Wedding-Night Baby Read Online Free

opposite her. Her head turned as if pulled by invisible strings and her stomach muscles clenched painfully.
    The first time she’d seen him she’d been blind to everything else, but now she was uncomfortably conscious of the man beside her. Disturbingly she wanted to turn her head and look at him. The memory of the fleeting sensation she’d experienced when she’d first seen him washed over her. Had Alex ever made her feel like that? What a ridiculous time to admit how physically attractive she found her escort, she told herself crossly.
    Alex was an extremely good-looking young man, tallish, athletic. His features were regular, his expression sincere and forthright. The teeth were standard toothpaste-advert stuff and his naturally blond hair was highlighted with exquisite restraint.
    The loss and bitterness she felt were suddenly physical. When Alex’s eyes passed over her without any sign of
recognition she didn’t know whether to be glad or devastated. The city gloss she’d worked hard to achieve obviously worked. Pity she was still the same girl underneath the expensive clothes and make-up.
    The large hand that suddenly clasped her jaw woke her from the short, intense abstraction. As her head turned life flowed back into her body, and it hurt, like icy fingers when the circulation in them began to move once more. ‘I take exception when a woman with me looks at another man like a drooling idiot.’ Low, conversational, his words made her blink. His face had come in close, the whole incident having the appearance of intimacy.
    â€˜How dare you?’ she spat. The arrogance of the man was breathtaking. ‘So long as you’re paid, it’s no concern of yours what I do. Don’t get carried away with your role,’ she advised tartly. She felt humiliated at being caught out in the sort of behaviour she’d sworn to herself she’d not indulge in. Her anger, perfectly logically, was aimed at the only person who’d noticed her momentary weakness and who had had the tasteless effrontery to mention the fact.
    â€˜It’s a waste of time to spend money on a love-struck swain if you behave with the discretion of an adolescent. Why should I waste my time and effort to act the lover if you aren’t going to co-operate?’
    She was instantly stung by the insinuation that to act the lover required a vast amount of effort. ‘Because you’re being paid to do so,’ she hissed venomously. ‘So save the temperament. What are you anyway—an out-of-work actor? If you must know, you aren’t at all what I wanted. I require an escort, not a soul mate, so stop working so hard. Unless you’re an excellent liar you’ll end up making fools of us both. My mother’s interrogation techniques are honed to perfection,’ she told him drily, aware of the sharp eyes watching their every move.
    He gave a snort. ‘If that—’ he jerked his head in the
direction of the groom ‘—is your taste, I find it easy to believe I’m not what the doctor ordered. Take a dummy from the average shop window and you could have a facsimile of your perfect mate.’ The curl of his lip was openly derisory.
    Her bosom swelled with outrage. ‘How dare you?’ The long-entrenched habit of thinking Alex encapsulated masculine perfection made her eyes flash.
    â€˜Without any great effort,’ he murmured with casual, almost bored provocation. ‘You do keep saying that, or hadn’t you noticed? Repetition is a sign of a limited intellect, so I’ve heard.’
    â€˜Do they employ many intellectual giants at the escort agency?’ she was pushed into responding sarcastically.
    â€˜One for every snobbish client.’
    Absurdly she felt suddenly apprehensive; there was something about the softness in his voice and the contrasting hardness in his deceptively guileless eyes Mentally she shook herself for having such fanciful