Captivity

by Margaret Pargeter

  Making a great effort, she closed her eyes to the sight of his tall, well made figure disappearing in the distance and turned back to the house. Goodness knows, there was plenty to do, and if she was tired enough she could have no energy left for thinking.

  Ruby paused by her on her way to the pool. 'Why don't you join me, Alex?' she asked. 'Aunt Harriet's still in bed. She won't want you for at least another hour and I see Chase has gone off with Davina. I believe they're riding out to the mustering camp, though what Davina will do there I can't think.

  Anyway, they probably won't be back until later in the day, so he won't want you either.'

  Alex hesitated, sorely tempted but conscientiously resolute. 'I promised I'd have a batch of letters ready for your aunt's signature. Also some for your brother which I didn't manage to finish yesterday. I'm not on holiday now, you know.'

  Ruby didn't look too perturbed about that. 'Well, don't make it sound like a penance, young Alex.

  Staying here can't be worse than sitting in a mouldy old office in Melbourne. And think of all the fun of an Outback wedding. It's a chance you might never get again.'

  'I didn't want to come here in the first place, remember?' She thought Ruby could have remembered a lot of things she apparently found it more convenient to forget. A few short weeks ago it was Coolabra that had been 'mouldy'.

  Not at all put out, Ruby shrugged. 'Never mind. Stop worrying! Your visit has certainly served its purpose. Henry is quite convinced he jumped to the wrong conclusions. What do you think?'

  'It's not really any of my business, is it?' Alex refused to be drawn. She had no idea what Henry Brett believed, but he must be able to work a lot out for himself. He wasn't a stupid man and if he was satisfied surely that was all that mattered. Ruby might be better advised to leave things alone. Ruby considered she had hoodwinked Henry, but mightn't she be the one who was being fooled? Henry wanted her, all right, but once married he would be master of his own household, Alex was sure of that.

  What bothered her, at the moment, was her own inability to get away from Coolabra. She wished Ruby might give some thought to that!

  Wondering if she could appeal to her, Alex was startled to hear Ruby exclaim, 'Wouldn't if be fun if we were to have a double wedding? Chase and Davina! It's just occurred to me. Would you say they were in love?'

  'They've only gone riding,' Alex faltered, again avoiding a direct reply.

  I don't know,' Ruby frowned. Chase was keen enough a few weeks ago, but it sort of fizzled out. He didn't follow her to Sydney, he came to Melbourne instead.' 'To investigate you,' Alex reminded her.

  Yes, but I still can't make it out. Davina's at Coolabra which must mean something, and Chase hasn't gone away. And my wedding isn't responsible. He would never let it get in the way of business. There has to be another reason why he stays, and both Aunt Harriet and I think it can only be Davina.' In the office, which she reached eventually, Alex tried to compose herself. If Chase had fallen in love, which she doubted, after his remarks on the subject by the pool, she hoped it was with Davina. She couldn't understand why even contemplating this should make her feel slightly ill, but her own feelings for him were so confused she couldn't even begin to sort them out. He could make her heart race and her hands go clammy, but somehow, she was coming to associate him too much with her mother. They both appeared to have the same ambition to see her married. While the two- had never met, their characters merged continually in Alex's head. They both thought marriage should be a girl's sole goal, that, willy nilly, she should be pushed into it. Neither of them, she felt sure, would ever stop to consider what the girl herself wanted.

  Davina and Chase returned to the homestead during the afternoon and, to everyone's surprise, Davina left the station an hour later. No one said anything. Davina's coldly angry face seemed sufficient explanation. She wasn't even coming back for the wedding.

  'Which proves how wrong I was to be talking of a double one!' Ruby whispered dryly to Alex as she went to get ready to spend the evening with Henry. 'Do you think Chase overheard?' 'They might make it up. I mean, if they've merely fallen out,' Alex added hastily. 'I doubt it,' carelessly Ruby shook her head. 'I recognise the death of hope on any girl's face. Chase can be a brute when he wants to be.' The house seemed quiet with Davina gone, but Alex liked it better. Henry arrived to collect his fiancée.

