Mistaken Mistress

by Margaret Way

  Surprised by his tone, which bordered on curt, she backed off. “Well I’m awfully sorry if I’ve offended you.” She lightened her pressure on his arm. “I was speaking facetiously. Personally I think she’s absolutely lovely. I’m sure we’ll be good friends. I want Delma to bring her over to visit us.”

  “That’ll be nice.” Lang swallowed down the white lie, regretting the sharpness of his tone, but he was sick of the bitchiness.

  “I can’t say I blame Delma for being a little worried about the state of the marriage though,” Lara continued, unaware.

  “What is that supposed to mean?” Again Lang showed his impatience.

  “Why don’t we go out onto the terrace?” Lara urged, already beginning to move. “It’s a gorgeous night. Delma and I are friends. It’s only natural she confides in me.”

  “So is it acceptable for you to pass on her confidences to me?” Lang asked, nodding at several of the guests.

  “Don’t be like that, Lang,” Lara pleaded, moving onto the softly lit terrace. “Delma adores Owen, you know that. I know it’s odd but Delma has never felt really secure. Now I suppose she had—reasons?”

  “I take it you mean Eden?”

  “You’re as observant as they come, Lang.” Lara gave a faintly bitter laugh. “Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed how much Owen dotes on his daughter? He behaves as though she’s the centre of his life. Not Delma or Robbie. I suppose Owen is acting out of a sense of guilt.”

  Lang was angry and didn’t care who knew it. “Lara, I don’t want to have this conversation.”

  She stared up at him in the golden glow. “I understand, but you can see I don’t want my friend hurt in any way. Delma tells me Eden is very friendly when Owen is around but it’s a different story when they’re on their own. All the warmth evaporates it seems.”

  Lang kept his voice deliberately low. “Now that I don’t believe. Delma is misrepresenting the situation for her own ends.”

  “Please, Lang, it’s not as though she’s complaining, but she does need a sympathetic ear. Somehow Delma’s got it into her head that Eden is trying to penetrate the family in such a way Delma’s own position will be usurped.”

  Lang walked a little way down the terrace, the exterior lights flickering through the tall golden canes that stood in pairs flanking the French doors. He was trying hard to control his anger, caught unawares by Lara’s sudden onslaught. He could hear her high heels tapping on the terracotta tiles as she ran after him.

  Let her.

  The night was tropical and the sky full of a billion stars. The scents of the garden in this area were richly fragrant, with a top note of gardenia. Gardenia, the delicate fragrance so like Eden’s skin. But it was Lara not Eden who put a staying hand on his arm, her voice filled with pleading and a touch of pure fright as if she realised she had set their long-standing friendship back.

  “Surely we can talk?” she protested, feeling jealous and singularly unloved. “We’ve known one another forever. Why are you so angry? What is this girl to you?” Lara’s full shapely bust, accentuated by her sequined strapless gown, rose steeply. “I hope she hasn’t gotten to you, as well?”

  God how that jarred! “Just a moment, Lara.” He found himself pressing his lips together. “This is a party. It’s been given in Eden’s honour. And here you are, after telling me you hoped you and Eden would be good friends, warning me her middle name is opportunist. Isn’t that what you’re saying?”

  How clearly he put it. Lara sighed painfully. “You’re merciless when you get started, Lang. Sometimes I wonder why I care about you so much. I thought you owed me some loyalty. Delma, too. She isn’t lying. She’s said there’s much to like and admire about Eden, but she’s genuinely worried about what is happening in her life. It’s not a crime for Delma to share her worries with me. And me to share mine with you. We’re all close friends.”

  “You’re not doing a bad job of it, are you?”

  Even in the semi darkness she couldn’t miss his caustic expression or the angry flash of his eyes.

  “I’m not trying to belittle Eden,” she pointed out, absorbing the very unpleasant fact that Eden had made quite an impact. “That would be a bad thing. There are causes for everything. Eden must have felt deprived. Now that she’s found her father she wants to become a very important person in his life.” Perhaps the most important person in his life? she left unsaid.

