His Most Exquisite Conquest (10 page)

Luscious Lucy...

The phrase slid into his mind and stuck there.

They were served a seafood banquet. He watched the sensual way she forked oysters into her mouth, the relish with which she ate chunks of lobster, the licking of her lips to capture any escaping dipping sauce with the prawns, the sheer love of good food that shone through her enjoyment of the sumptuous supper.

Luscious Lucy...

There couldn’t be a man alive who wouldn’t think of her in those terms. Everything about her was sexy. Michael was strongly aroused simply watching her. It was difficult to contain the desire she stirred in him, the need stealing his appetite, making him impatient for the stack of gourmet food to be eaten and cleared away.

Finally the band started up again. They began with a slow number—a jazz waltz.
Perfect,
Michael thought, gesturing in invitation to Lucy as he rose from his chair. While he skirted the table, she rose from hers, as eager as he was for physical connection. He took her hand. She squeezed his. A few strides and he was swinging her into his embrace, holding her close, legs brushing against each other in the sensual intimacy of the dance.

He was acutely conscious of his erection furrowing her stomach, her breasts pressing into his chest, the warmth of her breath feathering the skin of his neck. He wanted her so badly it was almost a sickness inside him. He wanted her to himself, completely to himself.

The control mechanism in his mind snapped.

The question that should have stayed unasked came out of his mouth in a harsh rasp.

‘How many men have you slept with, Lucy?’

She stopped dancing with him.

Her hands slid down to his chest, pushing to create distance between them. She looked up, stared at his face, her eyes blank of all expression, as though she was staring through him at something else.

And Michael knew instantly what it was.

The frog inside him.

He could almost feel himself turning green, and though he wanted to push back that fatal tide of colour, it was impossible to erase the words he had spoken. They hung between them, waiting to be answered—words that might well cost him a woman he wanted to keep in his life.

He wasn’t ready to lose Lucy.

He might never be ready to lose her.

She’d become an addiction he didn’t want to end.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

L
UCY
FELT
SICK
.

She couldn’t understand why Michael had asked that question now, on this night of nights, when everything had seemed so good between them. She had expected it—dreaded it—a week ago when Jason Lester had made that crack about her having slept with half the men in Cairns, which she had made worse with her ‘town slut’ remark.

Her stomach roiled with nausea.

Had she done something
sluttish
tonight? Lucy frantically searched her mind for some word or action of hers that might have triggered bad thoughts along those lines.

Nothing.

She’d simply been herself.

And if Michael couldn’t accept her for the person she was...

‘It doesn’t matter!’ he fiercely muttered. ‘Forget I asked, Lucy. It was a stupid question.’

It jerked her into refocusing, meeting his eyes, searching them for truth. ‘It does matter to me, Michael,’ she quietly stated, hating the fact that he might think her indiscriminately promiscuous.

He grimaced in self-disgust. ‘I ran into your latest ex—the control freak—in the men’s room. He made some remarks about you. I shouldn’t have let what he said bother me, but coming on top of Lester’s...’ Michael shook his head as though trying to rid his mind of images he didn’t want there.

‘People who want to cast nasty aspersions on others usually make sex the centre of them. Especially men, I’ve found. But women, too,’ Lucy said, instinctively mounting a counter-attack out of a desperate need to defend herself. ‘I was confronted by
your
ex—Fiona Redman—in the ladies’ room. Her words were you were great in bed, but you used women up and tossed them away.’ Lucy summoned up a wry little smile. ‘I didn’t believe you were so callous.’

‘I’m sorry,’ he declared. ‘It’s just that you’re...’ He paused, struggling to explain, probably hating that he’d put himself in the position of having to explain.

‘What, Michael? Does it bother you that I feel free to enjoy sex as much as you do?’

‘No!’ He sliced the air with his hand—a sharp, negative gesture. His eyes blazed with intensity of feeling. ‘I love how you are with me, Lucy.’

Not enough,
she thought.
Not enough.

Her stomach started cramping.

She clutched it, trying to stop the rolling of pain. Something was wrong. This wasn’t just emotional stress. It was too physical. Had she eaten something that was violently disagreeing with her?

Defiantly determined to finish what Michael had started, she lifted her chin and faced him with her truth. ‘To answer your question—’

‘Don’t!’ he commanded tersely.

