Falling for Alexander (Corkscrew Bay #2) (5 page)

She stepped back to shrug out of his grasp. He came with, pressing her up against the promenade railing. No, not pressing. There was a decent foot between them, and yet it felt as if she were squashed up to the wall of his chest. She couldn’t think. Could barely breathe. Resistance was a hard, hard battle she didn’t have the strength to fight.

Alexander Gerardo was bad news, but right now, in this very moment where the air was thick and heavy and her heart pounded erratically, he was
her
bad news. She wanted that kiss. She wanted his touch with a feverish need. She didn’t care about right and wrong. About the lies and consequences.

She was even beyond caring if his grey eyes were laughing at her from behind those shades.

But she didn’t think they were. His fingers curled over her shoulders, tight with the same tension pulling at his jaw. His breathing not quite regular. She recognised the signs. He was fighting his own battle and, dear God, she didn’t want him to win it.

Lose with me.

Sink to the bottom.

She reached
out, putting a hand to his chest. A ribbed wall of granite and hot beneath her palm. An ache of longing pulsed low in her abdomen.

“
Alex?” She hadn’t descended into total crazy. Her hand on his chest could be begging, or pushing. His choice. His will.

He
lowered his head, the closeness another wave crashing over her, melting the marrow from her bones.

Her lips parted on a sigh, her eyes closing beneath the sudden heaviness of her lids.

“Given how light you’re travelling…” His roughened jaw scraped tender, his breath warm against her cheek as he spoke. “I assume you didn’t pack a gift for your aunt.”

What?

Her eyes snapped open. Her body was still tingling, aching, wanting. Her lips trembling for that kiss.

His grip on her shoulders tightened fractionally,
then released as his arms dropped to his sides. He stepped back, shoving a hand through his hair and holding it there.

And just like that, the big fat lie was between them again. The marrow whooshed straight back into her bones. The hand on his chest push
ed. Hard. He didn’t resist, moving another step back.

“
It would be rude to arrive empty-handed,” he pointed out.

“
Um, yeah, well… ” Kate swallowed past the lump of dismay clogging her throat. Damn those sunglasses. Had he not felt any of that? Had he been playing her?

“
This trip came at me out of the blue,” she said. So had that ridiculous rush of desire. The plunge off the cliff. She’d jumped willingly, apparently without even the suggestion of a nudge.

“
Which is why I thought this might be of interest to you,” he said, moving his gaze from her to the shop fronts behind.

She followed the line of his sight.
Crickets
. The battered metal sign hung above the shop’s doorway. Woven baskets either side the doorway overflowed with the type of junk people loved to buy but never used.

“
How sweet of you.” She twisted some version of a smile from her lips. “You think of everything, don’t you?”

“
I do try,” he said, holding out his arm. “Shall we?”

Ignoring the offer, she strode around him to swat a path through the tunne
l of wind chimes at the shop’s entrance. The musical cacophony followed her as she stumbled out the other side. The cramped interior was a disarray of display units, tables piled with trinkets and yet more woven baskets taking up most of the floor space, some partially tipped, all overflowing.

Another ripple of tinkling chimes from behind pushed Kate forward. A pair of teenage girls fussed around a table of stuffed lizards in the corner. She gave the lizards some serious consideration.

A woman with cropped ash-silver hair peered up from where she was bent over a half unpacked crate. “Anything I can help you with, love?”

Yes, please. Where do you keep your imaginary gifts for fake aunts?
Kate smiled tersely, shaking her head. “Just looking, thanks.”

Ambling d
eeper into the shop, she paused at an open shelf of crushed-shell jewellery boxes. Reasonably appropriate, she decided, picking up one for further examination.

“
An interesting choice,” murmured Alexander over her shoulder, his breath tickling her ear.

Hot
ice trickled down her spine and spread beneath her skin. Kate stilled, then slowly exhaled. She turned the box over in her hands, refusing to reveal the effect he had on her by skittering away. “It’s very pretty.”

“
A perfect gift,” he said, that gravel voice washing over her with an illicit thrill.

There were so many things wrong with this scene, she could take her pick.

She couldn’t have him.

She shouldn
’t want him.

This delicious distraction was a carefully targeted, calculated move on his part. She knew
that with as much certainty as she knew the heat stinging the back of her neck had nothing to do with the unusually warm late March weather.

That didn
’t stop her knees from turning to marshmallow while the rest of her registered his closeness, so very close, closer than that almost kiss outside. Alexander was the ice-cream advertisement on a melting summer afternoon. The one designed by suit-people around a boardroom table with only their company bottom line in mind. Didn’t stop anyone from lusting after that scoop of creamy double-thick dark chocolate, did it?

She caught herself licking her lips and bit down hard. This was bordering on pathetic. “
Yes, my aunt will love this.”

“
Except,” he said, still breathing near her ear, “she doesn’t wear jewellery.”

