by Susan Napier
‘Don’t think you’re going to use Carl to make me jealous!’ Ryan growled, his hands remaining where they were, firmly compressing the sides of her breasts, his dark blue trousers and shirt showing the wet imprint of her body.
His anger was like the flick of a velvet whip. ‘For goodness’ sake!’
‘I hired him, I can fire him,’ he snarled. ‘Bear it in mind that the next time you feel like flirting with him you could be costing him his career!’
‘You wouldn’t fire an employee for flirting with me, especially not Carl!’ Jane scoffed, with an absolute conviction that sparked a small flame of appreciation in his angry eyes.
He dropped his hands but remained standing between Jane and the door. ‘No, I wouldn’t—because I’m not the cruel bastard you like to pretend to yourself that I am. And I didn’t say he was flirting with you; I said you were flirting with him.’
‘I was just being friendly—’
‘Semi-nude over a couple of glasses of wine? A man could get the wrong idea about a woman that way.’
She wanted to dispute the semi-nudity, but suddenly realised that it would be a mistake to attract his attention to her treacherous body.
‘Are you accusing me of being drunk?’ she demanded belligerently. He knew full well that she had been in no danger of Carl misinterpreting her friendliness, but he was still furious. There was only one explanation for his unreasonable attitude: he was jealous!
Jane’s burst of triumph was swiftly followed by a deep resentment. He had even less right than reason to feel jealous!
Ryan had planted his hands on his hips, his legs astride. ‘No, just stupid—if you think I’m going to let you get away with it! This is between you and me, Jane. I won’t let you hide behind another man, no matter how innocent the situation. If you want to flirt, why don’t you flirt with the man you really want to hop in the sack with?’
Her resentment was goaded into temper. ‘Why, you arrogant—’
‘That’s right, sweetheart, get mad,’ he interrupted, running his gaze insolently down her body, allowing it to linger on her hard nipples, clearly visible against the thin nylon. ‘I like it when you get hot and bothered over me.’ She trembled and a wicked smile softened his angry expression. ‘Hard to fight the memories, isn’t it, Jane?’
Something inside her snapped. ‘You should know!’ she flung at him. ‘You’re the one who can’t let go of the past!’
His dark head went up, as if catching a scent on the wind. ‘What do you mean by that?’
‘Ava!’
The name shimmered accusingly on the air between them.
‘What about Ava?’ he said, with a careful casualness that didn’t fool her for a moment.
‘Well, she’s still your ideal woman, isn’t she?’ sneered Jane, wrapping her arms around her rapidly cooling body, her voice dripping with sarcasm as she whipped herself up into a jealous rage. It was as if Ryan’s irrational burst of jealousy had given permission for hers to exist, and finally she was free to allow the old, corrosive envy that she had tried so hard to hide from her best friend to bubble to the surface.
‘She’s the oh-so-fragile flower of feminine perfection that all others are measured by, the woman you loved and lost, your soul mate, the one whom you knew instantly on meeting was the woman for you—only, hey, guess what? It turns out that she isn’t!’ she said with sweet vitriol. ‘She ends up marrying someone else so I guess you must have been mistaken. But you can’t accept that. You can’t let the memory rest in peace—you’re still so hung up about her you’re always asking me questions about what she did and why—’
‘Hardly always. That must be your guilty conscience working overtime, Jane,’ he ground out. ‘It’s not her actions—the what and why of what she did that I’m hung up on—it’s making sense out of your involvement.’
But Jane was beyond making sense. Having set her jealousy free, she could no longer control the words spilling off her bitter tongue. ‘Did talking to her again bring all your old feelings flooding back? Are you wondering whether you might get a second chance at your first love? If you’re hoping that she isn’t happy, forget it! She and Conrad have a good marriage.’
He uttered a black curse. ‘I’m not the type to waste my life pining for a lost cause, and that’s what Ava became the moment she got married—only three months after she left me!’
