by Jane Porter
As she reached the point of no return Winnie whimpered, dug her hands into Morgan's shoulders and he covered her mouth with his, sucking her cry of pleasure into him.
This lovemaking was different from that of last night.
Last night had been gentle, tender, and beautiful. This lovemaking was just as intense, her orgasm had shattered her, but today she felt Morgan's drive, his expertise, his will.
It was as if Morgan was showing her how much she wanted him, just how much she needed him, and that he was the one firmly in control.
****
During the next few days they fell into a pattern of eating, playing and lovemaking. Some mornings they'd sail, other afternoons they'd snorkel, but inevitably they retreated from the world, stripped off their swimsuits and spent long hours immersed in a very private world of touch and pleasure.
Over the course of the week Winnie discovered how to touch Morgan and what turned him on. She loved making him hard, loved building the anticipation and loved it even better when she could answer his hunger. She learned to use her hands, her mouth, different positions with her body. It all felt so natural with him. Nothing ever felt wrong.
By the middle of the week Winnie had been moved into Morgan's bedroom. He said he couldn't stand waking up and not discovering her there and frequently he woke her when the sky was still dark and the night far from over but he'd already be hungry for her warmth, her softness and her skin.
One evening, curled up next to Morgan, their skin still damp from lovemaking, Winnie forced herself to return to the issue that had been bothering her since Monday.
"What happens when we go home? What am I supposed to do if I don't have my job?"
His fingers lightly stroked her hip. "Move in with me."
She lifted her head a little, frowning. "I don't get it.'
He shrugged. "I want you to live with me. Be with me. I'll take care of the bills."
For some reason his calmness struck her as indifference. Didn't he understand that work was important? That she got a sense of self-worth from working? That much of her self-esteem came from doing a great job?
Winnie rolled away from him and sat up on the edge of the mattress. "As much as I like sleeping with you, Morgan, that doesn't quite constitute a full-time job."
He folded his arms behind his head and looked at her. "We could make it a full-time job."
"This is important."
His expression hardened. "You knew when I proposed that I've had enough of the bachelor thing. I'm sick of being single. I like being with you. I like sleeping with you. I like waking up with you. So this is just as important to me. Move in with me. Make this a permanent relationship."
She drew an unsteady breath, shaken and more than a little confused. Was this his way of saying he loved her? "We're not married, Morgan."
"We don't have to be married to live together."
"But you don't love me."
"Winnie, I don't think I'll ever love anyone ... "
"You loved Charlotte," she flashed, interrupting.
He swore. Angry. Really angry. "I learned my lesson. I don't fall in love anymore."
CHAPTER ELEVEN
HE LOVED Charlotte, but he didn't love her. He'd loved Charlotte, but he wouldn't love her. Winnie couldn't get the words out of her head and nothing was quite the same after that.
They stayed on the island for another three days and on the surface their physical relationship remained the same but there were new undercurrents between them, friction that hadn't been there before.
It was almost a bitter point for her that Morgan still brought her to the peak of pleasure, still applied his immense skill, but it wasn't a physical release she wanted as much as emotional.
Was this just sex? Would Morgan ever love her? And if it was just sex, wasn't it inevitable that he'd tire of her?
On their last evening on St. Jermaine's, Morgan went for a sail on his own and Winnie stood on her balcony studying the sky, and the horizon. Waiting for the sun to set for the last time.
Heart heavy, she watched the fiery red sun drop, seemingly disappearing into the middle of the ocean, and as the water exploded crimson and gold, tears filled her eyes. Goodbye, paradise. She was ready to go home.
They reached New York late Sunday afternoon. Morgan had two cars waiting at the airport. One limousine was for Winnie, the other for himself and Mr. Foley.
So it's over, she thought, just like that. One week of great sex and then put the girl in the car and send her on her way.
As her limousine drove over bridges, on and off freeways, through tunnels, and past tollbooths, Winnie had plenty of time to think. She wasn't entirely sure why Morgan had cooled toward her, but she knew why she'd cooled toward him. It wasn't just his job, or Charlotte, or Annika-it was his complete lack of emotional commitment.
No words of love. No promise of security. Just wink, wink, "I'll pay the bills as long as you continue to take care of me."
Maybe he didn't mean it exactly like that, but it's how it felt, and it felt rather sordid.
Oh, Winnie, she thought, closing her eyes, you didn't have a prayer. From the beginning you were in over your head. You can't substitute sex for love. You can have love without sex, but face it, you're a mush-head, a softie, a born romantic. You don't have a crush on Morgan, you're in love. And whatever game you've been playing lately is going to obliterate you.
The driver parked the limousine in front of her Upper West Side apartment building, and carried her suitcase to the door.
