by Penny Jordan
That was exactly what Luke did mean, and he cursed himself inwardly for adding to her distress.
'It's just a precaution,' he tried to reassure her.
Suzy felt faint and sick. Even with Luke so close to her, holding her, she still felt afraid, her thoughts going round and round.
'We could die in here,' she said in a small panicky voice.
'Don't think about it,' Luke advised her firmly.
'Talk to me, Luke,' Suzy begged him, desperate to have her mind taken off their danger.
'What do you want me to talk to you about?' Luke responded.
'Tell me about the children you rescued,' she replied.
Half of her still didn't dare to believe that he was actually here with her, that she wasn't alone any more. She needed to hear his voice to keep her fears at bay.
Sensing what she was feeling, Luke hesitated and then settled her more comfortably against his body, frowning a little as he realised how cold she was.
The children! Those were the very last memories he wanted to resurrect right now, but how could he deny Suzy anything?
'What do you want to know about them?' he asked quietly.
'Everything,' Suzy answered. 'But first tell me—are they all right now?'
'They're recovering,' Luke told her slowly, 'and with time, and proper medical care, hopefully they will be able to return and live reasonably normal lives. Raschid, the little boy, lost an arm.'
He felt Suzy's tension and cursed himself beneath his breath for having told her.
'Halek, the little girl—the baby—is fine,' he added.
'And their parents—their mother?' Suzy asked tentatively, not really sure why she felt so impelled to ask that particular question.
Was she reading his mind? Luke wondered helplessly.
'Both dead.'
'Tell me what happened,' Suzy whispered.
She could feel the rise and fall of Luke's chest as he breathed in and then exhaled slowly.
'The children's mother was helping us with information. Her husband, their father, had been killed trying to resist the tyranny they were facing. She wanted to avenge his death by helping us to set her people free. It was a dangerous situation for her, and important that we kept her identity hidden, that no one gave away the fact that she was helping us.'
'But someone did,' Suzy hazarded, lifting her head from its resting place against Luke's shoulder to try to peer up into his face.
'Yes,' he agreed heavily. 'Someone did.'
She could feel his remembered anger in the increased thud of his heartbeat, and suddenly out of nowhere she knew!
'Was it—was she a reporter?' she guessed intuitively.
She was still looking up at him; he could tell by her her gentle breaths as they fell on his face.
'Yes, she was,' he confirmed. 'Somehow or other she'd heard about Maram and decided to she wanted to interview her for a human interest story. Of course I informed her that she was going to do no such thing, and I pointed out to her the danger she would be putting Maram in. She ignored my warning, though, and managed to find a young rookie soldier foolish enough to be seduced by her—and I mean literally—into giving her Maram's name. Two days after she interviewed her Maram was murdered, and that was when I found out what Sarah had done.'
'Perhaps she didn't realise the danger she was exposing her to,' Suzy suggested huskily.
'Oh, she realised all right,' Luke told Suzy harshly.
'I had told her myself. But she just didn't care. Nothing mattered more to her than getting her story—not even another woman's life. She even had the gall to try to photograph Maram's children as they were being lifted out of the rubble of their home—the rubble that still contained their mother's body!'
'Jerry said that you have taken financial responsibility for the children,' Suzy murmured.
'They needed medical attention they couldn't get in their own country, and they could only be brought to the UK for treatment if someone agreed to sponsor them. It was the least I could do, seeing as I was responsible for the death of their mother.'
'No! It wasn't your fault,' Suzy protested immediately.
'I was the Commanding Officer, and I'd had enough experience of the determination of reporters to get their story to realise that this particular reporter wasn't going to put another woman's life before her own career,' Luke responded grimly.
'And is that why you hate women reporters?' Suzy asked him quietly. 'Because of what she did?'
'Well, let's just say that she reinforced everything I'd already experienced and felt about them as a breed,' Luke acknowledged. 'One woman murdered, two children nearly killed, three of my men shot and a gunshot wound myself didn't exactly endear her type to me!'
'You were shot?' Suzy exclaimed anxiously, before putting two and two together and asking softly, 'That scar—is that—?'
'Yes,' Luke told her tersely, anticipating her question, before continuing. 'Fortunately the children are survivors—and once they are medically fit to do so they will be returning to their own country to live with their mother's sister, who will love them as her own. Why are you crying?' he asked Suzy gently.
'I'm not,' Suzy fibbed.
But she was, and her tears were tears of sadness for the children and tears of joy for herself, because she was so proud of the man she loved.
The man she loved! Suddenly Suzy wanted to tell him how she felt, how much she loved him. How she had believed the first time she had seen him that fate had brought them together and that he was her one true love, her soul mate. It didn't matter any more that he didn't share her feelings, or that he didn't love her back. She wasn't going to die without saying the words that were locked up inside her heart.
