Serpent in Paradise

by Rosemary Carter

  'Yes. And when I want something I make a habit of getting it.' There was something dangerous in his tone.

  'At any cost?' She was breathless.

  'Sometimes. But I do have rules, and I play by them. I wonder if you play by the same rules, Teri?'

  CHAPTER FIVE

  She felt suddenly frightened. There was a harshness in Sloan's tone which she could not explain, a meaning to his words which she did not understand. Whatever it was he was trying to say, it was not clear to her. She was about to ask him what he was getting at when he asked, 'Well, will you have more wine?'

  'No, thanks.'

  'You said you liked it.'

  Perhaps he did not understand her in turn, did not know that her refusal stemmed from the fact that his manner called for defiance.

  'Not that much.'

  He shrugged and put the glass back on the table. 'Round one, two and three to you,' Teri thought as they walked to the door, 'but this round was mine, even if I won it only at the end.'

  The end of what. A battle? Yesterday she had taken his change of mood for a truce. He had been so nice. No, not nice, for that was a word which could never be applied to Sloan. He had been generous to Jill, amusing with Teri herself. Today he had been informative—and seductive. Seductive above all else.

  She had not imagined the message in the spreading fingers, in the eyes that had lingered on her face and body. She had been excited by the message. There had even been a moment, earlier, when if Sloan had tried to kiss her he would have met with no resistance.

  And now it seemed there was a battle after all. Why? she wondered, as they emerged from the cellars and she blinked her eyes against the sudden dazzle of the sun. She could think of nothing she had done to offend Sloan. Except to throw mud at his car. Could he still be nursing a grudge over the incident? Surely not! Sloan was not a man who would sulk or hold on to a grudge. And then again, perhaps he was. It was possible that she had been taken in by the vital appearance, and had misjudged him.

  They came to the horses, and this time Teri mounted quickly, escaping the hands that might otherwise have helped her. She told herself that she did not want to experience their touch again so soon. Preferably never, she amended firmly.

  With the tour of the cellars at an end, she imagined they would ride back the way they had come, but Sloan set his horse in a new direction, and with no orders from Teri the mare followed suit.

  The trail went some way through the vineyards before the scenery changed. They were in open veld now, a windswept area on the slope of a hill. A few stunted trees dotted the slope. Here and there aloes grew, the waxy-tinged flowers a dusty mauve.

  Glancing at the tall figure in front of her, Teri wondered at his thoughts. Since leaving the cellars Sloan had not turned in his seat, had not uttered a word. Why did his moods keep changing? Would she ever grow to understand him? Did she want to?

  Restlessly she shifted position. There were things Sloan did not know about her. He thought that Jill was her child, no doubt he had endowed Teri with an illicit and exciting past. It was time to tell him the truth. Perhaps if he saw that she was honest with him, his own attitude towards her would change.

  They rode farther, and the terrain became more inhospitable. Were they still on Vins Doux land? Even if they were, the tour had obviously ended. Teri wondered why they were going this way.

  At the brow of the hill Sloan halted his horse and turned. Seeing him dismount, Teri did likewise, quickly again, and knew from the twist of his mouth that he understood the reason for her haste.

  A little uneasy all at once, she asked, 'Why did you bring me here?'

  He shrugged and gestured. 'There's a good view of the valley. Not far to walk.'

  The view was indeed good, Teri acknowledged minutes later, as she surveyed a vista of vineyards, stretching as far as the eye could see. Yet she could not shake off the feeling that Sloan had had a motive in bringing her here. There had been other views, not unlike this one…

  She turned her head, suddenly, hoping to catch him unawares. She did not have far to look, because he was close beside her—a little too close for her comfort— and she could see that his eyes were hard.

  'Why did you bring me here?' she asked again.

  'To talk.'

  'About books and music?' she asked lightly, concealing her growing apprehension.

  'Hardly.' The word confirmed what she already knew. Sloan had the look of a man with things on his mind, and a cosy chat was not one of them.

