From Prim to Improper

by Cathy Williams

  ‘I—I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ But she stumbled over her words and then cleared her throat assertively. ‘And I really think that it’s time for me to mingle. Like you said, this party is all about my father introducing me to his friends, bringing me into his life and making sure that everyone knows it, even if some might disapprove. Like you.’

  ‘Nice try.’

  Elizabeth stared at him mutely. Everything about him oozed self-confidence, and right now more than self-confidence. A certain knowledge that had her cringing inwardly.

  ‘What were you hoping for?’

  ‘I wasn’t hoping for anything!’ To her own ears, she could hear the undercurrent of desperation.

  ‘Would a more substantial offer have done the job? Did you want a marriage proposal? A ring on that finger? Did you think that I would fit the role of suitable husband? You must have been disappointed. I’m man enough to admit that sex with you was…what can I say?…in a league of its own. But marriage…’

  ‘I wouldn’t marry you if you were the last person on the face of the earth!’ Elizabeth told him in a fierce undertone. ‘But you’re right when you say that I’m looking for more out of life than just a romp in the hay and a wave goodbye when it’s over and done with.’

  ‘And you think your chances are good with Gilbert? London’s a village. I personally know four of his past conquests.’

  Elizabeth wished that she could wipe that curling smirk from his beautiful mouth.

  ‘Thank you for that. I’ll take my chances. And, just to tell you, I think that I’ve learnt a lot from you and the most important thing I’ve learnt is that arrogant men who think they don’t owe anyone anything at all are the kind of men I should steer clear of!’ She spotted Toby across the room and gave him an insouciant wave.

  ‘Toby might be just the tonic I need! Because you’re right: in this day and age, who the heck gets involved for the sole purpose of sticking on a wedding ring and walking up the aisle? So, thank you for your advice. You’ve done me a big favour, because I see now that what I really need is just a bit of fun. With someone who doesn’t think that he’s the greatest catch in the world, and won’t have girlfriends chasing me across the country so that they can get their own back!’

  CHAPTER NINE

  ELIZABETH’S compelling and assertive exit was somewhat tarnished by her slight stumble as she spun around, and she reminded herself to never wear high heels again. Having sung Toby’s praises to the sky, she now felt duty-bound to seek him out. He was outside, sitting on one of the garden benches, smoking.

  ‘I know, I know. I should give it up.’ He looked at her and grinned. ‘Finished your tête à tête with the wonder boy? He didn’t seem to be in the most jolly of moods, but, then again, when has Andreas ever been in a jolly mood? He’s never been noted for his ability to see the lighter side of life.’

  Elizabeth opened her mouth to rush to immediate defence of him, but then stopped herself, because defending Andreas just wasn’t going to do. The more she fixated on all the great things about him, the things that she had kidded herself she had been privileged to see, the deeper she would fall into the trap of never being able to let him go. If there was one thing tonight had shown her, it was the necessity of letting him go.

  When Toby patted the space beside him, she hesitantly sat down, and, when she laughed about being cold and he proffered his jacket, she tentatively accepted it. If step one in getting over Andreas was to ditch the compulsion to compare every single man to him and find them all wanting, then step two was surely to accept that she would need an open mind when it came to other men. No, she certainly wasn’t going to leap into bed with someone else when she was still raw and bleeding from a broken heart, but she wasn’t going to go into perpetual hibernation either. Toby might not be the man of her dreams, and it might take her weeks, months or even years to find the man of her dreams, but find him she would.

  She was hardly aware of them walking back towards the house, Toby’s arm slung heavily over her shoulder, although every muscle in her body went into full-alert mode as she spotted Andreas across the drawing room, his hair lightly tousled from the breeze blowing through the open French doors.

  He was busily talking to James, his dark eyes lazy and arresting. He sensed her entrance even before he saw her, and there was a brief, disconcerting few seconds when his mind seemed to literally develop a peculiar kind of rigor mortis as he took in the unpleasant sight of Gilbert draped all over her like a rash. He had come to this party expecting vapid pretty-boys, the kind of airheads who would not have interested her in a million years. He was cottoning on pretty fast to the sickening fact that she might just be crazy enough to consider them as potential love-interests. Or one in particular, at any rate.

  Half of him protested immediate indifference to the fact, because he was a man in ultimate control of his life. He always had been and nothing there would be allowed to change. The other half, however, was thrown into crazy confusion, and he fought against this half with an instinct that had its roots in self-preservation. He was not even aware of the struggle inside him as he watched her flush to the roots of her hair, as she said something low and soft to Gilbert, before reluctantly making her way over to where they were standing.

  Feeling the steady, inscrutable gaze of Andreas’s eyes on her burning face, Elizabeth resolutely turned to James and began an earnest conversation about the party, which enabled her to more or less exclude Andreas from the picture. Most normal people would have taken the hint, she thought, but naturally he remained where he was. She didn’t have to see his face to know that there would be a sardonic grin curving his mouth as he took little sips of wine and continued to ruminate on the hilarity of a woman in search of some replacement therapy.

