Kate found her mother lying across her bed, sobbing as if her heart would break.
`Mom! Mom, please—what is it?'
Kate never could bear to see her mother cry. She was such a strong woman, the backbone of the family. For her to break down in such a manner could only mean something devastating had occurred.
`Oh, Katherine! I'm so sorry—I didn't mean to spoil the party for you. This is so silly . . .!'
`But why, Mom?' Kate gathered her mother into her arms. `Everything's fine now,' she lied.
`That's why I'm being so silly, Katherine. The relief . . .' She stifled a convulsive sob. 'Oh, Katherine—I thought I'd lost him! If your Gregory hadn't . . .' Alissa stopped abruptly, biting her lip, and controlled her tears through sheer force of will. Kate's forebodings grew tenfold.
`What do you mean, Mom?'
`I shouldn't be bothering you with this, Katherine. Not now. This is a happy day . . .'
`Mom!'
Kate was not Callum's daughter for nothing. Alissa took
one look at the angle of her chin, noted the determination in her eyes and conceded defeat.
`Your father was going to leave us, Katherine,' she admitted finally in a hushed voice. 'That day—you know, when I called you home from work?' Kate nodded. She had been so worried herself, she hadn't stopped to consider how out of character it was for her mother to fall to pieces. That only happened at times like now, when the crisis was over. 'I found a packed suitcase under the bed—that's why I panicked. He . . . he'd been saying for weeks that he couldn't stand taking money from you any longer. He said that if—if you wouldn't agree to the second mortgage then . . . then we'd be better off without him. That you were the head of the household now, that there was no place for him. I—Katherine, you know how he is when his mind's made up. We'd have lost him, Katherine, without your Gregory.'
Years later, Kate was able to pinpoint that moment as the time she subconsciously admitted defeat. Cradling her mother's head on her shoulder, she knew her last resort had been blocked. The McNaughts could pull through anything together—but Kate could not be the catalyst to pull them apart.
Even so, her capitulation took a further two weeks.
Greg did not touch her, did not speak to her about anything but business. He merely existed—everywhere.
He took full advantage of Callum's invitation to drop in. The one evening she escaped to the local pub with Terry, Greg turned up half an hour later. Robbed of any respite from his disturbing presence, Kate had no opportunity to shore up her defences against the potent attraction which was dragging her into a mire of sexual craving. Her dilemma was acute.
She was normally such a calm, level-headed person. She had never wished for the moon, had no burning ambition, had no need of bright lights in order to enjoy herself. These new sensations were so totally outside her experience, she had no idea how to even begin to overcome the hunger which was fast becoming intolerable. The fierce yearning to recreate the magic they had so briefly shared was balanced only by
her own innate sense of self-worth. She had a right to expect her decisions to be respected.
She felt as she imagined an alcoholic would, faced every second with a bottle of whisky in full tempting view, knowing that by merely reaching out a hand she could satisfy the gnawing craving. For a little while, at least.
Her body turned traitor at every look, at every thought. She made so many mistakes at work, Greg was forced to comment about it. After all her efforts to reason with him had met with abject failure, she listened to his patiently understanding lecture with growing resentment.
`So fire me!' she blazed at him when he had finished.
`I intend to, Kate,' he replied, his sardonic expression not quite overcoming the husky note in his voice when he added, `Something along the lines of spontaneous combustion!' And he continued his waiting game.
On the following Friday Kate finally cracked under the strain. Her mother took one look at her flushed face and ordered her back to bed.
Kate was too exhausted to argue. Her throat burned, her head was drumming a tattoo, and her eyelids were simply too heavy to remain open. She slept throughout the day. She was barely aware of the comings and goings through her bedroom, the doctor's visit, her mother's constant presence, or of Greg's visit later that day. Her fever broke in the night, but Kate slept on.
When she did finally awake properly, she was totally disorientated, and a little light-headed. Her throat was parched, but a more immediate, not to say urgent necessity was a visit to the bathroom.
