His After-Hours Mistress Page 9

  ‘Roarke…’ His name was a low moan in her throat as he tore his mouth from hers only to plunder the sensitive cord of her neck. She felt dizzy. Caught up in an overwhelming maelstrom of sensations. Her heart was tapping out a crazy beat…

  But it wasn’t her heart she could hear. Penetrating through the passion-induced mists in her brain, she slowly realised that what she could hear was a frantic tapping on the bedroom door. Roarke must have heard it too, for they both froze at the same time. Staring at each other, both recognised the look of disbelief each wore at the realisation that they had responded to each other again. Yet there was no time to discuss it, for the tapping continued, managing to sound even more frantic.

  ‘I’ll get it.’ Feeling self-conscious, Ginny clambered awkwardly off Roarke and scrambled to her feet. Smoothing her nightdress down, she composed herself as best she could before going to answer the door. A glance back at the bed showed that Roarke had vanished, then moments later she heard the shower running.

  Taking a deep breath she opened the door, and gasped at the sight of her sister standing outside. ‘Lucy!’ she exclaimed in surprised delight.

  Lucy, however, looked ill at ease, constantly glancing over her shoulder—and Ginny instantly knew what she was afraid of. Grasping her by the arm, she pulled her sister inside and hastily shut the door.

  She was so pleased to see her younger sibling that she immediately enveloped her in a hug. ‘It’s so good to see you! I’ve missed you so much,’ she declared in a voice thick with emotion, and only then became aware that her sister hadn’t responded. Her heart sank as she realised she could have misinterpreted her sister’s reason for being there. Lucy might well feel as James did, which wouldn’t be so surprising. Bracing herself for rejection, she released her sister and stepped back.

  ‘Sorry. You probably didn’t come here for a family reunion at all,’ she apologised uncomfortably. ‘I got a little ahead of things,’ she added with a laugh that teetered off-key.

  Lucy’s expression immediately became contrite. ‘No, no, don’t be silly. That was exactly what I came for, but I wasn’t sure that you wanted to see me!’

  ‘Not want to see you!’ Ginny exclaimed in astonishment. ‘Lucy, not a day has passed when I haven’t wished I could see you.’

  ‘I missed you, too,’ Lucy confessed, and this time it was she who threw her arms around her sister. They shared laughter and brushed away a tear, and then Ginny held Lucy away from her.

  ‘Let me look at you. You’ve grown so, I would hardly have recognised you.’ Lucy had turned from a gangling youngster into a beautiful young woman of eighteen.

  Just at that moment the bathroom door opened and Roarke stepped out. He wore nothing but a towel and a smile. The sight of him took Ginny’s breath away and knotted her stomach. She could feel telltale warmth invading her cheeks.

  ‘Ladies.’ Roarke greeted them with charming panache, considering the situation.

  Ginny decided to ignore his lack of clothes—as much as she could, anyway. ‘Lucy, this is Roarke. James is marrying his sister. Roarke, my sister Lucy.’

  Roarke’s grin was dashing. ‘Pleased to meet you, Lucy. Let me get some clothes on, and then we can talk and spare Ginny’s blushes.’ With which taunting statement he crossed the room and vanished into his dressing-room.

  Lucy giggled, and Ginny rolled her eyes. ‘Don’t encourage him!’

  ‘No, I’ll leave that to you,’ her sister returned, tongue-in-cheek. ‘Thank goodness your taste in men has improved. I never did like Mark,’ she added seriously, surprising Ginny.

  ‘You didn’t?’ she asked falteringly.

  Lucy pulled a face and shook her head. ‘He was a phoney. I bet he didn’t do half those things he said he did.’

  Mark had bragged about where he had been and who he had met. Ginny had pretty soon discovered none of it was true. ‘I wish you’d told me,’ she drawled wryly. She could have saved herself a lot of grief.

  ‘You wouldn’t have believed me,’ Lucy replied with a fatalistic shrug, and Ginny knew she was right.

  ‘Probably not,’ she conceded.

  Lucy suddenly laughed brightly and gave Ginny a knowing look. ‘But I like what I’ve seen of this one,’ she said saucily, which made Ginny laugh. ‘He’s delicious.’

