by Abby Green
Luc stood at the side of the pool, a large towel in one hand, letting the water drip from his naked body. The cool night air didn’t bother him, even though his skin was in goosebumps, because he wasn’t feeling cold. He was feeling quite hot.
A scowl marred his features momentarily, because he couldn’t seem to bring his wayward body to heel. He looked down, almost bemused at the sight of his arousal which sprang rebelliously from his recalcitrant body.
He’d expected to go down to the kitchen and taunt Little Miss Uptight a bit. He hadn’t expected that her blushes and obvious discomfiture would turn him on to the point where a cool dip in the pool had been entirely too necessary and annoyingly ineffective.
She’d looked all too appealing, standing there in bare feet and tight jeans, with a loose top half falling off one shoulder, exposing a very staid white bra strap. And her scent … that maddeningly inappropriate scent for one so uptight … had enflamed him even more. Making him think of an exotic harem scene, where she would be lying naked on a sumptuous divan.
In his fantasy she had long hair, spilling over her shoulders, tantalisingly touching small breasts which he imagined had nipples like hard berries, pink and ripe on his mouth and tongue …
Emitting a growl of frustration at finding himself thinking of her again, and not his predicament, Luc roughly rubbed the towel over his body and sent up silent thanks when his libido finally seemed to do as it was told. He slung the larger towel around his waist and turned off lights before striding back up the garden.
The villa’s kitchen was still bathed in light, but he knew she was gone and, sure enough, when he glanced up he saw a light switch off in one of the rooms down from his.
He smiled grimly at the thought that Jesse Moriarty’s crimes were mounting by the minute. The latest one being making Luc desire her.
The following morning Jesse was grouchy after a night of broken sleep. Even though she was well used to insomnia. She hadn’t had a decent night’s sleep for years, and it was in the small morning hours that she did her best work—even coming up with the anti-hacking software that had made her name. She was most relaxed when surrounded by quiet and darkness, such a far cry from her chaotic upbringing.
She cursed loudly as black smoke billowed out of the toaster and the kitchen’s smoke alarm went off. Scrambling to try to eject the toast, she vaguely heard, ‘What the hell?’ before she sensed a large presence by her side. And then she was being summarily lifted out of the way, so that Luc could flick out the charred toast far more dextrously than she’d been doing.
Even through the acrid smell of burning his own scent, clean and lemony, hit her nostrils and caused an immediate physical reaction. She lurched back further and took him in. He was now flicking a tea towel at the alarm, which was no bother to him considering his height. The T-shirt he was wearing pulled upwards, exposing a sliver of taut belly with that tantalising line of dark hair leading down under the jeans he was wearing. His bare feet, with their strong bones and hair-sprinkled toes, made Jesse’s own feet curl into the tiled floor.
And then suddenly the alarm stopped, leaving the residue of an echo in their ears as they adjusted to the silence again. A bird twittered innocuously outside.
Jesse gulped and looked up at Luc, who was quirking a brow and looking down at her with the offending toast held between thumb and forefinger.
‘I didn’t think it was actually possible to burn toast in a toaster. Obviously you’re more proficient at computer programs and kidnapping.’
Jesse scowled at being reminded of the fact that in this area she failed miserably, and grabbed the toast out of his hand. She wasn’t going to admit weakness in front of him now, and she slapped it down on a plate and took it over to the table, where a steaming cup of coffee awaited her.
‘I don’t have a sophisticated palate. I happen to like burnt toast.’ She slathered spread on it defiantly, her stomach already protesting at the thought of eating it.
She took a bite and looked at Luc, who shrugged minutely as if already bored with her little performance. He said laconically, ‘Forgive me if I don’t join you—I prefer my food a little less cooked.’
She struggled to chew the burnt bread and watched as Luc busied himself pulling ingredients from the fridge. Eggs; salmon; milk … Then she continued to watch as he whistled tunelessly and prepared himself a delicious-looking breakfast of scrambled eggs and smoked salmon. All evidence was pointing to the fact that at least Luc wouldn’t starve while on the island.
