“I tried to stay away,” Ian said roughly. “But I can’t, Michele.”
She started to push his hands off her but somehow couldn’t complete the motion; the moment she touched him, it was as if her own strength drained away. She was throbbing for his touch.
He wanted to move fully into the cradle of her legs, to kiss her moist lips, to feel her in his arms again. The driving urge to lose himself in her until there was nothing on earth but the two of them and the fiery heat of mating was so powerful it filled his mind and sent a shudder through his body.
Her eyes closed suddenly and her slim hands gripped his wrists almost frantically. “I don’t even trust you,” she said in a voice that was nearly a moan. “Don’t do this to me!”
Ian drew a deep breath and grimly hung on to his control. How could they sort through the tangle of thoughts and emotions when their physical response to each other was this explosive? It was almost impossible to think at all. He’d never wanted a woman so badly in his life, and it was clear that her need was just as great.
“Look at me, Michele,” he ordered tautly.
She caught her breath, her lids lifting slowly to reveal shadowed, haunted eyes the color of a mountain fog.
“Let me teach you to trust me. Give me a chance. Give us a chance.”
“Even if—” She broke off as he shook his head briefly.
“One step at a time,” he urged, his voice still rough and strained. “We have to be sure. If you can’t trust me, we’ll never know how it could be between us. It’ll end right here.” He wondered if he had a hope in hell of keeping that promise when he could barely hold his own desire in check. “Please, Michele,” he added softly.
She felt something inside her give way, deeper than the first wall that had crumbled the other night. And quite suddenly her mind was clear and quiet, the pain of indecision gone. As if she’d been straining against some irresistible pull and had finally let go and accepted the inevitable.
She gazed into those striking pale blue eyes, and her hands slowly relaxed their grip on his wrists. “All right,” she said unsteadily. “Now what?”
Ian turned his hands to catch hers and stepped back, gently drawing her down to stand with him on the sand. “Now we try to get to know each other,” he said.
Michele looked up at him, her fingers unconsciously clasping his. “I’ll have to tell Jackie.”
“How will she react?”
“Not well. She practically grew up in my house, so she’s heard the Stuart name cursed most of her life. I’m not even sure she’ll keep the confidence.”
“She could call your father or brother?”
Michele shrugged. “I’ll try to talk her out of that. I don’t want them to know, Ian. I don’t want to hurt either one of them if—if it isn’t necessary.”
He nodded, accepting that. “Why don’t you both have breakfast with me? On that little terrace by the garden.”
Not sure Jackie would even consent to sit at the same table with a Stuart, Michele managed an uncertain smile. “I’ll ask her.”
Ian held her hand as they began walking back toward the hotel. Striving for lightness, he said, “Tell her she can be watchdog, and protect you from the dragon.”
Chapter 3
Jackie Flynn leaned over the balcony railing and breathed in the morning air happily. She wasn’t, by nature, a morning person, but this island life agreed with her, and she was finding it no hardship to rise earlier than usual. She was beginning to understand why Michele loved mornings. She was already up and about, probably running on the beach since that was her habit. Even on vacation, Michele wasn’t the type to laze away her days.
Jackie leaned farther outward, peering to the left to try and catch a glimpse of the garden path to the beach, which was obscured by a wing of the building. She spotted Michele.
With a man.
A big blond man, Jackie noted with interest, and he was holding Michele’s hand in a way that was possessive rather than casual. She watched them emerge from the garden and walk past the pool, every step bringing them closer. Her smile faded, a niggling uneasiness growing inside her. From her position she could see Michele’s face well, but only the man’s profile as he talked earnestly with her.
There was something about him…
The conversation several floors below was finally finished, and the man half turned to watch Michele walk on alone. Jackie could see his face now, all too clearly. She jerked back away from the railing, feeling sick.
“Oh, my God,” she muttered.
—
Jackie was standing in the doorway to her room.
