“We are women, Anne-Marie. It is part of our nature to confide in one another in matters of the heart.” She laughed again, a little wickedly this time. “Men are dismayed by that, of course. They don’t care for the fact that we…what is that American expression which puts is so well? Gang up on them.”
By then as curious as she was mortified, Anne-Marie said, “Is that what we’re doing? Ganging up on Ethan?”
“Possibly.”
“He’d be furious, if he knew.”
“He won’t hear about it from me.” Josephine stroked the fine cotton sheet covering her and sighed. “Ethan is very good at orchestrating other people’s lives, but he’s in danger of making a terrible mess of his own. And that’s why I’m speaking to you so bluntly—because from what I’ve observed, you might be the one woman to change all that. So the question now becomes, what else can you bring to the relationship, apart from the obvious sexual attraction?”
“At this point, I’m not sure we even have a relationship!”
“Well, the potential for one is certainly there. I’m neither blind nor stupid. I know what to look for. He drives you pleasantly crazy. You can’t think straight when he’s near. He fills your mind, your heart, your soul. You crave him, even as you fear him, because he threatens to turn your world upside-down. But Ethan will run in the opposite direction if he believes you’re drawn to him only because he’s beautiful.”
“Oh, there’s more to it than that!” Anne-Marie protested. “But he’s a complicated man. Overcoming the barriers he throws up isn’t easy.”
“If you can bring yourself to understand what makes him the man he is today, you might find it worth the effort. His experience has been that women can’t distinguish between love and infatuation—that they value things like money and prestige and appearances, over unwavering devotion, integrity and, yes, passion. Passion not just for him but for his family, and for the people of this island.”
“All the things his ex-wife lacked, in other words.”
“Precisely. And once you recognize that, your options become very clear-cut. He’ll probably have sex with you, if that’s all you want and don’t mind walking away without regret afterward. But he’ll never again compromise Adrian’s happiness, or his own, by allowing himself to fall in love with you, unless you can convince him that you’re as capable of loyal commitment as he is.”
“That kind of thing takes time—more than I can afford. Once the wedding’s over, I’ll be gone from here.”
“Then make the most of every minute you have left.”
“But how, on such short acquaintance, does a person tell the difference between infatuation and love?”
“Mon Dieu, child, I don’t have all the answers! I know only what I see, and bring to those observations only the wisdom of my years. Perhaps what exists between the two of you will never amount to more than a superficial attraction and that, indeed, only time will tell. However, if you sincerely wish to begin the journey of discovery, then for heaven’s sake get on with it! Start showing him that you’re not someone to be easily dismissed, regardless of where you’ll be living a week or two from now! Dare to reveal to him all that’s in your heart.”
But did she have that kind of courage? The question plagued Anne-Marie for the rest of the afternoon and throughout the time it took her to dress for dinner.
It was almost midnight, yet the air remained as heavy and close as if the sun still cast its powerful light over the gardens. Exchanging her elegant navy dinner gown for a short sarong printed with scarlet hibiscus, Anne-Marie slipped quietly out of her villa and headed for her favorite retreat.
Though shrouded on either side by deep shadows, the hillside steps lay clearly defined in the moonlight and the sand, when at last she reached the beach and took off her shoes, sifted between her toes like warm flour.
The evening had been a triumph from the moment she set foot in the main house and found Ethan waiting for her. That he’d said not a word when he stepped forward to greet her hadn’t mattered. The firm, almost possessive touch of his hand in the small of her back as he guided her into the salon, and the unspoken approval in his eyes as he poured champagne and regarded her over the rim of his glass, had been enough.
It wasn’t enough now, though. Everyone else might be so sated with good food, wine and conversation that all they wanted was to flop into bed and sleep off the meal, but she was filled with a restless sense of unfinished business, of anticlimax.
The night should not have ended as it had, with formal handshakes, Gallic air-kissing on both cheeks, and her slipping quietly away in a rustle of midnight silk while Ethan directed the Pelletiers to their overnight accommodation.
