by Dana James
Polly’s eyes widened. He was agreeing with her?
‘Man is by nature a hunter,’ he went on before she had a chance to speak. ‘But civilisation has changed the ways in which he can express this instinct. Instead of facing some fierce wild animal alone and killing it armed only with courage and a spear, he now channels his competitive instinct into his job, or sport.’ One corner of his mouth lifted in a self-mocking grin. ‘It can still be pretty hazardous, though not quite so bloody.’
Polly didn’t answer. She couldn’t. Her mind was locked into a vision of Nathan, his bronzed body gleaming with oil and sweat as he ran in silent relentless pursuit of his terrified prey. Only it wasn’t a wild animal he was hunting, it was her. She could hear her own heartbeat, feel her own mouth-drying fear.
They had reached the boat. He stepped on to the deck, then down into the cockpit and, turning, held out his hand.
‘I can manage,’ she said firmly, shaking her head in an effort to banish images which frightened her, but enthralled her as well. Such thoughts were dangerous. She climbed down after him, her gaze drawn to the way his back tapered beneath the stretchy material of his T-shirt from heavily muscled shoulders to the narrow waist and lean hips of a man in peak physical condition.
He unlocked the companionway hatch that led to the yacht’s interior, glancing over his shoulder as he folded the doors back. ‘I’m sure you’ve noticed how some older men believe their image is enhanced by being seen in public with beautiful young women.’
‘Oh, yes,’ Polly said drily, ‘I’ve noticed.’
He glanced up at her from the bottom of the ladder. ‘How do you feel about that?’
‘It’s none of my business,’ she replied, gripping the solid wood grab-rails as she went down the five steps with their non-slip treads.
‘It seems to make you a little uncomfortable,’ he observed. ‘Why?’
Turning to face him, Polly shrugged. ‘I don’t know. It’s just . . .’ After a moment’s hesitation she blurted, ‘The couples I’ve seen seem to parade, as though they want everyone to notice them.’
‘Perhaps they’re proud of each other,’ Nathan suggested.
Polly shook her head decisively. ‘No,’ she frowned, searching for the right words. ‘Their pride is not for each other, it’s for themselves. As if they’re saying, “look at me, see what I’ve got”.’
She felt hot and sticky, and there seemed to be far less room at the bottom of the companionway than she remembered. Nathan had engineered this conversation. He was leading up to something, but she had no idea what.
‘Then if these beautiful young women are not in love with their elderly escorts,’ Nathan’s voice was soft and mildly puzzled, ‘what do you suppose is the attraction?’
‘It’s obvious,’ Polly retorted. ‘The man is probably wealthy and important.’ The moment the words left her lips she saw the trap, but it was too late. She was neatly caught.
‘Ah,’ he murmured with a cold ironic smile. ‘Money and status. Perhaps that’s all women are really interested in.’
‘No, it’s not,’ Polly cried. ‘How can you say that?’
‘Personal experience?’
Beneath his dry tone she heard an echo of her own pain. It startled her. Had he been hurt too? She mocked her own naïveté. It would be a cold day in hell before Nathan Bryce allowed any woman within touching distance of his emotions.
‘Then you should choose your . . . friends . . . more carefully,’ she responded, oddly breathless, her heart thudding unevenly.
He gave an ironic snort of laughter. ‘Like you did?’
‘I haven’t had your practice,’ Polly retorted, colouring.
He shook his head, exasperated and cynical. ‘You make it sound so easy.’
‘What’s so difficult?’ Polly demanded.
‘You don’t have the faintest idea what sort of life I lead, do you?’
‘You’re joking,’ she sniffed. ‘Most of the people in Britain know the basic facts about your life.’ Affecting boredom, she ticked the points off on her fingers. ‘You’ve made a fortune by combining your talent for yacht design with a keen business brain. You’ve won so many cups, shields and tankards, you’ve cornered the silver market. You travel all over the world and stay in the top hotels where every room has its own sauna, jacuzzi, and hot and cold running maids. And let’s not forget the Nathan Bryce Adoration Society.’
