by Daphne Clair
But she had guessed right about him, and opposition was a challenge, obviously. She found her wrists firmly held as he pressed her head back against the pillow and his mouth became dangerously exciting on hers, persistent, seeking and determined. Her resistance was hopelessly inadequate from the start, with her legs
trapped by the blankets, Cade's hard chest imprisoning her body and inflexible against the softness of her breasts, and his hands keeping her wrists helplessly pinned to the bed.
She made herself stop fighting because it wasn't going to get her anywhere, but the sweet punishment had only begun. When he felt her taut muscles relax, his body seemed to settle closer to hers, and though he lifted his mouth it was only to kiss her throat and shoulder and then move warmly to the curve of her breast.
She protested then with a feeble shake of her head, saying, No—don't!' And while her lips were still parted on the word he covered them again with his in a silent, seeking, devastating demand until she capitulated and gave him the response he wanted. She was swept into a vortex of dizzying delight, and when he released one of her wrists and slid his hand warmly on to the soft swell of her breast, she didn't protest, only moved her hand to touch his hair gently with her fingers as he went on kissing her.
When he finally paused again and moved away from her, she lay bemused and quiescent while he surveyed her flushed face, a hint of a smile tugging the corners of his mouth.
Now,' he said softly, 'what was that you were saying last night, Miss Martin?'
She felt as if the breath had stopped in her throat. She could only lie there and watch as he picked up the tray and moved towards the door. He was nearly there when she found voice enough to say, 'One swallow doesn't make a summer, Mr Franklin.'
He didn't answer, just stopping in the doorway to look back at her, but the look was merciless, flickering over her like a burning finger. In his eyes she saw how she looked, with her pale hair spread on the pillow, her cheeks still flushed, her lips still throbbing from his kisses, and the strap of the nightgown had fallen
again—(or had he pushed it aside?) exposing her bare shoulder and the beginning curve of her breast.
Involuntarily she put up a hand to straighten it, and then wished she hadn't, when she saw the amused smile he watched her with, before he turned away.
She would go away. Getting out of bed," gathering up clothes to put on, using the bathroom and brushing her hair, Carissa kept that one thought in mind. She could not possibly stay here with him, not for another day. He had his two bodyguards. Her presence was totally unnecessary, just an extra frill that could well be done without. She would go back to Auckland and tell Morris ...
Tell Morris what?
That she quit—that from here on Cade Franklin or Cadiz Fernand could look after himself? Why? Morris was going to ask. She would tell him she was scared—but she had accepted the assignment far too readily and phlegmatically for him to accept that she was suddenly overwhelmed with fear for her safety now. Besides, her pride revolted at the idea of letting Morris think she was a coward.
Tell him that Cade had made a pass? He would thin!! she was crazy: Fending off passes was all in a day's work, as well he knew, and she had never had any difficulty before in doing it with finesse and tact—it was one of the reasons Morris employed her for just this sort of thing, looking after his show business personalities offstage.
If she said Cade had tried to force her—but reluctantly she admitted there was no justice in that; Certainly she hadn't been a willing party, at first, and he had held her down, but she had been in no danger of rape. Another danger, perhaps, that arose from within herself, but she had no grounds for a serious accusation
o
against him, and it would be a despicable thing to do. She couldn't leave, there was no plausible excuse.
By the time she had got dressed and made the bed and hung up the remainder of her clothes in the roomy wardrobe, she was left with no alternative but to go downstairs, unless she was to spend the day skulking in her room, which seemed both childish and weak-minded. And she had come to the reluctant conclusion that she had to stay and see this thing through. She could only hope that Cade's would-be assassin would soon be caught.
If she played it decidedly cool from now on she would be in no danger, she decided. She had flicked Cade's masculine pride last night and-she had to admit, trying to be philosophical about it, that he had certainly proved a point this morning. She tried to thrust down a burning anger born of humiliation, and tell herself that if she presented no further provocation he would be unlikely to try to repeat the performance. For all he knew, after all, they were practically total strangers, having only met yesterday.
