Hours to Cherish

by Heather Graham

  “Well, I don’t smoke and you know it. Why would I carry around matches? I don’t even have a purse on me.”

  “Come on, Cat, humor me,” Clay said, proving his point by pulling a small meerschaum pipe from his pocket. “There must be matches in the back of the bar somewhere.”

  Sighing, Cat slipped from her stool and lifted the hinge on the counter. It was almost pitch-black in the unlit service area, and she had to feel along the shelves, searching blindly with her fingers.

  Clay waited until her sable head disappeared as she stopped on the other side, then slipped a tiny packet of white powder into her steaming coffee, swirling it quickly with her swizzle stick, wincing, feeling a physical pain at what he was doing.

  I have to, Cat, he thought, because I can’t let you marry that man. I have no right in your life, but I have to use every means, fair or foul, to keep you from DeVante. I wish so badly I could just explain it to you, Cat, but you would never believe me. You would defend him until the earth stopped spinning and I love you, Cat, you were all I thought about, when I knew, and when I didn’t know, and I can’t let you be used, I can’t let you be hurt. …

  “Here!” He saw her slender fingers—the nails not long but evenly filed, buffed to a shine as she seldom used polish because of the ravages of salt water—deposit a book of matches before him. Then her sable head appeared, the curled coils of her upsweep reflecting the dim light that filtered to them in a sheen of moon silver. She stayed on the other side of the counter, standing.

  Clay watched her as he filled his pipe with tobacco from a leather pouch. She had always been beautiful. She was more so now, wearing her maturity like a regal cloak, and yet she still carried that essence of reckless spirit that was more tantalizing than the light hint of French perfume.

  “That’s a beautiful outfit, Cat,” he said, cupping his hands around the bowl of the pipe as he struck a match. “Stunning.” He raised a brow cryptically. “Might your exceptionally lovely appearance be in my honor?”

  “No,” Cat lied evenly. “I wasn’t even sure I was going to see you.” She frowned suddenly, and then laughed, a sound that was as light as the breeze, finally entirely natural. “Aren’t you ever afraid you’re going to set that beard on fire when you light your pipe?”

  Clay laughed in return, lowering his head suddenly as he felt the sound choking in his throat. Damn, how he wanted to crush her into his arms. She had been a dream all those years, and now he could reach out and touch her skin that was satin, her hair that was silk. His hands could remember the lithe curves beneath the black outfit. His body could remember the perfect fit of hers beneath it, moving with overpowering sensuality, driving him insane, taking him to heaven on earth. “No.” He raised his head and laughed easily again. “I’ve never thought about lighting my beard, but then I don’t smoke this thing that much. By the way—what do you think of the beard?”

  “I—uh—”

  “Do you like it?”

  “Yes, oh, I don’t know. It’s not bad. But no, I don’t think that I do like it. It’s strange, Clay. I do know you, and I don’t know you. Maybe if you didn’t have the beard, you wouldn’t be quite so strange. I mean, you’ve really changed, Clay.”

  “Yes,” he said abruptly, “I have changed.” Oh, Cat, you don’t know how I’ve changed, but you don’t care to hear, he thought bitterly. I understand, it’s been so long, but I wish—yeah, I was praying—that you would have cared. … You think that I left you.

  “Clay,” she was saying, her voice soft and serious. “I have to tell you now, I’m simply going to tell Jules all about you tomorrow. I want what I have with Jules. I don’t know why you’ve suddenly decided to make an appearance now, but it doesn’t change anything for me. You’ll get your money, Clay, but you won’t get me. You’re going to have to go right back to wherever it was that you were.”

  “So you’re going to hand Tiger Cay over to DeVante? I’m not so sure you can, Cat. The island is half mine.”

  “Don’t be absurd.”

  Clay smiled, biting down on his pipe. “Bring your tale of righteousness to court, Cat. If we ever get that far.”

  “All right, Clay,” Cat hissed, losing patience. “You’re right—we will settle all this in court, and Jules will be beside me! Now, I am going to bed—”

  A hand came down over hers, a hand that pressed just enough to hint at the raw strength behind it. “We were having a nightcap, Cat. You haven’t finished your coffee.”

