Scarlet Lady (6 page)

K
NOWING
the island roads as she did, Ginny wisely took the helicopter ride from the airport. It set her down in the delightful small town of Soufriere.

Slipping off her winter layers down to her sleeveless body and swirling jade-green silk skirt, she twisted a matching scarf through her newly cut hair—now in a page-boy bob—and hoped that the new hairstyle plus the enormous sunglasses and a conscious effort on her part not to project glamour would hide her identity. So far no one had rushed up to her, pointed, sniggered or trained cameras on her. Wonderful. Freedom! And she was smiling naturally for the first time in ages.

A small dugout with an outboard motor ferried her to the hotel, speeding along at an exhilarating rate over the smooth, glassy sea. When she saw the bay she fell in love with it at first sight.

It was a place that she'd always meant to visit but had never found time for in the hectic schedule of being photographed for magazine covers. Anse La Verdure Hotel sat halfway up a jungly hill, only partly visible among the tropical trees. Coconut palms backed the gentle curve of the beach and boats bobbed in the bay. The beauty and peace of the isolated cove offered all the privacy she could desire.

Leaving Reception to call her if Monsieur St Honore arrived, she walked up the hill to her villa, her heart lifting at the glorious view that unfolded when she entered.The two-bedroomed cantilevered villa sprawled out over the hill and was open to the fresh air on three sides. Its skilful design afforded total privacy, yet gave maximum exposure to the glorious blue skies and rampant vegetation.

For three days she never left the room or the big sun- deck, waiting, for the call from St Honore. She didn't even think. All she did was read the novels she'd bought at the airport.

Already she was rested. On the fourth morning she woke late and decided to trace St Honore herself. Stripping off her satin nightdress, ignoring the clothes she'd shed last night in deliciously teenagerish chaos all over the floor, she walked into the shower, laughing at the birds which flew in and prinked their feathers where the water splashed on the tiles.

It would be paradise if only Leo could be with her too. She sighed. Leo would be the only man in her heart for the rest of her life. She loved him so deeply that she would carry her love to the grave. And dreamily she imagined his face, his body, his wonderful smile, wondering how she could resurrect his love for her.

Her reverie was interrupted by a banging on the door. 'Oh, drat!' she sighed, reaching for her robe. 'Yes?' she asked warily, when she opened the door.

'My name is St Honore,' began the unshaven and dishevelled flaxen-haired male with incredibly piercing blue eyes. 'I wish to God it wasn't, but I imagine you're pleased.'

'Oh!' she said, startled. 'Yes, I am!'

fie wore only a pair of shorts, was tanned to the colour of teak—and seemed as furious as hell. And he obviously was far too young—perhaps thirtyish?—to be her father. The disappointment swept through her and she realised that she'd set more store by this meeting than she'd thought.

'Let's talk,' he said tightly in an oddly accented voice. Sexy French crossed with the lovely Caribbean sing-song. Though, with a name like his, he probably had French ancestry.

She drew her robe firmly about her body. 'I'd like that—' she began politely.

'Fine.' Before she knew what he was doing, he'd walked past her and up the stairs into the room. When she padded uncertainly after him, he whirled round and frowned. 'Are you here for the old man's money?'

Ginny blinked and understood. 'You mean your father?' she hazarded, and remembered the promise that she'd learn something to her advantage. Her heart thudded. She was fair, like him. Could they be related? Brother and sister? 'I could be—'

'If you've come to play gold-digger, then I'd advise you to go home,' he told her curtly, 'before you're in deep, deep trouble!'

Her eyes narrowed at his animosity. 'I've only just arrived!' she said spiritedly.

'I want to know what your expectations are,' he muttered.

He began to walk towards her and she retreated till her back was against a pillar. His hands came up and she wriggled, mortified that her action had wrenched the robe open a little.

Just as he laid his hands on her naked shoulders, she heard a gasp and both she and St Honore jerked their heads around in unison. Ginny's eyes widened in shock. A beautiful and clearly distressed woman with heavily tumbled brown hair was staring at them in blank horroramid the chaos of Ginny's scattered clothing. The woman cried 'Pascal!' twice and fainted dead away, crumpling in a heap on the floor.

