‘Yes, I have.’ He had one arm bent behind his head and he cupped her shoulder with his free hand and slid his finger beneath the broad lacy strap of her sleepwear. ‘Have you?’
‘Mmm… With my parents when I was sixteen. I loved it. Sadly, however, the whole experience was so momentous, I made myself sick.’
A smile flickered across his lips. ‘That could have been the Egyptian version of Delhi belly.’
She bent her knees and crossed her ankles in the air. ‘I think Africa would suit you,’ she told him reflectively, ‘or would have in times gone past.’
‘I do remind you of Dr Livingstone? How?’ he queried amusedly.
‘No. But maybe Denys Finch-Hatton. I’ve seen his grave in the Ngong Hills, you know.’
‘Same trip?’
She nodded. ‘And Karen Blixen’s house. It’s preserved in her memory. The Danish government gave it to the Kenyan government on independence. She’s a bit of a hero of mine.’
He turned his head towards her. ‘Are you trying to tell me I’m a disappointment to you because I’m no Denys Finch-Hatton?’ he queried gravely.
She denied this seriously. ‘Not at all.’
‘You did say something about taking me for a more physical guy.’
Maggie curled her toes. ‘I just got that impression—well, yes, it presented itself to me in the form of hunting wild animals, crewing racing yachts et cetera, but translated it seemed to me that you liked to test yourself to the limit.’
He was silent for an age, just stroking her shoulder, then, ‘In lots of ways I do—and did. When I started out, using the bank’s money, not mine, I took some huge gambles. I often had to strain every nerve just to keep my head above water.’
‘Did you enjoy that?’
He grinned fleetingly. ‘There were times when I was scared to death, but on the whole, I guess I did.’
‘So I was right about you all along,’ she said with deep satisfaction.
‘Wise as well as beautiful…’ He drew the strap of her top down. ‘Striking as this outfit is, I’ve got the feeling it’s going to get in my way.’
Maggie flipped over onto her back and sat upright. ‘This outfit’ was a camisole pyjama top in topaz silk edged with ivory lace and a matching pair of boxer shorts.
‘That could be remedied.’ She slipped the top off over her head.
He watched her as she sat straight-backed with her legs crossed, like a naked ivory statue in the moonlight, slim, beautifully curved, grave, young and gorgeous. Her hair was tied up loosely with wavy tendrils escaping down her neck.
He sat up abruptly. ‘If we changed the location slightly, moved this raft east across the desert sands, say, I could be the Sheik of Araby and you could be a candidate for my harem.’
Maggie’s lashes fluttered and she turned to him with an incredulous look, but a little pulse beating rather rapidly at the base of her throat.
‘Jack! That’s very—fanciful.’
He grimaced. ‘Surprised you?’
‘Uh—’ she licked her lips ‘—yes.’
He shook his head wryly. ‘I’ve surprised myself, but that’s how you make me feel at this moment and you were the one who put us in another spot in the first place.’
She thought for a moment, then bowed her head. ‘Do I qualify?’
‘Oh, yes, fiery little one,’ he drawled. ‘You do.’
‘Fiery?’ She lifted her head.
He touched one nipple, then the other, then he trailed his fingers down her spine towards her bottom. ‘Fiery, delicious, peachy—definitely peachy. I knew I was right about that even if I couldn’t understand it at the time.’
‘Right?’ She looked confused. ‘What do you mean?’
He laughed softly. ‘Don’t worry about it. Come here.’
She moved into his arms and not much later he made exquisite love to her in the moonlight, on their raft anchored in the sands of Araby.
Two things Jack touched on during his visits were rather surprising. His latest development project, a retirement village, and the property he’d bought.
‘Not the one with a shed hijacked to hide some vintage vehicles, the one I locked us into?’ she said, her eyes wide with surprise as she unconsciously repeated how he’d described it the last time it had been mentioned between them. ‘I happen to know it’s been sold to a company, Hanson Limited, or something like that.’
‘It’s one of my companies.’