The house was unnaturally silent as she made her way there, hanging on to the wall for support, but Kate knew she was not alone. Her mother had very firm ideas when it came to sick members of the McNaught family. Pampering was the number one priority. She stared longingly at the bath. She felt so stale and sticky. A brief look in the mirror had been enough to inform her that the only colour in her face was the freckles standing out in stark contrast to the pallor of her skin. Her eyes were almost transparent.
Acting on impulse, she turned the bath taps on full, with the ridiculous idea that perhaps she could be in and out of the bath before anyone heard the water running. But she heard the footsteps pounding up the stairs before she had even straightened up. She turned with resignation towards the door, trying to summon a little energy to do battle with her mother.
But it was not Alissa who exploded into the bathroom. It was Greg! Kate stared at him, wide-eyed and totally defenceless.
`Where's my mother?' she demanded, annoyed that her voice was no more than a croak.
`She's gone out with your father and the boys. She needed some fresh air.' He took a complete, thorough inventory of her—tangled red waves, shadowed eyes, bloodless lips and, naturally, the thin apricot cotton nightdress she had worn since she was a teenager. Kate would have screamed had she possessed the energy. Greg was dressed casually in a thin grey sweater and slacks and looked as fresh as a spring morning! 'I offered to babysit,' he added at Kate's desolate look. 'How are you feeling?'
`I'm fine.'
`You don't look it.' He stepped forward to place a cool hand against her forehead. Kate jerked back out of his reach. `Dammit, Kate! I'm not in the habit of jumping on sick women!' His eyes blazed angrily.
`I know.' Kate was immediately contrite. She also knew she did not have the strength to argue. 'Please, Greg, just let me have a bath.' She bent over to turn off the taps as the bathroom filled with steam.
Greg sighed impatiently, raking his fingers through his dark hair as he frowned at her.
`I don't think a bath is on the list of instructions your mother left.'
A ghost of a smile touched Kate's lips. 'Don't tell me! Chicken soup, fruit juice, aspirins and sleep.' She thought it prudent not to mention the hugs.
`She was worried about you.'
Kate looked up in surprise. He sounded almost defensive.
`I know.—I'm not griping. But I am going to have a bath before she gets home and stops me . . . So—' She looked pointedly at the door. His eyes narrowed at the stubborn set of her jaw, then, amazingly, he grinned. It was just as well Kate was in no state to appreciate the difference it made to his whole face. With a conspiratorial wink, he carefully looked over his shoulder and lowered his voice.
`OK, I'll get you a robe—if you promise not to let your mother know.'
`Are you kidding? It'd be more than my life's worth!'
Kate let out a long breath as he left her. For once, happily devoid of any sexual feelings towards him, it now seemed she had to battle against the urge to be friendly. He reappeared within seconds, handing her a long navy winter dressing-gown.
`I am under the strictest of instructions to ensure you don't catch a chill.' He stilled her objections before they could form. 'I'll go and get the soup ready.'
`Right.'
`Kate?' She looked up at him as he wavered on the threshold and caught an uncharacteristic uncertainty in his expression. 'I—Forget it. Don't
lock the door. And if you're not out in five minutes, I shall come in and get you.'
She took three minutes, then defiantly yielded to the temptation to wash her hair. She had very nearly finished when the shower spray was unceremoniously yanked out of her hand.
`You little fool! Why didn't you ask for help?'
`Because I don't need it. Will you give me that back? I'm getting soap in my eyes.'
Greg went one better. Very gently he tipped her head forwards over the basin and washed away the shampoo suds, then carefully wrapped her hair in a towel.
`Don't say a word, Kate!' he muttered gruffly as he lifted her into his arms to carry her downstairs to the kitchen.
The table was already laid. A bowl of steaming chicken soup was placed before her, and under Greg's watchful eyes she began to eat. Strangely, there was no self-consciousness. Never in a million years could she have imagined sitting
easily across a table from him dressed in an old dressing-gown, devoid of make-up, feeling—cared for. Would married life be like this? The thought was seductive—more so to Kate than the sensual sparks which flew between them. It was also too dangerous to deal with when her defence mechanisms were not in full working order.
