“I thought this...crush on me was a thing of the past. Just some fleeting infatuation he’d gotten over long ago. Turned out he never got over it, just spent six years disguising it.” Her expression was bleak. “Last spring he was dating this wonderful woman. Isabelle. She was in love with him, wanted a commitment. I couldn’t believe it when he dumped her. I told him he was nuts to let her go, that he’d never find a better woman and should give the relationship a chance.”
Her wry smile spoke volumes. “It...wasn’t what he wanted to hear. Not from me. That’s when it all came out. He’d been biding his time for six years, hoping I’d come around and return his feelings. It wasn’t the simple crush I’d once thought, it was more like...an obsession.”
She looked him in the eye. “I tried to let him down easy, Caleb. I was as gentle as I knew how to be.”
“I’m not buying it, Lizzie. It started out as friendship, what you two had, but it turned into something more, something hot and heavy. You two talked about marriage.”
“Never!”
“You waited till he was totally dependent on you emotionally, at his most vulnerable. Then you yanked the rug out from under him. Rejected him in the most brutal way—”
“No...no!” She was shaking her head.
“Demeaned him. Ridiculed his pathetic devotion to you. Taunted him with your infidelities—”
“Stop! Caleb, stop it! Do you really think I’m capable of something like that?” Her eyes burned with tears of indignation. Hot color spotted her cheeks.
Hadn’t he asked himself that very question, more than once? Could Lizzie have done those things?
He held her stare, even when he saw her lips tremble, even when he realized with a sick jolt what had wounded her: not his brother’s accusations, but Caleb’s own unquestioning acceptance of them. His lack of faith in her.
He sucked in a steadying breath, propped up his resolve by sheer strength of will, when it threatened to buckle. Forced himself to look into her stricken eyes when instinct commanded him to turn away from the raw pain he saw there.
“It was all some kind of sick game to you, wasn’t it, Lizzie? To see how far you could push my brother before he cracked. Was it diverting, at least? Were the results as dramatic as you’d hoped? Must be flattering as hell having someone kill himself over you. Something to brag about at the beauty parlor.”
He had to give her credit—she took it without flinching, as if she was simply waiting for him to wind down, to get it out of his system. Her flat expression bespoke disappointment in him.
He looked away first. Self-doubt bubbled up like acid. He could taste it.
After an eternity she said, “Caleb, you must know your brother was emotionally immature. Manipulative, even.”
“David may have been a little...insecure, but he wasn’t the basket case you’re making out”
“I suspect you don’t know these things about him because you weren’t around much.”
If she’d walloped him with that brick, she couldn’t have struck a more hurtful blow. Caleb was all too aware off how little he’d been around for the fatherless boy who looked up to him David had grown up smothered by their weak, introverted mother. Caleb was the nearest thing the kid had had to a stable male role model, but he’d gone off to West Point when David was ten, and never saw much of him after that
If David had turned out to be less than the man he should have been, wasn’t Caleb at least partly to blame? It was a question that had tormented him in the months since his little brother had put a noose around his neck.
Had Caleb been too quick to attribute David’s self-destructive impulses to Lizzie’s brutal rejection? Too eager to buy in to the whole sordid story? Certainly it was less harrowing to blame some nameless, faceless heartbreaker than to confront his own failings as a brother and a role model.
Perhaps he should have allowed Lizzie to remain nameless and faceless. How much easier to condemn her before he knew her as a three-dimensional woman, a resourceful, sable-eyed temptress with an interest in French cooking and rocket science.
When Caleb remained silent, Lizzie said, “David revered you, you know.”
“I know,” he said hoarsely.
“And he had to know how much you’d despise the Avalon Collective. Has it occurred to you that he might have made all this up as an excuse for his actions?”
“What are you saying?”
She leaned forward, crossing her arms on the brick. “By blaming me, by telling you I’m the reason he joined Avalon, he sidestepped the truth.”
“Which is...?”
