by Natalie Fox
A smile slicked across his face, slowly and dangerously.
‘Dear, sweet Gemma. Did you think I would let you slip out of my life so easily again? I haven’t finished with you yet. Apart from my wanting to torment the life from you in my bed, you have a job to do and if you walk out on the contract I’ll let it be known that you’re unreliable…’
‘Don’t threaten me, Felipe. Our worlds are different and you can’t touch mine.’
‘I believe Sir Ralph Pitton is your next commission and the one after that the Greek shipping magnate, Koztakis. Our worlds might be different, but in business it’s a surprisingly small one. A word here, a word there…’
‘You wouldn’t!’ Gemma breathed incredulously.
‘I don’t have to, Gemma,’ was all he said. His hand came up and touched her chin, and the current that threaded through her body electrified her senses till they screamed. ‘You’ll stay because you want to,’ he said so persuasively that she almost believed it all possible.
The touch on her chin deepened to a caress and Gemma lowered her black silky lashes to blot out the look in his eyes, that heavy-lidded sensual look that was so self-explanatory.
Need. It was there in his eyes and coursing through her body as their lips closed on each other’s. Felipe’s arms slid around her and six months of despair slid out of Gemma’s heart. She clung to him desperately, willing a miracle, wishing it all could be right. But there was too much wrong knotted inside her and her emotions tangled obstructively. She couldn’t breathe, she couldn’t think when he held her like this, every touch urging her submission till she didn’t know where or who she was.
Felipe’s hands were skilful, smoothing over the old shirt she worked in, sliding it from her shoulders to reveal the straps of her sundress. His mouth grazed kisses over her naked flesh, burned into her skin, spurred the tears to her eyes.
A heartrending sob of despair tore from her throat, and, startled, Felipe drew back from her.
It was just the release she hadn’t had the strength to engineer herself. She stepped back from him, hating herself for her weakness, hating him for his strength in pulling back from her. With trembling fingers she drew the old shirt back over her shoulders.
‘Please let me go,’ she pleaded without looking at him.
He lifted her chin and she was dismayed to see the hardness in his eyes once again.
‘Let you go, just when it’s getting interesting? No chance, Gemma. I shall keep you here till I’ve taken my fill of you, only then will I let you go, and by then you will be spoiled for ever more. You won’t want another man after me, sweet one. I’m going to bed you so thoroughly you won’t know what’s hit you. London was just the foreplay.’
He turned from her then. Left her shivering by the sink with the intensity of his threats. She was afraid, so terribly afraid that every word he said was leaden with the cruel truth.
CHAPTER FOUR
GEMMA’S suitcase was half packed before he appeared in the doorway. She was going. She had decided. Nothing was going to stop her. Felipe stood watching her, leaning casually on the doorpost as if he had nothing better to do with his time.
‘You’re not going anywhere, Gemma,’ he said at last, so predictably that she nearly laughed in his face. ‘So take all that out of your case.’
‘I’ll do no such thing,’ she told him tightly. ‘And before you start making puerile excuses why I can’t leave, I’ve already seen Mike in the gardens with Christina. I’ll ask him to fly me out. That’s if you don’t mind; tough if you do!’ she added sarcastically.
‘I do mind, as it happens, but that doesn’t matter because you’ve missed Mike.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘You’ll hear the thrust of the engines shortly.’
Gemma saw triumph in his eyes and at the same time heard the jet roaring in the distance. Damn! If she’d been five minutes earlier she could have been with him. Furiously she balled a silk scarf in her fist and flung it into her case.
‘Has he gone to pick up Agustªn?’ she asked, tightlipped.
It made little difference to her intentions if he had. She was going, portrait or not. Apparently Agustªn wanted this portrait as much as he craved a hole in the head, so both of them would be happy if she terminated the agreement. She wasn’t even curious to meet him any more. She wanted out from Felipe’s life and that was all.
‘Agustªn won’t be back for a few days yet. Mike has gone to pick up supplies. You may have noticed that there isn’t a supermarket in the immediate vicinity and——’
‘Spare me the boring details of your domestic problems. When will Mike be back?’
