‘Who was that?’ asked Rosanna, in the little silence that followed Nicola’s departure.
‘An old friend,’ he said dismissively. ‘Mother wants us to stay on for a while when everyone’s gone. Says she hasn’t had a chance to chat. All right with you?’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘Just a half-hour or so,’ he promised.
It was a good deal longer than that by the time Mrs Hilton had been seen off, and everyone, even the reluctant Geraldine, had finally gone. And the moment the elder Frasers had Rosanna to themselves her resemblance to her grandmother was the main topic of conversation, along with Ewen’s good fortune in tracking down Rose Norman’s family to learn her story. By that time the sky had grown dark and thunder was beginning to rumble across the river. Ewen turned down the offer of supper.
‘I’d better get Rosanna home before the storm breaks. I work her hard,’ he said lightly, kissing his mother. ‘She needs her sleep.’
‘Perhaps you should hang on until the weather improves,’ said his father as lightning lit up the room.
‘Thanks just the same, but I’d better get home,’ said Rosanna. ‘I like storms.’ She smiled at Ewen. ‘I assume the hood doesn’t leak on your prized possession?’
‘Certainly not!’
They made their farewells, and at last, when the lift doors closed behind them, Ewen braced himself, eyeing her warily. ‘You look a touch militant, Rosanna.’
‘As well I might,’ she said promptly. ‘You didn’t say it was your grandmother’s birthday, or exactly how much feminine attention I was required to shield you from.’ She looked at him challengingly. ‘Who, exactly, is Nicola—?’ She gasped, choking back a scream as the lights went out and the lift stopped dead.
Ewen fumbled for her hand. ‘Are you all right?’
‘No!’ She hurled herself into his arms, clinging to him like a limpet. ‘Don’t you have a match or something?’
Ewen cursed under his breath. ‘I don’t smoke. Let me feel for the control panel. There must be a panic button—’
‘Don’t mention panic!’ she implored, and he laughed, patting her back soothingly.
‘It must be the lightning. But don’t worry. Someone will soon put it right.’
‘But it’s Sunday night!’ she wailed.
‘Which is where emergency services come in.’ He cursed again. ‘Nothing doing with any of these buttons. There’s no phone in here either. I’m afraid we just wait. Don’t worry, my father’ll be on the case as we speak.’ Ewen settled her more comfortably in his arms. ‘I thought you weren’t afraid of storms,’ he teased.
‘I’m not,’ she said hoarsely. ‘Claustrophobia’s my problem. I loathe lifts even when they’re moving.’
Ewen’s arms tightened, and she clung to him convulsively. ‘At this moment I can’t say I loathe them myself,’ he said breathlessly. ‘Let’s think of some way to pass the time. No point in “I spy”, I’m afraid.’
Rosanna gave a hysterical little chuckle. ‘Talk to me, Ewen. Take my mind off it somehow. Please!’
‘This is the best way.’ He turned her face up to his, finding her mouth unerringly in the darkness. For a moment she resisted, but sheer visceral fear cancelled out normal caution, and she responded to him with fervour, passionately grateful for the security of Ewen’s embrace. But security quickly changed to danger. Rosanna gasped as Ewen’s tongue penetrated her mouth, twining with hers in a caress so intimate and inflaming her knees trembled and she melted against him as he held her so tightly their hearts thumped in a united drumbeat, urging the blood through her veins.
Ewen held her with one hand as he shrugged off his jacket, then pushed Rosanna against the wall of the lift, his body holding her there as he caressed her bare arms, and her throat, thrusting his hands through the heavy waves of her hair as he kissed her with such unrestrained passion, Rosanna forgot they were imprisoned in a lift, forgot everything in the surge of response which bathed her entire body in fire as she stood on tiptoe and wreathed her arms around Ewen’s taut neck. Breathing raggedly, he bent his head to kiss her throat, his hands reaching behind her to undo her zip and slide her dress off her shoulders.
Rosanna thrust herself against him shamelessly, and Ewen gave a deep-throated sound of mingled pain and pleasure as he kissed her with escalating hunger, his hands moving over her in the darkness, learning every curving contour with his fingertips. The tortured, unsteady rhythm of their breathing was loud in the enclosed space as Rosanna astonished herself by undoing Ewen’s shirt to press open-mouthed kisses against the taut muscles of his bare chest.
