happy innocent girl I married, Amy?’
‘She’s dead.’ The words passed her lips before she had even thought about them, coming straight from the heart, and something in her tone of voice must have set the antennae buzzing again because his eyes searched her face slowly and consideringly, their inky depths thoughtful, before he took her arm and indicated that they continue walking.
‘Now what makes me think that the course of true love is not running as smoothly as you would have liked?’ he asked coldly, with bitterly raw cynicism. ‘What’s the problem, Amy? Did lover-boy prefer having you as an extra little titbit now and again rather than you camping on his doorstep?’
She glared at him without answering as Mrs Cox’s small detached cottage drew nearer.
‘Or maybe the appeal of being a working girl again in the big bad world is less than attractive?’ He looked down at her steadily, his eyes veiled.
‘Can’t you just leave things alone?’ she asked tightly. ‘Accept—’
‘By “things” I take it you mean you?’ He smiled coldly. ‘You would like that, wouldn’t you: to be able to finish my chapter in your life as though this were all an abstract exercise? But it isn’t and we aren’t. You are still my wife—my wife, Amy.’ The emphasis and intonation of his words were exactly as spoken in the dream, and as a slow shiver crept down her spine she gazed up at him with naked fear in her eyes.
‘Do I frighten you?’ They had reached the cottage now and he leant back against the post of the garden gate as he swung it open for her, his stance lazy and laconic and his face cruel. ‘You’d be wise to fear me, Amy. People have feared me for far less than you have done.’
‘You don’t scare me,’ she lied bravely as she lifted her chin a fraction. ‘And I don’t like threats.’
‘Then take it as a warning,’ he drawled smoothly as his gaze held her eyes, their blueness dark and velvety in the moonlight. ‘One that you can pass on to interested parties. I understand John is due home tomorrow.’ The last sentence had been arctic cold, his voice chilling.
He had turned and walked off down the lane before she could react and she felt a moment’s deep thankfulness that he hadn’t seen the relief on her face. He still thought this was something to do with poor John, then? If she could just get through the next few days without betraying herself he would have to leave soon. His empire needed him at the helm and he couldn’t afford to be away for long, besides which this place would drive him mad. She would have smiled to herself if her heart hadn’t been so raw and bleeding. The swelling moorlands, deep wooded valleys, rolling hills with their trickling pure streams and crystal-clear waterfalls that spelt peace and sanctuary to her would be an enigma to the man she had married. His place was in the cut and thrust of the razor-sharp business world he inhabited. The hectic lifestyle and cynical, sceptical people he dealt with every day were what he knew. Her quiet backwater with its stolid, unexcitable Yorkshire folk who were the salt of the earth couldn’t be more different. He’d soon tire of all this and then—
‘One more thing, Amy.’ She started violently as he reappeared at her side, dark eyes glittering hotly. ‘I’ve got all the time it takes.’ It was as though he had read her mind and she stared at him, with the garden gate a small wooden barrier between them, as he smiled sardonically. ‘I’m in no rush to get back to London, and this is a beautiful part of the world. Now go in and rest; you look as though you’re going to pass out again.’ He was mocking, taunting her! She kept her thoughts hidden as the black gaze raked her face.
‘The last three months have been a little—troublesome. I could do with a nice relaxing holiday about now. What do you think?’ he finished silkily.
‘I think you’re lying through your back teeth,’ she said angrily. ‘In all the time I’ve known you you have never, ever, had a “nice relaxing holiday” of any description. It would kill you—’
‘Ah, but then that’s the crux of the matter, my sweet.’ There was no mockery in the deep cold voice now. ‘You haven’t really “known” me at all, have you? A whirlwind courtship and within months you were a blushing bride. You have no idea really of what makes me tick. If you had, you would never have had the temerity to walk out on me with another man.’ The icy threat in his words was unmistakable. ‘And don’t make the mistake of thinking that I’m staying here because I care in any way. I’ve told you before, I don’t.’ He eyed her cuttingly. ‘But you are my property as far as I see it and no one, no one steals what is mine.’
‘Your property?’ For the first time since he had come back in her life undiluted burning rage swept all the darkness out of her mind. ‘How dare you say that?’
As she raised her hand to strike him he moved swiftly, grasping her upraised hand in an iron hold at the same time as pushing her backwards while he opened the gate with his legs, joining her in the small front garden before she could draw breath.
‘You don’t like my terminology?’ he said tauntingly. ‘Well, how would you describe yourself, then?’
‘I’m your wife, not your property,’ she said hotly as she struggled against the sheer hard bulk of his body. ‘How dare you say that, how—?’
‘Ah, so you’ve remembered at last.’ As his lips descended on hers for the second time that night she began to fight, really fight, with her arms and legs kicking and writhing in desperate panic as she twisted her head this way and that to avoid his searching mouth. She heard him swear once, softly, as her foot made brief harsh contact with his shin-bone, and then he had pinned her arms at her sides as effortlessly as though she were a child, moving her backwards into the shadows of a gnarled old lilac tree that was scenting the cool night air with its heady perfume. ‘You need to be taught a lesson, my girl,’ he said thickly.
She knew, even as she continued to struggle, that it was a hopeless battle. It wasn’t really him she was fighting after all, there might have been some hope of success if it were, but it was her own weakness where he was concerned that was sending her whole system into hyper-drive.
His mouth was warm and firm and sensual on hers and she knew instinctively he was seeking to break down her resistance with persuasion rather than force. And to what end? she thought desperately. He didn’t really want her any more, he had made it perfectly clear that he considered her damaged goods. No, this was a cruel revenge of the worst kind because once it was over he would leave her without a second thought. But that was what she wanted, surely? her mind ground on as his hands and mouth worked their magic on her shaking body. She’d made the decision three months ago that she had to leave and face the fury and hatred such an apparently motiveless action would bring down on her head; she couldn’t back out now, she just couldn’t. But she hadn’t envisaged this sweet torture, not in her wildest nightmares.
‘I could kill you for what you’ve done …’ His voice was a thick frantic murmur against the smooth white column of her throat as he groaned her name before devouring her lips again in a kiss that was endless.
She was powerless to hide the shudders that were coursing through her body, the touch, the taste of him was intoxicatingly delicious and she felt drunk with the pleasure his lovemaking induced. She knew she ought to continue to fight him, that it was madness to wind her arms round his neck and return his kisses in heated desire, but nevertheless that was exactly what she found herself doing.
The light jacket she had been wearing was at her feet—how it had got there she didn’t know—and now his hands were on the silky skin beneath her open blouse, his fingers gentle but firm as they moulded the soft fullness of her breasts. There was a moment of startled protest as his head lowered to take possession of what his hands had found, and then she was lost completely and utterly in the sensations his lips drew.
She loved him, so much, but she couldn’t—couldn’t …
‘Amy?’ Mrs Cox’s voice cut into the moment like a rapier-sharp blade. ‘Is that you out there, Amy? I heard a noise …’ They were hidden from sight behind the overgrown foliage in the small