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He wondered uneasily whether Heather was right, whether histo find ‘the right woman’ What was it omen and their pointless belief that a perfectly satisfactory life wasn’t possible unless there was soround?

‘So what do you suggest?’ he asked heavily ‘And stop standing there by the door! You’reme feel uncomfortable’

‘Well, we can’t have that, can we?’ Heather said acidly, but she took up position on one of the chairs ‘I don’t knohat to suggest, except that we can’t carry on deceiving Katherine’

‘We’re deceiving no one!’

‘Maybe you don’t see it that way, but I do’

‘So, in other words, we either break things off right now or else hat? Get engaged? Start looking for wedding rings?’ Just when he had got used to having her around, he could sense her gearing up to take flight Again What was it about this woman?

‘Of course not,’ Heatherher to marry him For her, he was her one and only love The situation into which she had drifted with Brian had been based on what other people had expected of them This was the real deal

‘You’d like that, wouldn’t you?’ Leo said softly, narrowing his eyes on her pinkened cheeks So hinored it

‘I…I don’t knohat you’re talking about,’ Heather staround threatened to open up under her feet

‘It would have been easy to laugh off Katherine’s roed your shoulders and told her that ere just having a bit of fun, nothing serious My ht woman, and I wouldn’t know about that because she’s never mentioned that to ine she would be shocked at the reality that a ht have been attracted to one another, ht have initiated a relationship Buther up to speed with the truth Did it suit you to let her think that there was so on between us?’

‘No!’ Had it? Had she been unable to conceal her starryeyed response to Katherine’s scrutiny? She had tumbled like a blindfolded idiot into love with Leo, and had his mother spotted that even before she herself had?

‘Are you sure about that, Heather?’ He was very slowly co to terreat deal more into their relationship than she had cared to let on He had originally thought that their mutual physical attraction was just too powerful for her to resist, had forced her down frooody principles she had been so keen to spout when they had met She had mouthed assurances that it was all about the physical attraction because he wasn’t her type, and, since that had made perfect sense to a man as physical deep down to the core, he hadn’t stopped to question the apparent ease hich she had embarked on their affair

Now, of course, he knew that she was not a woman to whom sex was the be all and end all of a relationship Her principles were deeply ingrained in her, and only noas it dawning on him that she had fallen in love with him

He should be running scared This was the very last thing he wanted Indeed, in the aftere, he had made a determined effort never to find himself in a situation such as this He wasn’t scared—in fact, he felt weirdly pleased—but co

‘I’rabs,’ he said in a cool,this conversation before There had been the occasional woive, and he had had to do the letdown speech, although by the ti Frankly, by then, he had usually seen the signs of over-dependency and had dealt with the inevitable with a certain a to analyse that, because the net result was the saret that he would have to forgo the splendours of her body He was ashamed to admit to himself that he wasn’t ready

Heather was mortified ‘I know that,’ she said quickly

‘Do you?’

‘Of course I do!’

‘Then why did you allow yourself to fall for me?’