'Luke,' she began shakily, 'if we don't get out of here I—'
'We will get out,' Luke began, and then stopped speaking as a sudden rumbling above them had them both looking upwards. 'Don't worry,' he reassured her.
'It just means that they're closer to getting us out, that's all.'
Suzy stared into the darkness, wishing she could see his face and his eyes so that she might have some clue as to what expression they were holding and if he really believed what he was saying or was merely trying to comfort her.
'Suzy—'
The raw urgency of the way Luke was saying her name had Suzy turning to him.
'This is all my fault,' he told her grimly. 'If I hadn't been so determined not to believe you—'
Suzy felt the pad of his thumb brush against her lips.
'I'm sorry, Suzy,' she heard him whisper. 'Oh, God, I am so sorry. I'd give anything, do anything, to get you out of here safely.'
Suzy could feel the warmth of his breath against her mouth, and suddenly, sweetly, she recognised that he was going to kiss her. She was lifting her face towards him when they both heard the sound of activity in the tunnel.
A shower of debris fell down from the ceiling above them, and immediately Luke moved to cover Suzy's body with his own.
'Luke, what's happening?' she demanded, terrified.
'It's all right,' Luke reassured her, holding her tightly. 'Everything's going to be all right. We'll soon be out of here.'
Just hearing his voice made her feel better, Suzy acknowledged as she leaned into him, soaking up the comfort of his presence and his warmth whilst his hand shielded her head from the stones rattling down around them.
Suzy was still wrapped in Luke's arms ten minutes later when their rescuers arrived.
'Take Suzy first,' Luke instructed them. But when they came to lift her away from him she could hardly bear to let go!
CHAPTER TWELVE
'LUKE?'
The moment he heard the small, anxious cry Luke was awake, throwing off the duvet he had covered himself with and padding across the suite to where Suzy was lying frozen with terror in the middle of the large bed.
It was three days since they had been rescued from the grotto, and every night Suzy had had the same nightmare. Every night
Luke had gone to her to take her in his arms, to comfort her and reassure her that she was safe. And once he had done that he had gone back to his makeshift bed on one of the sofas.
It was Suzy who had been insistent that there was no point in declaring now that they were not partners—not with the African President's visit so imminent.
'You've got enough to worry about without having to explain who I really am,' she had told Luke when he had told her that although he would prefer it if she didn't leave the villa until after the meeting, he would, if she wanted, make it clear to Sir Peter that they were not partners and ensure that she was provided with her own room.
In the event it was perhaps just as well that they were still sharing the suite. Her nightmare had woken her every night, leaving her shivering with cold and fear, only able to go back to sleep once he was holding her safely in his arms.
'They'll stop soon,' Suzy had told him last night, her teeth chattering as she clung to him.
Luke hadn't said anything. Locked away in his desk drawer was the report he had commissioned on her. And the information it contained had increased his guilt and his shame. She was innocent of everything he had accused her of. She had not lied to him. She had told him the truth and he had refused to believe her. He had treated her with contempt and cruelty. Luke knew he would never forgive himself. When he had read about her life as a child, with her mother, Luke had felt the acid burn of tears stinging his eyes, and his anger against himself had trebled. His anger, but not his love. His love, he recognised now, had been born fully formed and complete the moment he had set eyes on her!
His love. Broodingly, Luke went towards the bed, lithe and silent as a panther as he moved through the darkness. His love was a burden he would never lay on Suzy's shoulders. His report had told him what kind of person she was: the kind of person who put others before herself, the kind of person who gave up her own future to look after the mother who had never cared enough to love and protect her as she deserved. One day Suzy would meet someone for whom she felt as he felt about her. Someone she could love as he loved her!
A savage pain tore through him. He had reached the bed and he sat down on it. Because of Suzy's nightmares he had taken to wearing a pair of boxers to bed, but he still had to turn sideways so that she wouldn't see the telltale outline of his erection.
'It's all right Suzy, I'm here,' he told her gently.
'Oh, Luke hold me, please!' Suzy begged him.
Her nightmare terrified her. In it she was trapped underground on her own. She could hear Luke talking to her, but he wasn't there with her, and she was afraid. Afraid that she would die without seeing or touching him again.
Physically she had not suffered any harm from her incarceration in the vault beneath the grotto, but emotionally and mentally it was taking her longer than she had expected to recover.
Reluctantly Luke took hold of her, tensing as she burrowed closer to him. His body registered the fact that she wasn't wearing anything other than a pair of silky briefs.
Here in Luke's arms was the only place she felt safe, Suzy acknowledged as the nightmare receded and the warmth of his body comforted her. Comforted her and then aroused her, she admitted shakily, as the familiar feelings of longing and love filled her.
