Authors: Sara Craven
His voice was too quiet for anyone else to have overheard, she
knew, but she could not prevent a wave of colour flooding her face.
She was thankful to her heart to see the head waiter heading in their
direction to take their order.
When he had gone, she said in a low voice, 'Gethyn, it's foolish to
go on like this. Can't—can't we call a truce at least for the rest of
the day?'
He sent her a derisive look. 'We could always try. But I advise you
not to provoke me again, Davina;'
'No,' she said, unhappily aware of her shorn hair and resisting the
impulse to make yet another nervous adjustment to her scarf. The
last thing she wanted was to draw his attention again to her peculiar
choice of headgear. She glanced round hastily. 'I—I wonder who all
these people are. That group in the corner are climbers, of course,
but that woman at the table against the wall looks rather strange. I
wonder why she's wearing a cloak. Do you think she's an artist or
just pretending ...' Her halting words died away as her eyes met his
blazing with anger.
His fingers closed round her wrist in an ungentle grip.
'What are you trying to do, Davina?' he demanded in an undertone.
'Pretend that the last two years have never happened? Well, I'll go
along with you. Play your little games, if you must, but don't
complain if you should find I've substituted my own rules.'
'I—I didn't mean it like that.' She lifted her shoulders unhappily. 'I
was just—trying to make conversation, that's all.'
He gave a mirthless smile. 'If anyone had told me I'd ever hear you
say that ...' he said quietly.
'Please,' she said with difficulty. 'My wrist. You're hurting it.'
He released her almost contemptuously. 'Pity it wasn't your neck.'
He swallowed the remains of his drink with one violent movement,
and turned away. 'They're ready for us in the dining room.'
It was an uncomfortable meal. Davina barely touched the melon she
had chosen as her first course, and picked at the delicious-looking
salad when it arrived. It was little consolation to note that Gethyn
seemed to have no better appetite himself, and she felt nothing but
relief when, after she had declined a sweet and coffee, he sent for
the bill.
When they were outside again, she touched his arm rather timidly.
'Are we going home now?'
He sent her a cool, unreadable glance. 'We're going to Plas Gwyn,
certainly,' he replied, and she flushed at her slip of the tongue.
She kept silent as the car threaded its way through the busy streets.
When they were clear of the town at last, she said, 'It was a mistake
for me to come here, Gethyn. I'll pack up as soon as we get back.
I'll go back to London and leave you in peace.' She stared down at
her clasped hands. 'You can contact Uncle Phil with your decision
about the trip—when it's convenient.'
She gave him a swift, sideways glance, but although his mouth
tightened, he made no attempt to reply. She leaned back in her seat
and closed her eyes. So that was that, she thought. She would leave
tomorrow without having achieved any of the things she had come
for. All she had succeeded in was a further deterioration in the
relationship between Gethyn and herself. She stifled a sigh. It had
been madness, of course, to imagine she could arrive at an amicable
solution to their problems with this—dark dragon of a man. Gethyn
was a law unto himself and always had been.
She kept her eyes determinedly closed. It was bad enough having to
sit beside him in the car, their sleeves practically brushing, but at
least she did not have to look at him, see his lean brown fingers
gripping the wheel and remember the utter magic of their lingering,
sensuous exploration of her body.
When at last he spoke, his words seemed flung at her like stones.
'You'll leave when I say you may and not before. If you insist on
going now, then I'll contest each and every effort you make to
divorce me for the rest of our lives.'
'But that's ridiculous,' she protested, her voice quivering. She sat
bolt upright in the seat, her eyes fixed on him appealingly. 'You
want to be free as much as I do, and besides—there's your
bride-to-be. Aren't you going to consider her?'
He gave a cynical shrug. 'I don't doubt I can—persuade her to fall in
with my wishes. Not all women are as insistent on the wedding
ceremony as you were.'
She paused, her heart thudding painfully, then she said in a low
voice:
'You seem very sure of yourself.'
'Not of myself. Of her.'
'She has my sympathy,' Davina said with difficulty.
'She doesn't need it.' He slanted a look at her. 'I intend to spend
every moment that's left to me in making her happy.'
A sudden searing vision of Rhiannon, her full mouth parted in a
triumphant smile, was imprinted on her inner vision. She was
horrified at the sudden, sick jealousy that clawed at her throat.
But it made her reckless. 'Are you sure you know what it takes to
make a woman happy? You haven't been conspicuously successful
so far.'
As soon as the words were uttered, she knew she had gone too far.
She blenched under the hard glitter of the look he turned on her,
and an apprehensive shiver ran along her nerve endings as she
realised he was bringing the car to a halt at the side of the road.
'Gethyn,' she protested, dry-mouthed, as he switched off the engine
and turned to her. 'I'm sorry. I didn't mean it ... I ...'
Her words were crushed under the brutal pressure of his mouth. Her
hands came up to thrust him away, and were trapped between their
bodies as he pulled her against him so hard that the breath was
jerked out of her. But she resisted him, mouth and teeth locked
against his savage insistence, fighting the terrifying clamour of her
senses, her body's instinctive welcome for him.
Just before her thoughts dissolved into chaos, she seemed to hear a
voice inside her head screaming, 'No. No!' And as if he had heard
the silent plea and knew that it was not a rejection of his kiss but
only the desire to punish which had inspired it, his lips gentled
suddenly, magically, and she was lost.
