Sweet Seduction

by Whitelaw, Stella

  "You’re very kind but I’m staying at a hotel and couldn’t cook it."

  The old man rested his arms on the top of the wall, wiping gnarled hands on his shirt. "You on holiday then, miss?"

  "I was in a road accident and the doctor at the hospital thought I ought to get away."

  "You couldn’t have come to a better place. People have been coming to Barbados for their health for years. Even George Washington came, with his half-brother, Lawrence, to get over some lung infection. And there weren’t no jumbo jets in 1751. They think he stayed at a house in Bay Street; put up a plaque, they did, but nobody knows for sure if it’s the right place. So how come you got hurt?"

  "It was an ordinary street accident in London, me and a motorbike. A sort-of collision on a windy day."

  "Don’t sound too good. You’d better not walk too far before it gets dark. It gets dark very quickly. Comes down like a blind and there are no street lights out this way. You could get lost."

  "Thank you," said Kira. "I don’t fancy walking along the sea road in the dark with all the traffic and no pavement. This is a funny house, isn’t it? Like something out of a Walt Disney film with all those weird statues. It looks a bit like a fairytale castle."

  "It ain’t a funny house, miss," said the gardener, a bit ruffled. "Built it was, for a special person. Long time ago."

  * * *

  "A castle? You’re going to build me a castle? Oh Ben, you are a darling! I don’t believe it. No-one has a castle on Barbados. There’s only those old forts, out Gun Hill way. You’re teasing me. You’re always teasing me. It isn’t fair."

  "Dolly, I’m not teasing you. It’s a real promise. If you marry me, I’ll build you the most fantastic house on the island. Something that will be the perfect setting for my princess to live in."

  Dolly’s eyes lit up. "Me, a princess? Now, you’re joking. I’m the daughter of a poor white painter and I don’t know why you’re bothering with me, Benjamin Reed. You’re a rich sugar planter and could marry any girl on the island. I bet they’re lining up from here to Speightstown for your attentions."

  Benjamin found it difficult to string any words together. He was not used to talking with women, especially a wild young girl with flying hair and green eyes that were always laughing at him. He did not feel comfortable with her. All his life he had worked, not courted.

  "Dolly, believe me. I love you. I’m mad about you. Can’t get you out of my mind. It’s like an illness for which there ain’t no cure but you marrying me. I’d look after you, take care of you. And you could do what you liked. I shouldn’t mind. Paint, swim, ride, anything you wanted all day long."

  "That’s not very flattering, Ben Reed, calling me an illness like spot-measles or the plague. Fidget, I think I’ll be going, Mr Reed, until you can think up some more pleasing and flattering words for a lady."

  Benjamin Reed groaned aloud and struck his head. "Dolly, I’ll never get it right. Never. I can’t say proper words. I can only do things. Doing is my way of showing love. I’m building you a castle, girl. I know the right place, facing westwards, only a run from the beach."

  "A pink castle?"

  "Any colour you like."

  * * *

  "I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make fun of the house. It’s very unusual, but you must admit that the statues are a little strange," said Kira quickly.

  "The statues? Yes, I suppose you holiday folk might think them strange. They were made by a young local sculptor who hadn’t ever seen the animals. He did his work from pictures and photographs."

  Kira detected a note of irritation in the old man’s voice. Perhaps she had kept him talking long enough, halfway up a tree.

  "Thank you for the offer of breadfruit. It was nice talking to you. I hope I haven’t kept you from your work."

  "Work’s never finished. Fitt’s House might seem a rum old place to you, young lady, but it ain’t all out of the history books. It’s got four solar panels on the flat roof," he said, as he disappeared down the ladder, tangible hostility in the air. "Hot water all day from the sun. I’d call that modern technology."

  So this was Fitt’s House. Kira felt a surge of excitement that she was within yards of her grandfather’s house, the house where her mother had been born and grown up. Perhaps Tamara had even climbed this breadfruit tree as a child, run along this lane, picking flowers, straddled the stone animals in story play.

  "How enterprising of your employer," Kira called out. She could hear the gardener sweeping up branches and a muffled oath.

