Alex, who was waiting outside, towel in hand, stared at her transfixed, and she heard the catch of his breath.
'You're exquisite,' he said huskily, stepping into the shower-room. 'Don't grow wings and fly away.'
'Chance would be a fine thing!'
His chuckle followed her as she went up on deck. He had found a couple of deckchairs, and on the slatted table that they had used for their lunch he had set out the food for their dinner, covering it with a fine lawn cloth to keep it fresh. She pulled a face. He might not be husband material, but he was definitely house-trained! Was that because of his hotel experience or because he frequently had live-in lovers? Nervousness assailed her and she fought it down, aware that if she didn't, Alex's antenna was well tuned enough to sense it.
His step sounded behind her and she swung round to see him walking towards her, a champagne bottle in one hand, corkscrew and two fluted glasses in the other. In brief shorts and matching Gucci cotton sports shirt the colour of freshly churned butter, he was every girl's idea of Prince Charming.
'It's the real thing,' he smiled, holding up the bottle for her to see it was vintage Krug. Setting it on the table, he deftly uncorked it, filled the two glasses and handed her a foaming one. 'To us,' he toasted. 'May this night together be the first of many.'
Refusing to acknowledge the implication behind the seemingly innocent words, she touched her glass to his. 'May we sleep in our beds tomorrow!'
Alex's hps were curled into a smile as he raised the Klass rim to his mouth and drank, and with a shiver of apprehension Marly knew that the task she had set herself was fraught with danger.
'Delicious champagne,' she observed.
'For a delicious woman. "Here's looking at you shweetheart,'" he added in a fair imitation of Humphrey Bogart's famous line in Casablanca.
'You've missed your vocation,' she smiled.
'I doubt that. My only other recognisable impersonation is Donald Duck!'
They exchanged glances of amusement, and their eyes met and held; hers nut-brown and wary; his silver-grey and getting darker as they ranged over the smooth oval of her face, slender neck, and small, full breasts.
'Do I take it you're a movie buff?' she asked, anxious to keep the conversation on an impersonal level for as long as possible.
'Not especially. I prefer the theatre.'
'So do I.'
'What's it like in Thailand?'
She was momentarily flummoxed. Not having been, she had absolutely no idea. 'Not in the same class as London or New York,' she cleverly parried, then hurriedly switched the discussion to music.
In this, his taste was similar to hers, and they debated the merits of jazz and blues, rock and rap, and musicals. Only when it came to opera and classical music did their tastes diverge, for he liked ultra-modern composers and she preferred Mozart, Brahms, and Verdi. But again she deferred to him, nodding sagely when he expounded on the merits of an avant-garde composer she found particularly atonal.
'Don't you find the Second Movement of his Fourth Symphony brilliant?' Alex questioned.
'Brilliant,' she echoed.
'Liar.'
'WhatV
'I said liar,' Alex answered pleasantly. 'There isn't a Second Movement because there isn't a Fourth Symphony. He's only written three!'
Furious with herself for falling into such a simple trap, Marly lowered her head. 'I'm sorry, Alex. I didn't like to admit my ignorance.'
'You mean you didn't want to admit you don't like modern composers. Why not, for heaven's sake?'
'It's a matter of taste, I suppose.'
'That's obvious,' he said tersely, 'but it isn't what I meant! I'm just curious to know why you wouldn't disagree with me.'
'It isn't seemly.'
Alex visibly swallowed a retort and Marly awarded herself full marks for riling him the way she had. Not so many weeks ago he had professed himself dehghted with her amiable disposition, but now he was beginning to see how irritating a 'yes-woman' could be. By the time she finished with him, he would make sure that his next love-affair was with a rampant feminist!
Deciding to change the subject, she began removing the covers from the food. 'I don't know about you, but I could eat a horse.'
'I'd rather ride them,' he said with a return to good humour. 'But I wouldn't refuse a little something else.'
