Of course, he didn't love her. He had made love to her because he fancied her, and because both their defences had been lowered. He had acted on instinct, touching her in a way that had left no room for doubt in her mind.
Not then, anyway. Now, the doubts which had been pushed to one side were becoming a steady, cold stream.
Why had he made love to her? He wanted her. She had felt it in his urgent moans as he thrust against her. But maybe there was more to it than that.
She looked at the handsome, clever face, a face designed to have its own way with the female sex.
He could have anyone he wanted, she thought. As Sophia said, he was the biggest and brightest catch in the ocean. So why her? Unless, a tiny insistent voice said, she had what he wanted. Namely, money.
Did he think that she was in line for Alistair's inheritance? Had that made her irresistible?
The palms of her hands were clammy and her head was spinning. All those thoughts rushing through her mind, gathering momentum even as she tried to banish them.
She groaned inwardly, hating him and hating herself even more because, despite everything, she had wanted him. She had needed him to touch her, like some fairytale Sleeping Beauty waiting for that single kiss that would revive her.
Except, she thought miserably, this was no fairy-tale.
If it were, then she would be able to at least gather her self-possession, and walk away from him with some dignity. But now she realised with horror that the attraction which she had labelled her private, physical obsession for him was much more than that. Perhaps that was how it had started. A tingling in her veins whenever he was near, the knowledge that he had managed to do what no one else had ever done, which was somehow to get under her skin until he filled her whole body and mind with his presence.
Oh, no, she was in love with him. All his little habits and expressions rushed over her, bombarding her with their profuseness. She had not realised just how much she had been taking in, details which she had stored away and which their act of lovemaking now released.
She drew away from him sharply, fumbling to get on her clothes with frantic, trembling hands. When he pulled her back against him, she looked at him with alarm and tugged away. How could she? How could she have made love to a man who cared nothing for her, and who quite probably had used her for his own ends? He was quite an expert at using people, she had seen that for herself.
He had used Sophia, hadn't he? He had been more than prepared to marry someone simply because it suited him, and he had made love to her for the same reason.
'What's the matter?' he asked lazily, making no effort to dress.
Emma grabbed his clothes and threw them on him.
'I think you should get dressed,' she said coldly, averting her eyes.
'You do, do you?' He stood up, his face clenched and hard. 'Don't you think it's a bit late to be putting on this puritan act?' He forced her to face him, and she controlled the pounding in her head, staring into his bright, glittering eyes with contempt.
'And you can wipe that expression off your face,' he said tightly.
'I'll look at you the way I want.'
He slipped back on his clothes, still soaking wet from the rain.
'You weren't looking at me like that a minute ago. Why the sudden change?'
'Has the weather cleared enough for us to leave?'
'Answer me, damn you!' He gripped her by her hair and Emma winced in pain.
'I want you to get this boat going. Now!'
'I asked you a question!'
'And when you ask a question,' she jeered, 'you get an answer, right? Just as you get whatever you want, right? Including women!'
'Right.'
'Well, not with me!' she shouted. He had released her, and she backed against the side of the cabin, until she was pressed against it and couldn't move any further back.
'Really? Are you going to try and convince me that I forced you to make love with me?'
'I don't have to try and convince you of anything!' Just as I don't have to answer your questions!'
The watery sun caught his hair and she looked away. It hurt too much to continue staring at him. It was like a test of strength, trying to fight against the insane love that she felt for him.
'You'll damn well talk to me, or else we'll stay right here for the rest of the evening, and longer if we have to!'
'Is that some kind of threat?'
'You're damn right, lady.'
He moved across to her, and her body froze as he placed his hands on either side of her, making any escape impossible.
'When all else fails, do you normally resort to threats?' she asked scornfully.
'No. Believe me, this is a first! I don't normally make love, only to find that the first thing my woman wants to do is get out as quickly as she can!'
'I'm not your woman.'
'You were, not too long ago.'
'Only in the physical sense!'
He had left off his shirt, and the compulsion to place her hands on the flat, firm planes of his torso was so strong that she stuck them safely behind her back.
Why hadn't she listened to reason? Reason had told her from the very beginning to steer clear of him. If she had, she would never have fallen in love with him, and would never have found herself in the mess she was in.
'So what is it, then? Is it because you were a virgin? That's no reason to feel ashamed, you know. Just the opposite.'
A slow red flush crept up her cheeks.
'That's not the reason,' she said in a hard voice, if you want answers, then here they are. We should never have made love; it was a mistake. I think that I was just so relieved when you came through that door, so relieved that everything was going to be all right, that I gave in to some kind of temporary insanity.'
in other words, let's just blame it on the heat of the moment.'
'That's right,' she said expressionlessly.
He didn't answer. He turned away, and when he faced her again it was to inform her that the journey back would probably only take forty minutes to an hour, and the sooner they got going, the better.
She watched him disappear through the cabin door, and then she collapsed heavily on one of the wooden benches, like a puppet whose strings had been suddenly cut.