He wasn't in the house. His bed had been neatly made, she discovered when she tapped on his door and peeped in to see if she should attend to that, and the kitchen was can and tidy with not a dish in sight. '
She went out and found him standing with his back to her near the-lake's edge, across the wide lawn. Suppressing an impulse to turn and go back inside, she strolled across to join him.
Long before most people would have noticed her presence, he had turned to watch her coming towards him. He still had his blind person's facility for using every sense to its highest degree.
As she stopped a few feet from him he said, 'Don't you think a loving bride would come closer and take my arm? There are witnesses.'
There were a couple of boats on the lake, fishermen trying their luck.
'They're more interested in the fish than in us,' she said. But she tucked her hand into his arm with what she hoped was a casual air, bringing an amused glint to his eyes which stirred her to faint anger again.
'Satisfied?' she asked.
Cade looked down at her and his eyes gleamed as he said, 'Hardly,' then laughed when her cheeks warmed with colour.
She threw him a look of pure hatred that at least made him stop laughing as his brows rose questioningly. He stopped her attempt to withdraw her hand by clamping hard fingers over it on his arm. 'Spoiling for a fight, aren't you?' he teased callously. 'You wouldn't win.'
'Physical strength isn't everything,' she flashed at him.
'Agreed.' His eyes roved over her. 'You have weapons of your own. But they'd be more effective if you didn't show so plainly that you don't like me.'
'I don't dislike you,' she said stiffly, remembering she had a job to do. Then, resentment ,overwhelming her sense bf duty, she added, 'You can't blame me for being angry—you deliberately humiliated me!'
He looked down at her and asked, 'By kissing you—or by not carrying things further than kisses? Were you disappointed ?'
Furious, she managed to wrench her hand at last from his grasp. 'You have an outsize ego !' she snapped. 'Of course I wasn't disappointed! I'd much prefer that you didn't touch me at all.'
'That might be a little difficult,' he drawled, looking faintly amused. 'We're supposed to be a loving couple.' Abruptly, he said, 'Come for a walk along the shore. Our guardian angels next door are about, they'll be
able to watch us.' He turned her along the pale sand near the water.
`It's as beautiful as you said,' Cade told her, his eyes narrowed slightly, against the shimmer of the sun on the lake's dappled surface.
Forgetting her vendetta for a moment, she said, 'It must be marvellous for you—'
`Being able to see again? Yes, it is,' he said quite soberly. 'I don't think I'll ever be able to take it for —granted as so many people do.
`You'd been blind since you were nineteen, hadn't you she asked.
'Yes.' He changed the subject, pointing to one of the trees growing almost at the water's edge and asking her if she knew what it was. She looked at the dark red velvet trumpets of flowers surrounded by sharp-toothed leaves and told him it was a rewarewa, or New Zealand honeysuckle tree. Happy to find a neutral subject to talk about, she discoursed on some of the other inhabitants of the bush, the tall kahikatea with its feathery leaves and purple-and-red frui
ts, the scarlet-flowering rata and the golden kowhai, prettiest of the forests' flowering trees.
'you're very knowledgeable,' he commented as they stopped where the lake intruded into the grounds of the lodge in a long narrow inlet.
'Not really.. Morris's visitors are often interested in the trees and the wild life, so I've studied them up a bit since I've been bringing people to the lodge. There are several books back at the house, if you're really interested.'
He didn't answer at once, and she looked up at him enquiringly, to find him apparently studying her with some intentness.
At last he said softly, 'Oh, I'm interested,' but she didn't think he meant the trees. His eyes held hers deliberately with a masculine light of challenge, and it
was an effort to keep her face politely blank and pull her gaze from his.
'We'd better go back,' she said as coolly as she could manage, and began to retrace their steps along the sand.
What on earth, she wondered, had she let herself in
for? Morris, damn you! You don't know what you've done.
