Kitabı oku: «It Started With A Kiss», sayfa 3
Rafe’s eyes widened. It sounded as if she’d been there, done that. She was becoming more interesting by the minute.
‘That kind of physical affair never lasts,’ she finished bitterly.
Yep. She’d been there, done that, all right. Rafe didn’t know if he felt tantalised by this knowledge, or jealous. Either way, the thought of Isabel in the throes of an all-consuming sexual passion was an intriguing one.
‘Is that what you’re hoping?’ he suggested. ‘That maybe this thing your Luke is having with this girl won’t last? That maybe he’ll wake up on Monday morning, realise he’s made a big mistake and beg you to take him back?’
‘Well, actually, no. I hadn’t been hoping that. But now that you’ve mentioned the possibility…’
Luke could have kicked himself.
‘Don’t start grasping at straws, Isabel.’
‘I’m not. But I’m also not going to repeat the mistakes of my past. So, thank you for thinking of me, Rafe. But find someone else to photograph, and to take to dinner, because it isn’t going to be me.’
‘Isabel, please…’
‘No, Rafe,’ she said sternly. ‘I realise you have difficulty in accepting that word, but it’s definitely no. Now I must go. Goodbye.’
And she hung up on him.
Swearing, Rafe slammed down his end of the phone. He’d handled that all wrong. Totally abysmally wrong!
Still, perhaps it was for the best. Isabel wanted marriage. Whereas he most definitely didn’t.
But she was wrong about what he wanted from her. It wasn’t just sex.
Oh, come now, the voice of brutal honesty piped up. It’s always just sex you’re looking for these days. All that other stuff you offer a female is nothing but foreplay. The chit-chat. The photographing. The dinner dates. All with one end in view. Getting whatever pretty woman has taken your eye into bed and keeping her there on and off till you grow bored.
Which you always do in the end. Admit it, man, you’ve become shallow and selfish with women, exactly as Isabel said you were. You haven’t been worth two bob since Liz left you. She stuffed you, buddy. Took away your heart. Isabel was right not to get involved with you. You’re a dead loss to someone like her. Go back to work. That’s the only thing you’re good for. Creating images. Anything real is just too much for you.
He stomped downstairs, still muttering. Till he saw Isabel’s shiny blue cellphone on the hall table. How odd that just seeing something she owned gave him a thrill.
Did he dare still take it back to her?
No, he decided. She’d said no. He had to respect that. He’d post it to her on Monday, as she’d asked.
Feeling more empty and wretched than he had in years, Rafe returned to his darkroom and tried to bury himself in the one thing which had always sustained him, even in his darkest moments.
But, for the second time that day, his precious craft failed to deliver the distraction he craved.
CHAPTER FIVE
ISABEL groaned. She’d handled that all wrong; talked too much; revealed too much.
Alcohol always made her talkative.
She thanked her stars that she’d pulled herself together towards the end—and that she’d had enough courage to resist temptation.
But oh, she’d wanted to say yes. To everything he’d offered. The photography. The dinner date. Sex after wards, no doubt.
Isabel closed her eyes at the thought.
They sprang open again at another thought. Her mobile!
Would he still post it to her after all she’d said to him? Her assassination of his character had been a bit brutal, even if correct. He hadn’t denied a single word. Okay, so the man did have a sweet side. But how much of that was real? Maybe he’d just learnt that you caught more with honey than with salt.
If he was really sweet, then he’d post her phone back. If not?
Isabel shrugged. She couldn’t worry about a phone. If she never got it back, then she’d report it lost and get another one. After all, she didn’t have to watch her pennies any more. She was an independently wealthy woman now. Or she would be soon.
Luke would be as good as his word. That, she knew.
Isabel wandered down the hallway to her mother’s kitchen, thinking about Luke. Was it possible he might change his mind about this Celia? Or was she simply looking for an excuse not to tell her parents the wedding was off when they came home?
Just the thought of their reaction—especially her mother’s—made Isabel shudder. If she hadn’t been over the drink-driving limit, she’d pack up her car right now and make a bolt for the town house Luke had given her. She had her own set of keys.
Unfortunately, as it was, there was nothing but to stay here and face the music.
The music, as it turned out, was terrible. Her father recovered somewhat after Isabel explained Luke was going to recompense them for everything they’d spent. But her mother could not be so easily soothed, not even when Isabel told her what Luke was doing for her in a financial sense. When Isabel repeated Luke’s suggestion that her parents go on their pre-booked holiday to Dream Island, her mother’s face carried horror.