  They had been asked to dine with some friends of his in Mount Isa. Ruby would sleep at the Brett station where tomorrow she would discuss last minute wedding plans with Henry and his parents.

  After dinner Aunt Harriet announced she was having an early night and Chase asked Alex to come to his study. 'I want to speak to you,' he said curtly.

  She was tired. They were all tired, having spent one of those kind of endless days that come before a wedding. There was so much to do. As fast as one job was completed there was another two to take its place. At dinner, Alex could see Aunt Harriet was looking exhausted. While she was in the study with Chase she must mention it. It would be an opportunity.

  She wore a long-skirted dress in pink, with a demure neckline. She had had it since she was seventeen, and while she knew the colour was a bit unfashionable it was a dress she was fond of. It had been an effort to change at all, this evening, but she was familiar enough with Coolabra now to know it would be regarded as almost a sin not to. Here everything stopped for dinner, and guests and family alike were expected to dress accordingly.

  'Come in,' said Chase, when she knocked.

  Alex did so and closed the door. Tall and darkly handsome, in his well cut clothes, he seemed to envelop and tower over her. Her breath catching in her throat, she stared at him, looking very fragile and far more appealing than she knew. Her hair fell, fair and softly shining, on either side of her perfectly modelled face, and her eyes, deeply blue, held an oddly trapped expression. She broke into speech with a haste that reflected her nervous state of mind.

  'Your aunt is exhausted, Chase. I think you should insist she has a day in bed.'

  'My, dear girl,' he grated, 'do shut up and sit down. My aunt will probably agree to spending a month in bed, after the wedding. But before that, never. She may be tired out, but she's the only one who's supposed to know it.'

  Alex gritted her teeth. 'You understand, I hope, that she could collapse?'

  'No, she won't. And we must see she doesn't unobtrusively, I mean.'

  'I'll do what I can,' Alex agreed fretfully.

  'Only three more days. They'll go in a flash.'

  Bitterly she nodded. I do hope you're right. I don't think I could stay here much longer. Oh,' against Chase's raised eyebrows, she threw out her hands, 'I realise I couldn't abandon Miss Harriet now, but it all seems so pointless.'

  'Of course it isn't,' he said crisply, pouring her a sherry and helping himself to whisky. 'It's good training for your own wedding, which will soon follow.'

  Too weary to fight him, she sighed, half closing her eyes. He might have passed a casual remark, but she didn't think so. He had a very purposeful look in his eye and she couldn't fight his immense vitality.

  Tonight she couldn't even try. Deliberately she made light of it, pretending it was a joke. 'I think Ruby's wedding will be enough to last me a lifetime. Who would want to go through all this again?'

  'Unfortunately,' he observed coolly, 'unless you want to live in sin, as I'm sure your mother would still term it, there's no other way.'

  'I suppose not.' Delicately Alex yawned, while her small feet edged warily towards the door. 'But as I'm not thinking of marrying or living in sin, why should I worry?'

  'Where do you think you're going?' he asked harshly. 'I told you to sit down.'

  She came back to him, not wishing to be thought a coward but desperately reluctant to remain. Why hadn't she thought of an excuse and gone to bed, like Miss Harriet? 'I finished all your mail,' she pleaded. 'Was that what you wanted to see me about?'

  'Mail?' He might never have known there was such a thing. 'No; it was n
ot. I want to know if you've come to your senses about marrying me yet. You've had long enough to think it over. I won't announce our engagement on the day Ruby marries, but plenty of people will be staying over. It will be as good a time as any. Then, if you don't think you can face another big wedding, we can be married quietly within a few days.'

  'You're mad!' She jumped back in alarm as she realised what he was saying. Her heart thumped in terror as he followed up, looming above her. 'Quite mad!' she exclaimed, her eyes wide on his hardening expression. 'No one would believe that you, of all people, would act this way. It's completely out of character.'