‘Oh? Then why were you so disappointed that I hadn’t told her we’d slept together? Did you hope I might tell her what a fantastic lover you were so that she’d finally realise what she’d been missing? Maybe, in the twisted logic of your revenge having sex with me is the next best thing to bedding my unattainable best friend,’ she spat unforgivably, and when he lunged towards her in raw outrage ducked under his arm and ran—out into the hall and up the stairs, fleet of foot, unencumbered by clothing, splattering drops of water against the walls as she dashed around the landings, conscious of his pounding pursuit gaining on her at every stride.
She’d had enough of a head start to get to her room just in front of him, tears blurring her eyes as her fingers fumbled to shoot the lock a split second before the full force of his pursuing weight hit the door. She leaned back against it, gasping for breath, feeling the vibration of his pounding fists down the length of her spine.
‘Go away!’ she shouted desperately.
‘Jane—open this door!’ He punctuated his angry demand with a hefty kick.
Why? So he could punish her with his contempt for her ridiculous accusations? Or poke and probe with that horribly relentless, incisive mind into the painful reasons for her ignominious loss of control? She’d thought love was supposed to be an enriching, spiritually uplifting experience, not this cheap fairground ride of thrilling euphoria followed by sickening plunges into terrifying despair.
‘No—go away!’ she gulped, dragging an arm across her eyes. Surely he wouldn’t dare break it down? But at least, if he did, she knew the noise would bring Peggy swiftly to the rescue.
His voice lowered and she felt a little bump against the back of her skull that suggested he was resting his forehead against the polished wood. ‘Jane? What’s the matter? Are you crying, sweetheart?’ She could hear him reining in his angry impatience. ‘Look, let me in. I don’t want to hurt you—I just want to talk...’
She gulped back her tears. Sweetheart! How could he call her that? Her heart was as shrivelled as an old boot and it was his fault!
‘Well, I don’t! Go away! Or—or I’ll scream over my balcony for your mother!’
Silence on the other side of the door. Jane smiled a watery, humourless smile. She pressed her ear to the wood and still had it there when she heard a scraping sound coming from the open glass door to her balcony and rushed across just in time to see Ryan launch himself in a flying leap from the narrow rail of the next balcony, at least two metres away. In the darkness he seemed to hover like a sinister avenging angel before swooping earthwards.
Jane screamed as his landing foot hit her rail and slipped off again, but the forward momentum of his upper body carried him over the barrier to crash on his haunches in front of her.
‘Are you crazy? You could have been killed!’ she shrieked angrily as he bounced to his feet, her hands moving helplessly over his arms and heaving chest as if to reassure herself that he was real.
‘Nah...a broken leg or two at the most,’ he said, with infuriating macho insouciance, capturing her wrists and pulling them around his thick waist.
Her heart was still pounding like a freight train. So was his, she realised as her breasts were crushed against the hard wall of his chest. ‘You could have been killed,’ she repeated shrilly, almost paralysed by the thought of losing him.
‘Would you have cared if I’d crashed to my doom?’ he murmured, his hands sliding up her long, trembling back. ‘Maybe you might have thought I deserved it...’
She shuddered, burying her head in the damp front of his shirt, her voice muffled with horror. ‘What a terrible t
hing to say.’
‘I know... we’ve both said some pretty horrible things to each other in this love/hate relationship of ours, haven’t we? That’s why I think you’re right—we shouldn’t talk, talk only gets us into trouble—and, besides, actions speak louder than words...’
And, so saying, he eased back so that he could slant his hands over her shoulders and hook his fingers into the straps of her wet swimsuit, tugging them gently down her arms to bare her breasts to the soft night air, the whiteness of her body accentuated by the contrasting band of black fabric.
The only protest she could summon was a sigh of longing as he bent to moisten the tight twin peaks.
‘Shh...’ He smothered her choked murmur with his mouth and picked her up, carrying her across to the soft bed and collapsing down on it backwards so that she sprawled on top of him. He reached out and turned on the bedside lamp without breaking off the kiss, and as the familiar, addictive taste of him began to saturate her senses Jane gave herself up to a primitive world of all-consuming passion, devoted to the physical expression of the love that she was too afraid to put into words.