  "No point in wasting heat from the sun," he replied from the other side of the wall. “It’s all money.”

  That sounded like Benjamin Reed’s philosophy of life. He would be a thrifty man, counting the pennies. Kira remembered the poverty of when she was a child, knew her mother had worked hard in a corset factory, spending hours at a sewing machine till her eyes were red and blotched with tiredness. Sometimes Tamara had brought home pieces of waste material, ivory and pink silk and brocade, to make dolls’ clothes for Kira. But the scraps frayed and were quickly of no use.

  How easily her grandfather could have sent some money. A few pounds would have made no difference to him. He even had food growing for free in his garden. A shiver of anger went through Kira as she glanced back at the coral pink house and its absurd statues. The setting sun was casting wild orange and crimson rays in all directions, making the stone glow with light. Benjamin had certainly chosen the right site for his house. It looked glorious, bathed in the fiery warmth, deep shadows from the trees adding a steely blue to the picture.

  Kira turned away abruptly. At the end of the lane she crossed the sea road and cut down to the beach between trees and houses. She did not want to get lost inland. She took off her sandals and the sand was cool to her feet. She hitched up her skirt so that she could paddle on the edge of the lapping water.

  There were evening joggers now, kids out of school playing cricket on the sand, people walking dogs, swimming after work. These were the lazy, hazy hours of evening. Everyone smiled and said good evening. Her anger faded. If she stayed too long in Barbados, she would have little hostility left in her heart towards her grandfather.

  Kira was seeing Giles in every distant runner, his brown body glistening, muscles rippling, long legs moving with ease in easy strides over the sand. But she was in no mood for any man to start taking over her thoughts even though she could still feel the magnetic power of his eyes. He was a devastating man, someone to die for. Everything about him, his looks, his voice, his touch. She shivered at the thought of his touch. His skin would have the tangy salt of the sea in its taste.

  She was suddenly drowning in tormented pictures of Bruce and Jenny, and the lingering hurt came back, crunching her stomach into cramp. The baby would be born in the Autumn. A tangible sign of his new love and their commitment to each other, their future. She meant nothing to Bruce anymore and she had to accept that hard fact.

  A young woman was playing with a baby on the shore. The baby was brown and chubby, covered from head to foot in sand, clutching fistfuls which his mother gently redirected from his open mouth. She wrapped him in a big towel and swung him around until he gurgled with delight. Kira noticed that the baby was very dark but that the mother’s skin was paler. There were many black youths walking with white girls, talking, laughing together, hand-in-hand, very natural. The colour taboos had been crossed.

  Giles was white-skinned but darkly tanned. She wondered about his ancestry. His dark hair was crisply short but every feature was mid-European. Not that it was any business of hers, nor did it matter.

  Back at Sandy Lane, Kira stood in the shower, letting the tepid water wash off the salt and sun oil. The scar on her leg was vivid but she was hoping a tan would soon camouflage its ugliness.

  Kira was not vain. She thought her chestnut hair and green eyes merely passable. She was quite unable to see the elusive quality that shone in the depths of her eyes or the tawny red that brought a burnished sh
ine to her hair.

  The scar was a misfortune but could have been worse. It did not matter if her leg marred her looks. She belonged to no-one but herself. Men were not the centre of her hurricane. The nerve ends near the scar were still sensitive to any touch. She patted them carefully with a towel.

  Her hair dried into a wild tangle on her shoulders and she did not bother to style it. She did not know how much she resembled the girl in the painting. She put on a strawberry-coloured cotton dress that would turn heads. It had a blouson top, hip sash and hem appliquéd with cut-out flowers. All very Thirties; slim and svelte.

  She spun round in front of the mirror. She looked like a pink flame. "You’ll do. Sandy Lane, here I come," she said.

  Forget about everything, she thought; forget about Bruce and the baby he had made with his body. She wandered into the bar, fighting back waves of loneliness. It was full of people, laughing and talking. They gave her a cursory look, then went back to their drinks.

  "May I join you?"