The grip on Ginny's arms was released. Without a word, the man—Pascal, presumably—ran to the woman, picked her up and carried her out.

The peace, the serenity and her sense of calm had been shattered. Ginny clung to the veranda post, her chest heaving, her hair falling about her face. The woman was obviously Pascal St Honore's wife, lover or partner. Ginny went scarlet, thinking back to how it must have looked to an outsider—she with her robe falling open, thrust against the pillar with Pascal's hands holding her, his face close to hers, urgent and intense. An intensity that could have been interpreted as sexual passion.

'Oh, wo!' she whispered hopelessly. 'More scandal. More accusations.'

And she groaned when she heard footsteps on the wooden stairs that led up from the front door to her room, dreading the prospect of the woman's disgust when she accused her of seducing her guy.

But before she could move she heard a voice that froze her where she stood.

'Often entertain half-naked men, do you?' drawled Leo's voice.

Ice formed inside her. She seemed to have been frozen right through by those soft, sinister tones. Leo! His contempt had rung out across the room, hurting her with a sharpness that rendered her temporarily mute.

Then the two years of killing all outward emotion concerning Leo came into play and she turned, cool and haughty, mistress of herself despite the shaking of her legs and the sickness in her stomach.

She let her eyes wander up and down him, calculating the amount of insult that she could get away with safely. It was nearly her undoing.

Scornful and hard he might look, but he was also flinging his wretched masculine appeal at her and she burned beneath his slow scrutiny of her barely covered body.

'Surely my behaviour is no concern of yours?' she said mildly, tying up her gaping robe and somehow wandering with a deceptive casualness across to the stagey dressing table.

'It is when you involve what appears to be a distressed wife in full flight,' he said coldly. 'You are a little tramp, Virginia!'

Virginia, she thought dully. Formal. Detached. Only her adoptive parents had ever called her that. 'For men it's all right, is it?' she asked in a low tone, racked with pain as she remembered the horrific sight of Arabella and Leo in bed together. Her voice hardened. 'It didn't matter that you entertained a naked woman in our bed or that I was a distressed woman in full flight?'

'You deserved what you got,' he said brutally. 'I doubt if that unhappy little innocent did!'

'It wasn't what it seemed!' she defended. 'He'll explain to his wife, if that's who she is.'

'If she believes you two were doing something innocuous, she's more guileless than she looks,' snapped Leo.

She quivered involuntarily. What was it about him? Her eyes lingered on his mouth. A hardness, a predatory sensuality. She felt her stomach lurch. He was somehow dangerous—not the man she'd known before. And that excited her, against her will.

'I hope she does believe it was a misunderstanding on her husband's part, because it's true,' she said huskily, certain that Pascal would placate his wife by explaining the possible relationship between himself and the half- naked woman he'd been accosting.

And, worrying that her senses were spilling into her brains, she sat down on the stool and smiled coolly, non-committally at Leo's reflection in the mirror while she unhooked the hair-dryer.

Her hand wavered, however, because she suddenly remembered the mind-blowing sex with him on the library floor... as she had remembered it so many times since. And every time it had left a raw ache inside her. This time he was here in person and it was worse. Because she still loved him and he'd cheated on her. Even now she wanted to scream at him and ease her impotent anger. Yet she knew that she had to keep calm and dignified for her own sake.

Obviously irritated by the noise, he took the hair-dryer from her hand and replaced it. With a deep sigh, she angled her head to show her exasperation and asked coolly, 'Why are you here—and how did you find me?'

'Chas,' he drawled, his fingers resting on the nape of her neck.

'How could he?' she protested resentfully.

Slowly Leo's hands ran up through her wet hair and she was reminded of another time, another lifetime, when she'd been so desperate to hold her marriage together, to keep Leo's love, that she'd walked into the shower fully dressed. And been rebuffed. Her heart hardened.

'I rang you,' he said casually, 'to make sure you knew the divorce had gone through. Chas didn't mean to betray you. He accidentally mentioned that you were in St Lucia and I tricked him into giving away a little more. A name—St Honore.' A sinister note had crept into his voice.