“That he joined Avalon of his own free will,” she said firmly. “A conscious decision. He wasn’t the first to opt for the communal life-style, and he won’t be the last. He couldn’t admit that to you, Caleb. I don’t think he could face your disapproval.”
His hands clenched. “You’re saying David took the coward’s way out.”
She couldn’t have offered a lower insult to his brother’s memory. Why had he let her start talking? She’d had more than a week to work on her story.
He said, “I get the feeling you’re trying to convince yourself as much as me. Own up to it, Lizzie. You’re responsible for what happened to David.”
That much was still true, though he conceded that the issue was far more complex than he’d originally thought.
She sighed. “If I’m responsible for any of this—” she studied the brick nestled in her lap, picking at the flecks of mortar “—it’s because I wouldn’t sleep with him. He made a lot out of that—set me up as some sort of model of feminine purity, I guess. Anyway, it only encouraged his obsession.”
“I have a hard time with that one, Lizzie. You expect me to believe you two never—”
“I’m a virgin.”
The laughter erupted from him before he could check it. She regarded him with stony patience, looking very small and childlike on her high perch, swaddled in that nasty old blanket. “Lizzie...” He chuckled, pressing a hand to his heart. “God help me, I’m trying to keep an open mind, but you gotta work with me, sweetheart. You’re what? Twenty-three? Twenty-four?”
“Twenty-five.”
“Even if I believed you’ve kept it under wraps for a quarter of a century, the fact is, you just spent three weeks at Avalon.”
“It’s not that kind of place.”
“No, but the Exalted Grand High Poobah is that kind of guy. Constantly on the prowl for tender young morsels like yourself. And as I understand it, what Lugh wants, Lugh generally gets. Sweetheart. Come on.” Caleb’s mocking expression urged her to fess up. “You weren’t scouring the john the whole time!”
“No, I was looking for clues—”
He raised a palm. “That nonsense again. I’d rather hear about Lugh’s proclivities, but since you’re not so inclined...” He pointed to the house. “Get your fanny back in there, on the double. That’s one hellacious mess you made, and you’re going to get to work on it right now.”
“No.”
He kept one eye on the brick. “Oh yes, Lizzie. You’re gonna pick up every damn thing, sweep the floors and scrub them.” While part of him insisted he take a hard line, another part of him empathized with her defiant outburst, the culmination of eight days of impotent rage. It wouldn’t hurt to let her salvage some dignity. “And I’m going to help you,” he added.
She looked at him sharply, as if sensing a trick.
He said, “Call it my thanks for all those times you refrained from scratching my eyes out.”
“Even though you deserved it.”
“Even though I deserved it.”
“Here, catch.” She tossed the brick, and he barely jumped away in time. “Something else for your chamber of horrors.” She threw off the blanket.
“My what?” He was captivated by the sight of her jeans-clad bottom descending the rope ladder. Halfway down she shot a narrow-eyed look over her shoulder. He quickly bent down to retrieve the brick.
“You k
now...your chamber of horrors,” she said when she reached the ground. “The locked room where you keep all those dangerous objects. Juice glasses. Paperweights. Grapefruit spoons.” She shuddered dramatically. “Scary to think of all that destructive potential in the hands of one man.”
He steered her toward the house. “You sweep, I’ll hold the dustpan.”
AN EARSPLITTING CLAP of thunder jolted Elizabeth awake just before dawn. As she lay in bed listening to the pounding rain and the accompanying low rumbles, she resigned herself to the fact that she was up for the day. She rose, pulled on her old pink terry-cloth robe and made her way downstairs to put on a pot of coffee.
In the four days since she’d discovered her SOS note in Caleb’s pocket and abandoned all hope of rescue, her interactions with her “host” had become more natural and relaxed. She’d dropped the pretense of submissiveness, while taking care not to provoke him. Unfortunately, he considered any attempt to explain her presence in Avalon highly provoking. Still, he seemed to treat her with a greater regard nowadays, his attitude almost one of respect. She considered it ironic that if they’d met under less outlandish circumstances, the two of them might actually have become friends.
