Subtle Revenge

by Carole Mortimer

  Long after Sally had fallen asleep she lay awake, worried as to the outcome of Luke’s meeting with Aunt Jessie tomorrow.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  SALLY had decided to go and spend the day with her family when she got up the next morning, leaving straight after breakfast. In the circumstances Lori thought it was probably the best thing for her. Sally came from a big family, four brothers and a sister; the main reason she had wanted to move into a flat of her own. But Lori knew that when one of them was in trouble or unhappy the others closed ranks about them. Sally would feel a lot better for being with that closeness today.

  Luke arrived just after eleven, casually but smartly dressed, his grey trousers and grey-checked jacket superbly tailored, a black silk shirt fitting tautly across his chest and flat stomach.

  ‘Will I do?’ he asked as she looked up at him.

  ‘You know you will,’ she smiled, knowing he had dressed to please her aunt, wanting to make a good impression.

  ‘You will too,’ he said throatily, his eyes silver-grey, very intense. ‘Come here,’ he instructed softly.

  She held back, nervous of the response he was beginning to evoke in her whenever he touched her. ‘I think we should be going,’ she said lightly.

  ‘We have time for you to kiss me hello.’ He drew her into his arms, bending his head to claim her mouth in a kiss that seemed to draw the very soul from her body.

  Her lips opened to his as she felt his hands moving over her caressingly. The tan dress she wore was of a thin silky material, and the heat of his body was clearly discernible to her.

  Lori clutched on to his shoulders as a familiar warmth began to invade her body, her head bent back as his kiss deepened to fierceness, his hands now fevered on her body, caressing her from breast to thigh. The zip on her dress slowly slid down her spine, and Luke’s hands followed the same path, curving her to him.

  ‘Kitten, I love you,’ he groaned, slipping the dress off one shoulder to explore its creamy curve, smoothing the material down to her waist as he claimed one peaked breast between his pleasure-giving lips.

  She leant against him weakly, moving with him as if in a dream as he sat down in an armchair to pull her on to his lap, his mouth at once returning to the throbbing nub of her breast, his tongue on her nipple shooting spasms of sensation through to her fingertips. Without even being aware of it she was moaning low in her throat.

  ‘That’s it, kitten,’ he encouraged huskily. ‘Purr for me, my darling.’

  She was purring, there was no other way to describe that almost animalistic moan of pleasure she was giving, and it shocked her to the root of her being that she was allowing Luke to touch her so intimately—and enjoying it.

  She struggled to sit up, standing to refasten her dress, finding it impossible to even look at Luke, although she knew he had been as affected as she had, his heart beating swiftly as he caressed her, his thighs surging wildly against her.

  ‘I love you, Lori,’ he said suddenly, straightening the darkness of his hair with one hand. ‘I love you, we’re both adults, and we have no need to be embarrassed about the fact that we have a fiery effect on each other.’ His gaze was intent. ‘Did you make love with your ex-fiancé?’

  Lori stiffened, moving to the mirror to brush her hair and re-apply her lipstick, surprised that her reflection could still look back at her so calmly when she was so angry inside. How dared Luke Randell question her about her relationship with Nigel? He had no right to question her about anything, least of all Nigel!

  ‘Lori?’ Luke prompted huskily, coming to stand directly behind her, looking dark and dangerous in the mirror.

  She forced warmth into her eyes. ‘Have I asked you about your past lovers, Luke?’ she attempted to tease.

  His mouth thinned, his eyes suddenly icy. ‘This is different—’

  ‘Why?’ she demanded to know. ‘Because I was engaged to him? Really, Luke, a sexual relationship doesn’t come along with the engagement ring,’ she scorned.

  His mouth twisted. ‘I didn’t think it did,’ he rasped. ‘I just have to know!’

  ‘Why?’ Her anger was beginning to show now. ‘What good would it do—’

  ‘I have to know, Lori!’ His eyes glittered, his body tensed as if about to spring.

  ‘No!’ Her tone was sharp. ‘No, I didn’t make love with my ex-fiancé. Are you satisfied now?’

  He heaved a deep sigh, as if he had been holding his breath as he waited for her answer. ‘Yes, that satisfies me. I can’t help my jealousy, Lori,’ he rasped. ‘The thought of you with any other man but me drives me insane.’

