"Something wrong?" Charlotte asked.
Erin shook her mind back to the present. "No. Everything's fine."
"You went away for a moment." There was a frown of concern on her face.
"I have a habit of doing that," Erin quickly replied, grimacing an apology.
The frown didn't clear. "It didn't look like a good place, Erin. Are you okay with marrying Peter?"
"Yes. Yes, I am. He's a good man. I've never met better." That was the absolute truth.
Charlotte's expression turned reflective. "You know, I didn't love Damien when I married him. He more or less rescued me from a nasty situation and I took the chance he offered to turn humiliation into a triumph."
"You're very well matched."
"Yes." A wicked grin burst across her face. "And he's still the sexiest man in the world for me." One eye arched in provocative inquiry. "I take it you were hot for Peter when Jack was conceived?"
"Very much so," she answered wryly.
"Well, I don't know what went wrong between you two back then, but if that primal spark is still there, it sort of pushes you into growing closer together. Just don't hold back on it, Erin. Peter needs to be wanted for himself, you know. Not for what he can give."
"I know." She smiled to show that she understood. "Thank you, Charlotte."
Erin was only too aware of how much Peter was giving. It was an embarrassment of riches all going one way. She wasn't giving him anything except ready access to their son. Although she had given up control of her own life, her independence, and she couldn't help thinking that all Peter's gifts were aimed at sweetening her surrender to this marriage.
He wanted Jack.
But she wasn't sure he still wanted her.
He hadn't once tried to reignite the primal spark, not with a look, a kiss … no attempt whatsoever to establish any form of physical intimacy between them. It made Erin worry that, in his mind, she was still tainted by her lies of omission. She felt very nervous about what would happen tonight, when the wedding was over, how it would be as his wife, not just the mother of his child.
"Time for us to get going, Erin," Charlotte said. "Ready?"
"Yes, I'm ready."
Ready to seal the commitment she had made, for better or for worse. From the day of their son's birth, Peter had been driving her towards this moment. There was no turning back. Let it be done now, she thought on a wave of fateful resignation. Deal with what came after … after.
They went downstairs.
Her father was waiting in the grand foyer, ready to escort her to the marquee and give her away. He'd given her away when she was seven, Erin thought. Peter would never do that to Jack.
She had to make this marriage work.
Had to.
A princess … a gut-wrenchingly beautiful princess. Peter's heart started galloping as she walked down the aisle towards him. A surge of desire tightened his groin.
His bride.
The woman he'd wanted more than any other.
But she wasn't smiling.
Her gaze was tightly focused on him, not even a glance at the guests on either side of red carpet she trod with deliberately measured steps. Her chin was held high. Peter read determination on her face, and he was suddenly riven with doubt.
Had he done right by her in hemming her into this marriage?
Too late to change anything now.
And he didn't want to.
A fierce wave of possessiveness ran through him. Erin … Jack … both of them belonged with him. He would make her see it, make her believe it.
Yet he couldn't get rid of the doubt. It plagued him during the wedding service and throughout the reception afterwards. He put on a happy face. To Erin's credit she put on a happy face, too. They fulfilled the role of a happy couple in front of the sea of guests.
But it was a strain to Peter and he sensed the hidden tension in Erin, too. He was glad when ten o'clock came-the agreed time for Erin to slip away from the party to breast-feed Jack. The festive dinner had been eaten, the speeches were over, the cake had been cut, coffee was being served.
"I'll come with you," he said, keeping his arm hooked around hers as he guided her to the exit of the marquee.
She threw him a startled look. "You don't have to. You have so many friends here, Peter."
"I want to."
He didn't care if she preferred to be alone for a while. She was his bride, his wife, and be damned if he'd lose her, even for a moment, on this, their wedding night.
Her fingers fluttered nervously across his coat-sleeve, but she voiced no further protest. Once they were outside and on the path through the rose garden to the conservatory, he heard her suck in a deep breath as though she was short of oxygen.
"Thank you for the wedding, Peter," she said softly. "Everything's been beautiful."
Mega-wealth could buy everything beautiful, he thought cynically, but it can't buy the heart of a woman. At least he knew Erin hadn't married him for his billions.
"I wanted it to be a fairy-tale wedding for you, Erin," he said with a dash of irony, aware that love should have been at the centre of it. "Fit for the princess in the park," he added, remembering how taken he had been with her on that first day of meeting.
She stopped walking. He halted beside her, seeing the angst on her face as she shook her head, tensing, not knowing what it meant. Then she looked up at him, her beautiful green eyes filled with a vulnerability that squeezed his heart.
"You were my prince that day, Peter. I wish we could go there again. I regret, very much, deciding not to tell you I was the author. I just didn't want to spoil the fantasy. But I ended up spoiling everything. And I'm sorry … sorry … "
A wild hope soared through his mind. "I thought it meant you'd planned only a brief fling with me," he said, trying to explain his reaction to the deception.
"I did."
It was like a punch in the gut.
"I didn't believe that with you being who you are, and me being who I am, the attraction we had could lead to any real future together," she rushed on. "But I wanted so much to have you want me … "
"What about now, Erin?" he couldn't stop himself from asking, his desire for her racing hot through his veins, kicked into uncontrollable acceleration by the admission of the desire she had once felt so strongly for him. "Do you believe in a future for us now?" he pressed.
"You've made it so different to what I had imagined … expected … "
"Good different?"
"Oh, yes! Yes!" she cried so fervently, hope soared again, gathering a sense of triumph in the tactics he'd used to wipe out her fears and doubts.
"I want our marriage to work, Erin."
"So do I," she said with no lessening of fervour.
"Then it will," he said confidently.
He wanted to crush her to him. Only the fact that Jack might have woken up and be yelling with hunger held him back. He hugged her arm, bringing her closer to him as they walked on, their bodies touching, and he burned with the need to have her to himself all the way to the nursery.
The nanny had Jack cradled against her shoulder, patting his back. Erin whipped off her veil, draped it over the cot-rail, unzipped the wedding dress, lifted her arms out of the cap sleeves, let the bodice hang from her waist, unclipped a white lacy bra, removed it, slung it over the veil, moved quickly to the rocking chair-all this with her back turned to him. She picked up a towel which had been laid on the armrest of the chair, arranged it over one shoulder, then sat down, holding out her arms for their son.
The nanny gave him to her and Jack instantly latched onto one bared breast, sucking as though his life depended on it. Which it did, Peter thought, wishing that the bond between him and Erin were so simple. Her face was flushed. Was she embarrassed by his watching her breast-feed their child? He hadn't done it before, careful not to impinge on space and time which she might consider very personal and private.
He dismissed the nanny, saying they'd call her when they were ready to leave, and settled in another chair. Of course, there'd been another reason for staying out of the nursery at feeding time. As he had suspected it would be, he found watching Erin suckling their son almost unbearably erotic, tiny hands kneading her milk-laden breast, the absorption in the physical link between them. It was weird to feel jealous of his son, but he did, probably because it had been so long since he had known such an intimate connection with Erin.
"Is he always this hungry?" he asked, his voice gruff with too many raw emotions.
"Yes." She flicked him a look that seemed oddly desperate.
It disturbed him too much to let it pass. "Is my being here worrying you?"
"No." She shook her head vehemently.
She kept too much to herself. He realised now that it was habitual, ingrained from her childhood, her defence against the emotional upheaval of her parents' broken marriage-her road to self-survival, self-sufficiency-but understanding why it was so did not ease his frustration with it.