Читать книгу Her Tycoon Lover - Lee Wilkinson - Страница 10

FOR twenty-four hours Luke did stay away from Katrin. He got back to the lodge that afternoon late for a panel discussion, which did nothing to improve his state of mind. He then set up a private consultation with the Peruvian delegates in his suite, ordering room service for dinner. Afterward, he worked far into the night, fell into an exhausted sleep, and was also late for breakfast because he’d forgotten to set his alarm.

At least he hadn’t dreamed about her. He’d been spared that.

When he took his seat in the dining room, he soon discovered it was Katrin’s day off; a young man called Stan waited on them. Again Luke drove himself hard all day. But by four-thirty he’d done everything that needed to be done, and he was in no mood to drift to the bar and exchange small talk. He decided to go for a run instead.

He jogged for the better part of an hour, watching distant purple-edged clouds move closer and closer, until they merged into a dark mass that spread all the way to the horizon. When he passed the wharf below the resort, he noticed with an edge of unease that the daysailer was gone from its mooring.

The wind had come up in the last few minutes. A south wind, he realized, his unease growing. Hadn’t Katrin said that was the most dangerous wind on the lake?

It was her day off. Wasn’t it all too likely that she’d gone sailing?

What had she said? It kept her sanity?

When he needed a break from the pressures of work, he jogged, played tennis and skied. It was the same principle.

A sudden gust whipped through his hair. Fear lending wings to his feet, Luke ran back to the lodge, changed in his room into jeans and a T-shirt, and raced for his car. First he checked the resort wharf again, but there was still no daysailer. Then he drove fast to the village wharf. Again, no slim white boat with a furled scarlet sail. By now, waves were lashing the wharf, the spray driven against the thick boards.

An old man was climbing the metal ladder from his boat to the dock. Luke strode over to him, raising his voice over the gusts of wind. “I’m looking for Katrin Sigurdson—she uses a small boat with a red sail. Do you know if she’s out on the lake?”

The old man had red-veined cheeks and bleary blue eyes. “Katrin? That’s my niece…I’m Erik Sigurdson.”

“Luke MacRae,” Luke said, shaking hands. How it must have amused Katrin to posit her disreputable uncle as her husband. He repeated urgently, “I’m worried about her, surely she wouldn’t stay out in weather like this?”

“Katrin?” The old man gave an uncouth cackle. “Too smart for that. Although she likes pushing herself, I must say. I’ve said to her more than once, you’ll go too far one day, my girl, and then what’ll—”

“Then where is she?”

“You’re in a right state, young feller,” Erik said, spitting with careless accuracy into the churning water.

Luke said tightly, “Yes, I am. So why don’t you answer the question?”

“She ain’t interested in guys from the resort. Here today and gone tomorrow, that’s what she says.”

Each word dropping like a chip of ice, Luke said, “I may be staying at the resort, but even I can tell there’s a storm brewing on the lake. No one, but no one, should be out there in this kind of wind, especially in a skimpy little daysailer. So will you for God’s sake tell me if you know where she is?”

“If she’s not home and the boat’s gone, she likely docked on the far side of the island. In the lee.”

“How do I get there?”

Erik took a square of tobacco from one pocket of his flannel shirt, a jackknife from the other, and with its viciously sharp blade cut off a chunk of tobacco. “You got designs on my niece, Mr. Luke MacRae?”

“No. But I sure don’t want her drowning while you and I stand here passing the time of day!”

“Okay, okay, no need to get antsy. Get in your car, turn right, take the next left and keep going to the end of the road. And I’ll bet my entire supply of ‘baccy that she’s there.”

“I hope you’re right,” Luke snarled, and ran for his car. In a screech of tires he turned right. The first drop of rain plopped on his windshield. The limbs of the birches were tossing in the wind; clouds skudded across the lurid sky. Then he was suddenly enveloped in a downpour as a flash of lightning split the horizon in two.