  She collected her jacket from the bedroom, looking at him coolly. ‘I said I didn’t make love with my fiancé,’ she told him as she slipped the brown jacket on over the tan dress. ‘But that was five years ago, Luke,’ her head went back in challenge. ‘I was nineteen, very naïve, and now I’m a woman.’

  ‘With a woman’s needs?’ he rasped.

  ‘Exactly,’ she nodded.

  ‘I don’t believe you.’ He shook his head with arrogant confidence. ‘I remember a double-edged conversation we had once about sailing—’

  ‘I remember it too,’ her mouth twisted mockingly. ‘I also told you I’d tried it.’

  ‘Once!’

  ‘Several times,’ she bit out stubbornly. ‘Now could we please leave. My aunt is expecting us at twelve.’

  ‘I haven’t finished yet—’

  ‘And I don’t want to discuss this any further.’ Her voice was steely. ‘I’ve been out with you a couple of times, I don’t have to explain myself to you about anything. If you would rather not go to see my aunt—’

  ‘I’m coming with you!’ His hand gripped her arm, his expression forbidding as they went down to the car.

  Oh, she could have told Luke that she and Nigel had decided to wait until they were married before making love—a marriage that wasn’t to be. She could also have told him that she hadn’t allowed any man near enough since to even approach a physical relationship. But she saw no reason to tell him any of that, considering it her own affair what she had done before she met him, and no one else’s. Luke was just like all men—he liked to gain experience himself, but when it came to the woman he loved she had to be chaste. In this day and age of reliable contraception and availability, that was asking a lot of any woman. It was certainly asking too much of her to tell him the truth!

  But if they made the journey to see her aunt in stony silence, Luke’s expression grim, then she could see he was visibly trying to break the mood as they walked to her aunt’s tiny flat. It was a battle within himself he seemed to be having difficulty with.

  ‘To hell with it!’ he snapped suddenly as they stood outside her aunt’s door, and turned to pull Lori into his arms to kiss her firmly on the mouth.

  Lori’s eyes widened at this unexpected onslaught, but she was too surprised to fight it.

  Luke’s eyes glittered with satisfaction as he moved back. ‘I don’t give a damn if you’ve had a hundred lovers, I’m still going to marry you!’

  ‘Hardly a hundred, Luke!’ She regained her composure with effort, looking about them selfconsciously, although the hallway appeared to be deserted except for themselves. Her lip-gloss was once again non-existent, her mouth swollen from the passion of the kiss she had just received.

  ‘Don’t push it, kitten,’ Luke warned softly. ‘Or I’ll be sorely tempted to take you away from here and make you do more than purr!’

  His mocking laughter followed her hasty entrance into the flat, and she knew he was amused by her evasion of being in his arms. But that part of her plan was spiralling out of control, becoming so that she couldn’t control it. Each time Luke made love to her he seemed to wear her resistance down a little bit more, and this last time it had taken tremendous effort to break the spell. They had been at the flat, without fear of interruption from others in the immediate future, and she had found just how dangerous that was. She would have to do what she had done l
ast night, try to make sure they were never alone in places where he could do more than kiss her.

  So much for her aversion to him! He was slowly proving that to be untrue, and despite her despisal of the Randell family, Luke’s physical effect on her was growing stronger.

  Her aunt was in the process of watering her plants when they entered, and without turning she barked, ‘You’re late again. Really, Lorraine, your time-keeping is atrocious! What your boss thinks of you I have no idea,’ she tutted.

  Lori gave Luke a rueful shrug, seeing by the amused raising of his eyebrows that he was already captivated by the elderly lady. No doubt her bluntness appealed to him!

  ‘He thinks,’ Luke said slowly, teasingly, smiling as her aunt slowly turned to look at him, ‘that she’s the most beautiful woman he’s ever seen—and that she needn’t come in until lunchtime if she doesn’t want to,’ he drawled.

  ‘I’ll remember that,’ she warned softly.

  ‘As long as I’m the one she spends the morning with,’ he added softly.

  Aunt Jessie was looking at him critically, obviously liking what she saw, although she looked a little worried. ‘I thought you said Mr Hammond was married—with a grown up son,’ she said in a scandalised voice.

