Kelly's Man (15 page)

'For opening your eyes to the truth? Grow up, little Kelly. Be honest with yourself. Then you'll know why you didn't tell Mary the truth about our sleeping arrangements.'

It was a statement of fact and they both knew it.
Kelly had
been forced to admit that she was stirred by him. In the circumstances she could hardly have done otherwise. But painful as it had been, she wondered if he knew that the admission she was making in her own mind was doubly painful.

As if to push the pain from her she said, 'I'm not sleeping with you, Nicholas.'

Another laugh, even more sensuous this time. 'What would happen if I tried to persuade you, I wonder? I think you'd give in, Kelly.' A finger lifted to her cheek and trailed slowly, tantalisingly, down her throat and further to the hollow between her breasts. The movement brought a fresh torrent of desire coursing through Kelly's body, so that even while she wanted to push the finger from her she could not move. 'An interesting supposition, wouldn't you say?' he continued in an outrageous drawl.

With uncanny perceptiveness he had struck too near what Kelly suspected was the truth. 'No!' The word was gasped, the denial more a violent shake of the head. 'You wouldn't dare!'

'You don't know me very well if you think that? His voice was very soft now. 'I'd dare most things if I wanted them enough. It just so happens that you're safe tonight.'

'You don't want me?' The words were torn from her. She would have given much to bite them back the moment they had been uttered.

Another laugh, soft and amused and infinitely seductive. 'I won't say I like my women more willing. You're willing enough, though you want to pretend otherwise. Let's just say there are times when I prefer a degree of experience.'

'Like Serena de Jager!' Kelly choked on the name.

'Nobody could call Serena inexperienced.' There was no missing the satisfaction in his tone.

Was there an answer? Kelly did not know. If there was one she could not think of it. For his last words had given her more pain than the devastating kisses which had preceded them. She stood very still, and a tiny hammer began pounding at her temples.

Once more a long finger traced a sinuous line from cheek to throat. Then Nicholas spoke into the darkness. 'Sleep well, Kelly.'

C
ONTRARY
to Nicholas's injunction she did not sleep well. Sleep was well-nigh impossible when her mind was in a turmoil which resisted all efforts at discipline, and her body ached with a racking desire which was like nothing she had ever experienced. If she slept it was fitfully.

At the first light of dawn she was awake. Peeping warily into the living-room, she saw that Nicholas was still sleeping. For long moments she watched him. The thick dark hair lay in a careless swathe across his forehead, and the mobile lips were pressed lightly together. A tanned shoulder was visible above the edge of the rug, and the top of a broad chest. It had not occurred to Kelly to wonder whether he wore pyjamas...

There was something appealing about the sleeping figure. For the first time Kelly was seeing him at a time when he was off guard and vulnerable. She was swept with a crazy urge to touch her lips against his forehead, to let her fingers feel the hardness of his shoulder.

It was with a determined wrench that she jerked her eyes from the couch and went back into the bedroom.

If he was surprised to find her already at work when he came up to the hotel he did not say so. His good-morning was crisp, matter-of-fact, with no hint of the sensuousness of the previous night. But for an odd glint in his eyes there was nothing to indicate that he even remembered what had passed between them.

There was no teasing this morning, no seductiveness. Instead he told her that the engineering convention was coming to an end, and that the men had decided on a special dinner, a kind of banquet to finalise their proceedings. Kelly would be in charge of the dinner.

She let his words wash over her, the crispness of his tone overshadowed by the impact which his physical nearness had on her always. But at his last statement she jerked up.

'Me?' It was more an exclamation than a question.

'You,' levelly.

'Oh, no, Nicholas, I can't do it!'

'You will.' A quiet statement.

She looked at him wordlessly for a long moment. Then she asked, 'Why, Nicholas?'

'It's something Mary would have organised if she had been here.'

'Nicholas, I...' She hesitated, struggling for the words that would convey her uncertainty, her feelings of inadequacy. 'This banquet will be important, a yardstick by which to measure the hotel. What if I make a mess of it?'

