“No?” Kelly asked, amused. “Are you sure you didn’t plan our disappearance to gain publicity?”
He chuckled and patted her hand. “No amount of fame would be worth what we’ve gone through, love.”
Glad to be alive, she settled into the comfortable seat, unable to believe they were on their way home. “I think I’ll just pinch myself to make sure it’s real.” The plane taxied down the runway and soared into the air, leaving Fiji far behind.
“Let’s get some sleep,” she said, turning to Alex, but his eyes were already closed.
Thoughts of their future whirled through her head. She suppressed an urge to smooth back the lock of dark blond hair falling onto his forehead. She shouldn’t, since so many attendants had recognized him.
Sleep eluded her. Perhaps she should have taken one of his pain pills.
She stared out the window, her thoughts churning inside. Did he love her? Even during their most intimate times together, he’d never once said so.
* * *
As soon as the plane touched down at the Honolulu Airport, an officer escorted them to the police station. Now dead tired, Kelly sipped a cup of strong coffee and filled out yet another detailed report for the U.S. authorities. After midnight, they were finished. The detective closed his file.
“You’ll be free to go to a hotel once this paperwork has cleared.” He left them alone at his desk and allowed them the use of his telephone.
Alex handed Kelly the receiver. “News will travel fast. Would you like to ring first?”
“Okay, but won't they all be surprised? After three months, how do you tell people you’re alive?” She dialed her aunt’s number, while Alex leaned back in the chair, eyes closed.
“Hello,” answered Kaye in her gravelly voice.
Kelly exhaled in relief that nothing had happened to her aunt during her absence. “Aunt Kaye. It’s me—Kelly. I’m alive. I’m so sorry—it’s the middle of the night—but we just made it back where I could finally call you.”
“Oh, my Dear Lord in Heaven. We were told you’d either drowned or were killed in the explosion.” Her aunt started crying, sending tears down Kelly’s cheeks.
After Kelly reassured her aunt she was very much alive, she said, “Aunt Kaye, I have to go, but I’ll talk to you soon. I need you to send money for a hotel and expenses.”
She gave her aunt the address of the Crystal Polynesian, a nearby hotel they’d seen on the way to the police station.
“Shall I call Robert for you, sweetie?”
Kelly’s stomach clenched into a knot. Guilt coursed through her at what her being alive and with Alex would mean to Robert. She frowned and stole a sideways glance at Alex. He leaned back in the chair with his eyes closed, as if asleep. “No, I guess I’d better do that myself.” She punched in Robert’s telephone number.
“Hello,” he answered groggily.
“I know this is unexpected, but this is Kelly. I didn’t die in the dive boat explosion as everyone assumed. I’m very much alive.”
There was a moment of silence where she wasn’t sure if he believed her or not. Then he said, “Can’t be . . . Oh, honey, this is amazing. I searched for you, but they insisted you were dead. I shouldn’t have believed them. I would never have given up. Do you believe me?”
“Of course.”
“Tell me what happened.”
Kelly couldn’t concentrate. “I’m so dead tired, I’ll tell you everything when we . . . when I get back.” She told him where she intended to stay. “I’ll be home in a day or two. I’m sure we have a lot to talk about.”
“No. Don’t move from the hotel. I’ll bring my private plane down tomorrow.” Click.
Gasping, she sagged back in the chair. “Alex, Robert is coming here tomorrow.”
“Hillyard?” Alex’s eyebrows slanted into a frown. “Why did you call him?”
“I had to. I couldn’t have him hear it in the news. You probably can’t understand this, but he’s always been a big part of my life. He’s like family. Besides he runs my company, and we have so much to talk about.”
While Alex used the telephone, she went into the hall and collapsed on the wooden bench outside the detective’s office. Worry and guilt grasped her heart like a fisted hand. After all Robert had done for her, by keeping her company afloat, by extending loans and being her staunchest supporter of her dad’s innocence. Now, she was going to have to hurt him.
* * *
When Alex called his mother and she didn’t answer, he called his home in the country.
