Authors: Fiona Brand
There were no strings, she reminded herself. Half an hour in a coffee shop or over a lunch table, and if she didn’t like Jack, or vice versa, they need never contact one another again.
The thought was soothing. On impulse she quickly typed in affirmatives for the other two men. Now more than ever, with the end of her time with Zane set and the knowledge that hurt was looming, it was important to stay focused.
She stared at the three messages on screen and her stomach did a crazy flip-flop. The decision shouldn’t feel like a betrayal of Zane, but suddenly, very palpably, it did.
With a jerky movement, she pushed back from the desk, rose from her seat and strol ed to the French doors. She stared out at the serene view of sea and the distant, floating shape of Ambrus.
A shiver went through her as she remembered the hours spent making love to Zane on Ambrus, then further back to the stormy interlude in Sydney.
Unhappy with the direction of her thoughts, she walked through to the bedroom and began to unpack. Long seconds ticked by as she emptied her suitcase and tidied it away in a large closet.
Despite trying to put a positive spin on the process of finding a husband, every part of her suddenly recoiled from the idea of replacing Zane in her life.
In her bed.
She walked back out into the sitting room and began to pace, too upset to settle. Her stomach was churning; she actual y felt physical y sick. She had the sudden wild urge to erase the messages she had sent, because she knew with sudden conviction that no matter how wonderful or perfect any one of the three J’s might be she was no longer sure she was ready to offer any of them a relationship. The thought of sharing the same intimacies with another man that she had shared with Zane made her recoil. She couldn’t do it.
The truth sank in with the same kind of absolute clarity she experienced when she knew a painting was finished or a jewelry design was completed. It was a complication she should have foreseen. She had tried to get Zane out of her system, but she had done the exact opposite of what she had planned to do. She had fal en wildly, irrevocably in love with him.
In retrospect, the damage had been done two years ago when she had first met him at the charity art auction.
She wondered why she hadn’t seen it from the first.
Clearly she had been so intent on burying her head in the sand and denying the attraction that she had failed to recognize that it was already too late.
She had been a victim of the
coup de foudre
. Struck down somewhere between the first intense eye contact when she had strol ed into the bal room that night over two years ago and the passionate interlude at the end of the evening.
With her history she should have sensed it, should have
known
. Her only excuse was that neither her mother nor her grandmother had ever mentioned a lingering fascination or liking coming into the equation. Cole women were notoriously strong-wil ed. As soon as the pregnancies, and their lovers’ unwil ingness to commit, had become apparent, the relationships had ended.
If she’d had any sense, as soon as she had registered the unusual power of the attraction she would have gotten as far away from Zane Atraeus as she could. Instead, she had offered to donate more paintings to his charity, gotten involved with fundraising, even volunteered to help with the annual art auctions. Every step she had taken had ensured further contact with Zane.
It was no wonder she had not been able to let go of the fixation. In her heart of hearts that was the last thing she had wanted. She had hung around him like a love-struck teenager, secretly sketching and painting him.
She had compounded the problem by legitimizing the affair as an exercise to get Zane out of her system. Instead she had succeeded in establishing him even more firmly in her life, to the extent that now she didn’t want anyone else.
She had been in love with Zane for two years. There was no tel ing how long she would remain in love, but given the stubborn streak in her personality, it could be for years.
Quite possibly a life
time
.
She stil wanted a stable marriage and a happy family life. She wanted love and security and babies, the whole deal. But she no longer wanted them with some unknown mystery man in her future.
She wanted them with Zane.
Zane strol ed out as she headed back to the desk, dressed in a soft white shirt and a pair of faded, glove-soft jeans.
Aware that the screen of her laptop portrayed the appointments she had made, and which she was now desperate to retract, Lilah made a beeline for the desk.
Zane, who clearly had the same destination in mind, reached her laptop a split second before she did.
The scents of soap and clean skin and the subtle, devastating undernote of cologne made her stomach clench.
