On legs that shook a little, she hurried up the dark-oak crimson-carpeted stairs to the pleasant, lattice-windowed room she’d had since childhood.
“It wouldn’t be wise to worry your father...” While she showered the quiet warning kept ricocheting around her mind, making her wonder if Nick knew something her father was keeping from her.
Well, it was no use getting worked up about it, Raine told herself firmly, but at the first opportunity she’d have a word with Dr Broadbent.
Hands unsteady, she pulled on a silky lilac dress with a matching jacket and, to counteract Nick’s intimidating height, high-heeled sandals.
Too het up to bother with make-up, she pulled a comb through her smooth, glossy, below shoulder-length hair and picked up her bag; she was ready.
Quick as she’d been, Nick was waiting for her in the hall. He’d changed into a well-cut, lightweight suit and a pearl-grey tie, and his thick blond mane was parted on the left and neatly brushed.
Standing arrogantly at ease, head tilted a little, one hand thrust into his trouser pocket, he watched her come down the stairs, long-legged and elegant, her slender body moving gracefully.
‘Full marks for speed...’ he commented with satisfaction. Then, tilting her chin with a proprietorial hand, he studied her exquisitely boned face with its black winged brows and wide-spaced almond eyes, straight nose and generous mouth.
His gaze lingered on her mouth.
‘Don’t!’ she said sharply.
‘You have no lipstick to smudge...’
She froze into immobility and closed her eyes as his mouth moved closer and hovered. But the kiss never came. With delicate cruelty he nipped her full lower lip between his white teeth.
When her lids flew open, he said flatly, ‘Even without make-up you’re still the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.’
Badly shaken, she tried mockery. ‘In a minute you’ll be telling me Kevin’s a lucky man.’
‘That’s a matter of opinion. Personally, I rate the willingness to trust a great deal higher than looks.’
The chilling put-down was delivered with a complete lack of emotion. Still it stung.
Jerking free, she retorted, ‘Was I the only one who was expected to trust you? Or did you ask your fiancée to trust you too?’
His mouth thinned. ‘I would have explained how things were if you’d given me a chance, instead of running out on me.’
‘Apart from admitting you were an unprincipled swine, how would you have “explained” seducing me while you were engaged to another woman?’
‘Hardly seducing you,’ he drawled. ‘As I recall, you were more than willing.’
Her face flamed. Unable to deny the charge, she said tightly, ‘But then I had no idea what you were really like.’
‘And you didn’t stop to find out. You weren’t prepared to even listen, let alone trust me.’
The accusation was full of anger and contempt. In that instant she knew that if he had any feeling for her now, it was hatred.
Well, that made them equal, she thought bitterly.
He lifted broad shoulders in a shrug. ‘However, that’s all in the past. It’s the future I’m concerned with, and what I want from you now doesn’t include trust.’
‘What do you want from me?’
‘Nothing you haven’t already given me.’
That sardonic statement made her blood run cold. ‘If you think—’
‘I think we’d better get going,’ he broke in crisply, ‘before we lose our table.’
With a compelling arm at her waist, he escorted her across the hall, pausing only to open the door to the living room and call pleasantly, ‘We’re just off.’
Ralph lifted an acknowledging hand. ‘Enjoy yourselves.’
The sun had set, and the scented air was still and velvety. Bats were flittering in the gathering dusk as they made their way to the stable block.
Nick’s rented silver BMW was standing on the gravel driveway. With ironic courtesy he opened the door and helped Raine in, before sliding in beside her and fastening his seat belt.
Staring straight ahead through the windscreen, she wished she’d had the courage to tell him to go to hell and refuse to come. But he had a kind of quiet forcefulness, an inborn air of command, that made him a difficult man to stand up to.
Oh, come off it! she told herself scathingly, all at once impatient with her own cowardice. It was more than that. She was scared stiff of him.
Scared of his anger—just one narrow-eyed look could make her feel as though he’d backed her into a corner with his hand against her throat—and even more scared of his overwhelming attraction. His lightest touch could send her senses reeling and make her body long for his.