  Cat picked up her mug and drained the warm liquid in quick swallows, ignoring the burning sensation of heat and liquor. “I hope you’re not staying in my lodge, Clay.”

  “My boat is out in the harbor,” he replied evenly, crossing his arms over his chest.

  “Good,” Cat said, depositing her empty cup on the counter. “Enjoy the view on the terrace as long as you like. I am going to bed.”

  “Good night.”

  It surprised Cat that he let her go so easily, but she wasn’t about to ask him why. “I’m not sure if any of my nights are going to be good for a while,” she murmured, lifting the counter hatch and striding by him.

  She didn’t pause as she walked across the tiny bridge, nor did she dare look back until she had entered the rear doors of the lodge. She could just make out his form, seemingly magnified by the mist of spray from the tinkling waterfalls.

  Oh, God, why did he come back? she wondered desperately.

  At that moment she turned and ran, hoping she would encounter no guests. In that respect she was lucky. She didn’t encounter a single soul as she raced through the main house to the left wing and her own door. She closed it behind her, as if barricading herself against an attack, her heart thundering. But no one was behind her; Clay hadn’t chased her. Still, she was careful to bolt her lock.

  When she felt her breathing return to normal, she moved away from the door. She automatically began to pull the pins from her hair, scattering them haphazardly as she did so. Things will work out, she tried to assure herself. I do love Jules, and Clay is wrong, Jules will stand beside me. Oh, God, I’ll never sleep, he has made me feel like a volcano about to explode and I can’t stand thinking about him but I can’t forget him and when I think about him I think that I want him again.

  No, she reprimanded herself, a lifetime isn’t worth a few minutes of pleasure, a marriage has to exist outside of the bedroom, but oh, lord, would I love to be with him again and why am I such a fool to feel this way. I can’t help what I’m feeling; my body won’t let me. I will never be able to sleep.

  But as she paced, she dragged a nightgown from her closet and carelessly shed her black halter-dress to drag the thin peignoir over her head, and out of habit her pacing took her to the bathroom, where she almost made her gums bleed by viciously scrubbing her teeth and then turned her face pink by attacking it with her washcloth.

  She paced the huge bedroom again with her thoughts running rampant, thinking she should have perhaps dressed in a bathing suit and returned to the pool—surely Clay would be gone by now—to work off steam in a series of energetic laps.

  But she found herself yawning instead, and then curling into her bed. It’s stupid to try, she thought, plumping her pillow, all I’ll do is lie here—and think back all those years to the days when I was a wife, sleeping beside him.

  But she didn’t suffer the torment of memory anymore, because surprisingly her head had barely hit the pillow before she was deeply, soundly, out, her sleep undisturbed by dreams or sounds.

  Cat was dreaming and the dream was pleasant. It was a vague dream, undefined, but she could feel the warmth of the sun and hear the delightful cascade of the waterfall bubbling. The dream slowly faded with the irritation of a persistent rapping sound. Cat fought the sound for a while, but it drove away the pleasant, relaxed sensations of the dream. Her eyes flickered and opened, and then she realized someone was knocking at her door.

  “Yes?” she murmured sleepily, blinking to clear her vision.

&nbs
p; “It’s me, chérie, Jules. May I come in?”

  “Oh! Jules!” Cat brushed her disheveled hair from her face and rubbed her eyes. Was it that late? She had slept so soundly.

  “Just a second!” she called, about to leap from bed and grab her robe.

  She never made it off the bed. She froze in shock and disbelief as the bathroom door suddenly flew open and Clay—sans beard and with little white flecks of shaving cream still specking his face—strode quickly toward the door, clad only in a large white towel knotted low over his hips. “Don’t bother, darling,” he said cheerfully, “I’ll get it.”

  And before her benumbed senses could respond, the door opened. A half-naked Clay was facing a dumbfounded Jules.

  “Oh,” Clay said, his tone deeply laced with regretful sorrow, “you must be DeVante. I’m Miller. Cat’s husband. Sorry we had to meet this way. Cat should have had a chance to tell you. …”

  Cat wasn’t really hearing him. She knew she had gone parchment-white beneath her tan, as white as the man staring over Clay’s shoulder at her. Jules’ thin, sensitive brows had flown high, his hazel eyes were so dilated they appeared to be a solid sheet of empty pupil. His slender patrician nose was pinched and the line of his lips had all but disappeared, as chalk-white as his face.

