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  “Your stepmother loves him?” she challenged. Whatever the story, Eve knew at some level Lady Forsythe was a little in love with Drew. And who could blame her?

  “People strike bargains and accommodations every day, Evie. You know that,” he answered reasonably, keeping his own temper down. “Susan feels deeply about my father. She was devastated when she lost the child. A lot of women go after status, a privileged lifestyle. Men, too. It’s happened all through history.”

  “I’m sorry.” Eve’s little smile was sad and apologetic. “But, Drew, you started all this.”

  “Admitted, and I don’t want to make you miserable. I’m trying to draw you out. There might be a little bit of pain but you can see it might help.”

  “Be a psychiatrist. Be whatever you want to be.” She half expected to feel the wetness of tears on her cheeks. “Are you trying to tell me you care?”

  “I’ll care if you let me,” he said quietly.

  “I’m not ready for someone like you, Drew. I’ll never be ready,” she said.

  They were silent on the way back to the bungalows, moving swiftly along the maze of pathways in an effort to beat the storm that was now imminent. There was no sign of the moon and stars. The cloud build up was complete, lowering over them, menacing. The great fronds of the tall palms whipped in the strong blustery wind that was coming off the sea laden with salt and a peculiar fragrance like incense. For a moment Eve thought she would be swept off her feet, but Drew grasped her around the waist, telling her with some urgency to keep her head down. The flowering shrubs, the oleanders, were taking a battering, tossing their branches right in their path.

  “Hell,” Drew muttered as he compelled her up the short flight of steps to her bungalow. “I just hope this isn’t Cyclone Nell coming to life.” Nell had been stationary well off the coast.

  A great jagged bolt of lightning flashed across the sky and buried itself in the earth. Another minute and it was followed by a violent clap of thunder that made Eve jump.

  “Go in. Get shelter,” Drew shouted above the din, adrenalin tingling through his veins. Despite the danger, storms had always filled him with a sense of awe and exhilaration.

  No so Eve. One of Ben’s closest friends from his school days had been killed by a lightning strike when he was out with his father on their boat. For years after, the boy’s mother had gone slightly crazy until she settled into a dull acceptance. He had been, after all, an only child. Ben still felt a strong personal loss.

  Inside the bungalow Eve turned on lights, trying to tighten her hold over her high emotion.

  “Evie?” Drew turned to give her a concerned look. Eve, the cool, the clever, the competent. She looked a little strange, her green eyes brilliant. “You’re all right, aren’t you?”

  For answer Eve closed her eyes as another flash of lightning seared the sky and lit up the bungalow. “I hate electrical storms. They’re so dangerous.”

  “You must be used to them living in Brisbane all your life.”

  “They never used to worry me,” Eve said tightly. “At one time I actually found them exciting but a friend of Ben’s was killed by a lightning strike. It was in all the papers. A few years back. He was out on the bay with his father. They almost made it back.”

  “That’s tragic. I seem to remember it.” Drew lifted his eyes as the lights of the bungalow flickered and dimmed. “There are some candles inside the kitchen cupboard. We’d better get them out just in case.”

  “Yes.” For a moment Eve didn’t move she was so shaken.

  “You sit down. I’ll get them,” Drew said, moving quickly to do just that.

  Rain was lashing down, drumming on the roof of the bungalow, sweeping across its small veranda and rattling the windows. Eve saw one was half open, but she didn’t want to walk across to it the lightning was so bad.

  “Another ten minutes and this will be over.” Drew comforted her, moving now to shut the window against the driving rain. “Even if the lights go out we have the candles.”

  Eve picked up a cushion, hugged it to herself. “I’m glad you’re with me. This is the worst storm I’ve ever experienced.”

  “It’s pretty volcanic at that,” Drew was forced to admit. “But it poses no real threat. The real threat is if the cyclone comes in. They’re just so damned destructive.”

  He had barely finished speaking when a quite terrifying burst of thunder threatened to shake the timber supports of the bungalow.

