Buck looked disconcerted. “It would be rude... I don’t want to offend them.”
“And not offending a potential business contact is more important to you than how I feel?”
“Sugar...”
“Don’t ‘sugar’ me, Buck. I’ve been through a lot and I hurt...” Another lie. “...and I’m just not comfortable here, and I’m really upset that you think so little of my feelings. Besides, we have to go to town. Won’t the police want to talk to me?”
“Oh, the police have already been here, while you were asleep.” Buck’s face cleared with the obvious dismissal of one problem. “Señor Arvisu talked to them for you.”
Cara’s eyes widened. “What? That’s not legal.”
“Honey, apparently what he says down here is legal.”
“Where are my clothes?”
“What?”
“My clothes. I want to get dressed.”
“I threw your dress away,” said Señora Arvisu, standing in the open doorway. “It was filthy and torn beyond redemption.” Her voice was redolent of disapproval.
How long had she been there? Cara wondered. And, more importantly, how much had she heard?
It didn’t matter. Cara threw back the bedcovers and stood up, pleased that she didn’t feel the least bit shaky or weak. “Then may I please borrow another, Señora Arvisu?”
“You are most dreadfully hard on clothes,” that august lady replied.
As if it mattered to her, Cara thought resentfully. Paris gowns, a palatial mansion, a private army, and she’s concerned about a couple of cheap cotton dresses.
“I will send you replacements as soon as I get to town,” Cara replied with as much dignity as she could muster, then added spitefully, “I cannot guarantee the colors or patterns will be identical, but perhaps a third dress will erase the debt?”
“Cara!” Buck gasped, shocked.
A stain of color rose and fell behind the señora’s flawless olive skin, but her haughty expression did not change. “That will not be necessary. The doctor advised bed rest for at least two more days...”
“Doctor?”
“He was here while you were out, honey.” Buck’s tone was placating. He could have added, See what good care they’re trying to give you?, but he didn’t.
“Did Señor Arvisu talk to him for me, too?” Cara asked sweetly. “Perhaps I should ask him how I’m feeling.”
“Enough!” snapped Señora Arvisu in a terrible voice. “I will not have you speaking so disrespectfully...”
“Then you will have no problems with sending me back to Puerto Vallarta!” Cara snapped right back.
“Cara!” Buck cried in genuine distress, simultaneously with the señora’s impassioned “Town? Impossible!”
“What is the meaning of all this noise?”
Perhaps Señor Arvisu didn’t approve of a man being in a woman’s bedroom, but his scruples certainly didn’t stop him from standing outside and staring. Trailed by a couple of tame guards, he stood in the hallway, surrounded by a blue cloud of cigar smoke, while his gaze covered every inch of Cara with unrepentant curiosity. His lewdly appreciative grin made Cara uncomfortably aware of how fluidly the soft cotton of her gown clung to her curves. She had to fight the impulse to cover herself with her hands.
“Jaime...” the señora began, followed by a spate of rapid, staccato Spanish, but her husband cut her off with a curt wave of his hand.
“I see our lovely guest has recovered...” His thick pink tongue passed over his bulbous lips, leaving them as wet and shiny as a snail’s trail. “How are you feeling, my dear?”
“Perfectly well, Señor Arvisu,” Cara replied civilly. “I’d like to ask you...”
“Señorita, you can ask me anything.” His oily smile widened.
“Are we prisoners here?”
Even behind his screening dark glasses, she could see his eyes open wide with surprise. “Prisoners? Of course not.”
“Thank you. Could you please make arrangements for us to be taken into town? Immediately, if possible?”
“I was hoping that you could stay a while...”
Inwardly Cara shivered. Maybe he had scruples about being in a woman’s bedroom, but she’d bet money it would be an entirely different story if it were his bedroom! And she’d also bet it wouldn’t be the first time; she could almost hear Señora Arvisu seething.
“I was, too...” Cara said slowly and with only a slight prick of conscience; after so many lies, what were one or two more? “But there are things that demand my attention. Perhaps we could return when the situation is not quite so...” She left the implication hanging for him to think whatever he liked.