It was a Sunday morning and he’d arrived just as she was starting a late breakfast. He wore a navy tracksuit and running shoes, his hair was windblown and he was glowing with vim and vigour.
‘Good,’ he added as he sat down at her breakfast table. ‘I’m starving.’
‘What have you been doing?’ Maggie asked as she got out more plates and cutlery.
‘A two-mile jog down Main Beach.’
‘Then you might need something more substantial.. like steak and eggs.’ She looked at him humorously.
He scanned the table. There was yoghurt and fruit, rolls and jam and, striking a slightly discordant note, a steaming bowl of chicken noodle soup.
He eyed it. ‘Going for oriental cuisine, Maggie?’
She shrugged. ‘I just get this incredible craving for chicken noodle soup. It can happen to me at any time of the day or night.’
‘Out of a packet?’
‘Oh, no. I make it myself so I can keep the level of salt down and there are no preservatives. I’m taking very good care of your unborn baby, Jack.’
He laughed. ‘I wasn’t suggesting otherwise. Well, don’t let it get cold, I’ll look after myself.’
‘There’s some leg ham and a nice piece of Cheddar in the fridge.’ Maggie lifted a spoonful of soup to her mouth and blew on it gently. ‘Help yourself if you like.’
He raised a wry eyebrow. ‘A continental breakfast? I will, thanks.’
‘So you bought it after all,’ she said when he’d assembled a much larger breakfast and was tucking into it.
‘Mmm… I thought you might be interested. Maisie said you had some good ideas for the house.’
‘I’m sure you could afford to pull it down and start again.’
‘I know you may still cherish the opinion that I delight in destroying landscapes and pulling things down to put up new ones, but in this case I don’t,’ he said mildly. ‘That house has a lot of character and potential.’
Maggie drank her soup, having had the wind somewhat taken out of her sails. Nor was it that that she had against Jack McKinnon any longer, she reminded herself. It was the fact that he could arrive uninvited at her breakfast table, make himself completely at home—well, she had suggested that, but all the same—and, treacherously, it reminded her of all the breakfasts they’d shared at Cape Gloucester.
One particularly came to mind…
‘What will we do today?’
He eyed her seriously. They’d had an early morning swim and she wore her pink bikini with her sarong knotted between her breasts. They were drinking coffee at the breakfast bar.
‘Nothing,’ he said.
‘Nothing?’ She wrinkled her nose at him. ‘How idle!’
‘I didn’t plan to be completely idle. Perhaps decadent would be a better word for it—starting now.’ He put his mug down and carefully untied the knot between her breasts to release her sarong, then he reached round and undid her bikini top.
Maggie looked downwards, entranced and feeling her heart start to beat heavily at the sight of his lean brown hands on her breasts.
‘It doesn’t feel decadent to me,’ she said softly and bit her lip as her nipples flowered and a wash of sensuousness ran through her body.
‘Actually—’ he looked up briefly ‘—I can’t think of anything more lovely and fresh and entirely the opposite from decadent than you, Ms Trent.’
‘So?’ Maggie queried with difficulty.
‘I was referring to the time of day, that’s all. Eight o’clock in the morning is not renowned fo
r its romantic properties. Moonlit evenings, starry, starry nights, dawn, perhaps?’ He looked into her eyes and shook his head. ‘However…’
She put her hands on his shoulders and rested her forehead against his. ‘Eight o’clock in the morning feels very romantic to me.’
He lifted her off her stool to sit across his lap, and slid his hands beneath her bikini bottom to cup her hips. ‘You are a siren, you know,’ he said against the corner of her mouth.
‘Not Delilah?’
‘Her too… Come to bed.’
She came out of her reverie feeling hot and cold, aroused and with her senses clamouring for that touch on her body again as she remembered the slow, perfectly lovely way he’d made love to her despite it being eight o’clock in the morning.
I thought I had it all sorted out, she reflected bitterly. I was no one’s hostage; I was this independent, mature—recently matured but all the same—person in charge of my own destiny. So why can’t I forget Cape Gloucester and all the things he did to me?