She looked pale, Michele thought, and her eyes held a queer, stunned expression. “Jackie? Are you all right?”
“I saw you.” Jackie swallowed hard. “I saw you with him.”
Michele slowly crossed the room to the table by the balcony doors and sat down in one of the chairs. Her friend’s extreme reaction didn’t surprise her, but it saddened her and made her think bitter thoughts. Twenty years of poison had made Jackie hate someone she didn’t even know, someone who had never lifted a hand against her, and that was a terrible testament to the power of brainwashing.
“Tell me I didn’t see that,” Jackie begged, coming into the room and sinking down on the corner of Michele’s bed. “Tell me it wasn’t Ian Stuart.”
“It was.”
“Michele…”
“I had car trouble the day after I got here,” Michele said steadily. “He stopped to help me.” Then a touch of painful mockery entered her voice. “The sky didn’t fall, Jackie. I wasn’t hit by a bolt of lightning. He didn’t turn into a Medusa or a gorgon or Jack the Ripper. He just offered me a ride back here, and that night we had dinner together.”
Jackie’s piquant face was marred by her anguished expression. “Michele, he’s a Stuart! He and his father have done their best to ruin your family for years—”
“No. Not Ian.”
“Oh, and I suppose he told you that?”
Had he? He’d said that he wouldn’t fight her brother, Michele remembered. That the feud would stop with him. But he hadn’t actually denied any involvement in the past. She felt pricking little doubts creeping nearer and fiercely pushed them away.
“Jackie, try to understand. I didn’t go looking for this; I didn’t know he’d be here on the island. And the last thing I want to do is hurt Dad and Jon.”
“But?” Jackie demanded sharply.
“Something happened that first night—”
“Did he hurt you?”
Michele shook her head, sighing. “No, nothing like that. It happened inside me, not because of anything he did. For the first time in my life, I—I felt like a woman. Everything came crashing in on me, so many emotions and needs and fears. It scared the hell out of me; I ran like a thief.”
Jackie was staring at her, frowning. “Actually ran? Where?”
“Out on the beach.”
“He followed you.”
“Yes. And he knew why I was running, what I was running from. When he kissed me—”
“I knew it!” Jackie exclaimed, her normally pleasant voice hard. “The bastard’s trying to seduce you!”
Michele felt a flash of sheer rage. “Is he?” she snapped back. “Then he missed a great opportunity that night, because I couldn’t say no. I asked him not to stop!”
Jackie drew back a little and they stared at each other, shock on one face and anger on the other. It wasn’t the first time they’d quarreled, but it was by far the most serious disagreement they had ever had.
“He’s up to something,” Jackie finally said, her tone unsteady. “He wants to hurt you, Michele.”
“Why are you so sure of that? Because he’s a Stuart? Does his name make him incapable of anything but hurt when it comes to me? Can it possibly be that he’s just a man who happens to find me attractive?”
“Is that how it is with you?” Jackie asked. “Do you find him—attractive—because he’s j
ust a man? Do you feel that way in spite of his name, Michele? Or because of it?”
“What do you mean?”
“Forbidden fruit. It’s supposed to taste sweeter.”
Michele felt a jolt, the ugly little doubts creeping nearer again. Then she shook her head and muttered, “Nothing’s that simple.”
“Isn’t it? Ian Stuart is the last man in the world you should get involved with. Your father would disown you in every sense of the word. So would Jon.”
“I know that.”
Jackie looked shocked again, and uneasy, as if she’d expected the reminder to cure her friend instantly of this madness. She stared for a moment, then said in a thin voice, “It would be a feather in his cap, wouldn’t it? He could destroy your family and enjoy himself doing it. Make you care about him until nothing else mattered, until you broke your father’s heart and—”
“That’s enough.” Michele tried to stifle her anger as she got to her feet and squared her shoulders. “You’re my closest friend, Jackie, and I know you want what’s best for me. So let me find out for myself what that is. Maybe it won’t be Ian, but I have to make up my own mind. I can’t hate him just because I’ve been told I should.”