Why dwell on what had happened? She had given in to him without restraint, she had ignored all the alarm bells sounding in her head.
She had swept all her suspicions tidily under the carpet, because, in the grip of her shaking passion, it had been simply more convenient to have them there, out of the way.
But, worse than all that, worse than her loss of control, her shameful, eager responses, was that she had fallen in love with him.
It did not bear thinking about.
She began tidying the cabin as quickly as she could, moving about slowly with her bandaged ankle.
She could feel the boat gathering speed, and reluctantly she made her way outside to the deck, joining him behind the steering-wheel, watching his hands with an inward shudder as she remembered how he had touched her, and politely made conversation about the journey back.
Conrad answered her questions with remote abstraction, barely acknowledging her presence.
She abandoned all attempt at conversation on the drive back, which they made in silence.
When they arrived back at the house, Esther was waiting for them by the front door, her face anxious and worried. She insisted that they go and see Alistair before changing, to put his mind at rest.
'He's been imagining the worst,' she confided, and Emma half smiled, thinking that the worst had happened, but not in the context that Esther meant.
Alistair was overjoyed to see them. He told them that they should really change into drier clothes, and then promptly insisted that they describe in detail what it had been like in the storm.
Conrad obligingly filled in the details, standing by the window with his arms folded, glancing perfunctorily at
Emma when she chipped in with some remar
k of her own.
If Alistair noticed the coolness between them, he showed no sign of it. As they were leaving the room, Conrad slipped his arm over her shoulders, and she remembered with a stab of pain that they were supposed to be engaged. The loving couple. The situation was painfully farcical.
She forced the muscles of her face to smile at Alistair, looking away before he could see that the smile did not reach her eyes. He was shrewd enough to notice something like that, and whatever happened between herself and Conrad she would not jeopardise Alistair's visible recovery by aborting the charade, much as she wanted to. For better or for worse, they had embarked on this and she was quite determined to see it through to the end.
Once Alistair was better, and that looked to be sooner rather than later, she would leave the island.
As soon as they were outside the door, she shrugged Conrad's arm away from her.
'There's no one out here to impress,' she said coldly, tilting her chin upwards.
'Quite right,' Conrad came back quickly. 'There's no need to point out the obvious.'
She saw something flash through his eyes, something that she couldn't decipher, and immediately came to the conclusion that it was antipathy.
'Another thing,' she persevered. 'Alistair has more or less recovered. He's even talking about starting work tomorrow.'
'And you're wondering when we can call off this little game of ours,' Conrad finished for her.
'Yes.'
'We can break it to him within the next few days. I see no reason to prolong this.'
'Fine. That suits me perfectly.'
She swung round and began trotting down the stairs. The sharp staccato of his voice had cut her to the quick, but she would not let him sec it.
She spent the remainder of the day cloistered in the study, preparing for work the following day, and returned there early the next morning. When the phone rang soon after lunch, which she'd had sent in, she almost ignored it, knowing that there was a good chance it would be for Conrad, and she did not want to have to go and look for him, and see that cold cynicism stamped on his face.
As it turned out it was Lloyd on the other end, over in Tobago because, he said, he could not get her out of his mind.
'Really?' Emma remarked drily. 'Now why do I find that a little difficult to believe?'
'Well, it could have been the truth. Actually, I have to see someone over here about some lighting equipment for the nightclub, but I also couldn't get you out of my mind.'
Emma laughed shortly, thinking how sweet those words would have sounded had they been uttered by someone else, in a different situation.
Still, it was nice hearing from Lloyd. His bantering lightened her mood, and when he suggested coming over for dinner Emma greeted the suggestion with enthusiasm. She had been dreading the ordeal of dinner alone with Conrad, if indeed he chose to make an appearance. Lloyd, at least, would do away with the necessity of even talking to Conrad, if she didn't want to.
'Eight all right?' he asked.
'The sooner, the better,' Emma responded fervently.
When evening came she took her time dressing, choosing a pale green dress which made her eyes gleam like emeralds and showed off her tan which, she thought, would be the envy of her friends back home. When she returned to England.
She made it down the stairs just in time to see Lloyd's car sweeping up the driveway. As she threw open the front door she was greeted with blaring pop music that was cut off abruptly when the engine was switched off.
Lloyd enfolded her in his arms and then presented her with a bouquet of flowers which, he claimed, had been picked with his own fair hands.
She laughed, smelling the delicate blossoms and thinking that it was almost a shame that they had been picked at all. The wild, exotic flowers over here only seemed truly beautiful when they were nestled in their natural foliage. To see them in a vase was somewhat similar to seeing a lion caged at the zoo.
Lloyd was already regaling her with all the things which she had been missing out on by being in Tobago, instead of accepting his invitation to visit him in Trinidad. He stared at her in amazement when she began telling him about the storm, which, he informed her, had swept through Trinidad and had found him well and truly ensconced in his flat.
'A coward has a thousand lives, or something like that,' he grinned, 'Where's the lord of the manor, then?' He glanced around and Emma shrugged.
