A Season for Love (18 page)

The simple task of rising and leaving her room the next morning was an arduous chore for Ronnie. Pieter, she knew, would not appear, and she would be left to face Drake alone. But she couldn't hide out all day, it would be cowardly. And God forbid, on top of everything else, Drake should call her a coward. . . .

Still, she stalled as long as possible, washing her hair leisurely, taking care to blow dry it. She showered for so long that she feared even their ample hot water supply would run cold, then convinced herself she needed a manicure and pedicure.

She was so perfectly primped, she told herself dryly, that she was like a young girl about to meet her lover. The thought brought a rush of miserable, ironic color to her cheek, and she quickly brushed it aside. Biting her lip, she knew she had to face the day, and Drake. Sweeping her hair into a severe knot, she finally opened the door and left her bedroom behind, hoping Drake had breakfasted early.

He had, but he was obviously waiting for her, drinking a second cup of coffee while he looked over the morning paper. As he spotted her entering the room he set the paper down and rose dramatically to greet her.

"Ahhh ... my dear Mrs. von Hurst. Good morning."

The cynicism of his tone did little to improve her state of mind.

"Mr. O'Hara." She acknowledged him with a nod, hoping he didn't notice how tense she was as she glided past him to the sideboard. Her hands were steady as she poured herself a cup of coffee, and she decided toast was the most she was going to be able to stomach with his mocking gaze upon her

He half lifted a brow as he reseated himself after solicitously pulling out and pushing in Ronnie's chair. What happened to your appetite?"

"Not a thing," she said, stirring a spoonful of sugar into her coffee. "There are just days when I'm hungrier than others. Could I have a section of the paper, please?"

"Certainly."

Ronnie was careful to keep the print right side up as she accepted the front section. The news of the world, however, could not engross her, not when Drake was openly watching her with unfathomable eyes. Was he still angry this morning? He was sardonic, but not cruel; mocking, but not scornful.

It was best always to be on the defensive with Drake. Fairy tales were brief in duration.

"Did you have plans for the day?" Drake suddenly inquired.

She was taken off guard but answered quickly. "Yes. I'm behind in quite a bit of correspondence, and—"

"And I'm afraid you'll have to forget it." Drake grimaced ruefully and reached into his shirt pocket. Ronnie felt a queasy sensation as she saw him extract one of Pieter's monogrammed notes.

"What now?" she murmured skeptically. "We've already seen Charleston."

Drake pushed the note across the table to her. "Is this how you and your husband always communicate? You should hire a full-time postal clerk."

She stared at him while fingering the note, finding a dry, almost bitter humor in his eyes. "We don't need a postal clerk!" she snapped, unnerved by the note that promised another day in his company. He was dressed casually today, in dark pants and a white tailored shirt with rolled-up sleeves that not only accentuated his strikingly dark attractiveness and bronze tan, but emphasized the ample strength of his arms. God, it wasn't fair that anyone should tantalize so by mere appearance. She was tempted to reach out and run a finger down the exposed length of bronze flesh. During those magical days on the cruise she would have impulsively done so. But they were no longer on the cruise. Her fingers curled resolutely around her coffee cup.

"I suggest you read the note," Drake advised, ignoring her waspish tone.

Her eyes darted warily from his to the paper. They flew back to his with the panic she was too surprised and dismayed to hide.

Pieter's request for the day was ludicrous. He couldn't be serious. In her glance to Drake, she unwittingly pleaded and demanded agreement that it was so. But his eyes gave her nothing in return; they were enigmatically dark.

"I won't do it," she said with flat finality, pushing the note aside. In his very precise wordage Pieter "asked" that they spend the day working. He was worried about the marble pieces, so near completion, actually reaching that stage. Drake knew what he was doing, while Pieter's hands "troubled him."

To Ronnie's surprise, Drake shrugged with a casual lift of his brows. "Then that's that, isn't it?"

"Yes," she replied, more forcefully than necessary.

He took a sip of his coffee and leisurely lit a cigarette, watching her all the while, giving her the prickly feeling that she was being baited. "You sound as if you mean it," he finally commented.

"Well, of course I mean it," Ronnie retorted, annoyed. "I usually do mean what I say."

She saw the cynical arch of his brow too late. He had been baiting her, and she had fallen for the bait.

"Funny," he remarked idly, inhaling deeply on the cigarette, "I seem to remember you saying several things it appears you didn't mean."

What had happened to the warmth they had shared yesterday? she wondered fleetingly, carefully freezing her face into a mask of indifference so as not to allow him the satisfaction of seeing how deeply his barb had struck.

"Rest assured, O'Hara," she said coolly, "I do mean what I say this time." She did mean it. Posing for Drake and Pieter was mortifying. Posing for Drake alone w as unthinkable. She couldn't even think of a word to describe it. Snide might be most appropriate.

He turned his attention back to his newspaper "Whatever you say, Veronica."

He didn't believe her, she thought with annoyance. Well, this time he was going to learn a lesson about her willpower.

And he would have, she assured herself later with marked bitterness, if only it wasn't for Pieter. Without finishing either coffee or toast, she had left the dining room, only to find herself summoned to her husband's room.

