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  “But you’ve changed.”

  Kate lifted her head from his shoulder, drew back so that she could look at Sean’s face, the face she loved so very much. How much should she tell him? There was only one answer to that—he deserved to know everything and she knew he would accept no less.

  “Mum went into the home a few weeks after we split up—it all happened very quickly, because I reached the breaking point. I couldn’t cope anymore. I visited her regularly but when I was forced to take a break, that’s when I took a look at my life, past, present and future.”

  “What happened then, a chuisle?” he prompted when she paused, lost in the past.

  “Sheer bloody hell. It was supposed to be my cue to find the real me again, but…I hit rock bottom.” Kate’s voice was barely more than a whisper, the destruction of that time something that she didn’t want to relive or burden Sean with. “Jilly still doesn’t know about the time I spent on antidepressants, trying to get myself straight.”

  She shouldn’t have told him. When she saw the pain that dimmed his beautiful eyes, she wanted to wrap her arms around him and take it all away. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have—“

  “Gone through all that alone. Dear God, Kate, what were you thinking?” he asked, his voice as gentle and loving as his arms.

  “That it was my problem to deal with.” It was as simple as that. “I came off the medication when it had done its job. I was able to sleep again and think again and deal with finding out who I really am. And when the time came, deal with Mum finally being released from her living hell.”

  “I’m sorry, a rúnsearc.”

  She shook her head vigorously. “No. Don’t be sorry, Sean. I started grieving for her the day she was diagnosed. The day I took her to the home and left her there, that was the day I really lost her, the day I cried as if she had actually died. When all comes to all, she was still my mother and she would have been horrified to see what happened to her.”

  Kate took a deep breath. Here was where it all ended. It was in the past, it was history—it had taken Sean from her once and she wasn’t going to let it do that again. “Sean, you had three questions. I called you that night at the hotel because I needed to apologize. Now you know why I split us up. The final question is why there’s never been anyone else.”

  She kissed his cheek. “I could say that it was purely because I was so messed up, had so much to deal with—that would be part of the truth, a very small part that would be more of an afterthought than anything else.

  “The main reason—the only reason, as far as I’m concerned—is that I’m already in love with someone, someone incredibly special, even though I forced him out of my life three years ago. I never told him that I loved him, because at that time to tell him that would be to put a weapon in his hands to hurt me, the way the only other man I’d ever said those words to did.”

  “And now?”

  She could hear the tension in Sean’s voice. “He came back into my life when I least expected it. I found I still love him, I still want him, want to have him in my life and for that to happen, I know that I have to risk putting that weapon in his hands. So here it is.

  “I love you, Sean—from the moment you turned up the next day with those flowers. Now you know why I could never let you come into the house, why I couldn’t spend that full day with you—I wanted to but I had to contact Jilly and ask her if she could sit with Mum. It was a miracle I was at the pub that night anyway—Mum was actually having a good night.”

  “A miracle?” Sean stroked her hair. “I always said we were meant to be together.”

  “So you did,” she remembered with a smile. “Anyway, the next day, that’s why I asked you to come back in the afternoon, to give Jilly a chance to come over.

  “It’s also why I could never stay away with you, apart from that one time when you came back from your deployment. Jilly insisted on using a week of her leave to stay with Mum while I was with you. I did love you, so very much and I never stopped. That’s why I never wanted to look for someone else—I had nothing to offer anyone else because you had it all and you always will. I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

  Kate doubted she had ever talked that much in her life. She was drained. She felt like she’d unloaded her heart and soul and for the first time she felt free, no matter what happened next.

  She was resting her head on Sean’s shoulder. As she came down from the emotional high of finally sharing her feelings with him, she became aware of his unnerving stillness. His arms were around her, his chest was rising and falling with each ragged breath he took, but he was saying nothing.

  Kate’s heart began to race with sudden nerves. Very slowly, she lifted herself away from him, bracing herself for what she feared she might now see, because she simply didn’t know what to think.

  He was crying. Silent tears filled his eyes and tracked down his drawn face. She’d done it again—hurt the one person she should never hurt, the one person who she should always protect. She’d been so intent on telling him the truth that she hadn’t stopped to think that sometimes the truth was best left unsaid.

  Her own eyes filled with tears. Head bowed, she was trying to find the words for another apology—the last apology she would ever owe this man, because she knew now that she had to let him go, so that she’d never hurt him again—when she felt his hands frame her face, tilting it up again so that he could look into her eyes.

  “A chuisle, you know I loved you back then. You know there’s been no one else since you. My heart was yours on sight the night we first met and I never took it back. I had opportunities, but they left me cold. I didn’t want them—I wanted you. I wanted you to have everything of me that I had to give. Kate, I feel as if I’ve loved you all my life. You are my life and I’ve been nothing without you. Forgive me—please forgive me.”

  Forgive him for what? “Sean?”

  “I should have been there for you.”

  “Sean, stop right there. Stop it—now.” She kissed away his tears. “There is nothing I need to forgive you for—nothing. I wouldn’t let you be there. Do you understand, Sean? It was my decision.” She looked into his eyes. “I wouldn’t let you be there.”

