The words took her back into a private empty world where she was really lonely. She was starved for the touch of a man yet she was saying the words that would send him away. A terrible ache filled her that Giles might get the message and go, leave her. Sudden tears stung behind her eyes and she brushed them angrily away.
"Nothing further from my mind. No, lady, I’ve booked a table for two and afterwards I will bring you back to the hotel."
He leaned towards her and his mouth was a breath’s caress away from her lips. His hand ran lightly down her arm, disturbing the fine hairs in a feathery touch. She found her lips parting in soft anticipation and her body leaning towards him. He was standing very close in the evening’s balmy darkness, every plane of his face etched like a river running black.
"But I’m damned hungry," he said. "And not just for food."
Nine
Kira turned her face away. He was not going to get to kiss her and she was not going to make herself cheap. Bruce had taught her that. It was dangerous to succumb to male magic even when the silvery moonlight was adding to that magic and a sheen hung on the evening air. Giles was too close, towering beside her.
"I do appreciate your hospitality to a complete stranger but I assure you I’m no helpless lady. I’ve been looking after myself since I was a little girl, and eating alone is the least of my worries," she said.
"You mean you’ve been living on your own?" He sounded surprised, his voice also tinged with apprehension as if he suddenly saw a child at home alone. The Barbados culture was family orientated. A child would never be left alone.
Kira shook her head, unaware of the red lights forming an aura round her hair. Giles was watching her, suddenly seeing a different person emerging from the cool businesswoman; someone vulnerable and afraid.
"Not exactly. My mother died when I was young. I was sent to a convent and the nuns were good to us but it was still a lonely existence. They are not given to hugs and kisses, more a pat on the head and ‘hurry along, there’s a good girl’."
"Then I insist on taking you out to supper and spoiling you." There was a new awareness in his voice. "My car is here. Allow me to play Prince Charming for one evening."
"Cinderella has to be home early."
"Of course. Though I’d rather like to see my Merc turn into a mouse."
"It was a pumpkin," she corrected.
She should have known he would have a white Mercedes. At a touch of a button, the roof folded back. Kira felt the last of her resistance slide away, as if she was walking into another life and taking that walk as if it was the only course open to her. She was being tempted by a car and ran her hand along its smoothness. She did not know that Dolly, her grandmother, had been tempted by a bathroom. She had never ridden in an open car before.
"Nice car," she said more abruptly than she meant to, as he opened the passenger door for her. The upholstery was pale blue with cream trim. The floor was carpeted in the same blue. She sank back into the comfort with a tiny sigh. Bruce had run a rust-ridden Ford Fiesta, a company car. She did not care what happened to the rest of this evening now. She would let it run and run. It was something out of time, a magic she would not allow herself to experience again.
Perhaps fate had decided that she was owed this kind of evening after the dark months of loneliness and pain. It was definitely the Cinderella syndrome. She looked sideways at her Prince Charming, his dark profile outlined against the lights hidden in the palm trees. He fitted the role well, though his strong arrogant nose and firm chin had none of the softness associated with the gallant fairy-tale prince.
She knew nothing about him. He was a stranger and yet she was letting him drive her across a Caribbean island to a place she had never heard of, an island that until yesterday had only been a name in a travel brochure. She must be out of her mind. It would serve her right if they found her tomorrow trussed up in a cane field. It was a dangerous world yet somehow she trusted Giles. A gut instinct told her that the danger was to her heart, not to her body.
A wry smile touched her face in the darkness. She had trusted Bruce and look where that had got her. A nightmare of hurt and anguish that was only now beginning to subside but could flare up with as much immediate pain at a thought, an image, a memory. That bouncing baby on the beach . . .
"Another sigh, Kira? Two sighs in one evening is the limit on Barbados. It’s a Government regulation. Sam Lord’s ghost won’t take too kindly to a melancholy visitor. He likes to be the centre of attention."
"A ghost? Really." She stared out at the passing countryside. It was swaying with strange grey, cobwebby images.