‘A couple of hours, by which time I will have persuaded you to stay.’
Gemma’s eyes widened. ‘This must sound like a remarkably stupid question in the circumstances, but however do you propose doing that?’ she cut back sarcastically.
‘Somehow I don’t think sweeping you into my arms and softening you with sensual kisses would go down too well at the moment,’ he drawled, changing his position to fold his arms across his chest and cross one leg over the other.
Gemma fumed. Was this the next phase of the torment game? Trying to humour her?
‘Sensual kisses, diamonds, fast cars—nothing would persuade me to stay. I hope that satisfies you.’
‘Only you in my bed tonight will give me any satisfaction.’
Her head jerked up at that and angrily she swept her hair from her face and tucked it behind her ears.
‘You’re in for a frustrating night, then, because you’ll have to thrash it out on your own!’
‘Now why should I have to do that when I have you here? Sorry, sweet one, but there is no way you are leaving and that is as certain as the sun rising in the morning.’
‘So I’m a prisoner here?’
‘Precisely, and prisoners do as they are told. So unpack that case before the warder loses his temper.’
She knew then that she hadn’t a chance. But what was the answer? Simply to let him have his way and suffer? The question and the answer was beyond her capabilities of reasoning at the moment.
‘Leave me alone, Felipe,’ she uttered wearily. ‘I’m bored with the game.’
‘I’ll have to think up some original moves, then. Can’t have you stifling a yawn as I’m making love to you.’ He eased himself away from the doorjamb. ‘I’ll see you at dinner.’
She heard his steps on the stone floor as he walked down the corridor, and then a door slamming shut. She thought he must be in the next room, though the walls were so old and thick that she heard no other sounds.
Crossly she shoved her suitcase off the bed and lay down, curling herself into a ball and biting her clenched fist. She might as well be in chains for the freedom she had. Prisoner and warder, it was a fact.
Reluctantly she dressed for dinner. She put on a black silk camisole top with matching baggy pants that whispered around her long legs, and her only jewellery was chunky gold swirl earrings. She made the effort because she knew it would infuriate him if she sulked another night in her room. She didn’t want any more abuse. She wasn’t weakening, she challenged herself, but there were ways of handling this, and antagonising him further wasn’t one of them.
‘I remember that perfume, Cassini, isn’t it? “A love-affair that never ends”,’ he breathed seductively as he took her elbow at the head of the stairs.
She’d heard his door close after him as she was walking down the corridor but she hadn’t stopped.
‘Yes, it was a favourite of yours, wasn’t it?’ she murmured, unable to resist baiting him in spite of her resolutions not to.
‘You know what that perfume does to me; it arouses me. Is that why you are wearing it?’
‘To tease you, you mean?’ she asked mock innocently as they walked down the stairs together.
‘There’s no point in trying to do that. I’m going to have you, tease or not. Maybe you feel the need to hot up the pace, though. Getting frustrated, are you?’
‘Not for your body, Felipe,’ she told him coldly.
‘Not yet,’ he whispered, increasing the pressure on her elbow with brute strength. ‘But you’ll be screaming for it soon enough.’
She held her breath in fury for a second, then. ‘So will you, so let’s see who screams first, shall we?’
He threw his head back and laughed and, though he hadn’t had the last word, he roared as if he had.
He guided her through the sitting-room to the terrace, which reminded Gemma of the first time he had taken her elbow and guided her into his world of love and sensuality. Unwanted frissons of neverforgotten passions surged through her, flushing her cheeks in the mercifully dark night.
‘Do you mind eating outside? I usually do when I’m here.’
‘It’s fine with me,’ she told him stiffly. She wasn’t going to be objectionable, at least not over where they ate.
One of the tables on the terrace had already been set for two so it would have made no difference if she had objected. There was a white linen damask cloth with candles and flowers and crystal set on it. The terrace was lit with concealed lighting that glowed rather than glared. It was beautiful, heady and dangerous.
