Читать книгу Jared's Love-Child - Sandra Field - Страница 6

SHE was hot. She was jet-lagged. She was late.

Very late. And the driveway to “The Oaks” was like one of those country roads that go on and on interminably and never arrive anywhere. With a sigh of impatience Devon Fraser wiped the perspiration from her forehead and tried to relax her neck muscles. Just to add to everything else that had gone wrong, she was—and had been for the last fifteen minutes—trapped in a line of limousines and chauffeur-driven Cadillacs occupied by wedding guests who were all early for the wedding. Early and fastidiously attired in formal suits and designer dresses.

Devon was driving her bright red Mazda convertible with the top down and she was wearing the same outfit she’d put on twenty-four hours ago to leave Yemen. A modestly styled and not very becoming green linen suit—now much crumpled—a blouse with a high neck, and undistinguished green pumps that were killing her feet.

No make-up. Almost no sleep. And absolutely no joy at the prospect of the next few hours.

It was her mother’s wedding she was late for. Her mother’s fifth wedding, to be accurate. This time to a man called Benson Holt. A wealthy man with a son named Jared, of whom Alicia, so she’d said, was terrified. Jared was to be best man to Devon’s maid-of-honor.

Devon had spent the last four days in negotiation with some very rich oil barons. She wasn’t about to be intimidated by a Toronto playboy called Jared Holt.

The wedding was scheduled for six p.m. and it was now five past five; she’d had to wait for several minutes to pass through the wrought-iron security gates at the entrance to Benson Holt’s property. It was going to take a small miracle, thought Devon, to get her to “The Oaks” and transform herself in less than an hour from a bedraggled dowd to a glowing maid-of-honor. All maids-of-honor glowed, didn’t they? Or was that the bride?

Devon didn’t know. She’d never been a bride and had no inclination to change that state of affairs. She could safely leave being a bride to her mother.

Venerable oak trees lined the driveway, the grass was velvet-smooth and all the fences—miles of fences—were painted a pristine white. The prospective groom was indeed rich. Surprise, surprise, Devon thought sardonically. While her mother was a professed romantic, Alicia had yet to marry a poor man.

Through the fences Devon could see open fields and placid groups of mares and foals, and for a moment she forgot how unforgivably late she was. She’d remembered to throw her riding gear into her suitcase in the ten-minute stop she’d allowed herself at her condo in Toronto. At least she might get one pleasurable experience out of this wedding. A ride on a thoroughbred.

Because she was, of course, dreading the wedding.

With a jangling of her nerves, she saw that the lane was widening into a expanse of groomed shrubs and statuary around a circular driveway. The house was an imposing mansion of Georgian brick with a great many shutters and chimneys. Ignoring the directions of the two uniformed men who were waving the cars to a parking area under the trees, Devon whipped out of the line-up, skidded to a halt not twenty feet from the front door and scrambled out, reaching into the back seat for her case and the long plastic bag that held her dresses.

Every muscle in her body ached. She felt like hell. And looked worse.

She ran for the front door. It was flanked by polished coachman’s lanterns and was painted a rich dark green. As she reached for the bell, the door swung open.

“Well,” a man’s voice said mockingly, “the late Miss Fraser.”

Devon tucked a stray blond curl into what had been, twenty-four hours ago, a sleek and well-mannered hairdo. “I’m Devon Fraser, yes,” she said. “Would you please direct me to my room? I’m in a hurry.”

The man was standing in the shadow of the door. Insolently he looked her up and down, from her windblown hair all the way to her dusty and unexciting pumps. “Very late,” he added.

Her brief assumption that this was a rather unconventional butler was just that: brief. The man blocking her entrance into the house had never in his life been the servant of others. No, he was the type who gave out the orders, and expected them, unless she was mistaken, to be instantly obeyed.

And then he stepped into the late-afternoon sunlight and for the first time she really saw him. Her eyes widened. Her heart began to hammer in her chest.