  Jules was ignoring the hand extended by Clay. He snapped out a single epithet in French that totally expressed his opinion of her.

  Cat flinched, but his stinging word broke the freeze of incredulous horror that had held her immobile. “Jules, wait!” she shrieked, fingers clenched tightly in her sheets. Oh, God, what was she going to say? How on earth was she going to explain the half-naked man in the towel, her own rumpled appearance, the state of the bed. More than anything in the world she wanted to kill Clay, tear him limb from limb as he stood before Jules with his expression of pained discomfort.

  “Jules, this isn’t what it appears to be! This man has set me up, he’s trying to destroy you and me.”

  Jules’ voice sounded as if it were coming from deep within the ocean. “Is this your husband, Cat? Your deceased husband?”

  “No! Well, yes, but—”

  “Cat!” Clay interrupted in mock agony.

  Jules turned smartly on his heel.

  “Jules, wait! Attend-moi!”

  But Cat’s semi-hysterical pleas were ignored. Jules kept going. She sprang furiously from the bed to race after him, but Clay slammed the door before she reached it. Cat slammed into the wood, screaming at Clay every label she could think of from her not-too-limited seafaring vocabulary. “You bastard! You set me up—”

  And then she lost all reason, so infuriated that she simply went berserk, flying at him.

  If she had been calm, she might have stood a small chance. Her mind instinctively turned to weight, counterweight, and balance. A foot wedged correctly behind his ankle and a subtle shift and she was able to bring Clay down. But Clay had obviously had a few lessons along the way she had known nothing about. She had the deep satisfaction of hearing him grunt with pain, but then she was sailing herself, landing hard beside him. Then he rolled, and his weight was secured over hers; she was pinned, but still half crazed with outrage and fighting like a wild woman.

  “Calm down, Cat, I don’t want to hurt you.”

  But she couldn’t calm down, she attacked him with furiously pounding arms, trying to strike, scratch, bite—anything—hissing a spate of oaths at him all the while. But despite her half insane and staunch efforts, he managed to secure her wrists and pull them high over her head, subduing her wild clawing.

  Their eyes met. Both were breathing heavily; the air around them seemed heavy with explosive tension.

  “Catherine,” Clay said slowly, shaking his head slightly and concealing a wry grin. She was like no other woman alive, determined, capable, totally oblivious to odds. Willpower kept her from knowing the meaning of the word lose. Powered by sheer fury as she was now, she could tax even his strength. “Cat,” he repeated quietly, breathing more normally. “I know you can’t believe this now, but I did what I did because I care … because I don’t want your life ruined.”

  He winced slightly as his words brought about another explosion of fighting energy and whole new line of epithets. He tensed and waited, tightening his grip around her wrists. She stopped in shock when her struggles served only to disengage the towel from his hips. Her eyes riveted back to his as she lay still, eyes wide and then narrowing. “Damn you,” she hissed, but he couldn’t help a small smile then as he saw her blush despite herself. “You were taking a shower in my bathroom!”

  “Technically—our bathroom,” he corrected. As well as robbing him of his towel, the struggle had hiked Cat’s gown high to her hips. The material was thin anyway, but now the flesh of their thighs touched; the coarse curled hair of his crushed to the smooth softness of hers. Clay could feel his own heat rising, and he was aware from the erotic electricity racing beneath him that she too could feel it. Her features were suddenly white, chiseled stone, as if she were afraid to breathe and give away more. A satanic urge gripped him. “What’s the matter, Cat?” he queried, brows raising in a sardonic tease. “Can’t you handle it?”

  Her emerald eyes touched his, glittering like a million facets. “Hell will freeze over before I can’t handle you, Clay.”

  Knowing he was infuriating her further—if possible—Clay still could not prevent another deep chuckle. “Come to think of it, Cat, you always did handle things remarkably well. …”

  “You son of a—”

  “Okay, stop it!” Clay interrupted her, his voice a whiplash, his mind turning to the seriousness of the situation and the maneuvering he had yet to manage. “I’m really sorry—”

  “Sorry!” Cat raged. “You purposely set me up, you destroyed my life, you dragged me down to the floor—”

  “Self-defense,” Clay interrupted curtly. “Sorry I was so rude as to learn a few countermeasures myself. I know you’re currently wishing that I had disappeared eternally into the Atlantic, and you’re probably envisioning various means to return me to the devil. For your own sake, Cat, settle down.”

