by Lynne Graham
‘What do you think?’
Lindy didn’t know what to say, because sensitivity made her shrink from mentioning past intimacies. On several occasions when they had been out riding they had tied up the horses outside The Lodge and fallen laughing and breathless into her bed below the eaves, hungry to sate the desire that rarely left them. She did not want to recall those painfully sweet memories which had evidently meant so much more to her than to him.
Ben brushed by her with a muffled apology and a hasty promise to ring during the following week. It was as if his angry conflict with Atreus had never happened. She wondered if Atreus could really believe that she had slept with Ben. Did that mean that he had never trusted her friendship with the other man? Or was Atreus simply being insulting because she had dumped him?
When Atreus was sure that he had tethered Dino securely, he strolled back to Lindy, six foot three inches of devastatingly handsome masculinity. Involuntarily, she found herself staring, helplessly feasting her starved eyes on him. Clad in riding gear, Atreus was every woman’s fantasy. In close-fitting breeches and boots, he possessed a male beauty and sleek grace of movement that knocked her sideways. Desire infiltrated Lindy in a heady surge, and her mouth ran dry and her knees went wobbly.
‘Why are you tying up Dino?’
Hot golden eyes slammed into hers and she felt the burn of that sexual smoulder low in her pelvis. He meshed one hand into her tumbled brown mane, tipping her head back so that his mouth could come down hard on hers. As he backed her indoors her senses swam and her heartbeat raced. Shock and satisfaction tore her composure apart. ‘We can’t…’
Atreus kicked the front door shut behind him and pressed her back against the panelled wall of the hall. ‘Tell me no,’ he challenged.
But the sensual taste of him was on her lips again, and like a shameful addict she could not resist her craving. Just one kiss, she told herself, bargaining with her conscience. Just one more kiss, she thought a split second later, while he crushed her against the wall and acquainted her with every muscular line of his lean, powerful body. He plundered her soft mouth, nibbling, stroking and delving into the sensitive interior until he had sent her temperature rocketing to a crazy height. She rejoiced in the hard muscular heat of him, all logic overpowered by his passionate urgency and the rigid swell of his erection against her.
Lean hands glided upward, pushing her wrap and nightdress out of his path even while she tensed and trembled. A tight knot of desire had formed inside her and she tried to fight it—even when a little voice in her head dared to whisper that Atreus had seemed to be jealous of Ben. Could he have missed her so much that he was now trying to get her back? In the state she was in, giving credence to such thoughts was fatal.
Atreus nudged her legs apart to probe the slick honeyed folds between her thighs. Beneath his ministrations she moaned and leant back against the wall for support. Once he had centred his attentions on the tender swollen bud below the soft curls on her mound tingling ripples of seductive delight controlled her, and no thought, no word or warning could have returned her to solid earth again. She stretched up on tiptoes to savour the driving hunger of his sensual mouth again.
Atreus closed both arms round her and swept her off her feet. Sexual need had never driven him with such ferocity. He felt like a runaway train, hurtling down a mountain, and it was an amazingly exhilarating experience. He carried her up the stairs into the bedroom and tumbled her down on the rumpled bedding, pushing up the wrap and the nightdress so that he could savour her voluptuous curves to the full.
A soundless sigh of appreciation escaped him as his lustful gaze locked to the glorious bounty of her breasts. He came down on the bed to suckle the tantalisingly distended pink nipples and mould the soft creamy fullness of her flesh with deep satisfaction. Preoccupied as he was with those distractions, it took effort for him to free a hand and withdraw a condom from his pocket, to unsnap his jodhpurs, wrenching down the zip with unhidden impatience.
Lindy was on a high of trembling expectation. Two of the things she most loved about Atreus were his unpredictability and his unashamed passion for her body. She saw his urgency as a compliment which only matched her own for him. Before he could don protection she pushed herself up and pleasured his straining sex with her tongue.
