Niko's Stolen Bride (21 page)

His voice devoid of emotion, he said, “Frank will be here in a minute.”

She opened her mouth to voice a shocked protest, but he silenced her with one finger on her lips.

“You need time together to work things out. Mend your relationship.”

She reached to jerk his hand from her face so she could speak. Low and urgent, she tried to convince him. “But I don’t want to see Frank. I want to stay here with you.” There, she’d laid it on the line. The basic truth of the words struck her almost as hard as they seemed to strike him.

The muscles of his forearm flexed under her fingers and he seemed to stop breathing. His eyes widened slightly and it almost seemed that he was going to reach for her, but then his jaw firmed. “Kara, please try to resolve this thing with Frank. It’s what I want. What I believe is best for both of us.”

Pulling his arm from her grasp, he shoved his feet into his sandals, grabbed his shirt from where it hung on the railing and disappeared down the steps to the main deck.

Kara’s knees were suddenly wobbly. She took one shaky step back and sank onto the cushioned recliner. If he’d been angry or demanding she could have resisted, but he’d been resigned, defeated. It was what he wanted and she didn’t have the strength to deny him. He needed time to understand what was between them as much as she did. It would take months, not hours or days to find out if it were real or just a holiday fling as he’d tried to convince her. Struggling to stay would only embarrass them both.

It was reasonable. Logical. And unbearably painful.

Defeated, she raised shaky hands to cover her face, then sank back onto the recliner, her knees drawn up to her chest as hot tears wet her cheeks.

The yacht swayed on its moorings as she heard the familiar thump of feet on the gangplank.

Kara gasped and jumped to her feet, hurriedly wiping a hand across her face, erasing the salty tracks of tears. Hope sprang up for a moment. Perhaps Niko had changed his mind. Striding to the railing on the fly deck, she leaned over to call out a greeting. Her mouth closed with a snap that jarred her teeth.

Frank.

He looked up, his broad features drawn in lines of strain. His eyes met hers for a second before he focused on a point above her head. His hands were shoved in the pockets of his long Bermuda shorts and he looked absurdly like a small boy, about to be reprimanded by the teacher.

“Umm, hi, Kara. Is it all right if I come aboard?”

Her fingers gripped the hot metal railing by the stairs. She had wondered what it would be like to see him again. Everything about him was familiar. His hair, his build, the set to his shoulders, even the clothes he was wearing. Yet, at the same time, he seemed a mere acquaintance, no more important to her than a former college friend. Disappointment and relief warred in her. Relief that the physical ache she’d expected wasn’t there and disappointment that he could arouse so little feeling in her. Had his infidelity killed her love so thoroughly? Or perhaps she’d never been in love with the real Frank at all.

That raised the question of whether she was in love with Niko. How could her feelings be real after only days if she’d been fooled for almost a year? The tears that threatened at the thought of Niko made her tone cool. “Looks like you already have.”

His face turned a shade redder. “Sorry. I was waiting at a bar over there until Maragos called.” He nodded his head toward the Marina shops. “I thought we could talk for a minute before we left.”

Her grasp on the railing tightened until she felt the painful pressure in her knuckles. “So talk.”

“Look,” he blurted. “It’s hotter than Hades out here. Is there air conditioning on this thing?”

Hades. How appropriate. Suddenly the small island and the ship seemed so confining, when before she’d felt free. She needed to be alone, to absorb her conflicting emotions. The last thing she wanted was to be shut up in the main cabin with Frank.

It would be terrific to kick him off the yacht, but common sense and courtesy wouldn’t allow it. He’d traveled a long way to talk to her. The least she could do was hear him out. Better that she get it over with while Niko was gone, just as he’d intended. “I’ll be right down.”

She descended the ladder to the lower deck then slid open the remaining glass door without bothering to see if he followed.

He gave a long, low whistle as he stepped in behind her and pulled the door shut. “This what the pirates did?”

Her eyes narrowed. “How do you know about that?”

“Your father. He’s talked to Maragos a few times, but he was worried about you. You know how he is.”  He invited her to share their special knowledge of her father with a slight smile. When she didn’t return it, his smile faded and he sucked his bottom lip into his mouth. It was a nervous habit that she had always deplored.

He stepped closer, and she caught the sharp green tang of the aftershave he preferred. “Are you all right? You look like you’ve been crying.” His broad shoulders squared as his tone firmed. “If Maragos has done anything–”

She cut him off with an abrupt movement. “That’s none of your business.”

He reached for one of her hands, clasping it in his own beefy, slightly damp one. “I’d like for it to be.”

She jerked her fingers from his and turned from him, stepping to one of the windows to look out. There was nothing to see but the broad, white shell of the yacht in the slip next to them, but it was better than looking at him. “Why are you here, Frank?”

He stepped up behind her and placed his hands on her shoulders. “I’ve come to beg forgiveness,” he said, his tone low and graveled.

She could smell the faint wisp of rum on his breath. Liquid courage. She wondered if he’d have been able to face her without it. “Consider yourself forgiven.” She twisted out from under his hands and eased to one side to face him. After spending nearly a week in the company of Niko, Frank seemed short in comparison, his body thicker and more compact. “You probably did us both the biggest favor of our lives.”

“Don’t say that.”