Zane touched the mouse pad. The screen saver flickered out of existence, revealing the three postings she had made.
To Lilah’s relief there were no replies, yet. In Sydney it would be midmorning. Al three J’s would be at work.
“You’ve made times to meet.” Zane’s voice was soft and flat.
Lilah stiffened at his remoteness; it was not the reaction she had expected. The lack of annoyance, or even irritation, that she was progressing with her marriage plans was subtly depressing.
With the suddenness of a thunderbolt his cool neutrality settled into riveting context. She had seen him like this only once before, when he had been dealing with a former treasurer of the charity who had “borrowed” several thousands of dol ars to pay for an overseas trip. Zane had been deceptively quiet and low-key, but there had been nothing either soft or weak about his approach. Potter had taken something that mattered to Zane, and he wasn’t prepared to be lenient.
Zane had quietly stated that if the money wasn’t back in the account and Potter’s resignation on his desk by the end of the day, charges would be laid and Zane would personal y pay for and oversee the litigation.
Potter had paled and stammered an apology. He hadn’t been able to write the check fast enough.
Lilah had always been aware of Zane’s reputation for taking no prisoners in the business world. The element that had struck her most forcibly was that the charity had mattered to him
personally
.
Hope dawned. She knew she mattered to Zane; he had admitted as much. As hard as she had struggled to stay away from him, he had struggled to stay away from her, and failed.
Because she mattered to him on a level he could not dismiss.
By his own admission, he had become more involved with the charity than he had planned because she was there. They had ended up together on Medinos and in Sydney. They’d had unprotected sex. For a man who was intent on staying clear of entanglements, that in itself was an admission.
Then there was the smal matter of Zane virtual y kidnapping her for two days.
She felt like a sleeper just waking up. She had been so involved in the minutiae of day-to-day events and her own plans for marriage that she had failed to step back and look at the bigger picture.
Zane cared for her. He said he cared about who she was with next. Although it was a blunt fact that Zane did not have a good track record with helping her to find love. He had gotten rid of Howard and a raft of dating applicants. He had effectively made sure that Lucas remained in her past.
There was only one conclusion to be drawn: Zane was jealous.
The tension that gripped Lilah eased somewhat as possibilities she hadn’t considered opened up, expanded.
If Zane was jealous, then maybe, just maybe, there was a chance that he could overcome his phobia about intimate relationships and commit to her.
The possibility condensed into a breathtaking idea.
Relationships were not her strong area; hence the marriage plan. It had not been successful, but at least it had given her a framework—a system—to move forward with, and that was what she needed with Zane.
Not a marriage plan. The stakes were suddenly dizzyingly, impossibly high. She needed a strategy to encourage Zane to fal in love with her.
It was a leap across a fairly wide abyss, but in that moment of realization she had already mental y taken that leap. The future stretched out before her in dazzling, Technicolor bril iance. Not just a steady, reliable marriage, but one based on true love.
Once Zane fel for her, she was confident the whole marriage thing would take care of itself. There was a risk involved, but when Zane succumbed to love, the intensity of the emotion should be powerful enough to dissolve whatever objections he had to marriage.
Heart pounding, Lilah stared at the incriminating dates on the screen. It occurred to her that the proposed dates had a positive angle. They could generate the pressure that was needed to convince Zane that he couldn’t bear to let her go.
The about-face in thinking was a little disorienting but she was already adjusting to the new direction. The sudden itch to sit down with a pad and pen and start formulating a plan was the clincher.
She could do this.
She had no choice.
She would begin by waiting a day or so before she canceled with the three J’s. Taking a deep breath, she smiled pleasantly and answered Zane’s question. “I didn’t see much point in waiting around.”
Zane’s brows jerked together. “There’s every point. You should have waited for the in-depth security checks.”
