Читать книгу Hawk's Prey - Кэрол Мортимер, Carole Mortimer - Страница 5

TWO things became apparent to her at the same time, firstly that she wasn’t about to be killed after all, and secondly that her driver hadn’t been employed by Tom Beresford at all. The latter won out, the relief of the first realisation overshadowed by the anger of the second.

‘You bastard!’ she burst out furiously, hurling herself up the gangway without a glance for the distance between that and the murky water below. ‘You unspeakable bastard!’ The second accusation was accompanied by a powerful slap to one lean cheek.

Long slender hands came up to grasp both her wrists to ward off more blows reaching their target. ‘Whitney—–’

‘I thought I was going to die!’ she choked, her eyes misted with tears as she looked up at him. ‘And it was you all the time!’

‘Mr Hawkworth—–’

Hawk glanced over her head at the driver as he stood hesitantly beside the car at the bottom of the gangway. ‘It’s all right, Peterson, I can handle Miss Morgan from here,’ he assured the other man confidently.

Maybe it was that arrogance, or maybe she just didn’t care what he thought of her behaviour after frightening her the way that he had, but suddenly she was kicking and scratching like a wild thing, Hawk unable to prevent all of the blows making contact, cursing under his breath as the pointed heel of her sandal caught him in the middle of the shin.

‘So I see, Mr Hawkworth,’ Peterson softly derided.

Tawny eyes, a clear golden colour, narrowed on him with displeasure. ‘Just send me your bill,’ he told the other man abruptly.

‘There’s nothing else I can do for you?’ The other man lingered, obviously enjoying the show.

‘Nothing,’ Hawk grated, his eyes flaring with anger as he glared down at the still struggling Whitney. ‘Stop it, you’re making a damned fool of yourself!’ he instructed through gritted teeth.

She stopped struggling only because she had run out of energy, knowing she wasn’t the one to look the fool, he was! And looking foolish didn’t sit well on the broad shoulders of James Charles Hawkworth. He towered over her now as he watched Peterson climb into the limousine and drive away, topping her five-feet-ten inches in the high-heeled sandals by at least four inches.

‘Martin must have called you as soon as I left his office,’ she muttered resentfully.

‘He had better have done,’ Hawk rasped with barely a movement of his lips.

Whitney glared up at him, resenting the fact that she had to do so. ‘You scared me half to death,’ she accused heatedly. ‘I thought I was on my way to be fitted for a pair of concrete shoes!’

‘That could still be arranged,’ he told her with icy control.

‘Don’t you threaten me,’ she snapped. ‘I could still have you arrested for kidnapping.’

Hawk eyed her mockingly with those curiously gold eyes fringed by thick dark lashes. ‘You’re a little old to be called a kid!’

‘Don’t prevaricate.’ She wrenched out of his hold on her arm, facing him now, wishing he didn’t look quite so handsome in the open-necked white shirt and tailored white trousers, the Gucci shoes also white. ‘You had me abducted in broad day—–’

‘On whose evidence?’ He quirked brows the same dark colour as his lashes, his hair a dark blond with gold streaks among its thickness from the amount of time he spent aboard Freedom in warmer climates than the one in England; the name Hawk suited his colouring perfectly.

‘Mine!’ she claimed indignantly. ‘And Peterson—–’

‘Oh, he wouldn’t back up the kidnapping story,’ Hawk denied with confidence.

Her eyes flashed. And to think that a short time ago she had been lamenting the fact that she hadn’t had the chance to tell this man she loved him; she didn’t love him at all, she hated him! ‘I think you’re overestimating your power of persuasion—–’

‘It isn’t a question of persuasion, Whitney,’ he mocked. ‘I’m sure that where a man is concerned your accomplishments in that direction are much more successful than mine could ever be.’ He made it sound like an insult. ‘But Peterson believes your protests to have only been part of the game.’

Whitney’s eyes narrowed. ‘What game?’

‘Shall we go inside?’ he suggested with a pointed glance at the crew members standing about watching them curiously. ‘If you’re going to give another display like the one earlier I would rather it was a private showing.’ He indicated that they should go into the lounge.