‘Fasten your seat belt,’ he instructed, and, when she made no immediate move to obey, he leaned over to find the buckle and snap it into place. As he did so his hand accidentally brushed her breast.
With a strangled gasp, she flinched away.
All movement stilled, watching her half-averted face, he remarked reflectively, ‘You used to like me to touch your breasts.’
When, her breath caught in her throat, she said nothing, he deliberately stroked his fingers over the soft curve, smiling when her nipple firmed betrayingly beneath his light touch. ‘It seems you still do.’
‘No! I...I hate you to touch me...’
But his insolent caress had made her heart start to race, and the blood pounding in her ears almost drowned out the desperate protest.
His expression mocking, he withdrew his hand. ‘Later on I’ll put that statement to the test.’
Those soft words sounded remarkably like a threat, and she shuddered as he started the car and, tyres crunching on the gravel, they moved away.
The Priest House lay just over Sley Bridge on the outskirts of Lopsley, and the ten-minute drive was made in silence. To Raine, with every nerve in her body painfully aware of the big, loose-limbed formidable man by her side, it seemed like hours.
In the deep blue dusk the lantern-lit black and white half-timbered building, with its thatched roof and twisted chimneys, seemed to belong to a fairytale.
Tubs of autumn flowers glowed as if they were fluorescent, and yellow lamplight spilled from doors and casements open to the balmy evening air.
Their candlelit table was by the window in one of a series of tiny rooms—little more than compartments--that led into each other. The only other table the room contained was empty and bore a reserved notice.
They were served with an excellent dry sherry—“compliments of mine host”—while they studied the leather-backed menu.
‘What do you fancy?’ Nick asked.
Raine, who had never felt less like eating, replied, ‘I don’t really know.’ Conscious of the discreetly hovering waiter, she added, ‘Perhaps you could order for us both?’
He did so with aplomb, recalling, it seemed, all her likes and dislikes.
As soon as the waiter had moved away she leaned forward, but before she could ask the question hovering on the tip of her tongue, Nick shook his head. ‘We’ll eat first and then talk.’
She bit her lip, hating his easy command of the situation, the way he could keep her on the rack.
For the look of the thing they might have made polite, general conversation, but, taking him at his word, she remained silent, staring fixedly out of the window. If the waiter thought they’d quarrelled, so what?
Both the food and the wine were first class, but Raine scarcely tasted either, eating little and drinking less. Only too aware of Nick’s eyes on her face, his critical appraisal, she had to make a real effort of will not to look at him.
Not until the coffee had been served and they were alone, did he enquire coolly, ‘Well, Raine?’
Her nerves skittered wildly. She took a deep, calming breath and lifted her chin. ‘I’d like to know what kind of game you’re playing.’ Ignoring the mocking twist of his lips, she went on doggedly, ‘So now you’ve had your fun, perhap
s you’ll—’
‘Oh, the fun is still to come.’ Cutting off her words with the skill of a surgeon wielding a knife, he allowed his eyes to drop briefly but meaningfully to the soft curves lovingly outlined by the crossover bodice of her dress.
Then, watching her face grow hot, he continued tauntingly, ‘And I’m looking forward to it immensely. If there’s one thing you can’t be faulted on, it’s the passionate way you respond.’
What he seemed to be implying she refused even to think about. Reminding herself that it was only a month to her wedding, she tried desperately to fill her mind with images of Kevin. But, like a hollow man, nothing of substance was there. Even his features remained vague, indistinct, making him seem no longer real.
As though he knew, Nick smiled a little, before going on, ‘And as for what kind of game I’m playing... It’s no game. I’ve never been more serious in my life. Nor more impatient. Already I’ve waited for what seems an age.’
Mouth desert-dry, she asked, ‘Waited for what?’
He moved his head and the light made his midnight-blue eyes gleam silver. ‘You.’
Her heart lurched sickeningly. Endeavouring to sound unconcerned, even slightly amused, as though she thought he was joking, she said, ‘Bearing in mind that I’m getting married in a month, haven’t you left it a little late?’