  Absolution. She knew Sean wasn’t a practicing Catholic but boy, could he do guilt—talk about unintended consequences. Just telling him he had nothing to feel guilty for wouldn’t cut it. He had to feel it to know it and that would take time. If he wanted it, needed it, she would give him all the time in the world. She would give him whatever he needed whenever he needed it.

  She would give him the rest of her life—gladly, and with all her heart.

  “Sean, you said I never asked you for anything…I want to ask you for something now. It’s the biggest thing I could ever ask of you—the biggest thing one person can ever ask of another.” She knelt down in front of him, took both of his hands in hers, kissed the back of each before she looked into his dark, troubled eyes.

  “Sean Patrick Kelly, I love you. Will you marry me?”

  Epilogue

  Another wedding.

  After Jilly Travers and Jonas Mitchell had tied the knot just before Christmas, Sean hadn’t expected to find himself attending another wedding quite so soon.

  The bride was currently cavorting round the dance floor with her brother-in-law, while his very pregnant wife was sitting to Sean’s right, watching the spectacle and trying not to laugh at her husband.

  “I’ll go and put a leash on him in a minute, Jilly—he’s embarrassing both of us,” Sean promised with a smile, knowing that his new sister-in-law would take the comment in the way it was intended.

  She returned his smile with one of her own, although she seemed a little anxious. “Sean? Can I have a word with you?”

  “Of course.” He pulled a chair over to sit beside her, wondering what was making her suddenly so serious. “Are you all right?”

  She smiled again, a little more easily this time. “Now I see more than ever why Kate loves you.
You will look after her, won’t you?”

  Sean took his sister-in-law’s hand. “With my life, Jilly. I swear.”

  “It’s just that…she’s always had the shitty end of the stick and she deserves to be happy. She had a crap time with Mum.”

  Sean squeezed her hand. “I know, Jilly. She told me about it.”

  “Did she tell you all of it, though? It wasn’t just the dementia, you know. Mum was hard on her, Sean—really hard. She demanded that Kate do everything to please her for as long as I can remember, until Kate just gave up trying to be herself. The whole thing with Mum affected her to the point where she became a chameleon, trying to be what other people wanted her to be. And I gradually lost my sister.” Jilly's face was a study in anguish. “When she didn't think anyone was looking, her eyes would just die—they'd go so empty.”

  “I know.” Sean remembered only too well. “I tried to get her to open up to me but all I did was back her into a corner, until she had no choice but to end things between us. I had no idea what she was going through.”

  “Don't blame yourself, Sean—she wouldn't want it, ever. It was a decision we took between us. She wanted the time she spent with you to be for the two of you, the same as I wanted with Jonas. I should never have left her to deal with Mum on her own so much, though.” Self-recrimination was all over Kate’s sister’s face.

  The young woman closed her eyes—Sean could tell she was trying not to cry. He enclosed the hand he held with both of his, trying to give her a little of his strength. If it weren’t for this woman, he’d never have met the woman who was his life.

  “Jilly, listen to me—Kate wouldn't want you to have that regret. She wanted you to have a life.”

  “She belongs to you, Sean—the same way I belong to that goofy idiot.” Jilly glanced toward the dance floor. “She always has and she always will. She needs you to take care of her.”

  “I will.” That was a promise Sean would have no trouble keeping. “I can’t think of any way I’d rather spend the rest of my life.”

  Jilly bit her lip. “You know she fell in love once before?”

  Sean nodded. “Some bastard who made her believe that love was a weapon to be used against her.”

  “Quite. She finally found the courage to tell him she loved him and that bastard walked away from her—broke her heart. She just shut down completely. After the way Mum had treated her, it was more than she could take. I just wanted to thank you for letting her believe in love again.” Jilly squeezed his hand. “Thank you for giving my sister back to me—to all of us—and helping her to be the person she was always meant to be.”

  “Jilly,” Sean said, his voice full of admiration for the young woman sitting beside him, “for a kid sister, you are a very perceptive lady.” He lifted his sister-in-law’s hand to his mouth for a fleeting, brotherly kiss. “I’ll make her happy—I promise.”

  He glanced down at the rich gold of the band on the third finger of his left hand, put there by his gorgeous wife a few hours earlier. He’d insisted on the ring—he wanted everyone to know that he was proud to belong to Kathryn Kelly, née Travers. It still felt strange, but it was a strangeness he welcomed. He flexed his fingers, watching the light glint from the metal.

  His life was changing in so many ways. Marriage to Kate was by far the most important of those changes but it was possible that his business could transform beyond all recognition as well. When he and his wife returned from their honeymoon, he was going to contact Adam Granger—now back in the security business—and Dan Chesterfield, with a view to pursuing the proposed merger of their companies. Now that he was a devoted husband, Sean’s view of his work had changed dramatically—it was a means to an end, not the end itself. And if the merger did go ahead, then relocating to Oxfordshire was something they had to consider seriously.

  He shook his head—what was he doing, thinking of business at his own bloody wedding? Priorities, Kelly—priorities. Kate was now and always would be top of the list and right now his focus needed to be on her.