Who
doesn’t wear jewellery? Kate conjured up a vision of the woman, put a pair of bob-earrings on her; took them off. Any rings? A Bracelet? She drew an absolute blank. Suddenly she couldn’t even remember if Mrs. Pinnings favoured pink or red shades of lipstick. If she even wore lipstick.

Kate swung around, and instantly swallowed the barbed retort that came with her frown. He
’d pushed his shades up, his eyes all dark and stormy. His nostrils flared. She’d caught him off-guard, in that second before a mask of bemusement blanked the signals of arousal.

“
Mrs. Pinnings suffers from eczema,” he said into her dumbfounded silence. “Her skin is hypersensitive and she’s allergic to most metal alloys. She stopped wearing any form of jewellery decades ago.”

Kate
’s mouth went slack. “How the hell would you know that?”

He leant in, and then a little more. A half grin pressed a dimple in one cheek, softening the harsh angles. His eyes were on her lips.

He really was going to kiss her this time and she’d have to slap that grin from his scheming face. Yeah, she thought through the haze steaming up inside her, she’d probably definitely have to do that. Maybe.

His eyes snapped up to hers. “
How the hell do you
not
know that?”

On the outside, Kate gave an almost imperceptible wince
. Inside, she kicked herself hard enough to leave a mental bruise. She didn’t mind the laying of the trap…that was par for the course. What she did mind was the disparity of him marking points with ruthless clarity while she bumbled around in a stew of simmering hormones.

“
Of course I know that.” She backed away into her own space. “How couldn’t I?”

He cocked a brow at the jewellery box she was still clutching.

“There are—this has other uses,” she informed him curtly.

That brow cocked higher.

“Like… Like holding keys,” she said. “My aunt is forever losing her keys.”

“
In that case,” he said, edging around the table, “you should take a look at these.”

Kate shoved the box back on the shelf and followed him to a wall hung with painted driftwood key-racks. Becaus
e, honestly, she just wanted to get this gift bought and be done with it.

She reached up, about to lift one off its hook. He moved at the same time, long fingers brushing hers with lingering, deliberate intent until she regained her senses and jerked her h
and away.

“
Hmm, I would’ve thought you’d spend slightly more on your aunt,” he murmured, flipping the price tag with his thumb. He gave her a pertinent, accusatory look. “It is her fiftieth birthday.”

Her skin prickled with indignation. Which, she supposed
, was a step up from pricking with desire. She watched with rising anger as he stepped closer to a display cabinet that had been arranged with an artist’s touch. Beneath the glass, a miniature shipwreck listing on the bottom of the ocean had been recreated with pearls and semi-precious stones spilling out.

“
Isn’t it delightful?” exclaimed the silver-haired woman, bustling up to him. “Have you heard of Julianne Rosher?” She didn’t wait for a reply. “She’s a fabulous local jewellery designer and we were so excited when she agreed to exhibit with us.”

Alexander traced a finger along the glass top, bending over. “
Could I take a look at that one?”

“
Those are fresh water pearls.” She brought her smile around to Kate as she fiddled with a chain of keys looped through her belt. “The quality is superb, I assure you.”

Reading the woman
’s assumption correctly, Alexander inserted, “The necklace is an emergency gift for my housekeeper.”

Kate spluttered.

Alexander gave her a sardonic look. “The pearls are roped onto leather. I’m confident a lovely piece like this will persuade Mrs. Pinnings to abandon her self-imposed ban.”

Her jaw locked in disbelief. She spun away from the infuriating man and grabbed the first thing her eyes landed on, muttering beneath her breath on the
way to the cashier. Daring him to say one more word on her choice of gift.

Unfortunately, he never did.

Chapter Six

And this, Kate thought snidely as she slid into her chair a short while later, is why your mother taught you not to lie. She dumped the statue on the slatted floor beside her and gave it a gruelling stare. The three-foot black porcelain cat stared back at her through glassy eyes, a creepy smile slashed behind white leathery whiskers.

The bistro they
’d chosen had a deck extending onto the sandy beach, their table shaded beneath a canvas awning. She took a deep breath of fresh, tangy air, then expelled it along with the bulk of her irritation.

Recalling the signs of attraction Alexander had managed to control, but not hide completely, she
felt even more inclined to let the resentment go. So, he’d played the game better than her. If that was because he’d had a lot more practice at living a lie, he could take the victory with her blessing.

Once this trip was over, she promised herself, she
’d never lie again. Not even a small white fib.

As soon as their order was taken, Alexander settled deeper in his padded bamboo lounge chair. “
I don’t know about the food yet, but the view is beautiful,” he drawled, a grin sliding over his jaw, his head turned to her instead of the ocean vista.

Fool me once…
So why was her pulse hiccupping beneath that hidden gaze? She bristled, although that bristle took more effort than it should have. Her eyes flew from him and landed on the useless cat.

Maybe not so useles
s, she decided as a memory sparked.

The change of topic was welcome.