‘The what?’ In the glow from the marina lights his eyes had the sheen of hard blue steel.
Apprehension dried Polly’s throat and she could feel her cheeks burning, but she had gone too far to stop now. Nor did she want to. He was good at dishing it out. It was about time he learned how it felt to be on the receiving end for a change.
‘Oh, come on, no false modesty, please,’ she chided. ‘You know perfectly well that there are scores of women who would do literally anything for a night out, or in, with you.’
‘You’re exaggerating.’ He was dismissive.
‘No, I’m not. I’ve heard them talking about you.’ Polly recalled that evening in the ballroom.
His eyes blazed briefly, and he seemed about to say something. Instead his lips compressed, as if he were physically stemming a tide of words, and he slung his briefcase on to the bare chart table. ‘Yup, I’ve got it made. Everything a man could ask for.’ He turned away to open the case.
Polly didn’t understand the bitterness at the corners of his mouth. She was acutely aware that the whole ambience of the boat had changed. But the tension in the atmosphere had nothing to do with the events which had taken place on board earlier that day.
‘I think,’ Nathan’s voice had an odd rasp as he pulled out a wad of papers and dropped them on the table, ‘you’d better get some sleep. We have an early start tomorrow.’
The boat moved restlessly beneath them, as if impatient to be out on the open sea.
Polly moistened her lips. If she didn’t make a stand now he would expect her to jump to his bidding for the rest of the voyage. She would do her share, but as an equal, not a servant.
‘I’d like a shower first,’ she said. ‘There won’t be time in the morning.’
‘As you wish.’ He turned towards the short passage on the left of the companionway, at the end of which lay the skipper’s cabin. ‘I’m going to unpack, then I have some paperwork to do. Do you know how everything works?’
‘Yes, thanks,’ Polly said over her shoulder, mentally crossing her fingers as she headed in the opposite direction towards her own cabin in the bow. That morning she had only been on board a couple of hours before being hauled off by the Customs men.
Clive had given her a lightning tour of the boat as soon as they arrived, but then he’d disappeared up on deck to start the engine from the cockpit, leaving her to stow the shopping in the ice-box and cupboards and unpack her bag.
She had only just finished when he called her to join him and enjoy the view of Gibraltar from the sea. A short time later the Customs launch had borne down on them and the nightmare had begun.
After fiddling with the tiny shower-head Polly managed to get a spray rather than a trickle of lukewarm water. Remembering that all fresh water had to be stored on board, she turned it off while she soaped herself. It was wonderful to rinse off the lightly scented lather and with it the heat and grime and terror of a day she never wanted to repeat as long as she lived.
As she dried herself, banging her elbows against the sides of the small compartment, she started to giggle. How on earth did a man the size of Nathan Bryce manage in here?
‘Are you all right?’ The sound of his voice made her jump, despite the fact that he was on the far side of the door.
‘Wonderful!’ she called back, fighting to control laughter which was only a heartbeat from tears. Yet it wasn’t altogether a lie. She did feel better. The shower had refreshed her. There was food in her stomach. And in a few moments she would be in the privacy of her own cabin, snuggling into a warm sleeping-bag on a thick
foam mattress with a fabric cover that matched the padded headrest.
The fact that this comfort was all courtesy of Nathan Bryce was something outside her control. Fate had put her in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong man.
After brushing her teeth Polly struggled into the tracksuit she had brought along to double as a bathrobe. She looked for her comb, but couldn’t find it. So, peering into the mirror fastened to the bulkhead, she ran her fingers through her mop of damp curls, then, tossing soap, flannel and toothbrush into the zippered toilet-bag, she picked up her towel and opened the door.
The shower-room and toilet, which Nathan called the ‘head’, were alongside his cabin. There was also a small washbasin set into a vanity unit with a cupboard underneath for storing spare toilet rolls and various cleaning materials.
Alongside her cabin was a hanging locker. She wished with all her heart that the layout could have been the other way round.
