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‘You don’t need to do anything. You look lovely the way you are,’ he said softly.

His eyes searched her face, and she felt herself drowning. When he reached out and touched her face, she felt as though her whole body was on fire. He seemed to know it, because he said softly, ‘I’m married,’ as though waiting for permission to advance his suit.

She nodded. ‘I know,’ she said, trying to smile. ‘All the best ones are usually taken.’

‘It doesn’t stop me wanting you.’

He didn’t remove his hand from her arm, and she didn’t move from where she was standing – so close to him that she could feel his breath. She shivered with excitement. It had been so long since a man had touched her. In fact, she’d never wanted any man to touch her as much as she wanted this man to touch her. Desire raced through her like a forest fire.

‘I want to kiss you,’ he whispered, and she had no time to reply before his lips found hers and she was kissing him back.

It was as though that first kiss ignited a raging fire in both of them. Her hands were suddenly all over his body and his were on hers, and she was aching for more. Like two people possessed, they began tearing off each other’s clothes, leaving a trail of garments across the kitchen and hall as she led him upstairs to her bedroom.

In a frenzy of desire, they kissed and explored each other’s naked body, unable to get enough of each other. And each time he took her, she reached a shuddering crescendo of pleasure.

Later, as they lay sated, their bodies drenched with sweat, they looked at each other and smiled shyly.

‘I’m not going to apologise,’ he said, kissing her nose. ‘You are the most exciting woman I’ve ever met, and I want to make love to you over and over and over again …’

‘Then I’ll have to make sure I fall off my bike more often!’ she said, smiling.

Suddenly, his voice was husky again. ‘Please tell me I can visit you again tomorrow?’

‘Yes,’ she whispered.

‘In fact,’ he said, leaning towards her, ‘I don’t think I can wait till tomorrow.’

As he reached for her, desire coursed through her again. And even though she was exhausted from their earlier coupling, he brought her to ecstasy once more.

The following evening, just as she arrived home from work, a delivery van arrived and deposited a shiny, new, state-of-the-art bicycle with five-speed gears at her front door. An envelope was taped to the front basket and as soon as the deliveryman had gone, she tore it open with shaking hands, pulling out the note inside. It read: ‘I’m so glad you came crashing into my life yesterday. I can’t wait to see you again.’ He’d signed his initial at the bottom.

Clasping the note to her chest, she felt a surge of joy running through her body. Yesterday clearly meant as much to him as it had to her. All day at work she’d been thinking of him, and when she’d caught a glimpse of him in his office as she walked by, her heart had leaped in her chest with joy.

Because of her excitement, Ellie didn’t give much thought to the fact that this was a seminal moment in her life. There was still time to alter its course. But she silenced the warning bells that reminded her he was married, and the father of a young son. The excitement she felt – the feeling of being more alive than she’d ever felt before – negated everything else.

C
HAPTER
3

I
n a sumptuous room off the hotel lobby, the champagne reception was in full swing. Laura smiled appreciatively at her new husband, who was talking to some friends of his from the badminton club. Jeff looked so handsome in his dress suit, his blond hair curling over his ears, his eyes a little glazed from all the champagne he’d been drinking.

‘Congratulations – you look radiant, Laura!’ her lecturer colleague, Maria, said, giggling as she emptied her champagne glass and deftly grabbed another from a passing waiter. ‘Jeff’s such a handsome guy – and a stockbroker to boot! Some women have all the luck!’

Laura nodded. She couldn’t be happier, and she loved being surrounded by all her colleagues on this very special day. She smiled as she watched Timmy, another lecturer from the Sociology Department, trying to impress Greta, the department secretary, with his version of the moonwalk, which wasn’t an easy feat, given the amount of champagne he’d already consumed. Several of Kerry’s colleagues from Sea Diagnostics, the engineering company where she was a partner, were also hovering around the bar. Laura waved across the room to Kerry’s colleagues, Norma and Jack, who were involved in some kind of shot-drinking competition. She suspected there would be quite a few hangovers needing a cure the following day!

