Читать книгу Forgotten Sins - Robyn Donald - Страница 7

IT HURT, Aline realised, to breathe. It even hurt to think. The last time she could remember such pain was when they’d told her Michael was dead. The irony almost knocked her to her knees.

Lauren said softly, ‘You’re so stubborn and self-centred, so sure you’re always right, but tomorrow you’ll have to believe me. I even lent the author Mike’s letters.’

Jake’s eyes narrowed. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’ he asked in a tone that wilted Lauren’s antagonism.

Defiantly she said, ‘Aline refused to talk to the writer—Stuart someone—when he contacted her about a biography of Mike. But I did. I told him everything about Mike and me because I wanted people to know he loved me. Tomorrow morning everyone in New Zealand will read that Aline gave Mike nothing, and I gave him everything.’

Locked in a savage agony of rejection and betrayal, Aline closed her eyes, listening to the meaningless words buzz around inside her head. She craved numbness, forgetfulness, with the avid hunger of an addict.

‘And that book’s coming out tomorrow?’ Jake demanded so silkily that Aline’s lashes flew up.

No emotion showed in his face, but his gaze focused on Lauren with the searing lance of a laser. Behind the hard, handsome features Aline saw a predator, menacing, relentless, and lethally dangerous.

Visibly bracing herself, Lauren took an instinctive step backwards. ‘It’s being launched next week, but tomorrow there’ll be a big extract in one of the Sunday papers.’ From somewhere she produced an aggressive tone. ‘Mike put New Zealand on the map with his single-handed sailing voyages around the world, and he cared enough about kids to set up the Connor Trust and raise millions of dollars for it. Some of the money from the book’s going to the Trust, yet Aline would have stopped publication if she’d been able to.’ She cast a scathing glance at Aline. ‘People need to know what a wonderful man—a truly great man—he was. I’m not ashamed of loving him, and I’ll be proud until I die that he loved me.’

Jake would have liked very much to wrap his hands around that slender throat and throttle the life out of her, but he needed to get Aline out of there before the confrontation—already drawing covert attention—went any further. White and frozen, her subtle cosmetics displayed for the mask they were, she hadn’t moved since Lauren had started her attack.

It was the first time he’d seen her at a disadvantage, and he was startled by the fierce protectiveness that unexpectedly gripped him.

Ignoring Lauren, he stepped between the two women and touched Aline’s arm. When she didn’t respond he said gently, ‘Aline, come with me.’

After a taut moment she shivered.

‘Let’s go,’ he said, relieved when she let him steer her out of the nearest door and into the entrance hall, mercifully empty of onlookers.

With a firm hand at her elbow, he led her across the gleaming wooden floor with its priceless Persian rug; he wondered if the door to Keir’s study would be locked, but it yielded to his urgent hand.

Mentally thanking Keir for his trust in his guests, he pushed it open, noting with a half-smile that Keir wasn’t that trusting; everything but the desk and the bookshelves had been locked away in a bank of cupboards.

Obediently, silently, Aline went ahead, finally stopping in the middle of the room to look around with dazed bewilderment. Succumbing to his concern, Jake folded her slim, cold hands in his, but although she didn’t resist it was like touching a statue.

‘She could be lying,’ he said harshly.

‘She’s not lying.’ Aline’s voice sounded distant, muted, empty of the subtle sexy texture that made it so erotic beneath the surface crispness.

‘How do you know?’

She shuddered. ‘He used to say my eyes were like the very best turquoise. How would she know that unless he told her?’

Pillow-talk, he thought savagely. ‘It could have slipped out in conversation.’

She shook her head. ‘Keir must know; he was Michael’s best friend,’ she said. And then with a half-sob, ‘Yes, of course. That’s why…’

‘Tell me,’ he commanded when her voice trailed away into nothingness.

She didn’t ask him what business it was of his. The shock of Lauren’s revelation had smashed the barriers he’d tried so hard to penetrate these past months. Ruthlessly practical, he decided it might be a good thing; if she’d been living in a fool’s paradise the truth could only set her free. It might even help the small personal crusade he’d embarked on—finding out exactly what was going on in the Connor Trust.

But, God, he hated to see her in such pain.