Greg cleared away the dishes the second she finished and ushered her into the lounge to sit before the fire he had recently laid. Although they were at the beginning of summer there was a nip in the air today, and Greg was apparently taking Alissa McNaught's words to heart.
`Let's get that hair dry before your mother gets home!' he ordered brusquely, and whipped the towel off her head before she had a chance to speak. He looked helplessly at the thick dripping tendrils. 'Do you have a hair-dryer or something?'
`In my room.'
Kate smothered a grin as she heard him run hurriedly up the stairs. What she wouldn't give for her mother's ability to turn him into a helpless dithering male! She knew the lecture he had been given. Number three on the care and recuperation of McNaught children—irrespective of their age. Instructions to be followed to the letter—or else! It seemed Gregory Courtney had finally met his match! He might be master of the boardroom, but in this house everyone danced to Alissa's tune, whether they knew it or not. It was comforting to know Greg was possessed of an Achilles' heel after all.
Kate insisted on drying her own hair. Although she was still generally weak, the warm bath and hot soup had restored some strength.
She did not think of asking Greg to leave. For one thing, it was doubtful he would even listen to her. And for another, Alissa would be very distressed to learn that her poor ewe lamb had been left unattended. So she sat on the rug before the fire and tended to her hair, only gradually becoming conscious that Greg was watching her every movement.
`Let me do that!'
`There's no . . .' Too late. He took the brush from her
clenched fingers and turned her so that she was sitting at his feet.
The swift sudden upsurge of desire as his fingers gently untangled her waves took her completely by surprise. Her heightened senses must have communicated themselves to him, for he stopped abruptly and slowly propelled her round to face him, tilting her chin the easier to read her expression.
`Do I frighten you so much, Kate?'
`Sometimes.' She licked her dry lips. 'The way you make me feel. It's . .
`It's mutual. I don't like it any more than you do, Kate. But you can't deny it's there. And it's time we dealt with it.'
Her lids drifted down to hide the slumbrous sensuality she could feel stealing over her.
`You can't win, you know.' Absently his hands roamed the outer edges of her face. Gently he began tugging her towards him and trailed the lightest of kisses along her jaw.
`No . . . It's—I can't!'
`Ssh, it's all right, Kate. Just a taste . . . I need just a taste . .
`Please!'
`Give in, Kate!' he urged huskily as his mouth continued to press whispering kisses down the long line of her vulnerable throat, setting up shivers of delight throughout her nervous system.
Vainly she tried to fight off the lassitude pushing her further into his embrace. How could it feel so right to be held in his arms when she knew it was so wrong?
But Greg gave her no chance to gather any scant reserves of will she possessed. She became easy prey to the hot, sweet lips scouring a sensitised path across her jaw down to the delicate bones at the base of her throat, where he buried his face for one long moment before journeying back to claim her lips.
Kate was lost in his gentleness. Unconsciously her hands drifted beneath the thin stuff of his sweater and became engrossed in their journey of discovery across his hair-roughened chest. His hoarse groan only added to the magic he was creating with his lips and hands. She was not
frightened by the evidence of his arousal this time, but gloryed in it, as he lay down beside her on the carpet, moving to cover her body with his own.
`Greg, please . . .!' Her mumbled entreaties for a release from the growing ache inside her were lost in his mouth. `Kate. Sweet Kate . .
She gave even as she received, covering his face with openmouthed kisses. She lost all sense of time and place . . . lost all the reasons why she must keep her distance from him. Wanting, needing desperately to put an end to this intolerable craving .. .
The startled gasps from the doorway did not impinge on her consciousness, but the loosening of Greg's hold did.
`Greg? What . . .?' The words died in her throat as her love-dazed eyes were captured in the misery of her father's stricken face!
Greg shielded her partly clad body from the dismayed, transfixed stares of her parents. Carefully he pulled her robe back into place, staring at her with a disturbing intensity she missed, everything in her focused on the man she loved more than any other in the world—her father.
