Gypsy

by Carole Mortimer

  Shay turned furiously on Lyon, her eyes deeply purple, almost black. ‘You cruel bastard!’ she choked.

  He didn’t even flinch at her unrestrained anger. ‘The only cruelty I can see is that there isn’t a rose out here to match the colour of your eyes,’ he smiled at her warmly, bending to pick a delicate pale pink bloom. ‘This will have to do instead.’ He tucked the flower behind her ear, a vivid splash of colour against the ebony of her hair.

  ‘Lyon, you’ve just hurt Matthew unbearably, how can you talk about roses!’ she demanded incredulously, impatiently ignoring the tingle in her cheek where his fingers had grazed the skin.

  ‘Matthew isn’t hurt—’

  ‘You taunted him in the cruellest way possible,’ Shay accused indignantly. ‘How do you think he feels being stuck in that chair for the rest of his life?’

  ‘I know how he feels,’ Lyon dismissed. ‘But he’s had lovers in the past.’

  ‘Not for a very long time.’ Her heart went out to the younger man, for the almost desperate look in his eyes before it was quickly masked by anger. Matthew was a very self-possessed man, rarely gave in to self-pity about his disability, and for Lyon to have taunted him in that way was the height of cruelty.

  ‘I’ll grant you it’s been a few years,’ Lyon shrugged. ‘But that’s been his own choice.’

  Her eyes widened. ‘Are you saying—Is—Can he—’

  ‘Take a woman to bed and give them both satisfaction?’ Lyon finished mockingly. ‘As I remember it he can do that very well.’

  ‘But he—Even now?’ she squeaked. In all the years she had known Matthew she had never seen him with a woman, had believed because of that that he was incapable of a physical relationship.

  Lyon nodded. ‘It’s a little awkward for him, I’m sure, but it is possible.’

  ‘I had no idea,’ Shay said dazedly. ‘But you told me he would never marry?’ she frowned.

  ‘And he won’t,’ Lyon confirmed tightly. ‘He doesn’t want to burden any woman by having him as a husband.’

  ‘But any woman that really loved him wouldn’t find his disability a burden,’ she protested.

  Lyon’s mouth tightened. ‘His fiancée didn’t feel that way.’

  ‘He was engaged at the time of the accident?’ Shay gasped.

  Lyon nodded. ‘It isn’t something he talks about, and so no one else does either. Everyone has something they would prefer to keep to themselves,’ he bit out tautly. ‘Don’t you?’

  Her eyes were suddenly huge in her pale face. ‘I—I think I’ll go and freshen up before dinner.’ She turned away, Lyon’s hand on her arm stopping her from leaving.

  ‘Coming here changes nothing, Shay,’ he rasped. ‘Matthew won’t help you.’

  She looked at him with glittering eyes. ‘I’ve come here as you wanted me to do!’

  He smiled, the merest curve of finely sculptured lips. ‘I want more than that, and you know it.’

  She looked at him coldly. ‘All you’ll ever get from me is the contempt you deserve!’

  The smile stayed confidently in place. ‘And a response you can’t deny,’ he drawled.

  She wrenched away from him, breathing hard. ‘Is that all you’ve ever wanted from me, a sexual response?’

  ‘One of the things,’ he confirmed softly. ‘Lousy sex can deteriorate a relationship quicker than anything else.’

  A coldness came over her. ‘And sex alone is the surest end to a relationship,’ she challenged.

  ‘We aren’t just going to have sex between us, Shay,’ he mocked. ‘Now tell me, did you take your rest this afternoon?’

  She frowned suspiciously. ‘Of course. But what does that have to do with you?’

  ‘I’m showing a little natural concern,’ he shrugged. ‘Just trying to find out if you had a restful and relaxing day.’

  Her expression was contemptuous as she suddenly realised what he was doing. ‘Am I now supposed to go inside and pour you a drink before we talk over the events of our respective days?’ she scorned.

  ‘It would be nice—’

  ‘It would be impossible!’ Shay snapped. ‘I’m not your wife, Lyon, I’ll never be anything to you ever again. Just because your wife has finally decided to kick you out of her life is no reason for you to think I’m interested in taking up where she left off!’

  ‘You know that Marilyn and I haven’t had what could be called a marriage for years,’ he said icily.

