announce some clear physical evidence of the father who’d sired her child, but she couldn’t. ‘My features. My hair. My eyes …’ She could have told him her daughter had her father’s smile, his stubbornness, his ability to charm the socks off anyone. But it would not be enough, so she didn’t say it. ‘She was a late talker but an early walker. And she likes to be smiled at. If you frown at her she’ll cry. She has done from—’
Her throat locked, choking her, because she had a sudden vision of those people who had taken her, frowning all the time and—
Oh, God. ‘Nicolas,’ she whispered starkly. ‘I’m frightened.’
He turned, his eyes as dark as his expression. ‘I know,’ he acknowledged quietly.
‘If they hurt my baby—’ Again she stopped, having to struggle with the fear clawing at her insides. ‘Would they hurt a baby?’ Her eyes were dark with torment. ‘Could they hurt a baby?’
‘Don’t,’ he sighed, but for once his voice sounded rough and unsteady, and the shoulders beneath the shirt flexed as if they could not cope with the tension attacking them. ‘They will not hurt her,’ he insisted. ‘It will serve them no useful purpose to hurt her.’
‘Then why this long silence?’ She stared at him wretchedly. ‘What are they waiting for?’
‘It is a game they are playing with us,’ he grimly replied. ‘The cruel game of making us sweat. They do it to push up the ante, so that by the time they do call again we will be so out of our heads that we will agree to anything.’
‘And will you—agree to anything?’
‘Oh, God,’ he rasped, his fingers going up to rub at his aching eyes. ‘How many times do I have to tell you that I will do whatever is in my power to get your child back?’ He turned on her angrily.
Remorse brought tears brimming into her eyes. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she whispered. ‘But it’s just all so …’
His harsh sigh eased her of the need to finish. ‘Come on,’ he said, and bent to lift her firmly to her feet. ‘You are exhausted; you need rest which you will not get here.’
He was right; she was so tired that she could barely stand on her own, but she pleaded with him, ‘Don’t send me back to that bedroom. Please! I feel so alone there!’
‘You will not be alone.’ Grimly, he plucked the pink teddy from her fingers, then laid it back in the cot. ‘For I shall be with you.’
‘You?’ She frowned in surprised confusion. ‘But—’
‘I will brook no protest from you, Sara,’ he cut in warningly. ‘You need rest. I am offering you the physical comfort of my presence. The alternative is two sleeping tablets the doctor left for just such a contingency. The choice is yours. Make it, but make it quickly or I will do it for you.’
Her luminous eyes lifted to search his, trying to discover why he was suddenly being like this. His own lashes lowered, two arcs of black settling against his cheekbones to hide what was going on in his head.
Something happened inside her—a soft flutter of yearning. A need. A memory of a time when this man had been as gentle and caring as any woman could wish for.
‘You wish me to make this decision?’ he prompted, at her continuing silence.
‘Your accent is thickening,’ she remarked, quite out of context.
He looked nonplussed momentarily, then grimaced. ‘That is because I am as tired as you are,’ he sighed. And in an act of failing patience he bent and lifted her into his arms. ‘Your time is up,’ he muttered, moving out of the baby’s room and down the hallway to her own room. ‘The decision is taken from you.’
He walked to the bed and allowed her bare feet to slide to the floor. Then he was grimly dealing with her robe, drawing it from her shoulders and tossing it aside to reveal a matching gown of the smoothest coffee satin, before leaning past her to flick back the covers on the bed.
‘In,’ he commanded.
Meekly, she did as she was told, while he turned his attention to extracting his mobile phone from his trouser pocket.
‘Toni?’ His voice was curt, demanding attention, not responses. ‘I am with Sara. Disturb me only when it is time.’ Click. The mobile was flicked shut.
‘What did that mean?’ she asked sharply, her wide eyes watching every move he made as he placed the mobile on the bedside table.
‘Nothing,’ he dismissed. ‘I am expecting a call from New York.’
He began striding around the room, turning off table lamps until only the small silk-shaded one by the bed remained illuminated. Then he returned to the side of the bed, and, never once glancing at Sara, though she was sure he was aware that she never took her eyes off him, he discarded his shoes then stretched out beside her.
‘Nic—’ she began pensively.
‘Shush,’ he cut in. ‘Go to sleep.’
‘I was only going to say—thank you,’ she whispered.
He didn’t reply, didn’t move, didn’t do anything but lie there staring at the ceiling above their heads. Sara watched him do it, watched until her eyes began to sting and her lids grew heavy, watched until she could no longer watch, and at last drifted into sleep.
He was still lying there over an hour later, but had moved onto his side and was half dozing when she suddenly groaned and moved restlessly, throwing off the covers and twisting out of them so that she could curl herself against him instead.
‘Nic,’ she whispered, then placed her warm lips against his.
It was his downfall. He knew it and despised himself for it even as he gave in to it.
But she tasted so sweet. So exquisitely sweet. Like nothing he had ever tasted anywhere else in his life but from her …
It was wonderful. Like floating on a soft, fluffy cloud of rich, warm euphoria. Her body felt as light as a feather but her limbs were heavy, somnolent with the most honeyed delight. And her flesh was smiling. Could flesh smile? she asked herself wonderingly. Because hers certainly was. And since this was her dream she could let herself do and feel anything she liked. So, yes, her flesh was smiling, its outermost layer caressed by something warm and moist and infinitely pleasing.
She tried breathing not fast but slowly, savouring the sensual pull of oxygen into her lungs which seemed to set off a chain reaction throughout her body, setting her senses pulsing, slow and easy like the cloud she was floating on, the smile on her flesh, the sigh she released as she exhaled again.
‘Nic,’ she whispered.
That was what this was. It reminded her of Nicolas in one of his lazy, loving moods when he would lick her skin from toes to fingertips, raising a million and one sensations of pleasure all over her, rendering her lost and helpless. His to do with as he pleased.
‘Sweet,’ a hushed voice suggested.
Oh, God, yes, this was sweet, she agreed silently. The sweetest, sweetest