There should have been something more exciting to round off the occasion, just as the thimble-sized glasses of fine orange liqueur served with rich island coffee had completed the magnificent dinner.
Maybe that was why she cast aside her usual caution and ventured into the sea. Not far at first, to be sure; just enough for the gentle tide to ebb and flow idly around her calves. Stooping, she swished her hands back and forth, and sent tiny sparks of phosphorescence shooting through the water.
Magical, she thought. As magical as this night was meant to be. And made bold by the benign pleasure of the moment, she raised the hem of her sarong and waded in deeper until the waves caressed her thighs as sensually as a lover’s hands.
“Oh, Ethan…!” She murmured his name on a tiny breath full of longing which only she could hear.
Or so she thought. But scarcely had the words escaped her than, with blood-chilling suddenness, a hand slid under her hair and closed around the back of her neck. Letting out a muffled shriek of terror, she spun around to find him standing behind her, with the waves lapping at the hem of his khaki shorts.
“For someone who claims to be afraid of anything deeper than a glass of water, you’re taking a hell of a chance wading in the shallows at this time of night,” he chided. “There are dangers out here, and not all of them lie below the tide line.”
“You mean, I could be mugged and robbed?” She pressed a fist to her ribs, to try to settle her erratic heart, and managed a laugh. “I doubt it! I don’t have anything on me worth stealing.”
His eyes were inscrutable in the dark, his expression unreadable. But his touch, as he trailed his fingers up her throat to her mouth, betrayed a hunger in him which electrified her. “I disagree,” he said, his voice deep and dark. “You possess something any man in his right mind would covet.”
“I do?” She trembled on the edge of expectancy, sure he would kiss her, and hoping it wouldn’t be enough, that he’d want more. That he’d want everything she longed to give.
He didn’t—but why should that surprise her? He seldom did what she hoped or expected. He merely led her to the brink of anticipation, and left her dangling there, hungrier than ever.
“You surprised me tonight,” he remarked, directing her back to shore. “I knew you spoke some French, but I had no idea you were so fluent in the language, or so conversant with current affairs as they pertain to these islands in general, and to Bellefleur in particular. Pelletier was quite smitten by you.”
And you, Ethan? she yearned to ask. Did I misinterpret the warmth in your gaze at dinner? Was there a reason you glanced at me so often, and always with a hint of a smile playing over your mouth, as if we shared a secret too deeply personal to admit to anyone else? “His wife was charming, too, but very quiet.”
Ethan’s laughter echoed across the water. “His wife likes attention—her husband’s and that of every other man in the room, but she found slim pickings tonight. You stole the show. Why didn’t you tell me how accomplished you are?”
“Why didn’t you ask, instead of presuming I’d be an embarrassment to you?”
“I didn’t say that, Anne-Marie.”
“Perhaps not, but I can read what’s going on in your mind.”
“Can you really?” he murmured, his voice a smoky, sultry
counterpoint to the cadence of the sea. “In that case, this shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise.”
And then, when she wasn’t expecting it, he did kiss her, bringing his lips to hers in a fierce, erotic invasion of heat which sent her senses swimming. He explored her mouth, and when he knew it as thoroughly as he knew his own, went on with thrilling dedication to discover her throat, her ear, the bare slope of her shoulder.
“I have wanted to do this all night,” he said roughly, his hands skimming the length of her spine to her hips, and pulling her so close she could feel the urgent throb of his erection through the layers of his clothing.
She clutched at his upper arms, dazed. How was it possible that, with the simple brush of his lips over her skin, he could reach a place within her unfettered by physical boundaries? By what divine intervention did he know how to touch her soul?
His fingers toyed with the top of her sarong. Dipped into her cleavage with tormenting finesse. A moment later, the fabric whispered down her body and left her breasts bare to his gaze.
