The Secret Sinclair

In her blue checked overalls, and with her hair scraped back under a matching scarf, Sarah figured she could easily have passed for a heap of old clothes dumped on the ground were it not for the elaborate trolley of cleaning materials by her side
.

She had had dreams once, but that had been five years ago. In a heartbeat all that had changed.

As the hushed voices got closer Sarah put her all into the wretched stain on the carpet, but with a sinking heart she was aware that the voices had fallen silent and the footsteps seemed to have stopped just in front of her.

In fact, sliding her eyes across, she could make out some hand-tailored Italian shoes just below charcoal-grey trousers, sharply creased.

Reluctantly, Sarah raised her eyes, and in that instant she was skewered to the spot by the same bitter chocolate eyes that had taken up residence in her head five years ago and stubbornly refused to budge. Raoul Sinclair.

Cathy Williams
is originally from Trinidad, but has lived in England for a number of years. She currently has a house in Warwickshire, which she shares with her husband Richard, her three daughters, Charlotte, Olivia and Emma, and their pet cat, Salem. She adores writing romantic fiction, and would love one of her girls to become a writer—although at the moment she is happy enough if they do their homework and agree not to bicker with one another!

Recent titles by the same author:

HIS CHRISTMAS ACQUISITION
HER IMPOSSIBLE BOSS
IN WANT OF A WIFE?
THE SECRETARY’S SCANDALOUS SECRET

Did you know these are also available as eBooks?
Visit www.millsandboon.co.uk

R
AOUL
shifted as quietly as he could on the bed, propped himself up on one elbow and stared down at the woman sleeping contentedly next to him. Through the open window the sultry African night air could barely work itself up into a breeze, and even with the fan lethargically whirring on the chest of drawers it was still and humid. The net draped haphazardly over them was very optimistic protection against the mosquitoes, and as one landed on his arm he slapped it away and sat up.

Sarah stirred, opened her eyes sleepily and smiled at him.

God, he was beautiful. She had never, ever imagined that any man could be as beautiful as Raoul Sinclair. From the very first moment she had laid eyes on him three months ago she had been rendered speechless—and the effect still hadn’t worn off.

Amongst all the other people taking their gap years, he stood head and shoulders above the rest. He was literally taller than all of them, but it was much more than that. It was his exotic beauty that held her spellbound: the burnished gold of his skin, the vibrancy of his black, glossy hair—long now; almost to his shoulders—the latent power of his lean, muscular body. Although he was only a matter
of a few years older than the rest of them, he was a man amongst boys.

She reached up and skimmed her hand along his back.

‘Mosquitoes.’ Raoul grinned, dark eyes sweeping over her smooth honey-gold shoulders down to her breasts. He felt himself stirring and hardening, even though they had made love less than a few hours ago. ‘This net is useless. But, seeing that we’re now both up and wide awake …’

With a little sigh of pleasure Sarah reached out and linked her hands around his neck, drawing him to her and wriggling restlessly as his mouth found hers.

A virgin when she had met him, she knew he had liberated her. Every touch had released new and wonderful sensations.

Her body was slick with heat and perspiration as he gently pulled down the thin sheet which was all they could endure out here.

She had the most wonderful breasts he had ever seen, and with a sudden pang of regret for things to come Raoul realised that he was going to miss her body. No—much more than that. He was going to miss
her
.

It was a situation he had not foreseen when he had decided to take three months off to work in Mozambique. At the time, it had seemed a fitting interlude between the conclusion of university—two hard-won degrees in Economics and Maths—and the start of what he intended to be the rest of his life. Before he threw himself into conquering the world and putting his own personal demons to rest he would immerse himself in the selflessness of helping other people—people as unfortunate as he himself had been, although in a completely different way.

Meeting a woman and falling into bed with her hadn’t been on his radar. His libido, like everything else in his life, was just something else he had learnt to control
ruthlessly. He had intended to spend three months controlling it.

Sarah Scott, with her tangled blonde hair and her fresh-faced innocence, was certainly not the sort of woman he fancied himself drawn to. He generally went for tougher, more experienced types—women with obvious attractions, who were as willing as he was to have a brief, passionate fling. Women who were ships passing in the night, never dropping anchor and more importantly, never expecting
him
to.

One look at Sarah and he had recognised a girl who would be into anchors being dropped, but it hadn’t been enough to keep him away. For two weeks, as they’d been thrown together in circumstances so far removed from reality that it was almost like living in a bubble, he had watched her broodingly out of the corner of his eye, had been aware of her watching him. By the end of week three the inevitable had become reality.

They made love now—quietly and slowly. The house they shared with six other occupants had walls as thin as tracing paper, and wooden floors that seemed to transmit sound with ruthless efficiency.

‘Okay,’ Raoul whispered, ‘how close do you think I can get before you have to stifle a groan?’

‘Don’t,’ Sarah whispered back with a giggle. ‘You know how hard it is …’

‘Yes, and it’s what I like about you. One touch and I can feel your body melt.’ He touched her accordingly, a feathery touch between her generous breasts, trailing a continuous line to circle her prominent nipples until she was squirming and breathing quickly, face flushed, her hand curling into his over long hair.