‘I did have some ideas,’ she said abruptly, anything to banish those images from her mind. ‘But they wouldn’t—’ she wrinkled her nose as she forced herself to concentrate ‘—come cheap.’
‘Spoken like a true Trent,’ he murmured, and grinned at her expression. ‘That’s fine with me. If I’m going to do it I want to do it properly. Tell me your thoughts.’
She did. And she couldn’t fight the quickening of interest she felt.
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE next time Jack came to see Maggie, as usual unannounced, he dumped a heap of blueprints on her coffee-table.
‘What on earth…?’ She stared at him.
‘I’m planning a retirement village. I do not want it to resemble a bloody chicken coop, but it has to stay affordable. What do you think of these?’
She took her time as she paged through the designs. ‘Ghastly,’ she pronounced at last. ‘They’re so poky!’
‘That’s what I told the architect. He’s withdrawn from the project. On the other hand, they are retirement homes, not vast mansions.’
Maggie pulled some cushions behind her back, which ached occasionally nowadays, and considered the matter. ‘I think it would be a help if they were more open plan. Separate bedrooms, yes, but not separate boxy little kitchens, dining rooms and lounges, so you got a more spacious feel even if it isn’t necessarily so.’
He waited alertly as she thought some more.
‘And since they don’t have gardens—’
‘Retirees are generally longing to get away from being slaves to lawnmowers and the like,’ he put in.
‘Perhaps,’ she conceded, ‘but a decent veranda so they can grow some nice pot plants and herbs if they want to would be… would be a priority of mine.’
‘There are going to be plenty of landscaped gardens,’ he murmured. ‘All taken care of for them.’
‘It’s not the same as suddenly being cut off from growing anything of your own,’ she countered. ‘In fact, if I were planning a retirement village, I’d set aside a section where those interested could have their own little plots to grow their own vegetables or whatever they liked.’
‘You are a gardening fanatic, Maggie,’ he pointed out and glanced at the riot of colour outside.
She shrugged. ‘Those are my ideas!’
‘OK. I’ll come back to you on it.’
‘Why me?’ she asked.
‘I think you might have a feel for these things which could be helpful to me, Ms Trent. I’ve never done a retirement village before. I’ve been more concerned with kids and families.’
‘Oh.’
He looked amused. ‘If you feel like doing some designing, some doodles even, I’d be very appreciative.’
Maggie blinked, but she allowed the matter to drop.
For some reason, she’d recently begun to feel as if she’d walked into a brick wall and nothing was of more than passing interest to her.
Or rather, one reason for it was loud and clear. Added to her memories, added to her growing desire to drop all her defences and say simply to Jack, Marry me, please, I need you and I can’t do this on my own, was her growing curiosity about other women in his life. It haunted her. There were times when it made her hate him and be prickly and uncommunicative with him. It sapped her energy. It was entirely unreasonable, she tried to tell herself.
You wouldn’t marry him when the offer was open. Perhaps the best thing for you is to hate him…
On the other hand, when she wasn’t being cross and out of sorts with him, she had to admit that his presence in her life was a bit like a rock she was coming to rely on.
What a mess you are, Maggie, she thought frequently.
She was five and a half months pregnant when he called in one chilly evening after dinner time.
They talked about nothing very much for a while, then he fell silent as his grey gaze flickered over her. She wore a loose ivory wool sweater over dark green tartan stretch pants. The sleeves of the sweater were a fraction too long for her and sometimes she folded them back, but they always unrolled.
Was it that, he wondered, that gave her a waif-like air? The exposure of her fragile wrists? Her loose hair tucked behind her ears? Her cream flat shoes that reminded him of ballet shoes?
Or her secretive eyes?
Grave and secretive now, when they’d been like windows of her soul only a few months ago. Capable of teasing him, querying him or laughing at him in a swift green glance, expressing honest desire. Expressing joy or, of course, sparkling with anger. But that had been longer ago, the anger, and what crazy voice in him told him he’d prefer that to this secretiveness?