Ewen let out another groan and crushed her against him, then slid to the floor, cradling her in his lap. He caressed her with shaking hands, and she arched her back involuntarily as his lips found her bared breasts, his teeth grazing with exquisite skill at the tips. Streaks of sweet agony shot through her. Secret, inner muscles contracted as his fingers slid slowly up her parted thighs, and she gave a smothered moan, her entire body on fire with anticipation.
Then the lights came on and the lift began to move downwards.
With a muffled curse Ewen shot to his feet, hauling Rosanna with him. With shaking hands she fastened her bra, then snatched her dress into place, turning her back for him to close the zip. She thrust her feet into her discarded shoes, then stared in horror when Ewen stabbed a finger at a button and sent the lift up again as it reached the basement.
‘What are you doing?’ she demanded, rummaging frantically in her bag for a comb.
‘My parents are probably going mad up there,’ he panted as he thrust his shirt back under his belt.
‘You mean I’ve got to face them looking like this?’ She raked the comb through her hair, gasping for breath.
‘You look beautiful,’ he said hoarsely. ‘And I want you like hell.’
Rosanna gave him a glare of angry panic, then the doors opened and Mary Fraser rushed to hug her.
‘Oh, my dears, I’ve been going out of my mind!’
‘So has Rosanna,’ said Ewen, thrusting a hand through his hair. ‘Claustrophobia,’ he added succinctly.
‘You need drinks,’ said Alec Fraser. ‘I raised the alarm straight away, but it took longer than usual to get the power on.’
Mary Fraser kept her arm round Rosanna as they went back in the flat. ‘What can I give you, dear?’
‘Tea, please,’ said Rosanna breathlessly as Ewen stared at his watch. ‘How long were we in there?’
‘Twenty minutes.’ He gave her a smouldering look. ‘It seemed less than that.’
‘If Rosanna’s claustrophobic,’ said his mother tartly, ‘I imagine it felt like hours. I’ll get that tea.’
Rosanna escaped to a bathroom, and stared at her reflection in dismay. Her hair was reasonable, but her linen dress had suffered badly from its cavalier treatment, and her eyes burned in her pale face. And to anyone with half an eye it was obvious that she’d been kissed half to death. She applied lipstick with an unsteady hand, then squared her shoulders and went back to join the others. Ewen was on the balcony with his father, watching the storm die away, and Mary Fraser beckoned her to a sofa, and began pouring tea.
‘Come and sit down, dear. What a way to end the day!’
Rosanna sank down gratefully, smiling valiantly as Ewen and Alec came to join them. ‘I’m afraid I was in a terrible state, shut up in there. Ewen had to cuddle me to stop me from banging my head on the wall.’
Alec Fraser laughed, and handed his son a large brandy. ‘I bet he hated that!’
‘It’s a terrible thing, claustrophobia,’ said his wife with feeling. ‘Mother suffers from it. I just hope she wasn’t in a lift when the storm broke.’
‘We’d have known by now!’ said Alec dryly.
They all laughed and Rosanna drank her tea gratefully, suddenly so weary it was an effort to hold the teacup. Ewen accepted another brandy from his father, shaking his head at the look Rosanna gave him.
‘Don’t worry. I�
��ll take you home in a taxi. They’re in demand tonight in this weather, but I was promised one in half an hour.’
‘Ewen doesn’t like exposing his beloved car to the elements,’ said his mother, smiling.
‘For once I wasn’t concerned about the Morgan, Mother, dear,’ he said dryly. ‘After our little adventure down there in the lift shaft I really needed a brandy for once.’
‘Are you sure you wouldn’t like one too, Rosanna?’ said Alec Fraser, eyeing her. ‘You look very pale.’
She shook her head, smiling, and held out her cup. ‘More tea, but no brandy, thank you. Otherwise I won’t be fit for work tomorrow.’
‘I’m sure Ewen would give you the day off!’
‘I won’t need it,’ said Rosanna firmly.
There was a wry twist to Ewen’s lips as he handed her the refilled teacup. ‘Your usual run in the park on course as well?’
‘I may give that a miss for once,’ she conceded, beginning to yearn for her bed.
