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  He sent her a sideways glance, his eyes glinting darkly. ‘I’m not a simple-peck sort of guy. If I’m going to kiss someone I’m going to damn well do it properly.’

  Mia felt a fluttery feeling between her thighs at his statement. She was already well aware of his kissing skill and couldn’t help wondering what it would be like to experience his whole lovemaking repertoire. She imagined he would be a demanding but consummate lover who would take his partner to the very heights of sensual experience.

  Her gaze strayed to his hands where they rested on the steering wheel, her skin tightening all over at the thought of those long, tanned fingers touching her intimately. How would it feel to have him stroke her…?

  Bryn caught the tail end of her glance, noting her heightened colour and the agitated look on her face. ‘If you’re feeling a bit nervous about meeting my great-aunt, don’t be. I’m sure you’ll take to her immediately; she’s that sort of person.’

  ‘I’m not nervous…’ she said and began chewing at her bottom lip.

  He sent her one more thoughtful look but she had turned her head and was looking out of the window, her fingers playing absently with the engagement ring on her hand.

  The private palliative-care unit Agnes Dwyer was residing in had a peaceful atmosphere and was beautifully landscaped with sweet-smelling roses that could be viewed from every window.

  Bryn’s great-aunt was in a room overlooking a trickling fountain adorned with cupids and dolphins, the sound of wind chimes signalling the movement of the summer breeze across the exquisite garden.

  Mia looked at the emaciated figure lying on the bed, the sunken eyes closed, the hollow papery cheeks speaking of a life long lived and now coming to its inevitable end.

  Her heart contracted painfully as she glanced up at Bryn. His expression, unguarded for a fraction of a second revealed the depth of his emotions at the loss he must soon face.

  ‘Aunt Aggie,’ he said softly, taking his great-aunt’s hand in his.

  Mia watched as the old woman’s eyes opened and gradually focused.

  ‘Oh, darling…you caught me napping.’ She struggled upright with Bryn’s gentle, solicitous help and met Mia’s clear grey gaze at the end of the bed. ‘Come here, my dear, and let me look at you. My eyes are not as good as they used to be.’

  Mia stepped forward and took the thin hand that had reached for hers. ‘Hello.’

  ‘My, oh, my, but you’re gorgeous,’ Agnes said. ‘One of the nurses brought in the papers this morning but you are even more beautiful than the photographs in them.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Mia said shyly.

  Agnes smiled. ‘You are just as I hoped Bryn’s future wife would be.’

  ‘I—I am?’

  ‘Yes, indeed. I so wanted him to find someone genuine. You have a big heart; I can see it in those big grey eyes of yours. You are perfect for him.’

  Mia felt the daggers of guilt prod at her sharply. She could barely stand to look into the old woman’s eyes in case she saw the truth about her relationship with her great-nephew.

  ‘I—I’m glad you think so…’ she said, lowering her gaze and hating herself for yet another lie as she added, ‘He’s perfect for me too.’

  ‘I knew it would be this way. His parents were the same, you know. When my nephew first met Bryn’s mother it was love at first sight.’ The old woman gave a sad little sigh. ‘But they didn’t get the chance to live the life they should have had together…’

  Mia could sense Bryn’s discomfiture at his great-aunt’s disclosure and her heart went out to him again for what he must have suffered. She felt uncomfortable with the way she had judged him so rashly; it didn’t seem right to have written him off as a self-serving playboy, given what he’d been through. No wonder he lived life so shallowly when life had let him down so early.

  ‘It was a long time ago,’ he inserted gruffly.

  ‘I know, darling, but now that I am facing…well, you know what I’m facing…I can’t help feeling that I could have done more for you.’

  ‘That’s totally ridiculous and you know it,’ he said. ‘You’ve been the most wonderful support. I couldn’t have asked for a better guardian.’

  ‘But I wasn’t the real thing, was I?’ Agnes said. ‘I was just a substitute for the real thing. I could never be enough. I could never be your parents, no matter how much I tried to be.’

  ‘Please don’t say that…’ Bryn said, squeezing her hand gently.