As she turned the corner, about four feet ahead of her at the saloon end of the passage, Nathan was sitting in the well-padded swivel chair bolted to the deck in front of the chart table. Hunched forward, the lemon T-shirt tight across his broad shoulders, his thick hair curling untidily on his tanned neck, he was taking measurements from the chart and making notes on a pad.
‘Goodnight, then,’ she said, edging past.
Clive had told her the boat could sleep six quite comfortably when the settees on either side of the drop-leaf dining table were converted into sea-bunks.
Polly couldn’t imagine it. For though the boat’s interior was a masterpiece of functional yet elegant design which created an impression of light, airy spaciousness, the very presence of Nathan Bryce made it feel cramped and claustrophobic.
‘Goodnight,’ he muttered without looking up.
Polly didn’t know whether to feel relieved or slighted. Then, smothering a yawn, she decided she was too tired to feel anything.
She went into her cabin. As she closed the door she glanced through the narrowing gap and saw Nathan toss down his pen, rest his elbows on the chart and rub his face.
The gesture betrayed more than simple fatigue. It revealed something she would never have associated with the man whose ironic half-smile appeared in tabloid gossip columns almost as often as it did in yachting magazines.
Polly leaned against the door. Nathan Bryce lonely? The stress of the day had given her delusions. He had people queuing up to spend time with him. He was on every party guest-list. And if she opened the door again any sign of the man she had just glimpsed, the human being behind the impenetrable barrier, would be instantly and totally erased. If he had ever existed outside her overheated imagination.
Opening the glazed hatch above her head to allow the cool night air into the small cabin, Polly threw off her tracksuit, pulled on a clean thigh-length baggy T-shirt, and slid into her sleeping-bag.
The mattress was shaped like a triangle to fit the shape of the boat. Stretched out flat, her feet pointing to the bow, she closed her eyes.
Seawitch moved gently on the water. Polly could hear far-off voices and laughter, and the soft tapping of metal halyards against masts. She turned over, acutely aware of the man on the other side of the door and angry at her own awareness. She moved restlessly, searching for a cooler spot on the pillow, her mind awhirl with fragmented images of Nathan Bryce as she relived the swift bruising pressure of his lips on hers. How would she ever sleep?
It seemed she had only just drifted off when she was woken by a sharp rap on the door and Nathan’s impatient voice announcing, ‘Breakfast in five minutes!’
‘Thanks,’ she mumbled, still drugged with sleep.
The door opened and his head came round it. ‘No,’ he corrected her brusquely, ‘I want breakfast in five minutes. You’re here to work, so get moving. Now.’
Her eyes flying open, Polly reared up on one elbow. She opened her mouth to fire a barbed reply, then, remembering where she would have been waking up if he hadn’t bailed her out, she bit her tongue. Her restraint was unnecessary. He had already gone.
She heard the companionway doors open and the hatch slide back. Pulling on navy shorts and a pale blue polo shirt over her white lace bra and pants, she made sure the cabin skylight was open as far as it would go, then gave her sleeping-bag a brisk shake and spread it out on the mattress to air.
Grabbing her toilet-bag and towel, she rummaged in her bag for her comb. There was no sign of Nathan as she hurried through the saloon, but his cabin door was ajar and she couldn’t resist peeping in as she passed.
Yesterday’s jeans and shirt had been tossed on to the rumpled heap made by his sleeping-bag and two dented pillows. Feeling herself blush, but not sure why, she went quickly into the washroom and locked the door.
A new bar of soap, still wet and streaked with lather, lay in a dish on the lower shelf of the pigeonhole storage area to one side of the basin. A battery-driven razor lay in another. A plastic tumbler containing toothbrush and paste stood on a deeper shelf behind two thin metal rails designed to prevent things falling off.
While part of Polly’s brain noted the fresh fragrance of the soap and minty scent of toothpaste, the other part was registering for the first time the significance of plastic-covered grab-rails in the shower cubicle and on the front of the vanity unit. She swallowed. Surely it didn’t get that rough?
Face washed, teeth cleaned, and her curly mop subdued by a damp comb, she placed her toilet things in another of the pigeonholes. It made sense to leave them where they would be used. It would also save time if she didn’t have to carry them to and fro.
