Substitute Engagement

by Jayne Bauling

  ‘Not sacrifices! You seem to have some weirdly limited ideas about what loving someone really means,’ she lashed at him. ‘It’s wanting to make them happy!’

  ‘At whatever cost to yourself?’ he derided. ‘Maybe your father and Olivier should have given an occasional thought to your happiness.’

  ‘My dad didn’t know I wanted to do other things.’ She quickly defended her father.

  ‘And Olivier?’ His remark was perceptive, in response to the omission.

  ‘It’s rather obvious that Thierry didn’t love me properly, isn’t it?’ she reminded him bitterly. ‘He needed me to be at home and I’d have been glad to do it because it would have been my home too, even if…Only that’s all over now, of course. He has got Nadine.’

  ‘He’d never have made you happy,’ Rob asserted bitingly.

  ‘Or me him?’ she prompted, then took a deep breath and added, ‘Nadine will, though. Make him happy.’

  ‘It’s not really his welfare that bothers me.’

  A slight frown was pulling his dark eyebrows together, so she said quietly, ‘He’ll never physically abuse her, Rob.’

  ‘How do you know about that?’

  ‘I saw her earlier, before I came up here,’ she explained. ‘She came looking for me.’

  ‘What for?’ he demanded suspiciously.

  ‘To find out if it was all right for her to steal Thierry from me,’ she volunteered flippantly.

  ‘What did you tell her?’

  ‘To go right ahead and good luck…that sort of civilised thing,’ Lucia offered tartly as she stood up.

  ‘You’d better have meant it,’ Rob warned her harshly before asking, ‘Did she actually tell you about the violence she has endured in her past relationships?’

  ‘I realised when she said she knew Thierry would never hit her.’ Meeting his questioning look, she added soberly, ‘He never will, Rob. I know that for a fact. I know him.’

  ‘And you loved him,’ he supplemented on a note of acceptance, and the horrified thought that he might be starting to pity her slammed into her consciousness.

  ‘Relax! You don’t have to have your loyalties divided by needing to feel sorry for me!’ She gave him a brightly insouciant smile. ‘I’m not hurt by what Thierry has done. I don’t care!’

  ‘Pride or truth, Lucia?’ Rob urged, gently mocking, and in the briefest of pauses that followed Lucia gained the impression that he was about to say one thing but changed his mind. Instead he came out with, ‘But either way I’m delighted to hear it, as long as you don’t change your mind and decide you want him back after all.

  ‘Unfortunately you’re not going to be able to demonstrate how little you care by parading your new interest tonight—I’ve accepted an invitation to dinner at the Olivier place and I don’t imagine you’ve got any wild craving to spend an evening there, although it would be perfectly appropriate for me to arrive with the latest woman in my life.’

  ‘Beth Olivier made it abundantly clear that I’m not welcome there,’ Lucia reminded him tightly.

  ‘I’ll make some excuse for you if Nadine wonders why I’m not running true to form.’

  ‘Why don’t you just tell her we’ve discovered we’re incompatible?’ she returned shortly, moving towards the door. ‘Then you could take Madelon with you.’

  ‘Are we so incompatible? There’s at least one area in which we’re wholly compatible, I think.’ Rob was blocking her way, giving her a lazily challenging smile. ‘What happened when I helped you back onto the boat after you’d been in with the dolphins today, Lucia?’

  Forced to halt, unless she wanted to collide with him, Lucia regarded him warily. She didn’t suppose that there was any point in denying what had happened when he was so infuriatingly knowledgeable about her.

  ‘I believe it’s called lust,’ she allowed sweetly. ‘Excuse me, please. I must go.’

  ‘I believe it’s called sexual attraction.’ Seeing resentment blaze in her eyes, he added gently, ‘It happened to me too, you know.’

  ‘So? That doesn’t mean we have to do anything about it.’

  She had no intention of exploring any physical attraction, mutual or not, with a man who didn’t respect her—and how could he when he was prepared to blackmail her? He probably despised her, in fact, for submitting to it, however practical her reasons.

