Kissed by Moonlight (19 page)

She could almost laugh at his conceit in thinking that all he had to do was reach out to her, touch her, and she would melt against him. Tonight it would take more than even his special powers of persuasion to woo her past the chasm this disclosure had opened between them.
This
was the man she loved, the man who could do all this to her and still expect her sensual acquiescence. This man ...

Although her father had lived for three years after his plans for Chimera had crashed in financial ruin, that, and not subsequent events, had been the reason he'd lost his will to live. Even if David had played no part in bringing her father down, he'd been quick to reach the scene to find out just what was in it for him.

“Profiteer. Opportunist. Vulture,” she flung at him with such vehemence that she startled even herself.

Tears of cold exhaustion filled her eyes. She hid her face in her hands, shutting out the dark anger sweeping across his face. When she drew her hands away again, he had gone. She didn't know where he'd gone, and cared less. She dabbed her tears with her handkerchief, but when she looked at it she saw that it wasn't her handkerchief at all. The crumple of red and black twisting in her fingers was the scarf he'd worn for the barbecue, which she had found here. The issue of her father had completely taken over, blanking everything else out. She had forgotten to confront him with the scarf and tell him she knew he'd brought Justine here. She had forgotten that this sweet haven was
their
love nest. She didn't care about that anymore either. She didn't care about anything.

Her brain had taken one shock too many and had found its own way of dealing with the situation. It had shut off and was ready to sleep.

She opened her eyes to the morning with a dreadful weight on her heart. Memory lagged a step behind and she came through the moments of limbo between sleeping and being fully awake, wondering at the horrific nature of the dream responsible for her despair only to plunge even deeper into despair when she realized it wasn't a dream. It had happened. Her eyes flicked nervously across the bed, widening on the smoothness of the pillow and the unrumpled state of the sheets on that side.

If only some power had cut her impulsive tongue out of her head. She wished she could call back all those corrosive things she had said to him, things she hadn't meant anyway. She groaned aloud. She had been carried away by her own feelings to the point of being blind to the truth, deaf to the voices of reason crying out in her mind to be heard.

She dragged herself out of bed and crossed the room to open the heavy blinds and look out at the new day with reproving eyes. How could the sky be such a vivid blue and the sun be so bright while she was so unhappy?

Had David left her, she wondered, and gone back to the hotel? No, she couldn't hear him, but she could sense his electric presence, and besides, she had now identified the smell of freshly percolated coffee.

She showered, dressed, and made her way to the kitchen.

“The smell of coffee is better than an alarm clock,” he said, filling a cup, picking it up by its saucer and handing it to her.

“Thank you.” As she accepted it she anxiously searched his face for something in his expression to give her comfort. Nothing. His icy politeness amounted to indifference.

“Another beautiful day,” he said in a tone better reserved for a casual acquaintance he didn't particularly wish to encourage. “You've missed the best part of it. I've been for a swim.”

His attitude jarred. How she hated this smooth manner that could shake off last night's bitterness as if it had made no more impact than water on a seal's back. How dare he look so unruffled while she was quivering with fury and hurt? She set her cup and saucer down quickly before its rattle gave her away.

What good would having yesterday back do for her? She had blamed her own deficiencies, her blind loyalty to her father and her intolerance of any plans David had for Chimera that did not exactly follow the original format. She had forgotten how exasperating he could be when he set his mind to it. There was also the matter of the scarf, which hadn't been sorted out yet. Given yesterday back, she would behave in just the same way.

“Hungry?” he inquired.

“Starving,” she said. She would beat him at his own game by not admitting to her loss of appetite in case he remembered – and he would – her inability to eat well when she was unhappy or in a temper. She would eat with gusto even if it choked her. She would not give him the satisfaction of knowing that even for a moment she had regretted her part in what had happened between them last night.

“By a strange coincidence, I anticipated you would be –” Blast his sneering mouth and his shrewd, knowing eyes! “– so I took the things out of the fridge for a full English breakfast. I've done my share, now it's your turn. I like my bacon crispy.”

He folded his arms and tipped his chair back on two legs, in line with the angle of his head. Was he going to sit there and watch her?

“Is there a clean tea cloth or something I could wrap around me to protect my dress, please?”

“I'm pretty certain that Carmen keeps a spare apron somewhere. But as any apron that accommodates her splendid hips will wrap around you three times, perhaps you'd better settle for the tea cloth. There's one on the rail.”

“Carmen?” she queried, reaching for the linen cloth and fastening it around her waist before taking up her station by the stove.

“The woman who keeps an eye on the house for me. Cleans, stocks up the fridge – all that.”

Ah, yes! The
señora
she'd talked to on discovering the bay.

“She was here bright and early this morning with our daily bread, and she's coming back later in time to cook our supper. I told her to leave the cleaning and that we'd forage lunch for ourselves.”

She had spotted the selection of crusty and soft rolls and the loaf of bread and wondered where they'd come from. “Sounds fine to me,” she said in an offhand voice, layering strips of bacon across the frying pan.

Had things been right between them it would have been more than fine. It would have been idyllic to be alone here with her husband, cooking for him, cleaning. In kinder circumstances she would have been tempted to ask him to send Carmen away so she could cook the evening meal as well. But ...

His hard voice crushed into her thoughts. “You don't have to look so dismayed. I'm not condemning you to a day of domestic chores. The house won't fall down if it misses getting the flick of a duster and fruit and rolls will suffice for lunch.”

“I'm glad to hear it,” she said, transferring the bacon onto a plate and cracking the eggs into the frying pan.

“I can see why,” he said drily.