She vetoed Cade's company when she went to the shop later in the car. She would have liked to walk the mile and a half, but she was supposed to stick fairly closely to the house and Cade.
She had been to the shop often enough in the past to be on mildly friendly terms with the woman behind the counter, although they had never exchanged names.
'Oh, it's you!' the woman said. 'At Kamahi lodge, are you?'
`Yes.' Carissa consulted a shopping list ostentatiously. 'Where do you keep the eggs now?' she asked.
'Over there, dear.' As she turned, the woman's voice continued, 'There hasn't been anyone at the lodge for quite a while. Have you got many guests this time?'
Last time the lodge had been used, there had been quite a party—a singing duo with their girl-friends and several hangers-on. Carissa hadn't enjoyed it, but the celebrities went home happy.
Turning back to the counter, she metaphorically breathed deeply and said, `No, not this time. Just me and—and my husband.'
The door banged to behind Stan as he entered the shop, and gave them an impersonal nod. Evidently she wasn't supposed to know him.
'Oh—I didn't know you were married,' the woman remarked.
'I--wasn't before,' said Carissa, trying to sound casual, and thinking, Lord! I hope I'm doing this right. She reached into a chilled unit for some butter, and
said, 'I'll need some milk, too. And could you slice a pound of bacon for me, please?'
The woman was looking pleased and knowing as Carissa put the butter on the counter beside the eggs. Then her face flickered as she followed the movements of Carissa's hands. `Oh I see,' she said, and turned to get the bacon.
Stan was behind her when she drew up at the gate, riding a motor bike and with a rifle slung over his shoulder. 'I've got a permit,' he said, as she eyed it. `Like to see you both later—come over,' he added, and she blinked and said, 'Oh, all right.'
But he had already kicked the engine into life and roared on down the side road, leaving her alone.
She passed on the message to Cade over a late lunch, and he said, `Okay, let's take another walk this afternoon. In the other direction this time.'
When they strolled by the hut, Stan was fiddling with a rod and line on the bank nearby, and Pat was in a boat on the lake, looking very much as though he had nothing on his mind but the possibility of trout for dinner.
Stan .gave them a casual wave, and Cade took Carissa's arm and walked over to him.
how's fishing?' he asked casually.
`Nothing biting,' said Stan, his fingers busy untangling a knot in the nylon line. `But,' he looked up, and Carissa realised that the blue eyes in his rather non descript, face were remarkably shrewd and alert, `we hear fishy stories from the locals.' He glanced quickly at Carissa and then back to Cade. `They reckon there's more strangers about than usual, this time of the year. Some of them Americans, too. So we hear. Might be nothing in it, of course.'
Cade's hand tightened on her arm until it hurt, and Carissa made a small protesting movement. The hard, fingers relaxed, but Cade didn't look at her.-
Stan said, 'If you two go for any long walks, don't forget to let us know. The bush can be risky, you know. By the way, the lady forgot her ring this morning. The woman in the shop noticed.'
'I don't have one,' said Carissa.
'Would've been better to get one,' Stan remarked, as he flexed his rod. 'Better not talk too long. Binoculars can see a long way.' He nodded to them casually as Cade took the hint and led Carissa away.-
'Let's walk,' said Cade, and slipped an arm about her shoulders, as they walked on. His eyes scanned the shoreline, resting speculatively on the small holiday homes and fishermen's huts nestled among the trees.
The road petered out at the lake's edge, and a litter of large rocks and smaller rounded stones barred the way. On the other side of the natural barrier a temptingly broad strip of white-gold sand could be glimpsed.
Cade hardly hesitated. 'Come on,' he said, and leaped lightly on to a flat-topped outcrop of rock, turning to take her hand and pull her up after him.
Carissa needed little help, for she had always been sure-footed as a cat about rocks and trees, and they soon landed on. the sand at the other side, Cade unnecessarily swinging her down into his arms on the last leap.
held her as she made to move out of his hold, his hands firm on her waist. She stiffened as they moved to hold her closer to him.