Whitney preceded him with a disgruntled scowl. She had been on Freedom several times in the past, and its elegant beauty didn’t impress her at all at this moment, although she acknowledged that Hawk had refurbished the spacious lounge that was larger than a single floor of her house. She knew there was also a library and dining room on this upper deck, that below, the hundred-foot yacht also boasted six luxurious bedroom suites, as well as accommodation for half a dozen crew members. Hawk spent a lot of time on board, and as such the furnishing in leather, brass and glass was of a high standard; it was more than a home-away-from-home for him. Hawkworth House had never seemed as warm and welcoming.

‘What game?’ she demanded once more as he closed the door behind him, only the hum of the air-conditioning on this hot July day to disturb the silence; the crew were paid well to make themselves inconspicuous.

Hawk shrugged broad shoulders. ‘You don’t think Peterson—procures women for a living, do you?’

‘He did a good job of abducting me,’ Whitney maintained stubbornly.

Hawk limped over to the bar, drawing attention to the fact that she had bruised him earlier, taking a jug of the fresh orange juice he knew she liked from the fridge and pouring them both a glass. Whitney ignored hers once he had placed it on the glass-topped coffee-table, and with an indifferent shrug of his shoulders Hawk moved to sit down in one of the brown leather armchairs.

‘Hawk!’ she demanded impatiently as he sipped his drink, feeling suspiciously like stamping her foot at his infuriating behaviour, resisting the impulse with effort.

His expression softened, if a face carved out of granite could soften! He had the hard features that should only have appeared on a sculpture but were in fact flesh and blood, his cheekbones high, his cheeks fleshless, his mouth a hard, uncompromising slash. And those eyes could be just as hard and uncompromising, as they had been the day he walked out of her life.

‘Peterson believes it’s a game we play,’ he drawled in a bored voice. ‘You’re the madly desirable woman and I’m the wicked abductor. Kinky, hm?’ he derided.

‘It’s sick!’ She dropped weakly into a chair, at last understanding the driver’s amusement at her predicament, heated colour flooding her cheeks at how well she had played the supposed game. The man must think she was a pervert!

‘Don’t look so worried, Whitney,’ Hawk mocked. ‘He assured me it wasn’t the most unusual request he’s received since he began his limousine service three years ago!’

‘Just one of them!’ she groaned her mortification.

‘Oh, I don’t know, the one about the sheikh who—–’

‘Hawk, I’m really not interested in the idiosyncrasies of an Arab too rich to have anything better to do than play ridiculous games!’

‘No, maybe not,’ he agreed slowly. ‘That one did go a bit far. I was only trying to show you that Peterson didn’t find anything unusual in our request—–’

‘Don’t try and drag me into taking part of the blame,’ she protested indignantly. ‘I’ll never be able to look the man in the face again!’

He quirked dark brows. ‘Were you thinking of engaging his services in the future?’

‘Hawk, all this is very amusing,’—her tone implied she thought it the opposite—‘but it doesn’t alter the fact that I almost had a heart attack when he made me get in the car. I felt so damned helpless, I didn’t know what to do!’

‘If Peterson had been a real kidnapper I would lay odds on you emerging the victor from the encounter!’

‘Even though I realise there was no real danger I still don’t feel very victorious,’ she said shakily. ‘I thought I was going to die,’ she repeated breathlessly.

‘And we both know why you thought that, don’t we?’ Hawk stood up in forceful movements, having all the grace of a natural athlete when he didn’t have a bruised and aching shin, and replaced the orange juice with a glass of whisky. ‘I would have had Martin’s job if he hadn’t called me when he did,’ he revealed grimly. ‘You are definitely fired!’

‘You can’t do that!’ She stood up protestingly.

He raised his brows in cold fury. ‘Forgive me, as the owner of the National I thought I could.’ His tone was thick with sarcasm.

‘That isn’t what I meant and you know it,’ she said exasperatedly. ‘You have no reason to sack me, none that would stand up to the union anyway.’

‘How about persistent absenteeism?’