  “God, this is awful!” Eve pressed her hands to her ears. She was trembling. Doing damage to herself. She had to stop. It wasn’t only fear of the lightning she had to control. It was fear of showing her vulnerable core. She had endured a lifetime of thunderstorms. A lot of them she had even enjoyed. She would get through this. But the assault of the rain on the roof was like some massive bombardment, that and the thunder that rolled and cracked.

  The lights dulled and as her nerves jumped in shock, abruptly went out.

  “Drew?”

  “It’s all right.” There was no trace of anything but the utmost calm in his voice.

  “God, I don’t know what’s the matter with me tonight. I’m being silly I know.”

  “We’re all afraid of something.”

  “Except you.” Maybe it was the wine that sent a rush to her brain.

  “Don’t deliberately play with fire, Eve,” he warned. Squat candles in their storm shades flared into life, spreading a golden illumination over his handsome down-bent face. His physical presence filled the room but for all his quietness he, too, looked tense as though the turbulence of the atmosphere was affecting him, as well.

  “I can’t always be careful,” Eve protested, thinking the tension was almost visible. “If you’re so wise, you should have left me on my own.”

  “I suspect it’s because right now you need me.” He came towards her, so tall and vital, Eve felt a powerful tide of inevitability. You pay for everything, she thought wildly. Terrible mistakes have terrible penalties.

  “Lord, Evie; what’s your problem,” he groaned, on edge but still retaining his good humour. “It’s one hell of a time for a seduction surely?” Yet there were little tongues of fire in his dark, dark eyes.

  “That’s good, because I think we’d both be very, very sorry.” Eve couldn’t have been more aware of her own emotional fragility.

  “You think it might interfere with your career?” He sounded both amused and challenging.

  “I wouldn’t be the first woman who had to quit.”

  He looked her over, a twist to his sensuous mouth. “You’re assuming a lot, aren’t you, curled up on that sofa? You’re not ready for a tiny affair let alone what I might or might not be considering.”

  Tightness gathered in her throat. “Please, Drew, let it go at that. I know I sound awful.”

  “Actually you sound like a paragon of virtue.” There was wryness and a certain toughness in his voice. “Just be quiet now and everything will be okay.”

  He moved determinedly to the window, looking out at the tempest, closing his eyes for a moment against another brilliant flash of electricity-spitting lightning. The rain, if anything, was coming down harder, the fronds of the golden canes outside the window thrashing from side to side.

  When he finally turned back to Eve he found her paper white, tears sliding down her face. His heart melted and his own edgy feelings fell away. “Evie, Evie.” He had the tremendous urge to kiss the tears away. “This place has been built to withstand cyclones. ”We’re quite safe.”

  “I don’t like it all the same.” She dashed her hand across her face in self-disgust.

  He knelt before her and took her hands. “What is it? What’s really wrong?”

  At his keen perception, as though he knew her so well, she threw back her head wordlessly, exposing the clean line of her chiselled chin and throat. Where was her famous detachment now? Her feelings for him were so new, so threatening, they rubbed her raw.

  Drew didn’t hesitate. He sat do
wn beside her, drawing her into his arms. “You’ve got a lot of tears locked up inside, haven’t you?” He swept her hair off her face, looking deep into her eyes.

  For the space of that moment there was no sound. The fury of the storm had opened the floodgate, now it was silenced as Drew, his heart leaping, his body full of desperate hungers that had never been assuaged, bent his head and kissed her lovely passionate mouth. As he always knew he would. Fate had placed her in his life.

  Somehow without knowing it, he lifted her across his knees so her head was thrown back against the crook of his arm. She wasn’t cold or resistant at all. She was a boneless, yielding, beautiful woman creature, her mouth dissolving under the heat of his like the tears on her cheeks or the rain that overwhelmed the landscape.

  Surrendering to this hot aching tide, his hand slid from the curve of her chin, across her shoulder and down the satin flesh of her breast. So slight, her body so young and taut, she had no need of a bra and his fingers met the peaks of her breasts nuzzling them until she moaned in his arms. It was a miracle A shared experience, passionate yet poignant. He had never known a woman so wonderful to kiss, to touch. He bent his head to her breast, pushing the top of her slip dress off her shoulder, his hand sliding down over a delicate hip, seeking the hem of her dress. No haste, no violence, but an ecstasy of tenderness. Eve was so vulnerable. He couldn’t bear to frighten her. But his hunger was merciless.

