the whole reason for being here was slipping away from her.
She couldn’t bear to play out yesterday’s scenario with Michael and Lucy again this weekend. It was too much pretence, too much pressure, too much everything with Harry hanging around, ready to take advantage of any weak moment, and she’d be tempted to use him again as a buffer. It was all horribly wrong and the worst part was she was trapped here—trapped by her own deceit.
If she walked out on the job after pretending to like being with Harry, how could she ever explain that to Lucy? It wouldn’t make sense. Telling her the truth wasn’t fair. It would cut into whatever happiness she was finding with Michael, tarnish it because it was causing her sister unhappiness, which Elizabeth knew Lucy would never knowingly do. Underneath all her ditziness was a very caring heart.
Having taken a deep breath and slowly released it to get her lungs working again and feed some much-needed oxygen into the hopeless morass in her brain, she squared her shoulders and looked directly at Harry Finn—her rescuer and tormentor. There was no devilish twinkle in the blue eyes. They were observing her with sharp attention, alert to any give-away signs of what she was thinking and feeling.
He had demonstrated yesterday how perceptive he was, and remembering how accurately he had read the situation, Elizabeth felt a strong stab of resentment that he hadn’t acted to protect her this time.
‘You could have dissuaded your brother from coming, Harry,’ she said accusingly.
‘How?’ he challenged. ‘By saying you don’t want him here? Mickey wants to see if you’re managing okay. Both of them do.’ His mouth lifted in an ironic tilt. ‘I did spring the job on you, Elizabeth.’
‘You could have said all the villas were taken—no ready accommodation for them,’ she argued.
He shrugged. ‘I’m not in the habit of telling lies. Besides, Mickey has a motor-cruiser. They’ll be arriving in it and could just as easily sleep in it. A head count of guests at dinner would have told him we have two villas vacant this weekend and he might have confronted me about it, raising questions. Would you have liked to answer them?’
She grimaced, accepting there was no way out of this and there was no point in protesting the arrangements already made. ‘Which villa did you put them in?’ she asked flatly.
‘Mickey requested a pavilion villa if available. Since one of them is vacant from Friday afternoon to Sunday afternoon, I’ve obliged him.’
A pavilion villa...honeymoon paradise!
She turned her head away, evading Harry’s watchful gaze. Flashing through her mind were images of Michael and Lucy enjoying an intimate weekend—making love on the king-size bed, cooling off in the infinity pool, drinking champagne as they watched the sunset. It was sickening. She couldn’t help thinking, It should have been me with Michael. Me, not Lucy.
For two years she had been dreaming of having just such a romantic weekend with him. Why couldn’t he have found her as wildly attractive as he obviously found Lucy? Harry had no problem in seeing her as sexy. He would have whizzed her off to bed in no time flat. Almost had last night.
‘They’re not coming in until Saturday morning,’ Harry said quietly. ‘It will only be for one night, Elizabeth.’
As though that made it better, she thought savagely. Lucy would be parading her happiness with Michael from the moment she landed to the moment she waved goodbye, and during that two-day span it was going to be one hell of an uphill battle to keep pretending happiness with Harry.
Unless...
A wicked idea slid into her mind.
It grew, sprouting a whole range of seductive thoughts, becoming a plan that promised a way to get through this weekend reasonably intact.
Harry would view it as a night of fun and games, the playboy triumphant. He wouldn’t care about what she was using him for since he’d get what he wanted. And she wouldn’t be hurt by it because she was the one directing the play, the one in control of what was to happen.
She could set aside her principles, be a butterfly flying free for one night. Maybe it was what she needed to do, use it as a catharsis, releasing all the emotional mess in her mind and heart and wallowing in purely physical sensation. Harry had proved last night he could drive up her excitement meter. Why not experience how far he could take it?
If it was good...if it was great...she could face Lucy and Michael without the horribly hollow sense of missing out on everything, especially since she would have already had what they were going to have and where they were going to have it. That part of it should kill off any sense of jealousy and envy, which were horribly negative feelings that she didn’t want to have towards her sister. Lucy was Lucy. It wasn’t her fault that Michael was totally smitten by her, and Elizabeth was not going to let their connection affect the close relationship she’d always had with her sister.
But she needed help from Harry to make all this stick.
His expert playboy help, smashing her mind with so much pleasure it took away the pain.
If he didn’t cooperate with her plan... But he would, wouldn’t he? He wanted her to surrender herself to him and that was what she’d be doing.
She threw a quick glance at him. He was leaning back in the chair, apparently relaxed as he waited for her to respond to the situation. However, his gaze instantly caught hers, sharply searching for what was in her mind. There was no point in taking any evasive action. She had decided on what she wanted from him. Her own eyes watched his very keenly as she put the question which would start a new situation rolling.
‘Do you still want to have sex with me, Harry?’
His eyebrows shot up in surprise. There was no instant yes. Elizabeth’s heart pounded nervously as she waited for his reply, watching his eyes narrow speculatively. He was obviously digesting what this change from her meant.
‘That’s been a constant for me over quite a long time, Elizabeth,’ he said slowly. ‘I think the more pertinent question is do you finally realise that you want to have sex with me?’
‘Yes, I do,’ she answered unequivocally. ‘But only if certain conditions are met.’
It had to be her plan or nothing.
His head tilted to one side. He was not rushing to accommodate her. His eyes watched her with an even higher level of intensity. Elizabeth held his gaze defiantly, determined not to budge from this stance. After a long nerve-racking silence, he casually waved a hand in an invitational gesture.
‘Spell out the conditions.’
Elizabeth took a deep breath, fiercely willing him to fall in with what she wanted. ‘The pavilion villa is empty on Friday night. I want it to be there. And then. The rest of this week we just keep to business.’
* * *
It took every ounce of Harry’s control not to react violently, to absorb this slug to his guts and remain seated, appearing to be considering what all his instincts were savagely railing against. This wasn’t about him and the chemistry between them. It was about Mickey and Lucy. In some dark twisted place in her mind, she probably wanted to pretend he was his brother, having it off in the same romantic setting where Mickey was about to take her sister.
No way would he be used as a freaking substitute!
It was a bitter blow to his ego that she should ask it of him. It showed how little she cared about what he thought, what he felt. He had encouraged her to use him as a blind to hide her angst over Mickey yesterday but to use him this far...it was brutal and he hated her for corrupting what they could have had together.
Hate...
He’d never felt that towards anyone. Why did she get to him so strongly? It was crazy. He should wipe her off his slate right now, find some other woman who thought he was worth having, who’d be sweetly giving, at least for a while.
Except...damn it! He still