‘I’m never off sick.’ She shook her head, her expression rebellious.

‘I don’t remember using the past tense,’ Hawk announced calmly.

Whitney blinked her surprise. ‘You have kidnapped me,’ she said incredulously.

‘Abducted,’ he corrected smoothly. ‘I don’t know of anyone who would pay a ransom for you!’

‘Beresford might,’ she pointed out tightly.

His eyes flashed deeply gold. ‘Maybe I should telephone and ask him!’

She knew she had gone too far, had always been able to tell that where this man was concerned. Hawk wasn’t a man to suffer fools gladly, and by meeting Tom Beresford in the way that she had Hawk considered her to be plain stupid rather than just foolish! But carrying her off the way that he had could have scared her to death, and she glared at him angrily. ‘You can’t keep me on board Freedom against my will—–’

‘Who says I can’t?’ he reasoned coldly. ‘You’ve been on board the Freedom plenty of times before; why should anyone assume this time is any different?’

‘Because I’m obviously a reluctant guest!’ Whitney pointed out exasperatedly.

He gave an unconcerned shrug of his broad shoulders. ‘I’ll just tell them that you’re loath to rest as the doctor has told you to.’

‘You have an answer for everything, don’t you?’ she snapped irritably. ‘And just what do you hope to achieve by this display of muscle?’ she scorned.

‘Achieve?’ Hawk repeated with cold thoughtfulness. ‘Maybe I’d just like to keep you alive for a few more years.’

‘After presenting me with a diamond watch and kicking me out of your life a year ago—–’

‘I didn’t kick you out!’ he grated protestingly, his body taut with anger.

‘Fulfilled your obligation, then,’ she amended heatedly. ‘It amounts to the same thing. After that I’m surprised you care one way or the other what happens to me.’

‘Of course I care, damn you!’ He glowered at her across the room.

Whitney gave a disbelieving snort. ‘That’s why you’ve been so solicitous of my welfare the last year, I suppose!’ she derided.

‘Martin would have let me know if anything were bothering you; he told me you were doing fine,’ Hawk dismissed with accusing impatience.

‘Of course I’m doing fine, I don’t need you to survive,’ she claimed perversely. Hawk had always had this effect on her; she had resented it when he demanded to know her every mood, and she resented it just as vehemently when he seemed disinterested.

Hawk’s mouth tightened. ‘This time you just may do!’ he rasped.

‘You’re as bad as Martin,’ she sighed. ‘I’m only following through a story, for goodness’ sake.’

‘On Tom Beresford.’

‘Why is everyone so scared of the man?’ Whitney scorned exasperatedly.

‘It isn’t a question of being scared of him, and if you weren’t such a baby I’d tell you exactly why you should steer clear of this one,’ he rasped.

‘I don’t think I was ever a baby,’ she dismissed. ‘Certainly not since I met you.’

A pulse jerked in his throat. ‘Was living with me so bad?’

‘Worse!’

‘Whitney—–’

‘You know Geraldine is married to Tom Beresford now?’ She inwardly cursed herself for asking the question as soon as it left her lips; of course Hawk would know who the woman he still loved was married to!

He gave a cool inclination of his head, a shaft of sunlight streaming through one of the windows picking out the gold highlights in his dark blond hair. ‘I received an invitation to the wedding.’ His bored drawl revealed none of his inner feelings.

‘The bitch!’ Whitney gasped incredulously, colour heating her cheeks as she realised she had just insulted the woman Hawk loved. ‘I’m sorry. I—–’

‘It’s all right, Whitney,’ he derided drily. ‘I was never blind to Geraldine’s faults.’

But he loved her in spite of that. It had never made any sense to Whitney, this unquestioning love Hawk had for the other woman. In business Hawk had no peer, the National only one of his successes, and at thirty-seven he was more handsome than any one man had the right to be, his very coolness exuding a power and cynicism that was a challenge to every woman he met. And yet he threw away all that he had to offer on a woman who wasn’t fit to be in the same room as him, let alone in his heart. It just didn’t make sense to Whitney.

