A suitable husband

by Steele, Jessica

  'There—I always knew you were intelligent,' she lobbed back sarcastically. She wanted him to go. Her anger was on the wane and she was starting to hurt again.

  Lukas stared at her unspeaking for some tense moments, then he took a deep and con-troUing breath. And then, very clearly, he clipped, 'I don't believe you.'

  Anger, born of panic that he might see just how deeply she did care for him, became her ally again. 'I don't give a button what you believe!' she hurled back at him fiercely.

  'You'd have me think you were the way you were with me last night—and didn't care for me?' Trust him to bring that up! 'You'd have me believe you didn't care for me whatsoever, yet would have given me what you've given no man?'

  'Charming!' she derided.

  'You deny it?'

  She wished she could. He knew her too well, it seemed. She turned away, presenting him with her back. 'Why have you come?' she asked dully—and started to feel more churned up inside than ever when she realised he must have taken a couple of steps closer to her. For his voice was directly behind her when he answered.

  'I've come, basically, because I find it too difficult, too hard, to contemplate that you have no feelings for me at all. I've come because...'

  'Don't,' she stopped him. 'Don't, Lukas.' She drew a shaky breath that was a half-sob, and supposed he must have heard it, for the next she knew he had taken an urgent hold of her shoulders. She shrugged him angrily away. 'I saw you!' she cried on a flare of anger, her emotions riding high.

  'Saw me?' Lukas questioned, taking his hands from her at the distress he picked up in her voice. 'What do you mean, saw me?'

  'I'm used to being the "also ran" when men see Edwina as the better option,' Jermaine answered, striving mightily to keep herself together. 'I just foolishly thought—thought—oh, never mind!' she snapped. For heavens' sake, she'd nearly told him that she'd thought he might prefer her, rather than her sister. Almost told him that she'd thought he was different from the others—indicating that he was special. Good heavens—Jermaine went hot all over—she'd nearly told him that she'd thought that there was something special between her and him—the two of them!

  She took a step from him, but before she could go any further Lukas caught a hold of her, and this time when she went to shrug him off he refused to let her go. What was more, it appeared he had grown tired of not being

  able to read her face, her eyes. For, regardless of her resistance, he began to slowly turn her until at last she was facing him. When she stubbornly refused to look at him he, as obstinately, if gently, placed a hand beneath her chin and brought her head up.

  His grey eyes searched into her wounded violet eyes for some seconds, then, very quietly, he said, 'But I do mind, Jermaine.'

  Tough!' she retaliated, but it was a weak effort. She wanted to oppose him, all the way she wanted to oppose him, only it didn't seem so easy now that he was here, in this very room, with her, his eyes holding hers. She supposed she might still be suffering from the shock of seeing him so unexpectedly.

  'So you saw me,' Lukas took up, ignoring her opposition and seeming determined to get sorted that for which he must have sped all the way along the motorway to get sorted. 'And this has to have something to do with your sister, or you wouldn't have mentioned her...' He broke off, his brow suddenly shooting back as clearly something he hadn't thought of struck him. 'Oh, my love,' he mourned. 'You saw me in Edwina's bedroom this morning!'

  'Too true, I did,' Jermaine answered coldly. How dare he call her his love?

  'Why didn't you come in and...?'

  'That depraved I'm not!' Jermaine erupted volcanically, giving him a violent shove—to no avail. For it seemed, with his hands clamped to her upper arms, that he had not the smallest intention of letting her go. What was more, it looked as though he was starting to get angry himself. The sauce of it!

  'What the hell do you think I am that...?' he began to rage—but she wasn't having that!

  'Don't you come the holier than thou with I me!' she cut in furiously. 'You'd already asked Edwina to stay at Highfield for as long as she liked, and the next thing I know,' she charged on, feeling more and more outraged by the second, 'is that you're in her room, carrying her to her bed, the same way you were in my room last night...' Hot colour surged to her cheeks, '...last night carrying me to my bed!' Lukas tried to get a word in, but Jermaine was in too much of an uproar by then to let him utter so much as a syllable. 'And we both know what happened then—what would have happened,' she tore into him, 'had not that door slammed somewhere and brought you to the realisation that there was a more experienced, more exciting female a few doors down who...'