Seriously bemused to see this side of such a man, Jesse said faintly, ‘There’s some coffee in the pot.’
Luc grimaced slightly, and she watched as he took a sniff and then poured it down the sink before preparing a fresh one.
‘No offence, but it would appear as if your coffee-making skills are in the same class as your toast-making skills.’
Inexplicably this made a dart of hurt lance Jesse. She’d got so used to eating out of cartons or heating up ready-made meals for one that she hated to think of it as pointing to a lack in her life. A lack of something earthy and feminine. It made her think of her mother and how she’d used to love cooking up Irish stews and feeding them to her daughter, along with tales of growing up in the countryside in Ireland …
Before Jesse could get up and escape Luc came over to the table with his own breakfast and freshly brewed coffee, sitting down. Curiously she felt the urge to stay put, not to escape.
His breakfast mocked her. The scrambled eggs looked so fluffy she could imagine they tasted as light as air, and along with the strips of smoked salmon … Her mouth watered. And then the scent of fresh coffee hit her stomach and it rumbled.
Mortified, she knew her wish that Luc hadn’t heard it hadn’t been granted when he glanced up. He said, ‘Help yourself to coffee, if you like … and there’s eggs and salmon left over.’
Rigid with embarrassment, Jesse fought down the softening feeling inside and said caustically, ‘I’m sure you don’t really want to share food with your captor.’
Luc merely shrugged in a very Gallic way and said in between mouthfuls of food, ‘I’m making the best of a bad situation. And I think if I can be pleasant then you certainly can. I’m the one here under duress, not you.’
Jesse felt ashamed, but bit back the words of apology on her lips. Unbelievably the man who wanted to save her father—one of the most corrupt men on the planet—was managing to make her feel in the wrong.
‘You didn’t attempt to escape last night?’
Luc finished chewing his last mouthful and looked at Jesse. He sat back and took a long sip of coffee, put his cup down.
He shook his head. ‘No—as you well know. Because if I had the sensors would have set off the alarm and the sound of the sirens would have split our eardrums.’ He elaborated. ‘I have the same security system on several of my own properties. I know that it’s so good it precludes the need for bodyguards. And I know how futile it would be to set it off.’
‘Oh,’ Jesse said now, still struck by how reluctant she seemed to be to leave. She was finding it curiously easy to be sitting across the table from the man she’d kidnapped the day before.
‘Where did you learn to cook?’
Immediately a shuttered look came over Luc’s face, his eyes going dark and mysterious. Jesse’s gaze narrowed on him, her curiosity piqued properly now.
Luc regarded the woman across the table. She was in another loose top today, albeit a short-sleeved one. It showed off her slender pale arms and tiny wrists and hands. Immediately he was furnished with a graphic image of one of those hands wrapped around a certain part of his anatomy, and was rewarded with blood rushing to that strategic region in his pants. Curse her anyway.
Anger galvanised him into answering her, because this anger would help remind him of why it was so important to get out of here.
‘I learnt to cook because my father died when I was twelve and my mother had a breakdown. I had to look after her and my younger si
ster.’
He saw Jesse’s face blanch and her eyes grow wide. As if she cared.
Anger at her response spurred him on. ‘My sister had—has special needs. She was deprived of oxygen at birth, and as a result has been mildly brain-damaged all her life. When my father died and my mother became ill she was only eight. She was terrified, so I had to try to keep things as constant as possible. Keeping her routine the same, including her meals, was part of that process. She’s slightly autistic too, so any change in her routine was inordinately more threatening to her than to another person with the same needs … though she’s much better now.’
Because, Luc reflected, he could now afford the best round-the-clock care and support.
Jesse’s voice was husky, and it had an immediate effect on Luc’s body. ‘I’m sorry. It must have been a tough time.’
‘The toughest,’ he agreed grimly.