  To Eve, almost fainting at the onslaught of high sensuality, her body trembling under his exploratory hands, it was like being possessed. Something new was running m her veins burning like molten lava.

  Desire. The fall of fire. When she had wanted only to escape it.

  He was so much more than a brilliant lover. Sensitive, imaginative, passionately romantic. He was a magician. Or a great artist.

  She couldn’t believe how far she had come. Dressing in such a flimsy dress, explaining it away as the heat. Every defence she had put up over the years crumbled before the triumphant male. Treacherous feelings engulfed her. Drunk on a kiss. Yet she couldn’t stand not to open her mouth to him.

  His hand moved across her lace briefs, about to find her, invade her in an eye’s blink, only a flash of her old resistance radiated up and out. Senses swimming, candlelight leaping over her exposed flesh, Eve turned her body so violently she would have fallen to the floor only Drew caught her back.

  “I can’t.” Her voice shook, her heart shuddering in her chest. Really, it was sad she was so messed up.

  “You can’t what?” His voice was slurred as though he, too, was affected.

  “I don’t want this.” Eve sat straight, pulling the thin strap of her dress back up her arm and onto her shoulder, acutely conscious her tightly budded nipples peaked against the violet fabric.

  “That wasn’t my impression, Evie,” he said with some mockery, kissing the back of her neck. “I won’t apologise because I made you aware of your own sensuality You surely can’t think I was about to rape you?” His voice matched his suave look.

  “Don’t joke about it,” she said shortly, her emotions ricocheting between a fierce longing and terror.

  “Let’s get something straight.” His hands found her smooth warm arms and closed on them. “You must know I’m falling in love with you?”

  At his words Eve’s heart fluttered wildly, like a bird beating its wings against a cage. Could it possibly be true, or just the usual male tactic to get a woman into bed? Charming women was a way of life for him. The expert rushing her into a headlong arousal.

  “Hey, it isn’t a bad thing!” he interrupted her thoughts wryly. “What’s important for me to know is, are you a virgin?”

  Eve’s cheeks flamed scarlet, her voice overemotional even to her own ears. “You’re wondering about that, are you?”

  “I sense you are but I’m not insulting you, Evie.” He tucked a long golden strand of hair behind her ear. So certain of her. Dangerous. Mesmerising. “I want to take care of you,” he murmured seductively. “I’ve had my affairs. I’ve been married. Now I’m looking for a serious involvement. With you. A deep involvement. With you. I don’t think you’re as unwilling as you try to make out.”

  No, I’m just sabotaging my chance to be happy. Eve bowed her head, shattered. “I don’t know. I can’t know.” She was forced to admit her ambivalence. “I’m only certain of one thing. TCR won’t be big enough for both of us. I’ll be the one who has to go.”

  “You think I’m likely to fire you?”

  He seemed to be teasing her. Thrilling her. Dominating her. When she cared not a jot for domination. “Why not? You dumped your wife,” she retaliated sharply, then could have bitten her tongue. All this anger and hostility was fed by old fears and confusions, a rising frenzy of desire that had brought her shockingly alive.

  “That’s rubbish,” he answered with magnificent disdain. “And it’s not you, Evie. It’s your past that’s eating you up. You won’t put me off, whatever you say. I’m very serious about you. I’ve had as many go-nowhere affairs as I can take.”

  All her senses overstrung, Eve made another attempt to pierce his armour. “Your wife isn’t even out of your life. She’s still tied to you,” she accused, watching his handsome face harden.

  “That’s absurd, Eve, and I don’t need it.”

  Eve gave a little jangled laugh. “It’s not. I saw her. I saw Susan. She’s virtually the same age as you. You mightn’t set out to have women falling in love with you but they can’t seem to stop themselves.”