In that same empty monotone she said, ‘About a year before Michael died I noticed a distance between them, and after that we didn’t see much of Keir. I asked Michael why, and he said that it was the natural way of things—married men didn’t have so much in common with their single friends.’ She lifted her lashes and looked at him with blank eyes like enamelled jewels, their vivid colour framed by long black lashes. ‘You believe people when you love them because it hurts too much not to.’

Looking into that lifeless, beautiful face, Jake thought violently that if he could kill a dead man he’d do it right then.

A soft sound from behind alerted him to the opening of the door; instantly he swung around, thrusting Aline behind him as their host entered the room.

Frowning, Keir demanded, ‘What’s going on here?’

Jake stood to one side and let Aline tell Keir exactly what Lauren had said.

He was good, Jake thought with respect; their host’s ice-grey eyes registered only a single flash of fury, but of course Aline noticed.

She whispered, ‘Was Lauren the only one?’

‘Yes,’ Keir said brusquely.

‘So he did love her,’ she said, as though the words stabbed her to the heart. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

‘Would you have believed me?’ When she shook her head he added more gently, ‘It wasn’t my place to tell you.’

Jake understood. He’d been in an impossible position. Was Keir’s knowledge the source of the tension he’d sensed between Aline and her boss?

Politely, Aline said, ‘Of course it wasn’t. I’m sorry I asked. Keir, I think I’d better go now.’

‘I’ll take you,’ Jake told her.

She swivelled as though she’d forgotten he was there. ‘That’s very kind of you,’ she said woodenly, ‘but my car’s here.’

‘You can’t drive.’ Jake’s voice was patient. ‘I’ll make sure your car gets home.’

He could see her try to muster her defences. ‘I’ll be perfectly all—’

‘You’re not fit to drive,’ Jake said brutally. ‘Kill yourself if you want to, but what if you kill someone else?’

Huge turquoise eyes held his until she made a blundering gesture of rejection, muttering, ‘All right, I’ll go with you.’ She turned back to Keir. ‘Please tell Hope I’m sorry?’

‘Of course. Will you be all right?’ He frowned, his eyes travelling from Aline’s shuttered face to Jake’s.

With an effort Jake could only imagine, she managed a faint curve of her lips.

‘Of course I will. You don’t die from disillusion. And I’ve got this week off—I’ll be fine once I’ve had a chance to get used to the idea of—of…’ She choked and caught herself up.

Harshly, Jake said, ‘I’ll look after her.’

He and Keir exchanged a look, golden eyes clashing with ice-grey. Jake said softly, ‘This has nothing to do with you.’

Keir didn’t like that, but after several taut seconds he nodded.

Once safely in Jake’s car, Aline sat back into the seat and stared at the window, trying desperately to summon a blankness that would blot out her thoughts.

It was useless. All her mind could register was the stark, inescapable fact that Michael had betrayed her.

Eventually she blurted, ‘I’m surprised she waited so long to tell me.’ The words burst from some secret part of her, rooted in a miserable mixture of anguish and furious humiliation.

‘Why would she want to tell you?’ Jake asked, backing the car skilfully between two badly parked others.

‘For years she hasn’t said a word! Why now, I wonder?’ And to her astonishment Aline heard herself say, ‘I’m so sorry for her; to love someone and not be able to grieve openly for him must be the worst kind of hell. And then to lose her baby…’ Her voice trailed off as she remembered that Michael had refused her a child. Stumbling, she said, ‘Perhaps she wanted to forewarn me—’

‘The baby,’ Jake told her with ruthless frankness. ‘That’s what she saw when she came in the door—you laughing with Emma.’

Aline looked down at her hands, realising they’d taken on a life of their own and were writhing together in her lap in the classic gesture of helpless indecision. Revulsion and sheer force of will subdued them into stillness.

‘I see.’ She straightened her fingers and stared at the wedding ring she’d worn with such pride ever since Michael had put it on five years previously. It weighed heavy, as crushing as treachery.

Clenching and unclenching her hands, she said thinly, ‘I feel a total idiot. Grieving nearly three years for someone who told his lover what pet names he called me!’

‘You’re not the first person to have your trust betrayed.’ Jake’s voice was infuriatingly calm, close to off-hand. ‘It happens to everyone.’