‘Would it have made any difference if I’d come earlier?’
‘No!’ The answer was swift and uncompromising.
‘I rather thought not. Last time I came over you ran and hid, like the little coward you are.’
Fighting back, she snapped, ‘Call me a coward if you like, but tomorrow I’m going up to London and I intend to stay there until the wedding. So if you have anything to say, it had better be now.’
‘I’ve plenty to say,’ he announced grimly, ‘and the first thing is, you’re not going anywhere.’
‘You can’t stop me.’ They were bold words, and she wished she felt as confident as she sounded.
‘Don’t bet on it.’
She tried to scoff. ‘You’ll be telling me next that I’m not getting married.’
‘You’re not getting married. At least, not to Kevin.’
A chill which had nothing to do with the night breeze that made the candle-flame flicker goose-fleshed her skin. ‘What do you mean, “not to Kevin”?’
‘I mean you’re going to end your engagement and marry me.’ He sounded so calm, so matter-of-fact, that his words took a moment or two to sink in fully.
‘You must be out of your mind if you think—’ Raine broke off and, grasping at her self-control, counted to ten. Then, as though she were talking to a not very bright child, she said carefully, ‘Six months ago Kevin proposed to me, and I accepted.’
When Nick continued to look completely unmoved, she added cuttingly, ‘I know an engagement means very little to you, but to me it’s a solemn promise.’
‘I’m afraid it’s a promise you’ll have to break.’
‘As you broke yours?’ Seeing a muscle jerk in his cheek as he clenched his teeth, she pressed home her advantage, deliberately needling him, though she knew it was dangerous. ‘I gather you and Tina never did get married?’
Remembering with a strange pang how Tina’s pale, pretty face had lit up every time she’d mentioned Nick, Raine pursued, ‘I know she absolutely adored you, so let me guess... Someone told her what a two-timing swine you were? Or you got bored with her uncritical devotion and walked out on her?’
Nick’s eyes darkened to obsidian and his beautiful mouth compressed. Stonily, he said, ‘Wrong on all counts. No one told her anything, and I didn’t walk out on her. We were married just before Christmas.’
Shock hit Raine with the force of a fist. Still reeling from the blow, she stammered, ‘B-but if you’re already married...’
‘I’m a widower,’ he informed her bleakly.
‘What?’ she breathed incredulously.
His face a tight mask of pain, he said, ‘Tina died’ ‘I’m sorry. I’m truly sorry. I had no idea...’
‘Of course you had no idea. You wouldn’t listen, wouldn’t let me explain. But without being aware of the facts you’re quite happy to make snide remarks and—’
‘I’ve told you, I’m sorry,’ she broke in desperately. ‘I wouldn’t have been such a bitch if I’d known...’ Then she said shakily, ‘Nick, won’t you explain now?’
‘No, I won’t. You had your chance and threw it away. From now on you’ll simply do what I tell you. Everything I tell you,’ he added with emphasis.
Alarmed afresh, she insisted, ‘But you can’t be serious about me ending my engagement?’
‘I’m deadly serious.’
‘Please, Nick,’ she found herself pleading, ‘you don’t understand. It’s three months since we set a firm date for the wedding. Things have gone much too far...I—I couldn’t possibly end it now.’
Coolly, he said, ‘Then I’ll have to make sure that Somersby does.’
‘Oh? And how will you do that?’ Words and tone challenged him.
‘If necessary I’ll tell him all about us—about what happened last fall.’
She might have expected it. ‘Do you think that will make him ask for his ring back?’
Nick smiled grimly. ‘Don’t you?’
Oh, yes. She knew Kevin’s view—or were they his mother’s?—on “casual” or even premarital sex only too well. Though it had never been openly stated, he was expecting a virgin bride, and, feeling guilty at deceiving him, she had prayed he would never suspect the truth.
When, pearly teeth biting into her lower lip, she remained silent, Nick insisted, ‘Don’t you, Raine?’