`Dad . . .?' Ignoring her trembling plea, Callum McNaught stood as if carved from stone, his fierce pride in his daughter as ashes in his mouth. He could not even bring himself to look at her.
Satisfied that she was now presentable, Greg rose and, very gently, as if she were the frailest of creatures, he pulled her to her feet, an arm clasped firmly around her waist as he faced Callum.
`Callum, you'll have to forgive us,' he began quietly, sombrely. 'Your daughter has just agreed to marry me.' He smiled a little sheepishly at the arrested expressions of delight from the duo in the doorway, but his iron grip manacled Kate to his side as she sagged. 'I've been trying to persuade her for some time—and in the excitement of the moment,' he grimaced ruefully, 'I'm afraid things got a little out of hand.'
Kate had been feeling as if she was taking part in a particularly nasty nightmare until Greg's comment about marriage.
About to deny it with all the force left to her, she caught her father's pain-filled eyes and choked on the words.
This was it, then. Greg had won.
How could she not agree to the one thing which could banish the misery from her father's face—to the one thing which would allow him to accept Greg's money—to the one thing to keep her family together?
`Daddy?' The childish term slipped from her lips as if she had been catapulted back to the days when a smile from her father could brighten the dullest of days. His arms opened wide to receive her. And Alissa finally found her voice as she joined the embrace.
`Well, I know I insisted Greg took care of you, but I never imagined this was what he had in mind!'
`Callum?'
Greg and Callum took stock of each other. Despite his being caught in such a highly compromising situation, Greg's natural authority was undiminished. A firm handshake brought their silent confrontation to a mutually satisfied end. Tactfully, Kate's parents then withdrew to allow Greg time alone with his very new fiancée.
Swallowing the bitter taste of defeat, Kate moved like an automaton to the windows, focused but unseeing on the surrounding view. Shoulders slumped in dejection, forehead absorbing the refreshing cool of the windowpane, she inwardly flinched at
the soft touch of Greg's hands on her upper arms; soothing, stroking, as if to imbue her with his own strength.
`I'm sorry it had to be this way, Kate.' The liquid tones flowed over her, his sincerity unmistakable, but Kate was beyond any comfort he could give. Shrugging off his hands, she turned to him with barely concealed bitterness.
`You're sorry? Hah!' The short harsh laugh she gave was an accusation in itself. 'You know, Greg, that could be almost funny if it weren't so pathetic. You can take your damned false apologies and lock them away with the empty promises and lies you so honourably refuse to use to placate me!' Despite the ragged edge to her voice, her confused exhaustion lent her the impetus to refuse to bow to his
quelling glare. For once the metallic glitter of his eyes had no effect on her.
`I suppose I deserved that.' His head bowed slightly in acknowledgement of her jibe, but his impassive features remained carved in granite. His eyes were watchful, intent on her reaction as if he were readying himself for whatever she might do.
`Why me, Greg? There are thousands of women out there who would gladly give you what you want.'
`I dare say we'll find the answer to that on our wedding night!' For a moment he sounded as weary as Kate felt. She shook her head slowly in disbelief at his callous tone.
`This must be some kind of bad dream!'
`It's real enough, Kate. Just resign yourself to it.' `What kind of man are you, Greg?'
`The kind who gets his own way!' His voice was as clipped and cold as the steely eyes regarding her.
`And now there's nothing to stop you, is there?'
He hesitated, breathing deeply. 'One thing. There is one thing which would stop me, Kate.' He spoke slowly, spacing his words with great care as he moved closer to tower over her, his long hands cupping her face, darkening eyes boring into hers as she waited with bated breath for the get-out clause. 'Look at me, Kate! Look me in the eye and tell me you don't want me! Then I'll let you go.' He laughed shortly, mirthlessly. 'I'll even set things right with your father. So tell me, Kate! Tell me you don't want me. Tell me you hate the feel of my hands on your body. Tell me you find me repulsive! Tell me, Kate!'
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