Savage Destiny

by Amanda Browning

‘Hate to argue with a lady, but you’re wrong, ma’am. I helped draw up the papers, and witnessed the bill of sale,’ he corrected, watching that fact sink in.

  Alix sank into silence, everything she had thought she understood suddenly plunged into turmoil. Pierce had bought the ships. He had gone back and bought them! But why? Why, when he already had them for nothing? It didn’t make sense, but now she understood why he said he had paid a high price for the line. According to Pat Denning, it had been very high indeed.

  Her grandfather had never told her, she thought achingly. He had known how being used had hurt her, yet she now knew he had cared more for his money than her sense of self-worth, which a simple word could have restored. All these years she had thought Pierce had bartered her, and her grandfather had allowed her to believe it because he could not stand the thought of her loving an Andreas!

  ‘Thank you for telling me, Pat,’ she murmured gruffly.

  ‘I only hope it helps, because I’d hate to see Pierce hurting the way he was before. He had us all worried, working like the devil until he was nothing but skin and bones. All he’d say was it was his fault you’d left and this was the only way to put it right. I thought it had worked, too, when he finally told me he’d married you. Wouldn’t be surprised, though, if he’s not thinking he’s probably scuppered his chances again.’

  ‘Why would he think that?’

  ‘Seems to me it would take a certain kind of woman to forgive the man who’d knocked her cold.’ He sent her a quizzical look, eyebrows raised.

  Alix couldn’t laugh, not with Pierce back on the island waiting for some madman to turn up and shoot him! ‘How can I forgive him if he’s dead?’ she demanded thickly, voice wavering with mounting dread.

  ‘Don’t book the wake too soon, ma’am. Pierce doesn’t aim to get shot. You’ll have your chance to murder him!’

  Alix found she was gripping his hand tightly. ‘Please, God!’

  ‘Amen to that.’

  Once more she looked out of the window, but now there was nothing to see. Fear clutched at her heart. ‘What am I going to do?’

  ‘The best thing you can do is what Pierce wants. He doesn’t need to be worrying about you too. Go to England, and wait there.’

  Alix swallowed hard. Wait? What else could she do, except wait and pray?

  * * *

  Twenty-four hours later, Alix paced once more to the window, wondering if she was beginning to wear a furrow in the carpet of the flat above Pierce’s office in the Martineau building. Contrary to expectations, she had not gone to England. Oh, Pat Denning had ushered her to the airport all right, but he had had to get away again, so he never knew that she changed the ticket he had given her for a seat on a jet bound for New York.

  She hadn’t told him because she hadn’t been prepared to argue about it. All she did know was that any news about Pierce would go to head office first, and that building was in New York. Her initial plan had been to use Pierce’s apartment, despite the bad memories it held for her, and haunt his office from there. But the apartment had proved to be empty, and had been so for quite some time, according to a neighbour. Balked, she had been about to go to a hotel when she remembered Pierce saying there was an apartment above his office at the Martineau building. It was late when she arrived, but the security guard had been only too happy to let her in when he discovered who she was.

  Then the waiting had begun. The flight had been a tense one, but at least she had been doing something; now all she could do was sit back and twiddle her thumbs. There hadn’t been anyone she could talk to without spreading alarm, and common sense told her that rumours could spread all too easily. All she had been able to do was contact his secretary, inventing a shopping trip, and asking her to have Pierce phone the apartment if he should get in touch. But no call had come all day, and now she found herself swallowing back the gnawing anxiety which sometimes threatened to engulf her.

  Where was he? How was he?

  Now, just when she needed to see him, needed to hear his voice, the silence was appalling. It didn’t matter if she never heard him explaining what Pat Denning had told her, never heard him saying what she was truly becoming to believe he felt for her. She just needed to know he was alive.

  Where they went from there she didn’t know. There was so much to explain, and she didn’t dare think too far ahead. She had gone that course once, and it had ended in rejection. Yet that, too, now needed to be explained. Why had he done it? Why had he done all the things he had? It seemed she had a million questions, and no husband to supply the answers.

