Page 38 of Gamble On Passion

'You fight dirty, Jacy.' His triumphant smile beamed up at her. 'We are a lot alike, you and I.' And, tangling his hand in her long hair, he forced her head down to meet his mouth.

Jacy tried to fight it, but it was no use. Sprawled on top of him, their bodies provocatively entwined, she felt her last shred of anger vanish in the wonder of his kiss...

'You were jealous, you little she-cat,' he murmured against her lips. 'You've no idea how great that makes me feel.' He pulled her head back and his darkening eyes searched her flushed face. Recognising her uncertainty, he continued, 'You had no need, my love. I don't know what you saw.'

'You and Thelma walking out of the office; you kissed her.' She wanted there to be an explanation, but she had been hurt too much by this man already.

'Jacy, I have never, ever even thought of being un­faithful to you, not from the first moment I saw you again at Liz's.'

'But I saw you...' It was a cry from the heart.

'You saw me with an arm around the shoulder of a woman who I had just congratulated on doing some ex­cellent work for me, hence the kiss on the cheek—and that was all it was.'

'What work?' she asked suspiciously.

Leo chuckled, his dark eyes lit with laughter. 'I suppose I will have to tell you, but it blows my surprise. You know when we collected the boys from Sunday school that day... well, did you notice the old vicarage with the scaffolding around it?' he asked, but, without waiting for her reply, continued, 'Anyway, it's a large stone-built house set in a small wood a hundred yards down the road.'

'Yes, but what's-?'

'Shut up and listen.' But the quirk of his lips belied his serious tone. 'When I was in America I arranged with Tom to buy the vicarage, and Tom put me in touch with a local builder and hired Thelma, as the best in­terior designer, to get a woman's opinion on what you would like.'

She stared at Leo dumbly, unable to speak. His brown eyes watched her with a compelling intensity, as if willing her to believe him. 'You bought a house for us, near Tom and Liz? When you were in America, before you even knew...' She spoke her thoughts out loud. 'You were that sure...'

'I've always known from the day I met an eighteen-year-old on the beach at Paleokastritsa, only it has taken me until just recently to finally admit it. I thought you knew how I felt on our first date, when I introduced you to my family.'

'Your father asked me if I was going to marry you...' she remembered.

'I know; I had already told him of my intentions. I had lost you once and I swore I would not let you slip through my fingers again. I tried to tell you how I felt when I called you from America. I hinted I wanted a family.' His strong fingers picked up the pendant that hung at her neck. 'I bought you this as a symbol. You had my heart. But I am ashamed to say I still did not quite trust you; this house, the bet, rankled with me. I have never been so relieved as when you told me your father left you the house, but the damage between us was already done when you let slip that piece of in­formation,' he chided gently, and she had the grace to blush.

'I should have put you right straight away, but you were so contemptuous that I got angry...'

'Anyway, when we made love here in this house I still hadn't the courage to openly declare my love; instead I hid my feelings behind taunting you with the bet and sarcastic comments about your lifestyle, but I seem to recall I let slip that, with every woman I'd tried to bed in the last ten years, the face on the pillow had always been yours. Why did you think I always dated blondes? Before I met you my preference was for brunettes.'

'Really? I'm flattered, I think...'

His dark eyes fused with hers. 'If I had thought for one second I would be away from you another three weeks I would never have behaved with such conceited arrogance. Please, Jacy, say you forgive me.'

'There is nothing to forgive.' She sighed and licked the skin showing through the open neck of his shirt.

'You're very generous,' he rasped huskily, his arms tightening around her. He buried his head in her sweet-smelling hair.

Jacy realised she believed him, and, if he was telling the truth about loving her, then surely it followed that he was also telling the truth about Thelma. Suddenly her heart felt lighter. Her golden eyes shone with love as she lifted her head and smiled down at him. 'You bought a house for us.' Only one thing bothered her. 'Then why were you so adamant we had to stay in the apartment? If we are going to have a home in the country, surely we could just as easily have stayed here?'

Leo sighed and stroked his hands tenderly up her back, but his brown eyes avoided her questing gaze, fixing on some point on the ceiling, almost as if he was afraid to look at her. 'Jealousy. You've lived here alone a long time, and the thought of sharing the same bed you've shared with other men...'

Jacy began to chuckle. Her head fell down on his chest and she curved her slender arms around him, hugging him to her. 'You fool,' she admonished, a wide grin en­hancing her beautiful face. 'I told you once—no man has ever slept in my bed but you.'

'You called me a chauvinist and I am. I know it's old-fashioned... What did you say...?' Suddenly her words had registered and in a second he had rolled her over on to her back, his large body poised darkly above her, but the glitter in his deep brown eyes was not in the least threatening. 'You never...'

'No, never! I loved you at eighteen and I never stopped.' The look of wonder and love on his bronzed face made her heart sing, and she knew he deserved it all. 'I didn't go out with you just for the bet; in fact when I saw you were the first man in the room I told Liz the bet was off. But you got under my skin with your arrogant assumption that because I was no longer sup­posedly a reporter I was all right to date.'

'Was I that bad?'

'Yes, but I knew when you went to America I wanted you back. I tried to tell myself it wasn't love, simply that I had spent too long celibate, and it was time I joined the adult world and plunged into a relationship. Only it didn't work. After the night we made love I was furious and felt used and vowed to forget about you all over again.'

'I know; I could have killed you when you turned down my date for the opera and turned up with that red-haired Adonis. Thank God I found out about him before I de­stroyed him.'

Jacy's eyes widened in surprise. The arrogant Leo was back with a vengeance. 'Destroyed him?'

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