‘No,’ he ground out in a voice of aching gratification. ‘You’ll make me come, mali mou.’
Empowered by the realisation that he was trembling with eagerness, Lindy fell back again. He gripped her hips and arched her back, sinking with a driven groan into her lush opening in a long, deep thrust. A frenzy of excitement gripped her as he lifted her up to receive his every stroke. The surge and ebb of his body into hers was primal and pagan, and she writhed in abandonment beneath that fierce onslaught of pleasure and possession. Nothing had ever been wilder or more satisfying, and the end came for them both in an intense climax that made his magnificent length shudder over her.
Frantic confusion assailed Lindy in the aftermath of their lovemaking, for she had no script to follow and no idea what she had been thinking of when she’d allowed things to go so far. Her overwhelming hunger for him had been satisfied but at what cost? she wondered in painful mortification.
Atreus emerged from the same experience shell-shocked. He was unnerved by the acknowledgement that he had been out of control for the first time in his life. His mood was not improved when his attention fell on the man’s black bow tie lying on the carpet by the bed. Halliwell’s tie…obviously. Distaste filled Atreus, and his reaction was instantaneous. He pulled away from Lindy and sprang off the bed to stride into the bathroom next door.
In the silence, Lindy tugged down her disarranged clothing and shuddered at what she had allowed to happen. He had neither held her nor kissed her afterwards; everything had changed between them; everything was different. She slid off the bed on nerveless legs, her body still quivering from the rampant impact of his and the excruciatingly tender state of it in the aftermath of his devouring passion. Like a woman running from the scene of a crime, she sped downstairs.
Atreus splashed his face and dried it. He was seething with anger and a daunting sense of bewilderment. He had not wanted sex since he’d left her. But he never, ever went back to a woman. When it was over, it was over. He had always walked away from relationships before they could reach the messy stage, but what had just occurred had been messy to say the very least. Brilliant, fantastic sex, he conceded bitterly, but inappropriate—particularly when she had wasted no time in inviting another man into her bed.
He had wanted Lindy again only because she was familiar, he decided grimly. But since when had he found the familiar so appealing? So sexually irresistible? Had he grown past the age where he wanted a constant parade of variety in the bedroom? Was he now ready for a more settled lifestyle? Perhaps it was time for him to begin looking out for a wife rather than another lover. That bold step forward in thought, away from Lindy and on to a more traditional horizon, pleased Atreus and steadied his resolve.
‘I’m sorry,’ Atreus breathed coldly, when he found Lindy waiting for him in the living room.
‘I’m not sure I understand what you’re apologising for,’ Lindy admitted stiltedly, frantically avoiding direct eye contact. She sensed his detachment and it chilled her that he could switch off again so easily.
‘What we had is over and done with,’ Atreus declared without hesitation. ‘I shouldn’t be here when I don’t want you back.’
Lindy marvelled that she managed to continue breathing through the savage sense of rejection that that blunt declaration had dealt her. He had dragged her off to bed and made passionate love to her but it had meant absolutely nothing to him. Indeed, his hostile attitude made it clear that he very much regretted their renewed intimacy.
‘You know…’ Lindy began hesitantly, despising herself in advance for the plea of innocence she was about to make without any encouragement from him. ‘I didn’t sleep with Ben. I slept down here on the sof
a.’
Against his own volition Atreus directed grim dark eyes at the sofa and the bedding still lying on it in an untidy heap. He looked away again, refusing to dwell on what she had said, refusing the suggestion that the information could have any power to influence him. ‘It doesn’t matter. You’re not my business any more,’ he said drily. ‘I crossed boundaries I had no right to cross today. It won’t happen again.’
