Tidewater Seduction

by Anne Mather

  ‘God, Jo, I don’t care if you’re stark naked,’ he grated, and she heard his fist thud against the door in frustration. ‘This isn’t a social visit. I need to talk to you. Now, can you cut the waffle, and open this damn door?’

  Joanna’s mouth went dry. ‘I can’t. I’m a mess——’

  ‘I’ve told you, I don’t care what you look like.’

  ‘No, but——’

  ‘Jo!’

  His use of her name was desperate, and, realising it must be something pretty serious to bring him all this way, Joanna gave in. But she still didn’t unlock the door.

  ‘Look,’ she called, ‘give me a few minutes, will you? I—I’ll put something on. Hold on.’

  Cole said something else, something not very complimentary, she guessed, but she couldn’t help it. He would have to wait until she had had a wash, and changed into something decent. Her pride wouldn’t let her face him looking such a hag.

  Ten minutes later, with her face washed and her teeth cleaned, and a deliberately chosen georgette tunic, in a becoming shade of apricot, giving warmth to her pale features, Joanna opened the door. Her hair was loose, a dusky fall of silk that swung against her cheek as she stepped back to let him in.

  She thought, belatedly, that she should have worn something on her feet. In the ordinary way, Cole towered above her. When she was in her bare feet, he was a force to be reckoned with.

  And her instinctive recoil when he stepped into the apartment was as much a reaction to the threat he represented as social politeness. She didn’t want him there, not now, not while she was still trying to come to terms with her condition. God, she hadn’t even decided what she was going to do about the baby. And she certainly wasn’t ready to give him that advantage.

  Even so, as he stepped forward and took hold of the door to close it behind his back, she had a moment to study his taut features. Her initial thought that he hadn’t changed had to be slightly revised. He had changed. He looked older for one thing. And thinner, too, if she wasn’t mistaken. Evidently his father’s death—for surely Ryan was dead now, and that was why he was here—had hit him rather harder than he had imagined. She hoped he wasn’t blaming himself for what had happened. She hoped he had made his peace with his father, however painful that had proved to be.

  She took a nervous breath. It was strange seeing Cole in a suit, for once. It made him look more serious, more severe. The dark grey fabric threw the lightness of his hair into prominence, shadowing his cheekbones, and accentuating the thin line of his mouth. And it also served to make him look more remote, and more unapproachable. This was not the man who had made such desperate love to her on the beach. This was still the stranger who had faced her in his father’s study.

  But she hadn’t looked into his eyes, and, when she did so, her interpretation had to be revised once again. There was an uneasy tension in his gaze, and raw desperation. No, not the unfeeling stranger, she thought unsteadily, but perhaps an approximation.

  Nevertheless, his presence disturbed her. No matter how she tried to rationalise her feelings, just looking at him gave her a shivery feeling in the pit of her stomach. She hoped it wasn’t physical. She hoped she wasn’t going to throw up again while he was here. It would be too embarrassing if she had to go dashing into the bathroom. And, while he’d never guess the real reason, he might get the wrong impression.

  The silence was unnerving, and Joanna was too emotional to cope with it right now. ‘I—how are you?’ she said, realising how inane that sounded after everything that had gone before, but incapable of thinking of an alternative. ‘I—I never expected——’

  ‘Grace said you’d been ill,’ he interrupted her abruptly, moving away from the door, so that Joanna felt obliged to back further into the room.

  She swallowed. ‘Ill?’ she said faintly. Was that why he was here? Because Grace had sent for him? ‘I—I’m fine, really. I don’t know what—what gave her that opinion.’

  Cole frowned. ‘She said you’re not working.’

  ‘Oh, that!’ Joanna managed to give a short laugh. ‘No—well, I’m not. But I don’t think that’s any concern of yours.’

  Cole’s jaw tightened. ‘Nevertheless, I am concerned——’

  ‘Well, don’t be.’ Joanna didn’t think she could stand this stilted conversation one minute longer. ‘If Grace has taken it upon herself to contact you and blame you, because I’m being lazy, then I’m sorry. You’ve had a wasted journey. I—I’ll work again, when I feel like it.’

  ‘She says you didn’t even attend your own exhibition.’