The food was delicious, roast beef and an assortment of vegetables. Gemma started well, bravely ate, but found the rich red wine more tempting than the food. The atmosphere between her and Felipe was thick enough to slice.
She needed insensibility to get through the night, but drink wasn’t the answer. She refused a second glass of wine and noticed Felipe didn’t refill his own glass either.
Maria tended to their needs and each time she came to the table her presence eased the tension that hung heavy in the night air. But once they were alone again the conversation became spiked and cruel.
‘So you have decided to stay. I didn’t have to work on you so very hard after all,’ he iced after Maria had cleared the plates from the table.
‘I decided nothing. You passed the sentence and I’m serving my time. I have no choice but to staytill my commission is completed, that is. And, talking of my commission, I wonder what your employer would think of this torment game of yours?’ She hoped a small threat might ease off the pressure.
‘You keep referring to it as a game, Gemma. A game it isn’t. I take rejection seriously, and your punishment I am taking seriously too. As far as Agustªn is concerned, forget running to him with your troubles. He has scant regard for women’s feelings and not even you could soften his heart. Besides, by the time he returns it will all be over.’
‘As quick as that,’ Gemma retorted drily. ‘Two, three days. You reckon you’ll have me on my knees in that short time?’
‘Well, I don’t want to rush it,’ he flinted back.
Gemma reached for the bottle of wine. She needed another drink after all. Felipe’s hand closed over hers.
‘No way, sweet one. I want you sober. I want you feeling every kiss, every caress, every last thrust.’ His dark eyes glinted ferociously in the candlelight, as if he were some predatory creature of the forest.
Gemma’s eyes flickered uncertainly but her heart steeled. ‘I’ve already told you, Felipe. You will be wasting your time. You can’t torment me. You can tempt me and you might succeed in possessing my body but that will be all. You can kiss and caress and thrust to your heart’s content, but the most important part of me you’ll never touch. I’ll block off my emotions and my heart and I’ll never give you the satisfaction of thinking you have hurt me.’
If she thought she had troubled him with that she was mistaken. He smiled without mirth.
‘You forget, Gemma, I have loved you before. I know every part of you. What turns you on, what arouses you, what has you writhing and moaning for more. You can block off, sweet one, but one dark lonely night you’ll wake up screaming for it and you’ll be alone. No Felipe, and no other man will be able to do for you what I can. You know it and I know it and any amount of denial won’t make the need go away.’
Gemma lowered her eyes and fought the truth of that brutal statement. Felipe was the essential lover, and when he had walked out on her she had known no other man could ever take his place. You couldn’t top perfection, and she didn’t even want to try. True it all might be, but Felipe had forgotten one thing.
She raised her eyes to meet his. ‘And you, Felipe?’ she started softly. ‘You forget the passion I can so skilfully arouse in you. You yourself admitted that no other woman could ever turn you on the way I do. Or maybe all men say that, I wouldn’t know. All I do know is that I’ve lived without your passion these last six months, whereas you seemed to have had a struggle.’
He smiled cynically. ‘Which proves that my feelings for you were deeper than yours for me. That’s a pity. It makes the task harder for me. I thought you might have some feelings left for me, but then love was a charade to you, wasn’t it? Sex held us together for that week——’
‘Stop it, Felipe,’ Gemma pleaded in a husky whisper. How could he bring their affair down to gutter level like this? ‘You know that wasn’t true.’
‘You cared for me, did you?’ His voice was thick with sarcasm. ‘Strange way you English have of showing it. You don’t trust. A weakness you will pay for.’
They sat in silence as Maria returned with coffee and brandy. She poured the coffees for them, her black eyes flicking uncertainly between the two of them. Did she sense the atmosphere? She must; it was heavy enough.