  'I don't think we've anything else to talk about.'

  'And there you're wrong, Teri.' His voice was soft, dangerous.

  Finding herself unequal to holding the gaze of eyes that were now like steel, she looked away. Not far away an eagle soared in the sky, and she envied the bird its freedom. If only she could get away from this spot with the same ease, away from this man!

  It was very quiet on the hill, so quiet that one could hear the wild grasses moving if one listened. What did Sloan want to discuss?

  'The mud I threw at your car. You still haven't forgiven me for that?'

  He gave a short laugh. 'Not on the agenda for today. Though we'll still deal with it.' He paused. When he went on his voice had changed. It had become deadly serious. 'Tell me about your friendship with Emma.'

  This was why he had brought her here? Amazed, she spun round.

  'You know about it already.'

  'Tell me again anyway,' he invited.

  'We met in a supermarket. Emma had fallen and I happened to be there. We became friends. When she decided to return to the Cape she asked me to come with her. That's all there is.'

  'No,' he said, and now his voice was even more dangerous, 'I think there's more.'

  'Perhaps you should tell me,' Teri said after a moment.

  'Perhaps I should. There's a girl in this story, Teri, a girl who's been buying a great many clothes lately, and only the most expensive.'

  Anger stirred in Teri. How dared Sloan appoint himself as judge over what she wore and what she spent!

  'You haven't seen half of them,' she threw at him tautly.

  'I've no doubt that's true. Whose money went into the purchase of those clothes, Teri?'

  'You're suggesting it wasn't my own.'

  'I know it wasn't.'

  'I earned a living before I came here,' she pointed out very quietly, over the anger that was beginning to assume the proportions of a veld-fire.

  'So you did, and you budgeted carefully. The girl who threw mud at my car was furious because her pretty dress was the only good one she possessed.'

  The gist of the conversation was becoming clearer by the minute. 'I could have lied to you about that. You were furious too, and I had to find a reason to excuse my behaviour.'

  'You're still budgeting,' he pointed out. 'You couldn't afford to buy your daughter a small doll. You stint yourself on ice-cream when it's obvious you love it. I think you live from one pay-cheque to the next.'

  'What if I do?' Her voice rose in the anger she could no longer suppress. 'There are millions of women out there who struggle to manage on what they earn. Do you think there's some shame in that, Mr Garfield?'

  'On the contrary, I respect people who work hard for what they have. Who have to balance their priorities.' His tone changed. 'I'd be a fool if I didn't.'

  I'm the fool, she thought bitterly. I fell for what I thought was your generosity—and all the while the whole thing was a trap.

  'You trapped me yesterday,' she said aloud.

  'It didn't start out that way. I don't expect you to believe me.'

  I believed you yesterday. I believed that you bought the doll for Jill just because you wanted to see a small girl happy. I believed that you treated us to the ice-creams for the same reason. Worst of all, when you let down my hair and spoke to me in a special kind of tone, I believed that you found me attractive, desirable. God help me, I believed I'd misjudged you before, I believed that there could be something between you and m
e, something good… I must have been insane!

  'I don't believe you,' she said coolly over the pain in her throat.

  'Emma did buy clothes for you and Jill?'

  'She gave me the money for them, yes.' Teri met Sloan's eyes squarely. 'She wanted us to look nice at Vins Doux, to be dressed appropriately. Is that so difficult to understand?'

  'And you went the whole hog and bought the most expensive things you could find.'

  All along she had got the impression that he was looking at her clothes. Now she knew why.

  'She wanted us to look nice,' she said again.

  'You make it sound so simple.'

  'It is simple.'

  'The way you put it—yes.'

  The blue eyes had lost none of their hardness, the long line of jaw was relentlessly set. Contempt seemed to be etched in every line of the hard-boned tanned face. He was not convinced.

  'Do you think,' Teri asked slowly, disbelievingly, 'that I conned Emma into giving me things?'

  'It has crossed my mind.' Flatly. With no hint of apology.