  Giles’s deep voice broke into her thoughts. A dizzy sensation flooded through her at the unexpected sight of him, tingling her skin. She had no time to think of a reason for saying no.

  He sat down opposite her, hitching up his slim fawn trousers to allow his long legs to stretch. His matching jacket was unbuttoned, revealing a thin black silk shirt open at the neck. He had a small glass of raw rum in his hand. Not a man for fancy cocktails.

  She was thrown by seeing him again so soon, confused by his rugged looks and masculine assurance. It was easier to nod briefly and let him call over a waiter. She tried to stay cool and calm. There was no way he would get the slightest inkling of how she was feeling.

  Eight

  "Planter’s Punch for my guest," Giles said, without asking her. "They make a good one here. It’s a mixture of rum, green limes, a dash of Angostura bitters, cracked ice, nutmeg, mint. One of sour, two of sweet, three of strong, four of weak; that’s the recipe, they say.”

  Kira listened to his voice knowing that she could listen to it forever. It had a warm and magnetic quality and his eyes never left her face. He signed the chit for the drink without looking at it. She could become addicted to this man and this life, she thought. Perhaps she would become a beachcomber, sell necklaces like Moonshine and live off rum and free breadfruit. Forget about becoming influential, about Bruce and his new woman, and the baby of their hot and writhing flesh . . .

  Giles seemed to have forgotten about their abrupt parting that morning and was choosing to ignore her chilly silence. But the rum was creeping its insidious way into her veins, making her relax into a pleasant warmth.

  "The decoration is a little over-the-top," he went on, referring to the harvest of sliced mango, pawpaw, glossy red cherries and fancy straw in her long glass.

  "But the drink is wonderful," she could not stop herself saying.

  "I like the dress," he said. "Very Twenties, and brings out the red in your hair. Did you know that your hair is an enchanting mixture of colours? A painter’s palette gone wild." He put out a hand as if to take hold of a lock, but Kira jerked back. He changed the direction of his hand and called over the waiter, indicating his empty glass.

  Kira was annoyed at her reaction. She should be taking pleasure from being in the company of the handsomest man in the room. She was well aware of the envious glances the other women cast in his direction and the fire of their desire.

  "Is Sandy Lane Hotel your second home?" she said, passing over his compliment on her hair and dress.

  "It’s my third home. I have a beach house built on the estate here. Sugar Hill is a great house, one of the last plantation houses. It’s too big for me to live in, even when Lace is there. I like the simplicity of the beach house. It’s quite beautiful, so peaceful and undemanding."

  "Does Lace like the house?"

  "She likes Sugar Hill but does nothing to help keep it together. She has never worked in her life; a lazy bitch, if you’ll excuse the language. Her life is one long round of parties and dancing and buying clothes."

  "How nice," Kira murmured, thinking of her long hours at the House of Commons and her small flat in Pimlico, everything so compact that she could prepare a meal in her kitchen without taking more than three paces. "But what about your mother? She lives at Sugar Hill?"

  "No, she’s in a nursing home. She’s in bed most of the time. It’s MS. She needs constant care. There’s little that can be done for her."

  "How very sad."

  "Perhaps you’d like to come and visit her, and then see Sugar Hill," he said, over the top of his glass. "It’s worth a visit. Stately home and all that. Very colonial."

  Kira wanted to refuse, but if his mother was so ill it would be very impolite and cruel.

  "Thank you, but not just yet. I’ve allowed myself twenty-fours to get over my jet-lag and now it’s back to work."

  "Very commendable. But you could take a lunch break. It gets very hot. We could drive to Sugar Hill in less than twenty minutes."

  "I don’t know. I have masses to do."

  He inclined his head as if to acknowledge her tight working schedule and dropped the subject. He was looking at her again with a disturbing look that was playing havoc with her senses. She forced herself to sit still though she longed to turn away, run to somewhere safe, miles and miles.

  "Are you sure we haven’t met before?" he asked. "There’s something about your face . . ."

  “Quite sure," said Kira. How could she ever forget if she had met him before? She took a deep drink, which was a mistake. Despite the cracked ice, the rum was strong and potent. A knot formed in her throat as if the liquid had burned and inflamed her mouth. She stirred the ice quickly and took in some of the melting coldness to still her starving desire.