  Derogatorily his eyes narrowed, and he didn't need to put in words just how dimwitted he considered any girl who refused such a bargain as himself! 'I'm not interested in what it is. Nor do I care desperately about other people's opinions. Most men act out of character at some time in their lives. It's sometimes necessary, especially when dealing with a feather brained girl like you—'

  Angrily she cried,' Shouldn't you be congratulating yourself on a lucky escape? You surely couldn't do with a fool for a wife, one you don't even like! I don't like you much, either,' she ended sharply, refusing to admit that that might not be true.

  Chase seized her wrist as she took another step backwards. 'Come here!' he said bitingly, jerking her tense body to him. 'If you have to be convinced that you're perfectly normal, under all those stiff and mysterious inhibitions, there are better ways of doing it than talking.'

  'No, Chase!' She wasn't to be conquered this way! If he chose to use brute force to gain his own way, she would never submit without a struggle.' Stop it!'

  As her voice rose hysterically, so did her hand. It had been a purely defensive action, but she had forgotten the glass of sherry she held. She couldn't remember throwing it deliberately, but suddenly there it was, streaming down the front of his beautiful white jacket. Horrified, she stared at the dark stain spreading all over the white cloth, her mind stunned with shock. 'Oh, your jacket!' she gasped. 'I didn't mean to do that.'

  'Didn't you?' His voice was laced with contempt, as was his glance on her aghast face, as though he was considering her crime more than the expense of replacing the jacket. 'We may as well ruin your dress, too, then we can commiserate with each other.'

  Relentlessly he pulled her into his arms, seeking her mouth, his lips bruising against hers, sending her senses reeling. Deliberately, as an agonising flame swept through her, he brought her closer, moulding her sensuously to the hard length of his body. It was a punishment and pain, an angry passion, and Alex felt her blood racing feverishly as she tried to get away. The room whirled as she gulped and gasped, like some poor drowning thing. The scent of sherry was heavy on the air, damp on Chase's skin as he went on holding her and kissing her savagely, taking no notice whatsoever of the twisting, convulsive movements of her protesting limbs.

  Her lips were stinging, her whole being enraged that he was kissing her with such intimacy. Blindly her clenched fists beat a helpless tattoo on his shoulders.

  Roughly, as he imprisoned her threshing hands, he spoke against her mouth. 'You got a kick out of your big moment, now let me enjoy mine.'

  'No!' With surprising determination, she pushed back, catching him unawares. Instead of tightening, his arms slackened and suddenly she was free. Involuntarily, her hand lifted to slap him sharply on the cheek. Might as well be damned completely, she thought wildly, as she saw his fury.

  As he muttered a smothered oath, she fled, stumbling across the polished floor up the stairs to her room.

  The splendid length of the wide staircase had never seemed so endless, and she couldn't tell if it was her heart or his footsteps pounding in her ears. The lights flickered, dancing as she tried to put more distance between them, while her mind tried to convince her there was no need to panic. Chase Marshall was a man of the world. This alone would never allow him to pursue a girl recklessly, frightening her nearly to death!

  Or would he? While she had ruined his jacket and shirt, expense-wise this would mean nothing to him. It was the way she had done it or the way he thought she had done it which had aroused his anger.

  Slapping his face hadn't helped either! Normally, he might have shrugged such an incident off as of little consequence, but somehow she had managed to get under his skin. This, she suspected, maddened him as much as her refusal to marry him. Why wouldn't he take her word that she didn't want to marry anyone?

  Breathlessly she reached the safety of her bedroom, but to her alarm he was right behind her, slamming the door. Before coming after her he had thrown off his jacket, but there was still the wine-soaked front of his shirt. Tearing open the buttons down the front, he rapped, 'You can apologise, and properly! And if you don't care for the sight of a half naked man in your room, you'd better make it quick. I don't intend steeping in sherry all night.'

  'Get out!' Her eyes blazed in her small face. 'Why should I apologise?'

  His eyes blazed back, their effect much greater. 'You didn't think you'd get off without making one, did you?'

  Apprehensively, Alex gulped. Chase Marshall was a gentleman , master of Coolabra and heaven knows how much more. She hadn't thought ever to see him as angry as this! 'You're making a great drama out of nothing,' she gasped.