  ‘So what?’ Joanna was beginning to resent him and Grace for putting her in this position. It was bad enough feeling as if her life had lost all meaning. The last thing she needed was Cole coming here to offer her some guilty consolation.

  ‘So—she’s worried about you,’ he said shortly, but she had the feeling that Grace’s emotions weren’t the whole reason he had come. ‘God, Jo, do you have to make this so bloody hard? I really hoped you might be glad to see me.’

  Joanna tensed. ‘Is that what Grace said?’

  ‘To hell with Grace!’ retorted Cole savagely. ‘Is that the only reason you can think of why I might be here?’

  Comprehension dawned. With an effort, Joanna remembered what she had thought when he first came into the apartment. Of course. He must have come to tell Grace his father was dead. It was the kind of thing he would do. So much more civilised than putting it in a letter.

  Now she shook her head. ‘I’m sorry.’

  Cole closed his eyes for a moment, and then opened them again. ‘What are you sorry for now? Not my wasted journey again, I hope.’

  ‘No.’ Joanna gave a helpless gesture. ‘A-about your father. I—I might not have liked him, but I didn’t wish him——’

  ‘Dead?’ Cole cut in harshly, and she nodded. ‘Well, I’m afraid your condolences are just a tad premature.’

  Joanna stared at him. ‘You mean——?’

  ‘I mean my father is still very much alive.’ Cole loosened the button of his collar and dragged his tie a couple of inches away from his neck, as if he was feeling the heat. ‘He’s even recovered his powers of speech, although he isn’t always intelligible. It rattles him like hell, but he makes himself understood, one way or the other.’

  Joanna was astounded. ‘Grace never told me.’

  ‘Grace didn’t know.’ Cole paused. ‘Not until an hour ago, anyway. I gather you didn’t tell her about his stroke.’

  ‘No.’ Joanna was beginning to feel uneasy, and she glanced behind her, as if she was getting bored with the conversation. ‘I—I haven’t talked to Grace much since I got back. I—I—I’ve been …’

  ‘Too busy?’ suggested Cole sardonically, and Joanna felt the warm colour invade her throat.

  ‘Not—exactly,’ she said, holding up her head. ‘I—do have a life outside of painting.’

  ‘Do you?’

  Cole’s tone was vaguely accusing, and Joanna wondered what he had expected her to say. For heaven’s sake, he knew, better than anyone, how she had felt when she left Tidewater. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t known she was leaving. Didn’t he remember his chilling rebuttal?

  Taking a deep breath, she decided this one-sided attack had gone on long enough. ‘Why have you come here, Cole?’ she asked. ‘I’m sure it wasn’t to inform me that your father is back at Tidewater——’

  ‘He’s not.’ Cole broke into her words with a swift denial.

  Joanna frowned. ‘He’s not what?’

  ‘Back at Tidewater.’ He paused. ‘I said he wasn’t dead. I didn’t say he was back home.’

  ‘Does it matter?’ Joanna felt totally indifferent to his statement. ‘As I say, I don’t believe your father’s—partial recovery was why you came to see me.’

  ‘It wasn’t.’ Cole took a step forward, and Joanna felt uneasy again. She wasn’t ready for this, she thought unsteadily, wishing Grace had warned her that he was coming. But perhaps she
had. She remembered those unanswered phone calls with a bitter sense of regret. ‘I came because I thought we needed to talk.’

  ‘What about?’

  ‘How about—us?’ ventured Cole, with cool audacity. ‘Like maybe we’re not finished yet. Despite all the signs to the contrary.’

  Joanna’s arms flailed. ‘Grace did send you here, didn’t she?’ she exclaimed. ‘Oh, I wish she’d——’

  ‘Grace didn’t even know I was coming to London,’ Cole retorted, grasping a protesting arm, and refusing to let go. ‘Listen to me, Jo, I’m the last person Aunt Grace would choose to get in touch with. If she’s worried about you—and she is—she wouldn’t send for the man who she believes is to blame for it all!’

  Joanna stared at him indignantly, but his words did have some merit. Grace might love Cole as a nephew, but she had always been wary of him as Joanna’s husband. And, knowing what had happened in the past, she was hardly likely to appeal to him now.

