Vendetta Read online

  Then—nothing!

  He had whispered goodnight, tucked his arm comfortably around her middle, yawned and gone to sleep. She had tried to wriggle out from under his arm, but in sleep he was just as possessive, his hand sinking more securely under her waist, a thick, hair-roughened thigh pushing between her knees to drape over her leg, anchoring her firmly against the bed. Even through her blessedly modest nightgown she could feel the warm shudder of his heartbeat against her back and the firm definition of his manhood pressed against her soft bottom.

  Each succeeding night it had taken her longer to fall asleep, and each morning when she woke up in a confusion of blushes it was to find that some time in the night she had turned over and mingled with him in a trusting sprawl of limbs.

  To her chagrin he accepted her rejection with a careless shrug. ‘I came to tell you that Frank almost has dinner ready,’ he said. ‘And I’ve already warned you it’s not a good idea for you to be stumbling around out here alone when it starts to get dark. Look what nearly happened just now—’

  ‘That was because you were distracting me. Maybe you did it on purpose,’ she goaded, inexplicably angry at him for caring. ‘Or maybe you’d like to see me go over a cliff, to be killed by an “accident”. That would be rough justice for you, wouldn’t it?’

  In the waning light his features were blurred into softness, his eye deeply shadowed by his fierce brow. ‘Do you really think I brought you here to kill you?’

  ‘I… No,’ she admitted truthfully. His declared intent had been to cause her maximum mental suffering and she couldn’t suffer if she was dead. ‘But we both know there are worse things than dying…’

  He moved closer. ‘Like bearing my child, you mean? Would that really be a fate worse than death, Vivian? To make love with me and create a new life…?’

  The wind snatched her breath away. ‘You only said that to frighten me,’ she choked. ‘I know you weren’t really serious—’

  ‘Do you? Just because I haven’t mentioned it again?’ He captured her gaze with the bold assurance of his glittering brown eye. ‘I knew I didn’t have to. I knew you were thinking what it would be like to accept me as your lover. Wondering if I would make love with the same passionate intensity with which I seem able to hate. I was giving you time to get used to the idea. After all, there’s no real urgency now that you’re here, living, eating, sleeping with me. I’ve waited this long for you…I can wait a little longer…’

  A little longer? Heat suffused her body at his arrogant sexual confidence. She fought to cool her instinctive response. How could she feel anything but revulsion at his depraved suggestion?

  She shivered. ‘Surely you wouldn’t use force to—to—’

  ‘Not force—seduction,’ he said smouldering. ‘We both know that there’s been some very volatile physical chemistry brewing between us since the moment we met. Why don’t you just accept that we were always fated to become lovers?’

  Fate again. Wasn’t that the very thing she had come here to defy boldly? Vivian shivered once more.

  ‘You’re cold—why didn’t you say so?’ Nicholas scolded her, shrugging impatiently out of his jacket and wrapping her in the heavy oilskin, tucking her chilled hand firmly through his elbow as he escorted her back along the stony path towards the cottage. ‘You should have worn the parka I offered you. No sense in cutting off your nose to spite your face. And if you’re going to go storming around in a temper, watch out for the wildlife—they have first priority. Nowhere Island is a wildlife sanctuary and part of a maritime park. All these outlying islands are really the tops of drowned hills, and the eroded volcanic tubes that riddle the shore and sea-floor make very rich habitats for marine life.’

  ‘You sound like an environmental tour-guide,’ she said grumpily, trying not to respond to the enthusiasm in his voice.

  ‘I should hope my learning is a little more useful than that,’ he said drily as he opened the back door. ‘As a marine biologist, I don’t approve of environmental tourism.’

  ‘What!’

  He pushed her stunned figure over the threshold of the kitchen, where Frank was cursing over a sizzling pan.

  ‘You’re a property developer!’ she accused, as he whipped his jacket from around her shoulders and hung it on the back of the door.

  ‘I’m also a marine biologist. It is possible to do more than one thing with your life, Vivian. One doesn’t have to limit oneself to living down to other people’s expectations,’ he said softly. Was that a dig at her?