  'How dare you think that of me?' Lukas interrupted her on a bellow of sound—about the only way he could get a word in—and Jermaine had never seen him so explosively angry. His hands were biting into her arms as 'Hell's teeth!' he raged. 'I knew you were different, knew you were...' He broke off and, as if striving to put a rein on his fury, took a deep breath—and only then, while still holding her there in front of him, did he release some of the pressure on her arms. Then he took another long-drawn, controlling breath and, looking straight into her eyes, he more calmly stated. The only reason I tore myself away from you last night was because making love for the first time will be very special for you.' Her face flamed, and a hint of a smile touched his otherwise serious expression. 'I wanted you to know...' He stopped, then went on,

  'I didn't want to rush you—knew I wanted to be alone with you, without interruption. Then that door crashed and gave me pause to realise that if you and your sister are like my brother and me, Edwina could waltz into your bedroom at any time—without bothering to knock. My home seemed crowded suddenly. I...'

  At that juncture Jermaine came to an abrupt awareness that his talk of their lovemaking had made her all weak and spineless, causing her to be in danger of believing his every treacherous word. 'No wonder it was crowded— you'd invited too many people to stay!' she flew.

  Lukas didn't care for being interrupted either; she saw that from the tightening of his fabulous mouth. But, when she was sure he would cast her to the devil and go rushing back to Edwina, he surprised her by staying exactly where he was and admitting, 'Yes, I did ask your sister to stay a few days longer at Highfield...' He broke off again when Jermaine struggled to be free, but held her firm and doggedly went on, 'But only for the same reason I extended the Christmas invitation to her in the first place. I...'

  'I don't need to hear all the gory details.' Jermaine chopped him off disdainfully.

  He didn't like that qither, she saw, as his jaw jutted, but still he refused to let her go. 'You're going to hear anyway,' he told her bluntly. 'My oath, never have I met such a woman!' he muttered.

  'You can say goodbye any time you like!'

  'Shut up and listen.' She objected to being told to shut up, but before she could acquaint him, vitriolic ally, with her objections, he was going on, 'Believe me, and I don't mean to be unkind, but I'd had more than enough of your sister before...'

  'It looked like it!'

  Lukas tossed her a killing look, but, as determined to have his say as Jermaine was determined not to shut up, it seemed, he pressed on. The only reason I tolerated her at all was because, having assured Ash that my home was his home while he searched for the right property to buy, I didn't want to alienate him by showing her the door. Their relationship looked serious in those first few days—for all I knew, he was planning on making her my sister-in-law. I think a lot of him,' he understated. 'I could put up with her if I had to.'

  'Oh, the hardships you have to bear!'

  He ignored her comment as if she hadn't spoken, but Jermaine didn't miss the glint in his eyes. Manfully, he controlled what he was feeling, albeit that he had to take a steadying breath. But he promptly proceeded to startle her when he went on,

  'I've put up with that woman when I've known from almost the beginning that
there was absolutely nothing wrong with her back. I've...'

  'You knew she was faking?' Jermaine gasped, shock causing the words to rush from her. 'I mean...' Jermaine tried to recover, feeling guilty at having admitted her sister was a fraud.

  Lukas's expression softened. 'You're so loyal to her, my love, but I knew you'd rumbled her from almost the start. That, of course, was the real reason why you refused to come and look after her.'

  'I'd—er—phoned her on her mobile,' Jermaine found herself confessing.

  'So you knew, before you even saw her, that she didn't require you in attendance?' Jermaine thought she had been disloyal enough, and did not answer. He continued, 'I think it was around then that my once clear and logical thinking started to get a little cloudy.'

  'It—did?' Jermaine found herself questioning. She didn't want to ask questions. She wanted him to go—didn't she? But, equally, she wanted not to love him. Always before when she had known herself betrayed she had lost interest in a moment. So why wasn't it happening now?