Apparently Señor Arvisu liked what he thought, for his smile widened. “You are welcome at any time, Señorita Waters.” Without even bothering to look, he gave a quick sharp order in Spanish that sent one of the waiting flunkies running. “I will escort you in myself.”
At that, his wife’s eyes blazed, but as she was slightly in front of him, he could only have been aware of her soft, dulcet tones as she spoke in breathless Spanish.
True regret tinged his voice as he turned a sorrowful gaze back to Cara. “I am sorry. My dear wife has just reminded me that I have a meeting this afternoon, which I cannot miss, so I must entrust you to Enrico, my personal equerry. The car will be waiting at the front door in just a few minutes. Enrico will see that your luggage is loaded and you can leave at any time that pleases you.”
“Luggage?” Cara asked.
“Yes... your brave young cavalier brought it with him when it was decided that Casa de los Arboles…here, our home…should be the center of the search for you.” He gave a genuine smile; it made him look like a slightly naughty cherub. “Ah, the excitement. I remember when I was with the Ministry...”
Cara turned to Buck, regarding him with quizzical eyes. “You packed my things? And you brought them here? What if I had gone back to the hotel?”
“Honey...”
“I will have your bag sent up,” the señora said through clenched teeth. “You will be in Puerto Vallarta well before time for dinner. Perhaps this time, Señor Tarrant, you will take better care of her.”
“I intend to,” Buck replied sincerely.
Chapter Seven
“You still haven’t answered my question.”
Buck only kissed her forehead and tightened his grip around Cara’s shoulders. It seemed that he had been touching her every minute since they climbed into the Arvisus’ Mercedes. In spite of his unconcern about anything except the social forms, Cara had not really relaxed until the big car had crept into the outskirts of Puerto Vallarta. Only when they had reached the hotel had her nameless fears started to seem silly. True to the señora’s prediction, they had arrived in town well before the dinner hour and Buck had agreed enthusiastically when she had expressed a desire to spend the dying afternoon lying mindlessly on the crowded beach.
Both their rooms were still available, and Cara was less than enthusiastic about that. Buck’s loving presence was comforting, a buffer against an inexplicably hostile world. She didn’t want to lose it, especially at night. Somehow, not even the impersonal hotel room seemed safe; she had decided that while changing into her bathing suit.
“What question was that, sugar?”
“My luggage. Why did you pack it and take it to the Arvisus?”
“I told you, honey... I wanted you to have something to change into when we found you.”
“But that doesn’t make sense...”
“At least you didn’t have to come back in that nightgown...” Chuckling, Buck pulled her close. “It was hardly decent. Did you see old Jaime ogling you? I thought the señora would scratch your eyes out before she got him away from that door.”
The unjust illogic of that statement irked Cara, but she wasn’t going to be distracted. “But what if I had gotten back to town and you and my luggage were all out in the country?”
Twisting on the sand, Buck rested on one e
lbow, his face only inches above Cara’s. “Sugar, I know looking back now it doesn’t make much sense, but at the time I wasn’t making much sense. You were just gone without a word... at first I thought you had just left me...” There was a most unmanly quaver in his voice. With one finger, he tentatively followed the outline of her jaw and throat as if reassuring himself that she was really there.
“Oh, Buck! I would never...” Cara cried, touched beyond all reason. “I love you!”
“And...I love you.” The words came softly, hesitantly. “And the thought that you were out there, somewhere, and that man had you...When the police said that the Arvisus had reported a couple who had been in an accident...I didn’t think it could be you, since they said they appeared to be a happy couple, but when they described you...” He laughed self-consciously, as if to break a mood that he found uncomfortable, and twisted one of Cara’s curls around his finger. “I knew that there couldn’t be two lost women with hair the color of the sunset and that meant you were in trouble. When the Arvisus asked if I wanted to make their home the center of the search, all I could think of was having everything you might need there...”