  ‘He is, and he has,’ Lori said with amusement; it was not hard to imagine Luke’s reaction to having a son of Paul’s age—there were only a few years between them!

  Aunt Jessie looked at Luke again, keen interest in her faded blue eyes. And Lori knew why. The only other man she had ever introduced to her aunt was Nigel, and with her aunt’s dislike of him that hadn’t been a great success. Her aunt didn’t seem to have the same aversion to Luke. It piqued her a little that her aunt should have disapproved of Nigel so strongly and yet should actually seem to like Luke.

  ‘Then this isn’t him,’ her aunt realised. ‘Is he Jonathan?’

  Lori was aware of a sudden tension about Luke; she knew that he was still jealous of any mention of the other man. ‘No, this isn’t Jonathan either, Aunt Jessie,’ she smiled. ‘This is my new boss, Luke Randell,’ she said the last tentatively, watching her aunt for any sign of recognition of Luke’s surname. There didn’t appear to be any as the two of them shook hands, Luke handing her aunt the fuchsia he had bought for her on the way there.

  Her aunt seemed pleased by the gesture, and smiled at him coyly. ‘You’re so kind.’

  Lori’s eyes widened at her aunt’s almost flirtatious manner. She really did like Luke!

  ‘Not at all,’ he returned smoothly. ‘If lunch is as delicious as it smells, the plant is the least I could do!’

  ‘Lorraine can go and check on the food while we sit down and have a chat,’ her aunt said imperiously.

  ‘Oh, she can, can she?’ Lori smiled.

  ‘Yes, she can.’ Aunt Jessie looked at her over the top of her glasses.

  She couldn’t help laughing at that stern expression. ‘I stopped being intimidated by those looks years ago,’ she chuckled. ‘But I’ll go and check on lunch anyway. I brought a trifle for dessert.’ She carried the dish through to the adjoining kitchen, putting her head around the side of the door just in time to see her aunt and Luke getting comfortable in opposite chairs. ‘And no telling him any of my dark secrets!’ It was a teasing warning, but one with an underlying strength she knew her aunt couldn’t miss.

  ‘You don’t have any dark secrets,’ Aunt Jessie dismissed lightly. ‘Except maybe that awful man you were once engaged to,’ she added thoughtfully.

  ‘Aunt Jessie!’ Lori gasped indignantly.

  Amusement glittered in grey eyes as Luke sat forward in his seat. ‘Tell me more,’ he invited the elderly lady.

  ‘Well, he—’

  ‘Aunt Jessie, please!’ she groaned, determined that Luke shouldn’t know anything about Nigel. So far he had just been another man she could taunt Luke with, the truth of her break-up with Nigel would show she was the one who had been scorned. ‘Tell Luke what a horrible little girl I was, tell him how well I did at school, but please leave Nigel out of it!’ She raised dark brows at her aunt.

  ‘All right,’ her aunt accepted her plea. ‘Now go and check on lunch before it burns,’ she ordered.

  Lori could hear Luke’s deep-throated chuckle as she put the vegetables on to cook and took the meat out of the oven. Whatever Aunt Jessie was telling him, he was enjoying himself.

  He seemed to do so through lunch too; he and her aunt were almost like conspirators as they teased her.

  ‘Now I hope you’re going to be kind to my Lorraine,’ her aunt warned him as they prepared to take their leave. ‘Underneath this tough exterior is a little girl who’s been hurt very badly in the past.’

  Lori paled. ‘Aunt Jessie—’

  ‘I intend being very kind to her,’ Luke assured the elderly lady softly. ‘As kind as any husband can be to the woman he loves.’

  ‘Luke!’

  ‘Be quiet, Lorraine!’ her aunt instructed impatiently. ‘If you have nothing more sensible to say than gasping our names in that ridiculous way then don’t talk at all.’ She looked over her glasses at Luke. ‘So you intend marrying my great-niece, do you?’

  He nodded. ‘As soon as she accepts my proposal.’

  ‘Giving you trouble, is she?’

  ‘Very much so,’ he smiled, his gaze mocking Lori’s barely held temper.

  ‘You look strong enough to handle her,’ Aunt Jessie said with satisfaction. ‘That other pip-squeak—’

  ‘Aunt Jessie, we really do have to go now,’ Lori interrupted softly. So far, in the circumstances, the day had gone very smoothly, but if her aunt started talking about Nigel there was no telling what she might say.