  With a nervous gesture, she pulled the cord which closed the curtains. Her stomach rumbled, and she realised she had eaten nothing since breakfast. She hadn’t fancied food then any more than she did now. Common sense told her it would be silly to make herself ill, so she went to the kitchen and fixed herself a sandwich and some coffee. She attempted to eat it while watching television, but that was too trivial for her to concentrate on, and she eventually gave up.

  Although a yawn overtook her, Alix knew she was too worried to sleep—especially in that big bed which was designed for two, and only seemed to emphasise her loneliness. Avoiding looking at it, she went to shower, afterwards wrapping herself in an ankle-length silk robe before padding back to the lounge. There was an old movie on the TV, and she switched it over, watching as the darkness settled about her, curled up in one corner of the couch. Gradually, though, sheer exhaustion had her lids growing heavy, and without really realising it she fell into a doze.

  It was the bright flash of light against her eyelids which stirred her several hours later, and she squinted, blinking awake, staring at the tall figure who stood in the doorway as if he were a ghost.

  ‘Alix?’ Her name was a disbelieving croak on Pierce’s lips, and she sat up, suddenly wide awake. He looked exhausted, the growth of beard heavy on his chin, and his clothes looking as if they had been slept in for several days and nights. But, dear lord, he had never looked so wonderful.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ he asked gruffly before she could find a single thing to say.

  At the sight of him, Alix’s heart had trebled its beat. She had been on the point of rushing across the floor and flinging herself into his arms, but there was something in the way he was standing which rooted her to the spot. ‘I went to the apartment, but it was empty. I remembered you mentioning this, and your security man let me in,’ she explained inanely, licking dry lips.

  Across the room, Pierce shook his head dazedly. ‘I gave it up,’ he informed her in a strange voice, even as his eyes were eating her up—as if he had never expected to see her again.

  Alix had the weirdest feeling that she was watching two other people acting out a scene from a play, speaking lines which were a million miles away from what they were really feeling. ‘Why?’

  ‘I couldn’t live in it after you left. Couldn’t live with the memory of what happened there,’ Pierce declared, then seemed to give one almighty shudder, as if waking up from an unpleasant dream. Dropping the case he had still been holding, he pushed the door closed and took a step forward. ‘Alix, for God’s sake, what are you doing here?’ he repeated the question in a sharp tone, making her jump.

  She struggled to her feet, brushing down the silky material of her robe with hands that shook. This wasn’t going at all the way she expected. ‘I told you. I couldn’t use the apart—’

  The words cut off as he closed the gap between them in three strides, taking her by the shoulders and shaking her. ‘Not here. In America. You were supposed to be in England!’

  Blinking at the note of angry despair in his voice, she cleared her throat nervously. ‘I know, but it was too far away! I came here because I thought this was where any news would come first. I needed to know you were all right,’ she explained quickly, amazed to see the colour wash in and out of his face.

  He let her go then, dragging his hands down his face in a tired gesture which twisted her heart. His laugh was harsh
ly self-mocking. ‘Dear God, have you any idea how I felt when I got to England and you weren’t there? When nobody knew where you were? I was back in hell again, and didn’t think I could stand it, and all the while you were here, waiting for news of me!’

  Alix was stunned at the sick look which had passed across his face when he spoke of hell. ‘I...didn’t know.’

  Her answer was soft, but she doubted if he would have heard it if she had shouted, for he was lost somewhere in his own far from pleasant memories. ‘Hell, I knew I’d ruined my chances of ever getting you back, really back, when I had to hit you, but I had to try again anyway.’ He laughed humourlessly. ‘When you weren’t there, I nearly went out of my mind!’ Now he looked at her and really saw her, looking at him in a kind of stunned trance. ‘Damn you, Alix, when are you going to realise that I love you?’ he demanded in a voice loud enough to raise the dead.

  There was a moment when the room swam alarmingly, but she got herself together, knowing this was definitely not the time to faint. ‘When you tell me,’ she said huskily, then got angry. ‘Damn you, Pierce, I’m not clairvoyant. I need to be told these things!’ she cried, and his head went back as he froze, eyes locking into hers.

