nerves.
‘Then what was it like?’
At least he had stopped the restless pacing. He had come to a halt but over on the opposite side of the room, well away from her as his molten copper eyes blazed into hers. The physical distance between them might be small in reality, but in Alannah’s mind it had suddenly opened up like some huge, unbridgeable chasm, stretching wide and deep to separate them totally.
‘It was an accident—a lorry driver lost control and veered right across, knocking them into the central reservation—no one’s fault—just …’
‘Just an accident.’ Raul’s tone put a spin of total disbelief on the words. ‘But it wasn’t an accident that Lori was here in the first place, was it? That was because you and your brother worked on her. She would never have gone against my wishes …’
‘Gone against your wishes!’
Alannah secretly felt that it was relief that he had moved on to another topic, giving her something to attack him with rather than just taking the accusations she couldn’t refute, that put a new confidence into her voice, though she wished it didn’t sound quite so shrill, so hard and belligerent.
‘Do you really think that you had the right to impose your wishes on her? That you could interfere in her life and tell her what to do? Dictating to her …’
‘I wanted to make sure she never met up with you again. You or any member of your family.’
‘And why? Because I wasn’t stupid enough to accept your cold-blooded proposal of marriage—does that make me unfit to even associate with any member of your family? I loved Lori.’
‘And so you encouraged her to come here and visit—to meet up with your brother—and now because of that she’s dead.’
‘They’re both dead,’ Alannah managed flatly, exhaustion draining all the emotion from her voice. ‘I lost my brother too.’
‘He took my sister with him.’
Raul sounded as if he was choking over the words; as if his throat was closing up around them.
Abruptly he wheeled away from her, his face set and hard as he headed for the door.
‘Raul …’
Instinctive concern dragged his name from her lips.
‘Where—where are you going?’
‘Out.’ And don’t even think of arguing about it, his savage tone warned.
He couldn’t bear to be with her a moment longer. He didn’t have to say the actual words, everything about his demeanour, the silent rejection stamped into every rigid line of his body, the proudly held head, said it for him. He was leaving and if she was wise she would let him go.
But that was something Alannah just couldn’t do.
She couldn’t let him walk out—not like this. Not when he was clearly feeling every bit as wretched as she felt—worse, because he had only just found out the truth about the terrible crash when she at least had had a couple of days to let the bitter reality sink in.
Outside, the night was pitch-black, the rain still pelting down, lashing against the windows. She couldn’t bear to think of him being out there, in the darkness, alone, when his mood was already so dark and desolate.
‘Oh, no …’
In a flurry of movement she rushed forward, slipped past him so that she reached the door before he did. Whirling round, she flung herself against it, pressing her back hard against the white-painted wood so that he would have to come through her if he truly wanted to get out.
And he was quite capable of doing that, the look on his face, the burning glare he flung her told her without any need for words. Never before had he seemed so big, so strong, so totally overwhelming so that her stomach clenched into tight knots of near panic, her throat drying painfully.
‘Alannah … move.’ Raul’s voice was a low, savage snarl of warning, his tone threatening terrible repercussions if she didn’t do as he commanded. ‘Don’t even think of trying to stop me.’
The ferocity of his expression, the danger in his tone kept her mute, but somehow she forced herself to set her mouth tight, lift her chin, as she shook her head in silent defiance, even though her knees were threatening to buckle beneath her as her eyes met the icy blaze of his.
‘Get out of my way …’
‘I won’t—I can’t!’
That ‘can’t’, or something of the desperation in her tone, got through to him, making him still suddenly, his head going back, molten eyes narrowing to sharply assessing slits. That terrible grey tinge to his skin was back and it was that that told her she was right to do this—whatever it took. However he reacted. He was a danger to himself in this state, although, being Raul, he would deny it furiously if she said anything.
‘Can’t?’ he questioned harshly. ‘What the hell—?’
‘I can’t let you go—not like this. I can’t see you walk out into a city you don’t know—on a night like this …’
A curtain of tears was blurring her vision but she could still see the way that his stance changed, becoming slightly less aggressive, less antagonistic. His silence was more eloquent than any words could ever be.
‘You’d care?’ he said at last, his voice cracking on the last word.
‘Of course I’d care.’
‘I’m a big boy, Alannah. I can take care of myself.’
‘I don’t care how big and ugly you are—I’m not letting you go. You’ve had a shock …’ Carefully she lowered her voice, pitched on a softer note. ‘You’re not thinking straight …’
Her tone was gentle, Raul registered. As gentle as it had been when she had come to him earlier; when she had reached out to him from the darkness. And just as it had then, her gentleness touched some needy spot in his mind so that for the first time in a terrible twenty-four hours he was still. Totally still. Even his whirling, raging, aching thoughts seemed to have stopped.
In the silence he watched her ease herself away from the door and come towards him. Once again he felt the softness of her touch on his hand.
‘Stay until Carlos comes,’ she said and still in silence he nodded slowly.
Once again the silence was enough.
‘Thank you,’ she said, in much the same way that he had said ‘Gracias’ to her a short time before, so that he knew without having to be told just how she too was grateful to have someone sharing the darkness with her.
It was then that he caught the faint waft of some perfume, soft and subtly leafy, that came from the shampoo she had used on her hair. But underneath it was another scent, richer, warmer, more sensual, intimate. More womanly. It was the scent of Alannah herself. The scent of her body, her skin and her hair, and it hit straight to his starved senses like a blow, melting the numbness in his head so fast that
