The touch of his mouth became an undeniable possession which had her arching herself almost shamelessly against him as his lips continued their relentless perusal. She knew he wanted her for, by this time, she was well aware of the strength of his desire, but tonight there was something else about him she couldn't fathom.
When at last he eased his grip a little, she whispered brokenly, 'I don't know what you're trying to punish me for now. Surely you can't keep remembering I pretended to be Alexandra?'
'I've forgotten that long ago,' he said thickly, 'but I still mean to have you.'
As his hands threaded cruelly through her tangled hair to bring her face to the exact angle he wanted it, Sandra stared up at him with shadowed eyes. Naked, unguarded eyes. 'I don't know how you can talk, act this way when you seem to love both Alexandra and Sophy.'
'Perhaps I never loved either,' his voice was full of selfmockery. 'Maybe I was just trying to make you jealous, to appease my ego by making you crawl.'
'Have you forgotten,' her face tautened, 'how you were actually engaged to Alex before you even met me?'
He laughed, letting his hand slide over her hot cheek, his eyes closely scanning her slightly gamine features, resting significantly on her passionate mouth. Pausing enigmatically, he said, 'I wonder if I should tell you, explain just how much I loved Alexandra?'
'You don't have to!' Resentment flared that he should expect her to endure such torture. Even though he didn't know how much she cared for him, she was his wife. 'Did you,' she accused, distraught, 'think of telling Alexandra we're married?'
'I believe I mentioned it,' he admitted coolly.
Her breath caught. Alex would hate her now. What did she say?' she faltered.
'Oh, quite a lot,' he laughed sarcastically. It was very obvious she considers you overreached yourself. Apparently marriage was not on the agreement when you agreed to stand in for her. She didn't appear to like it at all when I told her how very married we are.'
'Do you have to seek revenge all round? After all, Alexandra never did you any real harm— unless,' Sandra hesitated, her green eyes bright with unshed tears, 'you consider she did in foisting me on you?'
'I did initially,' he agreed cynically, as Sandra stared at him, wide-eyed and pale-cheeked. 'That was until I realised the fun I could be having at your expense — still intend having before I let you go and, believe me, it won't be as gentle as it has been before. When people hurt me I know how to hurt back!'
For an instant he sat glowering down at her with eyes that were darkly furious as he shook her slight shoulders before his mouth found hers in a wholly punishing kiss.
She fought him, as much as she fought the flame of scorching fire which went through her. No matter how savage, how cruel he was, something inside her responded fiercely. When she could no longer seem to bear it her hands clawed at his shoulders. Against his hard lips she gasped, 'If you don't let me go you'll be sorry!'
She had not expected to make any impression, and her small, desperate cry faded in surprise as suddenly she was free. Stein's arms dropped from her as his mouth tightened in disgust.
'I think I'd better make that coffee, after all.' His hand brushed over his brow and down the back of his head, an unconscious gesture which Sandra had noticed previously. 'What the devil does a few days in hospital do to a man!' he grunted darkly. 'Or maybe I should have stayed longer.'
Following him through to the kitchenette, Sandra saw he was white beneath his tan, but he plugged in the percolator and watched it grimly. She felt her own face pale anxiously as she read the signs of strain. Stein's was normally a strength above average and even to feel a little weak disgusted him. He would hate to think he was in any way vulnerable. Of course he should still have been in hospital.
'Hadn't you better sit down?' Alarm shook her voice and, while she might have looked on this interlude as a kind of reprieve, her love for him was such that she could only consider his pain. 'Stein, you look shaken ... '
'Maybe,' he retorted curtly, 'it has more to do with you than my actual health.'
This hadn't occurred to her, but somehow she couldn't believe it. Bewildered she shook her head, 'But you've just had a bad operation!'
'Oh, that,' he shrugged indifferently. 'The condition of my eyes wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been. I guess I was one of the lucky ones, so you can save your soft little glances for someone else. My eyes just need a little time. You weren't to know, of course.'
Abruptly he pulled out a chair, slumping down on it against the table. 'See how the mighty are fallen,' he quipped. 'You should enjoy it! Maybe,' he growled, as she went swiftly to the lounge and returned with some brandy, 'Maybe I've been trying to do too much too soon, but you make me see red every time I look at you.'
He swallowed the brandy in one gulp, then grasped her wrist so suddenly that she half stumbled, catching her elbow on the side of the table as he pulled her down to him. He didn't apologise, not even on hearing her small cry of pain. He looked impervious if anything. 'I thought
you were beginning to love me,' he jeered. 'I thought I could feel it in my bones, the way you responded to me each time I made love to you. You held nothing back, did you?' Rage tightened his mouth to a thin line and the paleness of his face was suffused by a dull red. 'I can still feel how you used to be in my arms, how you could make me want you until I feared I might kill you. But as soon as I was gone you forgot about me. Your ghost haunted my hospital bed while you stayed on Corfu, enjoying yourself.' 'Stein ...' Her eyes heavy with misery, Sandra felt herself shaken by a strange shuddering as she stared into his contemptuous face, sensing the anger which, like a living thing, was tearing through him. Suddenly she knew what she must do. There was a deadlock to break and she must be the one to make the first move. Stein was proud and so, she had discovered, was she, but where was pride going to get either of them? Wasn't it foolish to withhold the truth in the futile hope that he would suddenly realise something traumatic must have kept her from coming to him? She had never told him of her love, circumstances having been stacked against such a confession, and he obviously had not guessed.