  He answered between his teeth. 'You deliberately provoke me when God knows I have enough to do.

  No girl in her right senses would turn down what I've offered.'

  'It must comfort you to think so.'

  'Shut up!' he grated. 'Be quiet or…' He didn't wait to utter his threat. Like a man driven, he brought her violently to him, his mouth hitting hers with such force it knocked the breath from her body. His grip on her was iron hard, as though he was determined this time she wouldn't escape him.

  Alex was gasping for breath before he lifted his head. Weakened and trembling from his ravaging fury, she lay helpless in his arms. It was too much for her, she couldn't continue fighting him. Her mind rebelled, yet she was stunned by the force of her own awakening desire. What was it about this man that he could arouse emotions she hadn't known existed?

  His fingers bruised her soft skin as he tilted up her chin. 'I want an end to this nonsense,' he said curtly, his eyes glittering. 'Both my time and my patience are coming to an end.'

  'You can't make me feel guilty,' she whispered, shaking uncontrollably. 'You're the one who should be feeling guilty being in my room. A woman's room!'

  'It's a long time since my conscience bothered me about anything like that,' he drawled sarcastically.

  'I don't doubt it!' she all but spat, temper and another, more indefinable emotion making her eyes glow.

  'But not here, I think, I suspect you don't usually insult your sister's guests at Coolabra.'

  ' So my lovemaking is an insult, is it? At last we're getting to the truth!' His hand, curling around her slender neck, slipped inside her thin bodice. 'Come on,' he taunted, 'I may as well hear the lot. What more have you festering in that narrow little mind of yours?'

  'Nothing flattering, I assure you!'

  Cold anger was in his voice as he snapped, 'Let me tell you how far your refusal to see reason has been responsible for your own downfall. When I first saw you I didn't take you seriously, but I do now.'

  Alex was too muddled to work that out. She stared at him, frantically trying to understand, despairing that she was unable to. 'You're making too much out of this, Chase. You've let an idea build up until it's got out of proportion. If only you'd stop and think!'

  'Are you implying that I don't know my own mind?' His fingers lay still against the unsteady pulse in her throat as his eyes went slowly and insolently over her. 'When I first saw you I wanted you, and it's a feeling that's been growing ever since.'

  She went limp, exhausted from fighting someone so much stronger than herself. Maybe if she kept quiet? Yet how could she, when the glitter in Chase's eyes spoke so clearly of danger? 'You have to get out of here,' she pleaded unsteadily.

&n
bsp; 'Not yet. You can put up with me a little longer,' he growled, moving her zip with such swift expertise that she gasped. Her dress hit the floor in a silken heap before she had time to realise what was happening.

  'Chase!' Her voice cracked as she jerked away from him. 'You're mad!'

  'If I'm going mad why not join me?' he jeered, hauling her back to him, his mouth coming down on hers again as he lifted her.

  The mattress gave beneath their combined weight and she was crushed. Under his sensual attack her senses ran riot, consuming her mind in hot swirling waves. He kissed her face, her eyes, her throat as he slowly but surely removed the rest of her clothing. In vain her slender body shuddered and jerked as Chase flung off his shirt and dragged her close, his mouth parting hers with a shattering urgency.

  The harsh pressure of his lips aroused a frightening storm of feeling. It swept through her, devastating as a flood, with as little mercy, the force of it shutting out the rest of the world, isolating them completely.

  Unconsciously she edged closer as his hands sought the taut fullness of her breasts, her fingers creeping to his neck and gripping tightly as his hands went lower. Then there was only a wild rush of sensation, promising ecstasy.

  'Alex!' he muttered hoarsely. 'I want you, you torment me. You want me, too.'

  'Want…?' she groaned, his words filling her ears but making little sense. Perhaps he was right. They must want each other, for surely such an all consuming whirlwind of passion didn't lie. It wrenched their bodies with a feverish impatience to be one. Which might have brought the peace of utter fulfilment, if they had been in love. That Chase didn't love her stood out in the inflamed recess off her mind like a red light. This way, it flashed a stark message, lay danger.