His mouth moved on hers, warmly and seductively, coaxing from
her the response that force had denied him. His tongue flickered
like fire over the curve of her parted lips before exploring the
warmth and sweetness she had yielded to him. Her submission was
total. She knew that, even as the sweet bright flame grew within her
in answer to this remembered intimacy. Gethyn, after all, had taught
her what a kiss should be.
When at last he raised his head, his breathing was hurried, his eyes
as they held hers, oddly brilliant. Slowly, as if all the time in the
world was at his disposal, oblivious of their surroundings, he pulled
her down so that she was lying half across him, her head tilted back
over his arm. His fingers brushed her lips in a featherlight caress,
then began to stroke the smooth line of her throat. It was heaven,
but it was not enough, and her body began to arch itself towards
him of its own volition.
He gave a soft groan and his fingers slid compulsively under the
neckline of her dress, seeking the soft mound of her breast and
cupping it as if it were a flower.
'I want you,
anwylyd,'
he muttered huskily, his caressing hand
discovering the ardency of her own response for himself. And then
she heard him draw a quick sharp breath. Suddenly his encircling
arm was a steel band, bruising her spine. Her eyes which she had
closed while she abandoned herself to the pleasure of his caress,
flew open in alarm.
'Your hair,' he said too evenly. 'What in the name of God have you
done to your hair?'
She jerked herself upright, her hand flying guiltily upwards, but it
was too late. The disguising headsquare had slipped off altogether.
Gethyn bent and retrieved it from the floor of the car.
'So that was why,' he said, half to himself. He looked at her. His
eyes still glowed, but it was anger, not passion, that lit them now.
His lip curled contemptuously and she shrank. 'Why try to hide it?'
he asked. 'When you've embarked on revenge, then you should have
the courage of your convictions and see it through. Second thoughts
can be dangerous, as you nearly discovered for yourself just then.
You really had me fooled, you know. On the surface you're all
woman, but there's nothing underneath—just a spiteful child. God,
you must hate me!'
Something inside her was crying out, protesting that it had not been
spite, only self-defence, but she knew she could not betray how
completely she was in his power. Instead she let her own anger
kindle from his.
'How dare you criticise me! My hair is my own and I'll do what I
wish with it. I don't belong to you, Gethyn.'
'No?' His mouth twisted cynically. 'What did you have in mind at
the wedding ceremony, may I ask? A short-term loan? Thanks, but
I'm not interested.'
'You made that more than clear two years ago,' she whispered.
'Now drive me back to Plas Gwyn. I'm leaving. I won't even spend
another night under your roof.'
'You think not?' The look he sent her as he set the car in motion
again made her blench. 'Well, don't bank on it, my sweet wife,
because I haven't finished with you yet, not by a long chalk.
Perhaps I might just indulge in a little revenge on my own account.'
'I think you've already done so.' She tried to rally her
fast-diminishing courage. 'I—I'm bitterly ashamed of what
happened just now and ...'
'Are you now?' he mocked savagely. 'And after only a few kisses
too!'
'Oh, stop it, please!' She pressed her hands to her burning cheeks.
'I should practise that note of pleading,' he said. 'It's very effective,
and you'll need it by the time I'm through with you.'
It was pointless trying to reason with him in this mood, she realised
helplessly, and subsided back into her seat. The sun was blazing
into the car, but she felt cold and chilled. She made herself think
and plan for the moment when they arrived back at Plas Gwyn.
Whatever he had in mind, once she was in the house, his aunt's
presence should be some kind of protection for her. Her car keys
were in her bag. It would be the work of minutes to throw the few
things she had brought with her into her case. Her mind worked
feverishly. Surely at some time she would be able to slip away from
the house to her car? It wasn't feasible that Gethyn could watch
every move she made.
She tried to force herself to be calm, to steady her racing pulses, to
ignore the ache deep within her that spoke treacherously of
fulfilment denied. Oh, God, what was he— some enchanter that he
could hold her so easily in thrall? she asked herself helplessly. In
that moment when he had murmured that he wanted her, she had
been his for the taking. She would have gone with him willingly to
whatever lonely eyrie he had chosen in these wild hills and gloried
in the dark fierceness of his lovemaking.
But not now. Not since he had talked of spite and revenge. She put
up her hand and touched the short tendrils of hair curving on to her
face. Oh, she'd meant to make him angry, that was true, but that
was only the half of it. It had been the partly joking, wholly sensual
threat that he had uttered before he left her to go shopping that
morning that had driven her to do what she did. He'd spoken of her
hair across his pillow, aroused well-nigh unbearable memories. It
had seemed for a few mad moments that by destroying her hair, she
could in some way destroy his power over her. She had never in her
wildest dreams imagined that he would react as he had done. There
was a brooding purpose about him as he sent the car rushing
smoothly along the narrow ribbon of road that frankly terrified her.
And what a futile gesture it had been anyway. She had cut her hair
off to show Gethyn she was indifferent to him and his desires, but a
few brief minutes in his arms had shown her very clearly that her
sacrifice had been in vain. The only refuge left to her now was
flight.
Her hands clenched, her nails digging into her palms as he turned
the car into the track that led down to Plas Gwyn. When they
reached the parking spot under the trees, she opened the passenger