She went on, disregarding his denial of any need for it. ‘I’ve probably slept with as many men as you have women. I’ve seen no reason not to have the pleasure of sex when it promised to be pleasurable. I’ve found each experience quite different, because the men were different. And when it came it you, Michael, it was very special.’ Tears spurted into her eyes. ‘So special...’

Her throat choked up. Her stomach heaved. Bile shot into her mouth. She turned blindly, desperate to get to the ladies’ room before she started vomiting.

Strong hands gripped her shoulders, halting any attempt at flight. ‘Lucy...’ It was a gruff plea.

‘I’m sick! I’m going to be sick!’ she cried, clapping her hand over her mouth as she doubled over, pain shafting her lower body.

No more talk. Nothing but action, Michael moving her, supporting her, collecting one of his friends along the way to look after her in the ladies’ room. Lucy barely had time to sink down on her knees in a toilet cubicle before the contents of her stomach erupted. The convulsions kept coming, even when there was nothing left to vomit. Then she was hit by diarrhoea and that was just as bad. It felt as though her whole lovely night was going down the toilet, along with the relationship she’d hoped to have with Michael Finn.

* * *

Michael waited outside the ladies’ room, anxious over Lucy’s condition and cursing himself for probably contributing to her sudden bout of illness with his stupid question about other men. Everything she’d said back to him was totally reasonable.
Totally.
He should have known it without asking. He should have realised that a free spirit like Lucy would take what she wanted from life and not feel she had to account for it to anyone else. And neither should she.

He’d acted like a jealous man instead of being grateful for having her light up his life, and any sense of jealousy appalled him. It was not the attribute of a rational man, which he’d always prided himself on being. This overwhelming obsession with Lucy had to stop. It was getting out of hand. He needed to pull back from it, be less intense about the feelings she stirred in him.

Though he might very well have wrecked any choice to do anything about it.

Was he now an irredeemable frog in her eyes?

Certainly, he’d killed the light in them—the light that had told him he was special.

She
was special.

And he desperately wanted another chance with her.

If she walked away from him tonight, shut the door on him...

His hands clenched. He had to fight, win her back, convince her he would never again make the mistake of holding her to account for anything she might have done before they’d met. Only what they had together was important. That was what he cared about. The future without her in it looked too empty of any joy to even contemplate such an outcome. He would not accept it.

The door to the ladies’ room opened. He’d asked Dave Whitfield’s wife, Jane, to do what she could for Lucy, and it was a relief to see her coming out. He needed to know what state Lucy was in, whether there was some positive action he could take. Every fibre of his being was intent on changing the situation as it stood.

Jane made a sympathetic grimace. ‘Not good, I’m afraid. She’s violently ill. I think it must be food poisoning, though the rest of us seem to be fine. Maybe there was a bad oyster in the seafood banquet, and Lucy lucked out, being the one to eat it.’

‘What should I do?’ Michael asked, feeling helplessly locked out of doing anything.

‘I think you’ll either have to take her to hospital emergency or...does she have someone to look after her at home?’

‘I’ll look after her.’

‘She might need some medication, Mickey. I’ll go back and stay with her until she’s okay to get moving.’ Jane frowned. ‘Though if this keeps up we might have to call an ambulance. I’ll let you know if that’s the case.’

‘Thanks, Jane.’

‘It’s such a shame!’ She shook her head over the mishap as she turned back to the ladies’ room.

Shame was right, Michael thought savagely. Shame on him for causing more upset to Lucy when she had started to feel unwell. He had to make up for it, be all she needed him to be. The minutes dragging by felt like hours as he waited for more news. Other women entered and left the ladies’ room, glancing curiously at him as they passed. He didn’t care what they thought. Only Lucy mattered. He remained on watch.

Finally the door opened and Jane shuffled out, supporting Lucy, who looked completely debilitated—with no colour in her face at all. Even the bright orange lipstick had been wiped off. Her eyes were bleary, as though they’d been washed by a river of tears. Her shoulders were slumped and it was obvious she was too physically drained to stand up straight.

Michael moved quickly to draw her to his side, taking over Jane’s supporting role. There was no resistance to his action. Michael suspected she was grateful to have anyone holding on to her.

‘She wants to go home, Mickey,’ Jane informed him. ‘I think the worst is over, but she’s fairly shaky. I’ll get her bag and fetch Dave. If you give him your keys and tell him where you’ve parked, he can drive your car to the front of the casino, ready for you to put Lucy in. Okay?’

He nodded. ‘Thanks, Jane.’