Suddenly he felt very exposed, sitting here and telling Jesse Moriarty, of all people, about the most cataclysmic time of his life, when all his anger and rage had coalesced into a lifelong ambition to see justice meted out.
‘So how is it that you can’t cook? I take it that burnt toast is just the tip of the iceberg?’
CHAPTER FIVE
JESSE felt very vulnerable all of a sudden, and wondered if Luc had just furnished her with a fake story. But then she recalled the intensity on his face and in his eyes and she had to believe him—even though she didn’t like the sympathy he’d evoked within her.
She looked down at the blackened remains on her plate and found herself saying, ‘My mother died when I was nine. She was a brilliant cook, but she hadn’t started to teach me yet … She kept saying she would but there never seemed to be time. She was so busy …’ Jesse trailed off remembering her harried and stressed mother, whose face would be red and sweaty as she struggled to put together a meal for one of her father’s dinner parties with the usual little or no notice.
One time when something had gone wrong he’d come downstairs, flushed in the face with drink, and slapped her mother so hard that she’d fallen over the kitchen table, bringing pots and plates to the floor, waking Jesse up.
Feeling seriously disorientated at having remembered that, Jesse forced it from her mind and said lightly, ‘And then I just never learnt … I was terrible at home economics at school.’
‘But brilliant at maths and computer sciences?’
Jesse glanced at Luc and shrugged minutely. ‘They made more sense to me than sewing or baking.’ She had lost herself in numbers and algorithms far more easily than the more nurturing classes.
‘What about your father?’
Jesse forced her face to stay blank, not to respond. Tightly she said, ‘My mother was a single parent; I never knew my father.’
She hadn’t really. Not in the traditional sense. She’d always been the unwanted reminder downstairs. Hidden away. Until she’d had the temerity to come out and risk his wrath for the second time in her life. And that had had dire consequences.
Luc was moving and Jesse glanced up, a little disorientated to find that they’d been conversing so easily. He was heaping leftovers of egg and salmon onto his plate. He glanced at her and she felt breathless.
‘Are you sure you don’t want any?’
Jesse shook her head vigorously, realising that they’d gone way off track, sitting here talking relatively companionably. When Luc came back to sit down Jesse stood up and took her plate over to the sink to wash it. She felt prickly all over and, most betrayingly of all, as if she might cry.
Without saying anything to Luc she left the kitchen, walking as nonchalantly as she could, horribly aware that he might be looking at her. Only when she was around the corner and had ducked into the empty study that had so incensed him the day before did she breathe out shakily.
She walked to the window and looked over the stunning view of the garden at the side of the house. Crossing her arms over her chest, she told herself that she would have to be very careful not to trust this more civil side of Luc Sanchis. Or be moved by his stories of a difficult childhood. Her heart felt funny when she visualised him taking care of his vulnerable sister.
Jesse had to remember that he would be working tirelessly for a way to get off this island before he lost his chance to save O’Brien. Undoubtedly he was up to something, and she’d be the biggest fool to forget that for a second.
That evening Luc was sitting in a chair on the terrace outside the kitchen. He’d just eaten a perfectly prepared steak with Béarnaise sauce and a salad, and was washing it down with a robust Merlot. He had to concede, much to his chagrin, that this enforced doing nothing wasn’t entirely unwelcome. It had been a long time since he’d had no pressure on his time and energy. And it had been a long time since he’d indulged in cooking for himself. He’d forgotten how much he liked it.
He scowled faintly. Although he hated not being in control. When he’d watched Jesse saunter so nonchalantly from the kitchen that morning he’d wanted to send a cup flying after her to smash against the wall. To smash through that brittle shell that seemed to surround her all the time, making him want to delve underneath.
She made him feel all sorts of things, and he hated to acknowledge that anger at his kidnapping wasn’t usually the uppermost emotion.
He heard a noise now and turned his head to see her in the kitchen. She’d been avoiding him all day. When he thought back to their conversation earlier he got the distinct impression that just as he’d spilled his guts far more than he’d intended so had she.