‘You think I could be happy going on what should have been your honeymoon?’ she exclaimed. ‘No wonder Luke left you for another woman. You have no sensitivity at all! I dare say he worked out that you were only marrying him for his money. So he gave you what you wanted, then looked elsewhere for some genuine love and warmth.’
Isabel was stunned by her mother’s harsh words. ‘You think I was only marrying Luke for his money?’
Her mother flushed, but still looked her straight in the eye. ‘You weren’t in love with the man. That, I know. I’ve seen you in love, girl, and what you felt for Luke wasn’t it. You cold-bloodedly set out to get that man. I didn’t say a word because I thought Luke would make a fine husband and father, and I hoped that you might eventually fall in love with him. You played false with him, Isabel. And you got what you deserved.’
‘Dot, stop it,’ Isabel’s father intervened sharply. ‘What’s done is done. And who knows? Maybe it’s all for the best. Maybe someone better will come along, someone our girl can like and love.’
Isabel gave her father a grateful look. But she was close to tears. And very hurt by her mother’s lack of sympathy and understanding. ‘I…I have to go and ring Rachel,’ she said, desperate to get away from her mother’s hostility. Rachel would at least be on her side.
‘What about everyone else?’ her mother threw after her. ‘Who’s going to make all the other phone calls necessary to cancel everything?’
‘I’ll do all that, Mum.’
‘On our phone?’
Isabel closed her eyes for a second. Phones. They were her nemesis today. ‘No,’ she said wearily. ‘I’ll be moving into the town house Luke gave me tomorrow. I’ll make all the calls from there.’
‘You’re moving out?’ Suddenly, her mother looked wretchedly unhappy.
Isabel sighed. ‘I think I should.’
‘You…you don’t have to, you know,’ her mother said, her voice and chin wobbling. ‘I don’t really care about the phone bill.’
Isabel understood then that her mother had been lashing out from her own hurt and disappointment. She’d always wanted to see her only daughter married. And now that event seemed highly unlikely.
Because her mother was right, Isabel conceded. She had set out to get Luke rather cold-bloodedly, and she simply couldn’t do that again. Which left what? Falling in love with another Mr Wrong?
No! Now that was on her list of never-do-again.
‘It’s all right, Mum,’ Isabel said, giving her mother a hug. ‘Everything will be all right. You’ll see.’
Her mother began to cry then, with Isabel struggling not to join in.
She looked beseechingly at her father over her Mum’s dropped head and he nodded. ‘Go ring Rachel,’ he said quietly. ‘I’ll look after her.’
Rachel, who was Isabel’s only real female friend and now the owner of an unused wine-red bridesmaid dress, answered on the first ring.
‘Can you talk?’ was Isabel’s first question. ‘Have I rung at a bad time?’
Rachel’s life was devoted to minding her foster-mother who had Alzheimer’s. She’d been doing it twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, for over four years now. Despite being a labour of love, it was a grinding existence with little pleasure or leisure. Rachel’s decision to take on this onerous task after her foster-mum’s husband had deserted her, had cost her her job as a top secretary at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, and her own partner at the time. Sacrifice, it seemed, was not a virtue men aspired to.
Nowadays, Rachel made ends meet by doing clothes alterations at home. Her only entertainment was reading and watching television, plus one night out a month which Isabel paid for and organised. Last night had actually been one of those times, Isabel taking her friend to Star City Casino for dinner then a show afterwards. It was a pleasing thought that she’d have the time and the money to take Rachel out more often now.
‘It’s okay,’ Rachel said. ‘Lettie’s asleep. Thank goodness. It’s been a really bad day. She didn’t even know me. Or she pretended not to. She’s always difficult the day after I’ve been out with you. I don’t think she likes anyone else but me minding her.’
‘Poor Rachel. I’m sorry to ring you with more bad news.’
‘Oh, no, what’s happened?’
‘The wedding’s off.’
‘The miserable bastard,’ was Rachel’s immediate response, which rather startled Isabel.
‘What makes you think it was Luke’s doing?’
‘I know you, Isabel. No way would you opt out of marrying Luke. So what was it? Another woman?’
‘How did you guess?’ Isabel said ruefully.
‘It wasn’t hard. Men are so typical.’
‘Mum blames me. She says Luke looked elsewhere because I didn’t love him.’
‘You confessed it wasn’t a romantic match?’
‘No, she guessed.’