  People were beginning to show more interest in the food; an extensive buffet replaced the intricate finger-foods that had done the rounds. Elizabeth gave James a peck on the cheek, turning her back on Andreas with relief.

  She was doing a good job of pretending that he was nowhere around when she felt a tap on her shoulder just as she was about to move away from the buffet table with her plate of food.

  There was no need for her to turn around to guess the identity of the person invading her space. There was only one person she knew who had zero qualms about invading her space.

  ‘Tut, tut,’ Andreas said, having captured her attention. ‘Shouldn’t you be with your target audience? Leave him for too long and you might find his attention beginning to stray.’ He was grimly aware that he was in serious danger of behaving like a loser—how else would you describe a guy who couldn’t leave a woman alone? Even when his head was telling him that it was the only thing to do. Confusion had taken up residence somewhere deep inside him and he didn’t know what the hell to do with it because it was something he had never felt before.

  Elizabeth bracingly told herself that she would not, absolutely would not, allow Andreas to get under her skin. The second he did that, she was back on the merciless treadmill, see-sawing emotions, grinding misery and self-pity. This party would be her opportunity to launch herself into a different place.

  ‘He’s not my target audience,’ she said. ‘And, anyway, it’s a downright insult to imply that the only way I can get a guy to be interested in me is if I lock him in a room and throw away the key.’

  Andreas had a disconcerting thought about the satisfaction he would get in locking her in a room and throwing away the key. He stamped down such an irrational notion with a dark scowl. He would not permit himself to ask her whether she intended to date Gilbert.

  ‘Anyway, I should be mingling. James won’t think I’m enjoying myself unless I do.’ She gave him a long, cool look and headed away to one of the tables which had been set up in a massive marquee that adjoined the set of French doors out to the garden. The dining-room table
had been reserved for the contingent of older guests because it was altogether more comfortable. Which meant that for the next hour at least she would have to make continuing conversation with the young people, who were pleasant enough, in fact more pleasant than she might have expected, but with whom she essentially had nothing in common. If she could only take her own good advice to heart, she would give Toby the green light he was clearly looking for, but she dispiritedly realised that amber was the best she could offer, and even that was a reluctant concession.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Andreas as he cast his hawk-like gaze across the marquee, finally settling on her. Suddenly the plate of food in front of her lost its appeal as he made his way towards the place she had taken up at the very back of the marquee, a solitary figure in red, content to observe. She would mingle in a minute.

  ‘I have come to apologise,’ were his opening words as he settled himself next to her and began to tuck into his food.

  That wasn’t what Elizabeth had expected, and after a few seconds of bewilderment she, too, began eating. With only the minimum of notice, Dot had managed to oversee some splendid catering; although Elizabeth could feel herself stiff with tension, she could appreciate the delicate, flaky texture of the salmon and the crispness of the salad. Less welcome was that stirring of her senses which always happened whenever Andreas was in the vicinity, even when he was in full-attack mode.

  The tables were groaning under the weight of bottles of wine, and he poured them both a glass of white. People coming in saw them and discreetly moved to other tables.

  ‘You’re scaring off the guests,’ Elizabeth muttered. She was determined to let him know that his presence was the last thing she wanted, but her body was singing a different song. Just the mesmerising sight of his long fingers as he tore his bread, and the way his dark hair curled around the silver, metal band of his watch, made her tummy do cartwheels.

  ‘Good. I hate apologising in front of an audience.’

  ‘When have you ever done that?’

  ‘You’re right. Never. And now is definitely not the time to break that record.’

  Elizabeth made a concentrated effort to try and relax. If she could focus on all the things about him that made her mad, then she might actually be able to curtail her wildly inappropriate responses to him. But of course that was all well and good in theory. In practice, her mouth was dry, her pulses were racing and there was a tell-tale tingling in her breasts that spoke shameless volumes.

  ‘I admit I may have been a little out of order to imply that you were jumping on a bandwagon with this sudden array of possible suitors.’ He refused to narrow that down to Gilbert.

  ‘Possible suitors? That’s a ridiculous idea! James just thought that it might be nice to meet some young people, and the only young people he knows are related to older people he knows. Or else are friends of friends.’ She thought maybe she should imply here that Toby was a serious contender, that she was interested in him. Wouldn’t it prove to Andreas that she was on the way to getting over him as easily as he had got over her? Stringing the thought together, though, was a Herculean feat when his proximity was turning her brain to mush, and that softly worded apology had sent her pulses racing.

  Andreas thought it better to keep to himself that James had had much more in mind than altruism when he had compiled his guest list, but he made a mental note to have a quiet word with his godfather about the foolishness of trying to play match-maker. He considered that the very least he could do, as the gentleman he undoubtedly was. And she hadn’t mentioned Gilbert, which was a good thing. Clinging to that omission was less of a good thing, but Andreas didn’t dwell on that.

  ‘Well, whatever.’ He gave an elegant shrug, pushed his plate to one side and angled his chair so that he was facing her directly. His ability to devote one-hundred percent of his attention on the person to whom he was speaking was part of the essence of his charm, but right now it made Elizabeth feel a little giddy and confused.