  ‘I just did.’

  ‘I heard you.’

  She didn’t just see him swallow, she heard him. ‘And?’

  She knew what he wanted to hear, but the words hesitated on her lips. She was afraid to admit her feelings, commit herself, when she had been hurt before. At her silence, Pierce’s face broke up, and he swung away from her, pacing to stand before the now silent television.

  ‘I gave up the right to hear you say you love me a long time ago, didn’t I?’ he challenged thickly. ‘Lord, the gods were really laughing when they gave me you to love!’

  The bitter anger and despair in his voice tore her heart apart. ‘Don’t, Pierce!’ she cried in distress, then gasped as he turned a chalk-white face to her.

  ‘Don’t what? Hate myself? But who else can I blame, Alix? Who else hurt you? Who else twisted the knife in you and killed the best thing that had ever happened to him? I was guilty and I deserved every bit of the punishment I got. I loved you when I married you. I loved you even when I was destroying you, and I’ve loved you every day since. I’ll love you till the day I die.’

  Alix didn’t know she was crying, but the tears were streaming down her cheeks as she shook her head helplessly. ‘Then why?’

  There was no need for her to say more. Pierce closed his eyes in pain, then came to her, pulling her resistless body into his arms, cradling her head with hands that trembled. ‘Because I met you too late,’ he confessed hoarsely. His sigh was made of the tiredness of long years. ‘My grandfather made me promise on his deathbed that I would be revenged on Yannis Petrakos. That I would, by whatever means I had to, get our ships back. I gave my word, Alix, long before I ever knew you existed.

  ‘I cannot excuse what I did. When I knew a granddaughter existed, and having failed to buy back the ships by all legal means, I decided to use her to get them by blackmail. Honour demanded it. Try to understand. I knew that if there was one thing Petrakos would hate it was knowing his granddaughter had been dishonoured by a member of my family. I knew he would give anything to have that wiped out, and my price would be the fleet. It was cold-blooded but simple...only I hadn’t met you then.

  ‘When I did, I fell in love with you on sight. You were so lovely. So innocent, yet generous—everything I had ever hoped to find in the woman I loved. I was tormented. I would have given everything I possessed to change things, but I couldn’t. My word had been given. Though I suffered the tortures of hell in doing it, I carried out the plan. All I could do for you was do what had to be done in such a way to make you hate me—hate me so much you’d be damned if you let me affect your life from that day on. You say I killed something fine that day—well, something died in me too. I had no hope of regaining what I had destroyed, yet I couldn’t let you go. I promised myself that I would watch over you, help you if you ever needed it, and perhaps even one day win the right to your love again.’

  As Alix listened, so much became clear. If she believed him—and how could she not after that heartfelt confession?—then he had been hurting just as she had. It was not an excuse, it was fact. He accepted blame, lived with it daily, but knowledge could not conquer hope entirely. Didn’t she know exactly how that felt? Raising her head at last, she looked deeply into his blue eyes.

  ‘That’s why you married me?’

  He nodded. ‘And why your freedom is yours if you ask for it,’ he added solemnly.

  Now it was Alix’s turn to ease away, eyes dropping to where she could see his pulse beating erratically at the open neck of his shirt. ‘You must have loved your grandfather very much.’

  Pierce hesitated fractionally before saying, ‘I did, but not in the same way that I love you. What can I say? I knew him before you. He raised my family when our parents died. He had first call on my loyalty.’

  Alix had lived all her life with that Greek sense of family honour. She could understand it, even if she could not condone it. Pierce had used her to settle a debt, and, having done so, given that loyalty to her. Now she fully understood that reference to Lovelace. Were he not such an honourable man, he could not love her as much as he did.

  She raised her eyes. ‘I should hate you.’

  Pierce tipped his head in acknowledgement. ‘I deserve it.’

  ‘I should be telling you that I’ll never forgive you.’

  Blue eyes lasered into hers. ‘And are you telling me that, Alix?’

  Again she held back, not ready yet to commit herself fully. ‘How can I be sure something like that won’t happen again?’