‘Oh, well, you have to agree she had a few clues to go on. Luke wasn’t your usual type. Too traditionally good-looking and far too straight-down-the-line.’
‘Mmm. It turned out he wasn’t quite the Mr Goody-Two-Shoes I thought he was. Not once he met the sexy Celia.’
‘So who is sexy Celia? Where and when did he meet her?’
‘He only met her yesterday, and she’s his father’s mistress’s daughter.’
‘What?’ Rachel choked out. ‘Would you like to repeat that?’
She did, along with the rest of Luke’s story. Isabel had to admit it made fascinating listening. It wasn’t every day that a son found out his high-profile hero-status father had been cheating on his mother for twenty years. Or that the same engaged and rather strait-laced son would jump into bed with the mistress’s daughter within an hour or two of meeting her.
Isabel still did not believe that Luke was in love with this Celia, but he obviously thought he was after spending all night with her doing who knew what. Even now he was speeding back up to his dad’s secret love-nest on Lake Macquarie for more of the same!
It sounded like an episode from a soap opera.
No, a week of episodes!
Rachel’s ear was glued to the phone for a good fifteen minutes.
‘You didn’t tell your mother all that, did you?’ she asked at the end of it.
‘No. I just said he’d met someone else, fallen in love with her and decided he couldn’t go through with the wedding.’
‘At least he was decent enough to do that. A lot of guys these days would have tried to have their cake and eat it too, a bit like Luke’s father did with this Celia’s poor mother for twenty years.’
‘Yes. I thought of that. But I also wondered if Luke might eventually realise it wasn’t love he felt for Celia, but just good old lust.’
‘Could be. So you’d take him back if he changed his mind?’
‘In a shot.’
‘Maybe I shouldn’t alter my bridesmaid dress just yet, then.’
‘Maybe not.’
‘And maybe you shouldn’t cancel the reception place, or the cake, or the photographer. Not for a couple of days, anyway.’
Isabel wished Rachel hadn’t mentioned the photographer. She didn’t want to think about Rafe.
‘Oh, dear, I think Lettie’s just called out for me,’ Rachel said. ‘Amazing how she’s remembered my name now that I’m on the phone. I must go, Isabel. And I am sorry. But…’
‘Don’t you dare tell me it’s all for the best,’ Isabel warned.
Rachel laughed. ‘All right, I won’t. Keep in touch.’
‘I will.’ When Isabel got off the phone, she realised she hadn’t told Rachel about her financial windfall. But she would, the next time she rang her.
Meanwhile, she set about packing her clothes. She was emptying the drawers in her old dressing table when her mother came into the bedroom, looking miserable and chastened.
‘I feel terrible about what I said to you earlier, Isabel. Your father said I should have my tongue cut out.’
‘It’s all right, Mum. You were upset.’
‘What I said. I…I don’t think you were marrying Luke just for his money. I know you liked him a lot, too.’
‘Yes, I did.’
‘Do…do you think he might not have fallen for this other girl if you’d slept with him before the wedding?’
Isabel turned to stare at her mother. Truly, what world did she live in? ‘Mum,’ she said with a degree of exasperation, ‘I did sleep with him. Quite often.’
‘Oh…’
‘And he liked it. A lot.’
‘Oh!’
‘Sex wasn’t the problem. It was passion.’
‘Passion?’
‘Yes, that overwhelming feeling you get when you look at a person and you just have to be with them.’
‘Jump into bed, you mean?’
‘Yes. Luke and I never really felt like that about each other.’
‘I used to feel that way about your dad,’ her mother whispered, ‘when we were first married. And he felt that way about me, too.’
Isabel smiled at her. ‘That’s good, Mum. That’s how it should be.’
‘Maybe your dad’s right. Maybe you’ll find someone nicer than Luke, someone you’ll fall deeply in love with and who’ll feel the same way about you.’
‘I hope so, Mum. I really do.’ It would be cruel to take away her mother’s hope. She’d always had this dream of seeing her daughter as a bride. Isabel had had the same dream.
But not any more.
‘You’re still going to move out?’ her mother asked a bit tearily.
Isabel stopped what she was doing to face her mother. ‘Mum, I’m thirty years old. I’m a grown woman. I have to make my own life away from home, regardless. I only moved back in for a while because it was sensible and convenient, leading up to the wedding.’
‘But I…I’ve liked having you home. You are very good company.’
Isabel thought the compliment came just a bit late.
‘You’re a good cook, too. Your dad and I are going to miss the meals you’ve cooked for us.’
