‘Yes. Thank you for the perfume, Jean. It’s my favourite brand.’
‘That’s what I thought. This actually seems real now, your engagement and everything. It seemed unbelievable at first, but now I’ve seen the two of you together I can understand how you feel. I was so excited yesterday when Mr Stone invited Nathaniel and me to your party.’
‘I knew absolutely nothing about it,’ Brooke smiled. ‘Jarrod’s very good at keeping secrets.’ He was also a better actor than she was if Jean genuinely believed him to be in love with her.
‘Mm, I could see how disappointed you were today when everyone seemed to have forgotten your birthday. As if we would!’
‘Jarrod explained how you were sworn to secrecy.’ Brooke was once again aware that Jarrod was talking to Selina Howard.
She chatted to Jean and her other friends for the next hour or more and never once did Jarrod leave his mistress’s side. Brooke found this very humiliating and she knew Charles Howard was displeased by it too.
She felt quite relieved when the party eventually broke up and Jarrod drove her home. She had more or less decided to give him back his ring by the time they reached her home. She could put up with this deceit, but she wouldn’t be humiliated in this way.
She got out of the car as he held the door open for her. ‘Thank you for my party,’ she said formally. ‘It was very thoughtful of you.’
He quirked an eyebrow. ‘It was all I could do on your twenty-first birthday. It would have looked very strange if I hadn’t given you a party.’
Brooke bridled angrily. I didn’t think you’d made the gesture out of kindness.’
‘I’m sure you know me better than to think that,’ he taunted.
‘I’m getting to know you very well,’ she snapped. ‘And what I’m learning I don’t like!’ She turned on her heel to enter the building.
‘Aren’t you going to invite me in for coffee?’ he called after her softly.
She turned round fiercely to look at him, subconsciously noticing how handsome he looked as he leant back against the sleek car they had driven up in only seconds earlier. ‘Do you want to come in for coffee?’ she asked breathlessly.
‘Would I be asking if I didn’t? Besides, someone has to carry in your presents.’
She shrugged. ‘Okay then, you’d better come in.’ She went in without bothering to wait and see if he followed her.
Once inside she put her jacket and handbag in the bedroom before walking over to the kitchen to prepare the requested coffee. She was only halfway across the lounge when a hand shot out and pulled her hard against an unyielding body.
She looked up at Jarrod with defiant eyes. ‘What do you want now? Haven’t I already made recompense enough for one evening?’
Grey eyes glittered down at her before the dark head swooped down and firm punishing lips descended on hers, forcing her soft lips apart with ruthless brutality. For long seconds the world seemed to spin dizzily as she clung to him for support. And then she was free, rubbing her hand across her bruised mouth as he moved away from her
Her eyes were pools of deep violet hurt as she gazed up at him reproachfully. ‘What did you do that for?’ she asked accusingly.
Jarrod looked unperturbed, a devilish glint in his grey eyes. ‘You’ve been asking for that all evening.’
‘I have not! I—’
‘Oh yes, you have,’ he told her calmly, unmoved by her anger. ‘You’ve been giving me filthy looks all night and—’
‘Only because of the time you spent with that woman! Everyone noticed it and—’
‘And launching into a string of accusations every time we’ve spoken,’ he continued as if she hadn’t interrupted him. ‘You’ve just received your punishment, remember it for future reference. I have my own method of revenge. And just for the record, I couldn’t give a damn about what other people think. Now,’ he flexed his shoulder muscles, ‘perhaps you wouldn’t mind driving me home? Forget the coffee, that was just a way of getting in here.’
Brooke frowned. ‘Drive you home? Don’t you feel well?’
‘I feel fine.’ He handed her the car keys. ‘But as it’s your car I thought perhaps you might like to garage it downstairs.’ Besides, I’d like to be with you the first time you drive it, an Aston Martin is slightly different from a Mini,’ he added mockingly.
She paled. ‘That car—the Aston Martin— It’s mine?’ She looked down at the car keys in disbelief.