  ‘Darling, darling boy,’ Agnes sighed and, giving his hand an affectionate pat, turned her head to Mia. ‘You will have to take over from me, sweet child, and love him when I’m gone. It won’t be long now…’

  Mia swallowed the solid lump of emotion in her throat. She could feel the sting of tears at the backs of her eyes and her chest felt as if someone had clamped it in a vice. Guilt assailed her and passed over her skin like a scalding burn.

  ‘I will love him…for you and for me…’ she said softly. ‘He’s a wonderful man…’

  ‘I’m so very glad you think so,’ Agnes said through misty eyes. ‘Very few people know the real Bryn, but I can rest in peace now that I know he has found someone who loves him for who he really is. It’s not easy being in the public eye, but then you’d know all about that, being an actor yourself.’

  ‘I’m not a very good one, I’m afraid…’ Mia said with downcast eyes.

  ‘Your modesty is delightful,’ Agnes said. ‘But perhaps Bryn was right when he wrote that review, although he was a very naughty boy to put it quite the way he did.’ She sent her great-nephew a mock-reproving glance before turning back to Mia. ‘You were miscast. You have a delightful air of innocence about you which is so rare these days.’

  Mia wondered just how innocent Bryn’s great-aunt would consider her if she knew what was really going on between her and Bryn.

  ‘We mustn’t tire you,’ Bryn said to his great-aunt. ‘We’ll leave you to rest for now. I’ll pop by again later.’

  ‘Thank you, darling.’ Agnes took Mia’s hand again and gave it a tiny squeeze. ‘You probably haven’t even had time to discuss when you’re getting married but personally I’m not a great believer in long engagements. In this day and age, when practically everyone is cohabiting, what is the point? Besides, I haven’t got much time left. It would be a dream come true to see my Bryn happily married. I know it’s a lot to ask, but I do so want to be there on your special day if it’s at all possible.’

  ‘I want you to be there too,’ Mia said, swiping at an escaping tear.

  Bryn slipped his arm around her waist and drew her closer as he addressed his great-aunt. ‘We’ll let you know as soon as we have a date set.’

  ‘Thank you, darling…I’m sorry to be such a bother.’

  Bryn stooped down to kiss his great-aunt’s cheek. ‘You could never be a bother. Now, have a good rest and I’ll see you later.’

  Mia slipped out of Bryn’s embrace to kiss his elderly relative, her eyes bright with tears as she straightened. ‘It was lovely to meet you.’

  ‘You have made me so very happy,’ Agnes said. ‘I cannot think of a more wonderful partner for Bryn.’

  Mia was blubbering uncontrollably by the time they got back to where Bryn had parked his car. She began to hunt for a tissue when he pressed a clean white handkerchief into her hand, his expression thoughtful as his dark blue eyes met her streaming ones.

  ‘I’m sorry…’ she choked out. ‘I just can’t help it…’

  ‘It’s all right,’ he said and drew her up against him, his hand going to the back of her head to bring her head to his chest.

  ‘It’s just so sad…’ she sniffed. ‘I don’t know how you can bear it…it reminds me of when my granny died…I still feel emotional every time I see someone with grey hair and it’s been seven years.’

  Bryn kept stroking his fingers through her hair, his chest feeling a little strange as he breathed in the fragrance of her light but unforgettable perfume.

  Mia lifted
her head to look up at him, her eyes red-rimmed and swollen and her bottom lip still trembling with emotion. ‘I feel so guilty lying to her…I know you’re going to think this is really weird, or dumb even, but I wish we had fallen in love…’ She gave another little sniff and added, ‘I wish this was really true and not just an act.’

  Bryn stared down at her uptilted face and felt another gear shift in his chest. Something warm and indefinable began to slowly spread and then fill him inside as he thought about being loved for real by her.

  The only person he had ever felt truly loved by since he’d lost his parents was his great-aunt. The truth was, he hadn’t always been that lovable. Although he’d always denied it, he had been seriously traumatised by his parents’ death. He had never been able to find it within himself to forgive the person responsible for taking his parents from him.