  “Aren’t I lucky.” He spoke with bitter irony. “I have most things I need, Eve, but I don’t have the woman to love.”

  She looked back at him with blazing, don’t-mess-with-me eyes, swallowing up her face, green as lakes. “Is this a ploy to get me into bed?”

  He lifted a hand to his temple, rubbed it. “I might live for the moment, Evie, but no. I’m not perfect, sure, but I don’t go around covering every woman with kisses.”

  “Why did you leave your wife?” Eve asked more quietly.

  “Why?” He answered with a touch of grief. “I couldn’t stand it any more.”

  “You must have loved her to marry her.” Eve kept her eyes trained on his face. It was important for her to understand.

  He considered that for perhaps the umpteenth time. “None of us know what real love is until it hits. I thought I was in love with Carol. That’s all I can say. She’s very attractive and she can be good company. It took quite a while to accept she’s fundamentally selfish. We discussed having a family before we married. She smiled sweetly but concealed her true feelings. She didn’t want children at all. Not at any point. She swore she was off the pill well into our marriage but I discovered quite by chance she wasn’t. Her upset when I confronted her was real enough. She wept buckets. But she told me then what she should have told me before. She didn’t want children to disturb the harmony of our lives. She shuddered at the very thought of going through a pregnancy. I softened at once. I thought it might have been quite natural fears, and I could help her over them, but it was her figure she was worried about. I had her mother talk to her. Her doctor. But in the end it became clear to all of us. Carol was simply being herself.”

  “So you couldn’t get her to change her mind?” Eve listened, dismayed. It all had the unmistakable ring of truth.

  “As I said, I sure as hell tried,” he rejoined flatly. “I woke up too late to Carol’s mercenary side. She may have wanted me but she wanted my perceived position and wealth more.”

  “It must have wounded you, Drew,” Eve said with sudden clarity.

  “It did for a time. But not now. My life has taken a difference course since you came into it.”

  Eve felt herself melt under the sensuous heat of his gaze. As his hand circled her nape languorously, she closed her eyes, opening her mouth to accept his kiss. It was slow, deep, full of sizzling passion but an almost unbearable tenderness, too. For a long moment her being merged with his. Was consumed. Whatever was bet
ween them, the unanswered questions, his lovemaking was wonderful!

  CHAPTER FIVE

  THE acquisition of the Garratt land went through without a hitch. Sir David had returned from his trip to Japan and Indonesia where TCR had mining interests, the project, working name “Capriconia,” had been accepted by the board. A big celebratory party was scheduled for the end of the month with many guests from government, the business and social world being invited, including Elizabeth Garratt who had surprised them all by deciding to come. Eve had sent a personal letter to accompany the gold-embossed invitation, which, Drew remarked privately, had swung it. Though he had met with Elizabeth Garratt several times when the dealing was on, she had insisted Eve be part of the group She had come to look on Eve as a friend.

  “We’re kindred spirits,” she told Drew, a teasing light in her blue eyes. “Even if you are irresistible to women.”

  Flattery indeed but Elizabeth Garratt drove a hard bargain, Drew found, earning for herself a private villa in the grounds of the proposed resort. She confided now she had locked herself away far too long. She planned to spend part of the year in the city if Eve could find her a suitable apartment. Which of course Eve did.

  “Boy, have you come up in the world,” Ben remarked, reading out her invitation. “Don’t let it go to your head.”

  “As if I would.”

  “And what about the magnificent Drew?” Ben asked, a serious thread behind the teasing. “Face it, he’s getting to be more than your boss.”

  Eve, who was sewing a button on his shirt, jabbed herself with the needle. “Damn!”

  Ben laughed and passed her a box of tissues. “Is there something I should know?”

  Eve smiled, the same loving smile she always gave him. “Calm down, brother, nothing’s happening.”

  “Yet,” Ben answered wryly, “you’re getting more beautiful every day. You’ve always had a look of your own. Very cool and classy even in clothes we know weren’t good enough for you. But these days, you pack quite a punch.”

  “I need to look good. You know that.”