  “She already is,” Lang informed her.

  “Do you have a different slant on this?” she appealed to him, lifting her honey-blonde head. “I assure you I want to listen to everything you say. I have great faith in your judgment, Lang.”

  “Then you’ll report back to Delma,” he questioned cynically. “I think I need to keep this to myself, Lara.”

  “Now you’re angry with me,” she said tremulously, dipping her head. “Change can be terrible, Lang. Please reflect on that. It’s not all that hard to understand both Delma’s and Eden’s responses. It was everything to do with Owen and the battle to share his love.”

  “Let’s leave it there, shall we?” Lang put his hand to her shoulder, his voice as gentle as he could make it. “There’s always a huge problem with money. But Owen is a very generous and fair man and he’s in his prime, with many more years left. Surely Delma’s concerns are a bit premature? Let’s go back into the house.”

  “Then you can dance with me,” Lara said throatily.

  Inside the spacious solarium, which had been cleared for dancing, Eden was encased in the arms of a big, burly, rather sweet young man called Gavin Lockhart when Lang and his friend Lara Hansen made it onto the dance floor. She could see the excitement on Lara’s face, the look of adoration in her clear blue eyes. Eden found to her astonishment she had to look away. Jealousy snaked through her, startling her. It was a new, unwelcome experience and it complicated life. Lang looked marvellous tonight, silver eyes blazing against his tan, very elegant in formal dress, his dinner jacket, like a good many of the other male guests, white, which looked so good in the tropics.

  “I think I’ve had enough for the moment, thank you, Gavin,” Eden said gently, having endured jarred toes caused by Gavin’s joyous abandonment to the dance.

  Gavin’s good-natured face fell. “Already?”

  “I’ve been dancing for ages.” She smiled. “I would like a glass of champagne though.”

  “Of course,” Gavin beamed at her. “I’ll get it. Don’t go away.”

  “I won’t be far.”

  In fact she made her way out onto the terrace, resisting several more offers to dance on the way. It was blessedly cool in the night air. She drew in a quiet breath, hoping a young man she had danced with previously, now speaking to a very attractive girl over by the playing fountain, would not come down to her. Her head ached just a little. She had been watching what she drank, not risking the chance of becoming intoxicated although the champagne flowed. This would be her third glass of champagne. It was almost time for supper, which she knew would be sumptuous. Delma had done everything in her considerable power to make this night a great success. She had even taken Eden to a favourite boutique where she’d bought her dress, struck by the quality and range, blushing a little when Delma told her there was plenty of money in the North and plenty of women with the where-withal to indulge expensive tastes.

  The night sky looked wonderful, the Milky Way a curving river of diamonds. Eden broke off a scented gardenia, pressed the velvety petals to her lips. She was full of ever-unfolding emotions that perpetually kept her off balance. She had barely seen enough of Lang in the crush. It was hard to accept he’d had a full life of his own that excluded her, but clearly included other women. Why not? With that male sensuality. His friend, Lara, in her sexy gold-sequined satin dress couldn’t hide her feelings for him.

  She heard footsteps along the tiled walkway. They were coming towards her purposefully. It was probably Gavin, with her glass of champagne. She turned quickly, her smile fading.

  “O
h, I thought it was Gavin,” she said, excitement rippling.

  His smile was sardonic. “I think Gavin can spare you for twenty minutes or so. But here’s your glass of champagne.”

  “Which means you took it off him.”

  “How else could I get to see you?” he mocked. “You’re a great success this evening.”

  “I can’t remember all the names. But all very nice people.”

  “So here you are with me.”

  However he shaped the words they filled her with a desire that had the potential to destroy her. Excitement surrounded them like a heat haze surrounds fire. She sought escape by sipping at her wine, feeling its delicious cold tingle in her mouth. “I met your friend, Lara.”

  “You make that sound like Lara and I are an item. We’re not.”

  Tell her that. “She’s very attractive. I’m surprised you couldn’t remember the colour of her eyes. They’re a bright clear blue. But that wasn’t true, was it?”

