to give your father a frank rundown on my past, outline my future, and assure him that my intentions were entirely honourable.'
Tavy gasped. 'What on earth did he say?'
Jago's smile became a grin. 'He thought for a moment, then smiled and wished me luck.'
'He didn't mention Patrick?'
'Not a word. He left me to discover that for myself and suffer the tortures of the damned as a result. I'd never been jealous before and I didn't like it.'
'Yet you let me think that Barbie was your girlfriend...'
'In the vain hope that it might provoke some reaction. Yet you simply prepared her room as if her prospective arrival didn't bother you at all, instead of grabbing me by the throat and demanding to know what the hell was going on.'
She said breathlessly, 'But don't you see-I was scared to ask! Scared what your answer might be. It seemed better, somehow, not to know. As if that could somehow make me less unhappy.'
He said huskily, 'Oh, my dearest love.' He rose and came across to her, drawing her to her feet and cupping her face in his hands. 'Well, I'm prepared to take the risk. So, my wonderful, my precious girl, will you marry me?'
She slid her arms round his neck, feeling the dishevelled dark hair silken under her hands, smiling into the tawny eyes watching her with such tender intensity.
She said softly, 'Put like that-what can I do but say "Yes-and yes"?'
He said her name on a shaken breath and began to kiss her, gently at first and then with growing hunger, his mouth feasting on hers, her famished, untried senses responding in a kind of delirium.
She found her body leaning into his, as if wanting to be absorbed into the totally male hardness of bone and muscle. Knowing for the first time the overwhelming need to be joined, to become one with a man. Her man. Feeling the tight, cold knot of misery deep within her begin to dissolve in his warmth. In the strength of the arms holding her so closely, and the sensuous liquid fire of his kisses.
His hands slid down her body, tracing the length of her spine, and moulding the slender curve of her hips as he drew her even closer, awakening her to the potent demand of his arousal and all it signified.
His lips nibbled at her throat, gliding down to the opening of her shirt and pushing the fabric aside to reach the warm skin beneath.
Tavy felt her breasts swell against the confines of the lacy cups which encased them, her nipples hardening in anticipation of his caress-her first experience of such an intimacy, she thought, her senses drowning.
And yet this was also the beginning of a journey for which she was totally unprepared.
Jago, she knew, was accustomed to very different girls in his arms and his bed. Girls who would meet his demands and desires with their own.
Not someone who only had love to guide her and was suddenly scared that it might not be enough.
He lifted his head. 'What's wrong?'
'Nothing...'
'I don't think so.' He studied her flushed face. 'You were here with me, now you're not.'
She shook her head, looking down at the floor. 'It's stupid, I know. It's just that I've never...' And stopped, not knowing how to go on. Terrified that he might laugh at her.
He said huskily, 'Darling, you mustn't be frightened. But you have to want this too, not let me rush you into something you're not ready for.' He kissed her again, lightly, his lips just brushing hers. 'And if you want more time, I can be patient. We can just be-engaged. Tell our families, put a notice in the papers, buy a ring.'
He ran a caressing finger down the curve of her cheek. 'Now I'm going to open some champagne and we'll drink to our future before I take you home.'
She watched him walk out of the room. The man she loved who, by some miracle, loved her in return. And who, because his intentions were honourable, was coming back to drink wine with her, before he took her home.
Except-this was her home. She belonged here. She belonged to him, and she should have called him back, and told him so. Proved it to him beyond all doubt.
Instead, she'd let a fleeting uncertainty spoil a moment that would never return.
She turned restlessly and moved to the windows, looking across the terrace to the garden still glowing in the last of the evening sun. And beyond the lawns, sheltered by the tall shrubs, unmoving in the still air, was the lake.
The lake...
And suddenly she began to smile. She even laughed out loud. Kicking off her shoes, she walked across the sun-warmed flags, unbuttoning her shirt as she went, and dropping it at the head of the terrace steps.
Halfway across the lawn she paused, unzipped her skirt, stepped out of it and walked on, leaving it lying on the grass.
She draped her bra over the branch of a convenient buddleia, and negotiated a bank of fuchsias, just coming into bud, which brought her on to the edge of the lake.
The Lady was still there, gazing down into the waters, which had been cleared since Tavy's last visit, and were now reflecting back the turquoise, pink and gold streaks in the sky.
She whispered, 'Wish me luck,' as she slipped off her briefs and left them at the foot of the statue before wading in, taking her time, trailing her fingertips in the water as it got deeper.