Jackie was silent for a moment, then asked stiffly, “I guess you expect me to keep my mouth shut about this?”
“To Dad and Jon? I hope you will.” Michele slipped her feet into sandals and made sure her room key was still in the pocket of her skirt. “Maybe there won’t be anything to tell them, in the end. But if there is, it should come from me.”
Staring at the floor, Jackie said, “All right. I’ll keep quiet. Maybe you’ll come to your senses before they’re hurt by this.”
Michele went toward the door, then stopped and looked at her friend. “Ian’s invited us for breakfast. Do you want to come?”
“I’m not hungry.”
Not that she’d expected any other response. “We’ll be at a table on the terrace if you change your mind.” She was almost at the door when Jackie’s quiet voice stopped her.
“Michele?”
“Yes?”
“He can hurt you so badly. He can hurt you more than any other man ever could.”
There was nothing Michele could say to that, because it was the truth. Silently, she left the room and went to join Ian for breakfast.
“She didn’t take it well,” Ian noted a few minutes later.
Settled in her chair across from him in the morning sunshine, Michele conjured a faint smile. “Afraid not. I can’t even blame her for it, really. She’s a wonderful person, but she isn’t any more rational about you Stuarts than anyone in my family is.”
“I suppose she pointed out all the reasons you shouldn’t see me again?”
“Oh, yes.” Michele sighed. “All the reasons I’d thought about and a few I hadn’t.” Then she shook her head. “No, that isn’t true. Jackie didn’t say anything I hadn’t already said to myself. It just sounded…worse coming from her.”
Ian’s jaw tightened. “I can imagine.”
Michele glanced past him, then stiffened a bit. “You won’t have to. I guess she changed her mind.” Ian rose as Jackie moved toward them, and Michele added in a low voice, “I hope you have a thick skin.”
He certainly needed one, Ian decided during the next hour or so. Jackie didn’t hide her hostility one bit, and if she could get a barbed comment in, she didn’t hesitate. Ian didn’t mind for himself; it would take more than the venom of this antagonistic redhead to make him lose his own temper. But he minded for Michele, because he knew it bothered her. She didn’t say very much, hardly touched her breakfast, and more than once angry color rose in her cheeks.
The last thing Ian wanted to do was come between Michele and her friend; the cost of this relationship would likely be high enough without that loss. But he couldn’t bear to sit by and allow this hate-filled young woman to tear their relationship to pieces before it had a chance.
He signed the check, rose, then gently pulled Michele to her feet. “If you’ll excuse us?” he said pleasantly to Jackie.
She ignored him, looking at her friend instead. “Jon’ll probably call, Michele. Want me to tell him you’re slumming?”
Evenly, Michele replied, “I never knew you were cruel, Jackie. Until now. Tell him any damn thing you want to.” She turned away abruptly.
Ian saw Jackie’s face whiten, but whether with anger or shame he couldn’t say. He caught up with Michele in a few steps, and took her arm, guiding her back through the lobby and toward the front doors.
“Well, that little experiment was a mistake,” he said wryly. “She hates my guts. And it isn’t even her fight.”
“I’m sorry.” Michele’s voice was low, her head bent.
He didn’t reply until they were in his car and heading away from the hotel. “You don’t have any reason to be sorry. Jackie’s as much a victim of five hundred years as we are.”
Michele half turned on the seat to look at him. “But we aren’t reacting the same way. Why not? What makes you and me different?”
“Something stronger than both of us. Something that might even be stronger than the feud. That’s what we have to find out, Michele.”
The barbs Jackie had planted stung Michele’s flesh…and she wondered what influence they would ultimately have on her relationship with Ian. All through breakfast, she’d been conscious of the ache of longing inside her, and every jab from Jackie had only made her more aware of it.
