Vacation with a Commanding Stranger

by Penny Jordan

  ‘If things continue as they are,’ he was telling her, ‘inevitably we are going to end up in bed together. It’s an explosively dangerous situation, but no matter how good the sex between us might be, we both know…’

  Livvy couldn’t bear to listen to any more.

  ‘If you’re so worried about what might happen, the solution is obvious, isn’t it…?’

  He looked at her. ‘Is it?’

  ‘Yes. You must leave. That way there won’t be any temptation…any problem…any danger.’

  ‘I must leave?’

  ‘Yes,’ Livvy persisted stubbornly. ‘I was here first and besides, I promised Gale…’ She stopped abruptly.

  ‘You’re very loyal to her.’

  His comment surprised her. ‘She needs someone to be,’ she told him stiffly. ‘It ought to be George…if he was loyal to her—’

  ‘Or she to him,’ Richard interrupted her quietly.

  The way he was looking at her made her heart ache with love and pain. ‘I’m not leaving,’ she told him shakily. ‘You’re the one who seems to think…who feels…’ She stumbled over the words, unable to find the right ones to express what she wanted to say, and angry with herself for her confusion.

  ‘And you don’t agree with me, is that it? Any man, every man could…’

  ‘Why are men always so vain, so obsessed with the power of their sexuality and women’s vulnerability to it?’ Livvy demanded suddenly, hating him and herself for what he was obviously thinking, for what she by her own actions had allowed him to think: that she found him so sexually desirable that she was totally unable to resist him. ‘When you first arrived you couldn’t wait to tell me that you knew my type, that you considered I was the kind of woman who used sex to barter with, who had so little respect for herself that virtually any man… But now it’s different…now suddenly it’s you who’s responsible for arousing my dangerous sexual desires. Do you really, honestly think you’re so irresistible? Well, let me tell you, you’re not.’

  The look he gave her made her eyes burn with shamed tears. He was looking at her as though she had disappointed him, let him down. Didn’t he understand that she had had to do it to protect herself…to protect them both?

  ‘You know that isn’t what I meant at all,’ he told her levelly. ‘I was wrong in my initial assessment of you, I acknowledge that. It seems I was also wrong to believe that we could talk to one another as two adults, that we both had the maturity to be open and responsible with one another…’

  He was walking away from her, opening her door and then quietly closing it again behind him.

  She’d had to do it, Livvy told herself. She had had no option. So why was she standing here crying, painful, aching tears welling up in her eyes and sliding helplessly down her face? Why had her victory over him left a sour, bitter taste in her mouth?

  * * *

  Was it never going to stop raining? Livvy stared glumly towards the window.

  The storm Monsieur Dubois had forecast had broken in the early hours of the morning, the day after her confrontation with Richard. Since then they had each kept their distance from one another, avoiding one another as much as possible. This morning Livvy had hoped to go out, but with the rain so heavy that she couldn’t even see across the yard it was pointless even trying to think of doing any sightseeing. She was working upstairs in her room; the kitchen was somewhere she avoided as much as she possibly could do now.

  She heard the phone ring and tensed. Richard was downstairs and would answer it. If it was Gale…but apparently it wasn’t, because there was no foot on the stairs, no voice saying that the call was for her.

  She bent her head back over her work and then frowned.

  Ten minutes later, when she heard the sound of the BMW’s engine being started, she got up and hurried over to the window. Richard was going out. Where on earth to, in weather like this? Was it something to do with the phone call he had just received?

  For some reason his absence from the house, instead of helping her to relax, made her feel more uneasy and on edge.

  Outside it was murky, no more than half-light, the rain still a heavy, relentless downpour. The cat had taken up almost permanent occupation by the range. It got up and wound itself between Livvy’s legs while she made herself a hot drink.

  Livvy glanced across at the phone. Perhaps while Richard was out she ought to ring Gale and find out if she had spoken properly to George yet.