Strong winds and lightning were deadly enemies of sailors. Fear knotting his muscles, Luke drove as fast as he dared through the rain and the gathering gloom. He should have asked how far before he turned left, he thought, furious with himself for the oversight. But he’d been so desperate to get away from Erik Sigurdson, he’d overlooked that all-important question.

She had to be at the dock. She had to be.

He shoved his foot on the brake, then backed up ten feet. He’d almost missed the turnoff, a narrow road flanked by spruce and poplar, rain pelting its gravel surface and running in rivulets into the ditches. He turned onto the road beneath shadowed trees. Slowing down, flicking the wipers to high speed, Luke drove on. Rocks rattled under his wheels.

As suddenly as it had begun, the road opened into a clearing, then snaked down a short, steep hill toward the water. Almost miraculously, the wind had dropped: the broad bay that he’d glimpsed from the top of the hill was in the lee. Lightning ripped the sky apart, followed by a clap of thunder that made him wince. He took the slope as fast as he dared, then parked beside a tangle of boat cradles and overgrown shrubbery. His was the only car in sight.

Thrusting his door open, Luke got out. Earth and rocks had been heaped to make an artificial barrier from the lake, barring his view. He ran down the last of the slope, rounded the corner and saw in front of him a dark stretch of water, pebbled with raindrops, and a small wooden jetty.

A daysailer was moored at the jetty. Katrin was kneeling on the wet boards, searching for something in her duffel bag. Her back was toward him.

She was safe.

For a moment Luke stood still, all his pent-up breath whooshing from his lungs. She wasn’t out on the lake. She hadn’t drowned. She was right here in front of him. Safe.

She was also quite alone, and without any visible means of transportation.

Slowly he walked toward her, his hair already plastered to his skull, his T-shirt clinging to his chest. Another spectacular jag of lightning lit up the whole scene; her shirt was pink, her cap a fluorescent green. Like a drumroll, thunder ushered him onto the wharf.

Enter the hero, Luke thought. Although Katrin would more likely categorize him as the villain; and she had clearly no need of rescue, which is what heroes were supposed to do. As he stepped across the first couple of planks, the vibrations of his steps must have alerted her. She lifted her head sharply, gazing right at him; for a moment he saw the exhilaration still on her face, her wide smile and dancing eyes.

The terror that had kept his foot hard on the accelerator all the way across the island fled, replaced by a tumultuous rage. He grated, “Why are you looking so damned pleased with yourself?”

The laughter vanished from her face. She pushed herself upright, swinging her bag in one hand. “If you really want to know,” she said coldly, “I was congratulating myself on how well I handled the boat once the wind came up.”

“You were a fool to be out in this weather!”

“Thank you for that resounding vote of confidence.”

He stepped closer, water gurgling beneath the boards. “A south wind and a lightning storm—are you crazy? Or just plain suicidal?”

“Neither one,” she flared. “Why don’t you go back to the resort where you belong, Luke MacRae? Where, in theory at least, you know what you’re talking about.”

He took her by the arm, rain sluicing his face. “It so happens that right now I do know what I’m talking about—if you’d gotten in trouble out there, someone would have had to rescue you. You’d have been risking the lives of other people just so you could get some cheap thrills. I used the wrong word—that’s not crazy. It’s totally irresponsible.”

She tried to pull free, her blue eyes blazing. “You seem to be forgetting something—I got back ahead of the storm and I didn’t risk anyone’s life. Including my own. Anyway, what the hell are you doing here? I can’t tell you how much I dislike you following me around like this.”

Luke’s answer was to grab her by the shoulders, pull her toward him and kiss her hard on the mouth.

Her response was instant and unmistakable. She flung her arms around his waist and kissed him back. Passionately. Generously. Recklessly.

As the contact ripped through him, another stroke of lightning lit the wharf with an eerie blue light. Thunder rattled through the trees, where the wind moaned like a creature in distress. But Luke scarcely noticed.