She brought a smile up to the table. “I haven’t told you about the ninth Earl of Ashley, have I? In 1902, he returned from India with a tiger. An actual tiger! My great, great, great uncle was summoned to the castle—”

“
As fascinating as your earful of anecdotes is,” Alexander cut in, “they’re not
your
story. They don’t tell me who you are.”

She frowned at him. “
Then you aren’t listening properly.”

“
Give me one thing, Kate.” He tipped his sunglasses onto this forehead, that grey gaze unsettling in its intensity.

George Ashley and his gilt-caged tiger fled her brain. To be accurate, pretty much everything non-Alexander related fled her head.

“Favourite colour?” Alexander prompted, and she swore he’d deliberately dialled up the sinful in that accent. “Eggs scrambled or boiled? Birds or bees? Sweet or sour? Not your precious town or the nefarious antics of your ancestors. One thing that’s you.”

Kate sighed. He wasn
’t asking a lot. Orange. A rusty sunburnt orange. Birds were sinister. Sweet and sour, she wasn’t fussy. And she didn’t eat eggs.

Easy enough.

So why was she looking at him, looking into that gaze that seemed to be absorbing her breath bit-by-bit, convinced it wasn’t enough? Because she was stuck in a lie? Because she didn’t want that to be all that defined her in those eyes that burnt through her?

All that, she admitted reluctantly, and he
’d almost kissed her. She wasn’t delusional. Any combustive reaction requires two or more elements. He’d teetered on the edge of that kiss right there alongside her.

Because she should thank him, not blame him, for summoning the willpower she couldn
’t. Because he had the grace to not add that kiss to the pulp of what he assumed would be left of her once he’d crushed her.

“
I was born a twin,” she told him, flickering her eyes past him, to the timeless swells of the ocean behind. “We were almost two months premature and my sister—Anne, my parents named her Anne—wasn’t as strong as me, her organs too underdeveloped. Her heart, her lungs… She lived for three days and then she was gone.”

“
Kate…” The hoarse voice pulled her gaze back to him. “I’m sorry.”

“
Thank you.” She hadn’t been after the sympathy vote, but she didn’t hold it against him. What else could he say?

She
’d never had to speak of Anne, not in a town where everyone knew your business without a single question asked. She never specifically thought about Anne. She’d never grieved for the sister she’d never known. It was just who she was.

“
I never knew Anne,” she said. “I don’t miss her. But there’s a place inside me that’s always been lost. A part of me I miss, even though it was never there.”

Thank God she
’d never had to explain this to anyone, because it made no sense. And she wasn’t explaining now. She was simply telling it like it was. Peeling away the layers for this stranger, this man who was biding his time to smite her down. Talk about not making sense.

He looked at her, his eyes darkened to an overcast sky, saying nothing.

“Don’t get me wrong,” she said. “My life is pretty darn perfect, fulfilled and content. You wanted to know one thing about me? Well, here’s the pendulum that makes me tick. I’m the girl with one half missing and yet completely whole. And if that’s possible, then anything and everything is.
That
,” she finished quietly, “is who I am.”

“
I understand,” he said, just as softly.

And even though he dragged his shades down, hiding that turbulent gaze, she thought that maybe he did.

Strip back his arrogance and disapproval.

Stri
p back her frustration and anger.

Strip back the lies.

The same thread that had compelled her to strip back until she hit the spine of her soul spun deeper, wider, thickening the air with a web that pulsed awareness through her. More than desire. More than the shadows chased by deep, dark, elusive emotions all over the ridges and hollows sculptured into that striking face.

He dominated every female hormone in her body and he had done so since she
’d first set eyes on him. Scrap that…since she’d first heard his voice. He sent hot shivers down her spine and melted self-preservation.

He didn
’t take.

Didn
’t demand.

The danger with a man like Alexander Gerardo was that he didn
’t need to. He filled a woman with longing, with a desperate want to give, and it wasn’t all sexual. He’d asked for a morsel and she’d given her all, as if she could trust him, as if he’d safeguard the pieces of herself she’d just handed over.

Wrapped in this moment, stripped back from reality, phantom bonds of trust paraded as unspoken promis
es.

She recognised the trap, but the lure was almost irresistible.

One more minute.

Then she
’d start worrying about what he did to her. Why she’d allowed him to touch her in the very way he’d sworn she could never touch him.

“
Here we go, dears,” chirped a cheerful voice, un-spinning the web so fast, Kate felt light-headed.

The woman who
’d taken their order was back, a plate balanced precariously on each upturned palm and with a smile that was a tad too sunny for the mood at this table.

The intimacy of the
moment unravelled layer by layer, until all that remained was Kate. Naked and alone before the eyes of an unyielding stranger, without any phantom bonds to protect her.

What had she been thinking? This wasn
’t a lunch date. It was a delay tactic. This day had only one ending: a firework extravaganza of deceit, threats and betrayal.