  'It did,' Lukas confirmed, and Jermaine felt all wobbly inside and in need of some severe stiffening of her backbone when, still holding her, Lukas moved her over to her sofa and sat down with her. She wanted to say something sarcastic—such as, Feeling tired?—but as Lukas had stayed here this long when she felt certain he had already endured enough of her acid, further barbs seemed to have temporarily deserted her. 'It was logical, to my mind,' he took up, when he could see that for once she wasn't going to interrupt, 'when Edwina refused to see a doctor or have a nurse—not that she needed either—that one of her relatives should come to Highfield to fetch and carry for her.'

  'You weren't having Mrs Dobson doing it,' Jermaine put in.

  Lukas smiled. 'We're on the same wavelength at last,' he said softly. But he was determined, it seemed, to tell it how it was.

  'You ordered me to come and look after my sister.'

  'And you let me know what you thought about that!' He paused. 'I own, sweet Jermaine, that I'm not used to women treating me like that.'

  'You didn't care for it?' Why was she smiling back at him? This man was a treacherous toad!

  'Why should I? Why, too, should I be irked every time I thought of you? How dared this woman talk to me like that—this woman with a beautiful voice who didn't care who the devil I was if she felt like going for my jugular. You actually told me to go and play with my train set,' he reminded her. 'Can you not see that after that, while of course I wasn't at all interested in you, I decided to come and see you? I left this apartment that night having met a most stunning-looking woman, but a woman whose attitude had annoyed me intensely. Was it any wonder I was unable to put you out of my mind?'

  Her heart did a crazy kind of somersault— Lukas thought her stunning-looking! But Jermaine forced herself to remember his duplicity with her sister only that morning. Although somehow her trust in him was starting to kick in, and something, some instinct, was telling her to hear him out—she could trip him up later.

  'Was that why you went to tell my parents about Edwina?'

  He had the grace to look a smidgen abashed, but revealed, 'I was chatting to Ash when I got back to Highfield about some business I had near Oxford the next day. He told me Edwina's parents lived in that area.' Lukas

  hesitated, then added, 'Ash also said how your father doted on Edwina.'

  'It's not news,' Jermaine inserted, realizing that Lukas's hesitation must stem from his sensitivity that she might be upset by that fact.

  Lukas gave her hands, which he was still holding, a gentle squeeze, and went on, 'I then asked Ash if your father didn't treat you the same as your sister, to which he laughed and said your mother loved you. When I asked, did you love your mother? Ash said your mother had recently had flu and that he'd gained the impression that you'd do anything for her.'

  'So you asked him for my parents' address?'

  His lips twitched. She loved him. She rather thought she always would. 'Only very casually,' Lukas answered. 'But I didn't have any definite plans to call on them. Only if my business finished early and I was in the right area.'

  Jermaine felt her lips twitching too. 'And, hey presto...'

  'I had the added information that your mother might still be feeling a shade tired after her flu and, yes, hey presto—it worked like a charm,' he admitted. 'My only problem from then on, sweet Jermaine,' he added softly, 'having been unable to ask your sister to leave without risking a split with my brother, was

  that when it became apparent that Ash was quickly getting over his infatuation with her I began to fear that he would be the one to tell her to go.'

  Something in Jermaine began to ice over. 'Because you were starting to grow infatuated with Edwina yourself,' she stated coldly.

  'No!' Lukas denied vehemently. 'Never in a million years! You daft woman, haven't you seen yet that it's you I care about?'

  Suddenly her emotions were all haywire again, any ice in her veins going into a rapid thaw. 'M-me?' she stammered. 'You care— about me?'

  Lukas stared at her. 'Quite desperately,' he replied quietly.

  'Oh,' she whispered, and was too dazed to say anything else.

  She wished he would smile, but his expression, as his eyes searched hers, was deadly serious. 'Why otherwise would I be here?' he asked.

  Jermaine stared back at him, and all at once she wished he hadn't asked that question. He was here because she had bolted from Highfield. And why had she bolted from his home? Because she had seen him carrying her

  sister to her bed. The same way he had carried her to her bed last night!

