‘As for au pairs and governesses and nannies,’ he went on, ‘Lucy is just the latest in a long line. They aren’t the answer, either. None of them has the necessary commitment and you can’t blame them. The kids fall out with them, and the next thing you know they’re heading back to their agencies. No,’ he said, rising and walking to the window, ‘if Tracey and Terry are ever to have a mother in their lives again, I’ll have to marry someone else―someone with enough room in her heart to take them in.’
Leila looked up at him quickly. She wouldn’t normally have dreamed of saying anything, but the memory of Tracey’s bitter green eyes rose up in her mind, prompting her to speak. ‘Well,’ she ventured, ‘there seems to be a likely candidate in the offing…’
‘You mean Kate?’ he said, looking out at the night.
‘I think your daughter approves of her, if that’s anything to go by,’ Leila said delicately.
‘I know all about Tracey’s opinions on Kate,’ he replied brusquely. ‘She tends to make herself rather a nuisance about it.’
Leila wondered whether Blaize had any idea just how far his daughter was prepared to go in her defence of Katherine Henessey’s candidature as surrogate mother.
‘You’ve just said that she hasn’t ever had a proper mother,’ she pointed out, her lingering sense of guilt towards the girl making her unwisely forward. ‘And Katherine does seem very fond of them both.’
‘So those pretty blue eyes are sharp little watchers, after all,’ he said, rather grimly. ‘You’re doing the child psychologist routine again, are you?’
‘.No, and I don’t want to trespass,’ Leila said, recognising a snub when she got one. She rose to her feet. ‘Well, I’ll get off to bed, if I’m not wanted any more…’
‘I’m not the marrying kind, Leila.’ He turned to face her, hard-eyed. ‘I wasn’t the marrying kind even before Vanessa. If I were ever to consider changing my mind, then, yes―Katherine Henessey would be the first woman I’d ask.’
‘Ah,’ Leila said quietly. Tracey would have jumped for joy if she’d heard that, but, for some reason, a cold fist had just squeezed Leila’s heart. She forced herself to go on. ‘It seems to me that Katherine has a lot more to offer than just a mother-figure for your children.’
‘Oh, yes,’ Blaize agreed lazily, ‘she’s sexy, intelligent and stylish into the bargain. I enjoy her company as much as any woman’s I’ve ever been with. She’s got the poise to cope with the kind of chaos that usually prevails in my life. But I’d still have only one reason for marrying,’ he concluded brusquely. ‘And that would be to give the kids a mother. I don’t want a wife, Leila. I don’t want one, and I don’t need one.’
'Then you shouldn’t even be considering marriage,’ Leila said, shocked at his callous approach.
‘Who says I am considering it? I can do without that kind of restriction in my life.’
‘Yes, I can see that,’ Leila said drily. ‘Well, Mr. Oliver, none of our parents made much of a sacrifice for us. So why should you make a sacrifice for your kids?’
Her irony made his face darken angrily. The tanned arms were hard with muscle as he put his hands on his hips. ‘I love Terry and Tracey. But tying myself to one woman, even for their sake, would be a bad mistake, Leila.’
‘The rest of the world seems to get along with that system,’ she couldn’t help needling him.
‘The rest of the world lies and cheats,’ he retorted.
‘Ever read the latest statistics on marriage and divorce, baby blue eyes? Modern marriage is a long catalogue of adultery and betrayal.’
‘Not all modern marriages are like that,’ she said forcefully.
‘No?’ he sneered. ‘You and I are both illegitimate, Leila. I’m divorced. Rick Watermeyer is separated from his wife. Katherine Henessey is divorced. Even Mrs Saunders, the housekeeper, is divorced. In this household alone there are seven people whose lives have been affected by infidelity. It’s human nature. Accept it, girl!’
‘This is a particular household,’ Leila said briskly, ‘with a particular class of people in it. Rich, well-educated, and spoiled. People in that category have a very high incidence of divorce, yes. That doesn’t mean that the whole institution of marriage is disintegrating.’
‘Well, cherish your illusions if they keep you warm at night,’ he said drily. ‘The fact is that there’s no bH?logical pressure on adults to stay faithful. In fact, their biology points them in exactly the opposite direction.
But there is a biological necessity for children to have a mother.’
‘Which means you’ve got a problem,’ she said sweetly, ‘doesn’t it?’
‘Yes, I have a problem,’ he replied silkily. ‘My problem is that I’m constitutionally unable to trust women. Even paragons of virtue like Kate Henessey.’
Leila gave him a smile touched with bitterness. ‘Really? That explains a lot of things about you.’
‘Exactly.’ He nodded. His smile was astringent as he came over to her. He reached out to touch her hair, and she flinched. ‘It explains everything.’
‘But perhaps it’s you who’s untrustworthy?’ she challenged boldly.
‘In what way?’
‘In that you obviously can’t settle down with one woman!’