‘To you?’ she demanded.

He shrugged. ‘Of course.’

Suddenly aflame with reviving anger, she said intensely, ‘I’m not going to put myself in such a position again. Never!’

Jake glanced across and saw the savage, almost wild determination on her face as she wrenched off the wedding ring and wound down the window. He didn’t stop her when she flung the ring through the window. Fresh air whipped around them, carrying the scent of grass and manuka balsam and the faint, salty tang of the sea.

‘There,’ she said intensely. ‘It’s over. All I want to do now is forget.’

Brows slightly raised, Jake drove on.

A few miles down the road she said, ‘Turn right at the next turn-off. I live—’

‘I know where you live—in a townhouse beside the harbour on Whangaparoa Peninsula,’ he told her curtly.

Later she might wonder how he knew her address, but at the moment she couldn’t summon up the energy.

But he wouldn’t let her sink into the stupor she craved. Coolly persistent, he asked, ‘What are your plans?’

‘I don’t know,’ she said dully. She looked around as though in an unknown landscape. ‘Stay at home, I suppose. Regroup…’

‘Did you live there with him?’

‘Who? Oh, Michael. Yes.’ Stupid—she’d been so stupid! ‘I don’t want to go back there,’ she admitted with painful honesty.

‘You could come with me,’ he suggested casually. ‘I own a beach house not too far away—it’s completely isolated. I’m going there tonight for a few days before I leave New Zealand. You can come if you want to.’

She made a jerky movement, then clamped her hands together in her lap. ‘I couldn’t impose,’ she said in her stiffest tone.

His laughter was low and cynical. ‘You mean, you think I might try to seduce you. Naturally, after you’ve had such a huge shock, that’s exactly what I’d do. You don’t have much of an opinion of me, but, for the record, you won’t have to sleep with me.’

Scarlet-faced, she muttered, ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.’

Her head drooped sideways. Racked by an exhaustion of the spirit, by waves of tiredness that slowed her brain and made her unable to think sensibly, she muttered, ‘I’ll be fine. It was kind of you to offer, though. Thank you.’

But when the car drew to a halt outside her house a pleasant and determined young woman, with cameraman and sound recorder in tow, was waiting for her in the street. One or two neighbours were already outside, watching.

Strong face angry, Jake swore beneath his breath. ‘Do you want to turn around and get out of here?’

‘Where would I go?’ she asked, her voice so thin and apprehensive it horrified her. She dragged in a breath and said between her teeth, ‘No, I will not run away.’

‘Good,’ he responded smoothly, pulling in behind the television company van. ‘Give them that arrogant stare and walk right over the top of them. Wait in the car until I let you out, and from then on I’ll be just behind you.’

Clinging to that promise, Aline straightened her shoulders and disciplined her face as she got out of the car.

‘Mrs Connor?’ the journalist asked after a rapid, appreciative glance at Jake. ‘I wonder if I could have a word with you—?’

‘No, thank you,’ Aline said, appalled by the cold reptilian scud of fear down her spine. She saw the camera focus and had to hide an impulse to scuttle inside to safety.

‘It won’t take a moment—it’s about Stuart Freely’s biography of your husband.’ The woman gave a persuasive smile. ‘We thought you might like to make some comments.’

‘You heard Ms Connor,’ Jake said briefly. ‘She doesn’t want to comment.’

Smirched and sickened by the determined interest she saw in the woman’s face, Aline unlocked the door and walked inside.

‘It must be a quiet weekend for news,’ she said bitterly as Jake closed the door behind him.

‘Change your mind and come with me. The uproar will die down in a week or so—the media will soon find something else to feed on.’

‘You’re very kind,’ she said, fear mingling with a restless longing, ‘but it would be cowardly—’

‘Cowardly? To stop them putting you in a pillory to entertain an audience?’ Each scornful word cut through the armour of aloofness she’d erected. ‘Come up with a better excuse than that, Aline.’

Aline looked around the sitting room she and Michael had furnished with so much care, so much pleasure. Black anger and despair gripped her. The thought of spending one more moment in this shrine to a lie was beyond bearing.

At least in Jake’s abrasive company she wouldn’t wallow in self-pity, imagining Michael and Lauren in each other’s arms, hearing him whisper his love to another woman…

‘All right, I’ll come,’ she said, weakly surrendering.