The eyes that studied her face were considering, assessing. Kelly had the strange feeling that Nicholas was seeing in her something entirely new, something he had not seen, or cared to see, before. Which was clearly absurd.

Then he said, 'You won't make a mess, Kelly.'

'But...'

A rare streak of warmth lit the grey eyes. As if he had not heard the beginning of her protest he went on, 'You're more competent than you think.'

She was suddenly breathless. 'You mean that, don't you?'

'Of course.' This time the warmth extended to a smile. 'You'll cope, Kelly.'

Just a few words. Coming from anyone else they were words which would have elicited no response in Kelly. But the words came from the lips of the rugged-featured man who was like nobody else she had ever known, a man who from the moment he had set eyes on her had made no secret of his dislike and contempt. The words were praise indeed.

As Nicholas left her to go on with her duties Kelly found that she was filled with a ridiculous happiness. Nicholas had shown confidence in her. He knew only too well the importance of this banquet to Great Peaks Lodge. If he was confident it could be only because he thought the feeling well founded.

It came as no surprise that this unexpected token of esteem should fill her with such elation, for she had reached a point where her own feelings could no longer be pushed from the conscious reaches of her mind. Nicholas would never love her—strange how hard it was to use the word in connection with him—he might never even learn to like her, but his confidence was a sign of a dawning respect, a sign that he was seeing her as a person with worth and value apart from her position as her father's daughter. Though she could not deny to herself that what she yearned for from Nicholas Van Mijden was something other than respect, the fact that he no longer looked at her as nothing more than a parasite with a reasonably desirable body gave a definite lift to her spirits.

She
would
cope, she vowed. Though she had never done anything quite like it before, she had been hostess at enough of her father's parties to know what was required. For the Andersons' sake she would organise the banquet as well as she knew how, so that the engineers would use the hotel as a venue again. As far as Nicholas was concerned, she would prove to him once and for all that he had misjudged her.

All that day and the next Kelly threw herself into preparing for the function. The actual cooking and setting of the tables would be done by the staff. But there was a wealth of planning to do—the menu, the placing of the tables, the flower arrangements, even some special decor. When Nicholas had first broached the subject, it had thrown her briefly into confusion. But as her planning began to take shape and form, Kelly found that she was not only gaining satisfaction from the project, she was actually enjoying herself.

Andrew sought her out more than once, and seemed disquieted that she had no time for him. Once, when the engineers had a free afternoon, he asked her to go for a walk with him. At her refusal an odd expression crossed his face—not quite resentment, Kelly decided, unconsciously seeking to put a name to it, yet something very like it. For some reason she was sorry she had chosen just that moment to look at him. Then the expression vanished, and in a friendly tone he reminded her that he would be staying on at the hotel after the convention had ended. She promised that they would have their walk then.

Now and then Nicholas appeared in the room where Kelly sat with her lists. He was interested in her plans and listened without interrupting when she explained some new idea. She did not know that her eyes were lit with radiance when she talked, or that her lips curved in a smile which transformed prettiness into beauty. She knew only that Nicholas, for the first time in their acquaintance, treated her as a person whose words were worthy of attention. Occasionally he questioned or commented, and when he did so the sardonic look was absent from his eyes, and the mockery was gone from his tone.

As always, she was affected by his presence. It seemed there was nothing she could do to quell the leaping of her senses whenever he came near her. While they talked she was conscious of the desire to reach out and touch him, to feel his arms about her body. But just as the mockery was gone from his manner, so his behaviour seemed to have become wholly platonic. It was almost as if the moments in the scent-filled garden had never been.

'Do you think Mary will be back before the banquet?' she asked once.

Something came and went in the grey eyes which regarded her with a disturbing intentness. 'I shouldn't think so.'

'No?' She could not keep the eagerness from her tone.

'You'd be sorry if she did?' There was an expression now in his face which Kelly could not define. The closest she could get was approval, and it could not be that. Nevertheless she felt a sudden leaping of the senses.

