‘You were renting?’
She nodded, brushing past him with her box against her chest like a shield. He followed her in and, still frowning, took her things up to the master bedroom.
Cara looked at the king-sized bed and put her box on the end of it, her heart beating an erratic tattoo in her chest. It was made up with caramel-coloured linen and white pillows with a matching caramel trim. Several plump cushions were propped up against the pillows. She wondered if he’d had it delivered that day. It unnerved her to think of him so eager to resume a physical relationship with her when her emotions were in such tatters. How could she keep herself under control with him storming her defences in such a way?
‘There’s a walk-in wardrobe through that door.’ He pointed in its direction. ‘The en suite is over there. I’ll leave you to sort things out. I’ll get a start on dinner.’
Cara sat on the huge bed and looked around the room. As master bedrooms went it was one of the biggest she’d seen. The soft cream of the walls toned perfectly with the bedlinen, and although the marble floor was bare she could already imagine the rugs she’d lay down.
She got off the bed to look out of the large windows. The view was spectacular: the night lights of the city twinkling in the distance, and just below a harbour cruiser sailed past the marina with its arc of decorative golden bulbs.
She unpacked her few things into the spacious walk-in wardrobe and wondered if she’d ever be in a position to have enough clothes to fill it completely. She tried to ignore the neat row of Byron’s clothes hanging on the other side. She could pick up the faint smell of his aftershave clinging to his things and a host of memories assailed her. Almost without her volition she reached for one of his sweaters and buried her face in its folds, breathing in the scent of him lingering there.
She turned back to the task at hand and shut the door behind her once she’d finished. She wished she could close off the memories just as effectively.
She made her way downstairs with weary steps, her stomach tightening at the thought of the rest of the evening.
Byron was in the kitchen preparing some pre-cooked food. He looked up as she came in, his eyes sweeping over her assessingly.
‘You look tired. Are you hungry?’
‘Not really,’ she answered truthfully.
‘Didn’t you sleep?’
She shook her head.
‘Is the thought of being with me so torturous?’ he asked with a flint-like edge to his tone.
She didn’t answer. His mouth tightened as he placed a container in the microwave and she wondered if he were feeling the tiniest bit remorseful over the machinations that had led her here tonight.
‘I’m going to engage a housekeeper,’ he informed her coolly.
‘But there’s no furniture to dust,’ she pointed out.
‘There will be soon,’ he said. ‘We both work full time, this is a big house, and I don’t want you to waste your energy on tasks that can be better outsourced.’
‘When do you want me to start on your little project?’ she asked with a hardened look in her eyes. ‘I take it you’d like to get to the task at hand as soon as possible?’
His eyes met her challengingly.
‘You fight me at every corner, don’t you? Even though both of us really want the same thing.’
‘You know nothing of my wants.’
‘Don’t I?’ he asked. ‘I wouldn’t bet on that, if I were you.’
She spun away in anger, unable to look him in the eyes. The microwave pinged and she heard him rattle plates and cutlery behind her as he set their meal on the bench.
They ate in silence. Cara picked at the food and eventually pushed it aside, concentrating on her glass of water.
‘You don’t eat properly,’ he said, flicking a glance towards her plate before returning his eyes to hers.
‘Is there anything else you’d like to criticise while you’re at it?’ she asked. ‘Is my hair not to your liking? Or perhaps you think my clothes are outdated and my thighs full of cellulite?’
He frowned and pushed his own plate away.
‘I’m not criticising you, merely making an observation.’
‘I don’t like being observed.’
‘I know that.’
‘Then don’t do it.’
‘How am I supposed to get to know you if I don’t observe you?’ he asked.
‘You don’t need to get to know me,’ she answered coldly. ‘Your goal is to get me pregnant, remember? You don’t need to know me at all to do that.’
He didn’t offer a reply. Her face was stormy enough as it was; he didn’t want to make things any worse than they were already.
She got to her feet, scooped up her plate, took it across the kitchen and thrust the barely touched contents into the garbage bin. She heard Byron come up behind her and turned away to give him room.
‘Cara?’
She stopped, her back still rigid towards him.
‘Don’t do the Joan of Arc routine, OK?’
She turned to look at him, her expression bright with barely repressed anger.
‘No one likes a martyr, and it won’t help things between us if you persist in casting me in the role of the big bad guy,’ he said.
‘You put yourself in that role,’ she said heatedly. ‘I’m just the one dancing to your tune.’
‘You haven’t got the steps right so far.’
‘What do you want me to do?’ she flared at him. ‘Do you want me to grovel at your feet in gratefulness at your magnanimous financial gesture?’
‘No, of course not. I—’
‘You have a nerve, Byron Rockcliffe.’ She thrust a pointed finger at his chest before he could finish his sentence. ‘You think you’re so smart, calling all the shots now. You feel so powerful, with me stuck under your thumb like a moth on a toothpick. But I will never bend to your will, no matter how much you try to manipulate me. You can force me to do anything you like, but deep down you will always have to face the fact that I didn’t come to you willingly. Can you live with that?’
His eyes burned into hers with an answering heat.
‘Yes. I can live with that.’