“From the moment you appeared on the terrace, right through that interminable dinner and all the civilized conversation that went with it, the only thing I wanted was to get you alone and rip that incredibly sexy gown from your body,” he said hoarsely, grazing his palms lightly over her nipples. “Thank God you saved me the trouble. It would have been a pity to lay waste to such a lovely garment.”
A spasm of pleasure shot through her and left her skin puckered with sensation. “I didn’t realize you felt that way,” she whispered. “You seemed so much in command.”
He ripped off his shirt. Wrenched open the buckle at his waist, and kicked off the rest of his clothing. Moonlight glimmered over him, painting his bronzed limbs with silver, and she thought that Josephine had said it best: he was beautiful.
He took her hand, and placed it against his chest, right over his heart. “Does this feel to you like a man in command?” he rumbled, and when she shook her head in mute denial, drew her fingers lower and boldly closed them around his penis. “Does this?”
Her breathing, shallow enough to begin with, seized up altogether at the power and vitality of him. She felt the strength seep from her legs, the warm, damp heat surge between her thighs. Her knees buckled, and she sank to the sand.
He knelt above her and traced the shape of her from head to toe, his hands warm and possessive. He murmured her name and made it sound like angels singing.
He removed her panties, and parted her legs. Touched her—a single brush of his finger only, but it was enough. Enough to make her cry out in exquisite agony and reach for him, desperate to verify that this was no dream; that he really hovered over her, all lean and hard and ready.
He let her touch him. Thrust himself, hot and smooth, against the curve of her palm, before retreating far enough for a whisper of ocean breeze to flutter over her naked body.
“No…!” she begged on a long sigh. “Come to me, Ethan…please! Come now!”
“All in good time, my lovely Canadienne,” he murmured hoarsely, touching her again, this time with his mouth…and its talent defied mortal boundaries.
He made her shimmer from the inside out. His tongue delved and stroked, until she arched like a bow, and flew like an arrow. Until she shattered into a million shining fragments, and came together again more alive than she’d ever been before.
He left her begging and pleading and clutching at him. Reaching for him. Wanting more. Wanting all of him—everything he ever was or ever would be. And when he finally ended the glorious torment and drove into her, she knew that she’d never again be complete without him.
She closed around him, tight and sleek as a second skin. Contracted around the powerful length of him. And briefly reveled in the hot, sweet rush of his seed flooding into her before, once again, she splintered on another wave of ecstasy.
Of course, it had to end, unrehearsed miracle that their coming together had been, and she braced herself, expecting that, once the rush subsided, he’d pull away and again disappear behind the cool reserve that was too often his stock in trade.
When he did not, and instead lay with his weight pressing her into the soft white sand, and his breath gusting damp at her ear, and his hand idly stroking her hair, a slender hope sprang alive that perhaps he’d been taken by the same emotional storm as she had. Was it possible, she wondered dreamily, that they’d embarked on that journey of discovery Josephine had talked about?
At last—too soon—he stirred and, lifting his head, planted a kiss on the corner of her mouth. “Well?” he said. “How do you feel? Full of regret?”
“Mm-mm.” She shook her head, loving the feel of his cheek rasping slightly against hers. “Blissed out! What just happened between us…it was so much more than I dared to hope for!”
Laughter rumbled deep in his chest. “I’m not sure that’s a compliment!”
“Oh, Ethan, never doubt for a moment that it was wonderful!”
“Oui.” He kissed her again, lightly, tenderly. “For once, you and I are in agreement. What a pity that it has to end so soon, that we can’t spend the rest of this singular night together. But my son—”
“I understand,” she said. “You have to be there when Adrian wakes in the morning.”
“Yes.” He ran his finger over her mouth, unaware of the surge of desire to which his casual embrace gave rise. “And you, too, must leave, Anne-Marie, because I meant what I said earlier. This is not a smart idea, to be wandering alone in such an isolated spot.”