Katrin was soaked to the skin; he circled her waist, drawing her closer, trying to shelter her. One hand moved up her spine until her long ponytail hung like wet rope over his forearm. Then her lips opened to the urgent probing of his tongue. She pressed herself against him, her fingertips digging into his back, kneading his muscles. In a dizzying surge of pure lust, Luke felt her tongue dance with his.

She wanted him just as much as he wanted her. He’d been right all along. Fiercely and wondrously grateful, he grasped her by the hips and pulled them toward him, so that she could be in no doubt of his response. The wet fabric of her jeans was clammy and cold beneath his palms; yet inwardly Luke was on fire.

She was moving against him with a kind of coltish awkwardness that was eager, yet somehow untutored. She couldn’t be a virgin, he thought distantly. Of course not. Anna had said Katrin was choosy…but surely not to that extent? He muttered against her mouth, “Let’s run for the car—you’re soaked.”

“So are you,” she whispered, cupping his face in her palms, her eyes brilliant as stars, as eerily blue as the lightning.

She’d bewitched him, he thought. She could have been a spirit from the depths of the lake; yet simultaneously she was flesh and blood, wholly and utterly desirable.

With a muffled groan Luke kissed her again, moving his lips over hers in a voyage of discovery that he wanted never to end. Her cheekbones, the sweep of her forehead, the firm line of her jaw…he wanted to know them all, to put his mark on them so that they were his alone. “You’re so beautiful,” he whispered hoarsely, “so incredibly responsive…you taste of raindrops.”

She gave him another of those passionate kisses, her fingers running through his wet hair and down his nape. She couldn’t have missed his shudder of response. Again he felt the thrust of her hips against his groin. Overwhelmed by a hunger as primitive as the thunder that was shaking the sky, Luke said, “Let’s go to the car.”

Katrin suddenly pulled her head back, her breasts rising and falling against the hard wall of his chest; as the rattle of thunder died away, he watched her struggle back to a different reality. “My bag,” she muttered, “I’ve got dry clothes in it.”

“Then we’ll take it,” Luke said, grinning at her with something of her own recklessness. “Although I like that shirt just the way it is.”

She glanced down. Her nipples were tight, the thin cotton outlining them as though she were naked. She bit her lip. “Luke, I—”

He leaned down, grabbed her bag, put his arms around her and lifted her from the ground. Luxuriating in her weight, he growled, “Enough talk,” and kissed her again, his blood thrumming through his veins.

“I can feel your heartbeat,” she said, twisting in his arms as she rested her hand against his chest, her face rapt.

Had he ever wanted a woman the way he wanted Katrin? It was as though that first kiss had opened floodgates too long closed, loosing a torrent of desire Luke was helpless to resist. He took the slope in long strides, the runoff saturating his sneakers, rain lashing his face. With his chin he tried to tuck Katrin’s head into his chest, craving to protect her; a far part of his brain noted that protectiveness. Noticed also that it was new to him. Completely new. Inexplicable. But very much there.

He shoved his thoughts away. This wasn’t the time for analysis. Reaching the car, he fumbled with the passenger door, and eased her onto the seat. Then he hurried around to his side, searching for the keys in his wet pocket. He’d get some heat in the car first.

He got in and slammed his door. In the sudden silence, shielded from the onslaught of the storm, Luke looked at the woman in the seat beside him.

In the few moments it had taken him to walk from one side of the car to the other, Katrin had retreated from him. Her bag was on her lap; she was hugging it to her chest as though to ward him off, her eyes wideheld in the gloom. At a loss, for this wasn’t what he’d expected, Luke said with a lightness that didn’t quite succeed, “It’s okay—I don’t bite.”

“I must have been mad,” she cried. “It was the storm, and fighting the waves on the lake, and then getting into the bay and knowing I’d made it—”

“Katrin,” he said evenly, “we want each other. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

“There’s everything wrong with it!”