  ‘And unavailable,’ Ginny countered swiftly, surprised by the way her nerves had leapt at the notion that Lucy found Roarke attractive.

  Roarke chose that moment to reappear, dressed in the trousers of his morning suit, white silk shirt and bow tie. Pausing by the couch, he retrieved the blanket and pillow he had used to make his bed.

  ‘Come and sit down,’ he invited.

  ‘I can’t stay long. Dad will be looking for me,’ Lucy warned them, though she went to the couch, giving the bedding an odd look.

  Roarke was equal to the unspoken question. ‘We argued. I spent part of the night on the couch,’ he admitted easily.

  ‘Only part?’ Lucy queried archly, and Roarke laughed, looking right at Ginny.

  ‘We made up,’ he said huskily, causing Ginny’s cheeks to burn hotter.

  ‘Making up’s the best part,’ Lucy agreed flirtatiously.

  Roarke dumped the bedding on the bed and took one of the chairs whilst Ginny joined her sister on the couch.

  ‘I’m glad you didn’t respond to Ginny the way your brother did,’ Roarke observed, and Lucy sighed.

  ‘It isn’t easy going against a man like our father. James collapses under pressure, and there’s no one who can exert pressure as well as Dad.’

  Ginny had firsthand knowledge of that. ‘I’m sorry I wasn’t there to help.’

  ‘You had to get out. I understood that.’ Lucy immediately waved away the attempted apology. ‘When Dad told us we weren’t to see you or speak to you, it made me angry. Later, he said your name wasn’t even to be mentioned, and I really hated him. I used to mention you all the time, just to annoy him. It was worth being sent to my room to see his face go red. You were my sister, and nothing he said or did was going to change that. I’m really sorry I didn’t speak to you last night, but he was watching, and if I’d attempted it he would have made Mum’s life a misery. So I waited until this morning and snuck out before he did his rounds!’ she finished with a spirited laugh.

  Roarke grinned at her. ‘Seems the women of your family are a strong-willed bunch. Could it have something to do with the hair?’ Lucy’s hair was red, too, if less vibrant than Ginny’s. ‘I’ll have to watch what I say around you two.’

  ‘Oh, I’m a kitten compared to Ginny,’ Lucy contested. ‘Just don’t get in her way when she’s really mad.’

  ‘Lucy!’

  ‘Well, it’s true! You’re by far the most passionate of us all!’

  Ginny couldn’t help her gaze drifting to Roarke, saw in his eyes the acknowledgement that he had already discovered the passionate side of her for himself. She hadn’t wanted it to resurface, but it had. Twice now she had found herself a captive of her sensual response to this man, and she didn’t like it. It wasn’t part of her plan.

  ‘I’m not the person I was, Lucy,’ she denied, turning back to her sister. ‘I learned the hard way not to be so foolish. The world didn’t stand still these last eight years.’

  ‘Why didn’t you keep in touch?’

  ‘Not because the Brigadier told me not to, but because I thought you would fare better if I stayed away.’

  ‘You were right in a way, it was better—until recently,’ Lucy confirmed, then her expression clouded.

  Ginny’s stomach knotted. ‘What happened?’

  Lucy opened her mouth to explain, but the clock on the mantelpiece began to chime, and she got to her feet quickly. ‘Half past eight already! I can’t talk any more now, Ginny. Dad asked for breakfast in his room for all of us, so I’d better go. We’ll talk again, I promise,’ she insisted as she made her way to the door.

  ‘Let me make sure the coast is clear,’ Roarke commanded, taking a swift look up
and down the hall. ‘It’s OK.’

  The two women hugged each other swiftly, and then Lucy left, walking briskly down the hall. At the corner she glanced back and waved, then she was gone.

  ‘Nice girl,’ Roarke remarked as he shut the door again. ‘I find it amusing that a man like Sir Martin, who likes to throw his weight around, should have two daughters strong enough to fight him. He can’t have expected that his son would be the weaker one.’

  ‘He should have done. The red hair comes from his side of the family. James takes after our mother,’ Ginny responded with heavy irony, and their eyes met as they shared the joke. However, when the laughter faded, they found themselves remembering what it was that Lucy’s arrival had interrupted, and the air around them began to crackle with electricity.