She ignored the beseeching edge to the words. “Come on, Frank. You know you never wanted to be married.” Unable to stand still, she strode across the width of the yacht to the liquor cabinet. Underneath was a small refrigerator. She pulled out two bottles of water and offered him one. When he declined, she opened one and sat the other on the cabinet beside her. She drew a long, cold drink then leaned against the cabinet, crossing her ankles.

“It finally clicked together for me a few days ago. You never gave up your apartment, never made any plans for our life together beyond the wedding ceremony. You weren’t ever going to go through with it.” She couldn’t keep the sting of accusation from her tone.

“That’s not true. I just needed a little more time to get used to the idea.”

“Time? You had months.” She heard the agitated spike in her voice and deliberately lowered her pitch. “What was it really?” she demanded, her hands on her hips. “You changed you mind and didn’t know how to tell me?”

“No, I– That’s not it at all. I wanted to be married.”

The words jolted her, so close to those she’d spoken to Niko days ago. “You wanted to be married? Or wanted to be married to me?”

He took a step back, as if to dodge a blow. “To you, of course. That’s what I meant.”

She wasn’t convinced, but wouldn’t pursue it. Not when she was no longer sure of what the correct answer was for herself. Setting the bottle of water on the cabinet, she moved closer to him. Her voice dropped to a mere whisper as she asked the only question she needed answered, “Then why Frank?”

When he didn’t respond, anger stirred inside her. A mental image of him and the blonde female in the back of the Hummer rose unbidden in her mind. The obvious passion of that moment was a poignant reminder of how lacking their physical relationship had been. “Why?” she demanded again, her tone rising. “What was wrong with me?”

He reached her in three steps, grasping her upper arms with his warm hands. His eyes were sincere as he looked down into her face. “Nothing is wrong with you, Kara. It’s me.”

He released her abruptly and turned to look out the window again. He shoved his hands back in his pockets as if to steady them. “You were going to be my wife, the mother of my children,” he said, his voice muted. “You deserved to be treated with respect. I couldn’t tell you that I liked it … that I wanted it…”

Kara frowned, trying to pick up a cue from his body language before something connected in her memory. A fragment of conversation she’d overheard between Frank and one of his friends, the aggressive way he’d pulled the woman’s head around and kissed her. “You like rough sex.”

He nodded gratefully, though he didn’t turn around. Color seeped across the broad nape of his neck above the collar of his blue polo shirt. “I didn’t want you to think badly of me.”

She sighed and her shoulders slumped in relief. Frank had been unable to share his true self with her and their relationship had faltered because of it. It wasn’t an uncommon problem, especially after women became mothers. Women were pegged as either a sex siren or a mother and treated accordingly.

It was a bit demoralizing to realize that she’d represented the motherly side of womanhood to Frank. “So what kind of a marriage would we have had, Frank? Would you have been one of those husbands who went to their mistress to get satisfaction then came home to boring old me?”

He shrugged. She noticed that he didn’t refute the term
boring
that she’d applied to herself. If only he knew. Niko had brought out the hidden temptress in her. She’d met him play for play, surpassing all her previous expectations for the level of sensual joy that two people could attain.

Sharp pain cut into her chest at the thought of the whispered encouragements and endearments that she might never hear from him again.

“That wouldn’t have worked for me, you know.” She said the words slowly, careful to keep her tone soothing and sure. “I wouldn’t have stood by while you had affairs to satisfy your needs. I have desires too. Fantasies. I would have shared them with you if you’d ever shown the slightest interest.”

He twisted to face her, his mouth slack with astonishment. “Are you kidding? How could we have faced each other every day at work, knowing that we’d … uh…”

“Taken a walk on the wild side?” She put a hand to her mouth to hide the smile that curved her lips, amazed that she could see any humor at all in the situation.

“What so funny?”

The petulance in his voice was unmistakable. Her smile faded as she wondered why she’d never seen this side of the man. “So where do we go from here, Frank?”

“I don’t know,” he muttered. “I thought we’d go back to New York and, you know, go back to the way it was. Have a nice long engagement. Get to know one another.” He stepped closer to her. “We can make it work, Kara. I know we can.”

“No, we can’t.” She held up one hand to stop his forward motion. He edged closer until her palm rested in the center of his chest, absorbing the heat of his body.

For one moment, she imagined how it would be. Comfortable. Familiar. They’d share popcorn at the movies and go to their favorite pizza parlor. They’d meet their friends after work on Friday nights for a drink at Charley’s. It would be effortless to fall back into the uncomplicated patterns that had made up their life. Acceptable, but never quite what either of them wanted. Would she look back after twenty years and wonder how much more fulfilling her life could have been? Should have been?

“Think monogamy, Frank. Till death do us part. Years and years. Did it ever occur to you that the woman you marry should be everything to you? A respectable mother to your children
and
your sex kitten?”

“Well, yeah, I guess.”

“Then you need to go out and find that woman, Frank. I’m not her.”

He seemed stunned by the calm certainty in her tone and took a step back, breaking the contact with her hand. “How do you know? Last week, you thought you were.”

“True,” she murmured then shrugged, “but I’m not sure either one of us really knows the other. There should be more. A deeper connection…” She trailed off, then a smile curved her lips and she stepped close to him, placing one hand on the thickness of his bicep. “You’re my friend, Frank. When the pirate attack happened, I wanted to call and tell you. I’ve missed talking to you.”