  "Careful. Rum is apt to mount up into the head," said Giles, mistaking her uncertainty. "I hadn’t realised that I was making you feel that you were under a microscope. Not only are you a beautiful woman but you do remind me of someone. And I can’t think who it is. You know how elusive memory can be, and I can’t pin this one down."

  She looked towards the darkening sea. "I went walking today. There was this strange house – all pink, built like a castle with statues and turrets and battlements." Kira was probing cautiously, hoping Giles could throw some light.

  "That’s Fitt’s House, Benjamin Reed’s home," said Giles dryly. "Or Reed’s Folly, as it’s sometimes called around here. He built it for his young bride, to tempt her into marrying him. He had grand ideas of turning her into a princess, they say. But the house didn’t bring him any luck."

  "How unfortunate," said Kira. "It doesn’t sound very sensible."

  "Don’t waste your sympathy on Benjamin Reed," Giles snapped, putting down his drink. "He’s not worth it. He’s a twisted, bitter and stubborn old man and deserves his unpopularity."

  Kira’s heart fell into a long swoop, not quite anchored in time. The open-air bar was a moving field of light. Everything Giles was saying only confirmed her own opinion of her grandfather yet it did not help that other people felt the same way. It seemed disloyal in a funny way. It made her more determined to confront the man and tell him what she thought of him for his treatment of her mother . . . yet somehow she ached with a raw sweetness for the old man, so alone, so bitter. What had happened to his fairy-tale princess?

  "Doesn’t anyone like him?"

  "His old workers dote on him, the loyal ones. He has a few new friends. But he cut himself off. It’s his own fault."

  "Will you excuse me? I’m feeling quite hungry after my day in the fresh air. I think I’ll go into dinner. Thank you for the drink."

  "What an excellent idea, Kira. I’m glad you’re feeling hungry. I’ve booked a table at Sam Lord’s Castle. You said you wanted to meet a pirate. Do you want to fetch a wrap? I usually drive with the roof down."

  It was a bittersweet moment that pulled her two ways. He had a nerve, yet she was in too fragile a condition to cope with a man who was so sure o
f himself. But the idea of dining with him was tempting. Perhaps she could allow herself one slice of the goodie cake.

  "I take it that was an invitation, not an order? But I have booked to eat here at Sandy Lane."

  "You can eat here any time. A pirate’s stronghold is far more exciting, don’t you agree? Think of the publicity, Kira. There are always swarms of reporters at the Castle, looking for an item for the morning’s front page."

  The angles of his face were thrown into dark planes as they went outside. The night air was warm and balmy, full of glorious scents from the gardens. The sea murmured in the background as it washed the sand smooth for the coming day. The lights in the gardens drew the insects and they buzzed around the glowing magnets like a grey net.

  "Your research company could do with some publicity, couldn’t it? Have dinner with me at Sam Lord’s and you’ll get your photo in tomorrow’s paper."

  Giles took her arm lightly and steered her up the steps and towards the car park. His touch was minimal but the pressure of his fingers on her bare skin was electric. His fingers were hard as if he worked with his bare hands, as if he not only gave orders from his office but rolled up his sleeves too.

  "And what do you get out of this?" said Kira, still mentally kicking herself at the way he was manipulating her. He was wrapping his jacket round her shoulders.

  "I get dinner with a prickly female," he said with a wicked grin. "A new experience for me. My car is over here."

  "Charm doesn’t run my business," said Kira, flaring. He was teasing her. "I’m serious about my work. It’s more than a butterfly image. My consultancy is based on efficiency and hard work."

  He chuckled in the darkness. "I meant no disrespect, ma’am. You ain’t no butterfly, that’s for sure. More like a tiger cat, I’d say. I guess you’ve got claws hidden under that pretty dress."

  "I’m eating with you because I’m hungry, that’s all. Don’t think it’s going to lead anywhere." It seemed a stupid thing to say but the warmth of the night air was intoxicating. Something strange was happening, over which she had no control.