He nodded. ‘Your birthday present from me. Of course if you would rather have something else, a Porsche, or a Ferrari, then I don’t mind changing it.’
She gave a choked laugh. Jarrod had given her an Aston Martin for her birthday and said she could change it if she preferred another car. Change it! It was a dream of a car—and Jarrod had given it to her!
CHAPTER SIX
BROOKE shook her head. ‘You can’t mean it,’ she said huskily.
Jarrod shrugged. ‘Of course I mean it. It should be quite easy to change the make of car, and the colour too if you would prefer something different.’
She gave a breathless laugh. ‘That wasn’t what I meant. I meant that you can’t really want to give me a car like that for my birthday. I don’t expect anything from you.’
He frowned darkly, all humour leaving his face. ‘I didn’t get you it because it was expected of me,’ he rasped coldly. ‘Every girl should have something special for her twenty-first birthday.’
‘But a car like that!’ she pointed out desperately.
‘I’m glad you like it.’
‘I love it, but I couldn’t possibly—’
‘My wife will be expected to have a style of car fitting for her position in life.’
Brooke gasped. ‘Your wife? But I’m not going to be your wife. This is all an act, a ruse.’
He nodded agreement and sat down in one of her armchairs. ‘You might as well sit down too, I think we have some talking to do.’
She dropped into the chair rather than sat down. ‘We—we do?’
‘Yes.’ He watched her through narrowed thoughtful grey eyes. ‘Now don’t start to panic when you hear what I’m going to say. All right?’
‘All right,’ she agreed apprehensively.
‘Okay then,’ he sighed. ‘I think we should get married.’
‘What!’ Brooke sprang out of the chair to glare down at him as he watched her so calmly. He had no right to look so composed when she had been reduced to a quivering mass of nerves! ‘What did you say?’ she asked shakily.
‘You said you wouldn’t panic,’ he reminded her impatiently. ‘And if that isn’t panic you’re showing it’s a very good impression of it.’
Brooke gave him a disgusted look. ‘Of course it’s panic. When I said I wouldn’t I had no idea you were going to say something so outrageous.’
‘It wasn’t outrageous, I merely suggested that we do what everyone is expecting of us and get married. What’s so outrageous about that?’
She almost choked in her effort to give him all the reasons in one go, finally saying the one that seemed to matter the most. ‘We aren’t in love with each other.’
Jarrod raised one dark eyebrow. ‘Does that matter?’
‘I would have thought so if we intended getting married.’
‘It’s not necessary. We have something else equally volatile.’
Her eyes widened. ‘We do?’
Instantly his eyes darkened almost to black and he stood up in one slow fluid movement. Brooke stood mesmerised as he came towards her, her head back to look up at him as his arms passed around her waist to pull her close against the lean length of his body.
‘Wh—what do we have?’ She fought for sanity, aware of the weakness of her lower limbs at his closeness, of the even rise and fall of his chest just inches in front of her fixed gaze.
‘Don’t you know?’ he murmured, his dark head bending so he could nuzzle his mouth against her arched throat.
Slow drugging kisses to her skin had her br
eathless within seconds, her arms clinging about his neck, her pulse sounding so loud it seemed like a bass drum to her ears.
She cleared her throat. ‘No, I—I don’t know.’
His strong firm hands ran experimentally over her body, lingering on her taut breasts. ‘Oh, you know, Brooke,’ he groaned throatily. ‘Your body knows it too.’
His mouth claimed hers, and her lips blossomed beneath the cajoling seduction he chose to exert, knowing with all his experience that he could arouse her to the heights so easily. She gave up all pretence of appearing unmoved, knowing that she gave herself away at a touch of those sure tanned hands.
Her breath was coming in short gasps when his lips finally released hers, her eyes glazed with feeling. She shivered as his mouth travelled across her cheek to her earlobe, his hands moulding the contours of her body to the hardness of his.
‘Jarrod?’ she queried tremulously.
He didn’t raise his head. ‘Can’t you feel it too, the attraction between us?’