She could see now that, because he was so used to being absolutely in control of every situation, he had needed the assurance of her flying immediately to his side. What he had hoped to gain from this she couldn't think. Or was it that she didn't dare hope?
'Stein,' again her voice faltered, but this time she forced herself to go on, 'do you really want to know why I didn't follow you over here straight away?'
He went quite still, the only visible movement the tensing of a muscle in his hard jaw. 'I don't want to hear any more fictitious stories,' he warned coldly.
'I had an accident,' she confessed starkly, trying to ignore his rough words. 'On our way to the airport on Corfu, Thimios met another car and we crashed. I was in hospital over a week with concussion—until they checked everything was all right, you know. After I got out I came here as soon as I was able. At least,' she hesitated, knowing this wasn't exactly the whole truth, 'I might have come a day or two sooner, but I seemed to have lost what little confidence I had. I wasn't sure, you see, that you'd welcome me. In that note you left you were quite adamant about not wanting me. It was your grandmother who actually persuaded me to come.'
If Stein had listened to this in grim silence, he came alive as her voice broke unhappily. He went pale again, his fingers tightening dangerously about her wrist. 'Why didn't you tell me?' he rasped furiously. 'Why the hell didn't someone else tell me if you couldn't? You mean to say you were actually injured and in hospital and no one thought to let me know?'
Sandra could only see his anger, not the hard tension behind it. She could have complained a lot about his grandmother, but there seemed little sense in doing so now. Now that the old lady seemed kinder perhaps eventually they could be friends. 'We didn't want you worried,' she said quickly. 'It was important that this shouldn't happen and your grandmother insisted there could be disastrous results. Th
e funny thing was,' her voice faltered miserably, 'I could have told her you wouldn't have been so worried, because you didn't love me. At least, not as I love you.'
'Sandra!' he began angrily. Then, as if just realising what she had said, he exclaimed hoarsely, 'Would you please repeat that?
That last bit?'
Feeling numb, she complied listlessly. She hadn't meant to let it slip out, but now it didn't seem to matter. 'I love you.'
'How long?' he asked unsteadily, never taking his eyes from her desolate face.
'Before I married you,' she whispered, through stiff lips.
'If I hadn't loved you I don't think I could have gone through with it.' 'But you kept it to yourself all this time,' he accused her harshly. '
'You little .. '
'Don't say it!' Suddenly she was sobbing wildly, tears streaming down her cheeks. 'I don't love you anymore. I think I hate you!
What do you want me to do? You've had - me grovelling, in about every way you could think of, yet you still aren't satisfied!' 'Oh, darling!' His expression changed, but his eyes were still dark with angry passion as he drew her closer, kissing her wet eyes, her softly childish mouth. 'I'm sorry! But when I think of the time we've wasted! On Kalnos I tried to resist you but couldn't. I know I had no real excuse for making love to you
that night you believed the lights had failed, but things got beyond my control. You don't have any idea of the agony I suffered at the clinic. Not because of my op, but because I imagined you didn't want to come to me. To know now that you care, even half as much as I love you, is scarcely believable.' 'Stein!' As he paused thickly she had only time to utter his name before he kissed her gently. Then, as he lifted her and carried her into his bedroom, their lips came together violently as he crushed her against him. He laid her on the wide bed and between disjointed words his mouth found hers blindly, as if he never wanted to be free of it. This time she was a willing captive and, as he made urgent love to her, she was content to be borne along on a wave of earth-shattering sensation. She could only cling to him as he undressed her, then everything around her seemed to dissolve beneath the weight of his passionate desire. When their emotions combined to reach a devastating climax she felt she was at the heart of a whirlwind, lost, helpless and entirely possessed.
Later, as they lay together, he rested his head against her warm breast and said soberly, 'I love you, my darling— don't ever think you'll be free of me now. I didn't guess you loved me and I wanted you to suffer a little — as I was doing. That's why I wrote that note, why I kept on about a divorce — I fancied it got under your skin. But, most of all, I hoped you'd follow me over here almost at once. That, I decided, would prove you cared more than you realised. Imagine my thoughts when you didn't turn up! My pride as well as my heart suffered a severe blow. That was why I wouldn't speak to you on the telephone, why I didn’t seem particularly pleased to see you when you did arrive. I didn't count on holding out long, though—not when I realised my heart was suffering most of all. In fact I was desperately fighting a losing battle when you told me you loved me.'
Entirely content, she snuggled deeper into his arms as he held her and caressed her. 'You don't still want to get rid of me?'
'No, I' His hand tightened painfully on her waist in mock threat. 'Just try getting away from me! Don't you think,' he growled, nuzzling her cheek, 'I need a wife to help me through my convalescence?' What about all your other loving women?' she teased, then found herself sighing. 'You were going to tell me about Alexandra once. You must have loved her?'