But though the logic was undeniable, she still felt a quivery sensation in her stomach as she placed her toothbrush in the tumbler next to Nathan Bryce’s.
Dropping her folded towel on the curved edge of the kitchen worktop to remind herself to hang it out on deck later, she set about preparing breakfast.
She filled the kettle from the freshwater tap, then took a box of chilled orange juice from the well-stocked ice-box. Though the ice-box would continue to work at sea, run off the battery, the microwave could only be used while they were hooked up to the shore power supply. Polly popped three frozen bread rolls in, then made porridge and scrambled eggs on the two-ring gas burner, hunting for mugs and plates in the cupboards as she stirred.
Within minutes everything was ready. Setting it on the saloon table, and inhaling the delicious combination of smells, Polly went up the companionway ladder to call Nathan.
The sun had just risen and was beginning to burn away the mist. Entranced by the quiet calm, Polly stood in the cockpit gazing out over the stern. Hearing a sound behind her, she turned and saw Nathan approaching from the bow.
He was wearing a clean white T-shirt, frayed denim shorts, and navy canvas deck shoes, his dark hair already drying in unruly waves. As he came along the deck his legs were on a level with her eyes. Polly found herself staring at his thighs, mesmerised by the powerful muscles that bunched and flexed beneath bronzed skin dusted with gold-brown hair. Was he that colour all over?
As the thought sprang into her mind she felt her entire body flood with heat even as she shivered in the chilly air. ‘A bit fresh, isn’t it?’ she said with a bright smile, rubbing her arms fiercely as she looked anywhere but at him. ‘Though it’s certainly a beautiful morning.’
‘Is breakfast ready yet?’ he demanded, ignoring her greeting. ‘I want to get under way as soon as possible.’
‘Yes, it’s ready,’ she replied crisply. ‘That’s why I came up, to tell you. Though even galley slaves need an occasional lungful of fresh air.’
‘Then open the vents and hatches,’ he suggested, automatically ducking to go down the companionway. ‘There’s nothing in our agreement which says you have to suffocate.’
Polly made a face at his back, then followed him. But, not yet used to leaping up and down the ladder, she was slower and more careful.
By the time she reached the bottom he had the saloon de
ck hatch open and was sitting at the table. Next to his plate was a jotting pad and pen which he must have picked up as he passed the navigation station.
‘Shall I open yours?’ she asked with a clenched-teeth smile.
Swallowing the last of his orange juice, he replaced the glass on the table. ‘My what?’ He looked up from the list he was making.
‘Cabin hatch.’
He shook his head. ‘It’s already open. But you can make the bed.’
‘Gosh, thanks,’ she muttered, seizing her glass of orange juice. How many weeks of this could she take? ‘You certainly intend making the most of this—situation.’
‘Twenty-five thousand is quite a lot of money,’ he pointed out. ‘I think I’m entitled to something in return, don’t you?’
Unable to argue with the fairness of his statement, Polly felt her anger and frustration double. What exactly would he expect from her? Quickly thrusting the thought away, she clattered the glass against her teeth, gulped a larger mouthful than she intended, and struggled desperately not to cough.
Nathan returned his attention to his notes and began to eat, wolfing down the food. Setting her glass aside, Polly followed suit. His obvious hunger made her wonder how long he had been up and about.
As he pushed away the empty plates she waited for him to make some comment about the meal. When he didn’t she told herself she hadn’t really expected any and actually preferred it this way. The more he had to think about, the less likely he was to bother her. But she wasn’t used to being treated as though she didn’t exist, and nor, despite her quip on deck, did she intend being a slave.
‘More coffee?’ she enquired sweetly.
Without even looking up from his notes Nathan pushed his mug towards her.
Polly poured the coffee, adding milk and three spoonfuls of sugar. She placed it within reach of his hand, then got up and began clearing the table.
She had her back to him when she heard him pick up the mug. She waited.
‘Ugghhh!’ he grunted, and the mug thumped down on the varnished wood.