Isabel relented and gave her mother another hug. ‘What say I come over and cook you a meal once in a while? Will that do?’
‘Just so long as you come over. Don’t be a stranger.’
‘I won’t. I promise.’
‘And you’ve forgiven your old mum?’
Isabel smiled a wry smile. ‘Have you forgiven me for not giving you some grandchildren by now?’
‘Having children isn’t everything, Isabel.’
Isabel gave her a dry look. ‘Said by a woman who had five.’
‘Then I should know. What you need to do is find the right man. Then the children will follow.’
‘Don’t you think I’ve been trying to do that?’
‘Don’t try so hard. You’re a beautiful girl. Just let nature take its course.’
Isabel was tempted to tell her that nature always led her up the garden path into the arms of men who’d never give her children.
But it was too late to confess such matters. She’d never told her mother the bitter truth about her boyfriends. She hadn’t wanted to shock her. To reveal all now would only make her look even worse than she already did in her mother’s eyes.
‘Are you sure you don’t want to go on that Dream Island holiday, Mum?’ she asked, deciding a change of subject was called for.
‘Positive. I’m too old that for that kind of holiday, anyway. Look, why don’t you go yourself?’
‘It’s not a place you go alone.’
‘Then ask a friend to go with you.’
Isabel thought immediately of Rafe… He’d jump at the chance of going with her, all expenses paid!
It was a tantalising idea. Did she dare? Could she actually do something like that without getting emotionally involved?
Perhaps she could. Her experience with Luke had changed her, made her stronger and much more self-reliant. She’d gone after what she wanted for once, listening to her head and not her heart. She’d actually gone to bed with a man she didn’t love, and quite enjoyed it. Her mind no longer irrevocably linked sexual pleasure and being in love.
Just because Rafe was more like the type of man she’d used to fall in love with willy-nilly, that didn’t mean she would fall in love this time. She also had the added advantage of knowing in advance that he wasn’t interested in marriage or children. There would never be any fooling herself that she had a future with him.
He’d just be a passing pleasure. A salve to her pride and a comfort to her bruised female ego. Not to mention a comfort to her female body!
By the time she got through the next fortnight, cancelling everything and putting up with everyone’s condolences, she’d need comforting. And what better way than on a balmy tropical island in the arms of a gorgeous man you fancied like mad, and who seemed to fancy you in return?
‘Isabel?’
Isabel shook herself out of her provocative thoughts.
‘Yes, Mum?’
‘Well, what do you think about finding a friend to go away on that holiday with you? If you can’t get your money back, it does seem a shame to waste it.’
‘We’ll see, Mum.’ She’d better sleep on the idea. She’d been knocked for a couple of sixes today. And she had been drinking. The booked holiday on Dream Island didn’t start for another fortnight and she doubted Rafe was going anywhere in a hurry. Maybe if she felt the same way in the cold light of Monday morning…
A shiver ran down Isabel’s spine at the thought of doing something that bold. It was one thing to deliberately go to bed with a man like Luke, when your intention was marriage. Quite another to contemplate a strictly sexual affair with the likes of Rafe Saint Vincent!
CHAPTER SIX
RAFE didn’t sleep well that night, which wasn’t like him. Usually, he was out like a light soon after his head hit the pillow.
But not this time. He tossed and turned. Even got up on one occasion and poured himself a stiff drink.
The trouble with that, however, was it reminded him even more forcibly of the reason for his insomnia.
Had she drunk some more after hanging up on him? Was she also up, wandering around the house in her nightie with another glass of whisky clutched in her hands?
He carried that image of her back to bed with him and tossed and turned some more, his hormone-revved head wondering what kind of nightie it might be. Short or long? Provocative or prissy?
Various alternatives came to mind. She’d look delicious in long creamy satin, and wickedly sexy in short black lace. Better still in nothing at all.
His groan was the groan of a man suffering from a case of serious sexual frustration. Which would never do if he wanted to get some sleep. And he did. He hadn’t finished his work today and he’d have to beaver away at it all day tomorrow. No Sunday brunch down at Darling Harbour with his mother. No slouching around watching the cooking shows on satellite.
Dragging himself up again, he made his way into the bathroom, where he had the hottest of hot showers, a technique he’d found worked much better on him than cold. The heat sapped his energy, and relaxed his tense muscles and other aching parts. After a good twenty minutes of sauna-type soaking, he snapped off the water, dried himself with one of his extra-fluffy white bath sheets, then fell, naked and pink-skinned, back into bed.
