An Apple in Eden

by Kay Thorpe

  know I was in love with you how could you be so cruel?'

  `It's the way I am. I intended you to suffer a little in return for the number of times you threw this Gavin of yours in my face before I came and sorted matters out.'

  'Including Gavin?' she asked demurely, and he smiled.

  `If it had proved necessary, although I was sure you would have thought it a matter of honour to make your intentions plain at the earliest opportunity. What were his reactions?'

  'Gentlemanly. He said that if I felt I couldn't marry him then there was nothing he could do about it.'

  Ramon made a derisive sound deep in his throat. 'A man like that doesn't deserve any woman!' There was a pause while he studied her with an expression which made her pulses race afresh, then he said softly, 'Tomorrow, I must move out to my hotel. Three days alone with you here would be more than flesh and blood could stand.'

  'You mean,' she said at last in strangled tones, `that you had a room booked all the time?'

  'Of course. One doesn't come to London in August without a reservation. I phoned the hotel last night after I had put you to bed and told them I had been delayed.' He lifted a taunting brow. `Do you have any complaints?

  A spark of pure devilment lit her swiftly lowered eyes. 'Only one,' she said softly. 'I don't want to be

  left alone again tonight, Ramon. Please stay with me.'

  In the silence of the room his breathing seemed suddenly quicker. 'If you're sure that's what you want,' he said at last.

  'Yes, I'm sure.' Now she lifted her face to him. 'It will be the real proof of our love, won't it, to spend the night together without touching one another. I'm sure you'll find Lynn's bed very comfortable.'

  For one long moment he just sat there looking at her, then his mouth began to twitch. 'You,' he said, 'are a vixen, Eve. If I didn't love you to distraction I would draw those sharp little teeth of yours once and for all! Lynn's bed can remain empty. I'll stay on my couch and leave the door open between us.' He pressed her down into the pillows, tucked the sheet up under her chin and got to his feet. At the door he turned. 'And if you scream again I shall ignore you,' he said. 'So make sure you only dream pleasant dreams.'

  'I will,' she said softly.

  It didn't seem possible that she would sleep at all with so much going on in her mind, but she opened her eyes to find sunlight pouring into the room and the smell of coffee filtering through the partially opened door. Memory returned in a flood of warmth and palpitating emotion. She was going to marry Ramon, return with him to Tenerife. Oh, not as soon as he said, of course. He would have to realise that there were all sorts of arrangements to make first. Her job, for instance—although Mr Alison would have to make do with a week's notice instead

  of the usual month.

  Ramon was bringing through a tray from the kitchen when Eve went into the sitting room. He was fully dressed in a cotton shirt and pale slacks, and his hair was damp and curling slightly at the ends. He ran an eye over her long yellow housecoat and smiled. 'You look like a daffodil, but twice as lovely.' He put down the tray and held out his arms to her. 'Come over here.'

  She went to him without hesitation, lifting her mouth to meet his halfway. He held her tightly for a long moment after the kiss, his face against her hair, then he put her away from him, said briskly, 'Come and have your coffee before it goes cold. Later you can cook me an English breakfast. It will do me no harm to indulge your habits in the short time we'll be here.'

  'I want to talk to you about that,' said Eve, taking a seat beside him on the settee and pouring the coffee. 'I'm going to have to give at least a week's notice at the bank, you know. It should be a month, but I think Mr Alison will understand when I tell him the reason. Men can be as romantic as women over things like this.'

  There was a lengthy pause before Ramon said evenly, 'Today we make the arrangements for our marriage. In three days at the most from now we will be on our honeymoon. You'll tell the manager of your bank that you are leaving his employ at once, and spend those few days showing me those parts of London which I haven't yet seen.'

  Eve twisted her head to look at him, saw the firm

  set of his mouth and felt her own straighten correspondingly. 'I'm sorry,' she said, 'I just can't do that. It wouldn't be fair or right. I have to give Mr Alison time to find another secretary. It will only be a week, Ramon. Surely that isn't too much to ask.'

  'It's more than I'm prepared to wait.' He put down his cup and met her gaze unwaveringly. 'I intend to have my way in this, Eve. I'll speak to your employer myself this morning if necessary.'

  'You won't.' Her cup went down with a bang. 'This is my affair '

  Ramon said quietly, 'You still don't know me very well, do you?'

  'No.' Her chest felt tight. 'And at the moment I'm not at all sure that I want to. You don't want a wife, you want a ... a subject. An obedient little slave! Well, I'm not going to be it. I'm an individual, not a robot to be programmed to your habits!'

  He was sitting back in his seat studying her with an enigmatic expression. 'Is that how you see your sister?'

  'No,' she admitted after a moment. 'But that's because Juan doesn't try to enforce his will against hers all the time.'

  'Not in the small things, perhaps. Like the majority of men he enjoys indulging the woman he loves. But when it comes to something which is important to him then it's a different matter—as it is to us all. I'm asking-you to put me first, Eve, before every other consideration. Is that so much?'

  'You're not asking me,' she said. 'You're telling me.'

  He sighed. 'So I'm telling you. If you'd preferred a man who was willing to beg for your favours you would have chosen your Gavin.'

  'It still isn't too late,' she flashed. 'I'm not married to you yet—thank goodness! ' She was trembling with anger and the knowledge of what was happening between them, yet felt powerless to stop it. 'If it comes down to a choice I'd rather be quietly happy with Gavin than spend the rest of my life being ... bullied by you! '

  His smile was slow. 'Even if your choice of words fitted you'd still be a liar. You want marriage with me, but you want me to make it easy for you—or you tell yourself that you do. If I gave in to you now you would persuade yourself that you were glad, yet deep down inside you would be the disappointment of knowing that I was not after all the man you'd thought I was—the man you fell in love with. And you don't have that choice because you have already accepted me.'

  She gazed at him, uncertain of his mood, not at all sure of her own. 'You can't force me into marriage.'

  'I can.' He hadn't moved, but there was something in his very stillness which made her heart beat faster. 'Didn't I once tell you that I always get what I want one way or another? I know you very well, Eve, and I love everything about you—including your stubbornness, your spirit and your values. For your sake I was willing to wait to know you wholly and completely, but if there is any doubt at all in your mind that you are going to marry me then I'll

  make sure of you here and now. Believe me, I'd find it far easier not to wait.'

  It was no use telling herself that he wouldn't. He would, and she knew it. Eve felt the wonder stirring inside her. To be loved and wanted so much that a man was prepared to go to any lengths to have her—that was every woman's secret dream. Suddenly the conditions she was trying to impose upon her own emotions seemed petty and unimportant.

  'Ramon ...' she began, then paused and smiled. 'We'd better get a move on if we're going to get to the office at all.'

  Minutes later, with her head against his chest she said softly, 'Do you think we'll often fight?'

  He laughed. 'Of course. You are what you are and I am what I am, and no one changes completely. But you'll learn to handle me, just as Abuela learnt to handle her husband, and then I'll be lost.'

  'Down but not defeated,' she murmured. 'You make it sound like a game.'

  'It is,' he said. 'The greatest gamble of all.' His arms tightened about her again. 'But I was born
to win.'

  And so, apparently, thought Eve, was she.