A butler? Was she crazy? He was the most magnificent specimen of manhood she’d ever seen.

Tall, dark and handsome didn’t begin to describe him.

Certainly he was tall, several inches taller than her five-feet-ten, a fact that instantly irritated her beyond all proportion. His hair was black, his eyes dark as volcanic rock, and for a moment, her imagination working overtime, she saw him as a man who would trail devastation in his wake and bring her only sorrow.

Oh, stop it, Devon! Dozens of men have black hair and dark eyes. Get a grip.

As for handsome, his features were too strong, too infused with sheer male energy, for the word to have much meaning. He was handsome in the same way a polar bear was handsome, she thought. Take one look and run for your life.

Adding to her unease, his expensively tailored tuxedo and crisp white shirt—civilized and sophisticated attire—made him look dangerous rather than civilized, untamed rather than sophisticated. Certainly they did nothing to disguise his breadth of shoulder and depth of chest, his flat belly and lean hips.

He had a beautiful body.

Lots of men had great bodies. But this man exuded male magnetism through his very pores. What woman worthy of the name could resist him?

This one, she thought frantically. Me.

What on earth was going on here? She made it a policy never to be affected by a man’s looks or sexual charisma, a policy that had served her well over the years. Kept her from making mistakes like the ones her mother had made. So why was she now slavering over the man in the doorway? Who was, moreover, making her even later for the wedding.

Okay, Devon, calm down, she told herself. You’re exhausted and wired all at the same time, you’d rather be in the Kalahari Desert than attending a wedding at “The Oaks,” and your imagination’s gone on a rampage. A man trailing devastation? Come off it! Sure, his face is much too roughly molded to be called handsome, far too tough and full of determination to be dismissed by any label as facile as playboy. Who cares?

I don’t.

But she was certain of one thing. Certain in her bones. The man standing by the glossy green front door was the intimidating Jared Holt. Considerably less inclined to blame her mother for being afraid of him, Devon finally found her voice. “And who might you be?” she asked coolly.

Ignoring her question, he said in a deep baritone as smooth as expensive brandy, “I was hoping you wouldn’t turn up at all. So this fiasco of a wedding might at least be postponed.”

“Too bad,” Devon said. “I’m here.” Proud of how normal she sounded, she kept to herself the fact that she too thought of the fast-approaching nuptials as a fiasco. “I presume you’re Jared Holt?”

He nodded, making no attempt to shake hands. “You’re not at all what I was expecting—your mother keeps raving on about how beautiful you are.”

“Dear me,” Devon said, “you really don’t want my mother and me in the family, do you?”

“You got that right.”

“Any more than I want you and your father in mine.”

His jaw hardened; it was an extremely determined jaw. “So why didn’t you miss your plane from Yemen, Miss Fraser? I don’t think your mother would have gone through with the ceremony if you weren’t here. You could have scotched the whole thing. At least temporarily.”

“Unfortunately,” Devon said with icy precision, “I don’t see my role in life as my mother’s keeper. She may well be intent on making another ill-judged marriage. But she’s also over the age of consent. As is your father.”

“So you’ve got claws. How interesting. They don’t go with the outfit.” And in another of those scathing glances he took in her rumpled linen suit and loose-fitting blouse.

“Mr. Holt, I’ve spent the last four days negotiating mining rights with some very powerful men who live in a country with different dress codes for women than ours. My plane was late leaving Yemen, I missed my connection in Hamburg, Heathrow was a nightmare of queues and security, and then of all things there was a wildcat strike of baggage handlers in Toronto. Not to mention the traffic getting out of the city. I’m tired and I’m cranky. Why don’t you just tell me where my room is so I can get changed?”

“Cranky?” he repeated with a smile that didn’t touch his eyes. “You should choose your words more carefully—cranky doesn’t begin to describe you. You’re seething with all kinds of emotions. Typical female, in other words.”