  He’d been a lonely, angry child and his behaviour throughout his childhood and adolescence had been nothing short of deplorable. Even as an adult he’d been selfish and arrogant, riding roughshod over people with a ruthless disregard for their feelings. To a very large degree his bad-boy image had propelled him into the success he’d experienced and most of the time he played it to the hilt. The public expected him to be cutting and sarcastic, it was his trademark, but it wasn’t who he really was or indeed who he really wanted to be.

  ‘Does this mean you’ve decided to go ahead with our marriage?’ he asked after a little pause.

  ‘I don’t see how I can possibly say no,’ she answered somewhat grimly. ‘Agnes is dying…it seems so unfair not to grant her this last wish, even if it is all an act.’ She bit her lip and then released it to add uncertainly, ‘I guess I can see it through for a week or two…’

  ‘We have to see this through, Mia, no matter how compromised each of us feels. I don’t want her to know this is all an act. It would destroy her.’

  ‘I know…’ she said and eased herself out of his embrace. ‘I just feel uncomfortable…I’m being paid to be your wife. It just seems so…so…you know…terribly tacky.’

  ‘You’re thinking too much,’ he said as he unlocked the car. ‘It’s just money and I have plenty, so you don’t need to worry on that score. Think of it as any other acting job. I’m sure every actor has been assigned roles that aren’t quite to their taste, but they do it for the money.’

  Mia frowned as she got in and fastened her seat belt. It wasn’t the money she was really worried about, she knew he had plenty and what he was paying her would hardly make a dent in it, and it would certainly solve her sister’s dilemma. It was what he couldn’t give her that worried her more. She was being paid to pretend to love a man she had previously thought unlovable, but somehow as he’d held her a few moments ago she had felt a tiny flicker of something deep inside, as if something was trying to make its way out to the surface but was being blocked in some way.

  She sneaked a glance at him as he drove out of the car park. His expression was mostly inscrutable except for the tiny glitter of sadness she thought she could see in his dark eyes. But, as if he sensed her looking at him, he reached for his sunglasses on the dashboard and put them on his face and she was shut out once more.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  THE next few days passed in a whirlwind of activity that left Mia spinning. There was legal work to be dealt with and, although she felt uncomfortable signing documents that were so legally binding, she did it for the sake of Bryn’s great-aunt. She just couldn’t stop thinking about the older woman’s life coming to an end and how it would impact on Bryn. She was his last living relative. Once she died there would be no one else but him. His final link with his parents would be gone.

  As far as she could tell he had spoken to no one about his dying relative. Jocey Myers had only found out by a quirk of fate. There had been nothing mentioned in any of the newspaper articles about Agnes Dwyer’s role in his life and certainly no mention of the tragic loss of his parents when he was a child. She wondered if he did it deliberately, as Jocey had suggested, to keep his hard-as-nails image in place or whether there was some other reason.

  The Press went wild when the news broke of their impending marriage; requests for interviews flew thick and fast and wherever she went paparazzi followed, hoping for a candid shot of Bryn Dwyer’s intended bride.

  It made Mia totally rethink her life-long dream to be famous. Now fame was becoming a reality she found she hated it. She couldn’t do the most basic things without being followed; even going for her morning run or thrice-weekly visits to the gym became an exercise of subterfuge in order to escape the intrusion of journalists and cameras.

  Bryn, on the other hand, seemed to take it all in his stride. He insisted they dine out regularly and she was forced to put on a bright smile and accompany him to yet another high-profile restaurant.

  ‘I don’t know how you stand this,’ she said at the end of the second week of their engagement. They were in a harbourside restaurant and had only been seated for three minutes when a rush of fans had come up for autographs and impromptu phone-camera photos.

  ‘It’ll soon pass,’ he reassured her. ‘Once we’re married they’ll leave us alone.’

  ‘I certainly hope so…’ She toyed with the stem of her glass agitatedly as the maître d’ ushered the last of the lingering diners back to their tables.

  Bryn gave her a quizzical look. ‘I thought your goal in life was to be famous. Isn’t that what every actor wants?’

  She let out a tiny sigh. ‘There’s fame and there’s fame. I guess I didn’t really think about it too much…you know…how it would be if I ever made it into the big time.’