  She dialled her cousin’s number. Roderick answered the phone. He had a cold, he told her, and he was off school. Livvy sympathised and waited for him to fetch Gale.

  ‘Have you managed to speak to George yet?’ she asked her cousin when she came to the phone.

  ‘No. It’s impossible,’ Gale told her fretfully. ‘He’s still in Japan, out in some remote region where it’s impossible to get in touch with him, apparently. The whole situation is ridiculous, Livvy. He’s my husband and yet I don’t know where he is, or how I can get in touch with him. I haven’t seen him for over three weeks. I rang Robert Forrest this morning. Or at least, I tried to. According to his secretary he wasn’t there, but she promised she would ask him to ring me.’

  ‘Do you think it’s wise tackling him?’ Livvy asked her. ‘I mean, he is George’s boss.’

  ‘Exactly. And besides, how else am I supposed to get in touch with George? I’ve tried speaking to his secretary, but she’s useless. Worse than the one he had before and she was pretty hopeless. I told George when he took her on. It was obvious what type she was, although George insisted that her qualifications were excellent. I thought at one time that he might… Well, she was that kind of woman, you know. And they do say that middle-aged men are prone to… But when Robert Forrest took over, she left and this new girl started working for George. I’ve met her and she’s pleasant enough, a world away from the other one, who had vamp written all over her.

  ‘Look, Livvy, I mustn’t stay on the phone too long. I’m waiting for Robert Forrest to come back to me… Is he still there, by the way—Richard whatsit?’

  ‘Yes,’ Livvy told her. ‘Gale, you will let me know just as soon as you have talked to George, won’t you? Only it’s beginning to be a bit of a strain, staying here, and…’

  ‘Livvy, you mustn’t leave. You promised me that you wouldn’t…’

  Livvy sighed.

  ‘You promised me,’ Gale reiterated.

  ‘Yes, it’s all right. I’ll stay,’ Livvy assured her.

  * * *

  Five o’clock came and then six. It was almost dark and still there was no sign of Richard’s returning.

  Make the most of it, Livvy told herself as she made herself something to eat. You’re much better off without him here. After all, that’s why you want to leave here, isn’t it? Because you know how vulnerable you are.

  Vulnerable. What had happened to her went way, way beyond that. She could only hope that once she got back to the routine of her normal life she would feel differently. And stop loving him? Was it possible for such a miracle to occur?

  She shivered a little and then tensed as she heard a noise outside. It wasn’t the noise her ears had been straining for for the last couple of hours, the sound made by a car engine. It hadn’t been as definite and audible as that. It had sounded more like someone moving around outside.

  She got up and went to the door, opening it hesitantly and then freezing as she saw the apparition walking towards her.

  It couldn’t be Richard, and yet she recognised that it was, his hair plastered to his skull by the force of the rain, his clothes similarly plastered to his body. There was mud all down one side of him and she could see a tear in his jeans.

  ‘What is it…what’s happened?’ she asked him anxiously, forgetting their differences as she hurried towards him.

  He was limping slightly and, now that she was close to him, she could see a cut on his cheek, still oozing blood, the skin around it already discoloured.

  ‘It’s the lane,’ he told her
tersely. ‘It’s turned into a quagmire. I swerved to miss a bird—idiotic thing to do—and ended up in the ditch. I tried to move the car but there’s no way it can be shifted without a tow. Fortunately it hasn’t blocked the lane. I’ll give Monsieur Dubois a ring in the morning.’

  ‘So he was right about the tractor,’ Livvy murmured. ‘You’ve hurt yourself,’ she added. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Nothing that a hot shower won’t cure,’ he told her, grimacing as he followed her inside. ‘It’s just as well your cousin hasn’t refurnished this place yet. If she had, there’s no way I could go upstairs in this state.’

  Livvy could see what he meant. He was already dripping rainwater and mud on to the kitchen floor, and, although he had claimed that he wasn’t hurt, the rawness of the gash on his face made her wince sensitively for him.

