Honey staggered drunkenly to the side of the path and leaned against a tall palm, trying to get her breath. There was a sharp stitch in her side, and she felt almost dizzy with exhaustion as she clutched the bole of the tree with one arm and the paintings in the other. She’d never dreamed there was so much water in the world. For a while she couldn’t determine what was sea and what wasn’t, so thick was the blanket of rain that surrounded her.
The sea was again licking hungrily at her ankles, she noticed numbly. How high must she climb to escape its reach? She released her grip on the tree, tightened her arms around the paintings, and began to fight her way up the path. It couldn’t be much farther, could it? It seemed as if she’d traveled miles already. She stumbled and fell to her knees in the mud of the trail, and for a moment she stayed there, too weary to move, gathering her resources for the next effort.
“Honey! My God, I could murder you!”
She raised her head slowly, not even surprised to see Lance standing on the path in front of her. He was very wet, she thought numbly. His jeans were clinging to the strong line of his thighs like a second skin, the dark copper of his skin visible through the wet cotton of his shirt. She couldn’t see his features through the dense curtain of rain, but his tone was enraged.
Great. That was all she needed at the moment, to have Lance furious with her. Well, she’d better face it standing up. She was starting to struggle to her feet, when Lance suddenly pulled her up, shaking her like a rag doll. That was just what she felt like, she thought dazedly. Her legs were certainly stuffed with cotton, for they gave way, and she felt herself falling. Then she was scooped up and held close to Lance’s chest, while a string of obscenities issued from him in a strange, broken voice.
“Calm down, Lance,” Alex’s voice came out of the darkness somewhere over Lance’s shoulder. “You’re not making it any easier for her.”
“I don’t want to make it any easier for her. I could beat her. Just look at her, damn it!” Lance said harshly. “Take those blasted canvases from her and get rid of them, will you? She’s got them in a death grip.”
“No!” Honey gasped sharply, her arms tightening possessively on the paintings.
Alex was beside them now, and his voice was as gentle as Lance’s had been harsh. “Let me have them, Honey. I’ll take good care of them.”
Yes, Alex would take good care of them, she thought tiredly. Her hands loosened, and the paintings were lifted from her clasp. Her arms felt oddly empty as they fell to her sides. “Yes, you take care of them, Alex,” she said. “I’m so tired.” She relaxed drowsily and then nestled closer in Lance’s arms. There was an odd sound that was half growl and half sob beneath her ear, but she didn’t hear it, as she fell peacefully asleep.
Honey’s next conscious awareness was of being lowered into a tub of warm bubbly water that jolted her from sleep to a disgruntled wakefulness.
“Not more water,” she protested disgustedly, opening sleepy eyes to glare indignantly at Lance. “I’m practically pruney now.”
“Too bad!” he said, rolling up the sleeves of his wet cream shirt with one hand while he steadied her with the other. “You’ll just have to bear with it. At the moment, you’re so muddy, you look more like a tar baby than a Valkyrie. Now, be quiet while I get you cleaned up and into bed.”
She opened her lips to reply, but they were immediately covered by a ruthless hand wielding a soapy washcloth, and she was forced to shut them abruptly. Lance’s movements were far from gentle as he scrubbed her from head to toe, until she glowed pink and saucy as a baby. Then he washed her hair with equal impersonality and cool efficiency, his expression granite-hard and guarded. An expression that reminded her of Alex. Alex?
“The paintings!” she exclaimed, suddenly sitting upright in the tub. “Are they all right?”
“Alex said that would be the first thing you’d ask,” he said, grabbing a bath sheet from the towel rack. “You’ll be happy to know that they were in perfect condition when Alex unwrapped them.” He stood up and lifted her out of the tub and wrapped her in the voluminous towel. “Which is a hell of a lot better than you. What in Hades happened to your knees?”
“My knees?” Honey asked vaguely. Looking down, she noticed with surprise that they were both badly bruised, and one had a ragged cut across the kneecap. “I must have done it when I fell in the mud.” She frowned in puzzlement. “I don’t remember its hurting when I did it.”