'Maybe his experiences in the boat have taken their toll and he's cooped up in bed with delayed shock.'
'I doubt that,' Emma commented cynically. 'If anything, he enjoyed the whole thing.'
She diverted the conversation, not wanting to discuss Conrad, and unsure as to whether she should mention her make-believe engagement. In the end she decided against it. It was much too involved, and would be over in a day or two anyway.
Over dinner, she let Lloyd set the conversation and they spent the evening discussing movies and records. She only half listened to what he was saying, however. At times she would find her concentration wandering
altogether, and would have to pull herself up to control the crazy urge to look out for Conrad.
She had managed to project a suitable attitude of coldness towards him, but her mind was a little harder to control. It stubbornly continued to bombard her with sharp, strong images of him which made her blush. She never would have believed that she could close her eyes and feel a rush of sensation, but in the privacy of her bedroom the image of him was so strong that she could almost reach out and touch him. She closed her eyes, and could smell him, see the way his eyes crinkled when he laughed with genuine amusement.
When he finally did make an appearance, it was to find them settled comfortably on the sofa in the sitting- room, sipping coffee, and in Lloyd's case a glass of brandy.
Emma had switched on the stereo, and they were listening to a piece of classical music, which, she had informed Lloyd, would make a change from the pop music which he played every night in his club.
'Besides,' she had added, seeing him make a moue, 'there's not much choice. It's either this, or the pleasant sounds of nothing.'
She had hoped that Lloyd's company would put her in a more relaxed frame of mind, and she had been right. Lloyd did not burden himself with too many worries, not if he could avoid it, and he was blind to other people's worries as well. He was a free spirit and just exactly what Emma needed in the sort of mood that she was in.
Conrad stood at the door, the top buttons of his shirt undone, his hair tousled as though he had just stepped out of bed and had not been bothered to comb it.
Emma raised startled eyes to his.
'We wondered where you had got to,' Lloyd opened jovially.
Conrad walked slowly into the room, and Emma realised with shock that he had been drinking. As he stepped into the light, she could see that he had not shaved and a dark shadow of stubble roughened his face.
'Have you, now?' Conrad muttered through gritted teeth, his eyes not leaving Emma's face.
Lloyd shifted uneasily on the sofa and glanced across at Emma.
'Care to join us in a cup of coffee?' he persevered nervously. 'Or maybe in your case something stronger? The old boy may not have much by way of pop music, but he keeps a comprehensive line in alcohol. You look as if you need it.'
'Really,' Conrad snarled, turning to face him. 'How very observant of you. You clearly missed your calling. You should join the local detective force instead of doing whatever it is you do.'
'Nightclubbing.'
'Oh, yes. Forgot. Nightclubbing.' He dropped each word individually and with contempt.
Emma's initial shock gave way to a rush of anger. How dared he stride into the room and begin insulting her and her guest, who had done nothing to him?
He moved across to the stereo and picked up the Mozart album cover, staring at the record revolving on the turntable.
'Getting in the right mood?' he asked Lloyd sarcastically, then he spun round to Emma, his lips twist
ed in a sneer. 'I'm surprised you haven't gone the whole hog and dimmed the lights as well. Or did you think that that was just a little bit too passe? Still, I see you've dressed for the occasion.' He ran his eyes slowly over her, from her burning face to the tips of her feet, then back again to her face. 'No? Don't tell me, you always dress like that for dinner with a friend? Right?' He gave a mimicry of a laugh, running his fingers through his black hair.
Emma rounded on him. if you have a problem, then I wish you'd go and sort it out somewhere else!' she bit out. 'We'd been having a very pleasant time until you arrived on the scene.'
'Oh, I'm sure you had.'
Lloyd cleared his throat. 'Listen, old chap, why don't you go to bed and sleep it off? You'll feel much better for it in the morning.'
'Yes,' Emma rejoined sweetly, 'why don't you disappear upstairs and sleep it off?' And I hope, she added silently, you feel anything but better in the morning.
'And leave you two down here?' Conrad looked at her with an expression of incredulity. 'Now that wouldn't be very polite of me, would it?'
i think I can live with that.' The atmosphere between them was electric. Part of her felt very sorry for poor Lloyd, caught up in their private battle of wills, but it didn't manage to quell the anger inside her.
'No, I don't intend going anywhere. I may be many things, but I'm not impolite.' Conrad sat down heavily in between Lloyd and Emma, and folded his arms in the attitude of someone who had no intention of moving. His leg rested against Emma's and she shifted her position to avoid the contact.
Even in the state that he was in, and with her determination to treat him as part of the furniture, she still could not prevent herself from responding to him.
'Maybe I ought to leave,' Lloyd volunteered, gulping down the rest of his brandy and grimacing.
'Maybe you should,' Emma agreed, glaring at Conrad, who had a satisfied little smile playing on his lips.
She rose to see him out, and Conrad stood up as well.
'There's no need to see us to the door,' she said coldly. 'I know how to find my way there.'
Caribbean Desire Page 14