  ‘And whose fault was that?’

  Lyon stiffened. ‘Mine,’ he finally bit out.

  ‘Exactly,’ Shay scorned. ‘I had a good marriage with Ricky—’

  ‘It was safe,’ Lyon corrected harshly. ‘That doesn’t necessarily mean it was good!’

  She gave him a pitiful glance. ‘It was good,’ she repeated flatly. ‘Now you can take your “natural concern" and find some other poor woman to bestow it on.’ She made it sound like an insult. ‘There must be hundreds of women who would just love to be your mistress!’ she derided, pulling the rose from her hair and thrusting it into his hands. ‘Gestures like this are wasted on me!’ She followed Matthew into the house, no less angry than he.

  * * *

  HUNDREDS OF WOMEN was probably an exaggeration, although the power of money certainly appealed to a lot of women, and the fact that he didn’t look like a monster and wasn’t nearly in his grave had always helped him attract women too.

  Before Shay, he had taken as many of those women as it amused him to, even after Shay he had taken women to his bed. But never more than once; he couldn’t bear to see the same woman in his bed more than that.

  His life had consisted of before, and after, Shay. And he was determined it would now be with Shay. And whatever her child happened to be. It would be their child, he was determined on that too.

  And he knew Shay was just as determined she would never be his again. She must have forgotten how arrogantly sure of himself he could be when he wanted something bad enough.

  * * *

  HE WAS so arrogantly sure of himself and what he wanted!

  He had been the same when she had first met him; but he couldn’t get away with it now! Lyon had always wanted what he couldn’t have, and at the moment she presented a challenge to him.

  ‘Plotting his downfall?’

  Matthew’s door stood open as she passed his suite of rooms on the way to her own, Matthew seated at his desk in front of the window. Shay realised, with embarrassment, that this room overlooked the rose garden!

  ‘Murder would be more like it,’ she drawled, strolling into the room, casually standing next to the window, a quick glance outside showing her Lyon striding off in the direction of the stables. Her eyes glittered angrily as she turned back to Matthew. ‘You voyeur!’

  He returned her gaze steadily. ‘You didn’t look as if you were making love.’

  ‘Far from it,’ she snapped, high points of colour in her cheeks. ‘In fact, we—’ Shay turned as a movement outside caught her eye, a horse and rider coming out of the cobbled stable-yard to ride off towards the woods at the back of the house. Lyon seemed like part of the golden stallion as they moved fluidly together, only Lyon’s business shirt and trousers seeming out of place as he still wore the clothes he had been to work in.

  ‘When you and Ricky lived here riding half the night away seemed to be the only way Lyon could get through them,’ Matthew told her softly.

  She turned to him sharply, Matthew slowly moving from looking at his brother to meet her gaze.

  ‘It’s true,’ he assured her huskily. ‘Sometimes he wouldn’t come home until dawn.’

  ‘He was probably meeting a woman,’ Shay dismissed scornfully.

  Matthew shook his head. ‘He couldn’t bear to be in the same house as you and Ricky, knowing the two of you were probably making love. But he couldn’t stay away from here either.’

  Delicate colour flooded her cheeks once again. ‘You’re crediting Lyon with a sensitivity he just doesn’t possess!’ she snapped.<
br />
  ‘And you’re judging him too harshly,’ replied Matthew gruffly.

  ‘You have no idea what happened between us,’ Shay told him heatedly.

  ‘There are a lot of things I don’t know, or even understand. Why Lyon stayed married to a woman he didn’t love while the woman he did love married his brother being one of them!’ he acknowledged coldly.

  ‘Lyon never loved me!’

  ‘You can’t be that stupid!’

  ‘I—’ She broke off abruptly, turning back to the window once again, the golden stallion looking wild as it galloped across the grass towards the stable—its rider nowhere in sight! She moistened suddenly dry lips. ‘Matthew, you don’t think—’

  ‘No, I don’t think!’ He moved to pick up the telephone, dialling quickly. ‘Jackson? Wildfire is coming back alone! Yes! The west woods. Right now!’ he instructed harshly, slamming down the receiver to join Shay in front of the window, his anxious gaze scanning the fields and woods to the west of the house.

