Well, that she could handle, no problem; in fact she admired his financial acumen. As for the other, the unwanted sexual pull she was unable to hide from herself, well, she hated to admit it, but she was having difficulties.
And instead of being able to dismiss them from her wakeful mind she found herself lying in the darkness actually listening for his signal, the pebbles he’d lightly tossed against the window-pane, calling her down to him.
How willingly she’d gone…
She sat up, squirming to the edge of the bed, flicked on the bedside lamp and pressed her fingertips to her aching temples.
She had to pull herself together, stop remembering. They were different people now and she knew what a heartless bastard he really was. The man she’d loved all those years ago was nothing but a figment of her imagination, a silly romantic dream.
Her watch told her it was just gone two o’clock and she knew she wouldn’t sleep. Why lie sleepless in bed, agonising over the past, when she could be working, bringing the time of her departure that little bit closer?
The decision made, she slipped her arms into the aqua silk robe once more, tied the belt securely and reached for her notebook.
She’d visit the dining room first she thought as she slipped silently down the great staircase. The Regency dining table with its twelve chairs had been sold long ago. She’d been about fourteen years old, home for the Christmas break and, when she’d questioned him, her father had said sarcastically, ‘How else am I to pay your boarding school fees? Rob a bank? Ask the tooth fairy?’
Useless to tell him, for perhaps the fourth time, that she’d have been happier at the nearest comprehensive. He’d given that withering look he’d seemed to reserve for her alone. ‘Remember who you are!’
Who she was. Suddenly she had the unnerving feeling that she didn’t know. A successful woman in her own right or a rootless shadow, pining for a lost love? Being back here with the boy who had been forbidden in the grounds, now transformed into a hard-eyed man who owned everything around her, made her feel unreal.
Shrugging off the unsettling feeling she turned her mind back to business. The table had gone, never replaced because her father had never entertained. But there had been a mahogany serving table— George III she thought—and a large dresser of around the same period. Both would be valuable and would represent a sound investment.
Pushing open the double doors and quietly closing them behind her she unerringly found the light switch and stood for a moment, transfixed by what she was seeing, wishing she had swallowed her distaste at seeming to be interested, and had asked Linda what plans Dexter had for the house.
The ugly, dark red flocked wallpaper had been stripped away, replaced by warm primrose-yellow emulsion. The boards beneath her feet gleamed and two refectory tables, complete with long bench seats, took up the centre of the room while comfortable but functional armchairs surrounded the huge fireplace.
Remembering the catering-size kitchen equipment, the extra, functional bathroom that had been made in what had once been a bedroom next to her own, she began to put two and two together. But a country house hotel didn’t make real sense. Everything was too basic.
Hearing the double doors behind her open she stiffened, holding her breath, praying that it was Linda doing the investigating, not Dexter.
But her luck was out, as it always had been with him, and he walked into her line of vision, dressed in black, a soft V-necked sweater over well-worn jeans, his feet bare, as were hers.
Her heart thumped, a bolt of electricity zapping through her bloodstream. He looked so unfairly sexy, his dark hair rumpled, his jaw shadowed, his black eyes glinting beneath heavy, brooding lids. How well she remembered that look, the promise it offered—and delivered.
‘You couldn’t sleep? I wonder why,’ he uttered silkily, his eyes sweeping the length of her body, lingering on the soft curves and hollows that the tightly belted, slithery robe did precious little to conceal. He made her so aware of how little she was wearing.
‘Something I ate at dinner. Indigestion,’ she lied, desperately trying to ignore the quivers of sexual response that were careering right through her. She didn’t want this to happen to her, to feel anything for him other than utter contempt.
And, the pity of it was, no other man had ever had this effect on her. She’d dated, of course she had; she hadn’t turned into a man-hater. But no one had ever come near to invoking the intense emotions, the devastating physical needs Ben had awoken within her.
The notebook she was holding shook in her hands. She made herself open it, remove the pen that was clipped inside the spiral of metal that bound it together, and said, ‘As I couldn’t get to sleep I thought I might as well do some work. I hadn’t meant to disturb you.’