“You were probably in shock,” Lance said roughly, briskly rubbing her hair dry. “You’re still not very coherent. Are you sure you didn’t hit your head out there?”
She slowly shook her head, frowning at him crossly. “I’m perfectly coherent,” she said resentfully, “though I don’t know how you can judge. You haven’t been letting me say a word.”
“Silence is golden and, in your case, a good deal safer,” Lance muttered between his teeth as he scooped her up and carried her into the adjoining bedroom. He sat her on the edge of the bed and left her for a moment to fetch the portable hair dryer from the dresser across the room. “It’s a little late for you to turn verbose. Now, shut up while I get your hair dry. You’ll be lucky if you come out of this without pneumonia.”
She opened her lips to answer but she was interrupted again, this time by the shrill roar of the dryer, as Lance proceeded to dry her hair.
Honey sat obediently silent under the warm blast of air, but her temper was slowly burning. Lance acted as if she’d committed a major crime instead of merely trying to salvage a few paintings. She hadn’t expected him to be grateful, but he didn’t have to be so damned churlish. Even Alex had been more gentle with her than this red-haired bear of a man.
Lance clicked off the dryer and threw it carelessly on the lime-cushioned empress chair by the bed. “It’s still a little damp, but it will have to do.” He turned and strode toward the bathroom. “Get under the covers and keep warm until I get out of the shower.” His hands were rapidly unbuttoning the sodden cream shirt. “But don’t go to sleep—I still have to care for those knees.”
Honey stood up, clutching the bath sheet firmly to keep it from slipping. “You needn’t bother,” she said coolly. “I’ll attend to them myself. I’ll be dressed for dinner by the time you get out of the shower.”
“Dinner!” His laugh was a harsh bark as he pulled off the wet shirt and tossed it on the carpet. “We’ll forget about dinner this evening. Thanks to your stupidity, I don’t think any of us are in the mood for a congenial meal.” He disappeared into the bathroom, slamming the door behind him.
Honey glared belligerently at the door before stalking angrily to the Korean wedding chest that served as a bureau in the corner of the room. So she was not only in Lance’s bad books, but was to be sent to bed without any supper! She wasn’t in the mood for a social dinner either, but she was hungry, damn it.
She snatched the first nightgown she saw in the drawer, and noticed with satisfaction that it was a shapeless, thigh-length cotton nightshirt with a friendishly smiling Garfield the Cat on the breast. She certainly didn’t want Lance to think she was trying to seduce him into a better humor. He was entirely in the wrong, and she would make sure that he was aware of that fact. Two minutes later she had folded back the lime-and-white bamboo-patterned spread on the bed and slipped between the sheets, plumping the pillow with furious energy and pulling the sheets up to her chin before settling down to wait grimly for Lance.
When he did stride back into the bedroom, with only a white towel draped about his hips, she felt a treacherous wavering of her resolve. Why did the man have to be so damn sexy? she wondered gloomily. He was all sleek copper muscle and virile grace as he moved toward her, and she felt a familiar stirring in her loins, which she tried to disregard. His face was still grimly set, she noticed sourly, and she girded herself for the battle to come.
“Did you take care of your knees?” he asked tersely as he sat down on the side of the bed.
“Of course I did,” she l
ied defensively, her glance sliding guiltily away from him. She’d been so incensed by his arrogance and unjust anger that she’d completely forgotten. Her injuries weren’t all that bad anyway.
“Fine!” he said curtly, ripping off the towel. He punched the button on the lamp on the bedside table, and the room was suddenly in darkness. She felt the mattress depress as he slid beneath the sheets and settled himself on his side of the bed. “Good night.”