  Ginny licked her lips and took the bull by the horns. ‘What happened earlier… That was a mistake,’ she declared firmly.

  Roarke had no trouble following her. ‘I couldn’t agree with you more.’

  She folded her arms protectively. ‘I’ll play the part as I promised, but we’ll have to keep our distance. I don’t intend for anything to happen a third time.’

  ‘I’m with you all the way, sweetheart. Finding myself physically attracted to you wasn’t on the cards for me, either,’ he acknowledged. ‘Discovering this unexpected fire in you doesn’t help. It would have been better if that ice in your blood hadn’t melted!’

  ‘I never had ice in my blood. That was your invention. If I appeared frosty, it was because I didn’t like you.’

  ‘Well, sweetheart, we would both have been better served if you’d continued to dislike me,’ Roarke shot back.

  ‘I never stopped. In fact, right now, I dislike you every bit as much as I ever did!’ Ginny returned fire swiftly.

  ‘Then why didn’t you put up more of a fight when I kissed you?’ he wanted to know, incurring her wrath.

  Her lips parted in an angry gasp. ‘Are you suggesting this is all my fault? You should learn to keep your hands to yourself!’

  His lips twisted into a mocking smile. ‘I would, if you didn’t keep responding to me!’

  Green eyes narrowed wrathfully. ‘So it is my fault!’

  ‘I didn’t say that.’

  ‘Not in so many words, but I got the message. Damn, none of this would be happening if you hadn’t kissed me last night!’ she exclaimed accusingly.

  ‘Cut it out, Ginny. Neither of us expected the response we got. Besides, whilst we’re on the subject, who was exploring whose body no more than an hour ago?’

  Of course she had no answer to that. Roarke had been asleep. It had been all her own idea. All she could do was draw herself up to her full height. ‘Thank you for throwing that back in my face!’

  Roarke took an impatient step towards her, which she countered by taking a step back. ‘I wasn’t about to touch you,’ he protested irritably.

  ‘I wasn’t taking the chance!’

  ‘Now you’re just being ridiculous. I have no intention of touching you…in that way…ever again,’ Roarke snapped back testily.

  ‘You can’t know how happy I am to hear that!’ Ginny snorted, fully aware that she was overreacting, but not seeming to be able to stop.

  ‘Oh, for the love of God! Nobody has to take all the blame. We’re both at fault. It turns out this response we have to each other isn’t going to vanish as easily as we expected. We didn’t ask for it, but we have to deal with it. We can’t expect someone to always bang or knock on a door to stop us doing something rash.’

  Ginny knew he was right. They had to get control of the situation. ‘OK. No kissing, no touching—no anything. We keep our distance from now on.’ How hard could it be? They would be leaving the next day, so there was something like twenty-four hours for them to get through. They could do this. All it would take was self-discipline.

  ‘Fine,’ Roarke agreed, dragging a hand through his hair.

  ‘OK, then,’ Ginny retorted, facing up to him.

  An uneasy silence fell, during which time each observed the other warily. This was a new situation, and neither wanted to precipitate another incident. Roarke’s eyes dropped, taking in her apparel.

  ‘You can help by putting some clothes on, or are you going to stay like that all day?’ he asked sarcastically, waving a hand at her nightdress.

  Not for the first time, she was tempted to hit him. ‘Of course not! I’m going to shower and change, and then we’re going to see your sister,’ she exclaimed, putting action to the words by heading for her dressing room. ‘And if I don’t murder you before the day is out, you can consider yourself lucky!’ she added, before vanishing inside.

  Of all the nerve, she thought, as she collected together underwear and the dress she intended to wear for the wedding. She had been respectably covered in her nightdress, whilst he had wandered around in a towel. Talk about a double standard. Obviously she had become Eve, the temptress, and he was the poor hapless male. Hah!

  Gathering up her things, she re-entered the bedroom. Roarke was on the telephone. Ginny crossed to the bathroom without looking directly at him, but she felt his eyes on her all the way. Her spine tingled. Only with the bathroom door shut did the feeling go away. Setting her clothes down and hanging her dress on the door, she stripped off her nightdress and stepped into the shower. The warm water was refreshing and she stood under it, savouring the pleasure.