  ‘Mmm…if Gale were here she’d make you strip off in the kitchen.’

  He gave her a brooding look, his voice harsh as he demanded, ‘I don’t think in the circumstances that that would be a good idea, do you?’

  Leaving Livvy staring helplessly after him, he opened the door and went upstairs. She had been going to offer to make him a hot drink, but now…

  Refusing to let the tears blurring her eyes to fall, she hurriedly cleared away the evidence of her own meal. She was going to go upstairs to her own room, and, when she did, she wasn’t going to leave so much as a crumb behind to let him think that she wanted him to be reminded of her.

  She was on the landing when the bathroom door opened.

  Like a film played in slow motion, she saw Richard standing there, water dripping from his body…his naked body.

  ‘I forgot my towel.’

  His voice was blurred and hoarse. It seemed to reach her from a great distance, so that she heard the words but could not shake herself free of the paralysis that gripped her, nor avert her eyes from him.

  It wasn’t his nakedness that paralysed her, she recognised numbly. It was her own reaction to it; that great tide of shaming, claustrophobic longing and pain which told her with aching clarity just what she was to be deprived of.

  Better not to have seen at all than to have to bear the instinctive knowledge that for the rest of her life her flesh would ache weakly for all that it had to be denied, for each touch, each breath, each sensation.

  It wasn’t a matter of wanting, needing or lusting for him, she recognised fiercely. What she felt went much, much deeper than that.

  ‘Livvy…’ She heard him say her name, caught the raw harshness of the word, saw the anger in his expression and turned her back on him, half stumbling in her awkward, anxious attempt to get away.

  ‘Livvy…stop…wait…’

  She made a small, anguished sound and then froze with shock as she felt him catch hold of her.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  PANIC overwhelmed her. As Richard turned her round to face him, she lashed out at him, small ineffectual blows which landed harmlessly against his chest. Harmless to him, that was. To her…

  As her bunched fingers made contact with his skin, hot and sleek, a silken covering for hard muscles, Livvy started to shake violently.

  ‘Let me go…’

  The words threatened to choke her, or was it the tears her pride would not allow her to shed that were blocking her throat?

  ‘Livvy, stop it…listen… Oh, for God’s sake.’

  She tensed as he picked her up, scooping her off her feet in irritated impatience with her refusal to listen to him, holding her against his body as though…as though he had never spoken those warning words to her, never acknowledged and forced her to acknowledge what was going on between them, but he had said those words. Said them and meant them.

  It wasn’t just she who was tense now. He was, too. She could feel him looking at her and, even though she knew it was the wrong thing to do, the most dangerous thing she could do, she lifted her head and looked back at him.

  ‘Livvy…’

  His voice was hoarse, rough, a plea and a demand, his eyes dark with arousal.

  When she raised her hands she would have sworn it was so that she could lever herself away from him and put some safe distance between them. So how was it then that, instead of doing so, she was actually allowing them to slide tentatively, caressingly almost, up over his shoulders, her lips parting in a tiny breath, a provocative sigh of wanting as she looked at his mouth?

  It wasn’t like the other times he had kissed her. This time it was the kiss of a man who already knew he would be her lover, the kiss of a man who desired her and knew that she desired him. It neither forced or cajoled but simply, and far more dangerously, acknowledged and ignited what had already begun between them.

  She didn’t remember how they had got into his bedroom or on his bed, she didn’t remember moving…didn’t remember anything at all but the feel of his mouth on hers, the sensation of drowning beneath a kiss so sensual that it stimulated her to a point that was almost unbearable.

  She felt him undressing her and even helped him to do it, but it was without any real awareness of what she was doing. All that mattered…all she wanted was for him to continue holding her, touching her, kissing her.

  When he broke the contact with her mouth, she whimpered protestingly, nuzzling into his skin, kissing and licking the warm flesh of his throat and then his shoulder, while he groaned in protest and his body arched, his hands holding her briefly away from him.