Watching Atreus leave, Lindy felt as if someone was squeezing her heart dry of blood. She couldn’t breathe for the pain of it. She watched him ride off from the window and then drew back to cover her tear-wet face with trembling hands. She felt sick again, and she wanted to bang her head against the wall to hurt herself—because she felt that she deserved to be punished for the way she had let herself down. How could she have been so foolish as to go to bed with him again? Particularly after he had suggested she was a loose woman? Where was her self-respect? She and Atreus had never been on a level playing field. It seemed that his convenient affair had been her heartbreak…
CHAPTER SIX
FORTY-EIGHT hours later, Lindy was doggedly engaged in packing orders for her customers, in preparation for heading off to the post office, when the doorbell rang. She had to sign for the envelope the postman gave her, and she tore it open with a frown.
It was a notice to quit The Lodge for non-payment of rent, and it requested that she move out within two months. Lindy’s eyes were wide with disbelief. In recent months she had received a couple of letters pointing out that she owed the Chantry estate rent arrears. When the second letter had arrived she had gone to the estate office in person, to point out that she had paid the rent but that it had been continually repaid into her account. The estate manager had apologised, explained that it was a computer-generated letter and said that she should just ignore it. He had turned down her offer to write a cheque to cover the rent arrears then and there, and had said something about that not being Mr Dionides’s wish. Advising her to ignore any similar letters that she received, he had shown her to the door. When she’d mentioned the matter to Atreus, it had been evident he already knew about it. He had told her not to worry about an oversight made by a new member of staff and that the problem would not arise again.
Now those recollections could only send a shiver down Lindy’s tense spine. She thought it very probable that Atreus would prefer her to vacate The Lodge now that their affair was over. Had he sunk low enough to use those supposed rent arrears as an excuse to evict her?
Truly taken aback by that suspicion, Lindy sat down to reread the letter, which was written in clear language and even gave the final date by which she was to vacate the premises. It also said that if she was prepared to leave ahead of that date her rent arrears would be reduced accordingly. It was that last point which confirmed Lindy’s sinking suspicion that Atreus simply wanted her off his country estate as soon as possible, and that realisation was just another kick in the teeth.
Indeed, Lindy felt utterly overwhelmed by that final blow, which struck at the very base of her security. She knew that she ought to consult a solicitor, but she also knew just how pricey legal assistance could be. If she was going to be forced to move out she would need every penny she had to secure new accommodation and relocate. And if Atreus was so determined to get rid of her, did she really want to fight to stay? Or to run the risk of having her affair with Atreus alluded to within the public arena of the County Court? After all, her relationship with Atreus and his double-dealing with her rental payments would be central to any defence she attempted to mount. She shuddered at the prospect, but the concept of staying on at The Lodge when her presence there was evidently so very unwelcome was no more appealing.
She loved her compact home, and it provided a perfect base for her business. She had enough land to grow lavender and roses, and the cellar was ideal for the equipment required for pot pourri preparation and candle-making, as well as for the storage and packing of her products. Where else would she find such a base at an affordable rent? It would also be a rare rental property that allowed both the running of a business and the keeping of pets. She fondled Sausage’s fluffy ears while the tears trickled down her cheeks. As if that frightening letter were not enough, she also felt sick once more. What a louse Atreus was, and what a rotten, selfish, ruthless rat he was proving to be! No, he had not been joking all those months ago when he had warned her that the creed of the gentleman was long dead. Now that he had decided he no longer wanted her around, Atreus wanted to throw her off his country estate like so much rubbish!
It was in that wretched mood that Lindy phoned her friend Elinor. This time Lindy was too upset to hold anything back, and the whole story came tumbling out, laced with tears and regrets and disbelief that anyone she loved could be treating her so badly. Elinor, who was now the epitome of a very sedate royal princess, residing in Quaram, her husband’s country, said some very blunt and unprincesslike things about Atreus, while adding that Lindy was to stop worrying because she already had the perfect solution in mind. Lindy came off the phone feeling reassured and less fearful, although she could not really have said why since she could not see what Elinor could realistically do to help from thousands of miles away.
But that same evening, her other close friend Alissa phoned, and explained that Elinor had consulted her. Alissa immediately offered Lindy the use of a vacant cottage on the country estate which her husband, Sergei Antonovich, had recently bought as a home for his family in the UK.