“Generalizations are the sign of a lazy mind,” Devon said sweetly. “And the words that would most accurately describe the way I’m feeling aren’t the kind of words I’m going to use with a complete stranger. My room, Mr. Holt.”

“So I was right—there’s a lot more going on under that meek little exterior of yours than mere crankiness…although I fail to understand why you don’t want your mother marrying a very rich man. There’ll be a lot of spinoffs for you.”

Don’t lose it, Devon told herself, gritting her teeth. Jared Holt would like nothing better than for you to scream at him like a harpy five minutes after you arrive on his father’s doorstep. She said coldly, “My mother’s been married to men much richer than your father…I have no idea why she’s settling for less.” Delicately she raised one brow. “Unless, perhaps, he’s a great deal more charming than his son?”

“I can be charming when it suits me, and I hate talking to someone who’s wearing dark glasses.” Moving so fast she didn’t have time to duck, Jared whipped her glasses off her nose. For a split second she saw the contempt on his face falter, flare into something else altogether. Then that elusive emotion was gone, leaving her to wonder if she’d imagined it.

Whatever it had been, it had again set her heart to racing in her breast.

He said tightly, “I’ll show you to your room. Your mother’s room is next to it. After the wedding, of course, she’ll move into my father’s wing of the house.”

With an innocent smile Devon said, “So you have trouble with your father having a sex life, Mr. Holt? Maybe you need a good psychiatrist.”

“I don’t care who he sleeps with. I do care who he marries.”

“Control.” She gave a short laugh. “Why am I surprised?”

“Let’s get something straight right now,” Jared Holt grated, with such suppressed rage in his voice that Devon had to fight the urge to step backward. “And you can pass this on to your mother. I will not allow her to take my father to the cleaners when—as is inevitable, given her record—the divorce comes about. Have you got that? Or do I have to repeat it?”

To hell with all her good resolutions. She hadn’t traveled thousands of miles to listen to this kind of garbage. “You know what?” Devon blazed. “I’ve been to forty or fifty different countries in the last eight years and in none of them, not one, have I met a man as gratuitously rude and ignorant as you. You take the cake, Mr. Holt. Congratulations!”

If she’d hoped to get under his skin, she’d failed. His lip curling, he said, “I’m not being rude—merely honest. Not a trait you recognize, Devon Fraser? But perhaps you’re just not used to it.”

For Devon the game, if that was what it was, had suddenly gone on too long. She said sharply, “Are you figuring on trading cheap shots with me until it’s time for the wedding? Hoping my mother will call it off at the last minute if she thinks I’m not here? I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I’m perfectly capable of finding her on my own, thank you very much.” And she took two steps past him.

Again he moved so swiftly she scarcely even saw the movement. His hand closed around her sleeve; its grip was as tight and impersonal as a circle of steel. Devon wasn’t used to having to crane her neck to look up into a man’s face; she was too tall for that and wasn’t above using her height when it suited her. But Jared Holt made her feel diminished and ridiculously unsure of herself. Not certain which she hated more, that sensation or the man himself, she rapped, “Let go of me!”

“Calm down,” he said sardonically, “I was only going to show you to your room.” He reached round her, the scent of his aftershave drifting to her nostrils, his dark head so close she could have stroked his hair, and took her suitcase from her unresisting fingers. “Although,” he went on, “time’s running out, and I’ve never yet known a woman who could get ready for anything in less than an hour.”

She wanted to run her fingers through his hair, find out if it was as silky as it looked. No use denying it. Oh God, what was wrong with her?

With a hollow sinking in her belly, Devon strove for control, praying her crazy impulse hadn’t shown in her face. Coating her features with disdain, she looked him up and down. “I’m sure you’ve known a lot of women.”

“You could say so.”

“In my opinion, the man who has to boast of his conquests isn’t worth bothering about.”

“Those with little experience of men, Miss Fraser, have to make do with opinions.”

Obviously he thought her too unattractive to get herself a man. Gritting her teeth, Devon said, “Some of us prefer to choose our experiences! You look good, I’ll give you that. But a man—again in my opinion—should be a touch more substantial than the packaging.”