"I can manage from here," she said. "Mr. Grady said I was to see you up."
Hot tears burned the back of her eyes. If only Mr. Grady had said something kind to her when they parted! If only he'd said, "Thanks for a great week. Take care of yourself. I'll be thinking about you." But not a word. Not a goddamn word.
She blinked hard. Her chest ached with emotion she was afraid to let out. ''Tell Mr. Grady you had no choice," she said, taking her suitcase from the driver. "Tell Mr. Grady I refused to let you in."
Her building didn't have a doorman and she jammed her key into the lock, opened the front door and closed it behind her.
She crossed the lobby, went to her mailbox and retrieved a week's worth of mail before taking the elevator up to her apartment on the eleventh floor.
Upstairs her footsteps were muffled as she walked the faded green carpet to her apartment at the very end of the corridor. Her apartment was a corner unit and the long silent walk seemed to last forever and each step made her feel even farther from Morgan. Damn him. Damn his beautiful, arrogant, egotistical hide!
By the time she reached her door the tears were falling in earnest. Shifting her suitcase and armful of mail, Winnie fished out her key yet again and leaned against her door to unlock the deadbolt. But as her shoulder hit her door, the door fell open.
Her apartment wasn't locked. The door wasn't even completely closed.
Someone had been here.
It seemed like forever as she stood there, trying to figure out what to do before she forced herself to take a step into her apartment and flick on the light.
With the light on, her heart fell. Her apartment had been trashed. All her furniture had been upended. Clothes lay in heaps. Broken glass glittered on the floor.
Winnie dropped her mail and suitcase and raced back to the elevator. She was running in slow motion, a raw physical terror stretching time out, distorting reality.
Wildly she punched the down button, begging it to return. Once downstairs, she called the building manager on the house phone. The building manager summoned the police and Winnie sat in the apartment lobby until the officers arrived.
It took the police nearly a half hour to make an appearance and even then they didn't seem overly concerned.
"This is New York," one of the officers said, heading upstairs to check out her apartment. "We can't respond to every break-in call as if it's a homicide."
"But what if the intruder's still up there? What
if he's hiding somewhere?"
"Highly unlikely, but don't worry, we'll check it out, and I promise we'll let you know what we find."
Winnie spent another half hour alone in the lobby while the police did their work upstairs. Finally one of the officers returned to the lobby to take a statement from her.
After filling out the lengthy report, Winnie headed upstairs to inspect the actual damage. Maybe, she told herself, it wasn't as bad as it looked.
But walking into her tiny living room was still shocking. Whoever had been there had done quite a number. Almost everything had been turned over, emptied, or broken.
She didn't understand it. She had no money, no jewelry, no art, nothing of value and yet her apartment had virtually been destroyed.
The police left behind a copy of the report and form with a number where she could call periodically to check on her "case." But Winnie knew nothing would ever come of the "investigation."
Winnie did a slow walk around her apartment, wearily noting that whoever had been here had been very thorough. Her pillows were cut. Her mattress upended. All the clothes dumped from her closet. What was the point? What did they want, and was it really necessary to slash her couch? Did the intruder honestly think she'd hidden a hoard of diamonds in her cheap sofa cushions?
"What the hell happened?" Morgan's voice thundered through Winnie's apartment.
Winnie jumped and shrieked, whether in fear or relief it was hard to say.
"Why didn't you call me?" he demanded, stripping off his blazer, dropping it on the back of her cushion less couch.
"I... I..." she looked at him, stuttering, utterly helpless. "I... "
"What?"
Her heart pounded. Her stomach churned. "I didn't think you'd care."
Morgan swore a string of violent epithets strong enough to make a hardened sailor blush. "What do you mean you don't think I'd care? I just spent the last week proving to you I care. If that doesn't say anything-"
Winnie's jaw dropped. "Say anything?" she interrupted hotly. "You never say anything. You make love and go to sleep. Make love and go to sleep."
His hands were on his hips. "But that should tell you something. I don't make love with someone I don't like."
"Like? I don't want to be liked. I want to be loved."
His eyebrows flattened, his expression as dark as Winnie had ever seen it. "For Pete's sake, woman, like, love, what's the difference? I want you. I wanted you with me. I asked you to move in with me. I told you I wanted to take care of you. But no, that wasn't good enough for you."
He was making it sound as if she'd been the unreasonable one. "You implied I'd be your mistress!"
"I thought you might like the idea."
"Like being your mistress?"
"Well, you sure didn't want to be my wife!" His dark blue gaze was as brittle and cold as black ice. "I'm just trying to figure out what you want, Winnie. You obviously don't want to be my mistress, you really don't want to be married to me, so what the hell do you want from me?"