  This can't be happening to me, Teri thought wildly. Coming to Vins Doux was such a wonderful opportunity, and now it was turning into a nightmare. She looked at Sloan, and to her horror tears filled her eyes before she could do anything to prevent them. She felt her lips quiver.

  My God, he mustn't see me like this, she thought. He mustn't know what he's doing to me.

  Abruptly she bent her head, wishing that her hair hung loose today, for it would conceal her distress.

  She jerked when a hand went beneath her chin. She tried to pull away, but the grip was strong. No seductive tenderness in the fingers this time. Sloan was forcing her to look at him.

  His eyes held a strange expression. The contempt was still there, but there was something else as well, as if Sloan Garfield had caught a glimpse of something he had not expected to see. Teri was too overwrought to put a name to the expression. She did not even try.

  'Let go of me!'

  'The innocent,' he drawled.

  'What!'

  'The picture of distraught young innocence.' His voice became harsh. 'Innocence is the one thing you don't possess, Teri.'

  Just for a moment she was bewildered. And then she realised that he was talking about Jill. All morning she had intended telling him the truth about her sister, but the moment for that had passed. Sloan did not deserve her honesty.

  She forced herself to smile. It was a smile that was totally foreign to her, feminine and provocative and all-knowing. She had no idea that with the tears clinging to her lashes its effect was devastating.

  'You're right, Sloan, I'm not innocent.'

  His voice was harsher than she had heard it. 'Emma must have been a pushover! For a moment you nearly had me fooled.'

  'What a moment that would have been!' She was on dangerous ground now, but anger was spurring her on. 'You're not used to being fooled, are you, Sloan?'

  She was bracing herself for another verbal rebuff, bracing herself to meet it, when merciless hands pulled her up against him. She tried to twist away, and knew the struggle was unequal as she did so. His hands cupped her head, clamping it between his strong palms. He looked down at her a moment, his eyes as searching as if they could see to the depths of her soul. She heard him laugh harshly, and then his mouth had found hers and was savaging it with ruthless intensity. For a moment Teri couldn't think, couldn't breathe. There was only awareness of the cruel mouth on hers, of the hard legs and thighs pushed against her own soft ones. With a rush her senses sprang into vivid life. As his lips forcibly parted hers, she felt dizzy.

  And then, quite suddenly, outrage took over. Later she would wonder why it had taken so long to surface. As Sloan lifted his mouth to breathe it was that outrage which gave her the strength to push herself out of his grip.

  'Was that a demonstration of your brute power?' she demanded over the thunder in her ears.

  Beneath his tan he was a little pale, otherwise he was perfectly composed. 'It's my way of telling you that I'm not a man to be fooled with.'

  Which she knew already. Just as she knew that she had never been quite so excited.

  'And that I won't allow defenceless people to be fooled either,' he added.

  'As I have an eye to the main chance you'll have to watch me carefully, won't you?' she taunted, throwing the words at him as she made for her horse.

  'Wait!' he commanded.

  'Not for you!' she shouted without slowing her step. Lightning-swift, she mounted the mare and spurred her back along the trail. Though she knew that Sloan would catch up with her in minutes she did not stop to look back.

  There was a car in the drive, one she did not recognise. Walking rapidly back to the house from the stables, Teri stopped short. Was Emma Roland entertaining guests?

  Then she remembered Bruce and Virginia, the nephew and niece who were due to arrive today. She had thought they were coming in the late afternoon; obviously they had arrived already.

  Pushing her hands through hair that had loosened from the snood, Teri knew she looked a mess. Not that it mattered that her hair had been tangled by the wind, or that her shirt had worked loose from her jeans, those were imperfections easily excused and explained. Harder to explain were the ravages to her face. A tentative lick at her lips told her they were swollen from Sloan's kisses, and the tears that she had failed to check on the crazy ride back to the house would have made telltale tracks on dusty cheeks.

  She could not put on a pretence of polite sociability for Bruce and Virginia. More important, she could not face Emma. If the elderly woman was tactful enough to withhold comment, one look at Teri's face would lead her to draw conclusions, and essentially they would be the right ones.