In the event he ate a big something else, tucking into his food with gusto. 'There's nothing nicer than dining at sea with a beautiful woman,' he sighed contentedly. 'Even Anton Mosiman couldn't have bettered it!'
'Anton Mosiman?' She feigned ignorance.
'He's one of the finest chefs I know. He runs his own restaurant in London. I'd like to take you there some time.'
She restrained the urge to tell him she occasionally dined there. 'I have no plans to visit your country.'
'Who knows what the future may hold?' he said softly.
She waited for him to elaborate, and when he didn't, knew he was mouthing words without meaning them. Typical of a man on the make!
'I shouldn't imagine you're very domesticated,' he went on unexpectedly.
'I happen to be a good cook—and tidy with it!'
A tawny eyebrow rose. 'From the little I've learned of Thai society, I was under the impression that most well-to-do families had domestic help.'
This was true, and too late Marly realised she had answered his question as herself, and not in the role she was portraying. Luckily it wasn't too late to retrieve the situation.
'You're right, Alex. None of my friends sets foot in her kitchen, but since I love food and am curious by nature, I took some cookery lessons.'
'When may I sample your efforts?'
'When my parents return and I move back home.'
There was a lengthy silence which Marly had no intention of breaking, and when she saw Alex didn't intend to do so either, she stacked the dirty dishes and glasses on a tray.
'Coffee?' she enquired, one foot on the rung of the steps leading to the galley.
'Please.'
The kettle was still boiling when Alex loomed large beside her. 'Anything I can do for you?'
If she was correctly interpreting the vibes he was emanating, coffee was the last thing he had in mind.
'How kind of you to ask,' she flattered.
'I can be kind in other ways too,' he answered throatily, and coming closer wound his fingers in her silky black hair, tilted her face up to his and laid claim to her mouth.
The insistent pressure of his lips forced hers apart, and instantly his tongue, hot and demanding, probed the inner softness, crashing through her defences and leaving her open to his demands. Again and again he drank deep of her, and unable—nay, unwilling—to resist him, she responded with all the ardour of which she was capable.
Alex was the first to draw back, stroking her cheek with a hand that trembled. 'You've cast a spell on me, darling,' he murmured. 'You've cast a spell on me and there's only one way to break it!'
Once more his mouth found hers and she made a show of attempting to break free, but even had she genuinely wished to do so it would have been useless, for his grip was like iron though his hps were velvet-soft as they traced tiny kisses down her throat to the soft curve of her breasts, the outline of her taut nipples clearly visible beneath the white silk cheong-sam.
Desire shot through her, piercing as a knife, and with a gasp she pushed against him, her palms flat upon his shoulders. This was Act One, and she had to play her part carefully.
'Please, Alex, let me go.'
Slowly he stepped back but kept his arms lightly around her. 'Why, my darling? You want me as much as I want you. We both knew it the moment we met, so why keep fighting it?'
Little did he know she had no intention of fighting it. No, sir, the name of the game was to drive him wild with longing and then pretend she was holding out for marriage.
Keeping her eyes downcast to hide the resolution in them, she put a tremor in her voice as she spoke. 'You know
why I won't, Alex, and nothing has changed.'
'It has, darling. You love me. I've seen it in your look, heard it in your voice, felt it in your touch. Are you denying it?'
Cupping her face in his hands, he forced her eyes to meet his, and for what seemed an eternity they stared at one another. In the subdued lighting she saw the naked passion in his eyes and felt she was drowning in their depths, losing her sense of control.
'I can't deny it,' she answered shakily, and realising it was true, despised herself for it.
'Thank God you've finally admitted it!' Drawing her close, he stroked her shoulders and hips with practised ease, moulding his hands round the curve of her buttocks to press the lower part of her body upon the burgeoning swell of his arousal. 'I love you too,' he whispered against her throat. "That's what makes it perfect.'
'I'm sure you've said that to other women.'
'You're wrong. I've teased and flattered and I've made love, but I haven't been in love. This is the first time and you are the first woman to whom I've said it.'