She helped clumsily as Ryan wrestled his shirt and her swimsuit off, throwing them to the floor and tugging her thighs astride him so that he could cup her naked bottom and move her against his undulating hips in a way that made her squirm with pleasure and plead for more. He was about to give it to her when a sharp rap at the door froze them in the midst of their glorious, erotic abandon.
‘Jane—are you all right in there? I thought I heard a scream?’
Jane reared up on her elbows, looking down in shocked embarrassment at the face of the man beneath her. Ryan’s hard features were blurred by reckless passion, his mouth bitten red by her feverish kisses, his eyes glittering chips of blue diamond fire.
‘Yes.’ She tried again, her panicky voice louder as she responded to Peggy’s anxious call. ‘Yes...but it was nothing—I’m fine...’
There was a pause, and then a quiet, ‘Are you quite sure?’
She could feel the tension that gathered in every straining muscle of the powerful body that supported her as Ryan waited for her answer. For her choice.
‘Yes—yes, I’m sure,’ she said starkly. ‘You don’t have to worry, Peggy...thanks.’
She felt a wave of joy sweep over her at the fierce exultation that ripped through Ryan’s expression. As they heard his mother’s soft footfalls retreat down the stairs his hand slid around the nape of her neck and slowly applied pressure.
‘She knows you’re in here with me,’ she whispered, when her mouth was an inch away from his.
He grinned wickedly. ‘Good, then she’ll know not to disturb us until morning!’ He nipped her lower lip, and their mouths eagerly clashed again as he tipped her body sideways onto the bed while he pulled off the rest of his clothes. When he was gloriously nude he lifted her back on top of him, uttering a guttural groan as the soft thicket between her legs caressed his belly and a moist, creamy warmth settled over his aching groin.
Long minutes of heated bliss followed, until Ryan finally caught her desperately seeking hands and rasped, ‘No—let me do it...you’ll hurt yourself this way...’
He turned her gently over onto her back, extending her arms out to her sides so that her wrists draped over the edge of the bed and bracing the soles of her feet flat against the bed on either side of his knees. Then he positioned her hips and, with his eyes fixed on her flushed and excited face, entered her in slow, steady increments until he was buried to the hilt. They both groaned as he withdrew and began the process all over again...establishing a slow, sensuous rhythm of measured thrusts that progressively accelerated until they were both wrenched to a breathless peak of explosive ecstasy, their voices mingling in hoarse cries of frenzied rapture.
Afterwards, as they lay in a satiated tangle of sweaty limbs, Ryan kissed her wounded hands reverently, each in turn. ‘If we’re this good now, imagine how much more intense the pleasure will be when you can use these again!’
‘I guess this means we’re having an affair after all...’ Jane’s smile was tinged with tristesse.
Ryan traced it with a provocative finger. ‘Not necessarily...’
Jane’s abused heart clenched in her chest.
‘Not if we regularised the situation.’
The blood drained out of her face, rushing to restart her stalled heart. Shock made her whisper barely audible. ‘What?’
‘Well, if you married me, we could sleep together as often as we like without offending your puritan soul!’ But he was laughing as he said it. He was joking—he had to be!
She recoiled. ‘You never said anything about marriage!’ Or love. Didn’t a declaration of love traditionally come first?
He shifted back from her, an infinitesimal distance, still smiling, but with a wariness in the back of his eyes that deepened her sense of foreboding. ‘Does that mean your answer would be no?’
She noticed the conditional tense. He hadn’t actually asked her a question yet, had he? It had been more of an evasively phrased statement. All Jane’s old insecurities came rushing back as she remembered the numerous false hopes that Ryan had taken delight in tormenting her with over the past two years. A love/hate relationship he had called it—but it was Jane who had done the loving and Ryan the hating. What if this was just another trap?
‘I suppose, if I said yes, I’d find myself jilted at the altar. That would be the ultimate revenge for you, wouldn’t it? To turn the tables and humiliate me in exactly the same way that I humiliated you—’
As soon as the words were out of her mouth she knew she had made a fatal mistake. Ryan’s face turned to stone and he slid out of the bed as if it were contaminated.