“You have a lot of opinions about men for a woman whose packaging doesn’t warrant a second look!”

You’ll pay for that, Devon seethed inwardly. I’ll make you give me more than a second look, you arrogant playboy! The plastic carrier over her arm contained two dresses, one entirely correct for a high society wedding, the other rather more interesting but by no means as correct. She now knew which one she was going to wear. Decision made.

Although if she were smart she’d go for the dull but safe dress. Because by far the worst thing about this absurd conversation was the fact that she found Jared so extraordinarily attractive. Male to her female at the most basic of levels. He exuded a sexual confidence that irritated her intensely, partly because she was sure it was completely unconscious. He wasn’t trying to attract her. Oh, no. She wasn’t worth the time or the effort.

But the ease of his stance, the shiny lock of dark hair falling so casually over his tanned forehead, the latent strength of his fingers—every molecule of his body—tugged her toward him even as every word he’d said warned her to run as far and as fast as she could. She’d managed very nicely the last few years by keeping her own sexuality under wraps. If Jared Holt attracted and infuriated her, he also frightened her. Deeply.

“You’re very quiet,” he taunted. “Don’t tell me you’ve run out of opinions already?”

“They’re wasted on you.”

He said with savage emphasis, “This whole day is wasted on me.”

“Then—at last—we agree on something.”

With sudden impatience he pulled her through the door, kicked it shut behind him and marched her across a generous and sun-filled hallway toward the graceful curve of a mahogany stairwell. More than his fingers were strong, Devon thought with a shiver of her nerves. Although she kept herself in very good physical condition, she knew it would be useless to resist him; he could overpower her without even exerting himself. Resting her hand on the banister, her one desire to puncture his intolerable ego, she said with assumed lightness, “I did compliment you, you know.”

“I must have missed it,” Jared said tersely.

“Your good looks, remember? The packaging. You look rather familiar to me…although I can’t place you. Have you ever done any modeling?”

“I have not!”

She’d gotten to him. Hurray, hurray. Taking her time going up the stairs, gazing at all the portraits of the race-horses for which Benson Holt was famous, Devon said pleasantly, “What beautiful creatures…perhaps you work for your father in the stables, Mr. Holt?”

He bit off the words. “No. I don’t.”

Score two. “Then what do you do?”

“Try and keep fortune hunters away from him. At which I’ve obviously screwed up.” He led her into a separate wing and pushed open a white-panelled door. “Your mother’s in the end room, this one’s yours. They both have private bathrooms.”

Before Devon could protest he’d walked in and was putting her case down by the bed. She didn’t want him in here. She didn’t want him anywhere near her or a bed or any combination of the two. She said amiably, “Do try and smile for the cameras, won’t you? Unless you want all the wedding albums to show you sulking like a little boy who didn’t get his own way.”

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Jared said softly. “I don’t like it.”

Her breath caught in her throat and her heart gave an uneasy lurch. From the very first she’d thought him dangerous. And she’d been right. But something in her refused to back down, no matter how intimidating he was. Devon said, “How interesting…I also hate being ordered around. Something else we have in common.”

“Unfortunately we’re going to have far too much in common. I can’t imagine you’ll like being my stepsister any more than I’ll enjoy being your stepbrother. Thanksgiving and Christmas in the same house. Family birthdays. On and on it goes.” He gave her a wolfish grin. “You and I will be tied together once this marriage takes place—one more reason you should have missed your plane.”

She said steadily, “My job—I’m a lawyer who negotiates mining rights—requires I spend a large part of the year out of the country. You might be available for every family birthday that comes along. I won’t be.”

Jared reached over and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear; as his hand streaked her neck with fire, it took every ounce of Devon’s control to keep her face immobile. He said smoothly, “Talking of wedding photos, I hope you’re planning on doing something with your hair in the next forty minutes. But don’t keep us waiting, will you, Miss Fraser? That’s the bride’s prerogative.”