  However, as she stood there, thoughts of Roarke and her response to him trickled back into her mind. There was no denying the response, but how had it happened? She would have bet anything that she would never feel anything for him. She disliked him and his attitude to women. Or did she…?

  Hadn’t it always been the case that she disliked his attitude to women more than she disliked him? When she had first met him, hadn’t there been a moment when he had set her nerves jangling? Before she remembered his reputation, and that he was exactly the kind of man she was determined to avoid?

  If she was honest with herself, then she knew that attraction didn’t just flare up. It had to have been there, unacknowledged. They had been fighting for so long that neither realised it had masked what they were now discovering was a pretty powerful mutual attraction. It had been hidden because neither wanted to acknowledge a response to the other. They called it dislike and fought like cat and dog. Now the blinkers were gone and they were left to face the passion.

  Which they still didn’t want, because they were the same people. Only it was going to be harder to ignore, because they had had a taste of what it could be like. Temptation hovered, however inconveniently. At least things hadn’t gone too far. They could retrieve the situation. That, at least, they were agreed upon.

  With renewed determination Ginny washed, then dried herself on the softest towel she had ever held, and dressed in the pale lavender shift dress. She emerged from the bathroom feeling much more confident, only to have that confidence tilted dangerously by the view she had of Roarke standing at the dressing table combing his hair. The action was stretching the cloth of his silk shirt over powerful shoulder muscles, and that reminded her of what he had felt like to touch. Her mouth went dry.

  ‘Something wrong?’

  Roarke’s eyes met hers in the mirror, and she hastily shook her head. ‘I was just wondering what I did with my shoes,’ she lied, giving herself a mental ticking-off for allowing the erotic thought to enter her head. The few seconds it took her to retrieve her far from lost shoes allowed her to regain her composure.

  ‘Will your mother be with your sister?’ Ginny asked in concern, fixing tiny diamond studs to her ears as she emerged from the dressing room.

  Roarke laughed at the mere idea. ‘Mother never puts in an appearance until lunchtime. She’ll make a concession today, but I still don’t expect her to emerge before eleven. We should be able to get a short time alone with Caroline before her bridesmaids turn up, if we’re quick. Are you ready?’

  ‘Yes. I won’t put on the matching jacket until we leave
for the church,’ Ginny added as they headed out of the door.

  ‘I’m resisting wearing the rest of this monkey suit until the last minute myself,’ Roarke remarked wryly.

  ‘Morning dress suits you,’ she felt compelled to admit.

  He quirked an eyebrow at her. ‘Are compliments allowed under the rules?’

  ‘I’ve complimented you before,’ Ginny pointed out, which caused him to grin.

  ‘But that was before we discovered we were attracted to each other,’ he countered, setting her nerves leaping.

  Ginny winced. ‘Comments like that are definitely out,’ she declared.

  ‘Hiding our heads in the sand isn’t going to help.’

  She knew that. All the same… ‘Can we not discuss it right now?’ she begged, hurrying to keep up with him. ‘Where on earth is your sister’s room—on the moon?’

  ‘The other side of the house. Caroline prefers mountains to water. She has a morbid fear of it.’

  ‘That’s a shame!’

  ‘It’s a shame somebody didn’t drown her father. He was the individual whose idea of teaching her to swim was to chuck her in the deep end!’ Roarke explained, and clearly he had no love for his ex-stepfather.

  Ginny felt a sympathetic anger too. ‘He was husband number two, I take it?’

  ‘Correct. He was a flautist of international renown, but a dead loss as a human being. Fortunately, Caroline inherited his talent and not his ego. Here we are.’

  Roarke halted at a door and tapped out a particular series of knocks. Catching Ginny watching him in amazement, he shrugged. ‘We all have our own knocks—that way, the person whose room it is knows whether to answer or not.’

  Ginny’s lips twitched. ‘Who were you trying to avoid?’

  ‘Mother, mostly.’ He grinned unrepentantly, and looked so boyishly handsome that her heart skipped a beat and her breathing went awry.