Of course some of her dislike of Geraldine sprang from her own love for Hawk, but she had detested Geraldine even before she had made the mistake of falling in love with Hawk. Mistake, because Hawk was the type of man to inspire the sort of love that would last a lifetime, and his heart belonged to Geraldine.

‘Did you go to the wedding?’ She gave a pained frown.

‘Of course not.’ His tone implied it had never even been a possibility. ‘And watch some other poor devil go to his doom!’

Tom Beresford hadn’t given the impression of chafing against his love for his wife when they had spoken earlier. Like Hawk, he gave the impression of granting her every whim and fancy.

‘Tom Beresford isn’t like you.’ She spoke without thinking first, looking guiltily across at Hawk as she realised what she had said and how it must have sounded. ‘1 only meant—–’

‘I know what you meant, Whitney,’ Hawk grated harshly. ‘But you never understood my relationship with Geraldine. And I hope to God you never do!’

She wouldn’t wish the mindless love Hawk had for Geraldine on anyone, and on this proudly arrogant man it was particularly unpleasant to witness. She had tried for a while to make a place for herself in his heart, but even though she didn’t love or want him herself Geraldine had resented anyone else who did. For a long time she had managed to make Whitney’s life a misery.

‘Do you think Geraldine knows of Tom Beresford’s method of business?’ She watched Hawk closely for his reaction.

He shrugged. ‘Geraldine never cared where the money came from as long as there was always plenty of it.’

Maybe if Hawk’s love for Geraldine had been blind it would have given her hope in the past, but even knowing all the rotten things about Geraldine there were to know Hawk still love her. That sort of love could never be ignored or overcome, it just continued to consume, like a sickness.

‘You’ll never be free of her.’ Whitney spoke her thoughts aloud without realising it, blushing as she looked up awkwardly to meet his shuttered gaze.

‘Never,’ he sighed.

‘Hawk—–’

‘Whitney, let’s drop the subject, shall we,’ he cut in forcefully, obviously wearying of the subject. ‘I had the Freedom brought up to London with the intention of taking her out at the weekend for a week or so. This has changed my plans somewhat.’

‘I don’t see why,’ she protested. ‘If you’ll just let me go ashore—–’

‘No,’ he bit out before she could finish. ‘You’re staying right here until everyone forgets you were doing a story on Tom Beresford.’

She remembered the predatory look in the pale blue eyes of the other man and shook her head. ‘That could take weeks,’ she derided impatiently.

‘You have weeks,’ Hawk told her in a calm voice. ‘Months, if necessary. After all, you’re unemployed, and you don’t have a cat to feed!’

‘I—–’

‘And don’t even think about carrying out your threat to take this story to another newspaper,’ he added grimly, his eyes narrowed. ‘If you attempt to do that Martin will have to retaliate by quietly spreading the word that the absenteeism story was just that, that really you were sacked for embellishing the facts to get a better story.’

Whitney paled, knew her career would be at an end if such a rumour were ever started, however untrue. ‘I don’t believe you would do that to me.’ She shook her head.

Hawk shrugged, his expression cold. ‘Try me,’ he invited softly.

He had to know that a rumour like that, started from such a reliable source as Martin Groves, would finish her as a reporter forever. Not even a provincial newspaper would employ her after that. And she was damned good at her job. ‘You aren’t doing this to protect me at all,’ she accused.

‘Who, then?’ he grated harshly.

‘Geraldine!’ Her eyes were bright with anger. ‘If her husband falls so will she! I don’t believe any woman could be that close to a man and not know exactly what lengths he goes to to earn his money!’

‘No,’ Hawk conceded. ‘I’m sure Geraldine is aware of every corruption her husband is involved in.’

‘Then—–’ She broke off as his expression changed, blinking her confusion as he strode purposefully across the room towards her.

‘For God’s sake, Whitney, I’m not going to hit you!’ he growled as she flinched, his fingers biting into the tops of her arms enough to hold her in front of him but not enough to actually hurt her.

‘What are you—–?’

‘Be quiet!’ he grated, his head bending as his mouth claimed hers.

