Читать книгу In Bed With...Collection - Emma Darcy, Emma Darcy - Страница 49

CHAPTER EIGHT

MAGGIE didn’t want to answer the knock on her door. It was bound to be Mrs Featherfield, anxious to smooth things over again, offering excuses and pleading for more time and tolerance, probably bringing a soothing cup of hot chocolate to settle her down. Impossible mission, Maggie thought, inwardly recoiling from having to cope with it. Better to ignore the knock. She’d done enough answering.

She stayed out on the balcony, ending more than the long day of emotional battering. Her life with Vivian...Rosecliff...this view over the harbour...she had to say goodbye to all of it. There was not going to be any flow-on with Beau Prescott.

Another knock, louder, more insistent than before.

Maggie frowned. Was her silence giving Mrs Featherfield concern? She didn’t want to worry the housekeeper. Sedgewick would have reported the scene in the dining room to her and she might start thinking of real illness if she wasn’t answered. Better to let her check and have done with it.

Reluctantly but resignedly Maggie moved back to the French doors and called, “Come in,” hoping a minute or two would see the end of any fussing.

Beau Prescott stepped into her bedroom.

Disbelief dizzied her. Shock hit in waves. He’d actually come after her, right into her room, invading her privacy, making nowhere at Rosecliff safe from him. The civilised veneer had been cast off; his suit-coat, vest and tie gone. She was swamped by his sheer maleness, the physical dominance of the man, the aggressive masculinity that seemed to swirl from him and draw on her like a powerful magnet.

She stared at his muscular forearms, bared to the elbow as though ready for action. Her heart skittered. She wrenched her gaze up but it moved erratically over his chest, finding the arrow of flesh where his shirt was opened and fastening on the base of his throat where the throb of his pulse was clearly visible. Another shock. Tension tearing at her, forcing her to lift her eyes to his, to see what was driving his heart faster.

A blast of raw desire plastered her with a hot awareness of what she was wearing. She hadn’t thought of it, her mind scrambled by the impact he was having on her. The slinky nightgown had been a personal purchase, its sensual appeal irresistible, a clinging creation of navy silk and lace that slid over her skin and snugly moulded her breasts.

It wasn’t transparent and Mrs Featherfield had seen and admired it, but the lace-trimmed V neckline revealed more cleavage than she would normally put on public view, especially to Beau Prescott who already saw her as having no morals at all. It didn’t stop him looking at her with lust, though, and Maggie felt a quite vixenish satisfaction in stirring him on a primitive level when he couldn’t possibly approve of himself being attracted to her.

Rebellion simmered through the heat he aroused. She’d be damned if she’d make any move to cover up. She was in her own bedroom. She enjoyed wearing this nightgown. It was one little pleasure he couldn’t take away from her. Besides, a belated attempt at modesty wouldn’t impress him. He thought badly of her anyway. So let him stare. Let him burn as much as she was burning.

Her breathing quickened with the reckless, dangerous excitement of challenging him on the most basic level of all. She felt her breasts rising, falling, straining against the flimsy silk, her nipples hardening, flaunting themselves through the provocative arrangement of lace. And she didn’t care. She revelled in the feverish glitter in his green eyes, exulted when splashes of red speared across his cheekbones betraying his rush of blood, his discomfiture with what was happening to him, his response to the stimulus of her femininity.

Her mind boiled over the memory of her first sight of him this morning, the sizzle of sexual awareness, the pleasure, the tingling anticipation of thinking they were made for each other, the sense of at last having found a man she wanted, with whom it would be right to mate. Frustration seethed through her as her eyes raked down his body. This man should have been hers. Her bones ached with the sense of loss.

“Maggie...”

The low, gutteral uttering of her name snapped her gaze up to his again, violent emotion coursing through her at the violation of possibilities he’d ripped away before they could grow. Damn him! she thought in bitter fury. Damn him for not recognising what should have been!

It was true...Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. But he wasn’t scorning her now. Not now. Whatever barriers he’d imposed between them were gone and the wild child had been let loose. Except there was no child in those blazing eyes. It was rampant manhood on the move and he was coming at her, tearing off his shirt, blinding her with a broad expanse of bronzed masculinity.

His clothes were dragged off and hurled away with lightning speed. No hesitation. No inhibitions. Maggie did nothing, said nothing to stop him. She was totally mesmerised by the splendour of the nakedness emerging. He was stunningly beautiful and compellingly, enthrallingly, majestically male. Her whole body was seized by an intense lust for the touch of him, the taste of him, the complete and utter experience of him.

She’d barely had time to want when the want was answered, a strong, binding arm scooping her against him, the thin film of silk between them heightening the physical sensations of their bodies meeting, impressing, exulting in the intimate contact, his hand burrowing under her hair to curl around the nape of her neck, and his mouth crashing onto hers, hot and hungry, intent on plunder.

He kissed her deeply, a strong, sweeping possession determined on tasting all of her. Electric tingles shot straight through the roof of her mouth and exploded any inhibitions she might have had. A fever of passionate need took hold, inciting a wild response to his aggression. They ravished each other in a tumult of kisses, laying an erotic siege that pushed for more to give under the urgent escalation of the desire to take everything—everything they could—here and now.