“Look, before we get into a big discussion, I think you should get out of those wet clothes. Right now.”

She gave him a hunted look. “Oh, no—I’m fine.”

“I’ll close my eyes,” he said, exasperated. “Or I’ll wait outside the car with my back to you. For Pete’s sake, what do you think I am?”

“I don’t know what you are. Who you are. How could I?”

“You don’t trust me.”

With an intensity that entranced him, she said, “I don’t trust myself! Surely that must be as obvious to you as it is to me.”

Laughter welled in his chest. He fought it down; Katrin would not, right now, appreciate being laughed at. He turned on the ignition and the fan, to get some heat in the car, and said deliberately, “Is that why you lied to me? About your husband, Erik, and your two lovely children, Lara and Tomas, blond-haired and blue-eyed just like you? Because I have something to tell you—in Margret’s tearoom, your friend Anna informed me the children were hers…and then I met your uncle Erik on the wharf when I was looking for you half an hour ago. His shirt needing washing, his boots belonged in the garbage, and he was about to chew on a large lump of tobacco, no doubt using the lake as a spittoon. I must say I’m very glad he’s not your husband.”

Katrin glowered at him, if anything clutching her bag even tighter. “I had to tell you something! You think I was about to admit to you that ever since that first evening in the dining room I’ve been dreaming about you every night? X-rated dreams. Not the kind I could tell Lara or Tomas.”

His jaw dropped. “What?”

“You heard what I said. I’m not going to repeat it.”

Dazedly Luke said, “Is honesty your middle name?”

“Stupidity, more like.”

She looked as edgy as a wild creature, as though she’d bolt if he made the slightest wrong move. “That kind of honesty’s rare,” Luke said.

Her grimace was endearing. “I never usually tell lies…it goes against the grain, so I’m very bad at it. I was amazed when you fell for all that stuff about my husband and my two kids. I figured you’d see through it right away.”

“Maybe I’m the stupid one,” Luke said dryly. “How about making me a promise? No more lies.”

“Promises are made between people who mean something to each other.”

He looked her straight in the eye. “This particular promise has to do with your own integrity.”

She was the first to look away. “Okay,” she said grudgingly.

“Good,” said Luke. “Change your clothes, I’ll be back in five minutes.”

He got out of the car. The storm was moving off as fast as it had arrived, the lightning had abated, and even the rain had let up. He scrambled down the slope and sat down on some old boards, reflecting on what had happened.

He’d lost control down there on the wharf, when Katrin had so unexpectedly and wholeheartedly kissed him back. Lost it instantly and completely and uncharacteristically. He never lost control. No matter who the woman was or how long he’d been without one. Oh, physically he could let go, that wasn’t the issue. But he always kept his emotions under wrap.

Not with Katrin. In the space of five minutes he’d felt passionately grateful, hugely protective, and fiercely possessive. Grateful? Because a woman had kissed him? Protective of a woman entirely capable of looking after herself? As for possessive, he neither wanted to possess another human being nor to be possessed by one. If honesty were Katrin’s middle name, independence was his. He’d come to that conclusion at fifteen, and had seen no reason to change it since.

It was a good thing she’d been too shy or too frightened to change her clothes in front of him. He’d needed to get away from her. To take time out, to think with his brain cells instead of his hormones.

Danger. That was what Katrin spelled. He already knew that.

Danger or not, he still wanted her. More than he’d wanted anything or anyone for a very long time.

As a stray gust rustled through the shrubs behind him, a shower of raindrops trickled down his neck. Luke swiped them off, thinking furiously. If he really wanted Katrin, why couldn’t he have her? On his terms?

She hadn’t needed any persuading on the wharf.

He could persuade her again. Of course he could. Although he’d have to tell her what his terms were; it wouldn’t be fair to deceive her on that score.

But if she accepted them, he could take her to bed.

How else was he going to get rid of this obsession with Katrin Sigurdson?