“Oh, Buck...” Cara repeated.
“You see,” Buck went on after bending down for a quick kiss, “I wasn’t thinking straight...but then I never do when I think of you...” His arms tightened around her, pulling her close.
Cara molded against him as if her body had been softened and melted by the sun. She opened her lips to receive his kiss, but instead his mouth sought her ear, sucking gently at the lobe, then sliding down her neck to the hollow of her collarbone. It tickled, and Cara felt vaguely disappointed. Shouldn’t there be something more to an intimate caress like that other than just the touch of flesh on flesh?
“Golly, it’s good to have you back!” he said with a boyish grin, abruptly pulling back and planting a hasty, boyish smack on her lips. “Want to go swimming and cool down? This sun is about to broil me!”
The last thing on Cara’s mind was cooling down, so she forcibly reminded herself that this was a public beach. She struggled to bring herself back to the here and now. Thanks to Buck, she was here now, and thanks to him she had a bright future. She would be greedy to want to savor it all at once.
But she did want to, all at once and now. In her deepest soul, Cara knew that only Buck’s love, full, complete, and passionate, could completely banish the haunting specter of a kidnapper’s kiss.
“Who was he?”
“Huh?”
“The man who kidnapped me. Who was he?”
“Sugar, you were the one with him for all that time. What did you say his name was?”
“Dave Burkhart.”
Buck thought seriously for a moment. “The guy from your company who was following you around?”
“But you were the one he talked about so viciously. It wasn’t just palavering, either. He called you by name.”
Buck shrugged and looked longingly out over the sunset-tinted water. “Honey, I never was one of the superstars of football, but I did have a good career. I played with three teams and had a pretty good name. Maybe he’s some kind of football nut. People who are even semi-famous have to live with the risk of people like that.”
“But you haven’t played football in years.”
“Who knows what triggers nut cases like that, sugar? If he’s a crazy man, he’s a crazy man. Now come on... let’s get that swim.”
That answer didn’t satisfy Cara, and she knew Buck knew it, but she also knew that as far as he was concerned, the subject was closed. Already he was on his feet, hand extended to pull her up. Cara gestured toward her freshly bandaged foot.
“I don’t want to get it wet.”
“Aw, seawater’s good for what ails you.”
She shook her head. “No, not tonight. You go on,” she added unnecessarily to Buck’s retreating back.
Buck plunged into the water with the unselfconscious exuberance of a child. Propping herself on her elbows Cara watched him swim out with powerful strokes. Even though the beach crowd was thinning out with the imminent sunset, Cara could also see the favorable reaction from the women left on the beach. A spiky ripple of jealousy went through her. But she could hardly blame them; Buck was the best looking man there. Cara even wished his swimsuit was a little less skimpy. Speedo bikinis were a little too little for her tastes, revealing far too much of his muscled, manly physique.
So why was she haunted by the memory of a slender man in plain white cotton trousers a couple of sizes too small?
Could it be the Stockholm Syndrome? One of the TV newsmagazines had carried a segment on it not long ago; at the time, Cara had been highly skeptical that a hostage could come to side with their captor. Now...
Now she was less sure. Dave Burkhart had kidnapped her, scared her to death, dragged her by a rope through some of the most horrible, bug-infested jungle she had ever seen, and yet she couldn’t get him out of her mind.
He had also, some treacherous part of her mind whispered, aroused her like she had never been before, had made her feel more of a sensuous woman than she ever had before, even with the good and decent man she loved.
Cold water splashed over Cara, startling her.
“Hey! Where are you? Come back, sweet thing...” Towering over her, Buck was vigorously rubbing himself with a towel as the water, caught in a trick of the evening light, sheeted over his taut, muscular body like liquid silver.
Cara practically drooled. He was gorgeous...
But, that same small part of her mind asked insidiously, is he truly the other half of my heart?
Ruthlessly and deliberately, Cara choked off such traitorous thoughts. “Just daydreaming.”