Gazing steadily at Ian now, she felt the longing intensify, numbing her doubts and suspicions. She wanted his arms wrapped around her, his mouth on hers, his hard body pressed against her. She wanted to forget that they were anything but a man and woman. Her wishes were so simple, so clear, so untroubled by any doubt, fear, distrust.
“Where are we going?” she asked huskily.
Ian sent her a quick glance, and a muscle leaped in his jaw as his hands tightened on the wheel. “Dammit, don’t look at me like that,” he warned in a taut voice.
It should have embarrassed her that her feelings showed so plainly on her face, but somehow it didn’t. She was aware only of a tingling satisfaction that his response was so instant. “I can’t help it,” she murmured.
He drew a short breath, and the telltale muscle in his jaw flexed again as he stared straight ahead. “You’d better try, because it makes me want to drag you into the backseat like some horny teenager.”
Michele tried to look away from him, but she couldn’t. His blunt statement sent a stab of excitement through her, and the recklessness of that feeling pushed everything else out of her mind. She had to press her lips tightly together to keep herself from saying there was nothing she’d like more than to take him up on that rough promise.
Ian glanced at her again and instantly forced his attention back on the road. His brief look was enough to jerk the threads of his control painfully tight. He was going to plow the car into one of the palms lining the street if he wasn’t careful, or else just pull over in front of someone’s house and make love to her no matter who happened to stroll by. She was sitting there beside him in her prim white dress—except that it wasn’t prim at all. The bodice had some kind of fishnet panels down both her sides and another in front, between her breasts; golden flesh was clearly visible through the net all the way to her slender waist. She wasn’t wearing a bra; all he had to untie were the flimsy straps at her shoulders and smooth the sheer linen away to feel her naked breasts in his hands. The way she was looking at him only made matters worse. Her haunting gray eyes were soft and unfocused with the desire of a woman.
Ian cleared his throat harshly and held on to control with an iron grip. “Michele, for both our sakes, we have to be careful. If we become lovers before you trust me…”
Lovers. The word made a wave of heat wash over her. To be Ian’s lover, to lie in his arms, to feel his weight on her, to know his possession. That was what this was all about, she knew, what both of them had hesitated to name aloud. I
t was the connection that drew them together even though they were supposed to be on different sides of a war. Not rational or even sane, the compelling attraction existed, and they had to decide how best to deal with it.
She turned her head away finally, staring through the windshield, trying to gather her scattered wits. “Where are we going?” she repeated in a steadier voice.
“The waterfront park,” he answered, his voice still a little strained. “I thought we could walk for a while. Talk.”
“With lots of people around,” she murmured.
“Lord knows I’d rather be alone with you. But I think we should avoid that.”
Michele didn’t protest his decision, even though a part of her wanted to. Ian was right. It was too dangerous for them to be alone, too tempting. She remained silent until they were walking slowly along one of the paths of the waterfront park. The place was busy with tourists, mostly American, but nonetheless it was a quiet and peaceful place.
“You said I was too honest to have hidden motives,” she said, glancing up at him. “How can you be so sure? I mean, you must have listened to as many attacks on Logans as I have on Stuarts over the years.”
“Attacks on Logans, yes,” he admitted. “But always against your father and Jon. I don’t believe my father ever said a thing against you personally. The closest he ever came was when he raked me over the coals when you beat me in that Grand Prix event ten years ago. He said I ought to be ashamed of myself for letting a Logan brat on a green horse beat me.”
Michele couldn’t help but smile. “I was determined to win that day—but not because you were a Stuart.”
Rather dryly, Ian said, “I know. You were mad as hell at being dumped at my feet.”
Startled, she said, “Yes, but how did you know that?”
He walked a few more steps in silence, then drew her hand through the crook of his arm. “It was in your eyes. Not hate, but something fierce and obstinate. As I remember, you had a few nasty things to say about my ancestors when I offered you a hand up, but that seemed more or less automatic.”