He hadn’t missed the way she’d tightened all over at the mention of her father. Clearly that was a red button he should push again, seeking any means to unnerve her.
She’d obviously not seen him out on the terrace, and he sat back even more and observed her as she opened the fridge and took out the bowl of Béarnaise sauce he’d made. She lifted it to sniff and he found himself smiling at her wrinkled-nose expression. Curious as to what she would do with the raw materials in the fridge, he almost felt sorry for her when he saw her admit defeat and take out a yoghurt.
She had to be starving. Nothing had been moved from the fridge at lunchtime. Luc didn’t like the feeling of protectiveness that came over him, and quashed it ruthlessly. A woman had inspired that in him before, and it had nearly cost him his burgeoning reputation and career. He certainly wouldn’t give in to it here and now, with someone infinitely more dangerous.
Silently he stood up and went to stand with a shoulder propped against the open patio door, his eyes on the petite figure as she stood and ate the yoghurt.
‘So, where have you been hiding all day? I missed you.’
Jesse went rigid as that deep, mocking voice washed over her and snuck in somewhere very private and vulnerable. She forced herself to be as cool as a cucumber before she turned around to face her nemesis. It was laughable, but right now she felt far more the victim than Luc Sanchis.
She could scent the tantalising aroma of something he’d cooked in the air. No doubt he must relish the thought of her starving.
He was standing with arms folded across his chest, one shoulder propped against the door. He jerked his head back to where he’d been eating. ‘I made a steak. I didn’t think to ask you if you wanted one. Call me old-fashioned, but I don’t think the prisoner usually cares much about feeding the kidnapper.’
Jesse flushed and willed down the wave of hunger that almost knocked her sideways. She could well imagine that his steak had been as delicious as his breakfast. Churlishly she wondered if this was how he’d wear her down—by acute food envy. And why did the man have to be so proficient in the kitchen anyway? Why couldn’t he conform and be some stereotypical male who was as blind in a kitchen as she was?
‘Now, now—no need to look so fierce.’ Luc straightened up and went out, only to reappear seconds later with a glass of wine and a bottle. He tipped it towards Jesse. ‘Wine?’
Jesse shook her head. On her empty stomach a glass of wine
would be suicide. She backed away and said suspiciously, ‘Why are you so cheery?’
Luc calmly poured some more wine into his own glass, and then came into the kitchen to put the bottle down on the counter-top. He took a sip.
‘Like I said earlier, I’m making the best of a bad situation. As you pointed out, I can’t hope to get off the island, and you’re not going to let me near any means of outside communication, so what else can I do for the moment except feed myself and relax?’
Jesse recalled looking down from her bedroom that afternoon to see Luc stretched out in the family-sized hammock which was hung between two trees. He’d been bare-chested in those low-slung jeans, reading a book with an arm behind his head, showing off his pectoral muscles to great advantage.
She’d been transfixed for far longer than she cared to admit, with a slow upswelling of heat making beads of sweat pop out between her breasts before she’d realised what she was doing and moved away.
Abruptly, almost as if he’d touched her and she’d flinched, Jesse moved back. Angry. ‘I’m not completely helpless, you know. I can make a sandwich or … something.’
She flung open the fridge door again and eyed a loaf of bread balefully. Resolutely she took it out, and then took out some cheese and mustard. Determined to show Luc that she wasn’t to be pitied for being so culinarily challenged, she found a chopping board and set about cutting a slice of bread.
Perhaps it was his intent, mocking gaze on her, or the fact that she was left-handed, which always made her cut things awkwardly, having been brought up to use her right hand, but the knife slipped and sharp pain lanced her thumb, making her cry out.
Instantly she was aware of a blur of movement to her right, and then her hand was being cradled in a much bigger one and she was being led over to the sink. Already the awful numbing tide of sickness was coming over her at the sight of bright red blood. It got worse when Luc ran the water over the cut and she could see it flowing down the sink.