“‘Bout ready to change for supper? I thought we’d try that open-air place on the island...the one we read about. The one with all the iguanas around...”
If there were anything Cara did not want to face tonight, it was a herd of ugly lizards, even if they were in cages!
Extending her hand, she allowed Buck to help her up. He did more than that, though. In one fluid motion, he pulled her to her feet, enveloped her in his muscular arms, and lowered his lips to hers. Cara leaned against him, absorbing the pressure of his lips against hers as if it were a lifeline.
“Wow!” she murmured a minute later, leaning breathlessly against him as the world swam around her. Surrounded by his arms, his love, she felt her shell of fear begin to shatter and flake away. If he could make the heavens move like that with a simple, closed-mouth kiss, what could he do...? Inwardly she blushed at her own thoughts. Yes, Buck was right; heavy experimenting like that was best restricted to those who were committed to each other!
Determinedly, Cara fought the memories of the electric feelings Dave Burkhart’s touch had ignited in her, feelings that made Buck’s kiss, as enjoyable as it was, pale by comparison.
“I was so frightened when I couldn’t find you,” he whispered into her hair. “I couldn’t think of anything but where you were and what was happening to you...”
Cara’s heart filled and overflowed. This was love, not groping, probing, and all the stuff that Dave Burkhart had tried to do to her. Her reaction to him had been purely animal instinct, nothing more; this was...better, somehow, higher and purer. And the other feelings would come, yes, they would come in their proper time...
“I tried to get back to you,” she whispered back, tears of remembered frustration rising in her eyes. “I tried, but I couldn’t get away...”
“Shush, sugar, shush. You’re here now, and I’ll not let you get away again.” He gave her a quick hug and stepped back. “Hey, you’re all wet.”
Suddenly bereft, Cara gave a shaky laugh. “That’s what happens when a mere mortal is embraced by a sea god.”
“So I’m a sea god, am I? Thanks for the promotion, honey. Here, put this around you. We don’t want you to catch cold, do we?”
“If I do, will you warm me up?”
Buck planted a chaste kiss o
n her forehead. “Every time. Now what say we put on some clothes and go out to dinner? I’m starving!”
“Buck, would you mind very much if we didn’t go out tonight?”
“Aren’t you hungry, sugar?”
Silly question. After those hungry, thirsty days in the jungle, Cara had to deliberately stop herself from gorging all the time. “I’m starved, but I don’t really want to go out. Can’t we order up from room service?”
If it had been anyone else, Cara would have sworn Buck looked as uncomfortable as an adolescent.
“Boy, sugar, you sure know how to tempt a man... I don’t know if I could trust myself...”
Cara almost ground her teeth. “Buck, I’ve had a very bad time, and all I want to do is be alone with the man I love.” A tiny, unplanned sob escaped. “I want you to hold me and comfort me and make me feel safe again...”
Instantly Buck caught her in his arms and pulled her close. “Aw, honey, I didn’t know you felt like that. You seemed so calm...”
“I’m a good actress.” The little sob had grown into a fresh set of tears. “I’m not strong, Buck; I’ve been kidnapped and scared to death and all I want to do is be with you...”
“That’s really flattering, honey,” Buck said in a slow, odd voice. His hand slowly stroked her hair as he pressed her head against his shoulder. “I never thought of it like that. Yeah, we can order up dinner. Time enough for partying tomorrow night, or even the night after. Tonight, it’s just us.”
* * * * *
Even with both the hallway and patio doors securely locked, Cara felt uncomfortable after Buck left. She wedged the coffee table tightly against the sliding glass so that it would only open a few inches even if it were forced and shoved the vanity chair up under the hallway doorknob. Then, surveying her handiwork, she felt sublimely silly, but not silly enough to undo it until she had showered and dressed in a floaty cotton sundress of sea-foam green and fragile, elegant sandals of gilded leather. Only at his cheery, “Hey, sugar, it’s me,” did she remove the chair and open the door.
“Hi...come in.”
The Other Half of Your Heart Page 9