Love. But that was the one thing he'd told her he couldn't give. He could give her things, give her a name, give her pleasure, but he couldn't-wouldn't-give her love.
She bit her lip, fighting tears. "What are you doing here, anyway?"
Morgan snorted, walked away from her, picking his way around the mess but even as he walked she heard glass crunching beneath his shoes. "Your building manager called, let me know what had happened." He turned back, eyes snapping. "Because you sure weren't going to phone me."
Winnie slowly sat down again. He was angrier than she'd ever seen him. "How did my manager know to call you?"
He made a hoarse sound, jaw jutting all over again.
"I can't believe you care about details like that at a time like this!"
She'd always thought he was so calm, so controlled, but there was nothing calm or controlled about him right now. He looked like a huge panther ready to pounce. He was stalking, growling, hissing. He wanted blood.
She swallowed, rubbed her hands on her knees. Her knees were cold. She felt chilled straight through. She'd worn a skirt and blouse on the plane, but despite the summer heat, she was freezing now. "I didn't know my building manager knew you."
Morgan muttered another unflattering word beneath his breath before marching back to her and pulling her up onto her feet. "I asked him to look out after you. I gave him money to keep an eye on you. I've been paying him since January if you really want to know."
"January?"
He grasped her upper arms, pulled her closer, head tipping so he was speaking very close to her mouth. "I worried about your neighborhood. I knew you didn't have family in the state, I thought you needed someone keeping an eye out for you. Okay?"
"Okay."
Any fight left in her was gone. She didn't know what to think at the moment and her emotions were scattered. She was tired. She was hungry. She was overwhelmed, really overwhelmed.
He tipped her chin up, stared down into her eyes.
"Don't you ever scare me like that again, do you understand?''
Winnie couldn't look away. She could see the navy of his eyes, the reflection of herself, and something else, too, something very dark and shadowed, something which made her think of long-buried pain.
"But I wasn't hurt, Morgan."
"That's not the point." A muscle popped in his jaw. "I told my driver to walk you up. I told him to check out the apartment first-" He broke off, teeth grinding together and, releasing her, he took a step away. For a long silent moment he did nothing but shake his head, a slow furious shake.
"You can't stay here tonight," he said at length. He glanced at his wristwatch, noting the late hour. "I'm going to call Mr. Foley and have him make up a room for you at my place."
The guest room, a voice silently taunted. Not his room, but the guest room.
"That's not necessary. I'll be all right here. It's just a mess. I'll start cleaning things up and it'll be fine by morning."
He snapped his fingers impatiently. "The lock's been jimmied. You need a locksmith. It has to be replaced. Or do you want to argue about that, too?"
He faced her. "Do you want to get anything? Is there anything you want to pack, anything you don't want to leave? This is your chance. Grab whatever you want because there might not be an opportunity to return."
Mr. Foley met them at the door of Morgan's Fifth Avenue
apartment. Morgan's elegant apartment was one of the most coveted spaces in all of Manhattan.
"Are you all right, Miss Graham?" Mr. Foley asked, solicitously taking her travel bag and the stack of mail she'd brought with her.
"I think so."
"You need a hot bath and some dinner in bed." Mr. Foley's tone was very firm. "I've something in the oven for you, a delicious stuffed Cornish game hen and a lovely pear tart for dessert. Now if you'll follow me," he said, bowing slightly, "we'll get you settled for the night."
Morgan watched Mr. Foley usher Winnie away as if she were the most delicate, fragile being on the face of the earth. Well, she might be delicate, Morgan conceded, but she was also damn stubborn. Let Mr. Foley spoil her. His butler was obviously crazy about Winnie and Mr. Foley had never been crazy about anyone Morgan had dated before. In fact, Mr. Foley had never even liked anyone Morgan had dated before.
Frowning, Morgan went in a different direction, heading for his study. He'd only just started going through a week's worth of voice mails and business mail when he'd been notified that Winnie was in trouble.
Winnie. In trouble. Winnie. And trouble. Didn't those two just go together like peas in a pod?
Morgan tried to go through the rest of his voice mail but now he was too tired to concentrate. Heading for his bedroom, he showered, put on a pair of old cotton sweats for bed, but stopped short of turning in for the night.
He had to finish catching up. He forced himself to return to his study.
Leaning over his desk, Morgan flipped on the halogen lamp, and continued playing
back the rest of his voice mail messages.
Family. Friend. Family. Sales call. Sailing buddy.
Sales call. Morgan sighed, and really hated the phone. It was way too easy for people to leave a dozen messages, but it took forever for him to answer them all.
The next call stopped him cold. It was a voice from the past.