  He’d never imagined he could love her any more than he had during their first time around but he did, the emotion becoming stronger and fiercer with each passing day. She was so different now, even from when they’d met again at her sister’s wedding. Jilly had noticed the difference, had even just commented on it, although he doubted that she’d believe her sweet, gentle elder sister was capable of becoming the Mistress who took such exquisite control in the bedroom.

  The last few months had provided them with an ideal opportunity to make a few…interesting discoveries about one another. At first Kate had been hesitant, reluctant to see in herself what he had come to see so clearly, but Sean was a man who knew what he needed and knew that only Kate could give it to him—if she could come to accept the part of her that was a perfect fit for that part of him. It was taking time and patience, trial and error, but he would never forget the look on her face the first time they had made it truly work between them.

  And knowing what he did about Adam and Dan, he was sure that they’d be only too happy to give Kate the further guidance she insisted that she needed. There was only so much she could learn from books and the internet and as a sub, there was only so much he could teach her—she needed another Dom to lead her where he could not go, into the mind space of a Dominant.

  Memories of the past led Sean to thoughts of the future—and what would happen in another couple of hours when he and Kate would go up to their suite and make a second, private commitment to one another. Kneeling before her, wearing only his wedding ring, Sean would offer her his wrist and she would tie the decorative, soft brown leather cuff around it, claiming him as her property. The laces would be sufficient. It would not need a physical lock—his love for her would secure it in place. It was Kate’s wedding present to him, the one he had asked for. When he had asked her what she would like for her gift, her response had been a single word…You.

  He would give her that gift tonight.

  Sean fought his impatience and forced himself back to the more conventional celebration going on around him. Kate hadn’t wanted the big wedding, but since he was determined it was the only wedding she was ever going to take a starring role in, he’d wanted her to have it all. He felt like an idiot in the fancy getup—the gray morning suit with the brocade waistcoat, winged-collar shirt and cravat—but he didn’t care. When he’d tried it on at the menswear shop it was worth it, just to see the look in her eyes when he’d come out of the changing room. He’d never imagined any woman ever looking at him with such sheer, naked want in her eyes. She’d looked as if she could eat him alive and made him feel ten feet tall.

  Of course, he’d had to wait for the wedding ceremony to see her dress. Just a few hours ago, he’d been standing in the church, more nervous than he’d ever expected to be, waiting for her to come to him, wondering yet again what she’d chosen.

  She’d never been more beautiful than that moment when he first saw her, coming toward him on the arm of her brother-in-law, wearing the strapless, beaded champagne-satin gown that had taken his breath away, the color a perfect backdrop for the bouquet of heavily scented, vibrant-orange roses.

  Totally besotted with his bride, for Sean the ceremony had been pretty much a blur but there was one thing he would always remember—the moment when she had taken his wedding band from the clergyman and before placing it on his finger in a purely spontaneous gesture, she’d touched it to her mouth, her eyes never leaving his, her lips silently forming the words I love you.

  “Okay, that’s enough,” Sean muttered, dragging himself back to the party again—his mind really was wandering too much. Jilly, laughing again, was starting to get him worried. Although he was pretty hot when it came to first aid, he wasn’t sure he could cope with assisting in the delivery of his niece or nephew on his wedding day if her full-blown fit of the giggles resulted in an early labor. All that champagne her husband had consumed had a lot to answer for. He strode onto the dance floor.
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  “Mitchell, get your hands off my wife,” he ordered with mock severity, his tone harking back to the days when he’d been Jonas’ commanding officer rather than just his boss. “She’s had enough of you stamping all over her feet and Jilly needs to stop laughing or she’ll give us all a surprise we hadn’t bargained for.”

  Grinning broadly, Jonas glanced from groom to bride and back again, snapped off an equally mocking salute and loped off to keep his own wife company.

  “I’m sorry about that, darlin’,” Sean murmured, taking his wife in his arms. A sense of warm contentment settled around him. “He’s a prize pain in the arse, always has been.”

  Kate looked at him and failed to suppress a soft giggle at the indictment. She knew that Sean still hadn’t forgiven his brother-in-law for the stag night—that might take until their first wedding anniversary. Or maybe their tenth—Sean wasn’t sure. His wife draped her arms around his neck and fitted her body to his, oblivious to the attention they were drawing from their guests, as the music changed to something slow and romantic. “And now he’s family, Mr. Kelly.”

  “I know, Mrs. Kelly.” He paused for a moment and looked at her, a slight frown creasing his forehead. “I never thought to ask—do you want to be Mrs. Kelly, or would you prefer to keep your own name?”

  “Do I want to be Mrs. Kelly?” Kate appeared to consider the question. “Let me see. I have a list of the organizations I need to contact as soon as we get back from our honeymoon, to inform them of my change of name and marital status. I’ve had that list ready to go since the day after you agreed to marry me. Does that answer your question?” She smiled up at him, so much happiness and love in her eyes that her husband thought his heart might burst.

  “I guess it does, Mrs. Kelly.” Sean sighed, lowering his head to brush his lips across his wife’s mouth. “Sounds good, darlin’.”