Married for Real (Harlequin Presents)

by Lindsay Armstrong

  Arizona put the phone down moments later, clenched her teeth and thought, All right, if this is how he wants it, this is how he’ll get it, and she glared at the contents of the packet spread across the desk. A gold Mastercard in the name of Arizona Holmes, five hundred dollars in cash, his secretary’s list of the most suitable places to shop for a trousseau and the briefest note from Declan himself to the effect that they would be married at noon the following day.

  ‘I’m so angry I can’t see straight,’ Arizona said to herself. ‘I came up here to try to defuse things, I suppose, and because I’ve got no choice, anyway, but this kind of treatment deserves—worse! So be it….’

  And she shovelled the card and the cash into her purse, left the list of shops on the desk and stalked out of the suite.

  Four hours later, she returned, accompanied by a bellboy and a lot of stylish carrier bags. She tipped the bellboy generously, so generously that he bowed out of the suite backwards, and she sat down abruptly, buried her head in her hands and wondered miserably if she hadn’t walked right into Declan Holmes’s trap.

  You should never do things when you’re furiously angry, Arizona, she told herself, you should know that by now!

  She laid her head back with a sigh and thought, But it’s done now so I guess I’ll have to live with it, and glanced at her watch to see that she had an hour and a half before he came, and got up to run herself a bath.

  She soaked for half an hour and felt some of her spirit returning. So she opened all her purchases and laid them out on the huge double bed, quite artistically, she thought. Then she dressed, did her hair and made up her face carefully, tidied up and was walking to the lounge when, on the dot of six-thirty, the bell rang. She took a deep breath and went to open the door.

  ‘Arizona,’ Declan Holmes murmured by way of greeting, his eyes still the cold, hard blue she remembered from their last encounter in her bedroom at Scawfell, and walked past her into the suite.

  She closed the door and after a brief hesitation followed him, saying nothing. And it was like two implacable enemies that they eyed each other across the lounge when he stopped and turned to her.

  Until he drawled, as his gaze roamed up and down her, ‘Well, well, Arizona—new?’

  She looked at the beautiful black cocktail dress she wore, then raised her eyes proudly to his. ‘New from the skin out, Declan.’

  ‘I have to say I approve.’ The dress had a Thai silk short fitted skirt and strapless bodice, and the gossamer cobweb lace overblouse that tied at her waist had a stand-up collar and puffed sleeves. It was unrelieved black, and the skin of her shoulders gleamed through the exquisite lace, as did her legs, clad in the sheerest black nylons. Her medium-heel suede shoes had pearls embroidered on the heels. Her hair was loose and smooth to her shoulders.

  ‘I’m so glad,’ she answered sweetly, ‘because there’s a lot more for you to approve of. Would you care to take a look?’ She held out her hand towards the bedroom.

  His lips twisted, but he inclined his head and gestured for her to lead the way. Nor did he say anything immediately once there but scanned the bed and the armchairs all draped with clothes. There was a sensuous collection of underwear and nightwear, silk and lace in gleaming white, French blue, black and one long slim nightgown with tiny straps in a deep ruby. There were several casual outfits, shorts or slacks and jackets or blouses, two pairs of colourful leggings with fabulous printed polyester overdresses. There was a chic linen suit in the palest violet with a grey silk blouse, a long crushed velvet skirt in a colour that reminded one of blue steel with a sheer, fine metal mesh T-shirt to go with it—and beside most of the outfits, a pair of shoes or a handbag, beside some a scarf for her hair or a piece of costume jewellery, a lovely raffia hat or a pair of sunglasses. It was a dazzling collection.

  ‘What do you think?’ she asked at last when he’d said nothing for what seemed like an inordinately long time.

  ‘I’m impressed,’ he drawled turning to her at last. ‘And you did it all in an afternoon, Arizona!’ he marvelled. He added, ‘Did you take my secretary’s kind advice?’

  ‘I did it in four hours, Declan. Just imagine what I could do in a lifetime.’ She raised her eyebrows ingenuously at him. ‘And no, I did not. I don’t need anyone’s help to buy clothes, but particularly not your secretary’s.’