“Hello.” Vanessa’s voice hit him like a sucker punch. Why the hell was she answering? She’d never lived at his house. The estate should have gone to his mother on the ‘presumption’ of his death.
“Is anyone there?” Vanessa demanded.
“This is Alex,” he said bluntly. He heard glass breaking and the receiver bouncing on the stone floor, and then the rattle of Vanessa retrieving the phone.
"Damn it,” she hissed. “What kind of prank is this?”
“It’s not a prank,” he forced himself to stay calm. “It’s a long story, but I didn’t die after all.” He could hear people talking in the background. What was going on at his house? “I survived the dive boat explosion, and I’m in a hotel in Hawaii. Is my mother there?”
“No. Whatever you need I can help you with.” He couldn’t even tell if Vanessa was telling the truth about his mother’s whereabouts. He was suspicious when Vanessa said, “I’ll be there.”
“No. Don’t even think of it.” He tried to keep the hostility out of his voice. He didn’t have the strength to fight with her now, and they were divorced. “Sounds like you have guests. I’ll ring her again.”
“Alex, she’ll be here soon. If you give me the hotel’s address, I’ll have her send anything you’d like.”
“I need money.” If Vanessa had any ideas, he repeated, “Don’t come.” He had hoped she had accepted their divorce, but her voice held an edge of excitement. “Please, tell her I’m all right as well, and it’s late here. I’ll speak to her tomorrow.”
He hung up the phone and exhaled a deep breath.
His memories of his miserable marriage tumbled through his mind. Vanessa had been a clever seducer. Once he’d signed his life away, she had considered him no more than a hot stud to show off and use for her pleasure. Within the first month, he despised her. He’d soon realized how crude and kinky she was in her sexual appetite.
One of the last times he’d endured an evening with Vanessa had been dinner at her friend’s home. After the entree, Vanessa made an excuse to go with him into the kitchen. After closing the door, she flung herself on him.
Although he’d firmly said ‘no,’ she’d deftly unzipped his trousers. “You’ll learn, Alex, when I want something, I take it. Besides, Nell is occupied with her dinner date.” She lowered her mouth to him.
Nell hadn’t been too occupied because she walked in on them. In humiliation, he’d turned to fasten his trousers and realized Vanessa had achieved the results she intended.
Not caring to be publicly fondled for her friends’ enjoyment, he avoided her after that. She accused him of affairs, became insanely jealous, and imagined situations that never existed. It wasn’t long before he refused to have sex with her, which brought out the very devil in her. So after nine months of marriage, he filed for separation and moved into a London flat.
She harassed his friends and ruined what had been a budding career as producers and directors learned that with him came the excess baggage of a demanding and often hysterical wife. When Vanessa wouldn’t consent to the divorce, he moved on with his life anyway, refusing to feel guilty.
Now, he was finally free of the witch.
He walked out of the detective’s office. Kelly had fallen asleep on a bench in the hallway. Dark circles under her eyes revealed how little she’d slept in the last forty-eight hours. A burst of tenderness swelled in his heart. He dropped beside her and gathered her close, nestling he
r in the crook of his good arm. It was his turn to take care of her.
Her eyes flickered open. “Alex? What’s going on?”
“Vanessa was at my house. Strange, since she never lived there." He leaned his head against the hard wooden bench. “Go back to sleep, love, looks like clearing us might drag on through the night.”
“I couldn’t wake up if I tried,” she murmured, snuggling close.
With her head resting against his chest, they both slept soundly, oblivious to a few clicks and flashes of a camera.
* * *
After hanging up the phone, Vanessa laughed and twirled around the room in her wedding dress, trying not to step on the millions of fragments of an expensive, crystal vase smashed on the slate floor.
Needing to call off the wedding, she strode out on the lawn where the rental people were busy setting up tables and chairs for the garden wedding at noon. She waved her arms at the caterer. “Get all of this out of here and send me the bill.”