She glanced across at Jeff, who was now talking to Kerry
– she was glad that her best friend and husband seemed to be chatting together happily. It was so important to her that they got along. She was well aware of Kerry’s initial apathy towards Jeff, but she’d noticed that Kerry had been making a real effort to be friendly towards Jeff, and she silently applauded her for it. Her best friend was bound to feel a little left out – after all, they’d been friends since childhood, separated only during the six years immediately after Laura’s family died, when she’d moved away to live with her grandfather. But they’d always kept in touch, and had eventually managed to attend the same university. Their lives had been closely linked for many years, which meant that Laura’s marriage would undoubtedly bring about a change in their friendship, although she intended making every effort to ensure that Kerry didn’t feel left out.

Professor Darren Coyle, head of the Department, sidled up and slipped an arm around her. His thick glasses were askew, his normally neat, dark hair was falling untidily over his forehead and he was inebriated from the champagne. Laura felt a surge of affection for him as they hugged. She was pleased to have him with her on such an important day.

‘You look the picture of happiness, Laura!’ he slurred, planting a kiss on her cheek. ‘I hope you won’t let Jeff take you away from us? You know how much we all love working with you!’

‘Of course not!’ Laura told him, smiling. ‘I love my job too much.’

For a moment, Darren looked puzzled. ‘Oh. I thought Jeff said something about you giving up work –’

Laura shook her head. ‘Definitely not! It’ll take more than marriage to prise me away from all of you!’

On the other side of the room, Jeff was still in conversation with Kerry.

As he looked down triumphantly at her, he raised his glass of champagne. ‘Now Laura’s mine – all mine!’

Kerry smiled. ‘Congratulations to you both!’ she said, choosing not to let him know that she’d got his message. In effect, he was telling her that he’d soon see to it that he became the centre of Laura’s universe, and that his new wife would have little time left to spend with her friend.

Kerry kept the smile on her face as she walked across to the bar to top up her champagne glass. She’d be there when Laura needed her, as she suspected she eventually would. Kerry had no doubt that Jeff would soon reach his sell-by date. But Laura would be the last to realise it.

After a pleasant reception, a delightful wedding meal and a cheery send-off from their friends and colleagues, Jeff and Laura returned to Jeff’s luxurious apartment.

‘I just wish my family had been there today,’ Laura said wistfully, as she closed the front door. ‘That would have been the icing on the cake …’

‘You’re lucky to have no family!’ Jeff retorted angrily. ‘My parents beat me constantly, so I’m grateful that
they
weren’t there!’

Laura was stunned and more than a little shocked by his remark. It seemed particularly thoughtless to dismiss the loss of her parents and brother so insensitively. But she supposed he himself was hurting and hadn’t realised how cruel it sounded. Hers had been a loving family, whereas Jeff had only ever known violence.

Suddenly, being back in the apartment seemed such an anticlimax after all the excitement of the wedding.

‘Did you say anything to Darren about me giving up work?’

Jeff shrugged his shoulders. ‘I might have mentioned that
we’ll be starting a family soon, and then you won’t have time to work.’

Laura looked at him incredulously. ‘Jeff, whether I work or not when we have kids will be a shared decision! I’ll probably prefer to keep up my lecturing, and use the university crèche for our children. Anyway, we’ll decide that together when the time comes, won’t we?’

Jeff said nothing, then he turned to her eagerly. ‘But you’re going to take my name, aren’t you?’

Laura looked at him in surprise. ‘Well, no, I wasn’t intending to. I mean, I’m known in my profession as Laura Thornton – I’d rather not confuse things.’

Jeff looked hurt. ‘But I want us to be a single, loving family unit! Won’t it be odd for our children if their parents have different names?’

Laura smiled mischievously. ‘Well then, why don’t you take my name? Then we can all be Thorntons!’

Jeff scowled. ‘Maybe I should just change my name to “hen-pecked” and be done with it!’

Laura smiled. ‘Why is it okay for a woman to change her name, but not a man?’

Jeff shrugged his shoulders, but didn’t answer. Then he began hassling her again. ‘Seriously, wouldn’t it be better if we were all called Jones?’ he wheedled.