She looked down into the frying pan and saw that out of the three eggs, two of the yolks were broken. He'd put her off by sitting there in high and mighty anticipation of a ruined breakfast. Knowing that while she was useless in lots of things, cooking was a natural asset – something she loved doing and did well – added to her frustration.

“There,” she said slamming the plate down on the table in front of him. Her expression clearly said, “I hope it chokes you.” She set the basket of rolls on the table and went back for her own plate.

They lay side by side on the warm sand, close, yet apart. Since breakfast, they had hardly spoken.

He emerged from a deep, pensive silence to say, “It can't go on like this.”

“No,” she agreed. “What do you intend to do about it? It's obvious you've given it some thought.”

“Yes, I have.” He was lying on his front, wearing the black swimming trunks he'd discarded before going for his swim last night. He levered himself up on his elbows and looked at her. The burning sun that was baking her skin a deeper shade of golden brown was not as fierce as the torrid torture of the all-over exploration his eyes were making of her body. His scrutiny made her perspire; moisture beaded her upper lip and the hollow between her breasts left exposed by the cut of her swimsuit. “I'm sending you home,” he said starkly.

How could he look at her in that ravishing, hungry way and placidly announce that he was sending her home? Her mouth rounded on a small, hysterical laugh. “Home? You mean home to England?”

“My timing was off, Pet,” he said in dry self-derision. “I came back for you too soon. You were only a woman on the outside. Inside, you were still an adolescent with your head full of dreams.”

Last night she would have given anything to be home. Now she didn't want to go. She closed her eyes against the expression on his face and the vivid blue, sheet-of-glass look of the sky. The dazzle remained under her eyelids as tears she must not let him see.

“I'm not an adolescent,” she said. “You'll have to come up with a better explanation than that.”

“I don't have to explain anything,” he said in quiet menace, “but I will. I've a job to do. I can't give it my best while you're around. I've tried to be patient with you, but I've finally had to admit that it's not going to work. Your prejudices go too deep and I just can't deal with the situation. It will be better for both of us if you go home.”

His work – that's all he cared about. He wasn't a man running on normal feelings; he was a robot powered on ambition. That hard streak of ruthless dedication hadn't taken long in coming through.

“Look,” he said swiftly, “I know it sounds as if I'm putting the onus on you, but I'm not. I'm to blame. I should have known my workload was too heavy to accommodate a bride. Brides should be spoiled a little, be given time and attention. It's their right. I should have known you'd be too much of a distracting influence to have around.”

“I don't know how you have the nerve! I haven't managed to distract you from Justine. When you both disappeared from the barbecue I know you came here,” she blurted out hotly, “because I found the scarf you'd been wearing and it didn't walk here by itself.”

“No. It's true that I left the barbecue to come here. The storm was about to break. I wondered if Carmen had remembered to make sure the shutters were secure. I decided to check for myself rather than risk bringing you here and finding the place half wrecked.”

“Oh! But Justine came with you?” she persisted.

“I see now what last night's lockout was about,” he said, a mocking smile on his mouth. “If you've made up your inexorable little mind that I brought Justine here, nothing I say will convince you to the contrary.”

“How can I believe there's nothing going on between you and Justine when you won't give me a straight answer? You despise Geoffrey Hyland as much as I do. You wouldn't have anything to do with him if Justine weren't involved. You tolerate him to be near her.”

“Hasn't it occurred to you there might be another consideration? I could be tolerating his money. If he hadn't come in with me, I couldn't have taken up the option on Chimera. You didn't think I had access to that much ready cash myself, did you?”

“I never gave that side of it a thought.” She wasn't too forgiving. He hadn't denied involvement with Justine, only admitted to
another
consideration. She kept the thought that it couldn't have been easy for him to include a man like that in the deal sealed behind her lips.

“I had it written into the contract that I could buy him out.”

“That's something, anyway.”

“He had the foresight to insert a time clause.”

Which explained why he had been working himself into the ground. “Can you beat it?”

“I must.” His mouth hardened. “I won't let anything, or anyone, stop me.”

Meaning me, she thought. “David, this is going to sound terribly repetitive. I'm tired of saying ‘Why didn't you tell me?' But why
didn't
you tell me about the time clause?” She couldn't bear the thought that her presence, her behavior, might stop him from beating Geoffrey Hyland. If she'd known she wouldn't have been so obstructive.

“Perhaps I thought it was in my own best interest not to tell you. If you'd known that, you might have been even more demanding of my time. Anything to prevent my getting sole control of your precious Chimera.”

She bit her lip, disturbed and shaken. Then anger came to cancel out all other emotions. Anger against herself for softening toward him. If he could think that of her, let him. “How well you know me,” she said haughtily.

She placed her hands on the beach towel she was lying on, swinging her feet around and under her. His hand came out and held her in this half-rising position. “Where do you think you're going?”

“In the house to shower and dress. Then you can take me back to the hotel. If your mind is made up, I see no point in delaying. We might as well get back so that you can arrange my flight home as soon as possible.”

“No. We came here for two weeks. That's how long we're staying.”

She tried to find a reason for his decision not to send her home straight away. She had a horrible suspicion that she was going to regret this in a moment, but could it be that he wasn't going to send her home? Was it a bluff? Had he said he was sending her home with no serious intention of carrying out this threat – to shock her into seeing reason? Or had he meant it then but regretted it now, and was he playing for time in the hope that two weeks on their own would work its own magic and the situation would come right between them?

His derisive, scorn-flecked eyes held hers. “You don't think I'm going to let you make a laughing stock of me by returning to the hotel after only one day of our official honeymoon, do you?”

She should have known better. “You'd make me stay here against my will to save your face?” she said contemptuously.

“Against your will?” The hand that had stopped her from getting up slid into the deep cutaway side of her swimsuit, seeking its own answer.