It wasn’t the answer she had been expecting. She stood stiffly before him, her eyes darting anywhere but in his direction.
‘I’ve resigned myself to the fact that you are determined to cross me at every point, but I’m equally determined to break through your defences. You’ve been hiding for far too long; it’s time you faced life head-on.’
‘What would you know about life?’ she retorted with cold sarcasm. ‘You with your perfect family and a silver spoon stuck halfway down your throat since the moment you were born. What would you know?’ Unexpected tears brightened her eyes and she turned away from his all-seeing gaze.
‘I know enough to see you’re carrying far too much baggage for a young woman of your age,’ he said in a gentler tone. ‘But you won’t trust anyone enough to help you.’
She brushed at the tears in her eyes with an angry hand and faced him again, her cheeks hot, her bottom lip wobbling uncontrollably.
‘Don’t push me,’ she warned him. ‘Don’t you dare push me.’
He sighed and rubbed his shadowed jaw with one hand in a gesture of helplessness.
‘I don’t know how to handle you in this mood,’ he confessed.
‘Leave me alone,’ she said brokenly. ‘I need some time alone.’
He came over to her and touched her gently on the shoulder, but she flinched away from his touch.
‘Cara, this is—’
‘Please.’ Her tone was pleading. ‘I just need some time alone.’
He sighed and left her standing against the countertop, her small frame shaking from trying to repress the sobs that threatened to overcome her.
Byron stood in the large lounge and stared out at the night-time view with unseeing eyes. He seriously wondered whether he had what it took to carry on. He began to see himself through her eyes and felt
sickened by the way he’d engineered things to get his way, without stopping to think of the impact on her fragile emotions. He’d had a goal in mind and set out to achieve it; he hadn’t allowed for her at all. But then, when had he ever allowed for their differences?
He thought back to the time when they had been together so briefly and realised with a sickening jolt just how much he’d railroaded her—first into sleeping with him and then into marriage. He hadn’t given her time to think for herself. He’d acted in response to his own impulses and hadn’t given her time to refuse him.
He left her for half an hour before tracking her down in the bedroom. He’d gone with a speech prepared, but when he saw her curled up on the big bed, her face turned into the pillow, he felt the words die in his throat.
She was curled up into a tight ball, her arms tucked into her stomach, her slim form hardly making an impression on the huge mattress. Her face was finally relaxed in a sleep of sheer exhaustion, her cheeks still cherry-red from her bout of crying. He sat down on the bed next to her and, reaching out a hand, gently brushed the hair from her brow. She sighed and buried herself even deeper into the mattress. Byron gave an answering sigh and turned off the bedside lamp, casting the room into instant darkness.
Cara woke to find the iron band of Byron’s arm around her middle. She stared down at the masculine hairs of his forearm as it lay against her as if it belonged there. It had once belonged there, she reminded herself with a pang of memory that was more pain that simple recollection.
Byron sighed and pulled her closer, as if he sensed her instinct to remove herself from his intimate embrace. She could feel his legs against the backs of her, his rock-hard stomach against the softness of her bottom as he shifted slightly in his sleep.
She wondered when he’d joined her in the big bed. Had he looked down at her with desire burning in his eyes, or had he simply turned back the covers and gone to sleep?
She felt his lips on her shoulder and froze.
‘You taste nice,’ he said in a deep rumble. ‘Like vanilla.’
She didn’t dare move. She could already feel the ridged flesh of him against her in response to her nearness.
‘Did you sleep?’ he asked when she didn’t respond.
‘Yes.’
‘Good.’
She felt him move against her and her stomach gave a sudden lurch.
‘What time is it?’ she asked, looking for a way out.
‘It’s early,’ he answered, trailing a path of soft kisses down her back.
She shivered in reaction and tried vainly to stop herself from responding.
‘Why don’t you turn around and say good morning properly?’ he suggested.
Cara hesitated.
He kissed her neck as the hand around her waist reached upwards for her breast. Her breath locked in her throat as his palm closed over the mound of her flesh, his fingers searching and finding the hardened nub. She turned in his arms and his mouth found hers, leaving her no time to resist even if she’d been in such a mind to do so. Heat coursed along her veins at the feel of his mouth on hers. His tongue sought entry and she gave it, her mouth opening for him as readily as an orchid to the warmth of the sun after a cold winter.
Her deadened limbs came to life under the expert touch of his hands. Feeling charged throughout her body at the glide of his hands on her flesh. He shaped her breasts as if recommitting them to memory. He explored her mouth as if he’d never discovered it before. He laid her back against the pillows and leaned his rigid length into her softness, reminding her of all the pleasure they’d taken together seven years ago.
Her body was already ready for him. Desire had pooled and prepared her for his invasion, and she could barely think for the need of having him inside her, restaking his claim.
He moved from her mouth, replacing his hands with his lips on her breasts. He’d removed her simple cotton nightie with hands that had trembled against her flesh as if in reverent worship. She sighed as his mouth worked its magic on her, drawing from her a response she had no hope of withholding.