His fingers hooked into her hair, tilting her head back to expose her long throat to a burning trail of kisses, and she arched into him, loving the sensation of hard unyielding thighs against hers, the thick roll of his manhood pressing into her stomach, the heave of his chest compressing her breasts.

He dragged the shoulder straps of her nightgown down with his teeth, then lifted her off her feet, one arm under her thighs, the other under her back, lifting her high, shoulder high, draping her over his arms like a taut bow, her naked breasts pointing up for his mouth to take, the swell of her flesh taut and tingling, drowning in fierce waves of pleasure from the hot suction of his kisses as he carried her across the room.

Then the bed was beneath her and the silk was stripped from her body, leaving her open and utterly vulnerable to the eyes glittering down in rapturous thrall. “The same colour...the same colour...” he murmured, his voice furred with sensual satisfaction, and he thrust his fingers through the red-gold silkiness at the apex of her thighs, parting it, sliding down to caress the soft, intimate folds it hid...hidden no more as he buried his face there, tasting her sex, driving fierce spasms of sensation through her, making her jerk and twist and tremble with the intensity of his pleasuring.

She felt herself poised on a perilous edge, her muscles melting, contracting in need for him to be inside her, filling the aching emptiness, easing the screaming desire for full possession. She was dying for him...dying for the proving of the promise, the final plunge that would make order of chaos. She clawed at his head, silently begging, urging him to come to her.

He lifted himself over her, kissed her, his mouth invading hers with fast, darting thrusts that drove her wild, taunting her with what he withheld. She bucked in fierce incitement and he rolled, carrying her, lifting her to straddle him, challenging her to take what she wanted, how she wanted. He was there for her, primed and positioned, and his hands slid to her buttocks, squeezing them, urging her into aggressive action.

She took him, lowering herself slowly, feeling herself stretching to encompass him, feeling her muscles convulse around him in response to the exquisite sensation of him moving into her, deeper and deeper, like a delicious fullness pushing through a long swelling stem to a place that seemed to blossom with soft inner petals opening to ecstasy.

She closed her eyes, focusing on that fantastic inner world, and she lifted herself, revelling in the reverse slide, wanting to feel it all over again, exulting in the control he’d given her. His hands stroked up her back and lifted her hair forward, over her shoulders. As she undulated over him, he curtained her breasts with the long silky tresses, caressing them through the soft, tantalising texture in the same rhythmic movement she used on him, evoking a wild eroticism that drove her into pumping faster, until suddenly she was shaking, unable to direct anything.

He whirled her onto her back and took command, poised over her with all his dominant power and the stroking inside her was different now, like a steam train charging towards some zenith she couldn’t even imagine, the rails sparking with showers of electricity—speed, power, action—and a scream of achievement building, building, rushing through her, pushing her to an incredible peak and bursting into an explosion of intense melting sweetness that fused their bodies together and left them collapsed on each other, saturated in heat, all energy pooled and drained.

Maggie had no idea how long they stayed like that, limp and damp and dazed in the aftermath of passion. Eventually Beau dragged himself aside and lay on his back, apart from her. She didn’t mind the separation. Her brain was in some strange limbo where thoughts could not be defined, let alone caught and held. Somehow what had happened was too much to grasp, too difficult to sort out. It hadn’t really been she who had shared in all those wild actions. Some kind of madness had possessed her.

As though this recognition and acknowledgment cleared the haze a little, various ideas darted through. The madness was his fault. He had incited it. After all, she had never done anything like this before. Though it shook her that she’d let it happen, in a way, she had actually wanted it to happen. However, wanting him was no excuse when she knew perfectly well his wanting would stop right here in this bedroom.

He didn’t like her.

And she didn’t like him, either.

So what on earth were they going to do now?

The silence and stillness stretched on, humming with an awareness which was no longer sexual but gathering just as much electric tension. However exhausted they were, sleep was definitely not in the air. Maggie suspected Beau Prescott was nursing the very same thoughts that were plaguing her.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve been with a woman,” he said at last, making it a quiet statement of fact, all emotional judgment strained out of it.

He hadn’t turned to her, hadn’t moved at all. He spoke to the ceiling. Maggie understood this. It was easier to converse without looking at each other. The excuse he offered sounded reasonable enough for her to use, as well.

“Same here,” she answered, speaking just as carefully. “With a man, I mean,” she added for clarity.

“I didn’t come in here to do that.” A trace of shock in his voice.

“I didn’t expect you at all.” Maggie was pleased to make that point. “I thought it was Mrs Featherfield knocking.”

Another silence, not quite so tense, carrying more a stunned quality which they both accepted now they had spoken. Maggie thought how strange it was... both of them sprawled stark naked on the bed, yet wrapped in separate worlds, despite the incredible intimacies there’d been between them. Clothes didn’t seem to matter. Nothing could cover up what they’d done together. It felt ridiculous to even try.