He strode across the carpet and shut the door very quietly behind him. Devon dropped the plastic carrier on her bed and took half a dozen long, steadying breaths. The room seemed bigger without him. Bigger and emptier. Then a tap came at the door and she jumped as though a gun had gone off in her ear. “Yes?” she quavered.

“Darling, is that you?”

“Come in, Mother,” Devon said, and braced herself.

“Jared told me you’d arrived. I’ve been so worried, I thought you weren’t going to make it in time, and I really need your support—Jared looks at me as though I’m the original scarlet woman, quite frankly he terrifies me. I can’t imagine how Benson fathered him…darling, you’re not even dressed!”

“That’s because I’ve only just arrived,” Devon said, and kissed her mother’s exquisitely made-up cheek and looked her up and down. “You look lovely,” she said truthfully.

“I didn’t want to wear white—not really suitable. Do I really look all right?” And anxiously Alicia tweaked at the long skirt of her cream-colored silk dress.

For once Alicia had avoided the frills, lace and beadwork that were her normal adornment. The dress was elegant, and her hairdo equally restrained. It was five months since Devon had seen her, at which time Benson Holt had simply been a name Alicia had dropped into the conversation rather more often than was necessary. For the first time wondering if Benson had brought about other changes, Devon said, “It’s a wonderful dress! Show me your ring.”

With a shyness that Devon scarcely thought appropriate, considering this was her mother’s fifth engagement ring, Alicia held out her left hand. The diamond blazed in its ornate setting. Devon had never been fond of diamonds; their cold glitter never looked anything other than mercenary to her. “I hope you’ll be very happy,” she said.

Alicia gave a hunted look at her gold watch. “The ceremony begins in thirty-five minutes.”

“Then you’d better get out of here and let me get ready,” Devon said, smiling. “I’m sorry I’m so late. You know I’d originally planned to be here for last night’s rehearsal dinner—but between Yemen and here it was one delay after another.”

“I had to sit between Benson and Jared.” Alicia gave a shudder of pure nerves. “Do you know what he did three days ago? Jared, I mean. He tried to buy me off.”

“He what?”

“He offered me a great deal of money to call off the wedding. And I can’t even tell Benson; Jared is his only son, after all.”

“How dare he do that?”

“He’d dare anything. He’s the head of Holt Incorporated. Millions of dollars, darling. Millions. He didn’t make those by pussyfooting around.”

Devon’s jaw dropped. “Jared Holt runs Holt Incorporated?”

“He doesn’t just run it. He owns it. He’s made a fortune; he’s fifty times richer than Benson.”

Holt Incorporated involved chains of resorts the world over, some of which Devon had stayed in, a fleet of cruise ships, several commodity conglomerates and an outstandingly successful computer company. “Why didn’t you tell me?” Devon croaked.

With some of her normal spirit Alicia said, “Long distance? From Borneo and Papua New Guinea and all those other places you’re always going to? I’ve got better things to talk about than Jared Holt.”

Devon sat down on the bed and said with a gurgle of laughter, “Guess what? I asked him if he worked in his father’s stables.”

“Darling, you didn’t!”

“And before that I wanted to know if he’d ever done any modeling.”

Alicia groaned. “Oh, no…how could you?”

“Very easily. He’s the rudest and most arrogant man I’ve ever met in my entire life. And I’ve met a few.”

Alicia gave a little shiver. “You don’t want to cross him. He’d make a bad enemy, Devon.”

Her mother only called her Devon when she meant business. “I’m not scared of Jared Holt,” Devon said, not altogether accurately. “But I am scared of arriving half an hour late at that charming arbour I saw set up in the garden. Out, Mother. I’ve got to get ready.”

Alicia gave her a quick, fervent hug. “I’m so glad you’re here,” she said, and clicked the door shut behind her.

Wishing she could feel the same way, Devon unzipped her case, shook out one of the two dresses, and headed for the shower.