Good night? Was that all? How dare he be so cool and unconcerned, after the way he’d treated her? She was the injured party, and in more ways than physical, yet he was calmly going to sleep without giving her a chance to air her grievances. Could anything be more infuriating? Well, perhaps “calm” was the wrong word to use. Even across that icy expanse of bed, she could detect the tenseness of his muscles as he lay there, and a taut aura of leashed emotion was crackling about him like a live wire. It was clear that he was still angry with her and was letting her know it in no uncertain terms. Tonight was the first time since they’d become lovers that she wasn’t sleeping in his arms. Not that it mattered to her if he was as remote and cold as the Himalayas, she assured herself. It was just that she had become used to that warm, loving embrace enfolding her, and she felt a little lonely without it. Suddenly there was a rumbling deep in her stomach. That did it! She’d had enough!
Throwing back the covers, she jumped out of bed and strode purposefully toward the louvered closet.
“Where the hell are you going?” Lance’s surprised voice came out of the darkness behind her.
“I’m hungry,” Honey said belligerently. “I may not be considered worthy of dinner, but you can’t object if I go downstairs and raid the refrigerator. You may aspire to being a starving artist, but I’m just a pragmatic private investigator. I want something to eat!”
The light immediately flicked on behind her, and she riffled through the closet for a robe as Lance hissed an imprecation. She ignored him, pulling a white terry-cloth robe off a hanger and slamming the door behind her as she turned around.
“Garfield?”
“What?” she asked, frowning crossly at him. Then she followed his eyes down to the leering cat on her breast. “I like him,” she said defensively. “He has character.” She struggled into the terry-cloth robe. “And feelings! And that’s more than some people I know.”
“Garfield,” he repeated in wonder. And suddenly he began to laugh. “My Lord, Garfield!”
She planted her hands on her hips and glared at him. It wasn’t enough that this maddening man had been growling at her like a surly lion; now he actually had the gall to laugh at her!
Her fury only seemed to amuse him more, for he now dissolved in laughter as he gazed at her cross face and belligerent stance. “I fail to see what’s so amusing,” she said icily.
“I’ve never had a cat leer at me from the breast of a Valkyrie with such a royal bearing,” he gasped, wiping his eyes on a fold of the sheet. “You’ll forgive me if it struck me as funny.”
“I’m not the one who’s royal,” she spat, her violet eyes flashing. “I’m just a poor humble serf. It’s Your Highness who has the privilege of being rude and sulky and abusive and completely unreasonable!” She was practically sputtering by the time she finished, and was pacing restlessly back and forth. “And besides that, you’re trying to starve me to death!”
“I’m sorry,” he said, his blue eyes dancing. “I can see that last sin outweighs all the others.” His lips curved in a tender smile. “Come back to bed, Honey. I want to see if that pussycat knows how to purr as well as spit at me.”
“If I did, I’d be tempted to do more than spit,” she said through her teeth, turning and striding furiously toward the door.
Her hand had only closed around the knob when she felt herself being scooped up and carried kicking and struggling back to the bed. She was dropped on the counterpane, and he immediately followed her down, pinning her arms above her head and throwing a hard thigh over her flailing legs to hold her immobile. “Now,” he said, smiling down at her furious face. “Purr for me, Honey.”
It was too much after all she’d gone through tonight. Two tears suddenly brimmed and ran slowly down her face.
They had a galvanic effect on the man grinning impishly down at her. He stiffened as if she’d struck him, and his face looked almost frightened. “No!” he ordered sharply. “Don’t do that to me. Stop it, do you hear?”
She didn’t know what he meant, but there was seemingly no way she could stop the tears, now that they had started. “Nothing you could do would make me cry,” she said fiercely. “I’m just angry.”
“That’s what I wanted, but you weren’t supposed to cry,” he said accusingly. His eyes were haunted as he looked down at her. “You musn’t do that, damn it. You’ll ruin everything.”
She stared up at him in complete bewilderment. He was totally irrational. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said tremulously. “You’re not making sense.”
“Never mind!” he said huskily. “It’s too late now anyway. I can feel myself breaking into a hundred pieces inside.” She was released with dizzying suddenness, and his arms went around her in a bone-crushing embrace that almost squeezed the breath out of her. He rolled over, holding her in a clasp that was curiously sexless, for all its possessive strength. “Don’t move. Don’t say anything. Just let me hold you. Okay?”