'Don't fight me,' he said softly. 'We may be watched —and we're honeymooners, remember?'
She let her body relax against the hard warmth of his, but her lips closed firmly against him as he kissed her mouth. 'You're a lousy actress,' he muttered against it.
She moved her mouth aside and said, 'That's enough, Cade. You've convinced anyone who's watching. Now let me go.'
'Are you giving me orders?' he asked softly, his
breath warm on the skin of her cheek.
'I'm telling you to let me go ' she snapped, desperate at the closeness of him, the temptation of her body that wanted to mould itself against him, to give in to remembered passion.
She started to struggle, and he said 'stop it,' his arms tightening as he kissed her again, unmercifully finding her mouth and crushing it into some sort of submission, sweeping her into a dark country where nothing mat: tered but the hot waves of desire that assailed her body under the touch of his hands—except her panicky need to escape it, not to give in to the beating needs of her senses.
Driven by a desperate instinct for self-preservation, she opened her teeth and nipped sharply at his lower lip, and he gave a muffled exclamation and lifted his head, his eyes blazing with anger into hers.
'You bitch!' he muttered, and without warning pushed her down on the cool sand, in the shadow of the rocks, pinning her beneath him, his hands holding her by the shoulders, his mouth cruelly set, with a faint trickle of blood on the lower lip. 'Just try that again!' he said before his head came down and she tasted his blood on her own mouth as it punished hers again with hard, angry passion.
There was nothing to do but endure it, and close her eyes against the weakness of tears that threatened.
When it seemed the kiss was going to last for ever, Cade lifted his mouth and his body, and the sun blazed on to her closed eyelids. She felt as though a storm had just swept her up and then dropped her, exhausted and battered, on the lake shore. She opened her eyes and .saw Cade sitting beside her, wiping the back of his hand across his mouth and looking at it broodingly. She raised her hand to her own mouth and tentatively touched her fingers to the throbbing outline of her lips.
He glanced at her and said, 'All right, I'm sorry if I was rough. But you asked for it.' For an apology, it sounded remarkably savage.
Carissa closed her eyes again, and next time she opened them he was lying beside her, with his arm thrown across his eyes. The afternoon sun was hot, and she seemed to be floating in a limbo where nothing ma
ttered any more, anyway. She drifted into a doze for a few minutes, then roused herself with difficulty, remembering that it was risky to sleep in hot sun.
Cade still lay there in the same position as she eased herself up off the sand, quietly, and stood up. She had turned her back on him when his voice said, 'Where are you going?'
`Back to the lodge.'
He stood up without comment and was by her side as she clambered back over the rocks. But this time she kept ahead and he didn't offer to help her.
Stan and Pat were pottering with their rods by the water, and she. wondered if they were really keen on fishing. If not, the pastime must be boring and uncomfortable for them.
Carissa busied herself for the remainder of the afternoon making over-much work for herself in the preparation of a meal for the evening, and Cade fetched his guitar and took it into the lounge, playing it and the piano alternately, and she gathered he was writing a new song.
' The conversation over their dinner was politely conventional on the surface, and she ignored the hint of mockery in some of Cade's remarks, exerting herself considerably to treat him just like any other of Morris's guests.
Afterwards she refused his help with the dishes, and finding him in the lounge, holding his guitar across his knees but staring into space, she took a thriller from the bookcase in one corner and settled down to read.
For a thriller it seemed remarkably dull, but she ploughed on with determination into the second chap. ter before every nerve tensed as Cade rose and came over to her chair.
'Try this,' he said. She looked up and found him holding out a ring to her—a circle of gold with a band of.platinum decoration. It looked vaguely familiar, and she recalled she had seen it on his hand—the little finger of his right hand. 'I should have thought of it before.
She didn't want to wear a ring of his, but as she hesitated, he grabbed impatiently at her left hand and pushed it on to the third finger.