All the breath left her body at the unexpected caress, her limbs trembling as he moulded her body to his, her senses quivering—–

‘I’m sorry, Hawk, I had no idea—–!’ The shocked voice of another man interrupted them.

Golden eyes gleamed their satisfaction before Hawk turned to look at the other man. ‘It’s all right, Stephen,’ he assured smoothly. ‘Whitney, you remember the captain of the Freedom?’ He quirked dark brows at her.

She had met the other man several times during previous visits to the yacht, and nodded her head in greeting to him, now knowing the reason for Hawk’s sudden—and devastating—kiss. She daren’t even trust the steadiness of her voice to talk to the tall, distinguished captain!

Stephen Hollister still looked uncomfortable for having interrupted them at such an intimate moment. ‘I can come back later.’

Hawk gave Whitney a hard look before nodding to the other man. ‘Maybe that would be best,’ he acknowledged. ‘I was just about to escort Whitney down to her suite anyway.’

The innuendo in his tone was unmistakable, and with a rueful shrug of understanding the older man left them alone once more.

Whitney spun away from Hawk’s side as soon as the door closed. ‘And what if dear Geraldine got to hear about that?’ she challenged, hurt by the way he had used her. Her worst humiliation was that he had to know she had responded to him.

His body tensed, his eyes as hard as the metal they resembled. ‘My staff is paid very well not to gossip about me,’ he bit out. ‘Besides, none of them ever cared for Geraldine.’

She was so angry she just wanted to unnerve him the way he had disturbed her. ‘And what about Mr Peterson?’ she taunted. ‘Was he paid to forget, too?’

‘Yes,’ he answered with simple arrogance.

‘You didn’t have to kiss me just now to shut me up,’ she told him agitatedly, still able to feel the imprint of his lips on hers. ‘A simple “someone’s coming” would have sufficed! I know I lost my temper with you earlier but I’m not in the habit of causing a scene.’

‘I know that,’ he sighed wearily. ‘I just—I’m sorry if I embarrassed you.’ He shrugged awkwardly.

Embarrassed! She was a quivering mass of nerves, was still having trouble breathing, could barely resist the impulse to place her fingertips where his lips had touched hers; embarrassment was the last emotion she felt!

‘You were my guardian for six years, shouldn’t you be the one to feel embarrassed at being caught making love to me?’ she scorned, to hide her complete devastation.

He drew in a ragged breath. ‘Embarrassment doesn’t come into it. You’re right, I should never have kissed you. I’ll have a word with Stephen and tell him to forget what he saw.’

‘Don’t forget to explain to him that the kiss you gave me couldn’t possibly have meant anything when you still love your ex-wife!’ Whitney’s eyes were heavy with unshed tears.

‘Whitney—–’

‘Don’t bother to see me to my suite,’ she told him heatedly. ‘I’m sure it’s the same one that I usually occupy!’ She closed the door forcefully behind her, resisting the impulse to lean weakly back against it, her back straight and unyielding as she took the stairway down to the deck that housed the suites.

She didn’t relax that control until she had the door to the peach and pale cream suite firmly locked behind her; Hawk hated having people walking out on him in the middle of a conversation; she had learnt that at a very young age, having to spend every afternoon for a week of her holiday studying French the first time she had done it.

She had been fifteen when she had been put into Hawk’s guardianship, when she had met him for the first time at all. She knew he and her father were friends, her father often speaking of him, and she had seen articles about the Hawkworth heir in the same magazines that wrote about her father.

At that time the two men had dominated the motor-cycle circuits, one of them always taking first place, the friendly rivalry inducing a lasting friendship. Whitney had known what her father did for a living, had been proud of his achievements from the safety of the boarding school he had sent her to when she was eight, her mother having died while she was still a baby. The day James Hawkworth arrived at the school in her father’s place she had known Dan Morgan’s sparkling career had come to an end on the race circuit he had loved so much.

The teachers at the school had managed to keep the knowledge of the fatal bike accident from her until Hawk arrived to gently break the news of her father’s death, and because she had known of her father’s close friendship with the younger man she had moved instinctively into his arms to cry over her loss. He had held her until the tears stopped, not speaking, just holding her, and then he had quietly explained to her that her father had left her care to him.