  Shay couldn’t move, felt the ice creeping over the whole of her body, knew that if she did attempt to move she would break into a thousand pieces. Lyon was an excellent rider, had been riding horses as feisty as Wildfire since long before she had met him. She couldn’t believe he had been thrown. Maybe Wildfire had loosened his tether—She jumped nervously as the telephone shrilled loudly in the deathly-quiet room.

  ‘Yes?’ Matthew barked into the mouthpiece. ‘Hell!’ he rasped roughly. ‘Yes, get everyone out there looking.’ He turned to Shay after replacing the receiver for the second time in minutes, his eyes dark with worry and fear. Fear? Yes, Shay was sure she could see the emotion in those deeply hazel depths.

  That same fear gripped her now. She had wanted to do Lyon physical harm six years ago, but she hadn’t wanted him dead! ‘What is it, Matthew?’ she gasped anxiously.

  He swallowed convulsively. ‘Wildfire came back without a saddle,’ he bit out tautly.

  Shay frowned; it wasn’t like Lyon to be careless. God, could their conversation in the garden have so disturbed him he hadn’t been his usual meticulously careful self when he saddled Wildfire? If that were true, and anything serious happened to him—

  ‘Don’t let your imagination run wild, Shay,’ Matthew ordered abruptly. ‘It could turn out that all that’s injured is his pride,’ he added ruefully.

  She knew that Lyon would be furious with himself if it were his carelessness that had been the cause of his fall. But that would be far preferable than for him to have been seriously hurt. ‘I’ll go downstairs and wait for news,’ she told Matthew breathlessly.

  ‘Shay—!’

  She turned at the door, her face pale with worry. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Don’t blame yourself if—if it’s bad news.’ He looked at her with dark eyes.

  ‘I have nothing to feel guilty about,’ she snapped.

  He shrugged. ‘Tell that to the rose crushed into the ground down there.’

  She swallowed hard. ‘I’ll come back and let you know as soon as there’s any news.’

  She couldn’t wait in the house, walked over to the stables, most of the employees and horses out looking for Lyon. He couldn’t have gone far, so what was taking them so long? She hated the man, but this family had suffered enough of a loss when Ricky died.

  ‘Why doesn’t someone let us know what’s happening?’ she demanded of Jackson as he tried to soothe the golden stallion, the muscled body quivering in his distress.

  ‘They will as soon as they find Mr Falconer,’ the elderly man assured her calmly, revealing none of his own concern for the man he had sat on his first horse as a young boy, picking him up and putting him back in the saddle if he should fall off. This time there might be no getting back on …

  ‘Yes, but—’ She turned as one of the stable-hands galloped back into the yard.

  ‘Mr Falconer is only bruised,’ he gasped breathlessly. ‘Jim’s bringing him in on Cinnamon,’ he announced before riding off again.

  With Shay’s relief at the news came anger at her own reaction to the accident. She shouldn’t have cared if Lyon lived or died!

  ‘It’s good news, Mrs Falconer,’ Jackson prompted softly as she seemed on the verge of collapse.

  ‘Yes,’ she acknowledged jerkily, shaking herself out of her dazed state; she wouldn’t be here when Lyon returned! ‘I have to go and tell Matthew.’ She turned and almost ran back to the house, deliberately blocking all thought from her mind.

  Matthew was very open about his own relief, the grey cast to his cheeks seemed to lessen slightly.

  ‘I’m going to my suite,’ Shay told him abruptly.

  His eyes widened. ‘Aren’t you going to stay and see Lyon?’

  ‘No,’ she rasped.

  Matthew shook his head. ‘Don’t be so hard on yourself, Shay,’ he chided softly.

  She stiffened. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  His mouth twisted. ‘This love-hate relationship you have with Lyon will be the death of someone.’

  ‘Then let’s hope that it’s Lyon!’ she snapped angrily.

  She was shaking uncontrollably by the time she shut the door to her suite. She didn’t care whether Lyon lived or died, she wouldn’t let herself care! The man had almost destroyed her once, she just wished she had a way of destroying him as thoroughly.

  * * *

  SHE LOOKED BEAUTIFUL when she was asleep, those hate-filled eyes covered by palely translucent lids, her mouth soft and inviting.

  But she also looked exhausted, and it wasn’t surprising after what Matthew had told him. She shouldn’t be distressed any further in her condition, and Wildfire coming back alone seemed to have done that.