'Yes.' She smiled up at him, her teeth small and white against the tan which coloured her cheeks after the many days in the sun. 'At this stage I'd like to see it through all the way on my own.'

A long-fingered hand went to her hair, pushing a loose strand gently from her forehead. It was no more than a gesture, she knew. The hair had escaped its neat style and Nicholas was concerned about her appearance before the hotel guests. Nonetheless it was a gesture which had the feel of a caress. It was also the first time he had touched her since the night in the garden, when her back had been pressed hard against the rough bark of the oak- tree and Nicholas had intimated that she knew nothing of her feelings. The memory of that evening was still vivid in Kelly's mind. As if he was holding her now, she could feel the tautness of the hard body against hers, could smell the maleness that was so intoxicating, could hear Nicholas taunt her with the true reason why she had not told Mary they were sharing a cottage. 'What would happen if I tried to persuade you to sleep with me?' he had asked. More and more she thought she knew the answer to that question. As a tremor shot through her body she lowered her eyes quickly beneath long lashes.

'You'll see it through.' Nicholas's voice was low and amused. Kelly had the disturbing feeling that he knew exactly what she had been thinking.

'Try and stop me!'

And they smiled at each other, a real smile for the very first time since they had known each other, before going their separate ways.

The banquet was a success. Everything went according to plan. The meal was different from the one the chefs would have prepared had they been left to themselves, but once Kelly had explained what she wanted they were more than willing to follow her instructions. The bowls and tubs of flowers placed unobtrusively yet strategically around the big room added an exotic touch, and the decor, much of which Kelly had designed herself, elicited more than a few compliments. Best of all, when the function was over the president of the society approached Kelly and Nicholas who happened to be standing together, and told them that he would ensure that the following year's convention would again be at Great Peaks Lodge.

'That's good news,' Nicholas said. His words were addressed to the engineer, but his eyes were on Kelly, and the expression that she saw there sent a warm flush cascading through her cheeks.

There was no chance to talk further to Nicholas, for just then Andrew came from behind and put his hand on her arm. In a way she was glad. Any words she could have exchanged with Nicholas at that point could have only been an anticlimax.

It was late when Kelly went at last to the cottage. Nicholas was nowhere to be seen. In a sense she was disappointed, for it seemed she would not see him again that night. Yet in another sense she was re-lieved. The day had been so perfect that she wanted nothing to spoil it. Too often in the past Nicholas had been sarcastic or mocking, finding a vulnerability where she had not known it existed. After the banquet there had been a look in his eyes which she had never seen there before. When she lay in bed and relived the events of the day she meant to cherish that look, to hug it to her, as it were. It was the final touch to a day she would never forget.

'Sleepyhead!' There was a gentle quality in the tone which made it seem, through the blur of sleep, unfamiliar. And then, as her mind came to full waking consciousness, Kelly's eyes snapped open.

'Nicholas!' It was very light in the room—clearly she had slept later than usual—but Nicholas did not seem to mind. There was a look of amusement in his face, mixed with a quality which in any other man she might have taken for tenderness.

'I overslept,' she said softly.

'You certainly did!'

'I'm sorry about that. You should have woken me.'

Now the mockery would come, the stinging remark which could wound as well as excite. Strangely the unfamiliar expression in his eyes deepened instead. 'You earned your sleep, Kelly.'

And now it was all rushing back—the memory of the banquet, the wonderful moment when the chairman of the convention had said the hotel would be used again next year. Nicholas's approval of the way she had handled the affair, an approval which had been implied if it had not been put into words.

She had not heard him enter the cottage. She had lain in her bed, going over every minute of the evening, and had wondered when he would come. She had thought she would never sleep, but clearly she had. Nicholas must have gone to bed very late. What had he been doing? Had he sat talking to the engineers, or had he been attending to some facet of the hotel's running? A late-night rendezvous perhaps with Serena de Jager? Yesterday just the thought would have been enough to give Kelly pain. But today, with the sun streaming in through the windows, and with Nicholas standing over her with that disturbing look in his eyes, it did not seem to matter.