She knew she was attracted to him, she couldn’t deny it when she melted in his arms like this, but how did he feel about her? He wasn’t a man to show his feelings for any woman, except the beautiful Mrs Howard, and Brooke knew she was no competition for her.
She moved against his probing mouth, cherishing these few moments in his arms. These kisses were nothing like his earlier punishing onslaught, and she was loving every moment of being this close to him.
‘Don’t you feel it?’ he persisted, straightening slightly to look down at her, his eyes black with desire.
‘Yes, I—I suppose I do.’ She was embarrassed by the look in his eyes. ‘But what difference does that make? You’re in love with Selina Howard.’
He scowled. ‘Forget Selina, for God’s sake! I’m only interested in you and me at this moment in time.’
‘Forget her!’ Brooke scoffed. ‘How can I forget the woman you’re openly having an affair with?’
His hands tightened painfully on her arms. ‘You’re going to accuse me of that just once too often,’ he ground out viciously. ‘But I want you, Brooke, and I don’t think you’ll let me have you any other way but through marriage.’
‘You’re right.’
‘Okay, so we get married.’
Her head was thrown back defiantly. ‘I may only be a little nobody, but I wouldn’t marry a man knowing he was in love with someone else.’
‘You’ll marry me,’ he promised. ‘I’ll see to that.’
His head lowered and his kiss was totally savage, a deliberate onslaught on the senses, and in her already heightened state she had no way of denying him her full response. She shivered in sensuous delight as he slipped her dress off one shoulder to caress her skin with his rousing lips.
Jarrod swung her effortlessly up into his arms, his lips still firmly in control of her as she made to protest at his progress towards her bedroom. But those lips just kept on kissing her until she felt drugged by her own emotion, making not a murmur of protest as he lowered her down on to the bed before joining her with such rapidity his lips never left hers.
Her dress was no barrier to his searching hands and her breasts flowered under his touch as he slipped the dress completely off her shoulders and down her body. He discarded his jacket, removing his bow-tie, and leaving it to her to do the rest.
Brooke needed no second bidding, completely unbuttoning the silky shirt to slip it off his shoulders. It wasn’t the first time she had seen his naked torso, and yet the heat of his body against her own bare skin was enough to launch her into ecstatic delight.
‘Do you want me now?’ he asked as his lips teased the tip of one taut breast.
‘I—’ she gasped with the pleasure of feeling he was evoking. ‘Oh God, Jarrod! Please stop now, I can’t stand any more.’
‘Do you want me?’ he repeated harshly.
She flung her head from side to side in an effort to escape those pleasure-giving but drugging lips. ‘Don’t make me say it, Jarrod,’ she begged. ‘Don’t make me answer.’
He pinned her to the bed by her wrists, his legs also helping to hold her immovable. ‘Tell me you want me, Brooke. Tell me!’
‘I want you, I want you!’ she cried, her eyes wild.
‘And you’ll marry me?’ His hold on her wrists tightened, forcing her to answer him.
‘No, I—’
His lips descended before she had time to even think of evasive action. The kisses he devoured her with over the next few minutes were just as destructive as his earlier caresses, and Brooke’s hands were buried deep in the dark thickness of his hair long before he raised his head again.
His breathing was ragged and his heartbeat sounded just as loud as her own. ‘If you’re very wise, Brooke, you’ll agree to marry me. It could just be the one thing that will stop me taking you here and now.’
She knew he meant what he said and she also knew she wouldn’t be able to resist him; he had aroused her too easily for her to be able to do that. At least he was offering her marriage, even while knowing it wasn’t necessary. He was a man of experience, he would undoubtedly know he could take her any time he chose, without the least opposition from her.
But still she fought against the fate of having to marry a man in love with another woman and feeling only desire for the woman he offered marriage to. He might think that second best was better than nothing, but she had other ideas. ‘I can’t do it, it wouldn’t be right.’
‘Right!’ he scorned. ‘What’s right about desire? It’s a gnawing ache inside you that has to be assuaged. I want you and I’m not prepared to see my brother walk off with the prize.’