  His hard fingers were beginning to bite into the soft flesh of her upper arm, and, as if becoming aware of it, Cole uttered an oath and released her. But he didn’t move away. He stayed where he was. And she was still overwhelmingly aware of him, and the threat he represented.

  ‘Look,’ he said, and when he spoke again the husky timbre of his voice scraped insistently across her nerves. ‘I didn’t come here to argue with you. God knows, we’ve done enough of that in the past.’

  ‘I suppose that’s my fault!’

  Joanna’s response was swift and indignant, but it was as much a protest against the unwilling awareness he was arousing as a defensive ploy. It was hard to remain detached, when his warm breath was wafting over her forehead, and the male scent of his sweat was filling her nose.

  ‘No,’ Cole retorted now. ‘It’s mine.’ And she was still trying to absorb this when he added, with bitter self-recrimination, ‘I shouldn’t have believed my mother’s lies, but, when you’re in love with someone, you’re vulnerable!’

  Joanna’s knees went weak. ‘I—beg your pardon?’ she whispered, groping behind her for the back of a chair, anything that could give her some support. And Cole moved a little nearer.

  ‘I said, I was—I still am—in love with you. Why did you think my father and I were estranged? He knew damn well there was only ever going to be one woman in my life. And he’d driven you away. He and my mother between them.’ His blue eyes darkened with emotion, as he added, ‘That’s why I’m here, Jo. That’s the only reason. I knew I had to try and make you believe it.’

  Joanna had never fainted in her life, but for once she felt near to it. Cole’s face was wavering before her eyes, and she was fairly sure she must have imagined what she thought he just said. Was this what losing consciousness felt like? she wondered, unaware of just how pale she’d become.

  ‘I—don’t feel very well,’ she said, feeling foolish, and Cole’s ejaculation was harsh and self-derisive.

  ‘Goddammit,’ he muttered, abandoning any lingering shred of self-control, and swinging her up into his arms. ‘I always was a tactless bastard. I’m sorry. I’d forgotten Grace told me you were sick.’

  ‘I’m not sick,’ argued Joanna faintly, as Cole carried her across to her settee, and deposited her on it. ‘Really, I’m not. I—guess it’s just the heat.’

  ‘Or what I said,’ said Cole grimly, dropping his jacket on to a chair, and perching on the edge of the sofa beside her. He tugged off his tie, and sent it curling on to the floor. ‘I didn’t intend to blurt it out like that, but, hell, I had to get your attention!’

  Joanna felt better now that she was off her shaky legs, but the hard strength of the thigh beside her hip was still daunting. And now that he was without his jacket she could see the shadow of brown skin beneath his cream silk shirt, and glimpse the sun-bleached hair that arrowed down his chest.

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said, wishing she dared ask him to repeat what he had blurted out. ‘Um—do you think I could have a drink of water?’ she added, desperate to find some way of getting a little breathing space. ‘I haven’t had anything to eat this morning, and I am feeling a bit empty.’

  ‘You haven’t had breakfast?’ Cole got to his feet and towered over her, and now her eyes were irresistibly drawn to the narrow cut of his trousers. Was it her imagination, or were they tighter than they should have been across his hips? Dear God, she thought unsteadily, she was rapidly losing control.

  Shaking her head in answer to his question, she was unutterably relieved when he strode away into the kitchen. In the few moments it would take him to find a glass, and run the tap, she had to calm herself. And there was no way she could do that if she thought about what he’d said.

  The sense of unreality had passed by the time Cole came back, carrying a tray. But it must have taken longer than she’d thought, she reflected ruefully, for he’d taken the time to filter some coffee and make some toast. Of course, he knew his way around her kitchen, she conceded. He had lived here for several weeks before their wedding. Oh, those blissful days, she remembered wistfully. Before the coils of Tidewater had strangled their relationship.

  Cole hooked a low coffee-table with his foot, and set the tray down beside the sofa. Then, to her consternation, he resumed his earlier position beside her.

  ‘Coffee, and toast,’ he said unnecessarily, his eyes disturbingly warm and intent. ‘Can you sit up?’

  ‘I’m not an invalid,’ said Joanna, her voice sharper than it might have been because she was nervous, and Cole inclined his head.