She grabbed her mother-in-law’s hands, not regretting for one moment that she’d lied to Alex. His mother was already at the house. Poor Mrs. Drake. She had been too mousy to even put up a fight to keep the family ancestral home. “Explain to Reginald that Alex is alive. I can’t get married."
“My son? He’s alive?” Alex’s mother fainted on the grass.
Vanessa stepped over her and ordered to a passing maid, “Help Mrs. Drake. Then have my bags packed immediately. I’m flying to Hawaii.”
* * *
At his Beverly Hill’s mansion, Robert sat immobilized on the edge of his bed, stunned by the news—his Kelly had not died after all. When his racing heart quieted, he turned on the lamp and nudged his assistant who had been his constant companion these past three months.
“Robert? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” Tammy ran a hand through her short blond hair and squinted at the light.
“Close. Kelly’s alive.”
She pulled the sheet up over her breasts. “How? No . . . You can’t be serious?”
“I am. And I can’t have her coming back to find you living here.” He placed his hands on Tammy’s shoulders. Years ago, there had only been one other woman he’d ever wanted as desperately as Kelly and she had died. “I never lied to you about my feelings for her. You always knew.”
“You’re obsessed with that girl. I gave up my marriage for you, you jerk.” Tammy slipped off the bed and fled from the room.
Robert decided to let her go and vent her anger. He only hoped she wasn’t angry enough to tell Kelly about their affair, especially the part before their engagement.
If Tammy valued her job, she’d keep her damned mouth shut.
* * *
The four-story hotel lobby of the Crystal Polynesian surrounded a manmade waterfall and tropical palm trees under a huge, domed skylight. Alex agreed with Kelly it was prudent they get separate rooms in each of their names. However, when he made the reservation, he asked for those rooms to be adjoining. She raised an eyebrow at him as if to say he wasn’t being prudent enough. Perhaps he wasn’t. He shrugged.
After she showered and crawled into bed to sleep, he decided to buy a newspaper.
As soon as he entered the lobby, a local news reporter with a crew wielding cameras and microphones cornered him. “Did you anticipate the enormous success of your movie, The Spy, Mr. Drake, after the publicity of your supposed ‘death’?”
“I had no idea?” With his arm aching like hell and himself feeling weaker than a newborn kitten, he wasn’t exactly up for an impromptu interview, so he kept it brief.
When he turned to enter the elevator lobby, he found a second reporter. “Hey, Mr. Drake, what’s with the arm sling and bruises?”
He didn’t get the chance to answer when a third reporter with a beefy face stuck a microphone in his face. “Three months on a deserted island with a hot number. Not bad, eh? A little pleasure in paradise?”
Alex glowered at the man. These last two men were the lowest of the low, only out to discover dirt. He’d had enough exposure to their kind while married to Vanessa. “Aren’t you in the least concerned for those who died in the boat explosion?”
“Yeah, sure, yeah, but all of our readers are more interested in hearing about how you and Robert Hillyard’s lovely fiancée survived for three months stranded alone on a deserted island. Does Vanessa Caine know yet?”
“Why the bloody hell would I care what she thinks?” Alex snapped. “We have gone through hell, people have died, and you want to make an issue of my time with Ms. Cochran?” He turned on his heel and sought refuge back in the bedroom that Kelly had claimed as hers.
Her eyelids fluttered open. “Alex, is something wrong?”
“You won’t believe it, but it’s a nightmare down there with the press. They’re more interested in a story about us than how this happened.”
“Oh, no.”
He sank into the chair in the sitting area of the hotel room. “There is nothing we can do about it. Let’s stay up here. You need more sleep. My mother wired money. I’ll have clothing delivered and order room service. We’ll slip out when you’re ready to go.”
After she told him what she needed, he called an expensive department store.
* * *
Kelly yawned and hugged the soft pillow, refreshed after a few hours of sleep. She cocked her ear and realized Alex was talking to a woman in the other bedroom.