‘Meant or not, you did. And do,’ he responded drily. ‘And did you? Work?’
Wildly, she cast her eyes round the room that was now so different from how she remembered it, gathered her scattered mental resources and said, ‘There used to be a serving table. Father probably sold it, unless you’ve moved it somewhere else.’
‘Nope.’
She wasn’t looking at him but she had the distinct impression he’d moved closer. Much closer. Her skin prickled. She said, her voice thickening deplorably, ‘The dresser’s still here. Georgian. Valuable. Hang onto it if you’re looking for an investment.’
‘At the moment all I’m looking at is you.’
Caroline gulped, her breath fluttering in her throat. What he’d said was true. She could feel his eyes on her, burning her flesh. She wanted out of here. Now. But her legs wouldn’t move. Then she felt his hand on her waist, searing through the fine layers of silk, sending flickers of fire to her pulse points, each and every one of them. Don’t, she wanted to say. Don’t touch me. But her tongue was cleaving to the roof of her mouth.
‘You’re cold; the central heating’s turned down to the minimum. Let’s go. Warm milk should settle your—indigestion.’
The pressure of his hand increased, she could feel the exact placement of every fingertip. Now was the time to tell him she didn’t want his hot milk, or his manufactured concern, to take herself back to her room. But she didn’t. She simply went where he led, appalling herself by her mindless regression to that summer all those years ago when she would have followed him to purgatory and back if he’d asked her to.
‘You haven’t asked why I found it impossible to sleep,’ he said as they entered the warmth of the kitchen. ‘Don’t you think that would be the correct response in the course of polite conversation?’
The dark rub of irony in his voice touched a raw nerve. What lay between them precluded normal polite conversation. But then, she remembered, he’d always had beautiful manners, despite his wild ways, always seemingly highly tuned into the feelings of others.
Seemingly.
She said nothing, just hovered, her slender body as taut as a bowstring, watching as he poured milk into a pan and reached for two mugs, a bottle of brandy. She knew she should walk out of the room, break this strangely prickly intimacy but some dark compulsion kept her where she was, just as much in thrall to his male vitality, his smouldering sexuality as she had ever been.
‘Then, I’ll tell you, since you don’t seem inclined to ask.’
The mere sound of his voice made her catch her breath, her teeth sinking into the soft flesh of her lower lip. If she’d had her wits about her she would have said, Don’t bother, I’m not interested. But her wits had gone on holiday, along with her common sense.
And he told her, ‘Thinking of you, sleeping under the same roof, wasn’t conducive to a peaceful night’s rest. I needed something to read to take my mind off it. That was when I saw the strip of light under the dining-room doors.’ He shot her a brief, frowning glance. ‘I thought it would be easy, but it isn’t.’
He poured the hot milk into the two mugs and Caroline drew her fine brows together.
What wasn’t easy? Having her around? Was his g
uilty conscience pricking him? Why didn’t he say what he meant? He always had before. He’d had deep emotions and he’d expressed them freely, had been totally up front about what he’d wanted. Her.
Just for a time, she reminded herself tiredly. Another notch on his bedpost, the sheltered daughter of the local landowner who had treated him like scum, no less. How he must have been laughing at her father!
And how he had changed. Not an emotion in sight. A puzzling flicker of anger once in a while but nothing else. Watching him rinse out the milk pan and put it in the cavernous depths of the dishwasher she determined to get at least one straight answer out of him: an answer to the question that had been teasing her mind.
‘What plans have you for this house?’
‘Ah.’ His smile was slightly cynical. ‘I wondered when your curiosity would get the better of that aloof mantle you assume for me.’ He picked up the steaming mugs. ‘I suggest we drink this in the comfort of the library. And I’ll tell you what I have in mind for Langley Hayes. And in return you can tell me what messed up your relationship with—what was his name?—the Honorable Jeremy Curtis, wasn’t it? You were due to celebrate your engagement on your eighteenth birthday. Quite a catch for the only daughter of an impoverished local squire. So what went wrong? Did he find out you’d been enjoying a bit of rough trade and call it off? You must have been devastated, especially when you’d been so insistent that we keep our meetings so carefully secret.’
