The Bedroom Barter (12 page)

'Are you sure? You seem a little flushed—out of sorts.'

She shrugged a shoulder. Too much sun,' she said lightly. 'I'm still not used to it'

'Ah,' he said, his eyes considering her shrewdly. 'That might account for it.' He paused. 'I took some savoury pastries from the freezer earlier. Would you like me to heat them?'

'Yes, please,' Chellie said gratefully.

She poured the creamy vegetable soup into a pan, and began to warm it gently while Laurent busied himself at the oven.

She said, 'I just hope we get to St Hilaire before I poison everyone.'

He clicked his tongue. 'That is not fair. You should not put yourself down in such a way,
mademoiselle
.'

'Please,' she said. 'My other friends call me Chellie.'

His brows lifted, 'You flatter me—Chellie.
Merci du compliment
.'

'So, tell me something about St Hilaire?' She kept her voice bright, interested. 'I gather it's not very big?'

'No,' he said. 'But my home is there, so I think it very beautiful.'

'Are you married?'

'Yes.' His face relaxed into a smile. 'And I have a son and a daughter.'

Chellie remembered there had been family photos in his cabin, but could not say so, of course. She said, 'They must miss you—when you're away like this.'

He shrugged- 'It does not happen so often.'

'Oh,' she said. 'Then this isn't how you earn your living—sailing other people's boats?'

'No,' he said. 'On St Hilaire I manage a banana plantation. And I have a boat of my own,' he added with a touch of dryness. 'I like to fish.'

Chellie hesitated, fighting with herself and losing. She said, trying to sound casual, 'And Ash—does he live on the island too?'

'There—and in other places.' He paused, giving a slight shrug. 'Unlike myself, he is a single man. So—he enjoys his freedom.'

'Yes,' she said. 'I'm sure he does.'
But for how much longer
? she asked herself, remembering the photograph beside his bed.

She concentrated her attention fiercely on the soup. After a moment or two, she said, 'Laurent—will you tell me something?

'If I can.' He sounded faintly wary.

She drew a breath. 'Is Ash sorry that he rescued me? That he brought me out of that awful place?'

Laurent hesitated. 'I think,
cherie
, he regrets there was ever a necessity to do so.'

Her smile was wry. 'I'm sorry too.' She swirled a spoon in the soup, watching tiny bubbles begin to form. She said, 'But with Ash there's more to it than that—isn't there?'

He spread his hands. 'In life there are always—complications.'

She gave a wintry smile. 'And I'm one of those complications?'

He shook his head. 'I think I have already said too much.' He became businesslike. 'The pastries require five more minutes. There is salad in the refrigerator, also vinaigrette dressing in a small jar. Ash suggested that we eat on deck.'

'Fine,' she said, over-brightly. 'But I'll have my meal here. Less—complicated, you understand.

Laurent gave her a quizzical look as he prepared to depart. 'I think that I begin to,' he murmured. 'Perhaps it may be better for you to—stay out of the sun,
cherie
.' And he went off, whistling under his breath.

Lunch was not as difficult as she'd feared, after all. Ash barely looked at her as he thanked her with cool politeness for the tray of food she set in front of them. Nor did he query her failure to join them.

Perhaps he was glad not to have to face her, Chellie thought as she ate her solitary meal.

Once it was all finished, and cleared away, Chellie went to her stateroom and took a long cool shower, changing back into the clothes she'd worn earlier.

No more chasing a tan, she told herself. In future it would be safer to cover up.

Now she needed something to occupy her—something that would stop her thinking again, because there was no guarantee that she could keep her thoughts under sufficient control for her own peace of mind.

She'd noticed there were cleaning materials in a locker near the crews? quarters, and she decided to turn her attention to the saloon.

If her father were here now, he wouldn't believe his eyes, she thought, applying polish to a table surface and rubbing vigorously, but for the first time in her life, she actually felt useful.

The scent of the casserole was beginning to permeate through from the galley, and she sniffed with real appreciation as she worked.

The events of the past twenty-four hours notwithstanding, she was beginning to see the attraction of life on board. Maybe she could seriously learn to cook and become part of the crew on another boat—preferably in a different ocean on the other side of the world.

Although she could well imagine her father's reaction to the news that she'd opted to become a sea-going skivvy. His cold displeasure.

She paused, wiping a few beads of perspiration from her forehead, aware of a faint shiver of uneasiness, as if she'd conjured up his actual presence.

Which was ridiculous, she told herself, resuming her vigorous rubbing, because Sir Clive was hundreds of miles away and the Caribbean was the last place he'd look for her. If, of course, he bothered to look at all, she conceded wryly.