‘I might give it a try,’ he glinted, stroking her sensitive neck with the backs of his knuckles. ‘With the right woman, one day…’
‘For the sake of your children, I hope you do. Can’t you see how much they need stability?’ She moved away from the gently caressing fingers. ‘Can’t you understand that they don’t just need a mother? They need you to settle down in one permanent relationship.’
‘When there are such delicious prizes in the world as you to be won?’ he said softly. ‘That’s a hard sentence, Leila.’
‘I’ve been told Katherine Henessey’s worth a hundred of me.’ The stupid words were out before she had the wit to censor them.
Blaize’s eyes narrowed. ‘What are you talking about?’ he asked shortly.
Leila gulped. ‘Oh, nothing. I was talking in general terms.’
‘Has Tracey been saying something to you?’ he growled. He ripped the truth, out of her eyes. ‘So she has. That interfering, nosy litlle— She’s going to find she’s not too old to be put over my knee!’
‘Please!’ Anxiety flooding her at his angry expression, she put her hand on his arm. ‘Don’t say anything to her, for heaven’s sake. She’s a very confused, unhappy teenager, and giving her hell for expressing her feelings is the last thing she needs right now!’
‘Well, well.’ Lean fingers trapped her hand as she pulled it away. ‘So you really care about the little brat? That’s the first time you’ve ever touched me voluntarily, do you realise that?’ The devastatingly handsome face looked down at her with a slow smile. ‘Is that your soft spot, Leila? Other people’s children?’
‘I happen to feel sorry for yours,’ she said, trying not to respond as his fingers trailed up her arm, his caress raising goose-bumps of pleasure all the way.
‘Well, don’t,’ he murmured, pulling her to him despite her resistance. ‘Tracey is a lot harder and a lot less helpless than you give her credit for. Why not try feeling sorry for me, instead?’
‘Oh, I do feel sorry for you, Mr. Oliver.’ It was an effort to keep her voice cool and impersonal. ‘I think you’re even more confused and unhappy than your daughter is.’
‘Go on,’ he smiled, not letting her go. ‘As long as you keep talking about me, I reckon there’s still a chance…’
‘A chance of what?’
‘Of carrying through my plans for your seduction.’
‘I’ve had a taste of your technique already!’ she snapped, her nerves jumping at his proximity. ‘And, quite frankly, I found it crude, Mr. Oliver. Crude and unrefined, and therefore utterly unexciting.’
‘That was before I’d summed you up properly,’ he smiled. ‘I was way out of line that afternoon. Making a grab wasn’t the right way to go ab
out it, and my only excuse was that I kind of lost control of myself. But I know a lot more about you, now. For example,’ he said, his voice lowering to a purr as he drew her close, ‘I’ve discovered that you love to be kissed gently on your eyelids, like this…’ His mouth illustrated the point with bone-melting effectiveness. ‘And then on your throat and neck, like this…’
Leila’s throat arched back, exposing the tender skin to his lips in a momentary response she could not control.
Sweetness flooded her veins at his touch.
His kisses were changing from wickedly deliberate expertise to something less controlled. They became urgent, yet never rough, caressing the fine skin of her temples, the yielding sweetness of her mouth, as though he could not get enough of her to adore.
He murmured her name once or twice, revelling in the scent of her skin. Leila’s arms were sliding round his neck as his mouth moved downwards, finding the scented valley between her breasts. The buttons of her unpretentious cotton blouse opened under his questing fingertips, revealing the swell of her breasts, cupped in the pale blue lace of her bra.
With a little groan of desire, he kissed the perfumed curves. Dazed, Leila cradled his head, her fair skin so pale against the tanned face of Blaize Oliver. What was she doing, embracing her destruction like this?
She had to resist, stop him from giving her any more of this treacherous pleasure!
Yet she felt so weak suddenly, her very movements of protest seeming to melt into a languorous invitation.
‘Leila,’ he whispered huskily, ‘how lovely you are. I don’t know how I’ve managed to keep my hands off you this past week! You have the face of an angel, yet your mouth is made for temptation.’
‘Please, no…’
‘From the moment I saw you, I’ve been burning for you.’ Her eyes fluttered closed. She felt Blaize’s fingers cup her face, turning her mouth to his as though he had every right in the world, as though she belonged to him, body and soul …
His kiss was perfect, taking the soft, clinging surrender of her lips for granted. She held him as though her life depended upon it, as though nothing else were real except Blaize, except the need for her she could feel in him.
His fingertips caressed the naked skin of her arms and back, making her shiver with desire as they trailed up her flanks towards her breasts. The material of her bra was so fine and smooth that it was almost a second skin, making his caress tantalising and frustrating.
His fingers told him that her nipples were erect with hunger, and her gasp of pleasure told him exactly what his caress was doing to her.
Her body seemed fused to his, her loins pressed to the hardness of his desire, her thighs against his. Panic rose in her as she felt her response going beyond her control, their kiss, growing to become something more than just a moment of sexual pleasure, growing to fill her heart and mind until she thought she would burst.
She pushed him away with all her fast-fading strength.
‘No,’ she begged him shakily. ‘Don’t force this on me, Blaize!’
