most hospitable.’ She managed a smile as her heart jolted with desire. ‘Will you come to Lydyard’s Pride one afternoon? For tea?’
‘No. I will not.’
The humour vanished. The whole pleasant house of cards they had just constructed collapsed around them.
‘Why not?’
‘I would not be made welcome there.’
‘But why would you not? What on earth have you done to cause this impasse? Meggie will not say, and neither will you. How can I accept what I do not understand?’ She frowned at him, her dark brows meeting in frustration. ‘You don’t like the Hallastons, do you?’
‘No.’
‘There! Again! That’s no answer, Zan.’ Her fingers gripped hard when he would have released them. ‘Why won’t you tell me the truth?’
‘Because I choose not to. Goodbye.’ He kissed her fingers once more with an elegant little bow. ‘You have made your morning call and reprimanded me for my lack of duty in fulfilling my own obligations to you. You have seen and disparaged the way I live. Let that be an end to it. Whatever is between us—it can be explained away as a momentary foolishness. We should acknowledge it and bury it. It’s good advice, Madame Mermaid. I advise you to take it.’
‘No. I won’t.’ The frown became almost a scowl. How effective he was at dismissing her, at putting her at a distance. ‘Three days ago you called me Marie-Claude. Your told me I was beautiful and that you had known me all your life. And now you tell me to put it aside as if it had no meaning? Three days ago you kissed me.’
‘So I did and I should not have done so. Forget what happened.’
‘I will not.’ A determination stormed through Marie-Claude, to hold tight to what she believed might be if he would only allow it. ‘If you will not come to me at the Pride, then I must come to you. But you have to agree. I’ll not force myself on you or be a trouble to you.’
‘You don’t know what you’re stepping into. You don’t know me.’
‘I know what I see,’ she persisted. ‘A man who is brave, who risked his own safety to rescue an unknown woman.’
‘And kissed her in an inn parlour. Hardly a reputable act.’
‘Yes, you did. And then you took me home to save my reputation, from some ridiculous sense of honour!’
His lips twisted. ‘Don’t think too well of me.’
‘I’ll think what I like, what I know here.’ And Marie-Claude placed her palm flat against her heart.
For a long moment he looked at her as if he were reading her thoughts, considering an answer. Even searching for a decision. For the length of that moment Marie-Claude thought that he would dismiss her again.
‘What are you thinking?’ she asked.
‘I am thinking that, almost, you persuade me, Madame Mermaid.’
And Zan Ellerdine, for better or worse, made a decision.
Drawing her close, he released her hands to slide his arms around her waist so that she fit perfectly against him, then lowered his head and laid his mouth against hers. Warm and firm, as was hers in reply. He deliberately kept the pressure gentle, seductive, tender even, sinking into her scent, her soft curves. Even when desire flooded through him, prompting him to pounce and ravage, he maintained the control to keep his demand light. His senses swam and he was suddenly iron-hard, but he lifted his head and smoothed the pad of his thumb over her cheek.
‘Very well,’ he said. ‘I’ll not come to the Pride. Come here if you wish. I’ll not turn you away. But you must take care—if you tell them at the Pride, they’ll try to turn you away from me.’
‘So will you meet with me, Zan?’ she asked.
‘Yes. Come to the cliffs. Tomorrow afternoon.’
‘Will you call me by my name?’
‘I will call you by your name.’ His lips, soft as a breath, devastating as a spear of lightning, a seductive promise on hers. Or was it a warning? Marie-Claude was not sure.
‘Adieu, Marie-Claude. Until tomorrow. If you dare…’
Chapter Four
She dared! Marie-Claude kept the assignation. Nothing other than the Crack of Doom would have kept her away. And now she found herself seated in the stern of the Black Spectre, fighting to catch her breath, racing with the waves and the wind towards the far headland, the sails taut and full.
‘Come with me, Marie-Claude,’ he had demanded. ‘We’ll launch the Spectre. Come and sail with me across the bay.’ There he had stood on the cliff top as if he would bar her way. He was impossibly, outrageously persuasive. And so splendid to look at, his even teeth glinting in a smile that challenged her mettle, his black hair shining, lifted by the relentless breeze. ‘I’ll make a sailor of you yet.’
Her heart had leapt, with fear, excitement, desire. ‘No, I can’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘I think I’m afraid…’
‘Afraid?’ He seized her hand, tugged, as his careless smile tugged at her heart. ‘You have the courage to do anything, Madame Mermaid. I swear water’s your element. All you have to do is say yes.’
She doubted, after her recent ordeal, any affinity with water deeper than two inches, but could not refuse. Nor did she need to. He had swept her up into his arms before she could say either yes or no, carried her through the shallows and deposited her, hands firm about her waist, on to the planking of the Black Spectre. Zan Ellerdine had a distinct tendency towards the domineering.
Now here she was, denying her basic fear of open sea to be with him, and it was everything she had imagined it could be if she could overcome her trepidation. Windblown she might be, clinging to the side with rigid fingers, but exhilaration sang through her blood. Nor was it the speed and uncontrolled movement of the little cutter that forced her to catch her breath, even though it leapt over the water with the power of a runaway horse. Given the opportunity to study Zan whilst he was occupied, she felt free to watch the flex and play of his shoulders and back beneath the fine linen of his shirt, the strain of his muscled thighs as he braced against the kick of the waves. If she had enjoyed watching him groom his horse, how much more aware of him was she now as he leapt to secure a rope? Of his potent masculinity, the understated power of his body, the smooth control of interlocked muscle and flesh and sinew.
Suddenly he was standing before her, his body blocking out the light.
‘Why are you clinging to the side?’
‘The waves seem very close,’ she admitted as the spray rose and fell between them in a sparkling arc.
‘I’ll not let you fall overboard. Don’t you trust me?’
‘I’m not sure.’ She squinted up at him through the drops. ‘I think the sea has a mind of its own.’
Placing