As the lies tripped from his tongue, the love within her dried up, and though it was painful to admit how unscrupulous he was, it made it easier for her to carry on with her plan.
'Alex, no!' she cried as he led her out of the galley. 'I can't. I'll regret it afterwards.'
'You won't, I promise you.' His head lowered to hers and his breath was warm as a summer breeze on her hps. 'I won't do anything to hurt you. Surely you know that?'
As one hackneyed phrase followed another, Marly's fury rose. Any moment now and he was going to come out with the old chestnut about stopping whenever she gave the word!
'You do trust me?' he asked thickly.
'Completely.'
It was all he needed, and lifting her into his arms he carried her effortlessly up to the deck.
Hardly had she time to absorb that while she had been in the galley preparing coffee he had rearranged the re- clining-chair cushions into a bed than she felt herself placed upon it and he was deftly undoing the tiny front buttons of her cheong-sam.
'You're perfect,' he whispered, releasing her breasts from the flimsy material and burying his face in the warm hollow between them. His tongue moved from one to the other, caressing the soft fullness before taking a hardened nipple in his mouth and sucking it.
A shaft of pure desire shot through her and every nerve in her body throbbed with ecstasy. Only then did her fear increase as she admitted that what he had said a moment ago was true: she wanted him as much as he wanted her.
But she dared not give in to him. To do so would send her into the same pit into which he had cast Andrea. She tried to pull away from him, but his hands hfeld her prisoner as his hps parted hers, and her mouth gave up its moist sweetness to his marauding tongue. Feverishly she found herself responding to him, fatalistically accepting the inevitable as he familiarised himself with every part of her naked body: rubbing, nibbling, stroking, sucking. The ache between her thighs was unbearable, and more than anything else in the world she longed for his swollen hardness inside her. Now was the time to stop but her good intentions drowned in her need of him, and her legs parted spontaneously, telling him without words that only the ultimate act would satisfy her.
'Are you sure?' he muttered into her ear, momentarily easing his chest away from her breasts.
Surprised by his question, she wondered if he was playing Mr Nice Guy so that the onus for her seduction was firmly placed on her, rather than him. But even as she hesitated, lost in a moral dilemma and not certain which road to take, she heard the throb of an engine close by.
Alex heard it too, and jack-knifing into a sitting position, reached swiftly for their scattered clothes.
'Pirates?' she asked fearfully, bending low to stay out of sight as she put on her skirt.
'Not in this stretch of water. Either the coastguard changed their minds, or Fiona did it for them.' Alex slipped into his trousers and shirt and then stood up, masking her with his body. 'You should have a cheong- sam with a zip, not buttons!' He grinned briefly to lighten the mood. 'Bend double and go down below. I'll play host up here!'
Heart racing like a piston, she did as ordered, still so emotionally aroused that she was unable to think straight.
When she emerged, a sleek white cutter had pulled up alongside them and two coastguards were trying to explain their arrival to Alex, while a third was examining the engine, which burst into life even as Marly came forward to act as interpreter.
As Alex had correctly assumed, Fiona was the main instigator behind their rescue, for when an official had telephoned the beach house to explain their absence and say they would be rescued in the morning she had contacted the British embassy.
'The rest, as they say, is history,' Marly concluded as she recounted the story to Alex when the coastguards had returned to their vessel and were standing by to escort them back to Phuket. 'I don't think your fiancee is going to give up on you as easily as you think.'
'She is not my fiancee,' he asserted. 'This mania of hers is getting beyond a joke. If she carries on like this I'll have no option but to be brutal.'
'Not while she's such a long way from home,' Marly warned, cognisant of the girl's earlier breakdown. 'If our stay in Phuket doesn't show her you don't love her, it might be better if you flew back to England with her and then made her face the truth.'
Alex's grunt could have meant anything and Marly let the matter drop. After all, once she herself was finished with him, how he ran his life was no concern of hers.