‘If that’s honestly the way you feel then any relationship between us is obviously futile. You’re never going to completely trust me, are you? No matter how many times I prove myself.’ He swept up his clothes and began pulling them on, the tenderness of a few moments ago wiped away as if it had never existed.
‘Oh, yes, you’ll sleep with me...even have a blazing affair with me against your better judgement. But you’ll always withhold yourself from true intimacy because you don’t trust me to behave honourably. I’m not the one who’s hung up on Ava—it’s you! You want to be a martyr to the past? Fine! You keep your trust...and I’ll keep my honour! I thought I’d found a woman of pride and courage, but it seems I was mistaken—you’re just another lost cause!’
CHAPTER TEN
THE long black evening gown shimmered and swirled around her ankles as Jane sailed through the crowded hotel restaurant, ignoring the curious looks of startled recognition that followed her determined progress.
She could see Ryan in a tight knot of people near the centre of the room. Less than twenty-four hours ago he had been shaking with pleasure in the privacy of Jane’s arms, teasing her about getting married. Now he was the quintessential public Ryan Blair, rubbing shoulders with the rich and famous, drinking champagne and making deals.
A lost cause, was she?
She’d show him courage!
It wasn’t going to be easy; she knew that. He was going to be savagely uncooperative. He was angry and he was hurting and he had had the whole day to brood. She had offered a gross insult to his honour, his pride and his manhood.
She should have known that Ryan wouldn’t flaunt the idea of marriage lightly. Given his traumatic experience with Ava, it was understandable that he might prefer to approach it obliquely, protecting himself with humour, his defences ready to snap into place at the slightest hint of rejection. He had never said he loved her, it was true, but that didn’t necessarily mean that he didn’t... She had never told him how she felt, either, and men were notoriously less articulate about their feelings than women.
Peggy had not been the only one to be shocked when she had woken up this morning to find that Ryan had driven back to Auckland some time during the night. He had left a brief note of farewell for his mother and siste
r and a sealed envelope for Carl. No message for Jane—which she supposed was a message in itself.
‘What happened?’ Peggy had asked her bluntly.
Jane, red-eyed with weeping, still hadn’t been able to believe it herself. ‘He asked me to marry him.’
‘And you turned him down,’ Peggy had sighed.
‘Yes.’ Her face had looked so tragic Peggy had nearly smiled.
‘Why?’
Jane had blinked. She’d tried to think of some of the reasons which had seemed so utterly compelling the night before.
‘I don’t know,’ she’d realised slowly, horror dawning at her own blind stupidity. ‘He took me by surprise...I suppose there was a part of me that just couldn’t believe that I deserved that much happiness...’
The part of her that was still too much her father’s daughter—the little girl who had learned to expect emotional blows instead of affectionate encouragement, the ‘plain Jane’ who had been told she wasn’t worthy of a mother’s love...
Someone murmured something into Ryan’s ear and he looked up. An intense flare of white-hot emotion flickered across his face when he saw Jane, and then he was watching her approach through veiled eyes, his expression terrifyingly impassive.
‘Hello, Ryan,’ she said huskily, coming to a halt in front of him, glad he couldn’t see her trembling knees under the long black dress that she hoped he recognised—her battle dress!
She loved him. She could do this! She pinned on a dazzling smile as she confronted her lover, brutally attractive in his formal white jacket and black tie. Sexual electricity crackled between them as they measured glances.
He inclined his dark head in the parody of politeness that he did so well. ‘Miss Sherwood. Gatecrashing again?’
‘Actually, no, this time I managed to get one of these.’ She brandished the ticket that Carl had scrounged at Peggy’s behest.
It had been Carl who had given Jane a ride back to Auckland that morning, after mentioning that Ryan’s memo had included a reminder that he would be requiring his adviser at an important fund-raising dinner that he was scheduled to attend that evening. As soon as Jane had learned that the fund-raiser’s venue was the same restaurant which had hosted the Spectrum Developments bash, she’d known exactly what fate decreed she must do. She only hoped the grand gesture wouldn’t backfire on her this time!