"Not really, but there should be. Enough people died at his command, they say. It’s said that he used to hang lanterns in the trees and in the windows of the castle to lure ships onto Cobbler’s Reef. The ships would be wrecked on the rocks and Sam Lord’s slaves would loot the wrecks and drag the spoils back to the castle through an underground passage."
Kira shivered though the night air was not cold. She could almost hear the cries of the drowning sailors. The dark countryside was sliding by in swiftly changing shapes, tall mahogany trees blotting out the ivory moon, mysterious gates leading to secret villas, clusters of painted chattel houses, glimpses of the sea glimmering with phosphorous and shot with light. Fields of cane rustled in the wind. The sweet smell of flowers and the lush cane drifted on the same wind.
"I don’t much like the sound of Sam Lord," she said. "Do we have to eat there?"
"It’s only a legend." He leaned across and touched her arm momentarily for reassurance. "Admiralty records show that he was out of the island when many of the wrecks occurred. And no-one has ever found the underground passage. Yet there’s no doubt he was a ruthless and dishonest man, and he treated his family and wife with terrible cruelty."
"And now his castle is a popular restaurant?" said Kira, with a touch of irony. "A funny kind of justice for those people."
"We can’t dictate the future. Perhaps Sugar Hill will become a holiday camp or a theme park one day. Sam Lord’s Castle is a luxury hotel, very elegant, with a lot of his pictures and furniture preserved, like a museum. But if you don’t care to eat there, we can go to Cobbler’s Reef, the restaurant in a garden which is more informal," Giles suggested with a touch of sensitivity she had not expected in the man.
"Which one is the nearest?"
"Sam Lord’s."
"OK. The pirate place it is."
He drove steadily but not fast. The speed limit on Barbados was low compared with Britain. The lanes twisted and turned, very much like Devonshire, and even late at night a mid-road game of cricket brought the big car to a halt. The boys pulled up the stumps and stood back to let the car pass.
"Hiya, Mister Giles," some of the boys called out.
"Come and bowl, sir?" asked another, cheekily.
"Not tonight," called Giles. "I have a lady with me."
"Is that my promised publicity?" Kira asked.
"Half of it." He was laughing to himself and she liked that.
They drove through the village and passed the high walls of sugar cane in the fields beyond. The surprise was the flatness. Her eyes roamed over so much space.
Giles knew a way of cutting out the tortuous route through Bridgetown. He struck out onto Highway 7 – an ordinary two-lane thoroughfare, despite its title.
"The other half is that the news is already round the island that you are dining with me. They love gossip. They probably check when I have my hair cut."
A few minutes later he turned right into Bel Air Road, and she watched the deft way his brown hands handled the car. The discreet commercialism of the area became apparent, another way of life had taken over yet egrets flew overhead on their way home to roost. It was geared to tourism, almost a resort in itself with arcades of shops and mock village accommodation in the grounds. There was a uniformed security guard at the gate of Sam Lord’s who checked Giles’s reservation.
"They’re very careful," Kir
a commented, returning the guard’s big smile.
"They have to be. A lot of wealthy American tourists stay here. They pay to be looked after. Although there is little crime on the island – mainly mobiles and cameras lifted on the beach – and we want it to stay that way. We have a superb police force based in Bridgetown, very smart and highly trained. Have you seen the harbour police yet in their Nelson’s time sailors uniforms? There’s a good photo for you."
"I’m not a tourist. It’s the way people live that interests me. I shall hire a mini-Moke to look round the island."
"Be careful. It’s easy to get lost. The narrow roads twist and turn.”
“I shall be careful.” But Kira was not careful enough.
Ten
He slid the car into a parking space. It was quietly busy. Taxi drivers hung about waiting for a call from the hotel. Rows of yellow beach-buggies, hired by visitors, cooled down after racing round the island. The security guards did not look friendly in the dark and Kira was glad to have such a tall man at her side. She knew her fears were unfounded.