  At the same time she was conscious of a powerfully yearning sensation deep within her as she let her eyes sweep over him, trying to pinpoint exactly what it was about him that drew her so strongly,

  His dark face was unusual, not conventionally hand-some at all but undeniably and devastatingly attractive, and the mystery of his mouth, which could be so many things, was shockingly arresting; it took an effort of will to drag her gaze away from its evocative curve and complete the inspection. The trousers and casual shirt he had on were subtly suited to his lean strength and vibrant potency, and Lucia was again subject to the inner lurching sensation which she recognised as signal-ling the onset of erotic hunger.

  ‘Of course we don’t,’ Rob was agreeing smoothly as he lifted a hand to her shoulder.

  He let it rest there a few seconds before encircling her shoulders with his arm, pulling her close. Then, instead of kissing her as she was half anticipating, he simply stood there holding her like that with one arm, the other relaxed at his side.

  After a moment Lucia lowered her head, and she was aware of his bent over it. She had a sense of something oddly intent in his attitude, as if he was listening, or noting and absorbing whatever messages she was conveying to him with her stillness.

  ‘Is this—that relaxation thing again?’ she mumbled dislocatedly.

  ‘If you like. Whatever you want it to be.’ Rob sounded idly indulgent.

  But sharpened consciousness of him as a man precluded relaxation now. Obedient to all manner of inner stirrings, Lucia slipped her arms round him and tipped back her head.

  ‘No,’ she said, in a voice slowed and laden with a burden of sensual awareness, not really sure of what she was asking or telling him. His body felt so strong and warm within her slim, embracing arms, and she wanted both desperately—his certain strength and his vital warmth—her need unexpectedly emotional instead of merely physical.

  Rob chose to accept that single word as either permission or invitation. Lucia saw his eyes darken just before her own closed, and then he was kissing her. As his tongue nudged gently at hers in assured expectation of her response the internal stirring assailing her intensified to a deep, throbbing disturbance. She had never known a mouth so erotic, waking hers to miraculous, almost unbearably sensitive life.

  A hand massaging the low hollow of her back seemed to melt her loins. She felt as if she was composed of liquid heat, a molten, dragging deliquescence down there where softness and gently receptive shaping made her a woman.

  She was responding to Rob’s kiss with an aching passion, and yet at the same time she felt profoundly vulnerable, as if she was surrendering something essential to herself. Desire was an intolerable weight, oppressing her, depriving her of autonomy, her body’s call to his maleness become a heavy, pounding summons.

  Control didn’t exist, nor did thought, and she complied instinctively when he moved to the couch, pulling her down with him. But then a hand stroking along the taut, silky length of her inner thigh beneath the cuff of her shorts made her stiffen.

  The caress was too personal when only one other man had been permitted such intimacies. She wasn’t ready for a new man yet. Maybe she never would be. She didn’t think she wanted to give another man the chance to reject her as Thierry had done.

  And this particular man could only be playing with her, when there were women available to him such as Madelon and all those others she had seen looking at him so hungrily—women far more beautiful, poised and accomplished than she was.

  ‘No?’ he queried lightly in response to her resistance, and let her up, following easily after a moment

  Humiliation was s
calding. How could she have wanted him when he must either despise or pity her?

  ‘Right again, Rob,’ she acknowledged bitterly. ‘Just as you’ve been right about nearly everything to do with me. How do you do it? It’s quite a knack.’

  His expression defied interpretation as he surveyed her flushed face, feverishly shining eyes and slightly swollen lips.

  ‘And you hate it, don’t you? But you are transparent, Lucia, at least to me. Only, I haven’t been right about everything, you know, considering all that I’ve learned this evening,’ he added with unexpected gentleness.

  ‘But you guessed everything before I told you,’ she muttered resentfully, not yet in full control of herself, some strengthening purity missing from the anger that she was trying to gather about herself like a protective cloak. ‘All right, I know I’m being ungrateful when you’ve been…kind, and I’m sorry.’

  She couldn’t be sure, but she thought a slight sigh came from Rob just before he smiled. ‘I don’t believe I’m hearing this!’