He lifted his head, half frowning before suddenly smiling at her. 'Ah, yes, the story of your cousin. Obviously she never told you how we became engaged?'
'She did say you rescued her from an unwanted admirer.' 'And foolishly, my dear, offered her the temporary protection of an engagement ring. Strictly a business arrangement, mind you. This was when this chap continued to torment her. I felt sorry for her, and we seemed to be having enough problems with the film without inviting more. The snag came when she refused to keep her side of the bargain, to break the engagement off. Which seemed crazy as we were not even slightly in love with each other. I couldn't recall ever kissing her. She babbled a lot about the humiliation she would suffer if I was to leave her. Quite frankly I thought she'd taken leave of her senses and gave her a few days to think it over.
'This was when the accident happened in which I was blinded. I went back, but she still refused to release me and I lost my temper. I flung out after a furious row and didn't see another car shoot out of a side-road. The other man was drunk and in the wrong, but I was the one who got hurt.' Staring up at him, Sandra drew a shocked breath, horrified yet not too surprised at Alexandra's incredible behaviour. Her cousin had always been highly strung and unpredictable. I'm sorry, Stein,' she said helplessly. 'What did Alexandra do then?'
He shrugged wryly. 'Oh, she came around, drooling tears and making the most of the publicity, and for a while I was too ill to care. When I did recover I pretended, to my shame, that my blindness was more permanent than my doctors had given me to believe. Only that didn't help to get rid of her either. I didn't guess that, around this time, she met Arnold, but instead of telling me, she began suffering from an outsize conscience where I was concerned. That was why, she's since confessed, she agreed to learn typing and to come with me to Corfu, but when Arnold objected I think she got in a terrible panic and flew for you.' 'I really believe she must love Arnold very much,' Sandra sighed. Wrapped closely in Stein's arms she felt she could afford to be generous.
Stein grinned dryly. 'More likely his bank balance was the big attraction, especially compared to that of a disabled writer. However, as she sent me you, I'm prepared to forgive her.'
Uneasily Sandra stirred. 'I must have seemed slightly ridiculous, trying to step into her shoes.'
'Yes, my dear, you did! And I admit to being furious with your family all over again. I was even more furious when you succeeded in entwining yourself around my heart.
Every day I seemed to be falling more in love with you.'
'Do you regret it?' Sandra dared ask.
He smiled slightly as he shook his dark head, 'No. I haven't since I first kissed you, right here in this flat. It was then that I knew you weren't Alexandra, but that I couldn't let you go. Which proved ironical, my darling, when I'd been searching for weeks for a means of getting rid of Alexandra. It was an unbelievable experience, falling in love with a girl I'd never seen. But you're lovely, my small Sandra, more beautiful than I ever imagined you would be. When my intuition told me who you were, this afternoon, I could scarcely believe it.'
'Flatterer!' Sandra teased, yet couldn't hide her pleasure that she pleased him. 'So you'll forgive me too?'
'Yes, but you must send back the money Alexandra gave
you.'
'But I never had it,' Sandra said blankly. 'I believe I was to see Arnold's solicitors, but I never even picked up the address. It was only because of the utterly callous way Alexandra seemed to be treating you that I agreed to do as she asked — and,' she hesitated, adding unhappily, trying to be completely honest, 'and because Gran had just died and I was broke as well as untrained.'
'Sandra!' He brushed his lips tenderly over hers. 'I don't want you to upset yourself about it now. It's all over. Alexandra did confess a lot last week, after I told her how much I loved you. If it will make you any happier you can tell me the little bits she undoubtedly left out, later. Right now I don't want to talk any more about other women.'
'Not even Sophy?'
'Not even Sophy,' he mocked, his dark eyes meeting Sandra's pleading ones sternly. 'But, rather than have you worried, I might just mention that she stayed here, rather than go to a hotel, while I was in the clinic. She was actually packed, ready to leave, when you arrived. She had no intention of remaining here with me, in spite of her rather devious remarks. She's much too fond of her immaculate reputation.'
'Oh, darling!' Sandra breathed, and it was a
while before he would allow her to speak again.
Eventually he murmured against her hot cheek, 'I'm no millionaire, darling. Much as I love you, you might have to be prepared to live more or less permanently on Kalnos, and I wasn't altogether kind to you there. Unfortunately my occupation tends to be rather precarious, but we'll always have the island.'
'I'll be happy with you anywhere,' she promised, 'as long as you're content.'
'If I have you and Kalnos and the precious gift of my sight to see you both, what more could a man want? If that will be enough for you?'
'You'd be enough without anything else,' she assured him softly, winding her arms around him, holding him closer. Her lips curved as his touched them. 'I think I would be willing to do anything if you just keep on loving me.' 'That's something I'll never tire of doing,' he threatened, and for a long time everything but their own need of each other was forgotten.
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'Well, you won't have to do even that while you ar
‘Yes, kyrie.'
Gasping with dismay, she tried to pull away from h
The Devil's Bride Page 18