  He had come straight to her suite after leaving Matthew, only the pain in his leg where Wildfire had trampled on him in his fright to show he had fallen from the horse. Shay was sleeping, and he stood watching her for long, timeless minutes. The witch did care, he was sure of it. He was also sure she would fight the emotion with everything in her. And that was quite a lot.

  She moved in her sleep, making one of those purring sounds in her throat that instantly made his blood boil, desire surging forward, his hands itching to touch her. She moved restlessly as one of his hands lay over the baby inside her, turning on her side with his hand trapped beneath her. The gentlemanly thing to do would be to extract his hand gently and leave. But his feelings for Shay had never been gentlemanly, lying down at her side to curve his body into the back of hers. God, she felt good. He shuddered against her, his hand moving from the baby to her breast, his heart leaping with exhilaration as she eagerly turned towards him.

  ‘Ricky?’ she murmured lovingly, her face aglow.

  Lyon froze, continuing to hold her until her movements settled, and then slowly easing away from her to stand up. Even in her sleep she called out for his brother!

  His leg hurt unbearably as he swung up on to Wildfire’s back for the second time that night, urging him out of the cobbled yard, his expression set grimly as he knew he would probably ride until dawn.

  * * *

  SHAY WOKE SLOWLY. She had been having the most wonderful dream, Ricky had been beside her, holding her, enveloping her in the love he had always shown her. Even once she was awake, and aware he was dead, the feeling of well-being stayed with her, almost as if she had Ricky back.

  It wasn’t until she returned from the bathroom that she saw the indentation on the pillow beside her own, as if someone had lain beside her on the bed. Even if she believed in ghosts, she knew they didn’t leave such a human sign of their presence. Lyon had been here, not Ricky!

  She looked up angrily as a knock sounded on the door. ‘Yes?’ She wrenched open the door, only to find it was Patty and not Lyon who stood outside. She gave an embarrassed grimace for her rudeness. ‘I’m sorry, I—’ She stopped herself from saying she had thought it was Lyon. ‘I’m usually a bit crotchety when I wake up,’ she excused.

  The other woman nodded, about Shay’s own age, pe
rhaps a little older. ‘I’ve brought your dinner up for you,’ she explained, placing the tray on the table in front of the window. ‘Mr Falconer thought you might prefer that tonight,’ she smiled.

  ‘Lyon shouldn’t have made such a decision for me,’ she snapped. ‘He—’

  ‘Oh, not that Mr Falconer.’ Patty looked concerned by her anger. ‘This was Matthew Falconer.’

  Shay felt the aggression go out of her. She was picking on this unfortunate woman for no reason! But she had become so used to Lyon trying to interfere in her life that she had just assumed it was him this time. ‘That was very thoughtful of Matthew,’ she smiled. ‘I don’t really feel up to a family dinner this evening.’

  ‘Matthew is eating in his rooms too.’ The other woman unloaded the tray, attractively arranging the meal on the table. ‘And Lyon isn’t eating at all.’ She straightened, frowning. ‘One of the stable-boys said he’s gone out on Wildfire again.’ She sounded censorious.

  Shay nodded dismissively to the other woman, more sure than ever that Shay left the house in that way to be with a woman.

  He had already left for work when she came downstairs the next morning, even though she had made an effort to come down earlier than she usually did just so that she could speak to him. She didn’t even feel safe from him when she was asleep any more, had half expected to wake up and find him next to her this morning.

  Matthew was scowling when she joined him at the table, his coffee black, a sure sign that he was very angry about something—or someone.

  ‘Who’s upset you this morning?’ she mocked lightly as she buttered a slice of toast.

  Matthew glared at her. ‘I’ll give you one guess!’

  Her mouth quirked. ‘Not your dear brother Lyon?’ she taunted.

  Matthew crushed his napkin in his hand, as if he wished it were something more tangible he could squeeze the life out of. ‘He’s hardly ever here any more, and yet he refuses to let me dismiss a new employee who’s turned out to be incompetent!’

  Shay sipped her coffee, looking at him curiously over the rim of her cup. It wasn’t like Matthew to lose his temper over anything, usually shielding his real feelings behind a wall of mockery. ‘I’m sure he must have a reason,’ she shrugged.