  ‘I want to feel you against me,’ she heard him telling her. ‘I want to feel all of you next to me, Livvy…all of you.’

  She shuddered mindlessly. That was what she wanted too so why did he…why was he…?

  As she felt his hands on her body, she realised he was trying to remove the last of her clothing, the thin cotton all-in-one against which the hard points of her nipples pressed eagerly and wantonly, flaunting their desire for him, so tender that she winced slightly as the soft cotton rasped against them when he removed it.

  Instantly his hands were stroking her, soothing her, his lips caressing her swollen, tender flesh, drawing her nipple into his mouth where he bathed it with tender, moist heat.

  She started to shiver, wild, fierce spasms of pleasure racking her.

  She could hear him talking to her, telling her how much he wanted her, how desirable he found her, how the feel and scent of her body was arousing him, making him want to explore each and every centimetre of her to give her all the pleasure she could ever want.

  He wanted her to touch him, he told her; he wanted her to hold and caress him, to feel the need which turned him from a rational human being into something, someone, completely at her mercy and so much in need of her that his senses, his essential being would die of starvation without her to nourish them.

  He wanted her, he told her, as he suckled her nipples. He wanted her. His mouth brushed her midriff, her stomach, his tongue circling her navel.

  Helplessly, she clung to him, her nails digging into his flesh, stifling the frantic moans of arousal clogging her throat by burying her mouth against him.

  He tasted of soap and salt, his skin clean from his shower and yet musky with the scent of his arousal. He groaned when she touched him, smoothing her hand down over his back. His buttocks were flat and hard, the skin slightly paler than the rest of his body where it obviously hadn’t been exposed to the sun.

  She experienced an unfamiliar erotic urge to trace that demarcation line, to follow it round to the front of his body.

  She trembled wildly, molten with pleasure as his hand slid between her legs.

  She had wanted him there for so long, touching her like that with sure, knowing fingers that seemed to know all the secrets of her sex and to take pleasure in exploring them.

  He reached up to pull her down against him, smoothing the hair back off her face, his own miraculously softened by what they were sharing. She could see desire and need in his eyes, feel it in the response he was making no attempt to conceal from her.

  He wanted her to
see and know how much he wanted her, she recognised.

  Already her body was responding helplessly to his touch, making her arch up eagerly against his hand.

  ‘I warned you it would be like this between us, didn’t I?’ he groaned as he kissed her. ‘I warned you that it would get out of control… That I would get out of control,’ he added thickly, as she was unable to resist the temptation to reach out and touch him, to caress him as intimately as he was her.

  She wanted the taste of him in her mouth, she recognised achingly, the feel of him in her body; she wanted to wrap herself around him and never let him go, to abandon herself completely to him, to be so completely and utterly at one with him that nothing could ever drive them apart.

  ‘Livvy, Livvy…’ She felt him shudder as she started to press quick, aching kisses along his body, but when he realised what she was going to do he took hold of her and told her thickly, ‘No, no… That pleasure has to be mine.’

  And in the end it was his mouth that caressed her with intimate, lingering skill, that caressed and coaxed and finally gave shockingly intense release to her wanton body.

  She cried out to him as it happened, clung to him, weeping without knowing why she was doing so.

  Later, he made love to her again, filling her with the powerful and longed-for surge of his body within hers.

  This time, the release was slower, deeper, and carried with it, for her, an awareness of what this coming together of their bodies was really about, of what lay beyond the immediacy of their physical pleasure, of what this joining of their two physical selves had the power to create.

  She wanted him, she recognised, deep within her, was driven to accomplish the satisfaction of that atavistic need not just because of the physical pleasure it gave her.

  Nature knew that the closer man’s life-force was to its goal, the less distance it had to travel, the higher the chance was of it performing its task, and it was for this reason surely that it had implanted in her the need to urge and incite him to bury himself so deeply within her.