  Emma would be upset when she learned of Sloan's behaviour. Nothing could excuse his words or actions. As Emma's employee he would surely be told to pack his bags. Teri tried to suppress the knowledge that Emma held Sloan in great esteem, and that she would be sorry to see the back of him.

  Teri told herself that she did not care what happened to Sloan. He had behaved outrageously, and if he was fired that was no more than he deserved. But she was not quite ready to tell Emma what had happened. First she had to come to terms with certain aspects of the incident in her own mind.

  Hoping she had not already been seen, she changed course and entered the house through a side door. She breathed a little sigh of relief when she reached her room without seeing a soul. For once the sight of the room, with its lovely colour-scheme and beautiful furniture, gave her no joy. Breathing hard, she sank down on her bed—and then jumped to her feet as she remembered Jill. With a little stab of remorse she realised that she had not given the child a thought all morning.

  'Have you made me forget the things that matter, Sloan Garfield?' she asked aloud into the silent room.

  Jill was in the garden. Teri could see her from the window which overlooked a wide stretch of green lawn. Jessie, a quiet sweet-faced maid, was with her, as was a puppy, a gambolling ball of fluff which would soon grow into a pedigree collie. Miffi, the rubber doll—Teri felt a pang of bitterness at sight of her—lay forgotten on the grass, while the puppy and the little girl ran circles around each other. Even from a distance the air rang with the sound of the dog's excited yelping and the laughter of the child. It would be difficult to say which of the two was enjoying the game more.

  It was a game of tag of which neither seemed to tire, and which could have no victory, for the two seemed evenly matched. And then, rather incredibly, Jill managed to catch hold of the puppy's tail, and the resulting excitement increased in pitch. Through the rawness of her own emotions Teri smiled.

  Leaving the window, she sat down at the dressing-table. The face that stared back at her was that of a stranger. More than the dishevelled hair and swollen lips which she had expected, it was the eyes which she did not recognise. There was a wildness in them, and also a hunger. There was turbulence in those eyes, and emotions which looked li
ke erupting.

  This can't be me! Teri thought, appalled, staring at the furious sensuous being in the mirror. I've never looked like this in my life. And she knew that there had never before been a Sloan Garfield in her life. There had never been a man who could make her feel quite so vitally alive as she had been in those moments when he had kissed her.

  There had never been a man whom she so hated.

  Picking up her brush, she began to restore her hair to its usual smoothness with long fierce strokes. The repetition of the movement had a calming effect, and slowly the wildness began to fade from her eyes, if not from her soul.

  On her way to the room she had thought she would leave Vins Doux, but on reflection she knew she would not do so. She had made a commitment to Emma Roland, and it would not be fair to her friend to leave her now. Nor would it be fair to Jill to take her from this place where in so short a time she was' already beginning to show signs of getting better.

  But is it fair that I should have to stay? a small voice asked. Fair that at best my peace of mind will be shattered, at worst my world might never be quite the same again?

  The brush-strokes became fiercer still as Teri pushed the stirrings of self-pity from her mind. She had never been a quitter, why start now? Besides, if she were to leave Vins Doux, Sloan would know why, and the knowledge would give him satisfaction. That would not do. She would have to make the best of things—given the beauty of Vins Doux, surely only a determined martyr would find that a difficult feat.

  Fighting spirit to the fore now, she showered, and exchanged jeans and shirt for a pale blue sun-dress. Then she left the house and gathered a protesting Jill for her midday nap.

  The little girl settled, Teri went in search of Emma and found her in the sun-room where lunch had been served the previous day.

  'Enjoy your tour with Sloan?' Emma looked up from the wall-hanging, two rows of which had already been hooked.

  After just a moment's hesitation, Teri said carefully, 'It was very interesting.'

  The older woman's eyes skimmed her face a moment, then returned to her work as she said, 'I'm glad. As time passes I hope you'll learn a lot more about wine-making.'