She struggled against him in the darkness, but all her efforts were futile against his superior strength. ‘What does Dave have to do with us?’ she demanded, admitting her defeat by slumping back against the pillows.
Jarrod gave a harsh laugh. ‘My little brother is already half in love with you—and don’t deny it, because you know it’s true. And he would offer you marriage. But I don’t aim to let him have you. You’re already half mine, and I mean to possess all of you.’
‘I am not yours!’ she exploded angrily. ‘I belong to whom I want to belong,’ she added defiantly.
His eyes glittered down at her dangerously. ‘And who else have you already belonged to?’ His eyes slid insolently over her almost naked body. ‘No doubt you’ve used the power of this delectable body to taunt the hell out of other men.’
This time she did wrench away from him and up off the bed altogether, tugging her dress back over her shoulders and pulling up the zip with agitated fingers. She turned to glare at him, resenting the easy way he sat up on the bed and began to pull on his hastily discarded shirt.
‘What I have or haven’t done in my lifetime is none of your affair,’ she pushed back her tousled hair. ‘Get out of here—right now!’
Jarrod stood up slowly, buttoning his shirt before tucking it back into the low waistband of his trousers. He watched her through amused eyes as she threw his tie at him.
‘Get out of here, damn you!’ she almost screamed the words.
He slipped on his jacket in unhurried movements, putting the bow-tie in his pocket. ‘I’ll bring you to your knees before I’ve finished with you,’ he taunted softly. ‘I’ll have you begging me to marry you, you’ll see.’
‘Like hell you will!’ she blazed.
‘Oh, I will, Brooke. I’ll twist you up in knots so tight you’ll be glad to marry me just to find the release I can give you.’
‘Physical gratification,’ she said in disgust.
‘Don’t mock it,’ he warned. ‘You won’t find it so disgusting in a couple of weeks either.’ He smiled, a cruel taunting smile. ‘I’ll look forward to seeing you grovel.’
‘Go to hell!’
‘I’m going home,’ he corrected mockingly. ‘But I’ll see you tomorrow evening.’
Brooke looked at him sharply. ‘Tomorrow evening?’
‘Mm,’ he nodded. ‘The
start of the torture.’
She shook her head dazedly. ‘I don’t understand you. Why me?’ she pleaded.
‘Why not you? I want you, not just once or twice, but for all time. I could take you now, but if I did that you would never want to see me again. So I’m going to marry you.’
‘But what about Selina Howard?’
He shrugged. ‘I can’t marry her, she already has a very possessive husband.’
‘Oh, I see, you mean to marry me because you can’t marry the woman you really want.’
Jarrod gave a throaty chuckle. ‘You silly child,’ he scolded almost gently. ‘You felt my desire for you a moment ago, that was for you, no one else.’ He bent his head to claim her lips in a brief kiss. ‘Tomorrow I begin my pursuit in earnest. I hope you’re ready for that.’
‘Oh, go away!’ she retorted, more shaken by his threat than she cared to admit.
She waited until she heard the door close behind him before breaking down, deep racking sobs shuddering through her body. He had no right to play on her desire in this way, no right to torment her as he had. And if he meant to do what he said it could only get worse.
* * *
‘It was a fantastic party last night,’ Jean enthused halfway through the morning, the first break the two of them had had in their daily routine.
‘Thank you,’ Brooke replied distantly, unwilling to enter into any conversation about last night. She was doing her best to forget the events of the latter part of the evening and hoped Jarrod had done the same.
‘Everyone said what a great time they had.’ Jean obviously hadn’t noticed her reluctance concerning the subject.
Jarrod seems to be adept at arranging things like that.’
‘Your Jarrod’s dreamy!’ Jean became starry-eyed. ‘I never would have thought him capable of being that human. He always appeared haughty and slightly removed from the rest of us poor mortals.’
He was also devious and selfish and totally without morals. He used people—well, he used her—shamelessly. And he was going to get even more demanding. Brooke had to admit that the thought of it both excited and frightened her. And she wasn’t sure which feeling was going to be predominant next time she saw him.
Engaged to Jarrod Stone Page 10