  He pressed a finger against her jaw, pushing it closed with a slight snap. ‘What’s the matter, Ginger? Aren’t I fitting into your stereotype of a grief-crazed vengeance-seeker?’ He stepped away. ‘I’m going to have a quick shower before dinner.’ The dark gleam of light reflecting off his eye-patch managed to give the startling impression of a wink. ‘Feel free to join me if you want to help conserve the tank-water.’

  As soon as he was out of the room, Vivian turned to Frank.

  ‘Does he really have a degree in marine biology?’

  ‘Yep. An athletic scholarship in the States.’

  She waited but, as usual, further information was not forthcoming.

  ‘You don’t talk much, do you?’

  ‘Don’t have much to say.’

  She would have been offended if she hadn’t discovered that he was almost as taciturn in his communications with Nicholas. She hadn’t quite worked out Frank’s job description yet; he seemed to be a combination of assistant, valet, bodyguard, mechanic—he had already fixed the faulty back-up generator—and chief cook and bottle-washer.

  ‘Where’s Nicholas’s son?’

  He shrugged. ‘Ask Nick.’

  ‘He won’t tell me. He won’t talk about his son at all. Or his wife.’ She gave a little huff of frustration. ‘How long have you worked for Nicholas? Did you ever meet his wife? Do you know what she was like?’

  That brought the hawkish face around, bearing a hard stare.

  ‘Six years. No. Beautiful.’

  It took her a moment to realise he had actually replied to all her questions. She sighed. ‘I thought she must have been.’

  Astonishingly Frank’s dour expression broke up in a grin.

  ‘Nothing like you.’

  She scowled. ‘OK, OK, you don’t have to rub it in. She was so perfect he’s never met another woman to match up to her.’

  ‘Is that what he told you?’ His grin widened and she studied him with suspicious green eyes.

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  He shrugged. ‘It’s your life—you figure it out.’

  And, with that irritating observation, he crouched down to open the oven and stir something inside.

  Vivian was about to demand a proper answer when her eyes fell on a bulge in the front pocket of the jacket hanging against the door. She remembered the weight of something bumping against the side of her knee with a vaguely familiar chink as Nicholas had hurried her along. His keys! She had searched all over the lighthouse, but there was one place she hadn’t been able to look.

  She darted silently over and boldly plunged her hand into the pocket. Fisting the key-ring, she just had time to nip back to the other side of the room before Frank closed the oven and turned around.

  ‘Uh, I think I’d better go and change for dinner,’ Vivian said uncomfortably, edging out of the door.

  Her heart was in her mouth as she crept down the hall. The plumbing in the lighthouse was still incomplete, so Nicholas would be showering in the cottage bathroom and probably had his fresh clothes with him, which meant he wouldn’t need to go back to his room before dinner. Even if he did, the locked room was on the fourth landing, and she would have plenty of time to hear him on the stairs and whip up to the next level to fossick innocently in her suitcase.

  The locked door hid exactly what she had suspected: an office. A businessman with Nicholas Thorne’s autocratic reputation would never trust anyone enough to relinquish control of his b
usiness, even temporarily. She pulled the door softly to, and switched on the light.

  There was a computer work-station and various unidentifiable pieces of electronic equipment, and a big desk strewn with papers.

  Vivian ignored the wall of shelves lined with jars and tubes of dubious-looking specimens, her heart sinking at the sight of the heavy steel combination-safe on the floor.

  She went over to the desk. Only the top drawer was locked and she rifled quickly through the others, finding mostly stationery and files of scientific papers and journals. Nothing that might tell her more about Nicholas the man. No stray photographs of his wife or son. No photos of any other kind either…

  Adrenalin spurted through her veins and her sweaty hands shook as she unlocked the top drawer and sat down on the big swivel chair behind the desk to reach inside.

  The first thing she touched was a small medicine bottle, and her fingers tightened around the amber glass as she picked it up and read the typed label: chloral hydrate. Her soft mouth tightened and she pushed the half-full bottle into her trouser pocket, intending to dump the contents at the first opportunity.