  ‘Because I’d cut off my right arm rather than let any harm come to you, either through me or anyone else,’ Pierce returned forcefully, such a power in his determination that a shiver of awareness ran through her.

  She couldn’t resist raising a contemplative hand to her chin. ‘To the extent of knocking me out?’

  Pierce stiffened, rueful eyes dropping to her chin, and his hand lifted to brush hers away and run tenderly over the faint bruising. ‘I wanted you safe, Alix,’ he pointed out gruffly, and she sighed.

  ‘You could have tried talking to me, Pierce.’

  ‘I didn’t think you’d listen. You see, I assumed you felt the same way I did. If you were going anywhere dangerous, I’d be sticking to you like glue. Was I wrong?’ he challenged, eyes softening as colour stole into her cheeks.

  ‘No,’ she admitted, then, seeing the way his gaze had fallen intently on her lips, feeling them tingle as if his own had actually brushed them, she raised a hand to his mouth, holding him at bay. ‘Did they get the man? Are you safe now?’

  ‘Pat told you?’

  ‘He thought I had a right to know. I did, but I’d rather have heard it from you, Pierce.’

  He sighed. ‘Forgive me, but all I could think of was getting you off the island.’

  ‘And you weren’t hurt?’ Her eyes scanned all she could see for signs of a wound.

  ‘The police got the man before he even got close to me. I would have come here sooner, but there were questions to be answered, and I had to talk to my brother.’

  ‘I didn’t know you had a brother,’ she said, wondering if they would ever really communicate, when such basic knowledge was missing.

  Pierce smiled, as if reading her mind. ‘When you and I are together, ordinary conversation seems unnecessary. But I promise not to hide anything from you again. I’ve a brother and two sisters, all waiting to meet you at last.’

  Alix was surprised. ‘You mean they know about me?’

  He shrugged. ‘Everything. We’re very close. They helped to keep me going when times got bad. My sisters are hoping you’ll finally stop hating me.’

  That brought up another question. ‘If you were so determined to make me hate you when you used me to get the shipping line, why did you go back and buy them?’r />
  ‘Pat again,’ he acknowledged ruefully.

  ‘Don’t blame him, he was trying to help,’ she said quickly, then frowned. ‘Weren’t you afraid I would find out from Grandfather?’ she asked softly.

  Pierce took her hand, pressing a kiss into her palm before he answered. ‘I was hoping you would, but I knew you wouldn’t. Petrakos would never have told you.’

  ‘But why didn’t you tell me when we met again?’

  He shrugged. ‘I had my pride too, Alix. I knew I had done my work too well, and even I could not lay myself open to a woman who hated me. So I never told you that I couldn’t live with the thought of having bartered you. I went back and forced your grandfather to accept full payment. Not that he fought me. By my return he realised how I felt about you, and he used it to get as much from me as he could. Neither did I fight him. You were worth every penny, even if you never knew it.’

  She shook her head sadly. ‘So you really did pay a high price for them.’

  To her surprise his hand tightened about hers. ‘Not money, Alix. The price I paid for the ships was you...the most precious of all my possessions. I only gave you up because I knew that I would never rest until I’d done all that I could to get you back again.’

  Swallowing hard against a rising lump of emotion, Alix placed her free hand on his shirt over his heart, feeling the steady thud of life there. Felt, too, the way the beat altered at her touch. ‘Pierce, don’t you realise you’ve just laid your pride at my feet? I could walk over it just the way you invited me to.’

  ‘You would have every right to. I’ve offered you my heart and my life, but if it’s my pride you want, then it’s yours.’

  She licked her lips with studied care. ‘I think...that it would do me no good not to forgive you, because you cannot forgive yourself. Yet I can’t do anything else but forgive you, because I love you. I never really stopped loving you. So, my darling, if you love me as you say you do, you must forgive yourself too. That’s what I demand of you.’

  The world suddenly seemed to have gone still around them, and Alix looked bravely into eyes which blazed with a violence of emotion she had so longed to see. ‘And if I can’t, sweet Alix?’