Her elopement with Ramon would have made him very angry. So angry, probably, that he'd written off his unsatisfactory daughter with the same icy finality he'd show a bad debt. A line drawn and no further reference made.

My God, she thought. How many times have I seen him do it? So why should he treat me any differently?

Besides, Ramon had covered their tracks with extreme care. She could remember how impressed she'd been with his caution, the deliberate false trails that he'd laid. His insistence that they should not be followed. And how she'd naively interpreted it as his genuine wish to shield her from her father's wrath by putting themselves beyond his reach and winning their freedom.

Nice plan, she acknowledged ruefully. Yet its only achievement had been to enmesh her in a different kind of slavery.

And one that, in her heart, she had no real wish to escape.

It was an acknowledgement that struck her with all the force of a hammer-blow.

Chellie straightened slowly, feeling pain stir inside her with icy and corroding bitterness as she suddenly found herself reliving those all too short moments in Ash's arms. As she tasted once more the drugging sweetness of his kiss on her lips.

And stopped there, gasping, shaking her head in a despairing attempt to bring herself back to reality.

She said aloud, 'Don't do this to yourself, Michelle. Wake up and smell the coffee. Start repeating ten times a day, "There is no future with Ash Brennan" until you learn some sense at last'

And tried to ignore the tiny warning voice in her brain which whispered that it might already be much too late. That she could be lost for ever.

Ash, of course, must never know how she felt.

That was what she kept repeating to herself, over and over again, as this seemingly endless day drew towards its close.

He must never be allowed to suspect, even for a moment, the riot of emotional confusion churning inside her.

I'd rather be back at Mama Rita's than have him guess how I'm feeling right now, she thought, wincing, as she went down to her stateroom to change for dinner..

She needed somehow to practise his own brand of cool indifference if she was to survive the remainder of this short voyage with her pride undamaged.

And when they reached St Hilaire she had to walk away without looking back. Grateful, but casual. Drawing a line under the whole affair.

No regrets, she thought, swallowing past a sudden tightness in her throat, and no recriminations—no matter how difficult that might be.

Because, although she might be able to keep her pride intact, she could not make any similar guarantees about her heart.

She groaned inwardly. Oh, God, she thought wretchedly, what am I doing to myself?

First Ramon—and now this—this disaster.

Did she never learn? she demanded of herself with savage intensity. Was she really planning to be a loser all her life, sighing for a whole series of Mr Wrongs?

And wasn't she making far too much of it all anyway? After all, as Ash had said himself, nothing had really happened. He'd made his play, been turned down, and shrugged it off.

Which indicated fairly bruisingly the relative unimportance of the encounter in his scheme of things, she thought unhappily. As far as he was concerned the point of no return had by no means been reached. Whereas as soon as his mouth had touched hers she'd gone up in flames—ready to give him anything he asked for.

And it was small consolation to tell herself that, in fact, she'd been the first one to draw back. Because it should never have been allowed to happen at all. And belated second thoughts didn't change a thing.

For God's sake, she castigated herself, I hardly know him. It may seem an eternity, but the truth is that he walked into my life less than forty-eight hours ago. And that is no basis for any kind of relationship—and certainly not a one-night stand. I'm worth more than that.

Besides, it went across every principle she had ever possessed. She'd believed that she was being seriously courted by Ramon, yet she'd held out against him for weeks on end, telling herself it would make their eventual union on their wedding night doubly precious.

She looked at herself in the mirror, running her fingers regretfully through the short, feathery spikes of black hair.

She seemed to have become a stranger to herself in all kinds of ways, she thought, sighing. But then for the last few weeks of her life survival had been the name, of the game. She could afford nothing else.

And that was the situation she'd be forced to battle with for the foreseeable future.

Meanwhile, there was tonight to get through. And it was even more important not to lurk out of the way in the saloon or her own stateroom, as if she was too scared to face him. That would be instant self-betrayal.

She needed to be smiling and totally insouciant—as if she didn't have a care in the world and those few devastating moments in his arms had been shrugged aside as trivial. That was the way to play it—the only way.

She'd taken something quiet and unobtrusive from the wardrobe, but now she thought, To hell with it, selecting instead with a certain defiance an ankle-length wraparound skirt, with crimson tropical flowers on a creamy background, topped by a square-necked, short-sleeved blouse in the same vibrant colour as the flowers.

Go out in style, she told herself, smoothing the silky fabric over her slim hips and crushing down the wayward thought that maybe Ash might also be left with something to regret.

Because the words 'if only' would feature rarely, if ever, in his vocabulary, and she knew it. And she'd be an even bigger fool if she hoped for anything else.

So—I'm a fool, she thought, and sighed soundlessly.

The casserole was delicious, served with a mound of fluffy rice and some tiny green beans which Laurent had shown her how to turn lightly in butter.