  ‘She hates me talking about him,’ her aunt told Luke. ‘I’m not surprised. He was no good for her. Didn’t have the backbone of a—’

  ‘Aunt Jessie!’ Lori sighed her exasperation with the elderly lady.

  ‘We should be on our way,’ Luke put in smoothly, his arm about Lori’s waist as he guided her to the door. ‘I’ve enjoyed meeting you, Jessie,’ he smiled. ‘I hope I’ll soon be able to call you Aunt Jessie as Lori does.’

  Lori had barely been able to hide her surprise when she came back from the kitchen to find Luke calling her aunt by her first name, and her aunt returning the compliment. Her aunt had known Nigel for almost a year, and yet she had always insisted that he call her Miss Chisholm. Luke seemed to have achieved the impossible, that of charming her aunt within a matter of minutes.

  ‘I liked her,’ Luke announced on the drive back to town.

  ‘Maybe the two of you should get married!’ she said waspishly.

  His mouth tightened. ‘I quite like older women,’ he rasped. ‘But I believe you’re doing your aunt a disservice by talking about her in this way.’

  She blushed at the rebuke, knowing it was deserved. ‘She liked you too,’ she told him huskily. ‘And I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be bitchy.’

  He shrugged his dismissal of the subject. ‘I gather she didn’t take to your ex-fiancé in the same way?’

  ‘No,’ Lori acknowledged tightly.

  ‘Why not?’

  She shrugged. ‘I have no idea. Maybe because he didn’t try so hard to make an impression,’ she added nastily, unfairly.

  Luke’s face darkened once again. ‘I didn’t try to make an impression either,’ he snapped. ‘Why do I sometimes get the impression that you still don’t like me?’ he said slowly.

  Lori flushed. She was allowing her temper to reveal her true feelings towards this man, and that would never do. At the moment he was deeply in love with her, but if he should ever guess at her plan she had no doubt that love would turn to blazing anger. Luke showed her the gentle side of his nature, but she had also seen him blisteringly angry, and he could be formidable then.

  ‘You’re imagining things,’ she told him lightly.

  ‘Am I?’ he said grimly.

  ‘Of course.’ She deliberately let her hand rest on his thigh, feel
ing his instant response. ‘Why else would I go out with you if I didn’t like you?’

  ‘Why else, indeed?’ he murmured thoughtfully.

  ‘Don’t let’s ruin the day by arguing again, Luke,’ she said pleadingly, her eyes softly encouraging as she looked at him.

  He seemed to draw back from anger with an effort. ‘We do seem to argue rather a lot,’ he said lightly. ‘Do you suppose we’ll argue like this when we’re married?’

  She smiled at his arrogance. ‘I haven’t accepted you yet.’

  ‘No,’ he grimaced. ‘But I’ll just keep asking until you do.’

  ‘Don’t you think I should meet your family before we decide on anything as important as marriage?’ she suggested slowly, as if the idea had just occurred to her. ‘After all, you’ve met Aunt Jessie.’

  ‘I only have my father now,’ he told her harshly, his expression grim. ‘And I see no reason for you to meet him.’

  Her eyes widened; the rift between father and son appeared to be wider than Claude had first implied it was. And that couldn’t help her plan for revenge at all. ‘Why not?’ she asked.

  Luke didn’t seem as if he were really listening to her, lost in thoughts of his own, the harshness of his voice seconds earlier now reflected in his face, his grey eyes icy, his nostrils flaring, his lips compressed into a thin angry line.

  Lori’s own thoughts were chaotic. Surely she hadn’t come this far, encouraged this man even though she despised him, only to be thwarted at the end by his own anger with his father! She wouldn’t be put off now; she had come too far to baulk at the end.

  ‘Why not?’ she prompted at Luke’s continued silence.

  ‘I’ve seen him once since I got back from the States,’ he told her abruptly, ‘on the Sunday following Paul’s wedding, and I don’t see any reason to repeat the visit in the near future.’

  This couldn’t be happening, not after all she had gone through just to get this far. ‘I would like to meet him, Luke,’ she said stubbornly.

  ‘The great Jacob P. Randell!’ he scorned.

  ‘Your father,’ she corrected softly at his bitterness.