She felt the intimate probe of him and her thighs opened instinctively. He slid into her with a deep groan that sent shivers of reaction up along her spine, filling her emptiness with a completeness she hadn’t felt in seven long, achingly lonely years. He set his rhythm and she responded to it as if perfectly programmed to do so. Her breathing increased in pace to match his, her hands shaped him, caressed him just as thoroughly as his did her. Her mouth rediscovered his, her tongue playing with hers in an intimate dance that was mirrored in the movements of their joined bodies. Cara bit down on her bottom lip to stop herself from screaming with the pleasure of his touch.
‘Don’t hold back,’ he murmured near her ear. ‘I want to hear you.’
She writhed beneath him and fought against her own response. But finally she had to give in to it. She smothered most of her cry of ecstasy against the breadth of his shoulder, but she felt his smile of satisfaction at her response against her lips as he took her mouth once more.
The sound of his pleasure was a salve to her. It was some sort of compensation to her pride that he was just as affected by her touch as she was by his.
A silence settled between them as they lay still, intimately joined, as if neither of them wanted to be responsible for the first move away.
‘I’d forgotten how sensitive you are,’ he said after some minutes.
‘No doubt you’ve had plenty of other experiences with which to compare.’
‘Perhaps not as many as you think.’
She hated the thought of him with anyone else; it scored her flesh like a barbed weapon.
‘What about you?’ he asked. ‘How many lovers have you had since we parted?’
‘Not as many as you’d think.’ She used his own words to shield the truth.
He moved away from her and she instantly felt cold without his warmth to fill her.
‘I’ve got to get going.’ He reached for his bathrobe. ‘I’ve got a busy day ahead. What about you?’
‘I haven’t got any consignments, but I thought I’d work on the furnishings for here.’
He reached into the pocket of his jacket, hanging from a chair. He took out a credit card and handed it to her. She took it with a questioning glance.
‘You’ll need that to organise all the purchases,’ he said.
She looked at the card in her hands and felt uncomfortable.
‘I can bill everything to my office,’ she suggested.
‘You can, if you’d rather, but it’s still going to be my money that pays for it.’
She didn’t have an answer for that, so stayed silent.
‘I thought we’d eat out tonight,’ he said as he opened the en suite bathroom door. ‘That is unless you’d prefer to have something simple here and have an early night?’
She didn’t have an answer for that either, so simply turned her back and buried herself under the covers. She heard the rumble of his amused laughter and cursed her transparency. She didn’t want him to know how much he affected her. It made her feel vulnerable and exposed.
She heard the sound of the shower running and got out of bed, slipping into her bathrobe to make her way downstairs. She ignored the kettle and toaster to go outside and breathe in the fresh morning air as she stood looking out towards the harbour.
The sun was bright but the air felt heavy, as if rain was expected later. The gardens looked fresh and inviting, and she stepped down on to the lush green of the lawn in her bare feet, enjoying the sensation of the cool damp grass between her toes. She lifted her face to the morning sun, closing her eyes to the warmth of its caress on her cheeks.
She heard something behind her and turned around to find Byron standing looking at her.
‘Have you got time for a cup of tea?’ she asked him, to cover her embarrassment as she brushed past him on her way back to the kitchen.
‘No, I’ll get something later,’ he said. ‘I’ll call you during the d
ay. Will you be out looking for furnishings?’
She nodded as she searched for teabags. He handed them to her with a small smile.
‘Will you be all right?’ he asked.
She looked at him blankly.
‘Why shouldn’t I be all right?’ she asked, forcing her features into impassivity.
‘Why indeed?’ he answered wryly and, scooping up his keys, left the room.
She stared after him and wondered what he’d meant. Was he already regretting what had happened between them this morning? Why should he when he’d been the one to engineer it?
She turned to stir her tea and thought about the intimacy they’d shared. He was probably already choosing names for the baby he was planning for her to conceive. The thought of it made her insides shrink in apprehension. The contraceptive pills she took to regulate her cycle were burning a hole in her toiletries bag—but she wasn’t going to stop taking them, no matter what plans he’d made. There was simply no point. He’d surely tire of her after a few months, when she failed to conceive, and she would be cast aside to make room for the next candidate.
The day dragged interminably. Cara wondered if it was because Byron waited at the end of it. Her body tightened in anticipation and a wave of remembered pleasure swept through her, causing her insides to flip-flop in anticipation.
She threw herself into organising the delivery of several rugs from her favourite supplier, as well as buying two large cream leather sofas from the showroom floor. The dining room was easy; she went straight to a large antique warehouse where she purchased an elegant walnut table.
Several lamps and vases later, she was feeling a little more relaxed. She realised with a sudden jolt of surprise that she was actually enjoying herself. Choosing various items for Byron’s home had brought a sense of excitement to her usually humdrum day. She told herself it was the experience of shopping with carte blanche that was really responsible for her level of enjoyment, but deep down inside she had a feeling there was far more to it than that.
CHAPTER FIVE
CARA had not long finished dealing with the last delivery of furniture when she heard the sound of Byron’s car in the driveway. She dusted off the dining room setting with the soft cloth in her hand and, trying to control the leap of her pulse at the sound of his key in the lock, turned around to face him.
The Blackmail Pregnancy Page 5