  ‘So it would seem,’ he murmured. ‘The one thing I can’t seem to find is anything resembling a wedding dress.’

  ‘You’re right, there isn’t anything that’s especially a wedding dress,’ she said tautly as his blue gaze, which was suddenly lazy, gave her the oddest feeling of a paralysed prey about to be captured, but she soldiered on. ‘For one thing, you probably need a bit more time to choose something like that, and for another, if it’s going to be such a rushed wedding, why bother?’ She stressed the if.

  ‘Well, you certainly have made your statement, Arizona.’ But he stopped as she turned away suddenly from his now horribly mocking, insolent eyes, and a visible shudder went through her.

  ‘What now?’ he said.

  ‘I’m kicking myself, if you must know,’ she said through her teeth.

  ‘Care to tell me why?’

  ‘Because I did all that in a blaze of anger.’ She gestured vaguely towards the clothes. ‘Because I feel cheap and…! I don’t know what. Because I walked right into the trap I suspect you laid for me, Declan, that’s why, but the one thing I don’t regret is the lack of a wedding dress.’ She turned back, and her eyes were grey and haunted but curiously stubborn.

  ‘You know what’s wrong with us, don’t you, Arizona?’ he said after an age during which she could have cut the atmosphere between them with a knife.

  ‘Yes, probably every last syllable of it,’ she retorted.

  ‘Tell me then.’

  ‘I’ve told you so many times, surely I don’t have to go through it all again.’

  ‘I don’t think we’re talking about the same thing at all,’ he said dryly. ‘Particularly as it’s the one thing you refuse to talk about—the mutual hunger that’s making our lives quite tormented, Arizona. I don’t think you would be making extravagant and hostile gestures otherwise—why bother? And I know I—’ he paused ‘—am getting impatient and frustrated, particularly when I remember how you kissed me.’

  ‘Well then,’ she said with an effort, ‘why don’t I slip into something more comfortable? So we can get this… momentous event over and done with.’ She walked past him to pick up the ruby nightgown. ‘How about this—’

  ‘Stop it, Arizona,’ he said curtly and caught her wrist. ‘Anyone would think it was fright motivating you.’

  ‘Oh, but it is, Declan, you scare me and mystify me, but don’t imagine I won’t overcome it somehow—’ She broke off suddenly, her eyes widening as she realized what she’d confessed. ‘I mean—’

  ‘You little fool,’ he said roughly. ‘I’m not going to hurt you.’ He gathered her wrists in one hand and drew her right up to him. ‘If you stopped fighting me for a while I’d be able to prove that to you.’

  Arizona tilted her head so she could look straight into his eyes and said intensely, ‘It doesn’t seem right.’

  ‘Well, what would you like?’ he countered. ‘That we declare undying love for each other? I thought that kind of thing was anathema to you.’ His hand ground into her wrists and she sagged suddenly against him. He released her immediately but caught her around the waist, saying after a long moment, ‘Just give up, Arizona.’

  ‘I’m not that kind of person,’ she whispered.

  ‘Why don’t you wait and see what kind of person emerges? You might get a surprise.’

  She closed her eyes, frustrated, and flinched as he started to kiss her eyelids, but he ignored it and continued to kiss her until she shivered, but this time undeniably with pleasure.

  She stirred about half an hour later, and laid her head on Declan’s shoulder with a little sigh.

  ‘All right?’ he asked quietly.
>
  ‘Yes…’

  They were in the lounge with only one lamp on and the fabulous lights of Sydney stretching down to the harbour below them from the Hilton tower. She was in his arms, sitting on his lap, with her legs stretched along the settee, her shoes on the floor beside them and, temporarily at least, all the fight in her smothered beneath a tide of exquisite sensuality, evoked and aroused by his hands and lips. What was worse, she thought, was that this was only a brief respite because he was leading them down a path from which there was no return and she didn’t, couldn’t care.

  It was doubly ironic when he said very quietly, ‘Do you want to go on—or stop?’

  ‘Don’t… stop,’ she murmured and added with absolute honesty, ‘I don’t think I could bear it.’

  He traced the outline of her lips and watched the sudden wariness that came to her eyes. He’d discarded his jacket and tie, and she could see the springing black hairs where his shirt was opened. She resisted an almost overwhelming temptation, as she waited and wondered what his response would be, to touch them.