‘Get some clothes,’ Jake commanded. He took a mobile phone from his pocket and began to punch in numbers. She watched as he held it to his mouth, his keen raptor’s eyes fixed on her. ‘Sally?’ he said. ‘I’ve got a couple of jobs for you, both urgent—’

Aline ran up the stairs and flung clothes from her wardrobe into a weekend bag. Feverishly but automatically, she stuffed cosmetics and toiletries on top, grabbed a pair of shoes, and changed from her silk suit into black trousers and a polo-necked T-shirt the same colour. After pushing the long sleeves up to her elbows, she slung a black linen shirt around her shoulders in case it got cold on the boat.

Abruptly her energy drained away; she stood for a long moment, staring blankly around. Michael smiled at her from the dressing table. Eyes filling with tears at the loss of a lovely dream, she walked over and put the photograph face down in the drawer. One day perhaps she would accept that to have loved him was worth it; all she could feel now was outrage and humiliation—and an angry, unexpected sympathy for Lauren, because Michael had betrayed them both.

‘Have you finished up there?’

‘Yes,’ she said promptly, and came out of the room. Behind her, jerked by her ungentle hand, the door closed with a small crash.

Six foot three of virile, compelling male, Jake waited at the foot of the stairs, the autocratic angles of his bronze profile gilded by the late-afternoon sun. Tawny lights glimmered in his black hair and a cynical smile hardened his mouth.

He was the ultimate challenge, she thought, stabbed by an urgent, primitive response—a challenge she wasn’t up to.

‘Do you need help with that bag?’ he asked briskly.

Heat burned along her cheekbones. ‘No, thank you,’ she said, lifting it and walking down the stairs. Instinct warned her that by going with Jake she was setting out on an unknown journey into perilous seas, a journey with no map and no compass. And she was a very weary wayfarer.

Perhaps her mental and emotional exhaustion showed in her face, for Jake took the bag from her and asked in a different voice, ‘Do you have a back door?’

‘Through there.’ She indicated the direction. ‘It leads into the garage, and then into an access alley.’

‘Good.’ His smile twisted as he glanced at her. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen you when you haven’t been dressed in perfect taste. Those are ideal clothes for a fast getaway. Can you walk half a kilometre or so up to the golf course?’

‘Of course I can—but why?’

‘Because that’s where the helicopter will be.’

‘The helicopter?’ Her voice sounded flat, without inflection, but she didn’t care; she struggled to reach that shroud of grey nothingness that shielded her from pain and shock. She’d come to know it well after Michael’s death, but it was no longer there for her and she knew why; Jake’s raw masculinity had blown it into wispy shreds, leaving her quivering and exposed.

Patiently he said, ‘The chopper was to have picked me up in Auckland, but it’s on its way here now.’

‘What about your car?’

‘Someone will drive it back to town,’ he told her.

Because it seemed reasonable, Aline nodded and followed him through the back door, docilely handed him the keys and waited while he locked up behind them.

‘I’ll go ahead,’ he said.

But nobody ambushed them in the alley behind the townhouses.

‘Most people never think to check the back,’ Jake said, locking the gate behind Aline and pocketing the keys. ‘Let’s get out of here.’

Sometimes, she thought, donning sunglasses as they strode away from the house she’d shared with Michael, it was easier and simpler to give in to an irresistible force. And if that was just another way to say she was a coward—well, so be it.

They had almost reached the golf course when they heard the helicopter coming across the ocean, descending rapidly.

‘Walk faster,’ Jake said calmly as the whump-whump-whump of its engine began to echo. ‘No, don’t run—we don’t want to attract any attention.’

But no one took any notice; people living around this superb golf course were accustomed to the arrival and departure of helicopters. The street was still empty when they turned into the gate and headed for the concrete pad where the chopper was settling with cumbersome accuracy.

The pilot lifted a hand. The door slid open and another man leapt down, crouching as he ran towards them. Jake dropped something into his palm, then grabbed Aline’s hand.

‘Keep your head down,’ he commanded, and towed her up to the open door.

The blast of turbulent air whipped long strands of black hair from the neat coil at the back of her head, tossing it around her cold face. Jake dumped the cases, and in spite of her protests lifted Aline into the machine.