‘How are you feeling?’ he asked abruptly.
‘Fine,’ she replied automatically.
‘No, tell me.’ He’d come straight from a business dinner and hadn’t discarded his jacket, although he’d loosened his tie.
Maggie pushed a cushion behind the small of her back. ‘Apart from a bit of backache I do feel fine. The morning—afternoon sickness has gone and I’m told this middle trimester, before you get too heavy and slow, is when you should really glow.’ She grimaced.
‘But you’re not glowing, are you?’ he said quietly.
She shrugged and stood up suddenly. ‘According to my doctor every pregnancy can be different. Would you like a cup of tea? Or a drink? I’m dying for a cuppa.’
‘Thanks, I’ll have one too.’
She turned away, but not before he noted some differences in her figure. Her wrists might look fragile, but those high, firm little gymnast’s breasts were ripening and her waist was no longer reed-slim…
When she brought the tea tray back, he studied it rather than her figure.
He knew she liked Earl Grey tea so he wasn’t surprised at the subtle fragrance of citrus oil of Bergamot that rose above the lovely china cups as she poured boiling water into them.
He knew she drank hers black and sugarless, but she hadn’t forgotten that he took milk. He knew she always deposited the tea bags into an antique silver dish decorated with griffins rampant.
‘All the same, why is that, do you think?’ he queried as he accepted his cup and took a shortbread biscuit from the salver she offered.
‘Why is what?’
‘Is it the strain of being a single mother? Is that why you’re not glowing, since there aren’t any other problems?’ he said deliberately.
She sat down and tucked her legs up. ‘You’d be the last person I’d confess that to—if it were true.’
‘In case I repeated my offer of marriage? I’m not.’
She pushed her sleeves back and wrapped her hands around her cup. ‘No, it wouldn’t make any difference. It’s still no one’s fault but my own that I find myself a bit daunted at times, but especially not yours, that’s why I wouldn’t admit it to you.’ She hesitated. ‘It’s probably only because it’s such new territory and many a new mum might feel a bit daunted anyway.’
‘Have you made any prepa
rations for the baby?’
A glint of humour beamed his way. ‘Jack, whenever my mother comes to visit me, which is frequently, we do nothing else. That’s not quite true— we go to the movies, concerts and so on and every few weeks she insists I spend a weekend on the cattle stations with them. But this baby will have everything that opens and shuts; more clothes than any single baby could wear, many of them exquisitely hand stitched. She loves doing that kind of delicate sewing.’
‘OK.’ He finished his tea and thought for a bit. ‘What about your other social life?’
She wrinkled her nose. ‘What social life?’
‘Well, girlfriends, then?’
Maggie sighed unexpectedly. ‘One or two, but I think I may have been a bit—I don’t know—I think I may have given off pretty strong vibes that I would rather be alone.’
‘And Tim Mitchell?’
She flinched.
‘Did he drop you like the proverbial hot potato?’
‘Oh, no. He offered to marry me.’
‘I hope you turned him down flat,’ he said and was rewarded by a definitely hostile green glance.
‘Tim would make a fine husband,’ she said tersely.
‘Come on, Maggie,’ he drawled, knowing full well he was out to hurt and anger her further, as if he had the devil himself riding him, ‘that would have been a recipe for disaster. At least you loved going to bed with me.’
‘Don’t say—’
‘Another word? Why not? It’s true. You certainly made love to me as if you loved every minute of it. You tracked me down where no outsider has ever been able to find me to do so, come to that,’ he said lazily, then added, ‘And all the while you had Tim Mitchell virtually sitting in your lap.’
Maggie gasped. ‘That’s… that’s—’
But he broke in before she could go on. ‘If you’re contemplating a loveless marriage to anyone, Maggie, I fail to see what Tim Mitchell has over me. Then again, I did think that’s what you were expressly holding out against.’
The Millionaire's Virgin (Mills & Boon By Request) Page 29