we might as well be ruined together,” he blithely replied. “That’s only fair. Will someone please open the door for me and summon an elevator?”
With the way cleared ahead of him, he strode into the reception room with Joanna still in his captivity.
“Mr. Grayson!” the young woman behind the desk called after him, her voice on the edge of hysteria. She had never witnessed such a scene before and was totally lost as to how to act. She wrung her hands. “Your appointments, Mr. Grayson! What will I do?”
“Postpone them until further notice.”
“But what will I say?”
“Say I’m off for the dirtiest weekend that any man could hope to have. That’ll satisfy everybody.”
He swept into the waiting elevator, pressed a button and grinned with wicked satisfaction as the doors slid shut.
CHAPTER THREE
AS THE ELEVATOR hummed downwards, Joanna’s mind reeled around Rory’s outrageous presumption in hauling her off with him, the indignity he had subjected her to in doing so, the scandalous proof that he still didn’t care what anybody thought of him and the terrible truth that she had instigated the whole chain of events by not freezing him off when he kissed her.
“This won’t do you one bit of good, Rory Grayson!” she said in his ear, letting him know she was not about to fall under the spell of his wild and irrepressible nature again.
“It’s done me a power of good already,” he said cheerfully.
“I was only getting back at you with that kiss.”
“If that was revenge, Joanna, I found it very sweet. The magic is still there for us. As strong as ever.”
“I am not going to have a dirty weekend with you.”
“Tell me about Brad, and why you’re going to marry him.”
The elevator doors rolled open and Rory strode into a basement garage while Joanna whirled through another bout of confusion. She should take pleasure in telling Rory how perfect Brad was for her, but she didn’t want to. She no longer knew what she wanted. Somehow Rory had turned everything upside down, including her.
At last he set her on her feet, and Joanna found herself standing beside the passenger door of a sage-green Jaguar, almost the exact colour of her suit. Rory liked green. Always had. But since when had he been able to afford such an expensive car?
Bemused by his sudden rise to wealth, Joanna did not think of trying a getaway. Rory unlocked the door and opened it before she realised he wasn’t holding her captive anymore. He stood back from her, one hand on the door, the other gesturing an open invitation to choose her own course. He spoke quietly, seriously, his whole manner in marked contrast to all that had gone before.
“You may find this difficult to believe, Joanna, but I want you to be happy. I thought I was the man you could best be happy with. Even when things were wrong between us, I still felt we were right for each other, right in a way that I’ve never felt with anyone else.”
He paused, searching her eyes for a similar admission, some hint of vulnerability to what he was saying, but Joanna stubbornly resisted giving him any concession. If she gave Rory an inch he would take a mile. Yet his words did strike a deeply buried chord in her heart. She had believed that, too. Until he betrayed her faith in the worst possible way.
He gave her a wry smile. “I can’t go back and do things differently. If I’m not the man you can be happy with, then I want to know that Brad is. So long as I know you’ll be happy with him, Joanna, I can let bygones be bygones. But if you’re not sure about marrying him...”
“I didn’t say that,” she cut in swiftly, defensively.
“Joanna, there’s no engagement ring on your finger.”
Her eyes flashed defiance of this superficial judgement. “You didn’t give me a ring.”
“In those days I couldn’t afford what I wanted to give you. Is that the case with Brad?”
She grimaced in vexation at being pinned down. “He’s away at the moment. When he comes back...”
“So this is decision time. And you came to me for help.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Joanna.” He reached out and took her hand, his long, lean fingers curling around hers, stroking them, lightly pressing their persuasion. “Remember how we used to talk? Tell each other everything? No holding back?”
“That was before,” she protested, her eyes flashing with the pain he had given her. Yet she didn’t tug her hand out of his. Somehow it triggered good memories, of when her love for Rory had been young and innocent and full of joy.
“I have no wish to rake over old arguments, either,” he said softly. “We’ll talk about the future. Your future. How you want it to be. How you see it with Brad. As you say, you don’t have to prove anything to me, Joanna, but come with me now and prove whatever you need to prove to yourself. Conclusively. That is what you want, isn’t it?”
She stared at their linked hands, feeling his warmth and his strength and desperately wanting what he was offering. Could she trust him to do what he said? She lifted her gaze, meeting his in fearful uncertainty. “You’ll let me go free whenever I want to, Rory?”
“Whenever you want to,” he promised, the steady blaze of his blue eyes giving her the assurance she needed.
She heaved a sigh to relieve her pent-up turmoil. The voice of hard-learnt cynicism told her it was still a risk to go with him. He undoubtedly meant to take advantage of her compliance, one way or another. Nevertheless, he had to know that force wouldn’t get him any lasting advantage. He had already changed tack on that score. So what harm could it do to spend an hour or two with him? If it clarified her feelings, it would be time well spent.
“All right. I’ll come with you. For a while,” she said warily.
He smiled, a happy, lilting smile that transmitted unbounded joy, the kind of smile Rory used to give her long ago, enveloping her in his pleasure. Joanna’s heart gave a kick, sending a tingle of excited anticipation through her veins as she stepped into his car and settled herself into the low-slung passenger seat. Rory closed the door and moved quickly around to the driver’s side, as though he could not contain an eager exhilaration at the prospect of being with her again.
Joanna deliberately kept her gaze averted from him as he settled himself in the seat beside her. How she could find him so compellingly attractive was deeply worrying. Reawakened sexual chemistry. That’s all it could be. The years apart had somehow corroded the hurts that had formed a protective shield around her.
She had proved she could live without Rory, although existing was probably the more accurate word to describe most of her life since she had left him. Nevertheless, it was paramount she remember these dangerously wayward feelings couldn’t be trusted. It was time she concentrated on the problem that had brought her here, whether or not she could ever give herself wholeheartedly to Brad.
Her