The way her eager flesh reacted to his impersonal grip finally robbed her of any chance of reaching that barren, emotionless refuge she longed for. She might have been able to put the swimming in her head down to the thud of the rotors, but what set her heartbeat pummelling her breastbone was Jake’s touch, the faint salty fragrance of his skin, and his effortless strength.

She pushed the tangled locks from her face with shaking fingers.

By then in the front, Jake turned. ‘Seatbelt,’ he mouthed, pointing to the belt with one imperative hand.

Biting her lip, she nodded and groped for the straps. After watching until she’d buckled them across her waist, Jake pushed the door closed before reaching for a pair of headphones. Beneath the fine material of his shirt his body flexed with spare masculine grace.

Aline watched his lips move as he said something to the pilot. Was she being incredibly stupid to go with him?

Well, if she was, who cared? She closed her eyes. Michael, she thought drearily, oh, Michael…

Yet deep in her innermost heart she’d always known she wasn’t enough of a woman to keep Michael satisfied. Lauren’s ripe femininity was what men wanted.

A howling increase in the blast of the engines was followed by a sudden lurch and then lift-off. Aline settled back and let her eyelids drift up. With bent head, Jake was checking something in his lap. The westering sun painted a wash of gold over his face, emphasising its bold stamp of authority, its stark, forceful command.

Heat seared through her, smashing past the layers of weary grief. She shivered with muted apprehension as they flew away from the sunset over water the colour of wine, heading over peninsulas and bays and islands. How on earth had she let herself be hijacked like this?

Cowardice, she decided, and Jake’s uncompromising will. She should have seen it coming; she’d soon learned to respect his intelligence and his grasp of business. He’d known exactly what he wanted from his association with the bank, and he’d used his clout and a certain amount of ruthless power in negotiation, although the final deal satisfied both partners.

Yet beneath the civilised—if aggressive—businessman, she thought with an odd primitive thrill, lurked a warrior, a man with hunting instincts as keenly honed as those marauders who’d swept periodically out of the desert or the forest, or from frozen wastes to plunder and loot and enslave. In spite of his mask of civilised discipline, Jake Howard radiated a primal intensity that slashed through her misery and humiliation, homing in on the basic need of a woman for a man.

When he caught her watching him the arrogantly handsome face didn’t change expression, but his unreadable eyes narrowed when he mouthed, ‘OK?’

Bitterly angry at the betraying tug of sensation deep in the pit of her stomach, she nodded and glanced away. How odd that she should be torn between grief at the shattering of her memories and this heated awareness of another man.

From their first meeting she’d reluctantly responded to Jake’s sexual energy, the supercharged physicality that his expensive tailoring didn’t hide, but she’d done her best to ignore it, seeing her unwilling response as treachery to the memory of the man she’d loved with all her heart.

And if that thought didn’t hurt so much she’d be laughing at her own naïve foolishness.

Once more she closed her eyes and tried to sink into nothingness. It didn’t work.

Angry and tense because Jake’s presence kept jerking her back into the real world, she peered sideways, picking out places she recognised—various islands and the intertwined arms of sea and land. The helicopter rode through a sunlit canopy while darkness overtook the land, and in its wake sprang scatterings of golden pinpricks. Trying to keep her mind from fixing obsessively on the man in front, Aline named every cluster and string of lights.

At last it was too dark to see, and she closed her eyes again, only opening them when the helicopter banked.

They landed in a purple and indigo night that bloomed with stars. Jake pushed the door back and swung long legs down; turning, he beckoned Aline.

She fumbled with the seatbelt; once free she hunched her shoulders and eased herself across to the door. Jake didn’t move, and when she looked into his face he gave a sudden humourless smile and lifted her down. Frustrated by her involuntary response she stiffened, knocking her temple against the side of the opening.

It hurt, and she said, ‘Ouch,’ putting up a hand to the slight contusion as he carried her easily across the grass, setting her down well away from the helicopter.

‘What happened?’ he demanded, running his fingers through her hair to discover the small bump. Frowning, he traced its contours gently.

Shaken by his nearness and his unexpected gentleness, Aline stepped back and shook her head.