"It used to be called Long Bay Castle," said Giles, steering her towards the massive house. "It’s the finest old Colonial house in the Caribbean. Its thick walls even survived the terrible hurricane of l831."
There was a definite pride in his voice, though Kira was aware from the tone and timbre of his words that he did not take the place all that seriously. Yet the commercialism that had robbed the castle of its uniqueness had saved it from falling into a ruin.
"The hurricanes are pretty devastating," he added. "I hope we don’t get one while you’re here."
It was a white wedding cake of a building.
The 18th Century plantation house had been extended into an elaborate French-style mansion of the period. It stood on a low rocky cliff that looked out onto a coral beach, shaded with coconut palms and sea grape trees. It was turreted and crenulated along the top of the flat roof and Kira was reminded of the smaller pink castle that her grandfather had built for his young bride.
* * *
Dolly pressed herself against Reuben with all the vigour of a young, untamed body. Reuben wrapped his arms round her tightly, then even more tightly, almost crushing the breath from her slender frame. They had not seen each other for two days and the urge was overpowering.
He tasted the sweet, hot scent of her skin, feeling the softness of her hair against his neck. It drove him mad. Her strong young hands were digging into his back, pulling him closer.
"This is my living and loving," she murmured, her thoughts in disarray. To be apart from Reuben would be like death itself. Yet she had to tell him the news.
"Benjamin Reed has asked me to marry him," she said at last, when the urgency of their hot kisses was lost in exhaustion.
Reuben jerked back. "No. Dolly, you can’t mean it? Damn him. Tell him you can’t. You will, won’t you? You’re going to marry me."
Dolly smothered a giggle. "But when? You haven’t asked me and Benjamin has. He wants to marry me soon at a big church and he’s going to build me a grand new house on St James’s. He’s bought the ground already, right near the sea. It’s going to have proper bathrooms with water and a kitchen."
"Dolly, do be sensible. Don’t even think of it. Benjamin Reed is a middle-aged man. Let him marry somebody else. Someone nearer his own age. There’s plenty of single women who would jump at the offer. Dolly, you and I, we’re together, aren’t we? I thought for always, forever." His voice was tinged with bitterness.
Her laughter rang out. "Of course, we’re together," she teased. "But Benjamin wants to marry me and he’s not that old. He’s only thirty-something. That’s not even middle-aged. This house is going to be all pink," she added dreamily.
"Listen, you idiot girl." Reuben put his hands on her bare shoulders and tried to make her look at him. "You don’t marry someone for the sake of a house or bathrooms. You don’t prostitute yourself for a pile of pink coral. I hope you told him no. A very definite no, thank you."
"I didn’t do nothing of the sort," said Dolly, shaking his hands free. "And don’t use that nasty-nasty word about me or I will think you have been free with those buy-me-now girls down by the market, with their swinging hips and painted eyes. Oh yes, I’ve seen them making mouths at you."
"Don’t be a damned fool, Dolly. As if I would go with any other girl, any girl at all, when I’m crazy about you. You know that I love you. Wait for me, please. You know marriage is out of the question until I’m twenty-three at least. Twenty-five would be better, that’s when I come into my grandmother’s money."
"Money doesn’t matter," said Dolly, snuggling up to him, twisting her foot round his leg and rubbing his bare skin. It was a slow, sensual movement. "I would live in a shack on the beach with you."
He groaned with frustration. "You are going to live at Sugar Hill when I am the master. Promise that you won’t marry Benjamin."
"Promise," she whispered, her lips against his mouth, her tongue tracing the warm curve of skin. His nerves tingled as she wove her spell.
* * *
They approached the four flights of blue and white marble steps leading onto the open porches. It was like the film set of a Thirties movie. Kira half expected to see a row of dancing girls.
She could hear the pounding surf of the reef that perpetuated the Sam Lord legend. It was easy to imagine flickering lanterns in the trees, and the storm-blown ships crashing into the treacherous reef amid the terrible cries of the drowning sailors. She shivered.