  “Settle down! Do you know what you’ve done?” Cat shrieked, testing his grip on her wrists again. It was impossible to break his vise of steel and she was worn out “Clay—you’re crazy. A sane man doesn’t do the things you’re doing. Now, I’ll try to forget everything that’s happened if you just get up and let me go.”

  Clay tilted back his head and laughed. “You’ll forget! Cat, you’ve never forgotten a wrong in your life. Hell will freeze over before I ever believe a comment like that from you. And—” His voice deepened, his spurt of humor gone. “I guarantee you, hell will be a place of dangling icicles before I let you run after that Frenchman.”

  “I’m going to marry that Frenchman!” Cat exploded.’

  “No, I doubt it,” Clay reiterated calmly. “I told you he had no backbone. He left here like a jellyfish.”

  “Oh?” Cat narrowed her eyes to emerald slits. “What did you expect of him after that farce you pulled?”

  “If it were me, Cat,” he said heatedly, his face leaning dangerously close to hers so that she was treated to the enticing scent of fresh shaving lotion and a too close view of the iron in the shape of his now unblurred jaw, “I wouldn’t have walked out. I would have demanded my explanation then and there. You might have been throttled, but I wouldn’t have walked out.”

  Cat clenched her teeth down hard in misery. She wanted to claw his handsome face to ribbons, while at the same time becoming more and more aware of his body pressed to hers, the heat that touched her, alive and warm, the hands that held her, hips crushing hers; his chest, riddled with hair that brushed through the fabric of her gown to tease her breasts.

  “Walk out!” she suddenly hissed. “Don’t you dare mention the words walk out! You took a cruise out of here one day that walked you out of my life. Now get off me! I am going after Jules—and I’m going to explain that you came back totally
insane!”

  “And he’s going to believe you? You’re sounding crazy, Cat. Besides, I’m sure Monsieur DeVante is long gone by now, Cat.”

  Cat paled. He was right. When crossed or hurt, Jules left immediately to sulk.

  “God, do I hate you, Clay,” she told him.

  His smile twisted into something very bitter and a touch sad. “Do you, Cat? Maybe. I hope to change that, and you should try to change it yourself, for your own benefit. My two months start today.”

  “Your two months! What two months? I never agreed—”

  “You don’t have to agree. You’ve got no choices left. You owe me either five hundred thousand dollars—or yourself. It seems I get the latter—and I want it today. Tomorrow we’re going to start preliminaries on the search for the Santa Anita. That means I’m going to have to hear everything you know about her whereabouts tonight.”

  “Oh, Clay, you really are crazy,” Cat said, shaking her head. “You may have me down right now, but you can’t hold me forever. And if you think I’m going to follow you anywhere once I’m up, or help you in the least, you’d better start thinking again.”

  He smiled, switching both her wrists to one hand—easily, to her chagrin—and lightly caressed her cheek with the knuckles of his free hand. “I don’t think I need to think again, Cat. Granted, I’ll be watching my back when you’re around, but I seriously believe you’ll see things my way shortly. You can’t pay me. And besides that, you want to find the Santa Anita. I’m the only hope you have.”

  Cat suddenly started to laugh. “I don’t owe you a thing, Clay! If we’re still married, as you claim, then I can’t owe you anything! Wives don’t owe their husbands!”

  “But wives do live with their husbands,” he countered. “And you’re going to start living with me.”

  “Oh, really?” Cat demanded sardonically, twisting from his touch. “Starting when?”

  He released her very slowly, tensed for a spurt of action and warning her with his eyes that she not attempt one as he deftly retied his towel. “Tonight, Cat—platonically—if you wish. But we do start out tomorrow, and I can’t believe that will be a hardship for you. We both know the Santa Anita carried Aztec crown jewels. Think of the history, Cat, think of the archeologists and historians the world over, who would die for that find. And it would really be your father’s. Think of what it would mean. …”