It was a relief when the intercom rang to announce a taxi for Fraser.
‘Are you sure about the lift?’ said Ewen after they’d said their goodnights for the second time. ‘We could go down the stairs.’
Rosanna pulled a face. ‘If I do I may never get in a lift again.’
Nevertheless it was a trial to find herself in an enclosed space again so soon, her tension worsened by Ewen’s impenetrable silence which, to her dismay, lasted all the way home in the taxi. When they arrived he asked the taxi driver to wait, and followed Rosanna inside.
She switched on lights and turned to face him in the hall. ‘See you in the morning.’
‘So you are coming, then?’
‘Of course I am. I meant what I said.’ She forced her eyes to meet his. ‘Nothing happened today to merit time off.’
‘Really? Thanks a lot. You certainly know how to cut a man down to size.’ Ewen’s eyes glittered in his taut face. ‘Goodnight, then, Rosanna. Thank you for coming with me today.’
‘My pleasure. Any time you want protection from your adoring female public, just say the word,’ she said tartly.
‘There was only one,’ he snapped. ‘Geraldine wasn’t interested when I was a cub reporter, so she married money. Now she’s divorced and I’m successful she’s after me again. Money talks.’
‘Geraldine wants your body, not your money,’ said Rosanna scornfully. ‘And she wasn’t the only one. There was more than one pair of female eyes lusting after you, Ewen Fraser. Some of them attached to respectable wedding rings at that! Which reminds me. Who, exactly, is Nicola Blake?’
Ewen looked uncomfortable. ‘She’s the one who said I was married to my computer. We lived together for a while, but, as I told you, it didn’t work out.’
‘It didn’t work out because she wanted to marry you, not just live with you.’ Rosanna eyed him with hostility, surprised to feel sympathy for Nicola Blake. ‘In fact, Geraldine was just a decoy, wasn’t she? It was Nicola you wanted protection from. She’s still in love with you.’
His jaw tightened, but he made no attempt to deny it. ‘I made it clear from the start that marriage was never an option. It was a mistake to let Nicola move in with me. I don’t deny that. But in common with the majority of my sex I like women. And they tend to reciprocate.’
‘And how! I saw that for myself today.’ Rosanna paused, then forced herself to say what had to be said. ‘Ewen, I’m sorry I made such a fuss afterwards. In the lift, I mean.’
‘I’m not sorry. For anything,’ he added, and seized her by the elbows suddenly. ‘I never thought I’d have cause to be grateful to a storm.’ He bent his head and kissed her hard, then released her so suddenly, Rosanna rocked on her heels as he strode from the house to the waiting taxi.
CHAPTER SEVEN
ROSANNA’S tension increased by the minute as she travelled to Chelsea next day. After picking her way over the damp cobbles to Ewen’s door she almost turned tail and went home again, but in the end rang the bell, bracing herself for confrontation in the cold light of a wet Monday morning.
Ewen took a long time to come to the door. When he finally appeared, barefoot, wearing only a pair of ancient jeans, she stared at him in horror, forgetting all her qualms.
‘Ewen, you look awful. Are you ill?’
‘No. Hangover.’ His eyes, narrowed to malevolent slits, glared from a haggard, ashen face.
She sidled past him warily. ‘Anything I can do?’
He shook his head, gasped in agony at the movement, and retreated upstairs to his bedroom without a word.
Rosanna sighed as she gazed after him, then went to fill the coffee machine. After a tactful interval she ran upstairs to knock on Ewen’s bedroom door, and at his faint noise of assent entered the room she’d never been inside before. The curtains were drawn, and through the gloom she could just make out the large bed where Ewen lay like an effigy on a tomb.
‘Shall I bring you some coffee?’ Rosanna enquired.
‘Not in the contract,’ he muttered.
She went back downstairs, filled a tall beaker with strong black coffee and took it back to Ewen’s room. ‘Drink that,’ she ordered, and put it on the table beside the bed.
Ewen sat up with infinite care, and Rosanna leaned over and stacked pillows behind him. ‘Thank you,’ he said, without opening his eyes.
‘Drink the coffee,’ she repeated.
‘After you’ve gone.’