  ‘Make the most of it,’ she quipped, glad of the lighter moment, but he chose not to prolong it.

  ‘And the things I’ve learned, I wish I hadn’t,’ he told her enigmatically. ‘You’re too emotionally messed up—and you’ve been messed around. Even the most casual sort of involvement with you would be like accompanying you barefoot on a walk across a mile of broken glass, and I’m not a masochist, or into watching others bleed. If you want anything from me, you’ll have to sort yourself out.’

  She had been right, then. He did pity her. Lucia’s chin rose.

  ‘I don’t want anything from you, thanks, Rob. I’m off,’ she added as it occurred to her that she hadn’t actually told Chester Watson that she would take the alternative job he had offered her.

  Then a different thought struck her and she hesitated, searching Rob’s face reluctantly.

  ‘What?’ he asked.

  Still she hesitated, finding pride split down the middle by two opposing needs. Finally she gave a defeated little shrug. He knew everything, he knew the worst of her, so why not ask?

  ‘I don’t want anyone else knowing—all that you know. About anything.’ The jerkily ungracious request sounded more like a demand or even an ill-natured instruction, and, hearing herself, Lucia coloured, lowering her eyes in time to see one of his dark, able hands clench into a fist.

  A moment later, however, he had uncurled his fingers and was touching her lightly on the arm in reassurance.

  ‘It’s our secret, Lucia,’ he promised her.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  LUCIA had the elegant hotel shop to herself when Nadine Ballard walked in the following afternoon.

  She had spent the day not happily but contentedly, enjoying the contact with the hotel guests who came into the shop, which sold a wide variety of souvenirs, maps and literature about the islands in addition to beachwear and tanning oils and lotions.

  Relief at the knowledge that she need not enter deep water again had eased some of her tension, and her mood had been further soothed by the knowledge that she would not have to deal with Rob’s disconcerting presence all day. He had sent her a note that morning, telling her that he was flying to one of the archipelago’s other islands on business but would be back by the evening, flying conditions permitting.

  Pausing in the act of arranging some tubes of cream, in order of their protection factor, alongside a display of sunglasses and hats with a vivid pareo fanned out to form a backdrop, Lucia gave Nadine a quick, contained smile, careful not to offer or invite too much. She had quite liked her, and it had been reassuring to realise that she would make Thierry happy, but she didn’t think she wanted to get too friendly.

  ‘Oh, you’ve changed everything around,’ Nadine realised. ‘It looks so attractive now.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Lucia murmured, and, seeing that Nadine’s oval face had grown grave again immediately she’d stopped speaking, she added, ‘How can I help you?’

  ‘Lucia, you told me that it was all right…about me and Thierry?’ Nadine ventured unhappily.

  Lucia’s face closed defensively. Not again! How much reassurance did she want? But perhaps she had found out that Lucia still had Thierry’s ring.

  ‘Of course it is,’ she confirmed, blithely dismissive, suppressing an impulse to ask if she would like a certificate of transferred ownership.

  ‘Then why did my brother say such horrible things to Thierry about the way he has treated you when he came to dinner last night?’ Nadine demanded, and misinterpreted Lucia’s shocked gasp of outrage. ‘Oh, he didn’t go for him in front of Beth and me, but poor Thierry was so upset that I got it out of him after Rob had left.’

  Lucia concentrated on moving a hat in order to conceal the rage that she was sure must be blazing in her eyes.

  ‘Sorry, I know nothing about it.’ When she was sure that she had her facial expression under control, she faced Nadine with a shrug. ‘It wasn’t at my instigation and I don’t know why Rob did it. Don’t let him spoil things for you and Thierry, Nadine, because I do know that’s the last thing he’d want to do.’

  Considering the lengths to which he was prepared to go to prevent anything coming between the pair, she reflected acidly.

  ‘Yes, until last night I’d thought he was pleased about our engagement,’ Nadine admitted.