CHAPTER FIVE
CAROLINE couldn’t believe he’d said that!
Almost tripping over herself in her rush to catch him up, she followed him to the library, a small book-lined room furnished with the scuffed old leather sofas that had been here for as long as she could remember.
He knew why they’d kept their affair secret, damn him! He knew what her father had been like! And how dared he imply that she’d been using him just for sex!
He’d made space for the mugs on the cluttered top of a low table and now bent to flick on the electric fire. Caroline watched him through narrowed eyes, biting back the scalding torrent of recriminations.
If he’d made that insulting remark twelve years ago she would have responded with passion, hitting out, probably biting and scratching too! But she was older now, a hell of a lot older and in total control.
The angry thump of her heart threatened to push a hole in her breastbone, but she picked up one of the mugs in both shaking hands and sank down into the corner of a sofa.
She was not going to let him see he could still reach her on any emotional level. No way. Unlike her younger self, she could control her reactions to whatever he did or said.
So, treating his insulting remark about rough trade with the contempt it deserved, she ignored it and said, her voice tight and hard with the effort of masking her angry emotions, ‘Any engagement was in my father’s head, and Jeremy’s, not mine.’
‘Really? An engagement was arranged without one side of the happy couple being aware of it?’
Plainly, he didn’t believe her. He was standing a few paces away, facing her, a straddle-legged stance. The way he’d hooked his thumbs into the low-slung waistband of his jeans drew her riveted attention to the narrow span of his hips, his tautly muscled thighs.
She wrenched her eyes away, fastened them on the mug she was cradling in her hands and lifted it to her lips. A hefty swallow told her that his lacing of brandy had been far more than generous. Nevertheless, it did begin to take the sharp edge off her anger.
She pulled in a breath. For some no doubt nonsensical reason, she wanted him to believe her. What he thought of her shouldn’t be important but on some deep, troubled level it was.
One more mouthful of the potent liquid, and then she explained tightly, ‘Dad was at Oxford with Jeremy’s father and they kept in touch. After all, they only live twenty-odd miles away. Dad was Jeremy’s godfather and when I was young I used to spend school holidays with them. I think Lady Curtis thought I needed mothering, and Dad was glad to get me out from under his feet.
Then, when I was around thirteen, Lady C. was killed in a riding accident, and my visits stopped. But we still saw Jeremy. He and his father were about the only people we ever saw socially. Dad wanted me to marry him.’
She shrugged slightly, memories clouding her eyes. Marrying Jeremy, and the Curtis fortune, would have been the one and only thing she could have done to actually please her father.
‘Was the poor devil in love with you?’ Ben demanded. His voice was harsh, a strand of bitterness threading through the obvious scorn.
It was a question he had no right to ask. Besides, she didn’t know the answer. Oh, she’d caught Jeremy looking at her in ways that had made her feel uncomfortable and she’d been the unwilling recipient of a couple of clumsy, slack-lipped kisses. But love—no, she didn’t truly think so. Lust was more like it and a willingness to fulfil their respective fathers’ wishes in that rather spineless way he’d had.
She merely shrugged, took another gulp of the brandy-spiked milk and widened her eyes in shock as he castigated abruptly, ‘Still a heartless bitch!’ Then his voice flattened, as if control had been sought and found, and he said, ‘Your letter telling me my services were no longer required was obviously written a little too late. Because by then he must have found out that you’d been having some fun on the side and the engagement never took place. The man must have been gutted.’
He took a pace forward, bending to thrust his face close to hers, his black eyes brimming with contempt. ‘And all you can do is shrug!’