'So?' She shook her head to rid herself of his unwanted caress. Well, she admitted to herself, it
was
wanted, but fatal to her new-found self.

'I had lunch with my father yesterday and he said he knew of a St Honore on the island. I thought it was likely that it was the same man.' Leo wandered off and, not wanting to miss a word he said, she began to make up her face instead of defying him and switching on the dryer again. 'Do you know what you're getting into?' he asked quietly. 'Do you know what kind of person he is?'

Her huge, gold-brown eyes met his in the mirror. 'You tell me,' she said, disguising her apprehension with a shrug. She'd met Pascal St Honore. He was obviously trying to stop her from meeting his father. She was determined to find out why.

Leo scowled and strode over to her, twisting her around on the low stool and holding her wrists firmly. They both stared at her thighs where the robe had fallen away to reveal the fair triangle of soft, downy hair. Leo's jaw quivered and then he roughly covered her again. But they were both shaking.

She saw the lick of his tongue over his lips and quickly moistened hers. Saw his quickened breath lifting his chest in rapid movements. 'Get away from me!' she croaked.

His thick lashes lifted slowly and he looked steadily into her horrified eyes, smiling an infuriatingly mocking smile because she'd revealed her secret desire in that panic-driven sentence.

'First you listen. I've come to warn you, for old times' sake,' he said softly, his mouth and eyes enchanting her, weaving their old spell. Desperately she tried to comprehend what he was saying. 'Vincente St Honore is not someone you want to be involved with—'

'Vincente?' She furrowed her brow. The father, presumably. Intrigued, she angled her head.

'That's right,' said Leo curtly. 'Don't have anything to do with him.'

'I don't follow your orders,' she snapped.

'You never did,' he grunted. 'But this time, if you don't pay attention to what I'm saying, it could be your funeral.'

Ginny's eyes rounded. 'Why?' she asked shakily. 'Leo, you're scaring me!'

His slate eyes brooded on her for a moment. 'I hope so,' he said soberly, and she knew that he wasn't trying to be malicious, that this was something worryingly serious. Her lower lip began to tremble.

'You'd better explain,' she said apprehensively.

Leo appeared to be considering how much he could tell her. 'I want you to promise that this will go no further,' he said eventually. She nodded, alarm in her huge eyes. 'Many years ago, Vincente St Honore was part of the international social circuit,' he explained gravely. 'There was a scandal which caused him to be ostracised. Father knows the woman involved in the scandal—someone who was virtually driven insane by the brute.' Leo's mouth curled in scorn. 'She was treated despicably—insulted, humiliated—'

'No,' she whispered, appalled. This was the man who might be her
father?
'No, Leo!' she cried, not wanting to believe such things.

'So tell me why you've come here to see him,' Leo said tightly.

She wrenched herself free in distress and got up, pacing up and down, thinking of Pascal, and trying to comprehend Leo's story. It all sounded horribly true. If Vincente
was
her father, what would she do? Had he been the reason why her mother had run away and why she had been so disturbed? It was a background she didn't want for herself, blood she didn't relish flowing in her veins.

An unbalanced mother, a brutal father. She went chalk-white with misery, all hope of a happy reunion slowly being extinguished.

'You want a drink?' he asked sharply.

'Yes,' she whispered, waving to the fridge.

In silence she sat while he found the champagne and filled two glasses, coming to stand in front of her. 'You still haven't told me what you're doing flying out to meet this man,' he said. Something in his tone alerted her. He knew more than he was saying and that made her wary.

'My business,' she said shortly.

'Unwise business,' he said, scowling at the champagne in the elegant flute. He reached out and tipped up her chin so that she was forced to look at him. 'Forget any idea of seeing him. There can't be any reason worth the risk. Get dressed. I'll escort you home,' he said gruffly. 'We'll fly back-'

'No! I'm not going!' she cried with defiance.

'You fool!' he scorned. 'What are you expecting from the old lecher?'

Ginny crushed her wince of horror, gave an elegant lift of her shoulders and slid away from him. 'Leave me to run my own life,' she said with cool hauteur. 'I might have a chat with him, I might not. You've told me what you know and it's for me to decide what to do.'