‘I can’t let you do that,’ Lindy told Alissa ruefully.
‘Of course you can. It would be wonderful to be able to see you more often. Did I mention that it’s much closer to London as well? And much nearer Elinor’s place too. Sergei says that good tenants are really hard to find these days and you’d be very welcome, dogs included. Say yes, Lindy, please,’ Alissa pleaded. ‘I’m pregnant again, and I would love the company when Sergei’s away on business.’
Lindy’s eyes stung with tears at the warmth of that request. Her hormones seemed to be operating on a supercharged level, for her emotions were seesawing all over the place and tears flowed more readily to her eyes than they ever had before. It was that acknowledgement which made her decide that possibly she ought to consult the doctor, in case there was something more serious wrong with her than the persistent tummy bug that had not stopped troubling her.
In bed that night she burned with so much anger against Atreus that she could not sleep. He might be about to get his wish to see her move off his exclusive turf, but she wanted him to know what she thought of his despicable methods for achieving his own ends. In the darkness she sat up and put on the light to reset her alarm clock. Tomorrow, she decided, she would catch the train to London in order to see Atreus one more time, before she wiped him out of her mind and her heart for ever!
Atreus frowned when he learned that Lindy was waiting outside his office.
What was her game? What could have persuaded her to come all the way to London to see him? He did not want a scene caused at his place of work. Dionides Shipping was a conservative environment, and Atreus had always kept his private life rigidly separate from his working day. His even white teeth clenching, he caught a glimpse of the wary way his PA was regarding him—an unwelcome reminder that for the past few weeks Atreus had been struggling to control a disturbing tendency to explode into anger in a way that was far from being the norm for him.
Lush black lashes screened Atreus’s brilliant dark eyes and concealed his bewilderment at his own behaviour. When, he wondered in frustration, could he expect to return to feeling like himself again? Whatever, he had no choice but to see Lindy and draw a line under that unfortunate affair. He was already seeing how an unconventional relationship with someone who did not belong to his world could have unexpected and destructive repercussions. It was a lesson his foolish father had never learned, and Atreus had no intention of following in his late parent’s footsteps.
Lindy was trembling when she walked into A
treus’s big, imposing office. She had got out of bed at dawn to ensure she was well groomed, because there could be no satisfaction in suspecting that he might be looking at her and marvelling at how he had ever got involved with her in the first place. With her hair tamed into a blade-straight fall and a light application of make-up, wearing a burgundy blouse teamed with a pencil skirt and a smart knitted jacket, she felt strong enough to confront him.
Atreus sprang upright, his tall, powerful physique sheathed in a perfectly tailored black pinstripe business suit. He studied her, immediately aware of the impact of her soft pink-glossed mouth, the even more tempting swell of her full breasts below her shirt and the violin curve of her hips. His reaction to her appeal was instant and earthy, and it infuriated him to have so little control over his libido. There was a decided touch of sarcasm in his tone when he asked coolly, ‘How may I help you?’
And, that fast, Lindy wanted to hit him. There he stood, looking absolutely gorgeous the way he always did, and how dared he address her as if she was an importunate stranger? How dared he look down on her from his intimidating height with that hateful aloof expression when it was only days since they had made love? That, it seemed, was an injudicious recollection, for her eyes stung hotly when she finally acknowledged that they had not made love. It took two people to make love. Atreus had only been having sex: casual, uncommitted, very physical sex.
Lindy walked right to the edge of his desk and slapped the Notice to Quit she had received the day before down in front of him. ‘I wanted to hand this back to you personally,’ she informed him with gutsy calm, her dark brown hair flipping back like heavy silk from her flushed face, her blue eyes very bright. ‘I did nothing to deserve this kind of treatment. If I’d known eighteen months ago what I know about you now, we would never have had a relationship. You’re a man without conscience and a horrible bully!’