And so as well as her father’s death she also had to contend with the fact that she had been left in the hands of a complete stranger. At first nothing had changed, Hawk leaving her at the school to finish her last year, the only difference there was being that instead of going home to her fun-loving father during the holidays she now went to the large imposing Hawkworth House in the exclusive part of London where Hawk and his wife lived.

Never having really known her mother, except from the photographs her father kept, Whitney had envisaged becoming friends with Geraldine Hawkworth. But the first time she met the other woman she had told her what a nuisance she was, and how her guardianship had disrupted her life. Whitney had always known that Hawk came from a very wealthy family, that he had become something of the black sheep when he had chosen to take up racing motor cycles instead of going into the family-run businesses that had made them all so wealthy. Being given the guardianship of a fifteen-year-old girl had necessitated Hawk donning the respectability of the family business rather than the excitement of travelling around the world racing, Geraldine had tartly informed her. And the other woman obviously resented the loss of that exciting life.

Not that Hawk had ever seemed to blame her in any way, not even when the change in career had such an adverse affect on his marriage. But for years the confinement of business had sat awkwardly on his shoulders, and Geraldine had never made any secret of her dissatisfaction with the new, staid, if equally rich, life she now led. The arguments between the couple had often been horrific those first two years after Whitney left school, Geraldine having a wicked temper.

When Whitney reached eighteen she had suggested to Hawk that now that his guardianship was over she should move out and give the married couple some privacy. It was then that she had discovered that, although she had now reached the age of consent, Hawk was to remain her guardian until she was twenty-one. Her father, perhaps because of his long absences, had always been protective of her, but nevertheless the thought of spending another three years with the bitter Geraldine and the determined Hawk had filled her with dismay.

But the situation between the married couple had suddenly changed. Geraldine began to go out alone, sometimes all night, and it was obvious when she returned the next morning in the same evening gown she had gone out in that she hadn’t just arranged to stay overnight with friends.

Hawk became more withdrawn than ever, concentrating all his energies on his business empire, at last seeming to fit smoothly into this new career he had adopted for her sake, often working late into the evenings. Although the latter, Whitney had been sure, was so that he didn’t have to be at home to witness Geraldine going out to meet what had to be her latest lover. Somehow the role of cuckolded husband didn’t sit well on the shoulders of the man Whitney had come to know—and love. But, as Hawk raised no objection to the situation between himself and Geraldine, Whitney had had to accept that he loved the other woman, no matter what she did, or who she did it with.

Geraldine had finally tired of the life she was living just before Whitney’s twenty-first birthday, asking Hawk for a divorce, which he agreed to give her without argument; how could he hold on to the woman when she obviously wanted to leave!

With Geraldine out of the house while they waited for their divorce, Whitney had tried to get closer to Hawk, to show him that she loved him even if Geraldine had been too stupid to. He had rejected her love by arranging for her to move into her own house, and handing over the diamond-studded watch on the eve of her birthday, the last time they had met before today.

She had been working for the Hawkworth-owned newspaper since she was twenty, and as she knew she was good at the job she had seen no reason to change that; she occasionally saw Hawk striding about the building. He looked older after his divorce from Geraldine became final and she remarried, more cynical than ever, and despite the fact that he had always appeared to be a highly sensual man there had been no women reputed to be in his life, not even casually. Even though she no longer wanted him Geraldine still owned him body and soul. It didn’t matter to Hawk that she had made a fool of him with other men during their marriage, that she ridiculed his love during that stormy time, or that she had become involved with and finally married one of the most powerfully corrupt men in England.

Knowing Geraldine as Whitney did, only too well, and the other woman’s craving for excitement in any shape or form—the more dangerous, the better she liked it—she had a feeling that Geraldine was involved in Tom Beresford’s corruption right up to her beautiful neck.

She also had a feeling that, despite what the other woman had done to him, Hawk was going to protect Geraldine and the happiness she had found with the other man with the last breath in his body if necessary.

God, how she hoped she was wrong!