LITMIR.BIZ

      CHAPTER ONE

      ‘NO.’

      The single, emphatic syllable was the one word no one was expecting to hear. In the circumstances, it was the last thing any of the congregation in the tiny village church could have anticipated.

      It was just one word, but it was enough to shatter the happy, festive atmosphere of what should have been India’s most wonderful day and turn it into the worst nightmare she had ever had.

      Only seconds before, her uncle, the celebrant, had smiled encouragement at the couple standing before him, his eyes meeting India’s green ones through the fine lace of her veil.

      ‘And now we come to the most important point in the service—your vows. Aidan...’

      The man at his niece’s side had straightened noticeably. His dark head had lifted, his shoulders going back as if in preparation for the responsibility he was about to undertake. The slight movement had drawn India’s eyes to him at once. She’d seen the tension stamped onto his face, the tightness of the muscles around his strong jaw. Immediately all her own nerves had vanished, her earlier tremulous smile growing, becoming stronger.

      She would never have believed that her husband-to-be would share her own apprehension at this important moment, and the realisation that he did had warmed her heart, making her slide her hand into his at his side. She had been just a little disconcerted to find that Aidan made no response. Instead he had simply let her hand rest where it was, not closing his own strong fingers around it as she had expected.

      ‘Aidan, do you take India to be your wife...?’

      The familiar words, heard so many times before at other, far less personally significant moments, had echoed round the small medieval church, seeming to hang in the air along with the delicate scent of the banks of cream and gold flowers that framed the altar.

      India’s heart had skipped a beat at the thought that the moment she had been waiting for was finally here. In just a few more seconds it would all be official and she would be Aidan’s wife, no longer India Marchant but India Wolfe.

      ‘Until death do you part?’

      Until death do you part. She would be Aidan’s, and he hers for the rest of her life.

      The idea was so amazing that it had stopped her thought processes, leaving her unaware of the fact that her uncle was no longer speaking, his ritual question complete.

      By the time she’d registered that fact, the silence that had followed had already become just a little too drawn out, too significant to be simply the result of the need to take a steadying breath or impose the necessary control to be able to answer with confidence. The seconds had dragged on and on, extending the wait into a nerve-stretching endurance test.

      ‘Aidan?’

      William Marchant’s questioning prompt had been echoed by a spontaneous murmur of curious interest from the congregation, crammed into the dark wooden pews in the body of the church. Behind the ornate lace of her veil, India hadn’t been able to help smiling to herself at the thought that her family and friends might have anticipated that the bride might find her courage had deserted her at this vital moment, but not the groom.

      At least, not this particular groom. Aidan Wolfe, the notorious ‘Lone Wolfe’; a man with a reputation for being a ruthless businessman with a mind like a steel trap, so unsure of himself that he was lost for words? Never!

      ‘Aidan—do you take...?’

      ‘No.’

      It came out harshly, almost savagely. The single word slashed through the priest’s reiteration of the question with a cold violence that stopped it dead, creating a silence so complete, so taut, that it was as if all the air in the church had suddenly frozen into a sheet of ice, obliterating all sound.

      No?

      The word rang inside India’s head like the stunning aftermath of a violent blow to her skull, and she felt as if all the air had been driven from her lungs, leaving her gasping for breath. He couldn’t have said...

      No?

      Her lips formed the word but no sound came out. With her green eyes wide and dark with shock, her face losing all colour, she could only stare at the man she had come here to marry.

      Aidan’s hard profile was etched against one of the small, paned windows. His proud, dark head was held high, revealing the strongly carved bone structure that gave his features a power that went far beyond the restrictions of such inadequate descriptions as ‘handsome’.

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