Loved Intensely (UNEDITED)

Chapter 1

It had been a while since she'd had a good coffee. Strong, rich, bittersweet, and oh so bad for you. Like love, she thought, rather cynically. Emma was
not a fan of love at that moment.

It had been two years, maybe three, since Kit had gotten married. His wife Mary was expecting their first child. Everyone had been invited to their mansion up in the country area of England for a house party that was to last ostensibly for over a month.

Ridiculous extravagance, Emma thought, but then Kit Brandeworth was an enormously wealthy man and could afford to be extravagant.

Emma had inevitably been one of those invited - her family and Kit's had been lifelong friends, and though it had been a long time since Emma had last visited her family home up where Kit's was, she was still a part of them and thus it would have been an
unpardonable insult not to invite her. And while no one would have been surprised had she politely declined the invitation, she was not about to run away and hide like some snivelling coward and lick her wounds.

No, she was better than that. She
would show them that she had not been hurt, that Kit's betrayal had not cut her straight through
her heart...that she had not crumpled up and died. And so, here she was, on the morning that the guests were to arrive, drinking her fifth fortifying
cup of straight black coffee.

She looked up as a thundering noise on the stairs indicated that her brother had come down. She smiled blearily at him.

"Ready to go, Jordan?" she asked with false cheer, hoping he didn't notice her bloodshot eyes or shaking hands. Jordan regarded his sister for a moment, taking in the lackluster hue of her beautiful black hair, the redness of her usually bright sapphire blue eyes.

She'd lost the plumpness he remembered she'd had at her vulnerable age of nineteen, and while her new slenderness undoubtedly suited her, she looked small and fragile, and ever so vulnerable.

He felt a stab of rage at the man who'd left her at the altar, humiliated her, and broken her heart in front of the world, but quelled it quickly when he saw how weary she was. It would not do to cause a scene and besmirch her name further in any scandal - she would not be able to bear it.

He forced a smile onto his face.

"Shall we use my car or yours?"

They were all here, she thought, and wanted to cry. Every single one of them who had been at her wedding, who had watched her wait, and wait in vain, and then cry, and flee from the church once she had finally accepted that Kit was simply not going to come. And then they had all subsequently gone to Kit's wedding, to watch him marry his chosen bride, the woman he loved, the woman he had always loved, and who had not been her.

She had wondered, sometimes, if Kit had ever felt any love, any tenderness for her at all. She had wondered during her engagement to him, and she
had wondered after it had been broken. There had been times, when they were alone, and he had shown such love, such affection, she could have been in no doubt of his feelings. And yet, almost as soon as he saw her again, the next day or so, he
would be like a polite stranger once again, dutiful, courteous, but distant.

She had never understood it...even after the truth had come out and he had revealed his pining for Mary, his childhood sweetheart.

"Emma."

For a moment, she thought it was Kit coming towards her, and wanted to run. Then she realised that the hair was wrong, the expression was wrong, even the stance was wrong. It wasn't
Kit - it was James, his twin. James, with the same sculpted body, the same wide, broad chest and expansive shoulders, same muscular thighs and legs
and rippling arms. She smiled faintly.