THE FINAL FALSON SAYS I DO Read Online Free PDF Page A

teased. ‘I’m hanging on every word.’
    ‘Hey, I really like talking to you.’ He had chuckled. ‘You know how to flatter a guy’s vanity. Why don’t we—?’ He’d stopped, riveted by something he’d seen over her shoulder. ‘Hey, look who’s— Karen! ’
    Then he’d been gone, racing across the room to the girl who’d just appeared, seizing her in his arms, kissing her again and again.
    ‘So she turned up after all,’ a voice had said in Freya’s ear. ‘We all wondered if she would.’
    It had been Darius, regarding his brother with good-humoured cynicism.
    ‘Who is she?’ Freya had asked casually.
    ‘His latest light o’ love.’
    ‘Latest?’
    ‘They come and they go. Jackson likes variety in his life, which is partly why they broke up. Now they’ve got back together we’ll have to wait and see what happens.’
    ‘No prizes for guessing what’s about to happen now,’ Freya had observed, watching the pair slip out of the room.
    ‘He wouldn’t be Jackson if he passed up the chance.’
    It was a lucky escape, she’d told herself. She might have become seriously attracted to Jackson but fate had saved her.
    He’d brought Karen to the wedding as his guest. She was beautiful, Freya had thought enviously. Others had thought so too, because at the reception another man hadn’t been able to take his eyes from her. He’d hovered, annoying Karen, until Jackson had taken a firm grip on him and said something that had made him back off. Freya hadn’t heard the words but she’d seen Jackson’s face, and there had been a look of menace that had stunned her. All the charm had gone from him.
    It had been over in a moment. The man had fled and Jackson had reverted to his usual pleasant self. But Freya had never forgotten what she had glimpsed. She knew that if anyone had looked at her like that she would have been terrified.
    She’d expected to hear that Jackson was engaged to Karen, but nothing had happened. And why should she care? she wondered. She’d been briefly attracted to him, but rescue had come in time and it was no big deal. They’d settled for a friendship in which they teased, challenged and infuriated each other. What might have been was safely in the past.
    There was still a sense of irony that of all men it should be Jackson who had come to her rescue now, taking her into his home, offering her his shoulder to cry on. But irony had always been part of their relationship.
    Early in her mother’s marriage she’d joined Amos and Janine at their home in Monte Carlo. A heart attack had left him vulnerable, and Janine had asked her to pay a long visit.
    ‘He won’t hear of a nurse being there night and day,’ she’d said. ‘But he’ll have to let my daughter visit us, won’t he?’
    She’d made the visit reluctantly. Nothing about Amos appealed to her, especially the stories of his several wives and affairs. But Amos had taken a liking to his stepdaughter and begun plotting to marry her to one of his sons. Freya had been far from flattered.
    ‘Was he mad when he thought of that?’ she’d demanded of her mother. ‘There isn’t one of them I’d ever dream of—ye gods and little fishes!’
    As soon as Amos’s health had improved she’d left Monte Carlo, returning to England and her nursing career.
    Amos had failed to marry her to Darius, Marcel, Travis or Leonid. That left only Jackson. Their friendship was strong enough for him to ‘reject’ her theatrically, as he’d just done. Since she felt the same there was no problem.
    She’d be as mad to marry him as he’d be to marry her. Though there was no denying he was a nice enough guy—at least he was if you overlooked a few things—but he was a bit too set on having his own way. He must get that from Amos, although he’d never admit it. But he had been good to her today.
    She pulled on the pyjamas he’d offered her and lay down on the bed, certain that she would be unable to sleep, but the strain of the day caught