“Yes, these are all the packages that were delivered to the front desk, Mr. Drake,” the woman said. “I realize you’ve been hurt. I wanted to let you know, if you need anything . . .” The woman’s voice lowered seductively. “You can call me.”
Alex cleared his throat. “I’m all set for now.”
Kelly frowned. Was he always propositioned like this? Probably. She remembered the women on the cruise ship. There were the girls on Wamba’s island, the flight attendants, the way women’s heads swiveled just this morning when they’d entered the hotel. Alex would create a stir of feminine interest no matter where he went.
After lunch, she helped him undress in the bathroom and ran the water in the bathtub so he wouldn’t get his bandages wet. He stepped into the bath.
She sat on the edge of the wide marble platform, the luxury of it feeling odd after the island.
“How are you?” she asked him.
“Better.”
“I think you’re worse than you’re letting on.”
His gaze searched hers. "Do you care?" He clasped her wrist with his left hand.
She almost fell into the bathtub with him and warm water splashed onto her leg. She laughed. “Of course, I care, and I’m trying to help you.”
He grinned and steadied her. “I know. I like it.” He released her. A pained expression flitted across his handsome features. “Kelly, we need to talk. So much has happened between us."
She sighed. “That’s putting it mildly. Here, let me wash your back. Talk.” She lathered the thick washcloth with scented soap and ran it over his smooth skin, avoiding the bandages. His back was a perfection of muscles and lean strength.
“Come back with me to England,” he said in a low voice.
Her heart beat faster. Had he grown to love her as much as she loved him? Giddy and blissfully happy, she would definitely say ‘yes.’ This time, unlike with Robert, there was no doubt in her mind she loved this man with all of her heart and soul.
She was about to tell Alex she’d go with him anywhere, when he said, “You don't have to go back with Hillyard. And it’s probably not safe for you in L.A. You could stay with me for a while, at least until you decide what you want to do.”
The words that she returned his love died on her lips.
“You understand, don’t you?” he said over his shoulder again. “I’ve always been upfront with you about what I wanted in my life.”
Her throat aching, she couldn’t say anything. For her, she didn’t want to contemplate a day without him. Obviously, she was the only one in love here.
&
nbsp; “I wouldn’t be any good at a commitment. I’d only hurt and disappoint you in the long run.” He stated calmly.
If he didn’t know by now what they had, he would never realize it. Crushed on the inside, with tears burning at the back of her eyes, she tried hard to keep her voice from shaking. “You know, that’s fine. I-I have to get back to California . . . I have things to do with the business . . . I, uh, I have to check on my aunt.” She bit down on her lip to keep from sobbing out loud.
He glanced back at her, his eyes narrowing. If he expected her to make a scene like Vanessa did, he wouldn’t get one. She had endured more pain in her young life than most people did in a lifetime, and she could survive losing one man who didn’t love her.
“I’d better go.” She placed the washcloth on the ledge and tried to sound light. “You know, I don’t think I would be any good at fighting through the hoards of women anyway. I think it’s time we honored our agreement and said good-bye. That’s why we made it. We knew this day would come. I’ll see you later.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Is this what you want?”
She nodded, blinked back tears, and hurried from the bathroom. She could never be his short-term lover or his built-in playmate while he had other women on the side.
* * *
Alex dragged himself out of the bathtub and managed to dry himself with a towel and shave. Although his fever was down, his shoulder throbbed painfully so he took a pain pill. He’d not meant to hurt Kelly, and he could have used more finesse when asking her to live with him. He should’ve let her know she was special to him, but he just couldn’t give her his heart.
He curled his good hand into a fist as he considered the reality. He was going to lose her. She had her pride. She wasn’t going to be like Vanessa or like the other women who had begged him to stay with them.
He should be relieved. She’d make it easy for him to walk away. Damn.
Isn’t that what you wanted, not to have her hanging on, expecting something you can’t give? From the beginning, you made it clear you could never offer her love and marriage.
Bloody, bloody hell. If this was what he wanted, why did he feel like hell––and like the biggest cad of all time?
Dangerous Paradise Page 24