  Her heart gave a nervous convulsion when she saw what the drug had been sitting on—the settlement contract, signed, witnessed, dated—intact and still viable…

  She lifted it out and weighed it in her hands. But no…even if she took it, where could she hide it? The fact that Nicholas hadn’t already destroyed it was surely a hopeful sign. As long as it lay here undisturbed, Marvel-Mitchell Realties still had a future.

  She put the contract back, her breath fluttering as she slid it to one side and saw her forlorn dis-engagement ring crowning one very distinctive, disturbingly erotic photograph. She tried not to look at the haunting image, afraid to touch it lest she become further victim to her depraved fascination with Nicholas Thorne.

  But where were the others Nicholas had taunted her with? The wedding was supposed to be the day after tomorrow. If only she could continue to stave off disaster until the ceremony was over! She didn’t want her wedding-present to Peter and Janna to be a bunch of pornographic photographs and a threat of financial ruin. She could just imagine the poor vicar’s face if he caught a glimpse of any of those pictures. She would never be able to hold up her head in church again!

  However much she longed to believe that her brief presence here had taken the edge off Nicholas’s bitterness, had softened and changed him, she didn’t dare take the risk of relying on her increasingly biased judgement where he was concerned. Only when Janna and Peter were safely and securely married would Vivian let herself take the gamble of trusting Nicholas, telling him the truth and hoping that he would justify her faith in his basic humanity.

  She scrabbled frantically through the drawer, reaching deep into the back where she found something firmly wedged. She pulled it out.

  A cellphone. She flicked a switch. A working cellphone.

  Civilisation was only a single telephone call away.

  The alternatives bolted through her brain in the space of a split second. She didn’t have to go through with it. She could call Peter—call the cops. She could cause a scandal. Make a great deal of misery for everyone concerned, but save herself.

  And perhaps drive Nicholas out of her life forever…

  She let the telephone clatter back into the drawer at the same instant that she became aware of another presence in the room.

  She hadn’t heard him on the stairs and now she saw why. His feet were bare as he crossed the uneven wooden floor, not making a sound. He wore only a white towelling robe and his hair drifted in damp clumps across his brow.

  He was breathing hard. And he was angry.

  ‘Careless of me.’ Nicholas leant over and slammed the drawer viciously shut, nearly catching her guilty fingers in the process.

  ‘And even more careless of you to be caught.’ He locked it and wrenched the keys out with a violent movement. Vivian slid out of the chair and nervously backed away. ‘What were you doing, Vivian?’ he demanded harshly, stalking her every move. ‘Snooping? Or were you frantic to get to a phone so you could warn Lover-boy?’

  The back of her thighs hit the computer table and she pulled her scrambled wits together as he halted, his whole body bunched with furious aggression.

  ‘No!’ His appearance had rendered her split-second decision redundant, but she wanted him to know what it would have been. ‘No. I—I didn’t even know there was a phone in here. I was just looking for the photos—the other ones you said you had—’

  ‘I also said you were gullible,’ he sneered. ‘The only photos I had, you tore up—except for my personal favourite, of course…’ He wasn’t wearing his eye-patch and even his sightless eye seemed to blaze with sparks of angry golden life as he smiled savagely at her bitter chagrin.

  ‘I was thinking of having it blown up and framed before I send it to Marvel,’ he taunted. ‘It’ll have so much more impact that way. Perhaps I should even call him myself, give him a blow-by-blow account of how much pleasure I got from having his chaste bride-to-be mounted…’

  She flinched at the crudely insulting double entendre. His volcanic rage seemed wildly out of proportion to the condescending amusement, even wry admiration, with which he had greeted her other failed attempts to thwart him.

  ‘OK, OK, so I took the keys because I wanted to steal from you and snoop among your secrets,’ she flared, fighting back with her own fortifying anger. ‘I thought I might find something I could use to help persuade you to let me go. What’s so terrible about that? You snooped through my life—’

  He stiffened, his expression hardening to granite.

  ‘And, tell me—if I suddenly agreed with everything you said? If I handed you your precious settlement contract and said all debts were cancelled—what then? Would you be able to walk away and forget that any of this ever happened? Would you still marry Marvel on Saturday?’