The thought should have made her jump for joy, yet ah it did was make her want to burst into tears. Which went to show what a stupid fool she was for having given her heart to a man who didn't have one of his own.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Fiona and Kevin were at the dockside waiting to welcome Alex and Marly when the boat shpped into its mooring place at two in the morning.
Fiona flung herself into Alex's arms with the fervour of a bride on the return of her husband from the battle- front, and though the display irritated Marly, she could not help but be grateful that the girl's determination to prevent him spending the night on the boat with another woman had prevented her from giving herself to Alex and making the biggest mistake of her life.
Pleading exhaustion, she went straight to her room, where she relived the last passionate moments she had spent with him. Even in retrospect they set her pulses racing, confirming her realisation that the sooner her charade was over, the better for her emotional safety.
As expected, her sleep was fitful, and seven o'clock found her wandering along the shore, musing on what might have happened had she and Alex spent the entire night on the Lovely Linda. So deep was she in thought, she didn't see Kevin until his outstretched arms stopped her.
'Hi, Marly, you don't look your usual cheerful self.'
'With good reason,' she said wryly. 'Our blonde bombshell put paid to the plot I'd set in motion.' As she spoke she remembered she had not yet told him she had deliberately fixed the engine to give trouble, but before she could do so Kevin spoke.
'Fiona was determined not to let you and Alex spend the night together, and when she wants something there's no stopping her.' His voice held reluctant admiration. 'Between you and me, I think she suspected Alex of engineering the whole thing so the engine would give out and he'd have all night to seduce you!'
'He'd have had to be pretty conversant with engines to do that,' she smiled, recollecting his irritability when faced with a mass of plugs and wires.
'He is conversant,' Kevin said. 'According to Fiona he races internationally.'
Marly almost danced with rage. The devious, lying swine! From the minute she had suggested taking out the boat he had planned to spend a night with her at sea. Finding the fused cable had been a bonus for him, saving him the trouble of manufacturing a fault. Like her, he had intended making their breakdown appear genuine when they were eventually rescued.
Two minds with but a single thought, she
stormed silently, except that he had planned to seduce her, while she had intended to stop on the brink! Which was very odd, for when it came to the crunch he had surprisingly given her an out, and she had surprisingly rejected it.
'Why the war dance?' Kevin enquired.
Taking a couple of deep breaths, she told him, and was entirely unprepared for his shout of laughter.
'Talk about the biter being bit!' he said when he could talk. 'It wouldn't surprise me if Alex knew you'd messed with the engine.'
'He could never have guessed that. The fault I created might genuinely have happened, but given his knowledge, he could easily have fixed it.' Humour got the better of her anger, and she smiled ruefully. 'You're right, Kevin. I was bit!'
'Not to worry, your secret's safe with me!' Linking his arm companionably through hers, he led her in the direction of the beach house. 'Fiona's a strange girl, you know. Alone with me she's intelligent, but the instant Alex hoves in sight she's like a flighty teenager.'
'But you're still smitten?'
'Unfortunately yes, so all I can do is be around to pick up the pieces.'
'A bit tricky if the pieces fall when she's in England and you're here!'
'I've been offered a job in London when I leave the professor, and I intend taking it.'
Marly hoped he was not storing up more hurt for himself, but long ago she had learned that when it came to love one could not influence another person. All one could do as a friend was to be there when needed, and either congratulate or commiserate.
Although Marly's plan had failed, it was some consolation to know Alex had failed too. Yet he gave no sign of disappointment and continued dividing his attention equally between her and Fiona, making it clear when he was alone with Marly where his real interest lay.
She contrived as many ways as possible to keep him on the boil, while adroitly finding excuses not to go beyond kisses, and by the end of the third day after the boat trip frustration had taken its toll of him, for he appeared on the veranda for breakfast heavy-eyed and grumpy.
Roberta Leigh - Give A Man A Bad Name Page 11