  “No.” He gave a brief laugh. “I was attempting to head Delma off. It’s fairly obvious Delma would have liked us to become seriously involved.”

  “And you’re not?” She set the champagne flute down gently on top of the balustrade. She was intoxicated enough.

  “I have to say I’ve been toying with romance up to date, Eden,” he admitted, keeping his tone light and amused. “But then I have an excuse. I’ve been much too busy to make a big decision.”

  “You’ll have to soon,” she dared to taunt him.

  “Really? Any suggestions?” He looked down at her, driven by a desire that rolled in like a pounding surf.

  “Like the good girl I am, I’ll keep out of it.” She glanced away across the floodlit gardens, lapped in fragrance.

  “Which is a shame really. I could let myself fall in love with you, only it would constitute too much of a crisis. As it is, I’m surprised I haven’t simply picked you up and carried you away.”

  Colours seem to burst in front of her eyes. Though there was self-mockery in his tone it was apparent some powerful emotion was lashing at him. She, too, felt the sting.

  “To where?” she whispered, wanting nothing more.

  “Oh, far into the enchanted night,” he said.

  She had dreamed of this.

  A night bird dipped so low with a sheen of wings her lips parted in a startled cry. Lang lifted a long arm to frighten it away.

  “You’re nervous.” He could see she was trembling.

  “So you’ve noticed? I think you like it this way, with me, off balance.”

  There was a long silence broken by the crackle of flame.

  “I remember the last time I kissed you,” he said.

  “The only time.” He had made the soul float out of her body.

  “Extraordinary.” He leaned back against the balustrade. “I feel I’ve known you all your life. That, I don’t understand. Now what are you doing with that flower?” he asked in mock exasperation, allowing his hand to take it from her, bewitched by its fragrance.

  His height and the width of his shoulders seemed to blot out the sky.

  “I suppose we should go in.” This was pleasure but also fraught with dangerous high tension.

  “It seems a bit like that,” he said, feeling a hunger that devoured because it could not be satisfied.

  They had scarcely begun to move when they heard Delma’s voice. She sounded slightly rattled, as though something wasn’t going to plan. “I know they came out here.”

  Eden very nearly moaned while Lang gave a muffled, “Hell!” His white teeth clicking in irritation. “Now we have the girls in hot pursuit.”

  “Delma and your friend, Lara,” she whispered, having caught the gleam of Lara’s satin gown further down the terrace.

  “That’s what they think.” In a swift, deft motion Lang locked a purposeful arm around her, pressing them both to the wall, their bodies screened by the large handsome fronds of the golden cane.

  Eden found herself pinned to the point of rapture! His hands rested on her hips as he pulled her even closer, fingers flexing over taut flesh and bone.

  Eden stood motionless, trembling. Sexual excitement she couldn’t stop was pouring into her. Her blood scintillated, her heart beat madly. She never knew it was possible to feel like this. She couldn’t even trust herself with this man.

  Another world away, Delma and Lara continued their low discussion about where Lang and Eden might have gone.

  Surely they could see her she was so alight? She felt like a creature of air and fire. Lang’s creature. Eden knew she made a small, incoherent sound, seduced the instant he put his hands on her. Not fighting him but wanting him.

  Full of his own jagged need, Lang sought her breast, laid claim to it, his hand shaping the high tender curves, moving back and forth, feeling through his fingers her fluttering heart. Delma’s low-pitched voice was still audible, but he was too far gone to care. This woman was everything he had ever wanted. It was as simple as that.

  His touch was scorching, burning them both. So scorching Eden thought her skin might actually emit a sizzling sound. She could feel the hard thrust of his arousal, and her body moved in spontaneous response, so he half lifted her from the ground to draw her even closer.

  God, where was this going? Was that her ragged sigh, breaking…breaking…

  Hush!

  It was to die. Or swoon away with ecstasy. His fingers were teasing her molten nipple, his other hand smoothing her body with a marvellous pressure, hot, sweet and fierce. She had to arch back against him, biting her lower lip in a futile effort to restrain herself.

  “To have you like this always,” he whispered.