  He said at last, ‘You look as if you’re expecting me to crow with triumph.’

  ‘Do you want to?’

  He laid his head back and fiddled with her hair with the hand that was around her shoulders while his other one lay possessively on her waist. ‘I can’t deny a certain feeling of that kind—’ he smiled a ghost of a smile ‘—but for the most part I’m almost overwhelmed with relief.’

  Arizona moved and he looked into her widened eyes. ‘I’ve wanted you for over two years, Arizona,’ he said quietly. ‘That’s a long time. Will you come to bed with me now?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I forgot,’ she said huskily as they surveyed the bed, still strewn with her purchases.

  ‘If you take one half, I’ll take the other,’ he said with a grin and let go of her hand. It only took them five minutes to clear the bed, and he pulled off the cover, but it was long enough for Arizona to be attacked by guilt and a sudden sense of shyness, so that when he held out his hand to her again, she hesitated.

  He watched her briefly then came round to her side of the bed. ‘You could return them all tomorrow and we could start again, from scratch,’ he said gravely.

  She grimaced and coloured faintly. ‘I made them cut all the price tags off.’

  ‘Did you now—were you that angry?’

  ‘Yes,’ she whispered.

  ‘Then will you accept my apologies for doing that to you?’

  ‘Declan—’

  ‘No—’ he put a finger to her lips ‘—let’s just concentrate on this—have you any idea how lovely you are? Should we examine that aspect of it and the effect it’s had on me?’ he said wryly.

  ‘What do you mean?’ she said uncertainly.

  ‘Sit down and I’ll tell you.’

  So she sat on the bed after a moment’s thought, and he sat beside her, close although not touching her. ‘I think it all started with your eyes,’ he mused. ‘So clear and piercing at times, then so totally noncommittal at others or—worse. Such as the day, I think it was the second time we met, that you looked across the lounge at Scawfell at me and virtually told me with your eyes to do my damnedest. I can even remember what you wore, a black blouse and a long skirt that rustled as you walked. I can remember cursing that skirt, in fact, because it hid your legs. I still have the same problem whenever you wear anything long.’ Arizona couldn’t help smiling faintly.

  He took her hand in his but did no more. ‘Then there was your temperament,’ he went on, surprising her. ‘You were so positive in everything you said or did, so constructive. You also, even in your governess days, got around, when I was there at least, as if I was of absolutely no consequence, as if I was quite beneath you and always would be. I admired that,’ he said but added with a wicked glint as he looked into her eyes, ‘when it didn’t invoke a sense of—we’ll see about that, Arizona—in me. So what have we got now, your eyes, your temperament—ah, yes,’ he murmured, ‘your body. Now that was quite another matter,’ he said and said it so soberly she frowned.

  But he went on in quite a different, much lighter tone before she could say anything. ‘So you see, I’ve rather been like the beggar at the feast all this time. And that’s why I haven’t always been—quite rational, and that’s why having you sit here next to me with the perfume of your skin and hair tantalizing me, the thought of taking your beautiful dress off you all but driving me crazy, not to mention the thought that you might have changed your mind—all those things are particularly hard to bear,’ he finished gravely.

  ‘You… I… don’t know whether to believe you,’ Arizona said with another smile curving her lips.

  ‘Believe me, lady!’ he replied laconically.

  ‘But I didn’t know you could be like this,’ she persisted, although she was still smiling.

  ‘No?’ He raised a rueful eyebrow at her. ‘Well, you have sometimes given me the impression you imagine I’m the grab-them-by-the-hair-and-yank-them-into-your-cave kind of man. I must say you do look at me with just that kind of suspicion in your eyes, Arizona,’ he said reproachfully.

  ‘Sorry,’ she murmured, and the part of her that was incurably honest made her add, ‘I just didn’t expect this, though.’

  ‘Well, I hope it’s been a nice surprise—if not, I could always go back to being a strong silent type if you like. I did tell you,’ he said suddenly with no amusement, ‘that you might not know what you were fighting so dedicatedly.’

