Mary Middleton Writes of Love: A Valentine's Gift for You - final day

So here it is at last, Valentine's Day. A day for sharing with the man or woman of your dreams. But sometimes that isn't possible and if you can't have romance on our favourite day of the year, at least you can read about it.

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Here is the last excerpt of Come, Dance With Me ...enjoy and if you want to read more, you know what to do.

In this excerpt Sasha and Andrei are enjoying a meal with friends.

Sasha, in seventh heaven to be at the table with the two men she loved most in the world, was aware of Andrei’s leg beneath the table. Each time he moved, his knee brushed hers, making her quiver. It was extraordinary how, even though she spent the larger part of each day in his arms, she was still not yet accustomed to his touch. She didn’t think she ever would be, even if she spent a lifetime dancing with him. It was as if his every contact marked her, imprinted on her soul, as if he was slowly taking possession, making her his – piece by piece. One day, she knew, he would touch her and she would be totally consumed, leaving nothing more of her to be had.

She watched him chewing his food, his jaw strong. He put down his knife and fork and turned to reply to something her brother had said, using his hands to punctuate his sentence. At that moment, in the circle of the candlelight, Sasha admitted to herself for the first time, that she was deeply in love with him. Seeing him there, in the company of her brother, surrounded by the soft music, the gentle laughter of friends, the whole affair between them seemed inevitable. There was nothing she could do to stop it. It would happen. She wanted him; he wanted her. She wondered why she had fought against it for so long.

Jack chewed thoughtfully, emptying his mouth, twitching his fork as he spoke.

‘So, Andrei, what are the chances of you two winning Celebrity Dance then?’

Andrei sat back, put down his knife and picked up his wine, his gaze warm on the back of Sasha’s neck.

‘If your sister works as hard as she has been up to now, we stand every chance.’

She blushed scarlet, took a deep breath before straightening up and turning to look at him.

‘Surely not, Andrei. I mean, I’m not that good and I make so many mistakes. What about Vanessa? She is so much younger, so much more …sprightly.’

‘You make it sound as if you are a million years old, my darling. It is not just about the steps, it is about feeling the dance, interpreting the music...’ His voice trailed off as he became aware that all three of them had stopped eating and were staring at him in some astonishment. Sasha’s face was suffused with colour, her eyes like lamps.

He shrugged, suddenly seeming more foreign, more exotic. ‘What have I done? What did I say?’ His eyes darted from Sasha to Jack, and back to Lisa again, his brows raised, his face anxious, afraid he had offended them in some way.

Lisa put down her glass. ‘Nothing, Andrei,’ she said. ‘You did nothing wrong at all. You just called Sasha your darling, that’s all.’

Blood rushed up to taint Andrei’s face and, to help him overcome his obvious confusion, Jack turned away and began to ask Lisa about herself, where she worked, where she went on holiday, if she had a partner.

Sasha, meanwhile, with her ears burning and her insides aflame, experienced Andrei’s every movement as if she made them herself. When he stroked his chin with his long fingers, her own fingertips tingled, when he lifted his glass it was as if she became the rim, when he dabbed his lips with a napkin it were as if she were made of damask.

Everyone noticed that she was uncharacteristically quiet but they were too well-mannered to mention it that the thing that had been growing between them, threatening to swamp them both, was now inevitable. Even Sasha knew that now. Although she listened to the conversation, laughed gently in the right places, spooned up her dessert without tasting it she knew, without a shadow of doubt that by the end of the night her life would be changed forever. Whether the affair between them was short lived, or lasted for the rest of their lives, it had to happen.

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