  For a heartbeat Vivian ached to be selfish and trust to his sincerity. ‘Why don’t you let me go, and find out?’ she said warily.

  She knew instantly that she had made a serious mistake. His jaw tensed and colour stung his cheekbones as if she had delivered him a sharp slap across the face. Oh, God, had the offer been genuine?

  ‘I wouldn’t tell anyone, if that’s what you mean,’ she said quickly, hoping to repair the damage. ‘Nobody back home has to know about any of this. It’s still not too late—’

  ‘The hell it isn’t!’ Turning away from her, he jerked his head towards the door and grated, ‘Get out!’

  Was he ordering her out of the room, or his life? She moved hesitantly past him. ‘Nicholas, I—’

  He sliced her a sideways glance of fury that stopped the words in her mouth. ‘Frank said you were changing for dinner. Don’t make a liar out of him.’

  Then his voice gentled insidiously. ‘And, Vivian…?’ Her fingernails bit into her palms as he continued with dangerously caressing menace, ‘If I ever catch you here again, you won’t find me so lenient. Be very careful how much further you provoke me tonight. I’m in the mood for violence…’

  ‘If I ever catch you here again…’ He wasn’t sending her away! Vivian was shocked by the turbulence of her relief as she shakily made her way up to the room where she kept her meagre selection of clothes.

  Deciding it might be deemed further provocation not to obey his thinly veiled command, she quickly put on a fresh blouse, the cream one she had worn the day of her arrival, and changed her sneakers for her low-heeled shoes. The trousers, she decided with the dregs of defiance, could stay—she could do with their warmth around her woefully trembly knees.

  The kitchen had been transformed in her absence. It was no longer a bright, practical workplace; it was a shadowy corner of a private universe, lit only by twin flickering candles set on a table laid for two. A casserole dish sat in the centre, flanked by a bottle of red wine and two glasses. Nicholas, she discovered with an upsurge of her heartbeat, was still wearing his white robe—a spectral
white phantom floating at her out of the darkness.

  ‘What happened to the lights?’ she asked sharply. ‘Where’s Frank?’

  There was a brief gleam of teeth from the phantom and a movement of his head so that she could see that the dark triangle of his eye-patch was back in place, his vulnerability well-masked. ‘I’m conserving generating power,’ he said, in a tranquil tone of reason that sent a frisson down her spine. His silky calm was like the eye of a hurricane—she could feel the energy swirling around it. ‘And Frank’s already eaten. He’s in his bedroom. Why? Did you want him for something?’

  The innocent enquiry made her seethe. He knew damned well why she wanted a third person present! Frank was no use as a buffer tucked away in his little concrete bunker down the hall.

  It was pure nerves that made her blurt out as she sat down, ‘I’m not sleeping with you tonight!’

  He sat across from her, leaning his chin on his hand so that his face moved forward into the flickering pool of light, his eye gleaming, a tiny candle-flame dancing like a devil in the hot, black centre. ‘What’s so different about tonight?’

  She was hypnotised by the devil. ‘It just is, that’s all.’

  ‘Do you mean that you’re more aware of me as a man than you were last night?’ he murmured.

  She didn’t think that was possible! ‘An angry man,’ she qualified stiffly.

  ‘I’ve been angry with you before. Usually you just fling my temper back in my teeth.’

  ‘Usually you behave with more self-control.’

  His smile was darkly knowing. ‘Maybe it’s not my lack of control that you’re worried about. Don’t you trust yourself in bed with me any more, little fire-cracker? Afraid I might have lit your fuse?’

  Her soft mouth tightened and he laughed softly, reaching across the table towards her. Vivian stiffened, but he was only removing the lid from the casserole.

  ‘You dish up the food. I’ll pour the wine.’

  ‘Oh, but I don’t know if I like red wine—’

  ‘You’ll like this one. It’s a gold-medal winner from a vineyard I part-own in Gisborne,’ he said, brushing aside her diffidence as he filled her glass. He poured himself a glass, drank half and refilled it, all in the time it took her to ladle some of the steaming casserole on to their plates.