  ‘I know. The thing is,’ she said slowly because she was in fact thinking deeply, ‘I’ve never seen you with a woman before, one of your own, I mean.’ She grimaced awkwardly but continued. ‘You never brought anyone like that to Scawfell, did you? So—’ she’d been studying her hand in his but she glanced at him now ‘—perhaps that’s why I didn’t know what to expect, but there must have been…women in your life.’

  ‘Some,’ he agreed.

  ‘None that you wanted to marry?’

  He paused and considered. ‘When I was twenty-two I was madly in love with a very voluptuous blonde, and I can recall being quite desperate to marry her—for the space of about three weeks.’

  ‘Seriously,’ she said quietly.

  ‘Seriously, Arizona?’ He lifted a wry eyebrow at her then said soberly, ‘Yes, I’ve thought about it once or twice before, once particularly, a few years back.’

  ‘Will you tell me who she was? I mean, what she was like and why—you didn’t.’

  ‘She was—’ he paused and looked straight ahead with his eyes narrowed ‘—a very well-known businesswoman, very independent, very intelligent. There was no way,’ he said deliberately, ‘despite what we felt for each other, that we could live together, as we discovered to our mutual cost. It’s been over for nearly five years now.’

  ‘Was she younger or…?’

  He looked at her. ‘A couple of years younger—why do you ask?’

  ‘I was wondering whether she had the maturity or whatever it takes not to be sort of flattened by you,’ Arizona murmured.

  Declan grinned and glanced pointedly at the array of clothes around the room.

  ‘That’s different. You goaded me into doing that,’ Arizona protested.

  ‘I did apologize,’ he reminded her and added, ‘should we try to stick to the lighter side of things, though? I actually made you smile a couple of times earlier.’

  Arizona flinched.

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ he said softly.

  ‘I feel ridiculous now, that’s all. As if I’m making heavy weather of things for no good reason.’ She shrugged a touch desolately.

  ‘On the contrary, when you were kissing me, things were electrifying. Should we try that again? But could I make a request first?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘This beautiful lace blouse—is it a separate entity?’

  She frowned. ‘From the dress, do you mean?’

  ‘Uh-huh. Because if it is, I thought we mi
ght take it off. I’m dying to get closer to your skin.’

  Arizona hesitated then undid it at the waist and he helped her to slip it off. ‘Mmm,’ he murmured, sliding his hands down her arms, ‘that’s what I meant. How about the dress?’

  She tensed, then forced herself to relax. ‘It unzips down the back.’

  But he made no move to reach the zip. He took her in his arms instead, saying, ‘On the other hand, why hurry?’

  ‘Why, indeed,’ she murmured, somewhat dazed.

  But it was only a few minutes later, during which time he’d merely stroked her skin while she’d laid her head against his chest and listened to the beat of his heart, that she reached behind her and pulled down the zip herself.

  She also said huskily as he tilted her chin and looked enquiringly into her eyes, ‘I’m being positive, I guess. As I used to be once. I’d sort of forgotten that.’

  He kissed her lips. ‘I’m delighted.’

  She smiled a wry little smile. ‘The only thing is—I don’t quite know where to go from here.’

  ‘Could I take over then?’

  ‘If you would, Mr. Holmes…’

  She woke to a total feeling of disorientation. Then it started to come back to her and she groped across the bed but she was alone, so she pulled a pillow into her arms then realized a shaft of light was coming from the bathroom, and a dark shadow was standing in the doorway.

  She blinked several times, adjusting to the gloom, and saw that it was Declan with a towel tied around his waist, his shoulders propped against the door-frame as he watched her. Then he straightened, turned on an overhead light and came over to sit on the bed.

  They said nothing for a long moment, just stared at each other, and Arizona drank in the way his wet hair fell over his forehead, the still damp skin of his shoulders and chest, and remembered the feel of his body on hers, the strength of it and the way he’d held her and made love to her until she’d felt as if she was spinning off the planet like a singing top as she experienced the first climax of her life. Remembered how stunned she’d been afterwards, lost for words, incredulous—and helpless. For that matter how she felt now, only a couple of hours later, but all the same as if she might never leave this bed, but not only because she was tired—because she really felt like luxuriating between the sheets and feeling as if he was still there with her.