  ‘He is, because he knows you’ll be safe and happy with Thierry and that’s what he wants for you,’ Lucia pointed out gently. ‘And I know Thierry will be the same with you. I don’t know you well enough to be so concerned about your welfare, but if you’ve had a bad time with other men then I’m glad you’ve found Thierry.’

  ‘You really do mean it.’ The troubled look was beginning to clear from Nadine’s eyes. ‘I told Rob how nice you’d been when he first arrived last night, because he seemed to think I shouldn’t have come to see you, and he was convinced we must have quarrelled.’

  Naturally he wouldn’t have taken her word for it that they hadn’t! Lucia managed to keep a smile pinned to her face.

  To her relief Nadine didn’t stay long, so she wasn’t called on to sustain the act for long. Her hypersensitive pride was in revolt over what Rob had taken it on himself to do, and, had he been on the island, fury would have driven her in search of him once more.

  His absence frustrated her now and the anger remained with her, although she was forced to push it to the back of her mind by the need to concentrate on other things—making herself agreeable to her customers and being sociable when she ate dinner with some of the hotel staff that night.

  She and Hassan Mohammed sat on a while after the meal was over, happily reviving their shared childhood memories and discussing the improvements there had been to the islanders’ circumstances since those days.

  Taking her leave of him a little later, Lucia hesitated. Rob had sent her that note this morning in case she’d wondered where he was, but she didn’t feel inclined to return the courtesy—although she still had every intention of telling him what she thought of him. Additionally there was that act of theirs to be considered, if he still thought it was necessary.

  Finally she said casually, ‘I think I’m going to spend a while out on the beach, Hassan. If Rob Ballard gets back and you see him, you can tell him that’s where I’ll be.’

  ‘Sure.’ Hassan gave her a quick smile. ‘He’s great, the way he motivates us all. It was a relief to me to see you with him, you know. When I first heard about Thierry Olivier and Mademoiselle Ballard, I was worried.’

  Lucia shrugged, feeling guilty about deceiving a friend. ‘People move on; they find out that the things they thought they wanted no longer seem so important.’

  ‘Like me, having to accept that I couldn’t study medicine—’ he laughed ‘—and finding that my heart is in the tourist industry, in which I intend to go even as far as the ministry some day.’

  Lucia had the beach to herself at this hour, and she sat cross-legged on the soft ivory sand, facing the ocean beyond whi
ch lay Africa. A tropical night breeze came and went capriciously, returning to play lightly over her skin at intervals, too warm and idly tender for her to feel chilled. There was half a moon and the stars were decorative crystal baubles, palely glittering and remote in the inky sky, the occasional streak of a firefly’s flight so much warmer and nearer by contrast.

  Her mind kept drifting back to Nadine’s visit, and it was initially perplexing to discover that she truly was happy for her and Thierry because she knew they would be happy together. In the end, though, she decided it didn’t require analysis because the explanation was easy: of course she wanted Thierry to be happy.

  The difficult part was acknowledging that he would probably be a lot happier with Nadine than he would have been with her.

  But what about her own happiness? Lucia wasn’t sure how she felt. Her heart ought to be aching, but it seemed to be in her pride that she was experiencing the most rawly painful wound of all.

  She was rejected, discarded, abandoned—and yet, in thinking of what she had lost, she tended to do so more in terms of the emotional security that would have come with a sense of belonging, rather than her actual relationship with Thierry. Too, there were those odd moments when she caught herself looking at her situation with perverse relish, as if it represented—

  The long ebony shadow that fell across the pale sand beside her brought a surge of relief, because she had been prey to the uncomfortable conviction that whatever she was groping towards—some piece of self-knowledge—would prove unpalatable at best, and possibly utterly shaming.

  ‘Hassan Mohammed gave me your message,’ Rob announced.

  ‘It wasn’t a message,’ she snapped. ‘I merely told him he could tell you where I’d be if he saw you.’

  ‘Ah, yes, of course—to lend colour to our little pretence.’

  ‘It’s such a silly business.’ Lucia was scornful. ‘I don’t like deceiving people.’

  ‘Yes, you do,’ he contradicted her. ‘In this instance, anyway. I don’t believe you’re habitually dishonest.’