After a moment she said weakly, ‘He loves me.’
‘But not deeply. I believe he’s too shallow and inhibited to have very strong feelings. It’s more the idea of a “suitable” wife he’s enamoured of. A beautiful, undemanding, obedient wife, who will give him children without too much physical or emotional involvement.’
That reading of Kevin’s character and his reasons for marrying was close enough to Raine’s own unadmitted assessment to make her cringe.
Yet that was the kind of calm, dispassionate marriage she’d been looking forward to, she reminded herself fiercely. She’d had enough of being torn apart by passion and pain...
But Nick was going on, ‘To put it bluntly, your aristocratic fiancé is a cold fish, and, if I’m forced to let him know what a passionate lover you are, as well as shocking him, it will probably frighten him half to death. So perhaps it would be less traumatic all round to simply tell him that you’ve made a mistake?’
Slender hands clenched together, she whispered, ‘I can’t... I don’t want to...’
‘Well, one way or another I intend to see the engagement is broken.’
‘Even if it is, I’ll never marry you.’
With easy assurance, Nick insisted, ‘Oh, I think you will.’
A cold fear spread through her and she shivered uncontrollably. Spotting the betraying movement, he smiled.
Somehow she fought the urge to jump up, to run and keep running. Clinging doggedly to some semblance of calm, she queried, ‘Would you mind telling me why?’
‘Because you love your father.’
‘If you think I’m going to marry you just because Dad would like me to...’
‘No, because I would like you to.’
‘I don’t want to marry you,’ she cried. ‘I detest you.’
‘Our feelings for each other seem to be mutual,’ he told her trenchantly. ‘However, I still want you for my wife.’
In a choked voice she protested, ‘I’ve no intention of taking Tina’s place.’
‘Don’t worry, you won’t.’ His tone flayed her. ‘Tina was very special.’
‘Then why do you want to marry me? I don’t understand why.’
But suddenly she understood all too well. Nick was still mourning his dead wife, and he only wanted her, Raine, as a sexual substitute.
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The next moment he confirmed her unspoken conclusion by saying, ‘Because I need you in my bed. Ever since you ran out on me I can’t get you out of my mind.’ Just for an instant bitterness and some other emotion, keenly felt, showed through. ‘It’s as though I’m under a spell, and the only way I can think of to break it is to marry you and sate myself with you until the enchantment wears off.’
When she flinched, he added tauntingly, ‘And the fact that you hate me will only add spice to our relationship.’
Raine felt sick and churning inside. Their last encounter had stripped her of all self-respect and left her an emotional cripple. The kind of relationship he was talking about now would almost certainly destroy her.
And, hating his own reluctant enslavement, he wouldn’t care a jot.
It took a moment or two to control the growing panic and realise she was being a fool. Though he could almost certainly wreck her engagement, there was no way he could make her marry him.
Relief was flowing in like a warm tide when she recalled his earlier words, “I hold the whip hand,” and the warmth slowly turned to ice. He wasn’t a man to make a statement like that without reason.
With a kind of terrified fascination, a feeling of fatalism, she could sense a fine mesh of steel closing round her and imagine her own futile struggles...
Reading her cornered expression, he smiled grimly and remarked, ‘You seem to be getting the idea.’
Trying to mask her fear, Raine retorted, ‘I’m getting tired of playing games. It’s high time you told me exactly—’ She broke off as a lively party of four came in and, laughing and joking, were shown to the other table in the room.
‘I think a change of venue is called for,’ Nick said quietly, and signalled for the bill. As soon as it was paid, he escorted her out to the silver BMW, a hand beneath her elbow.
His touch was anathema to her, but, symptomatic of her feeling of being hopelessly trapped, she made no attempt to pull free.
It was a beautiful night, moonlit and starry. A sedate little breeze stirred the trailing ivy and ruffled Raine’s half-fringe then, getting more adventurous, sent a few puffs of grey wispy cloud drifting across the deep blue sky like smoke signals.
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