  ‘The fact is that I believed the worst of you, and for that I owe you an apology.’ She had stopped eating so that she could stare at him with bated breath, and he now took her fingers in his hand and idly played with them.

  Elizabeth felt as though there had been a sudden drop in the oxygen levels. She literally froze and then, when her lungs began working again, told herself that this was an absentminded and casual gesture from a man who had moved on and so could do this, could touch her without getting into knots about it. As she was doing.

  Andreas could feel the tension in her body as clearly as if it had announced itself in bright, neon lettering across her forehead and that in itself was strangely pleasing. As was the feel of her slender, smooth fingers between his. He found that he had a very clear memory of the feel of her, soft, satin-smooth, wholly and utterly feminine. It must have lodged somewhere at the back of his mind, or maybe it had been absorbed into his bloodstream, because along with that memory came an overwhelming urge to recapture the completeness of being with her. He didn’t just want to hold her hand in a caring, friendly way. He wanted to lead her hand to his body so that she could touch him where it was now beginning to physically hurt. He wanted his hand to dip into the sweet moistness of her. He wanted to watch her face as she moved against his fingers, and see her eyelids flutter as she located that special place and began grinding sinuously, exciting herself, and luxuriating in the knowledge that her excitement was his excitement. He had taught her to do that, to feel comfortable with her body, and comfortable with his vocal and visual appreciation of it.

  Like a possessive master selfishly holding on to his star pupil, Andreas gritted his teeth in the face of the glaring reality that he just wasn’t ready, willing or even able to let her go. He was in the grip of a desire much stronger than anything he had known before. Why else had he come to this party? He had plenty to do in London. He had been away from his office for a considerable length of time. James had not been at all disconcerted by his refusal, and yet he had found himself coming anyway. Why? Because he wasn’t ready to let her go.

  It irked him that she could still get to him even though she had affronted him on pretty much every level. She had contrived to keep secrets from him, even when they had become lovers. She had reacted to Amanda’s appearance on the scene by hurling unjust accusations at him, and he hadn’t explained himself. It wasn’t his style. Yet she had been less than impressed by his boundaries, choosing to behave in a fashion which he would have found unacceptable in any other woman. Most gallingly of all, she had turned down his offer that she become his mistress. That had been a direct hit to his sense of pride and to his ego.

  Taking all those things into account, Andreas knew that he should have had no problem whatsoever in walking away from her. In fact—in theory, at least—he should have had no problem walking away from her and straight into the arms of someone else, someone fashioned from that mould to which he had become accustomed; one of those women who didn’t keep him up at night, never questioned his authority and was inordinately pleased with whatever shows of generosity he chose to display. Isobel should have fitted that bill, but he hadn’t been remotely turned on by her, and she had ceased to exist the minute their date had come to its abrupt conclusion.

  James’s confession that he wanted Elizabeth to find stability with a boyfriend, and to that end was going to invite some eligible chaps, should have caused resounding cynicism and a sigh of relief that he was rid of her. Instead, he had ruminated all the way to his helicopter, his formidable, hard-headed logic and ferocious self-control for once taking a back seat behind other emotions which he had no inclination to analyse.

  It all went to prove conclusively to him that lust was something he had previously underrated. All that ugly confusion and tightness in his chest was testimony to the power of unfinished business.

  He released her hand and sat back, cont
ent in the knowledge that her body still stirred for him. She still quivered in his presence, and it would seem responded to him exactly like he responded to her, if only she was aware of the fact.

  He was acutely attuned to her every small movement, from the nervous fidgeting of her fingers to the delicate, heightened colour staining her cheeks.

  ‘I won’t deny that I was angry when I discovered that you’d taken us in.’

  ‘I explained.’

  ‘You did. And there’s no need to retrace old ground. You did what you felt you had to do, and I can see that you reached a certain point when backtracking might have been a little daunting.’ Andreas discovered that he actually did believe that. He suspected that he had believed her from the start, although his ingrained inclination towards suspicion, which had always stood him in good stead, had compelled him to question her motives.

  Elizabeth breathed a little sigh of relief and half-closed her eyes. ‘It means a lot to hear you say that,’ she confessed, her eyes widening as she looked at him and began drowning in the steady intensity of his gaze.

  She wondered if he would touch her again, and when she realised that she was longing for it she resolutely stuck her hands under her thighs. Just in case they started wandering of their own accord. It would have taken a lot for him to say what he had said, because he was nothing if not supremely arrogant, but say it he had.

  ‘I wouldn’t want you to feel uncomfortable in my presence,’ Andreas murmured softly. As his glittering, black eyes collided with hers, Elizabeth drew her breath in, feeling very much as if she had stepped out from the pages of a Victorian novel and was on the verge of swooning. She resisted the manic temptation to giggle when she wondered whether the generously supplied tables also had a line in smelling salts. She wondered what he would do if she told him that his fraternal reassurance was the last thing she wanted.

  ‘I don’t,’ she said with equal composure, even though her heart was hammering madly in her chest. ‘And I’m really glad that you believe me. I know I’ve said this before, but I wasn’t going to say anything about…well, about anything, if your girlfriend…’