“I watched the funeral,” he said.

“Oh!” Maggie puzzled over why that was relevant in the current circumstances. “I hope it was all you would have wanted for your grandfather,” she said gently, wondering if grief had knocked him sideways.

“Yes.”

At least she had done something right in his eyes. Though it was a bit late to change anything between them.

“I wanted to tell you...wanted to apologise for my attitude today,” he said in a rush. “I should have respected the position my grandfather gave you. And I will,” he added determinedly.

Maggie gave it some thought but couldn’t see how it would work, given his predilection to always thinking the worst of her. “I was planning to leave tomorrow,” she stated bluntly.

She could feel him frowning. It took him a while to reply. “I don’t want to drive you out.” It was said stiffly.

He didn’t really want her here, either. He’d made it perfectly clear their connection tonight was a total aberration. As it was for her. She found it difficult to even look at facing him tomorrow.

“It’s best I leave. You needn’t worry I’ll take much with me. I tend to travel lightly and most of the clothes Vivian bought me won’t fit into my usual life. You can sell them. The accountant, John Neville, will tell you where.”

“But it’s right for you to stay,” he argued, uncomfortable with the outcome of his gold-digging accusations. It stirred him to move. He propped himself up on his elbow and frowned down at her. “It’s in the will. My grandfather wanted it.”

Even with a beetling frown on his face, he was an incredibly handsome man. But looks weren’t everything. Sex wasn’t, either. With a heavy sigh, filled with disappointment and resignation, she stated the reality she had faced earlier.

“Vivian is gone. You made me realise that today.”

He expelled a deeper sigh. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what else to say. Except I do want you to stay.”

She searched the shadowed green eyes, trying to see what was driving him now. Was it only the will? Was tonight’s cataclysmic folly influencing him? Was he thinking he might want more of her? Horror suddenly billowed through her mind. She jackknifed up, sitting with her hands clapped to her face before jerking around to face him with the dreadful truth.

“You didn’t use protection!”

He shot up from an elbow to a hand prop. Her shock was echoed in his fast retort. “You’re not on the pill?”

“No. I had no reason to be.”

“Hell!” He thumped his forehead with the heel of his palm.

Maggie was struck by visions of him having explosive one-night stands all over South America. “Are you safe? I mean...medically clear of...”

“Damned right I am!” He whipped away the hand that had slid from his forehead to pinch his eyes. “Are you?”

“Yes. I haven’t had sex for years!” she defended hotly.

The green laser beams retracted into dark turbulence. “Is there a chance of...of your falling pregnant?”

Maggie took a deep breath and calculated. It was the worst possible time. Which had probably contributed to the mad wanting to mate with him. Didn’t they always say that was the danger period for women to fall to temptation?

“Yes. I’m afraid there is,” she said flatly, scarcely able to believe she had been so stupid, so wilfully, wantonly stupid.

“Bloody hell!” he said, not liking it any more than she did. He swung his legs off the bed and sat hunched away from her, his head in his hands.

Maggie drew up her knees, hugging them, feeling more alone than ever.

The silence was filled with pregnant things.

“Well, you can’t leave now,” Beau said tersely, twisting around to direct his decision at her. “Not with this hanging over our heads.”

Like the sword of doom, she thought, her heart sinking on the horns of their dilemma. She met his eyes, schooling herself to expect nothing. “Would you want the baby if I had one?’ she asked, hating the idea of forced acceptance.

“Of course, I would!” He stood up, stiff with indignation. “Do you think I’m the kind of man who’d abandon his own child?”

People did.

Who knew that better than she?

Maggie never would. She couldn’t. Impossible for her to trust anyone but herself to do right by her child. If she had one.

“I don’t know you,” she said. “I only met you today and you certainly haven’t struck me as someone I could trust and depend upon. I think you’d do what suits you.”

“Well, you’re wrong,” he declared, affronted by her opinion of his character. “And there’s plenty of people who’d back me up on that.”

She shrugged noncommittally. “I guess time will tell.”

“Yes, it will.”

He left her with that dark comment as he walked around the room collecting his scattered clothes.

Maggie sagged into dismal despondency. Maybe God would be merciful and let her get away with this one night of madness. When she did have a child she wanted to be in a true love relationship where abandonment would never be a possibility. She had no idea what kind of father Beau Prescott would make. Probably a resentful one and what good was that?

She didn’t look at him. Didn’t want to. In her mind he’d moved from being a possible mate to one who’d hate a lasting connection with her. Yet if he had fathered a child on her she couldn’t shut him out of their lives. Not if he wanted in. She couldn’t deprive her child of its natural father, couldn’t let it feel abandoned by him.

“It’s settled then,” he said decisively, having gathered up his clothes and hung them over his arm, still careless of his nakedness. The green eyes held steely resolution. “You stay, Maggie. At least until we find out if you’re pregnant.”

“Yes,” she agreed. It was the only sensible course to take.

Trapped, she thought.

Satisfied the matter was settled, he left, shutting her door on the most regrettable episode of her life.