As he delicately licked the stiffened, swollen tip of her nipple he automatically placed a gentle hand over her
mouth, and half smiled as she tried very hard not to groan into the palm of his hand.

Only a handful of times had they taken the beaten up Land Rover and escaped to one of the beaches, where they had found privacy and made love without restraint. Between work and down-time on the compound, however, they were confined to a type of lovemaking that was as refined and guarded as a specialised dance.

Sarah half opened her eyes, simply because she could never resist watching Raoul—the dark bronze of his body against the paler gold of hers, the play of sinew and muscle as he reared up over her, powerful and strong and untamed.

Although it was after midnight, the moon was bright and full. Its silvery light streamed through the window, casting shadows on the walls and picking up the hard angles of his face as he licked a path along her stomach, down to where her legs were parted for his eventual caress.

Quite honestly, at times like this Sarah thought that she had died and gone to heaven, and it never failed to amaze her that her feelings for this man could be so overwhelming after only a matter of three months … less! She felt as though, without even realising it, she had been saving herself for him to come along and take possession of her heart.

As their lovemaking gathered urgency the uneasy tangle of thoughts that had been playing in her head for the past few days were lost as he thrust into her and then picked up a long, steady rhythm that became faster and harder, until she felt herself spiralling towards orgasm, holding on so that their bodies became one and they climaxed. The only sounds were their fast-drawn breaths, even though she wanted to cry out loud from the pleasure of fulfilment.

As she tumbled back down to earth the moonlight illuminated
his suitcases, packed and standing to attention by the single old-fashioned wardrobe.

And then back came the disquieting thoughts.

Raoul sank against her, spent, and for a few seconds neither of them spoke. He draped his arm over her body. The sheet had managed to work itself into a heap at the foot of the bed, and he idly wondered just how long it would take for the mosquitoes to figure out that there was a new and much bigger entrance available to get inside.

‘Can … can we talk?’

Raoul stiffened. Past experience had taught him that anyone who wanted to
talk
invariably wanted to say things he didn’t want to hear.

‘Okay, I can tell from the way you’re not jumping with joy that you don’t want to talk, but I think we should. I mean … your cases are all packed, Raoul. You’re leaving in two days’ time. And I … I don’t know what’s going to happen to us.’

Raoul swung off her to lie back. He stared at the ceiling in silence for a few seconds. Of course he had known that this was where they would end up, but he had conveniently chosen to ignore that because she had bewitched him. Every time he had considered giving her one of his little speeches about expecting nothing from him he had looked into her bright green eyes and the speech had melted away.

He reluctantly turned to face her and stroked the vanilla blonde hair off her face, neatly tucking loose strands behind her ears.

‘I know we need to talk,’ he admitted heavily.

‘But you still don’t want to …’

‘I’m not sure where it’s going to get us.’

Hearing that was like having ice cold water thrown in her face, but Sarah ploughed on bravely—because she
just couldn’t see that what they had could possibly come to
nothing
the minute he departed. They had done a thousand things together. More than some people packed into a lifetime. She refused to concede that it could all melt away into nothingness.

‘I never intended to come out here and start any kind of relationship,’ he confessed, his eloquence for once gone, because he was just not accustomed to having emotional conversations with anyone. He never had. He just didn’t think that he had it in him. But there she was, staring at him in the darkness with those big, questioning eyes … waiting.

‘Nor did I. I mean, I just wanted to get some experience and live a little—do something a bit different before starting university. You know that. How many times did I tell you that—?’ She’d very nearly said
falling in love
, but an innate sense of self-preservation held her back. Not once had he ever told her what he felt for her. She had only deduced from the way he looked at her and touched her, and laughed at the things she said, and when she teased him. ‘That meeting someone wasn’t part of my agenda either. The unexpected happens.’

Did it? Not to him. Never to him. He had endured a childhood that had been riddled with the unexpected—all of it bad. Top of his list of things to avoid was
The Unexpected
, but she was right. What had blossomed between them had taken him by surprise. He drew her against him and searched for the right words to explain just why the future staring them in the face would be one they each faced on their own.

‘I shouldn’t have given in, Sarah.’

‘Shouldn’t have given in to what?’

‘You know what. To you.’

‘Please don’t say that,’ she whispered with heartfelt dismay.
‘Are you saying that what we did was all a big mistake? We’ve had so much fun! You don’t have to be serious all the time.’

Raoul took her hand and kissed the tips of her fingers, one by one, until the radiant smile reappeared on her face. She smiled easily.

‘It’s been fun,’ he agreed, with the heavy feeling of someone about to deliver a fatal blow to an unsuspecting victim. ‘But this isn’t reality, Sarah. This is time out. You pretty much said it yourself. Reality is what’s in front of us. In your case three years at university. In my case …’
The world and nothing less
. ‘A job. I really hoped that we wouldn’t have to have this conversation. I hoped that you would see what’s pretty clear to me. This has been great, but it’s … a holiday affair.’