Anger as hot and sharp as his pulsed through her. How dared he act this way! Putting her mug down on the faded Persian carpet she got to her feet, the tilt of her chin mutinous as she countered scathingly, ‘You’re trying to put the blame on me for what happened to hide your own guilt—it’s what people do, isn’t it? Why should you be any different?’
His dark eyes flared as he took a step towards her. Caroline stood her ground. The situation was explosive but she wasn’t going to run away from it. He had been guilty of almost every sin in the book, not she!
The palms of her hands were slick with sweat and the heat of his body consumed her, as if the fire of their anger was pulling them closer instead of pushing them further apart.
His lips curled thinly in a parody of a smile. ‘Is that so? Then you deny writing to tell me you never wanted to see me again? You didn’t even do me the courtesy of telling me to my face.’
Of course she couldn’t deny it! She wanted to hit him for trying to put her in the wrong. ‘You weren’t around.’ She spat the words out scornfully. ‘After my father had been to see you, you’d taken off, remember?’
Even now she could hear her father’s thin, sarcastic voice, ‘You can forget your loutish lover. I offered him money to make himself scarce, and he couldn’t take it fast enough. He won’t be back and, if that’s not enough to cool your ardour, ask young Maggie Pope who fathered that brat of hers.’
Caroline expelled a shaky, emotional breath. She hadn’t wanted this bitter confrontation, or the dreadful effect it was having on her body, making her aware of every pulse point, of every inch of burning, sensitised skin. The adrenalin flooding through her was turning passionate anger into a dark and dangerous pleasure.
‘So I wrote you a letter and left it with your mother. What else did you expect?’ she said, her voice a low, tortured growl.
She was out of here, she had to be, before she said something that would rob her of her pride, something that would tell him how much, and for how long, his cruel betrayal had affected her.
As if he’d read her intentions, Ben’s hand curved sharply round the back of her neck, his black eyes burning into hers. ‘What did I expect?’ He repeated her words, his voice thick now. ‘You tell me! But there was a time…’ the fingers that had been like talons on her neck gentled with the suddenly lowered tone of his voice ‘…when you more than fulfilled all my wildest expectations. Remember?’
The sof
t, stroking movement of his fingers on her skin held her far more effectively than that earlier threatening grip. Sensations she had denied for so long were springing to demanding life, making her head spin giddily when he repeated thickly, ‘Remember, Caro? Remember how we only had to look at each other? How looking was never enough? How we had to touch naked skin, move our bodies in the dance of love, how you couldn’t wait to take me inside you?’
‘Don’t!’ The word was a moan of denial, issued from quivering lips. Her whole body was shaking with all the old dark magic, uncomfortably mixed with the aching sense of loss and betrayal that still echoed through the years. ‘Let me go,’ she said thickly, her mind horrified by her body’s sensual anticipation.
‘I would if you wanted me to.’ His voice purred softly. ‘But you don’t. You’re as ready for me now as you ever were. Deny it all you like, but these don’t lie…’ Gently, he rubbed the ball of his thumb over her parted, pouting lips, the soft friction setting up a primal ache deep inside her, making her need to draw his thumb into her mouth take on a forbidden and self-destructive urgency.
He dropped his hand as if he’d read the need in her eyes, his fingers finding their way along the angle of her jaw, sliding down her throat and slipping beneath the edge of her robe where the soft silk trembled with the panicky force of the beats of her pulse.
‘And neither do these,’ he added, his voice slow, sultry, infinitely disturbing as long fingers grazed the crests of her blatantly peaking breasts, lingering, easing beneath the insubstantial barrier of fabric.
Caroline couldn’t breathe. His caressing fingers sent shafts of exquisite pleasure through her, just as they always had. Whatever he’d done in the past was obliterated for just this moment when the ties of passion were the only memories.
Her lips parting, she lifted her suddenly leaden eyelids and met the harsh, hungry lights in the narrowed blackness of his eyes. Her breath juddered on a soft whisper of sound, the atmosphere was so emotionally charged it stung—a million pinpricks of sexual awareness; sharp, intrusive, deeply exciting.
The Billionaire Affair Page 5
