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‘Tell me what happened to our baby.’
The content of his question shocked her far more than that suddenly terse, unforgiving delivery. And then anger and loathing for his desertion of so long ago raged right through her. She twisted her head, scornful eyes raking his stony face.
‘Why the interest now?’ The pain of loss came flooding back. Her voice was harsh with it. She’d wanted that lost child so badly. ‘Seven years ago, when it mattered, you were invisible!’
Her face set, she shot to her feet and swung round to stalk away, but a steel-fingered hand fastened around her ankle, shackling her.
‘Let me go!’
‘When I have an answer.’
Threat or promise, she was telling him nothing. He would have learned exactly what had happened from Vivienne, shrugged those impressive shoulders and got on with his life. She wasn’t going to put herself through the agony of telling him about the worst few hours of her life, the following long period of grief and depression, just to satisfy his twisted curiosity.
She tried to jerk her foot away, but his grip simply tightened. His strength was formidable. It was a pity his character didn’t match it!
‘Have it your way.’ Her mouth mutinous, she shuffled down in the sand, wondering if she could make a dash for it. The lean, tanned fingers slid away, releasing her. She decided she wouldn’t do anything so undignified. He could make her sit here for ever, but he couldn’t make her speak.
But her stubborn resolution was knocked sideways when he said bitterly, ‘Let me put it another way. Why did you have an abortion? I was going to marry you, take care of you both.’
‘I had what?’ The words were shocked out of her. Her eyes flew to his harsh face, her brows knitting together as she tried to make sense of what he’d just said.
‘You heard.’ Impatience turned his eyes black. ‘Just tell me why. I need to understand why you did it. When I do, I’ll get out of your life and stay out.’
Threat or promise? she thought again, and wondered wildly why it felt more like a threat than the other. She felt suddenly nauseous and dizzy, and her fingers clutched the sand, but there was no substance, nothing to hold on to. Just as there would be nothing to hold on to if she never saw him again.
Which meant, she told herself wildly, that she was going mad!
She looked at him, at the tanned, oiled-satin skin that covered hard muscle and bone, the lean, lithe length of him, his masculinity only just covered by that wicked scrap of black fabric. She swallowed a moan and closed her eyes to block him out.
‘You offered marriage out of duty. Because it was the right thing to do. When you heard what Harold said, on that awful day, you believed him. You didn’t even bother to follow me to hear my side of it. You just let me go because I disgusted you,’ she muttered.
Apart from one or two flashes of fighting spirit she’d been regressing ever since he’d turned up on the tiny island, and now she even sounded like her despised younger self—defensive and insecure.
She shivered, and he said heavily, ‘I didn’t follow you because—misguidedly, as it now appears—I was telling our dear departed stepfather not to blame you for his depravities. I didn’t imagine you’d take off like a bat out of hell.’ He gave a sharp, impatient sigh. ‘Let’s get you back to the house.’ Suddenly he was on his feet, gathering up her belongings. ‘You look as if you’re about to faint. It’s the heat. And you probably need food. We’ll finish this conversation later.’
Georgia wished he wouldn’t wait for her, but he did. And although he didn’t touch her she was so achingly aware of him it was like being in purgatory. He kept shooting quick sideways glances in her direction, his dark brows drawn together, as if to satisfy himself she hadn’t crumpled in a heap.
She had never fainted in her life; her pallor and light-headedness was down to shock, not a lack of food. As he stood aside for her to step on to the veranda she said firmly, ‘I did not—’
‘Not now,’ he interrupted tersely. ‘After lunch. And remember, I don’t want to be fed a load of lies. I just want your reasons. Then I’ll get out of your hair. We won’t have to see each other again.’
It couldn’t come quickly enough. He headed for his room. When she’d come to his room that night seven years ago his head had been blown away by a mixture of patent flu remedies, alcohol, fever and sex. It was only later, when he’d learned of the consequences, that he’d realised how much he cared about her, how much he wanted that sweet, loving, sexy creature in his life. Wanted their child. Wanted to protect, love and cherish the two of them.
Now, his body still wanted her—more desperately than ever, he had to admit—but his intellect told him that she was about as sweet and loving as a queen wasp. A woman with attitude, as devious and self-seeking as they came. He remembered Vivienne, and grumpily decided it was bred in the bone.
He’d be off the island before the day was over. Out of reach of her aura of sinful temptation.
For the sake of his self-respect.
CHAPTER NINE
‘YOU took your time!’ Blossom pounced the moment Georgia entered the spacious, forest-facing dining room. ‘Do I cook good food just to watch it spoil?’ She exited with a crackle of her huge starched apron, and returned almost immediately with a heavily burdened tray. ‘And that thing you’re wearing needs a laundering. You got pretty things; why don’t you wear them?’
Georgia took her place at the lunch table: elegantly laid for two and decorated with a bowl of delicate pink flowers which filled the air with fragrance.
‘I changed into the first thing to come to hand,’ she said airily, and told herself, Liar! You deliberately went for the cover of shirt and trousers. Then she wondered if she’d chosen to wear these same things yesterday, while she’d been waiting for Jason to arrive on the island, because she’d known deep inside her that the sex thing still fizzled between them and she’d been looking for protection. From herself. From him.
Blossom, muttering under her breath, set out a dish of spicy fried chicken, another of appetising mango, tomato and red onion salad, a platter of wafer-thin fried bread and a bowl of rice and peas, then stood back, her hands on her hips, waiting.
