The thought of Georgiana came back into his mind. For once, he didn’t shove it away. Sometimes he needed to think of her, or he would go mad. Work occupied him most of the time, but not always. Today was a beautiful day. He accepted the thought of her, and the pain, quite calmly, and with love.

There was always love.

His wife. Beautiful, although that had been the least interesting thing about her. Everybody had said it was a brilliant match, an old-fashioned, society match; he was the younger son of Baron Montfort, and she was an earl’s sister, willowy, white skinned, and graceful; although he wasn’t to inherit any estates, nor she, they both had money, enough to live very well indeed. Certainly enough for houses in town and the country, and horses, and enough to put any number of good-looking, well-bred children through public school. And she was intelligent, too. He had been to Cambridge, and Georgiana had studied at the Sorbonne—just to be different, he had teased her. Theirs was a glittering marriage, the congregation at the tiny country church in Alfriston thick with titles and society photographers. Everybody waited for the fruit of such a dynastic alliance, and speculated on the godparents. A duke, or perhaps even a minor royal?

But nobody had seen it as they had. Hugh couldn’t care less about dynasties and suitable matches. He didn’t care about Georgiana’s finishing school or her family’s estates in Scotland. All he cared about was her—kind, sexy, funny. So kind, she always saw the good in everybody.

She was his own darling, and he had wanted children with her more than anything in the world. Lots of children. Ahhh—a fresh stab, then, at the thought of the baby. Georgie shrieking with joy, racing downstairs waving a plastic stick at him with a couple of blue lines in the little window. And how he’d caught her up and whirled her round and then set her down again gingerly, afraid he might have knocked it loose or something. It was only a little speck. . . .

It had ended one night in Dublin as they walked home together after a friend’s party. She had stepped out into one of the narrow streets. He heard the motorbike before he saw it; the old soldier’s reflexes, still keen, had lunged, reached for her—he had caught only her dress. He could still feel the silky fabric brushing ineffectually against him, still see her crumple, and horrified eyes under a helmet. The man sped off. He wasn’t looking for a num berplate, he was crouched over her, cradling her. Screaming for help, but knowing, all the same, it was too late. The glassy look in her eyes. And yet so little blood, just a touch at the temple. Georgiana staring up at him, quite mildly, looking amazed.