“All right,” she answered faintly. Her anger had vanished when she’d heard that first note of desperation in his voice. She couldn’t have moved even if she’d wanted to, so convulsive was that iron grasp. “Lance?” she asked uncertainly. “Please tell me what’s wrong.”
“Everything would have been fine if you hadn’t cried,” he muttered throatily into her hair. “I could have held it off until you went to sleep.”
“Held what off?” Honey asked bewilderedly. Then, incredibly, she thought she was beginning to understand. His body was shaking and trembling against her like that of a malaria victim. “My God, Lance, what’s wrong? Are you sick?”
“I’m sick, all right,” he growled with a short mirthless laugh. “I’m so scared, I feel like I’m going to fall apart. I’ve been frightened out of my mind since we first discovered you were gone tonight.” His arms tightened. “Why the hell didn’t you come to us instead of running off on your own? Do you know what kind of risk you ran going back to the cottage in a storm like that? You almost died, damn it. You had no right to take a chance like that over something as trivial as those lousy paintings.”
“They’re not lousy,” she denied automatically. “They’re as brilliant as your other work. I guess I didn’t think about anything but saving the paintings, when I found they weren’t with the others.”
“Why the hell would you do something so incredibly stupid for a few daubs of paint on the canvas?” he asked throatily.
“They were part of you,” she said simply. “I couldn’t let them be destroyed.” Her lips brushed back and forth caressingly on the tautness of his cheek. Her tone was gently teasing as she continued, “I was hired to guard you, remember? I’d have been remiss in my duty if I’d let anything happen to such an important part of your life.”
“So you almost destroyed yourself instead,” he said fiercely.
“I knew there wasn’t much time.” She was fighting to free herself from his embrace. It was terrible to feel so helpless when she wanted so desperately to hold him in her arms and comfort him. Then her arms were sliding around him and drawing him even closer with a fierce possessiveness.
“You were right there,” he said bitterly. “Ten minutes later, and you wouldn’t have stood a chance. I knew when we were racing down that hill after you that the odds were you’d already been swept away, that I might never see you again. I nearly went crazy,” he whispered huskily. The words were muffled, but they held an odd note of wonder. “You cared that much about them?”
“I cared that much,” she answered quietly. She was stroking hi
s hair with an almost maternal tenderness. “Don’t you think it’s time to admit that you feel the same way about your work? You know it would have torn you apart to have anything happen to those paintings.”
He raised his head, and she inhaled sharply as she saw the torment in his face and the blazing emotion in his sapphire eyes. “It wasn’t worth risking you,” he said fiercely. “Nothing’s worth that. Promise you’ll never do a thing like that again.”
Honey felt a sudden surge of joy that was like the warmth of home fires burning bright. “I promise,” she said thickly, blinking back the tears.
His head lowered slowly, until he was just a breath away. “I’ve never felt like that before,” he said softly. “I’ve always been able to hide behind laughter and cynicism when anything has come too close to me. But it wouldn’t work tonight, Honey.” He kissed her with such lingering sweetness that she felt her throat ache with tenderness. “You’ve become too important to me. I don’t think I could stand it if I lost you now.” He buried his face once more in the thick silk of her hair. “Honey?”
“Yes?” she answered dreamily. Surely that last inarticulate murmur could be considered something of a commitment?
His words were oddly jerky. “If it means that much to you, I’ll have a show.” He heard her sharply indrawn breath, and went on quickly. “But you’ve got to promise to stay with me after we leave the island. I won’t go through that phony charade alone.” His voice was tinged with bitterness. “I know you look on this little island idyll as a purely temporary liaison, but if you want me to exhibit, you’ll have to restrain your eagerness to get back to your sleuthing.”
Where had he gotten the absurd idea that she was eager to leave him? She vaguely remembered making some comment that she didn’t expect any permanence in their relationship but that had been to lessen his feeling of responsibility.
The Golden Valkyrie Page 12