He looked so earnest that Laura had to smile. ‘Look, I’ll think about it,’ she replied. ‘But I really don’t see why it’s so important –’

‘Well, if it’s not so important to you, why don’t you just agree, since it matters so much to
me
? Laura, I just want us all to share the same name, and be a real family!’

Knowing Jeff’s history, Laura relented. If creating their own little family unit was so important to him, then maybe she should be willing to give way on this one. After all, wasn’t
marriage all about compromise? Besides, his insistence made her feel cherished – he was obviously looking towards a long and happy future together.

‘Okay, then. I’ll become Laura Jones.’

‘Oh, love, you don’t know how happy that makes me!’ Jeff said, his eyes alight with joy. ‘I feel as though you’re really going to be mine now! Oh, Laura, I love you so much! Let’s hope we’ll have lots of little Joneses as well!’

Laura smiled as he hugged her tightly. It was really such a small thing to do, yet it made Jeff so happy. And she was pleased that she could make him feel good. After his awful childhood, she wanted so much to make up for it and to help him build a wonderful future with her.

C
HAPTER
4

A
s they curled up together in Ellie’s bed, Alan stroked his lover’s cheek tenderly. They’d been seeing each other daily for several weeks now, and each bout of lovemaking was just as exciting as the last.

Even going to work each morning was proving exhilarating. Ellie felt like a teenager in the throes of first love, and she lived for occasional glimpses of Alan in his office. He, too, had started coming to the laboratory on flimsy pretexts, and Ellie feared that someone would soon notice how deeply she blushed whenever he entered the room.

‘This has got to stop,’ Ellie begged him. ‘Someone is going to notice before long. I just want to touch you all the time.’

Alan agreed with her. ‘But I can’t stay away from you! We’re going to have to find a way of spending more time together.’

And now Alan felt he’d found it.

‘If you were to leave the factory, I could visit you any time – at lunchtime, in the afternoon, in the evening – and no one would ever know.’

As she opened her mouth to protest, he silenced her with a kiss. ‘I could continue to pay your wages, so you’d maintain the same lifestyle as before. But we could then spend much more time together. What do you think?’

Ellie pretended to consider his offer, but already her mind was made up. Why be employed if she could pay her mortgage with far less effort? She’d be able to devote her life to loving Alan full-time. Because, by now, she’d admitted to herself that she was deeply in love with him.

Luckily, she’d never made any close friends at the factory. The laboratory staff were few in number, and contact with the factory workers was limited to the times when she collected batch samples for testing. During her marriage to John, she’d gone straight home after work rather than going to the factory social club or local pub. Now all that could work to her advantage. Other than factory manager, Tony Coleman – who clearly fancied her – the other workers left her more or less alone. If she gave up working at the factory, she wouldn’t need to worry about a trail of visitors to her home to disrupt her secret relationship with Alan.

‘Okay, I’ll do it,’ she said, her eyes shining. ‘I’ll leave the factory.’

Alan hugged her. ‘Oh, Ellie, it’s going to be wonderful! We’ll be able to create our own little world at Treetops, where no one else can touch us.’

Everyone at the factory was surprised to hear that Ellie was leaving. She smiled glibly as she lied about her plans for setting up a home tutoring business, providing one-to-one private lessons in science subjects for students.

Tony Coleman was clearly disappointed. He’d always tried to create opportunities to talk to her when she visited the factory floor to take batch samples for testing in the laboratory. He seemed to view these chats as some kind of proof that they were ultimately destined for each other. Which was never going to happen, as far as Ellie was concerned!

On the day of her leaving party, Alan was among the first to arrive at the social club. He bought drinks for everyone before making a short speech about Ellie’s value as an employee, how much she’d be missed, and wishing her well in her new business venture. After a round of applause from all her colleagues, Tony claimed her for a dance as the small combo in the corner began playing. Soon, the small dance floor was crowded, but Ellie could feel Alan’s eyes on her as she and Tony jived. She knew he’d be trying his best not to look at her, but he’d be unable to help himself.