An hour later he was still wide awake.
Swearing, he rose, pulled on his black silk robe, made himself some very strong coffee and trudged downstairs to his darkroom where he surprised himself by working like a demon for several hours. It was light when he emerged, but by this time he was too exhausted to care. He went upstairs, switched off his mobile, took his other phone off the hook, closed the roller shutter which he’d recently installed on his bedroom window and collapsed into bed.
If his oblivion was ravaged by erotic dreams, he certainly didn’t recall them, but he was embarrassingly erect when he was wrenched out of his blissful coma by the sound of his front doorbell ringing. It was just as well, Rafe decided as he struggled out of bed, that the robe he was still wearing provided discreet coverage. Because he had no intention of getting dressed. He was going to get rid of whoever was at the door, then go back to bed for the rest of the day.
It was Isabel, looking as if she was on her way to afternoon tea with the Queen.
Cream linen trouser suit. Blue silk top. Pearls. Pink lipstick. And that lovely blonde hair of hers, slicked back up in that prissy roll thing.
Her perfect grooming highlighted his own dishevelled appearance. Why couldn’t he have any luck with this woman?
‘I presume you’ve come for your phone,’ he grumped.
She looked him up and down with about the same expression she had when she’d first arrived yesterday. ‘Sorry to get you out of bed,’ she said drily. ‘But it is two in the afternoon.’
Rafe decided there was no point in telling her the truth, that he’d worked most of the night because of her.
‘Yeah well, we party animals do get tired. And last night was Saturday night. I didn’t get to bed till dawn.’
‘Alone?’
He crossed his arms. ‘Such a personal question for a lady who’s just come for her phone.’
‘You said I’d just come for my phone. I didn’t.’
Rafe stared at her. Was he about to get lucky here?
‘Do you think I might come inside?’ she went on in that silkily cool voice of hers, the one which rippled down his spine like a mink glove.
‘Be my guest,’ he said eagerly, stepping back to wave her inside.
‘I need to go to the bathroom,’ she said straight away. ‘I’ve just driven straight down from Gosford Hospital.’
Rafe frowned as he swung the front door shut behind him. ‘What were you doing up there?’ And, even more to the point, what was she doing here? The suburb of Paddington was not on the way from the Central Coast to her address at Burwood. So she wouldn’t have dropped in just to use his toilet!
His heart was already thudding with carnal hopes.
‘Luke was in a car accident on the F3 freeway yesterday,’ she said.
‘Is he all right?’
‘A few bumps and bruises. Nothing too serious. But he knocked his head and was unconscious for a while. The police found my number in his car and contacted me early this morning, so of course I had to go and see how he was.’
‘He’s having some rotten luck on the road lately, isn’t he? First his parents and now him. Does his new girlfriend know about this?’
‘Yes, I was there when she arrived. With her mother.’
‘The infamous mother. What was she like?’
‘The bathroom first, please, Rafe?’
‘Oh, yes—yes, of course. This way.’ He had the presence of mind to take her upstairs, instead of to the small downstairs toilet. The main bathroom upstairs was quite spacious and luxurious, another recent renovation. He’d been steadily renovating his terraced home since he’d bought it a couple of years back. It had cost him a small fortune, despite being little more than a dump. But, as in all big cities, you paid for position.
After showing her where the bathroom was, he dashed into his bedroom to dress. Hurrying into his walk-in robe, he ran his eye along the hangers, wondering what to wear. The day wasn’t hot, but neither was it cold. Lately they’d had typical spring weather in Sydney, fresh in the morning but warming up as the day progressed, provided it wasn’t cloudy. And it wasn’t today, judging by the sunshine on his doorstep just now.
By the time Isabel emerged from the bathroom Rafe was looking and feeling a bit better in his favourite black jeans and a fresh white T-shirt. But his face still sported a two-day stubble and his feet were bare.
There was only so much a man could achieve in just over three minutes, the time it took for Isabel to emerge. Clearly she wasn’t a girl who titivated.
‘Nice bathroom,’ she said crisply.
He’d known she’d like it. It was all white, with glass and silver fittings. Cool and classy-looking, like she was.
‘You might not like this room as much,’ he said as he led her into his main living room, which was decorated for comfort rather than style. No traditional lounge suite, just huge squashy armchairs to sit in, functional side tables, far too many bookcases and an old marble fireplace which he never used, although the mantelpiece was good for leaning on and holding glasses during a party. He had a hi-fi set in one corner and a television and video in the other.