Or something more. She refused to lie to herself and deny the attraction that sizzled between them. His masterful self-assurance, the unwavering strength of his convictions, were as arousing as they were frustrating. She’d never known a man like Caleb, never thought herself particularly drawn to powerful, take-charge men.
But this particular take-charge man had awakened something deep within her—something profound, elemental—and somehow she knew she’d never be the same. When he finally released her and she went back to her old life, this restless hunger would forever be a part of her.
And just as surely, she knew she’d never find the man who could ease this gut-deep ache and make her whole. This, then, would be the bitterest relic of her imprisonment, her captor’s ultimate revenge.
As she passed the sunroom, lightning illuminated it through the huge bay window, and she stopped cold.
He was in there, facing the window. His back was to her, his arms crossed over his chest.
Many times she’d imagined the body under the bulky sweaters. Now she was forced to admit she didn’t have much of an imagination. Caleb wore only gray sweatpants, which hung low on his hard, trim waist. The rapid lightning flashes sketched a bronze torso more powerful, more male, than she could have envisioned.
“You gonna just stand there?” he asked, not turning.
She grimaced. It wasn’t fair. If Caleb wanted to, he could sneak up on her in a tomb wearing a suit of armor. She, on the other hand, couldn’t even make it past him barefoot during a thunderstorm!
She entered the room and stood next to him before the window. “Some storm,” she said.
“Uh-huh.”
His voice was strained. Had she violated a private moment? Then again, he had asked her in. Sort of. She glanced at his face and was astonished to see the tightness around his mouth and eyes. Beads of sweat glistened over his upper lip. Now that she was close, she could discern the tension in his entire body.
“Something wrong?” she asked, an instant before another thunderclap roared.
Caleb flinched, though she could tell he was trying not to. For long moments her rational mind refused to acknowledge what her senses already had: he was afraid of lightning and thunder.
But that was impossible. The commando, afraid of thunderstorms?
A few seconds later the house shook with a deafening thunderclap that simultaneously lit the sky. That one was close! His eyes shut briefly, as if against his will. She saw his throat working.
“Caleb...are you af—” She bit her lip. You couldn’t ask Rambo a thing like that.
He looked at her, and she averted her eyes. She heard his harsh exhalation, then, “I’ve always had this stupid phobia, as long as I can remember.”
“But...you’re an explosives expert!”
He shrugged. “Not the same thing.”
Somehow his ready admission seemed a more manly response than denying the obvious. She said, “Well, a phobia’s nothing to be asham—”
His blistering look told her to can the platitudes.
What was he trying to accomplish by standing in front of this huge window, exposing himself to his fears? Of course, she supposed it was preferable to cringing in some dark corner. Her eye was caught by a glint of silver on his chest, above his folded arms. She crossed in front of him to finally discover what hung from that chain.
The tiny pendant was obscured, nestled within the dark, swirling hair of his chest. She glanced up at his face to find him staring at her, his eyes more pewter now than silver, the same color as the sky, with dawn struggling to assert itself. She burrowed her fingertips into the crisp curls and lifted the pendant, startled at the unexpected sense of intimacy that gripped her. She held a tiny silver cross, obviously handcrafted and exquisitely simple.
He said quietly, “It was my mother’s.”
She nodded. Her fingers curled around the cross, warmed by his skin, and his chest rose and fell against her knuckles. She unfurled her fingers and pressed her palm over the cross, over the powerful, steady beat of his heart. Almost against her will, she dragged her gaze back up to his face, to find those pale, penetrating eyes scrutinizing her, as if to turn her inside out and lay her secrets bare.
As more thunder rumbled, he stiffened and the heartbeat under her palm drummed faster. His arms unfolded and she felt his hands on her elbows, sliding upward. Another clap of thunder and his fingers bit into her terry-clad arms.
Never relinquishing her eyes, he murmured, “Now you know my secret. What’s yours? What are you afraid of?” After a moment he cupped her cheek, his expression sad and gentle. Had he read her mind? “Lizzie...you must know I could never hurt you.”