"I told you there were ghosts," said Giles. "The island abounds in stories."
"I don’t believe in ghosts," said Kira firmly. But she did believe in a different kind of haunting. Her ghost was a young woman called Jenny, gazing up at Bruce with adoring eyes, telling him that she was pregnant and loving the moment.
She hardly took in the interior of the castle, only that it was beautifully preserved with the original woodwork and ornate plaster ceilings. She saw herself in huge mirrors that also reflected the fine paintings and Regency furniture that might have been treasure trove from a wreck. Carefully-tanned women in long dresses were coming down the elegant staircase under the high-domed ceiling. Glittering chandeliers enhanced their jewels.
"I’m not wearing a long dress," said Kira.
"People wear what they like. There’s probably a special function in one of the rooms. Don’t worry, you’ll see other guests in Bermuda shorts and sun tops."
Giles took her arm possessively and this time Kira did not flinch. The atmosphere of the castle was evocative and bewitching as if Sam Lord was luring her into his clutches too.
"Upstairs is Sam Lord’s bedroom, with the original four-poster bed and drapes. Downstairs are the dungeons where he imprisoned members of his family who got in the way, even his poor wife. I think they’ve been turned into offices now."
“Why did he imprison his wife?”
Giles slowed his long stride, as though alerted by a sudden tenseness in Kira’s body. She was surprised that she should feel so deeply about the suffering Sam Lord had caused, as if the elegant decoration covered over real blood stains and the soft music disguised the whimpers of those imprisoned. A small, inarticulate sound escaped her lips and in a moment his hands were on her shoulders, turning her face towards him.
"This place upsets you, Kira," he said slowly. "I’m sorry. I didn’t realise there was a soft core to the cool Miss Kira Reed from London. We’ll leave immediately and find a fish restaurant in Oistins."
Kira shook her head, trying to clear the strange feelings, to be in command of herself again. To rid herself of Bruce’s cruelty too.
"No, there’s no need," she said, taking a deep breath. "But I think I would prefer the other restaurant in the garden. All these antiques are a little overpowering and it’s so hot. I’m not used to your marvellous climate yet."
"Cobbler’s Reef it’ll be then. You’ll love it. There’ll be a steel band playing and the gardens are gorgeous."
&
nbsp; Giles was right. They were shown to a moonlit table, set with gleaming silver and crystal glasses reflecting a flickering candle flame from among a wreath of flowers.
Kira began to relax to the soft beat of the music. Here she could forget the decadent white house at the back of the gardens, with its terrible history. She deliberately chose the chair which had a view of the not-too-distant sea.
"We have wonderful food in Barbados," said Giles, not handing her the second, unpriced menu. "But I’ll introduce you to our exotic Bajan dishes slowly. Will you let me choose for you tonight?"
Kira nodded. She doubted if she could read any menu in this light. And Giles was implying with his remark that he would see her again. It was probably an inborn politeness. They were such polite people. He glanced at the menu then put the heavy leather folder aside.
"We’ll start with the flying fish and spicy dip. Flying fish is practically our national symbol," he added. "Then grilled red snapper and side salads. I hope you don’t mind two fish dishes? The chef here cooks fish to perfection. It’s his speciality."
His charm could be devastating. His eyes glittered with a wicked cast of humour that Kira was not used to. They smiled over their glasses of chilled German Hock. No subject was taboo. He even made fun of her leg.
"So you’ve had a busy day, limping the length of St James?"
"The beaches are lovely. I met a man washing his goat in the sea. Then I went inland and bumped into, I mean literally – a breadfruit nearly hit me – an old gardener pruning a breadfruit tree. It was a very unusual pink house with statues of lions and eagles. At least, I think they were meant to be lions and eagles. It was difficult to tell."
"That’s Fitt’s House," said Giles, knowing. "One day I’ll tell you its history."
* * *
"Is this really going to be your house?" Dolly asked with awe. She hesitated in the unmade drive, staring up at the half-built villa. "Wow!"
Sweet Seduction Page 7