  The captive moth now an exquisite butterfly.

  While they were lost in the purple shadow of seduction a distance from them Delma burst out in frustration, “They must be in the library. They can’t have got lost!”

  Lang grunted deep in his throat. He pushed Eden’s hair aside, kissed the nape of her neck. He held tight to her swaying body letting his senses run riot. Such skin. Such silk. He wanted his mouth over hers, passionately, but at some point they had to go back inside with all eyes on them.

  Suddenly there was silence at the other end of the terrace. The music wove in and out. “I think they’ve gone,” he murmured, thinking he couldn’t possibly prolong this exquisite torture before he bore her away.

  “They’re really starting to hate me,” Eden lamented, understanding that was so.

  “Nonsense. Everyone loves you.” Now he had to act. Last chance. He turned her to him, forcing back the violence of his feelings, the uproar in his body. “Delma will get a hold on her jealousy. Give her time.”

  “Not to mention…Lara,” Eden murmured shakily.

  Lang continued to hold her, delighting in the closeness of her body. “Lara is just plain envious.” He turned his head to look the far length of the walkway. “We can slip in through Owen’s study,” he suggested. “It’s open. You can rest a minute.”

  She would have to. She felt feverish, nerves humming like live electricity wires. Distractedly she smoothed her lace dress over her hips. “I can’t believe the things you do.” He had peeled her like a peach.

  “When I’m being so very, very careful with you?” he mocked, lifting her hand to his mouth. “That tide of yearning wasn’t all mine, Eden.” The rush of radiance.

  “I know,” she confessed. “But I didn’t want…I didn’t mean…”

  “Liar,” he said gently.

  It was difficult to get through the rest of the night after that. Owen gave a speech over the lavish supper. It was an emotional speech that brought the sting of tears to quite a few eyes. None of these people had had the faintest idea Owen had a daughter until very recently, and now they could see what had been the cause of the deep sadness they had only sensed. Owen was to be congratulated. The near unanimous verdict was that Eden was simply beautiful and a great pleasure to meet. The same number of guests hoped she would remain in the community
and not go back to Brisbane. Surely Owen, clearly doting on his newfound daughter would never allow it?

  Though Delma’s dark eyes smiled and Lara maintained her warm friendliness, Eden knew neither woman was sincere. If they could arrange it, both would have her disappear in a puff of smoke. She had upset their world.

  It was two o’clock in the morning before all the guests had departed. All except Lang who generally stayed over on these occasions. He had long since had his own guest room, which made it all so easy.

  “It was a lovely party, Delma. Thank you so much,” Eden told the older woman gratefully. They were all about to retire. Owen in the greatest spirits, standing in the living room, his arm around his daughter’s narrow waist.

  “Thank you, too, Dad.” Eden reached up to kiss his cheek, touching his other cheek tenderly with her hand. “It was absolutely wonderful. And thank you again for my beautiful earrings.”

  “The start of a collection,” Owen promised her, studying them with delight. “They look beautiful on you, as does Lang’s wonderful necklace. Oh, God, sweetheart, this is really happening, isn’t it?” he asked, not bothering to hide his emotion, and it was as though a dam had collapsed. “It’s not some heart-breaking dream, is it? I used to have them, you know.”

  “It’s real, Owen,” Lang said, touching his friend’s shoulder.

  “I’m afraid at the same time,” Owen admitted slowly.

  “Why, Dad?” Eden stared up at him sudden anxiety in her eyes.

  “I worry that you’ll go away.” Owen brushed the long beautiful hair from his daughter’s cheek. “I love you.”

  “Don’t get over-emotional, Owen,” Delma warned, as if her husband had some heart condition. “You’re embarrassing Eden, too.”

  “No, no, he’s not. I’ll always be there for you, Dad.”

  “Not there, darling,” Owen shook his head. “Here. This holiday will soon be over. I don’t want a temporary daughter.”

  Delma intervened quickly. “Owen, dear, Eden must be exhausted,” she said, giving Eden a sympathetic smile. “She was the centre of attention all night.”