  ‘How long have you wanted to be an actor?’ he asked.

  He watched as her mouth tilted engagingly, his chest feeling that little fish hook tug again. ‘I think I was about four or five years old,’ she said. ‘I’m a middle child and apparently I was always trying to be the centre of attention. It was the Christmas pageant when I was in kindergarten that finally decided it for me. I was cast as the front end of a donkey in the nativity play and that was it. I decided I wanted to be on stage. I went to ballet and tap classes and gymnastics and joined the school swimming team and then a junior drama club when I could finally persuade my parents to pay for it. My poor mum was run off her feet ferrying me back and forth to everything.’

  ‘Tell me about your family.’

  ‘Well…’ She smiled fondly as she met his eyes. ‘My mum and dad have been happily married for nearly thirty years. They are wonderful, just as parents should be. I have a sister, Ashleigh, a year older than me, who’s married to Jake and they have a son and a little daughter. I adore them. I have a younger sister, Ellie, who’s adopted. She’s fantastic.’

  ‘So you’re a close family?’

  Mia gave him a very direct look. ‘There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for my family. I would give my life up for any one of them at a moment’s notice.’

  He returned her look for a lengthy period before asking, ‘Have you told them about us?’

  She chewed her lip for a moment and lowered her gaze. ‘My younger sister is…somewhere in the wilds of the Amazon. My parents are overseas at the moment with Jake and Ashleigh and the kids, so I haven’t got around to it. I’m not sure I want them to rush home for a wedding that’s not really real. Apart from a quick visit to London a few years ago, this is the first European trip my parents have had since they were married, so I didn’t want to ruin it for them.’

  ‘I hardly think attending their daughter’s wedding is going to ruin their holiday,’ Bryn said.

  Mia looked up at him with a slight frown. ‘But it’s not as if it’s a proper wedding. What would be the point? Besides, as soon as your great-aunt…’ she faltered over the words ‘…passes away the marriage will be annulled.’

  He gave her another lengthy look, his eyes very dark as they held hers. ‘What if my great-aunt doesn’t die in the next few weeks?’

  Her hands gripped the edges of the seat. ‘Wh
-what do you mean?’

  ‘I was speaking to her oncologist earlier today,’ he said. ‘Her condition has improved remarkably since she heard the news of our engagement. Her spirits have lifted and she’s making a real effort to eat again; the last bout of chemotherapy hit her hard but she’s put on a bit of weight and has more energy.’

  ‘But that’s a good thing, surely?’ Then at his wry look she stumbled on, ‘I mean…for your great-aunt, that is…maybe it’s not so good for me…us…well, you know what I mean…’

  ‘Of course it’s a good thing for Agnes, but it may mean we will have to continue our charade for a bit longer than I initially expected.’

  Mia lowered her gaze to her wine glass as she considered the possibility of being married to him for months on end. The very last thing she wanted was to hurry up his great-aunt’s death, but living with a man as his wife for several months was just asking for trouble, especially with a man like Bryn. She was already fighting an attraction to him that was threatening to get out of hand.

  ‘How…how long do you think we’ll have to stay married?’ she asked after a little silence.

  He picked up his wine glass and took a sip before answering. ‘It’s hard to put a time on it. Three or four months.’

  She swallowed thickly. ‘That’s a long time…’

  His mouth twisted. ‘It’s not such a long time when you’re the one who is terminally ill.’

  ‘No…no, I guess not…’

  He reached into his top pocket and handed her a card with the name of one of Sydney’s top bridal designers on it. ‘I’ve organised an open account for you to purchase what you need. I’ve also deposited funds in your bank account which you will no doubt need to draw on in preparation for our wedding.’

  Mia found it a little unsettling for him to be discussing their marriage in such terms. She couldn’t help wondering what it would have been like planning a proper wedding, with both parties excited at celebrating the most important day of their lives. Her sister Ashleigh’s wedding to Jake after four long years of separation had been one of the most moving experiences she’d ever had. There hadn’t been a dry eye in the house and even now, more than a year later, the photos of that special day still brought tears to Mia’s eyes.