‘Stay there,’ he commanded, and strode back to collect two bags, hers and one that must have been waiting for him on the chopper.

‘Thank you,’ she said bleakly when he dumped them at her feet.

She picked them up and turned towards the dark bulk of a house. After two or three steps she realised he wasn’t with her. A swift glance over her shoulder revealed him unloading a couple of cartons from the helicopter.

Food, of course; he’d have organised it while she’d packed. No, he’d planned this holiday before he’d gone to Emma’s christening, so supplies would already have been seen to.

She dropped the bags and started to go back to help unload, but Jake, his rangy body outlined in light from the helicopter, had almost reached her. As he put the cartons down the helicopter rose like a squat, noisy beetle, its lights blinking steadily while it banked above them and then soared away.

Jake straightened up. ‘How’s your head?’ he asked abruptly. ‘No headache?’

‘No, it was just a small bump.’ She cleared her throat. ‘It’s fine.’

‘Welcome to my bach,’ he said, and took her hand.

Automatically Aline pulled back, but the warm, strong fingers didn’t release her. ‘The grass is uneven,’ he explained, scooping up the bags and urging her towards the house.

‘What about the cartons—?’

‘I’ll come back for them. Come on, you’re cold.’

‘I’m not.’

He brought her hand up to his face, pressing it for one tense second against heated skin and the subtle abrasion of his beard. That fleeting contact seared through every quickening cell in her body.

‘Definitely cold,’ he said calmly. ‘Let’s get inside.’

And because she didn’t want to get involved in an undignified tug of war she couldn’t win—not because his clasp was strangely comforting—she let her fingers lie in the warmth of his and walked beside him towards the house.

Behind them the chop-chop-chop of motors faded into silence. Stars pulsated above, far brighter than they ever were in the city. A cool breeze flirted across her face, heavy with the delicious perfume of mown grass. Every sense suddenly and painfully alert, Aline pretended to gaze around.

At the house Jake dropped her hand and unlocked a wide door. Pushing it open, he switched on a light inside the door and glanced down at her, his face oddly rigid in the bright flood of light. ‘Come in, Aline,’ he said with unusual formality.

‘I wouldn’t call this a bach,’ she remarked, hesitating a cowardly second before bracing her shoulders and walking inside. ‘It’s far too big and modern. How many bedrooms does it have?’

‘Four. I didn’t know that baches had to have a certain number of rooms to deserve the name.’ His voice was cool, entirely lacking in any undercurrents, but his eyes scrutinised her face with a perceptiveness that screamed an alarm inside her. ‘It’s built to be easy to look after, suitable for casual holidays, so as far as I’m concerned it’s a bach.’

‘It’s lovely,’ she said quickly, looking around with assumed interest.

Apprehension prickled through her. Jake had seen her desperate and hurting; would he use that pain and desperation against her?

Not that it mattered; later her pride might suffer, but for the moment she didn’t—wouldn’t—let herself care.

She just wished it had been any other man than Jake Howard who’d offered her a refuge.

Perhaps he felt some guilt for that scene with Lauren, but a sideways glance as he strode beside her along the wide, tiled hall dispelled that idea. Why should he? It hadn’t been his fault, and anyway, Jake didn’t look the sort of man who did guilt.

‘Let me see that bump.’

‘It’s perfectly all right,’ she said, voice sharpening. ‘I can’t even feel it now, and it didn’t break the skin.’

But he insisted on parting her black hair with exquisite care so that he could check it. Aline closed her eyes, only to open them swiftly when she found that darkness emphasised his faint male scent—salty and sensual—and the slow fire of his touch on her head. Tensely she bit her lip.

He released her, saying abruptly, ‘It’s going down already. You’re rocking on your feet. I’ll show you to your room and you can rest there if you like.’

‘I’m fine,’ she said. ‘It was barely a bump.’

The room he showed her was huge; Aline stood staring at the vast bed as Jake opened windows, letting in a great swathe of fresh, salty air. ‘The bathroom’s through that door,’ he said, indicating one in the wall. ‘I’ll bring you something to drink.’