Rosanna left and went downstairs to start work, but concentration was difficult with one ear open for sounds from upstairs. Soon afterwards she heard Ewen race for the bathroom. Coffee had obviously been a bad idea. She went into the kitchen and took a litre bottle of water from the fridge, found a glass, and went upstairs to find Ewen back in bed.
‘You look like death,’ she informed him.
One hostile eye opened a fraction. ‘Go away, Rosanna.’
‘All right. I brought you some water this time. Please drink some. You’re dehydrated.’
‘Quite possibly. Now go!’
Rosanna went, determined to ignore the sufferer, and get on with the work he was paying her for. After a while, as always, the force of his writing drew her in, and she was soon oblivious of anything other than the young platoon commander inching his way across no man’s land to bring back his wounded corporal. Rosanna became so absorbed she was only torn away by the daily lunch delivery. She took the sandwiches into the kitchen, eyeing them thoughtfully, but decided against taking any up to Ewen, in no mood to get her head bitten off again.
Rosanna made herself a mug of tea, then perched on a kitchen stool with her tuna salad sandwich, and began to read the newspaper she’d bought earlier.
‘Sorry I was so rude,’ said a voice from the door, and Rosanna turned to find Ewen, dressed and newly shaved, but still pale and haggard.
‘That’s all right,’ she said cheerfully. ‘How do you feel?’
‘That with care I might just possibly survive.’
‘Good.’ Rosanna eyed him warily. ‘Will you hit me if I offer food?’
He closed his eyes briefly. ‘Please. Don’t mention food.’
‘Tea, then.’
‘Tea sounds great.’
‘Right.’ Rosanna slid from the stool. ‘Go back to bed. I’ll bring the tea when it’s ready.’
‘I’m not noble enough to refuse,’ he muttered. ‘Thank you, Rosanna.’
Rosanna set a tray, added biscuits and a couple of painkillers, then took it upstairs to Ewen’s room. This time the curtains were drawn back a little, and Ewen sat propped up against the brass bedhead.
‘My angel of mercy,’ he said sardonically.
She shrugged. ‘I’ve treated hangovers before.’
‘Yours or the good doctor’s?’
‘My brother’s actually—in his wilder days.’
Ewen looked morose. ‘I suppose a doctor treats his own hangovers.’
‘Try to eat some biscuits and swallow a couple of pills with your tea,’ she sa
id briskly, and paused in the doorway. ‘What do you normally do for hangovers?’
‘Avoid them,’ he said bitterly. ‘But last night, just for once, I felt like another brandy or two when I got home. So there it is. Crime and punishment.’ His eyes speared hers. ‘You know why.’
It was late afternoon when Ewen came downstairs again. He stood behind Rosanna for a moment, following what she was reading on the screen, then asked very politely if he could return the compliment and make her some tea.
‘Thank you. That would be very nice,’ she muttered abstractedly, her eyes glued to the screen. After a while she realised Ewen was still standing behind her and turned round, her eyebrows raised.
‘I suppose I should be flattered you find my prose so absorbing.’ He stalked off to the kitchen, shutting the door behind him.
Rosanna scowled. There was no pleasing Ewen today. Unlike last night. She hugged her arms suddenly across her chest. Last night, in the lift, she had pleased him far too much. And pleasure didn’t begin to describe the feelings Ewen had aroused in return. All day she had worked hard to keep the thought of them at bay, but now the scene came flooding back, and suddenly she buried her face in her hands.
‘What’s the matter?’ demanded Ewen, putting a beaker down beside her.
Rosanna raised her head quickly, running a hand through her hair. ‘I’ve been concentrating too hard,’ she said thickly, blinking.
‘Then take a break. Take me to task while you drink your tea.’
She looked up at him. ‘For what, exactly?’
‘Continue with the lecture you gave me last night.’
‘It doesn’t seem important any more,’ she muttered, and gulped some tea.
‘You were annoyed because I didn’t say it was my grandmother’s birthday,’ he prompted, perching on a corner of the desk.
‘That was part of it. I would have liked to give her something more inspired than mere chocolates.’
‘Are you still angry?’
‘Not after meeting your grandmother. Who could be? And we’ve already cleared up the identity of the beautiful Nicola—who still carries a torch for you, by the way.’
The Temptation Trap Page 8