‘I like the doors,’ Isabel said, as she sat in his favourite armchair, a reclining one covered in crushed claret-coloured velvet.
He glanced at the white-painted French doors which led out onto the small terrace. ‘They’re purely decorative,’ he said. ‘I never open them because of the traffic noise.’
‘What a pity.’
He shrugged. ‘You can’t have everything.’
‘No,’ she agreed with a touch of bitterness in her voice. ‘You certainly can’t.’
Rafe sank down in a cream leather armchair facing her, and tried to guess at why she’d come to see him.
‘The mother was stunningly good-looking for a woman of forty plus,’ she said abruptly. ‘And the daughter was…well, let me just say that I don’t think Luke is going to have a change of heart and marry me after all.’
‘Were you seriously hoping he would?’
‘Stupidly, I think I was beginning to. Which is really pathetic. But on the drive back to Sydney today I decided I had to stop hoping for some man to come along and give me what I want out of life. I have to go out and get it for myself. And if it’s not quite what I’ve dreamt about all these years, if I have to compromise, then that’s just the way life is.’
‘That sounds sensible,’ Rafe said, even though he had no idea exactly what she meant. ‘So what is it you’re going to do? And where do I come into the equation?’
She smiled. She actually smiled. Only a small, wry little smile, but it was even better than he’d imagined. Or worse. He’d do anything she asked of him, be anything she wanted him to be. If only she’d let him make love to her.
‘The thing is, Rafe, I’ve always wanted a baby,’ she announced baldly and Rafe nearly died of shock.
Hold it there, buddy, he reassessed. Now that was one thing he wasn’t going to do, even if it did mean he’d get to do what he wanted to do most at that moment.
‘Naturally, I would prefer to have a husband,’ she went on, with an elegant shrug of her slender shoulders, ‘or at least a live-in partner before having a child.’
‘Naturally,’ he said with heavy emphasis.
‘But that’s simply not going to happen in my case in the near future, and time is running out for me. So I’ve decided to opt for artificial insemination from a clinic which supplies well-documented but anonymous donors.’
Rafe was both relieved and confused. Why was she telling him all this?
‘Now that Luke is going to make me an independent woman of means, I don’t need a man’s financial support to have a child,’ she elaborated. ‘I can well afford to raise one on my own. I could put the child in daycare and go back to work, if I so desired. Or hire a nanny. Of course, I do realise it’s not an ideal situation, but then, it’s not an ideal world, is it?’
‘No,’ Rafe agreed. ‘But why are you telling me all this, Isabel?’ he finally asked.
‘I’m just filling you in on my plans so you can understand the reasons behind the proposition I am going to make you.’
‘And what proposition is that?’
‘I want you to come to Dream Island with me on the honeymoon Luke and I booked.’
Rafe tried not to gape. ‘Er…run that by me again?’
‘You heard me,’ she said in a straight-down-the-line, no-nonsense fashion.
Rafe stared at her. Wow. Talk about a shock.
He might have been ecstatic if he hadn’t been just a tad wary. The thought that she might have some sneaky plan to use his sperm to impregnate herself without his knowing did not escape him. Though, if that was the case, why tell him about her intention to have a baby at all? Better to keep that a secret if that had been her hidden agenda.
‘Why?’ he demanded to know.
‘Well, it isn’t because I don’t want to waste money,’ she threw at him with a measure of exasperation. ‘Even though the honeymoon package was all prepaid and it’s too late to cancel. I want you to come with me because I want you to come with me.’
Rafe had difficulty embracing the possibility that she just wanted him for sex, even though it was the most exciting thought. All his fantasies of the night before coming true!
‘As what, exactly?’ he persisted. ‘If you think I’m going to pretend to be your husband as a salve to your pride, then you can think again.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous. I wouldn’t insult you like that. You’ll be with me as my…my lover.’
Mmm, she’d choked a bit over that last word. He stared deep into her eyes and tried to see what was in her mind.
‘Yes, but is my role as lover just a pretend one, or do I get to have the real thing with you?’
She blushed, and it enchanted him as much as it had the first time. It also didn’t gel with her wanting him as little more than a toy boy. She just didn’t seem to be that kind of girl.
‘Spell it out for me, Isabel. I might be being dense but I’m still not getting the full picture here.’
She sucked in deeply, then let the air out of her lungs very slowly, as though she was gathering the courage to say what she had to say. He watched her, fascinated and intrigued.