‘I don’t want—’

‘Aline,’ he said very softly, his face hard and watchful, ‘just let go, will you? You’ve been running on adrenalin and will-power ever since that bloody woman spilled her guts. A drink will ease a bit of that tension, and a decent meal will give you something to use for energy. At the moment you look like the princess in the tower—white and drawn and so tightly wound you’ll shatter if a mosquito lands on you.’

Her chin lifted. ‘I don’t need a drink to ease tension. I’m not in the habit of “spilling my guts”—’ her voice infused his phrase with delicate scorn ‘—to perfect strangers, thank you.’

He gave her a thin, unsparing smile. ‘That sounds more like the Aline Connor I know. Not even my mother said I was perfect, but as for being strangers—I don’t think so…’

Something mesmerising in his fierce eyes, in the deep voice, tightened around Aline and imprisoned her in a cage of indecision. Breath clogged her lungs; she heard the distant drumbeat of her pulse, slow and heavy and then faster, faster, as Jake took her face in his hands and tilted it to meet his uncompromising gaze. Two lean forefingers traced the black, winged length of her brows.

Eyes glittering with a crazy mixture of anger and hunger, Aline jerked her head back. ‘Let me go,’ she said, the words hoarse and laboured.

‘We’re not strangers, Aline,’ Jake said, laughing in his throat as he dropped his hands and stepped a pace away from her. ‘Far from it.’

Sickened by the shivering pleasure his expert touch had given her, she said crudely, ‘You said I wouldn’t have to sleep with you.’

‘And I meant it.’ He didn’t seem angry, although his eyes were calculating. ‘But I’m not going to let you lie to yourself. You know as well as I do that from the moment we met we’ve been acutely, uncomfortably and inconveniently conscious of each other. Sooner or later we’re going to do something about it.’

‘I won’t—’

‘Calm down.’ He said it so forcefully the words dried on her tongue. ‘I’ve already told you I’m not such an insensitive clod that I’d try to persuade you now. Come out when you’re ready.’

Aline waited until the door closed silently behind him before unpacking with rapid, angry energy, stacking her clothes in the walk-in wardrobe next to the bathroom.

Then she gazed around the room—large and light, furnished with a casual expertise that breathed skill and money—and found herself liking it very much.

Retreating, she showered, sighing when her tense muscles finally relaxed under the hot water. But by the time she’d towelled herself dry and dressed—the same black trousers topped this time by a soft silk shirt in the moody aquamarines and blues that went so well with her eyes—she was once more as tight as a coiled spring.

‘Stupid!’ she muttered between her teeth, picking up the hairdrier. ‘So, why wouldn’t the bathroom have everything a woman might need? Do you care?’

A twist of jealousy gave her an answer she didn’t like. Refusing to consider the highly suspect implications, she used the drier and her brush to free her hair of tangles before winding it firmly into its knot and venturing out of the sanctuary of her room.

‘Ah, back to normal,’ Jake said enigmatically, looking across the high bar that separated the kitchen from a huge living and dining area. ‘A pity—I liked that wild, uncaged look.’

She frowned, shocked anew by the pulse of response through her. He’d changed too, his long legs and narrow hips shaped by casual trousers, with a tawny, superbly cut cotton shirt clinging to his wide shoulders. Rolled sleeves revealed tanned forearms, and damp hair fell across his brow as he stirred something that smelt delicious.

‘The wild uncaged look doesn’t fit into corporate life,’ she said evenly. ‘Can I help?’

‘Can you cook?’

‘I can stir,’ she retorted, irritated at the defensive undertone to the words.

He laughed. ‘It’s all right—I’ve got dinner organised.’ He set the spoon down and put a lid on the saucepan, then emerged through the doorway and strode across to a sideboard where a tray held a bottle of champagne and two tall flutes.

Aline shuddered. After this afternoon she didn’t think she’d ever be able to drink champagne again without recalling Lauren. She said tautly, ‘A man who can cook—wonderful!’

‘All the great chefs are men,’ he said, still amused.

‘Not any longer they’re not.’

Smiling, he eased the cork from the bottle. His charismatic mixture of confidence and grace and authority made everything he did seem easy.

Aline glanced at the bottle; this wasn’t merely champagne, it was superb French champagne. ‘Are you trying to impress me?’ she asked, a cynical smile touching her mouth.

Gleaming gold eyes scanned her face with cool interest. ‘Could I?’