‘Force?’ he rumbled. ‘My darling, the last thing I want is to force you! All I want you to do is face reality for once. Don’t you know how much I want you?’
‘1-1 know that you want to take me to bed—’
‘Yes,’ he said with a slow smile. ‘I want to take you to my bed, Leila, and undress you with great care.’
‘Stop!’ she whispered.
‘I want to kiss every part of your body,’ he murmured, drawing her close again. ‘I want to taste you, love you with all the skill of which I am capable. I want to see you faint and dizzy with pleasure in my arms!’
‘No,’ she pleaded, covering her ears with her palms, ‘don’t say any more!’
He kissed her mouth gently, drawing her protective hands away from her ears as he did so. ‘I’m going to have you, Leila. I’m going to make you mine. You know that as well as I do. Perhaps not tonight, or even tomorrow. But soon-the moment I see the look in your eyes that tells me you are ready.’
‘Never.’ She shook her head numbly. ‘Is it your colossal vanity that makes you so deaf? I am not one of your offhand conquests.’
‘No.’ He smiled smokily. ‘You’re something much more special. But you won’t accept the truth about us.’
‘I won’t accept your version of the truth,’ Leila said.
She knew that if she did not stop him now, say something cutting enough to turn him aside, she would not be able to resist this sweet torment much longer. Her hands were trembling as she pulled her collar closed.
‘As I said,’ she told him, finding a colder voice with a supreme effort, ‘your technique is crude and unrefined. Save it for someone less fussy, Mr. Oliver. Unlike you, I don’t have a pathological need for casual sex. I’m going to bed. Alone. Goodnight.’
He jerked her round to face him, the exasperation in his eyes telling her that her verbal needle had struck home somewhere in that usually impenetrable hide.
‘You’ve got a sharp little tongue, Leila. Where did you learn to put men off so efficiently? On one of those mysterious occasions you told me about, when you were touched once too often in your life?’
‘That’s right,’ she rejoined, facing him like a snared hind. ‘I also told you that I’ve learned I don’t have to put up with approaches I don’t welcome!’
‘Who was he?’ Blaize demanded. ‘Some overweight, over-amorous boss? Some office Romeo who cornered you behind the filing-cabinet?’
‘I don’t want to talk about it.’
‘But I do.’ He trapped her in his arms. ‘I want to hear all about it.’
‘It’s none of your business!’
‘It is if it’s coming between us,’ he rejoined grimly.
‘There’s a lot more than that coming between us,’ Leila retorted. Her eyes were cool. ‘But, if you insist on knowing, it was an employer in Nottingham who thought that my sexual favours came with the salary. Just as you do. I was very young then, Mr. Oliver, and he made my life hell for six months, because I was terrified of losing my first job.’
She saw his face change. Remembering that period of her life was having a salutary effect on the heat in her veins. Suddenly, she felt much more in control of herself, much more like the efficient secretary she usually was than like the melting voluptuary he’d turned her into so easily!
‘What happened?’ Blaize demanded quietly.
‘Eventually I realised that I was my own woman, and that I did have a choice. I walked out, and it took me a long, long time to find another job. But it was worth it, in the end. They call it sexual harassment, though I doubt whether you’d have the faintest inkling what it feels like.’
‘Oh, hell,’ Blaize said in a strained voice, all the tension fading out of him as he released her. ‘Leila, I’m so sorry…’
‘No,’ she said cruelly. ‘I doubt whether you’re sorry. How many of your employees have you treated in exactly that way? How many pretty little typists have you taken a fancy to, seduced and forgotten in the same day?’
‘Leila, you’re a long way off beam,’ he said urgently, his eyes dark and intense. ‘I’ve never forced my attentions on any woman who didn’t welcome them.’
‘Can you be so sure?’ she challenged. ‘You seem to take an especial pleasure in forcing yourself on me, despite all the signals I keep giving you that I don’t want to get involved with you!’
‘The signals you give out are not nearly as unambiguous as you imagine,’ he said forcefully. ‘You want me, every bit as much as I want you, and all your protestations to the contrary are just so much flammery.’
‘Funny,’ Leila replied cuttingly. ‘That’s just what he used to say.’
Blaize stepped forward, and took her hands in his.
His voice gentled. ‘This man who―who interfered with you … did he hurt you badly?’
‘You ,mean did he get what he wanted?’ she replied coldly,' Is this sympathy, Mr. Oliver, or just curiosity?’
&nbs
p; 'It s an attempt to understand you, Leila.’
'You only understand what you want to understand. As for what happened, I leave it to your imagination.’
BIaize's face tightened with anger, as though his imagination wasn’t painting very pretty pictures for him.
'If I knew who he was—’ He broke off his mouth a hard line. ‘You seem convinced that I spend my life having affairs with women,’ he said quietly. ‘I don’t know how you got that idea, but it just doesn’t square with the truth.’ I suspect it’s a fantasy of yours. But I really am not the heartless Don Juan you’d like me to be. I’m not telling you I’m an angel, but—’
Tiger's Eye Page 8