There was so much he wanted to say to Lucy. but she was in no condition to listen, and he knew it would be selfish of him to push any issues in these circumstances. She needed kindness and comfort.

Jane quickly organised the easiest possible exit from the casino, accompanying them to the car, which Dave had waiting for them. She opened the passenger door and Michael lifted Lucy into the seat and secured her safety belt.

Lucy mumbled ‘Thank you’ to everyone. Michael quickly expressed his gratitude for his friends’ help, anxious to get her home. She was so limp and listless, he worried over whether to take her to the hospital instead as he settled in the driver’s seat and started the engine.

‘Are you sure you don’t need medical attention, Lucy?’ he asked.

‘Just want to lie down and sleep,’ she answered, sounding exhausted.

It was probably the best option, he thought as he set off for her apartment. There wasn’t much comfort in waiting for attention in a queue at the emergency room of a hospital, and maybe the worst was over. She wasn’t sick during the trip home. Once there, he took her keys out of her bag and carried her into the apartment—a move she weakly protested wasn’t needed, but he did it anyway, wanting to hold her in his arms.

He stood her up beside her bed, unzipped her dress, slid it off her arms so it could drop to her feet, before he sat her down and worked on removing her underclothes and gold sandals. Her skin felt hot and she shivered several times, obviously feverish. He picked out the pins holding up her hair, running his fingers through the falling tresses to ensure they were all gone, before gently lowering her to the pillows, lifting her feet onto the bed and tucking the doona around her.

‘Good of you, Michael,’ she murmured with a ragged sigh. ‘It’s okay for you to go now. Thank you.’

She closed her eyes, and the sense of being shut out of her life twisted Michael’s gut. If she’d consigned him to the frog species, according to the fairy tale, the only way to change that was for her to kiss him, willingly and caringly. Somehow he had to win his way back into her heart, persuade her to overlook his crass question as totally irrelevant to their relationship. Which it truly was.

‘I’m not leaving you,’ he muttered with fierce determination, sitting on the bed beside her and gently stroking her hair away from her hot forehead. ‘You’re not okay, Lucy. You’re running a fever. Do you have any medication here that might lower your temperature?’

She sighed again, whether in exasperation at his persistence or with her illness, he couldn’t tell. Her eyelashes lifted slightly as she answered, ‘Bathroom cupboard.’

Her voice was flat. The slitted look she gave him revealed nothing of what she was feeling towards him. ‘I’ll find it,’ he said, and went to the bathroom.

There was a packet of pain tablets that were supposed to lower fever. He took them and went to the kitchen to fill a glass with water before returning to Lucy. He lifted her up from the pillows, fed her the tablets and held the glass to her lips. She gulped down some water. Michael was thinking she was probably dehydrated when she suddenly hurled off the doona, erupted from the bed and staggered towards the bathroom.

Apparently her stomach couldn’t tolerate anything in it. Michael had to stand by helplessly as she was convulsively sick again. ‘I think I’d better take you to hospital, Lucy,’ he said worriedly.

‘No...no...’ She shook her head vehemently. ‘Just help me back to bed. I’ll sleep it off.’

Did she want to sleep him off, too?

What could he say?

What could he do?

He tried to make her comfortable again. He dampened a face-cloth and laid it across her forehead, then remembered the cup of ice Harry had been given to suck when he was in hospital with a broken nose. Lucy was definitely dehydrated. He found a tray of ice cubes in the freezer, emptied most of it into a large tumbler and set it on her bedside table. Her eyes were closed again. Not wanting to leave her without any ready access for help, he took her mobile telephone out of her gold handbag and laid it on the bedside table, too.

‘Listen to me, Lucy,’ he said urgently. ‘I’m going to the all-night chemist to ask the pharmacist for advice. Hopefully, he’ll have something to settle your stomach. I’ll be back soon. Try to suck some of the ice I’ve left here for you. I’ve put your phone within easy reach, as well, so you can call me if you need to. Okay?’

‘Okay.’

It was barely a whisper of sound. Michael thought she was beyond caring. He hurried out to his car and drove towards the centre of town, where he knew the all-night chemist shop was situated. He was still in two minds about overriding her decision and taking her to hospital. The most important thing right now was to get her well again. Then he could work at making her understand how special she was to him.

He didn’t see the car coming at him from the street to his right. The traffic lights at the intersection were green his way. He was focused on where he was going and what he had to do. He felt the impact, then nothing else. All consciousness ceased.