  Even while part of her was urging her to give him the benefit of the doubt, Jermaine was attempting to get to her feet. 'No' Lukas denied her, holding her, anchoring her down. 'You...'

  'So tell me about Edwina,' Jermaine cut in. This had happened too many times in the past for her to be able to freely give him the benefit of the doubt. She had been hurt in the past, but never anywhere near as badly as now. Before, it hadn't mattered so much. Now, it did. Lukas meant everything to her. 'Tell me about the love scene I witnessed this morning!' she exploded, barely aware of what she was saying. Tell...'

  'Love scene! Utter rot!' Lukas scorned. 'Hells' bells...' He checked, steadied himself, looking nowhere but into Jermaine's lovely violet eyes. 'I hardly slept. Last night,' he confessed, 'I barely slept at all. Bed became torturous. I was going to see you again, but not until half past eight. I don't know how I got through those sleepless hours—what if I'd got it all wrong? You were different from any other woman I'd known; I knew that. What if, because I wasn't used to anyone like you, I'd misread what I'd imagined were positive signs? What if, because of your innocence, you were giving off the wrong signals?' Lukas halted, then further owned, 'My room became a cage. I left it—quietly, I thought. But Edwina must have heard me, because when, after prowling outside for a while, I came back in and up the stairs, her bedroom door was wide open and she was in a state about some over-large spider on the rampage.'

  'She called you in to catch a spider?'

  'I very much doubt now that there was any such bold arachnid. But at the time I'd got you so much on my mind I thought it best to deal with it quickly—I wanted to be first at our bench. Anyhow, when Edwina fainted, I...'

  'Edwina fainted?'

  'I thought she had. She appeared to go limp from the shock of seeing the eight-legged animal. It was instinctive to catch her before she hit the carpet. What...?'

  Remembering the way her sister had looked directly at her a moment before she'd closed her eyes, Jermaine spoke her thoughts out loud, relief, joy trying to break free. 'Edwina didn't faint.' Lukas hadn't been duplicitous.

  'You—sound sure?'

  'She does a good faint,' Jermaine answered.

  'She's done it before?' Lukas asked, but could see that Jermaine's loyalty was being stretched to the limits, so didn't press her for an an
swer, but said instead, 'I thought her grip was a bit fierce for somebody who'd passed out. When she wouldn't let go of me after I'd put her on her bed I began to suspect there might be a little play-acting going on there.' He paused, and then revealed, 'She certainly came round pretty quickly when I said I'd get Mrs Dobson to sit with her until she felt better.'

  Jermaine had to smile. 'Edwina wouldn't think much of that.'

  'I don't think she did, but I'd got other plans. I'd waited for hours to see you, and I couldn't take waiting much longer. No way was I going to call you to hold her hand. To be honest, my dear, if you were going to hold anybody's hand, I wanted it to be mine.'

  'Oh,' Jermaine whispered shakily.

  Lukas raised her right hand to his lips. 'You believe me, love?' he asked earnestly. 'You believe me that I am not, and never have been, remotely interested in her? Believe my being in her room this morning happened the way I've just said?'

  Jermaine knew her sister, knew quite well what she was capable of. It was just that in her adult life she had grown used to male friends deserting when Edwina beckoned.

  But Jermaine realised that, as Lukas seemed to think she was different, so she could trust that Lukas was different. She didn't doubt that he knew a lot about women—and began to take in that he had seen through Edwina straight away and had been unimpressed by her. Then it was that Jermaine knew that believe him she did.

  But because she was so much in love with him, she owned, it had made her devastatingly vulnerable where Lukas was concerned. Because of past happenings Jermaine still felt on distressingly shaky ground—it seemed impossible that when others had forsaken her for Edwina's charms Lukas was totally immune to them.

  'You—um—asked Edwina to stay?' Jermaine reminded him quietly.

  For an answer Lukas leaned forward and gently kissed the side of her face. 'It was you I wanted in my home,' he told her softly, and confessed, 'Where at one time I couldn't wait for her to leave, the more I grew attracted to you, the more I realised that if Edwina left you'd leave too. That, in fact, if she wasn't there, you wouldn't come to Highfield at all.'