  ‘If you say so,’ he allowed, respecting her obvious wish to be independent. He let her shuffle into a sitting position, and then reached for the jug of coffee. ‘Cream, but no sugar. You see, I remembered that, too.’

  Joanna wanted to say something flip and casual, anything to dispel the unwilling intimacy of their situation, but the smell of the coffee was turning her stomach.

  ‘I—think I’d prefer a glass of water, after all,’ she declared, struggling to contain her nausea. ‘I—excuse me, for a moment. I have to go to the bathroom.’

  When she came back, the tray had disappeared, and Cole was standing by the window, staring out on to the sun-baked grass in the park across the way. His hands were in his pockets, but there was tension in every muscle of his taut frame. But he had evidently heard her behind him, because he glanced over his shoulder as she hovered in the doorway, and his mouth flattened ruefully, as he said, ‘I guess you want me to go.’

  Joanna, who had just spent the last few minutes learning how appalling it was trying to be sick on an empty stomach, hesitated long enough for him to assume she did. With a tightening of his lips, Cole bent to lift his jacket from the chair where he had dropped it earlier, but when he turned towards the door desperation made her reckless.

  ‘I—what you said,’ she stammered, hoping she might bluff him into some kind of confession, ‘did you—did you mean it?’

  Cole’s brows drew together. ‘I’ve said a lot of things,’ he replied wearily. ‘And I’m not proud of a lot of them.’

  ‘No.’ Joanna sighed, realising she was not going to get round it that way. ‘Just now. When I asked you why you’d come here. You said—at least, I thought you said—you still—loved me——’

  ‘I do.’

  There was no mistake this time, and Joanna clutched the frame of the door with sweating hands. But Cole wasn’t rushing towards her with declarations of his intent. He was simply standing looking at her, with a definite air of defeat.

  Wetting her dry lips, she tried again. ‘But—when I came to see you, the night before I left Tidewater——’

  ‘I was a bastard, I know.’ Cole lifted his shoulders in a heavy gesture. ‘I guess I was still despising myself for wanting you. And when you said you were leaving, I tried to hurt you as you were hurting me.’

  Joanna caught her breath. ‘You succeeded.’

  ‘Yes, I know.’

  ‘Then why——?’

  ‘Why did I chang
e my mind?’ Cole’s lips twisted. ‘I’d like to say it was only because I’d begun to suspect that there had been nothing going on between you and Nathan.’

  Joanna stared at him. ‘There wasn’t!’

  ‘No. Well, as I say, I had begun to have my doubts. God, I even had doubts before you walked out on our marriage. But you didn’t want to listen to them then. You were too busy hating me for what happened to Nathan.’

  Joanna bent her head. ‘We all make mistakes. And I didn’t hate you. I—just thought I did.’

  ‘Yeah, well—you were pretty damn convincing.’ Cole’s shoulders hunched. ‘And, goddammit, I should have had faith in you. But when you left, I guess I convinced myself that you must be guilty.’

  Joanna swallowed. ‘So what did change your mind?’

  ‘Ben.’

  ‘Ben?’

  ‘Yes. He heard what Ma said to you as you were leaving. How she’d seen you with Nathan, and spread those lies about you.’

  Joanna stiffened. ‘She never said they were lies,’ she stated honestly. ‘As far as I know, she believed that Nathan and I—that we were——’ She broke off unsteadily. ‘If Ben told you she admitted making the whole thing up, he wasn’t telling the truth either.’

  She waited then for Cole’s expression to change. She hadn’t really believed that their problems could be solved so easily, and learning what had brought him here only reinforced that fact. It had been kind of Ben to tell him, kind of him to lie, if that’s what he had done. It proved she had at least one friend at Tidewater. At least one member of Cole’s family wanted to make amends.

  But Cole’s expression didn’t change, except perhaps to grow a little gentler. ‘I know exactly what she said,’ he told her. ‘Ben gave me it, word for word. But what you don’t know is that I never knew until then who it was feeding me that information. Ma didn’t talk to me, Jo. She sent me letters, anonymous letters. They started right after I got back from South America. So far as I knew, Ma didn’t even know of Nathan’s existence.’