“But I love it here,” she reasoned. “I love to watch the shooting stars streaming across the sky, and the reflection of the moon rippling over the night-calm sea. I love the tranquility of the island at rest, soothed by the quiet lullaby of the surf.”
“Very lyrical, I’m sure, but don’t be fooled by it,” he replied, unmoved. “The sea can turn into a monster without warning, and who do you think would hear your cries for help and come to your rescue, should you find yourself in difficulties?”
“You,” she said, leaning into him. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned since I came here, it’s that you’re always there when you’re needed.”
“Not always. I’m as fallible as the next man, Anne-Marie. You can count on me for only so much.”
It was as close to a warning as she wanted to get, that she shouldn’t expect one night to translate into forever.
“Then I’ll be more careful,” she said lightly. “I’ll only ever come here again after dark if I know I won’t be alone.”
“Temptress!” He smiled, sprang lithely to his feet, and offered his hand. “Come. I’ll take you home.”
“No.” She shook her head, aware that if she presumed too much, pushed too hard for a closeness he wasn’t ready to accept, then the regrets he’d spoken of would arise, and they’d be all his. “I can make it back on my own. I’ve traveled the cliff path often enough in the dark that I’m familiar with it.”
“But I have another way, safer and swifter.” He gestured down the beach to a spot where the encroaching jungle met the sand in a tangle of lush undergrowth, and she saw a horse grazing there; a ghostly, graceful creature, its flanks dappled by moonlight. So that was how he’d managed to sneak up on her so easily!
“Come,” he said again, climbing into his clothes and draping her sarong around her breasts. “This way, we can prolong the pleasure of the night a little longer.”
Denying him was beyond her. He vaulted astride the animal, then reached down and hoisted her up behind him. “Hold on tight,” he ordered—as if she needed any encouragement!—clicked his tongue, and they were off in a powdery thud of hooves, a mile or more along the shore to a place where a broad trail opened out.
She’d never ridden bareback before; never clung to a body so lean and strong and capable; never felt so secure, so cherished. And she knew that if she lived to be a hundred, the memory of this night would remain, undimmed by the passing years.
It ended too s
oon, of course. Cresting a final slope, Ethan drew the horse to a halt in the lee of guest pavilions, and dismounted. “À demain, ma chère,” he murmured, as she slid down into his waiting arms. “Sleep well.”
À demain—until tomorrow.
Oh, yes, she’d sleep! And with such implicit promise to pave the way, in her dreams she’d hoard every touch, every kiss, every word they’d exchanged. “Oui,” she breathed, lifting her face for one last kiss. “À demain.”
CHAPTER NINE
SHE did indeed see Ethan the next morning, but only from a distance. Since he appeared to be in a hurry and too preoccupied to notice her, she didn’t attempt to draw his attention. Refusing to allow the keen sense of letdown to take hold—for what woman wanted to learn that she was so soon forgettable?—she instead took herself back to her workroom, and told herself to stop behaving like a teenager in the throes of puppy love. One encounter, no matter how memorable, did not amount to a lifetime commitment, except in romance novels.
Later that afternoon though, when she stopped by to visit Josephine, and learned that he and Adrian had flown to Miami and would be gone at least overnight and possibly longer, her disappointment wasn’t so easy to contain.
“Did he not bother to tell you he was called away?” Josephine inquired, skewering Anne-Marie in her penetrating, all-seeing gaze, and discerning far too much.
“Why would he?” Anne-Marie looked out at the blue afternoon with pretended indifference. So much for making an indelible impression on the man! “He hardly needs my permission to go wherever he pleases.”
For the next forty-eight hours, she put aside her dented pride and drove herself to the point of exhaustion, finishing the dresses. But best intentions notwithstanding, nothing could silence the questions hammering in her head. Why hadn’t Ethan told her he was leaving? Was he deliberately avoiding her? Was this his way of telling her that, in the greater scheme of things, she simply didn’t count?
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