Gemma wondered what Felipe was thinking-maybe the same train of thought she was taking. Going back over all they had been to each other in London and asking why it had soured so badly. Mistrust, misunderstanding, or was it simply that their love was just not meant to be? If only she had made that phone call, swallowed her hurt and her pride and given him a chance to redeem himself—but would it have made it all right? How could it have done? He had gone away with Bianca and, though she had never known that for sure, she had convinced herself it was so. But suppose…
‘You did go to New York with Bianca, didn’t you?’ She held her heart on freeze, waiting for his reply. Though what difference if he hadn’t? He had already admitted his cousin was a part of his life, more than her.
‘We had a very interesting week together, yes. Almost as stimulating as our week together,’ he told her, laying cruel emphasis on the word stimulating.
How easily he could torment her. He didn’t have to threaten to take her to bed to do it. The thought of him and Bianca together was enough to have her heart screaming in agony.
‘And yet you persist in trying to hurt me for some triviality. I was the injured party, Felipe. You seem determined not to acknowledge that.’
‘Do you expect me to?’ His smile was thin and contemptuous. ‘How little you know of the South American man.’
‘Funny how your nationality suddenly seems to be an excuse for your disgusting behaviour.’ Gemma drained her brandy. ‘And for your promiscuity,’ she added as she lowered her empty glass to the table.
‘And what is your excuse? I thought the English were so frigid.’
‘Not at all, just choosy. And all I can offer for an excuse for my own wanton behaviour is that I took you on face value, not what was stamped on your passport.’
He smiled cynically. ‘Ah, if only we had known the depths of our differences then.’
‘If only,’ Gemma uttered sarcastically. ‘If only you had presumed my frigidity and I had presumed your licentiousness——’
‘What a lot we would have missed.’
She wanted to smile at that, but she didn’t. ‘But we would have avoided all this, though,’ she told him mournfully, immediately wishing she had held her tongue. It was almost an admission that he was getting to her.
He was on to it as rapidly as a whippet to a lame rabbit. ‘So my revenge is affecting you at last?’
‘Not the effect you wish for, though. I’d rather live without your gibes, yes, but I’ll put up with them.’
‘And you’ll suffer my lovemaking with
a traditional stiff upper lip, will you?’
‘If it gets that far I’ll lie back and think of England, yes.’
He laughed and shook his head. ‘How sweetly you try to evade the truth.’
‘Oh, and what is that truth?’
‘That your mother country will be the last thought in your mind when I make love to you.’
‘My patriotism means more to me than your groping!’ she flung back at him, pretty feebly, she thought as soon as it was out.
‘We’ll see about that.’
‘Yes, we will!’ she retorted. ‘And now I want to go to bed.’ She stood up and flung her crumpled napkin down on the table.
‘You always were a fast worker.’
‘I didn’t mean that,’ she rasped impatiently. ‘I meant——’
‘I know what you meant,’ he interjected, and rose to his feet. For a blissful second she thought he was going to let her go, but how naive could you get? His hand snaked out across the table, grasping her wrist before she had the wit to snatch it away. He pulled her round the table to him, crushed her in his arms. She steeled her lips for his penetration but it was useless. He took her fully, expertly, parting her lips so skilfully that he might have had a degree in kissing.
How tempted she was to let him take it all. Her body, her heart, her love. Then perhaps he would leave her in peace. She would end up a shadow of her former self, but wasn’t she already a shadow of the confident woman she had once been? She had run the gamut of emotions these last months; to run through them again wouldn’t be such a hardship. But it would, it would, her heart screamed as his hands caressed over her breasts, the fine silk of her camisole top seeming to heighten the hedonism he had threatened.
She hated him now, despised him, and yet every stroke he smoothed over her aching nipples was a condemnation of that hatred. How could you hate and love and want? How could your body lead you away from all that your sensibilities rallied against?
His hand slid under the silk to her naked flesh, burning her skin till the pain was almost intolerable. The torture of need; it hurt so badly that she wanted to forget his cruelty and give in to its pull. She wanted to melt under his strokes, to murmur that she adored and wanted him more than ever, but it was precisely what he wanted to hear, so that he could punish her with some cruel rejection. She wouldn’t be able to live with that.