If Pieter were really adept at something other than sculpture, that something was using and manipulating her. Looking pale and gray in the monstrous four-poster bed that seemed to consume him, he told her how much the pieces meant to him, how they might never be finished . . . unless she cooperated. He became so upset that, as usual, she backed down, concern overriding all other emotions. She was shortly assuring him that she would do anything in her power to help. And consequently, she was posing for Drake, her mind seething, her teeth sunk deeply into her lower lip.

Strangely, though, once she had admitted defeat with glacial quiet and and a dare in the lift of her shoulders and tilt of her head, Drake chose not to taunt her. He had known all along that she would be posing, and though her challenging reserve did not daunt him, he said little.

"Your husband is a difficult man to say no to," he had said simply when she sought him out.

And now, careful not to watch him as she arranged the drapery around herself, he said nothing. The room was deathly silent, and she instinctively knew that his dark gaze bored into her; she could feel the heat of his eyes. But he didn't come near her to make any adjustments as Pieter would have done; he simply waited.

Finally she could hear the grating of the chisel. Each rasp upon the marble was a cut across her nerves. In time, she was sure, she would toss back her head and emit a hysterical scream of pain. . . .

Drake was barely aware of what he was doing. His hands moved carefully upon the fine marble, but his eyes kept hazing over. Light beads of perspiration formed on his brow and threaded beneath his mustache, despite the comfortable temperature of the air-conditioned room. He paused several times to swipe at his forehead with the back of his arm and to nervously erase the moisture that clung to the fringe of black upon his upper lip. He was as miserable about the situation as she, but what did one say to a skeleton of a man whose eyes burned with fever as he pleaded?

He had lost to Pieter. He had known Ronnie would, and he hadn't meant to mock her this morning; he had meant to apologize. But his apologies meant nothing, and guilt and frustration drove him on, as well as the raging desire that burned him whenever she was near. ... He really wasn't sorry that he had taken her into his arms. The sensation was too fundamentally right to be wrong ... or to be denied.

He looked down at his fingers. They trembled, and he had to steady them before touching the delicate marble again. One mistake at this stage . . .

How long had they been working? He didn't know. A thin mist of perspiration was now breaking out across the backs of his hands. It was amazing, but the marble was taking shape beautifully ... and the shape he carved was beautiful—slender, but so shapely. Sleek shoulder blades, the spine that curved exquisitely to tempting hips . . . and at the base of those hips would be the slightly indented dimples he had previously formed from sweet memory ... agonized memory ... memory that was driving him to a torture his mind could control, but his body couldn't handle. Flames were lapping at his insides, searing him, crippling him. . . .

She breathed, evenly and deeply. She could never be a "tool" to him. Each breath that caused the tiny motion of the expansion of the fine, shadowed lines of her ribs reminded him that she was not marble. She was warmth, fire, sweetness, unconquerable passion. . . .

Ronnie was reaching that point where she would scream insanely, like a demented shrew. The chisel grated, the chisel stopped. The silence between them was such that she could hear his every movement. The entire room seemed to have a life, that of his radiating presence, that of his heartbeats. . . .

The stillness was broken with a shattering impact when the chisel went flying across the room. Ronnie heard the strange whizzing sound, and jerked around quickly to see the tool crash into the far wall. Drake was staring at it with a disgusted look on his face, his hands planted on his hips. He glanced at her suddenly, aware that she was staring him. He didn't speak for a moment and offered no apology. "I think," he said finally, that we have fulfilled our obligation. These pieces need only a few final touches—and Pieter should make those touches himself."

Ronnie nodded, only too happy to call it quits graciously. Drake had broken just seconds before she would have.

In her haste to scramble to her feet and escape the room, she stepped upon the long swath of silk drapery. The material jerked from her hands and fell to the floor, leaving her facing Drake totally naked.

She was too startled, too horrified, to make an instant grab for the material. It was not just her cheeks that suffused crimson; the color flooded her body from the roots of her hair to her pedicured toes. Still she didn't move; her eyes were held by a compelling prison of darkness.

It seemed like an eternity, but actually it was only seconds later that Drake came smoothly to her with a steady tread. He stopped directly in front of her, a semismile curving his lips. Crouching to his feet, he retrieved the drapery, rose, and carefully wrapped it around her shoulders. "Don't look as if the sky just fell," he said calmly, lightly tapping her chin with his knuckles. "I certainly didn't see anything I haven't seen before."

In mute misery Ronnie wrapped the material more tightly around her, her clear sapphire gaze thanking him for the gentle kindness with which he had handled a moment he could have used to full advantage against her.

He did not linger near her but turned quickly to straighten the tools he had been using and to stoop and also retrieve the thrown chisel. "What's the story with that boat?" he demanded conversationally, as if nothing had ever happened and they were idly talking over afternoon tea.

The color was still receding from her body; her mind wasn't working quite as quickly as his. "What?" she murmured, disoriented.

"The boat," he said. "That Boston Whaler. Is it Dave's private property, or can I take it out?"

"Ah, no," she said quickly, rebounding from the incident. "I mean, no, the boat is for anyone's use. You're welcome to take her out. Just let Dave know you're going."