Unable to stop herself she leaned forward and brushed her lips against his shoulder, and then his throat, her tongue-tip investigating the taut flesh over his Adam's apple.
Luke felt as though he had been speared by a firebolt His erection was no longer a mere outline beneath his boxers, but a hard and obvious straining of flesh, aching to be touched and tasted as she was touching and tasting his throat.
'Luke, please kiss me,' Suzy whispered against his lips.
'Suzy…'
'Please,' she begged.
'Suzy, this isn't—'
'I love you, Luke,' Suzy burst out, unable to keep her feelings to herself any longer. 'I love you and I want you. You saved my life, and in some ancient cultures when a person saves another person's life it means that that person belongs to them for ever. And I want to belong you, Luke—even if it is just for tonight.' She was speaking so quickly her words were falling over one another. She had had it all worked out, what she would say to him, but suddenly, halfway through her planned speech, her courage began to desert her. 'You are my soul mate, Luke,' she whispered.
Everything she was saying was true, but once she would never, ever have said such words—because her pride would not have allowed her to do so! Her brush with death had changed her, Suzy recognised. She was no longer afraid of being laughed at or rejected. She wanted—she needed Luke to know how she felt.
Luke tried to control what he was feeling. She didn't mean it! She might think she meant it, but she didn't. It was the trauma of what she had experienced that was making Suzy feel that she loved him. That and her belief that he had saved her life. After all, she hadn't loved him before, had she? Once she was over her trauma she would realise that she didn't love him at all.
Just because he loved her it didn't mean that he could take advantage of what she was offering right now.
'Luke…'
Her pleading whisper burned into him like fire. Her hand was touching his belly, tracing the curve of his scar. Luke felt as though he was about to explode with need and hunger.
'Luke…'
Her breath whispered past his mouth and Luke knew that he was lost. Hungrily he possessed the softness of her lips, savouring them, parting them, thrusting his tongue with hard demand into the sweetness of her mouth.
Without him knowing how it had happened his hand found her breast and cupped it, moulding it, teasing the peak to rise up into his palm as he stroked and tugged its tautness.
He wanted her.
He loved her!
Abruptly Luke reined in his feelings. He loved her and he had to protect her from her traumatised belief that she loved him.
The small whimper of distress she made as he firmly put her from him tore at his heart as nothing ever would tear at it again.
'Luke…' Suzy protested achingly. 'Please stay with me, Luke. Please…'
But he had already gone, firmly closing the door between the bedroom and the sitting room and leaving her on her own.
* * *
Suzy gave a small start, unable to believe she had slept for so long. She had originally come up to the bedroom halfway through the afternoon, intending to catch up on the sleep she had lost the previous night, lying awake and longing for Luke.
Luke! She wasn't sorry that she had told him how she felt about him. She was glad! She was proud of her love, and proud of loving him. Her brush with death had altered her attitude a great deal, she acknowledged, but it did not seem to have altered Luke's attitude towards her.
He might not love her, but he wanted her, Suzy told herself. Last night he had wanted her—even if he had left her.
Getting out of the bed, she went into the bathroom. She still hadn't got used to the sensuality of the room, or the open sexuality of its erotic décor. She hadn't used the huge bath as yet—which was more of a sunken pool than a mere bath—but suddenly she was tempted to try it.
Returning to the bedroom, Suzy picked up the ice bucket and the complimentary book of matches from the pretty desk. Back in the bathroom, she pushed the door closed, put down the ice bucket and then carefully lit the candles that surrounded the bath. Even their shadows seemed to cast intimate and erotic dancing images around the room, and a sensual shudder ran through her. This was dangerous. She knew it was dangerous. But still she filled the bath. The water gushing from the dolphin jets glittered against the mosaic tiles.
The circular pool was so deep that she had to walk down into it. Like a Jacuzzi, it had a ledge to sit on, and was easily large enough to accommodate two people. Two people? Her and Luke? Suzy scooped up a handful of blue-green bath crystals from the jar beside her. As she dropped them into the water it turned a deep cloudy aquamarine before slowly clearing to the colour of the purest se
a water. Self indulgently she lay back in it, floating in sumptuous, languid pleasure.
* * *
Worriedly Luke opened the bedroom door. It had been Lucy who had told him that Suzy had felt tired after lunch and had gone to lie down. A doctor had checked her over after her ordeal, and had pronounced her fine, but what if he was wrong—what if he had missed something?
And where was Suzy now? Not in either the suite's sitting room or the bed. Had she got up and gone back outside to join the children by the swimming pool?
It had been a long day—he had been cooped up in his office all morning, rearranging security for the President Njambla's visit because he had not been happy with it after all. He felt hot and tired and in need of a shower.