eclipsed by his dominating height.
‘Kane Falconer.’ His voice was deep and sexy, and as he reached across the deck her irritation melted under the blaze of his smile. ‘The newest assignee to the board.’ The board of directors, that was, which gave him top-notch status. The fingers that clasped hers were warm and firm, their contact so overwhelming that she completely forgot her manners and failed to return the courtesy of an introduction, hearing herself stammering uncharacteristically instead, ‘W-where’s my father?’
‘Your…’ Clarity dawned in eyes that reminded her of a cool blue alpine lake beneath the thick sable of long lashes. ‘So you’re Jezebel,’ he remarked, with his mouth twitching at the corners, repeating the name that one of the newspapers had so detrimentally used to describe her.
Had she been older, perhaps she would have laughed about it, Shannon decided in retrospect. As it was, for all her confidence, she had been too insecure and already hopelessly ensnared by that hard dynamism of his to take such unprovoked criticism from him lightly.
Feigning nonchalance as a protective armour, she had murmured, ‘If you say so. Didn’t she flout convention and shame herself by wearing red to the ball when every other woman wore white?’ She remembered watching a video once of the old Hollywood film. And when the man behind the desk dipped his head in the subtlest acknowledgment, she’d continued, ‘Perhaps they should have named me Danielle,’ with a forced little laugh. ‘For daring to stand alone.’
’Daniel,’ he corrected, releasing her at last, ‘was a man. And he faced lions—which I would have said was far preferable to a gossip-hungry press. And you’re just a girl.’ He might have thought so, but in that moment when those cool eyes moved over the smooth length of her throat, touched on the swell of her pale breasts beneath the low-cut jacket, she grew up; knew that she had met her match and, with a throbbing recognition, her mate. ‘Doesn’t it hurt or bother you?’ he said. ‘What they’re printing?’
Of course it did, but let anyone know it and they would have won—torn her to pieces, she thought bitterly. So, with the slightest movement of her shoulder that unintentionally exposed more of her breast to that hard masculine gaze, she answered, ‘What? That I’m seen at every wild party from here to John O’Groats and that I change my boyfriends as often as I change my underwear?’ She couldn’t believe she was quoting such derogatory statements to him, not only because they were totally untrue, but also because she had never in her young life met a man on whom she had so instantly wanted—no, needed—to make a good impression. Nevertheless, she felt herself cringing as she shrugged again and said, ‘Why should it?’, knowing that she couldn’t have sounded less bothered—as he’d put it—if she’d tried.
‘It hurts your father.’ He rocked back on his heels, surveying her with narrowed eyes and a dark heat that startlingly she recognised as something other than anger; something basic and feral. ‘But perhaps that’s the intention.’
Even while reeling from the shock of a mutual sexual chemistry, Shannon felt the sting of his remark like a whip across her face. Who did this man think he was? What right did he have to speak to her like this when he didn’t even know her? When he didn’t know anything about her—or of her unhappy relationship with her father?
‘I don’t know who you are, or what you’re doing here, Mr Falconer. But I don’t think my private life—or anyone else’s in this family—is any of your concern! Unless you think your duties include trying to take me in hand and dragging me back onto the straight and narrow—in which case I can tell you now, you’re wasting your time!’
He was moving some papers on the desk with those long, well-shaped hands, but glanced up, looking totally unperturbed by her outburst.
‘I’ve no intention of dragging you anywhere, Shannon.’ It was the first time he had spoken her name and, despite everything, hearing the way he said it in that deep, rich baritone voice made the hairs stand up on the back of her neck. ‘Much as I wouldn’t balk at the challenge, I’m rather opposed to seeing my name in the tabloids.’
She walked out of the office that day with her head held high, yet close to tears, having completely forgotten why she had gone there in the first place.
After that she tried to avoid him, but, of course, it was impossible. Having struck a hit with Ranulph Bouvier from the outset, Kane was often invited to the house for dinner. Sometimes she found herself having to speak to him if he rang her father at home—totally unaware of how even his deep, disembodied voice had the power to make her insides melt; her loins burn with a tense and feverish heat. And then, of course, he was at every company function that Ranulph insisted she attend.
‘How old are you?’ she found the courage to ask him after he had asked her to dance at that last company dinner.
And he replied, ‘Too old for you.’
Approaching nineteen, confident of her looks and a sexuality she had sometimes despaired of, she laughed up into his strong, exciting face and, using everything that was feminine in her to try and break through his hard imperviousness towards her, answered sweetly, ‘And what makes you think that that simple question suggests I’d want you?’
Her boldness surprised him, but he merely laughed under his breath and pulled her shockingly close.
‘Because I’m probably the only man in London who hasn’t shown any inclination to bed you,’ he returned, his smile blazing, his eyes coolly sardonic. ‘And one thing I strongly suspect about you, Shannon, is that your greatest challenges are the things you know you can’t have.’
Though she laughed it off, his remark depressed her, assuring her that, when it came to getting Kane Falconer to like her—let alone want her—she was wasting her time. He was too experienced, much too clever for her to outwit, argue with or even try to use her teenage charms on, and in his company she merely suffered one frustrating humiliation after another.
When she started seeing Jason Markham and he asked her to spend the summer with him at his lochside cottage in Scotland she grabbed the chance, as an opportunity to escape not only her father’s increasing domination, but also her hopeless feelings for Kane. They were, she decided, blind and stupidly juvenile; outrageously sexual; agonisingly intense.
Her relationship with Jason, on the other hand, provided her with something far less dramatic, along with friendship, of which, at the time, she seemed to be in short supply. Most of the women she tried to befriend since she had blossomed into womanhood seemed to view her only as a sexual rival, and most men as a means of boosting their egos.
Jason seemed interested in her as a person. He listened to her ideas; seemed to share her dreams. And if the relationship was a little less passionate to start with than he had hoped, well, he had no intention of rushing her—he was a patient man, he assured her, content to wait. And that was how she felt—content and comfortable. As one should feel with a person you were considering making a life with, she managed to convince herself. Not so crazy with wanting that you felt you’d burst from the agony of it; not like the mindless, adolescent crush she had harboured for Kane. And if Jason never drove her to those frenzied heights she had dreamed of reaching in Kane Falconer’s arms…well, wasn’t that for the best? What she felt for Jason was real, not something imagined; real and whole and lasting. Because Jason Markham, up-and-coming racing driver and son of a prominent cabinet minister, was real. Jason was there. Jason was hers.
Which was why, when the story hit the headlines of his wife’s suicide attempt following his infidelity, the tabloids had a field day, citing Shannon as the proverbial femme fatale with Markham as the hapless victim.
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