Without warning, the sky exploded in a violent barrage of thunderclaps accompanied by pulsating bursts of light. He trembled slightly as he pulled her close and brushed his lips over her temple, nuzzling her. She could barely breathe. Her nerve endings felt almost painfully sensitized. Even the gentle nudging of his nose and his abrasive, unshaven chin sent helpless shivers through her. The now-familiar scent of him was a narcotic, rushing to her head and stealing all reason.
Alarmed by the sound of her own soft, panting breaths, she tried to pull away, but he held her fast, thrusting his long, strong fingers through her hair, tilting her head up. Just before his mouth closed over hers, she looked into his eyes...and felt her pulse skid. Never had she seen a man look so predatory.
His warm lips raked hers with savage insistence. When she stubbornly refused to open her mouth, he slid the rough pad of his thumb over the seam of her lips and between them, with just enough pressure to force them open. His strong, lithe tongue plunged and retreated in a primitive and unmistakable rhythm. A shudder rippled through her, settling as a thumping, clutching hunger between her legs. His deep groan vibrated into her, rocking her to her toes. The storm still raged, but he barely seemed to notice.
“Caleb!” she gasped, wresting her swollen lips from his.
Impatiently he yanked at the cloth tie of her robe and tore it open, revealing her white silk nightgown. His fiery gaze scorched her, from her breasts down to the dark triangle she knew to be just visible under the thin white silk.
He drew his fingertips up the side of her breast, and she moaned. His hot palm cupped the weight and caressed her with unexpected tenderness. His thumb and forefinger met and captured the tight, burning peak, which seemed somehow connected to the empty center of her. She cried out hoarsely, grabbing his wrist in panic as a dizzying rush of damp heat overwhelmed her senses.
He caught her around the waist. “Lizzie...” he whispered, “make love with me. Take me inside you.”
“Yes...” Never had she felt more raw, more exposed, more aching, than at that frightening moment when the thread of her resistance snapped and she yielded to h
er desire.
His head swiveled and his eyes locked on the daybed in the shadows behind them. He tugged her robe off as he led her the short distance and sat with her on the bed. He pressed his lips to hers sweetly, cherishingly, then dropped soft kisses on her face and throat. He turned her around and she felt him lift her hair and kiss her shoulder and the back of her neck.
His fingers slipped around to the front, to the row of tiny, silk-covered buttons at the top of her gown. Her eyes fluttered shut as he eased the first button through the buttonhole—then the next button, and the next, as her heart slammed erratically in anticipation. Slowly he slipped the straps down her arms. And grew still.
Confused, she opened her eyes and glanced over her shoulder...and felt a chill crawl over her scalp. He was staring at the little sun tattoo on her shoulder blade, the same mark his brother had borne at the end of his life. When Caleb raised his eyes to her face, they were hard, searching.
“You were very good, you know,” he said quietly, and the chill raced from her scalp down her spine. He touched the tattoo, then drew his hand away as if she were soiled. “Is this how it started with David? Did you play on his weaknesses, his vulnerabilities? Is that how you got close to him?”
His words squeezed her heart. “Caleb, don’t...” she pleaded.
“Only you didn’t have to wait for a storm with my brother, did you?” He jerked as a peal of thunder reinforced his words. “With his insecurities, he must’ve been pathetically easy to manipulate.”
Elizabeth tried to rise, but he shoved her down onto her back, seizing her wrists in one hand and pinning her body down. He loomed over her, more predatory than ever. The tiny silver cross dangled from his neck, glinting in the dim, lightning-studded dawn.
With a bitter chuckle, he said, “Yeah, you were damn good, sweetheart. I know your history, and even I almost fell for it. Of course, you can writhe and moan all you like, but there are some things even the best actress can’t fake.”
Shock held her immobile as he thrust a hand under her gown and between her legs, his touch swift and impersonal. A mortified sob broke from her when his fingers found her wet and undeniably aroused.
A Hard-Hearted Hero (Harlequin Temptation) Page 7