Lilah’s mood soared at his bad temper. “You didn’t mention a further check. In any case, other than the very thorough checks you’ve already conducted there’s nothing more that can be done unless you intend to put them under twenty-four-hour surveil ance—”
She was caught and held by the complete absence of expression on Zane’s face. “That is what you were planning on doing, isn’t it?”
Zane’s gaze met hers for a searing moment. “Yes.”
The smal , delighted shock wave she felt at his admission was replaced by a sudden breathless anticipation as he studied the screen. Lilah felt like a kid at Christmas, waiting to unwrap a gift. The surveil ance only proved her point. It was the kind of extreme thing one did when they were fal ing in love.
The discovery made her feel like dancing a jig around the sunny room. She had clung to the depressing view that Zane was elusive and superficial and absolutely not good husband material. Now wasn’t a good time to feel that, despite al the areas they did not fit, crazily, he was perfect for her.
Zane stabbed a key and began studying profiles. “You’ve chosen Appleby, Riordan and Smith. I wouldn’t trust Smith.
His first name’s John—that makes him close to invisible in terms of security information.”
Lilah kept her expression smooth and professional. “The initial dates, are just a meet and greet, they do not imply commitment.”
There was a vibrating silence, broken by the near silent sound of an indrawn breath. With control ed movements, Zane picked up the hotel folder, which lay next to her laptop and flipped to the page of restaurant listings as if food was suddenly paramount. “You could withdraw from the process.”
The barely veiled command in his voice made her want to fling her arms around his neck and hug him. To prevent herself from looking deliriously happy, she picked up a pen and pad and started working on her new plan of action by making an important note. She could not afford any over-the-top displays of affection until Zane capitulated. She al owed her brows to crease, as if she had just remembered that Zane had said something but was too distracted to recal his exact words. “Why should I do that?”
Zane, who seemed more interested in the restaurant he was choosing than their conversation, picked up the sleek phone on the desk, although his grasp on the phone was gratifyingly white-knuckled. “Given the recent publicity, I’m not inclined to trust any of the three. If you won’t accept surveil ance reports then I’m going to have to insist on being present at the interviews.”
Lilah tapped her pen on the notepad. “Let me get this right. You don’t want a relationship with me, yet you’l take time off to make sure I’m…”
“
Safe
is the word you’re looking for.”
Lilah was momentarily sidetracked by the stormy look in Zane’s eyes. A quiver of anticipation zinged down her spine then she registered Zane’s emphasis of the protection angle. She was certain he was using it as a handy excuse to avoid admitting to anything else. “You can’t come to the interviews.”
She had no problem being firm on that point since she intended to cancel al three dates. “What would I tel the applicants?”
Zane froze in the act of dialing the hotel restaurant. “Tel them you’re no longer available.”
Fourteen
Zane alowed the singular truth that he was burningly, primitively possessive of Lilah to settle in.
With a sense of incredulity, he realized that he had made the kind of rash, male, territorial move he had only ever observed in other men.
He had crossed a line and now there was no going back.
He eased his grip on the phone and set it back on its rest a little more loudly than he had intended.
Lilah, who was in the process of shutting down her computer, was oddly composed. There was a distinct air of expectation that made his jaw compress.
She closed the laptop with a gentle click. “What exactly do you mean by ‘no longer available’?”
Her gaze was careful y blank, but he detected the hopeful gleam in her eye. He knew with utter certainty that she wanted him to say marriage.
Bleak satisfaction that he had final y made it on to Lilah’s list of marriage candidates was tempered with irritation that it had taken so long, and the old, ingrained wariness. He could feel the jaws of Lilah’s feminine trap poised to snap shut.
As much as he wanted Lilah, he would not be maneuvered into a relationship that would leave him vulnerable. Years had passed since his mother had abandoned him, not once, but a number of times in pursuit of wel -heeled lovers or husbands. He would never forget how it had felt to have the rug pul ed out emotional y, to be relegated to last place on her list when he had needed to be first. By the time his father, Lorenzo, had found him at age fourteen, he’d had difficulty forming any relationships at al .