Heart of the Dragon (11 page)

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” she replied.

Kash had never felt so emotionally drained. Standing in Rebecca’s room, waiting for her to open the small felt bag she’d gotten from the hotel safe, he hardly cared about the mysterious proof of her father’s story. He kept thinking of the bitter words he’d spoken to her when she’d mentioned
love
as if she expected to fall in love with him, as if a woman like her could. He kept remembering the shattered look in her eyes as she’d listened to him cut the idea to shreds.

To be loved by someone like her was a fantasy he’d never allowed himself to consider. The kind of love she meant—the lifetime commitment, the bonding, the sharing that went beyond sex and companionship to a merging of innermost dreams—seemed impossible for him. His furious reaction had come from the pain of self-denial and brutal experience.

Kash scowled as he watched her untie the delicate strings that held the bag shut. Her hands were smooth and strong, callused on the right thumb and forefinger from what he assumed were countless hours spent gripping paintbrushes and drawing pens. The nails were short and pearly clean at the tips, with a coat of clear polish. Even dressed in the revealing cotton pants and shirt, with her bare feet grimy and her hair a disheveled, mink-brown jumble, she had an air of nourishing niceness.

“I have a piece of jewelry that belonged to Mayura’s mother,” Rebecca said in a dull voice. “I had two pieces—a necklace and an earring—but those men at the brothel stole the necklace.”

Kash willed his haunting thoughts away. “Your father gave them to you?”

“Yes. They were gifts to Mayura’s mother, and after she died, he kept them. But one of the earrings was taken when the Vatans stole the baby. They took as many of her dead mother’s personal belongings as they could find.”

She slid the earring onto her palm and watched it shimmer in the light of the lamp on the dresser. It had three dangling pieces of sterling, the tiniest no longer than a pea, the largest as big as a penny. Each was inset with an oval of jade, and around the jade was intricate engraving.

When she placed the earring in Kash’s hand, he looked closely and saw endless swirls of flowers, so tiny that only the most skilled hand could have etched them.

“Turn it over,” Rebecca said wearily. “Read the back.”

The largest section was engraved in English with letters so small Kash had to squint to read.
To my beautiful wife, Nuan
. Mayura’s mother. And there was a date: 1960.

“Not long before he died, my father gave me that and told me the other earring says ‘From your loving husband, Michael.’

Kash closed his hand around the delicate piece of jewelry. “Why didn’t you show this to me before?”

“I was hoping to save it for my meeting with Mayura.” She looked despondent. “It was something very personal, something I hoped she’d recognize.”

“After over thirty years, do you really expect to find the mate to this? It was probably lost when Mayura’s mother died.”

Rebecca raised startled eyes to his. “Do you mean you believe it’s real? You believe me?”

“I believe you, but not your father. I’m sorry.”

She turned away, her shoulders sagging, and hugged herself. “What now?” she asked in a voice hoarse with defeat.

“I’ll show this to the Vatans and listen to their comments.”

“They’ll only say it’s a fraud.”

“Do you know any reason why your father would make up the story he told you?” Kash asked gruffly. He was tired of hurting her. Her pain radiated through him.

She pivoted and met his gaze with a cold, rebuking stare. “The story is true,” she said flatly. “The Vatans are the ones who’ve made up a lie. Please take the earring and leave.”

Kash hesitated, wanting badly to say something to soften her despair, but knowing that his words—and actions—had done nothing but give her the wrong impression of him since they’d met. Or was it the right one? Unsentimental, suspicious, a loner—he was all of those. He was also much more vulnerable than she thought, but only the people who knew him best recognized it. Sometimes when she looked at him with glowing approval in her eyes, he hoped she sensed it.

“Kovit or one of the other men who work for me will be on guard outside, if you need anything or want to go anywhere,” he told her. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

“Just phone me,” she replied calmly. “I really don’t care to see you again.”

He nodded, while disappointment warred with grim reality.
She’s trouble
, he reminded himself. “You’re right. That’s for the best.”

He left her standing in the middle of the room, looking as miserable as he felt.

“I thought you’d come here,” he said behind her.

She jumped at the grim, deep baritone with its aristocratic Dixie lilt. Rebecca pivoted swiftly and looked up
into Kash’s shadowed face. He stepped into the flickering gas light of a slender street lamp. It cast charcoal and silver streaks through his black hair.

Rebecca’s heart felt like a butterfly inside her chest. “You
let
me get away from Kovit. I should have known. You wanted to follow me and see where I’d go.”

“No. Kovit called me frantically and said you’d tricked him and left the hotel. I thought this was the most likely place you’d go.”

He cast a glance at the tall stone wall with its mysterious women/cat sentries and ornate iron gate. Inside was a courtyard, and beyond it, looking very traditional and exotic, was the thief’s home. “I know you wouldn’t be happy until you asked him yourself about his friendship with your father.”

“You’re a mind reader,” she said bitterly. Rebecca studied him in morose silence. Casual white trousers and a simple white pullover met at his belted waist. The buckle, she noticed with distraction, was of woven gold, similar to the slender watch on his left wrist. On his feet were smooth white shoes, almost like slippers. His appearance was graceful and streamlined, but very masculine. His broad shoulders and muscular arms were a striking contrast to his lean, lithe build. She’d never seen such a unique combination of vivid physical power and the trim refinement of a ballet dancer.

His dark gaze had returned to her too. He scanned the simple blue silk jumpsuit she wore with gold sandals. His anger was evident. “Did you think you could leave the hotel unnoticed? Good Lord, after what you’ve been through, weren’t you afraid someone other than me would follow you?”

“I had to take the chance.”

“If you’d been picked up by strangers again and hurt or killed, I’d have—”

“Been rid of me for good, and happy about it,” she finished sharply. “Don’t lecture me about my safety.”

The quick tightening of his face accented his unusual
features. Suddenly she’d never been more aware of the hawkish nose and deep-set, alert eyes, the savage thrust of his lips. “You’re the one who’d like to run from temptations,” he told her, speaking very softly, like satin pulling across steel. “I can control mine.”

“Bully them, you mean.”

“You need bullying. Otherwise your foolishness might ruin you. Come with me. There’s a car waiting for us just around the corner.”

He swept a hand toward the handsome road, with its sprawling, perfect homes and mantle of trees. Across it and beyond the thief’s villa, a dozen yards away, a side street peeked from behind someone’s courtyard wall.

“You sat there in a car and just waited for me to arrive,” she said angrily, tears of frustration burning her eyes.

“While my men were searching everywhere else for you. I’m efficient.”

“And I’m stubborn. I’m not going back to the hotel with you.”

“We’re not going to the hotel. Your things will be packed and brought to you. You come with me.”

She stared at him in disbelief. “I’m through doing what you tell me to do.”

Before she could pull back, he took one of her clenched hands and wound his fingers through hers tightly. “We’re not through with each other at all.” There was nothing gentle about his grip.

“What’s changed, then?”

“You’ve been invited to stay at the estate of Mayura’s aunt.” When she gasped softly, he nodded and gave her a slight bow. “I admire your persistence. The earring intrigued her. She wants you to be her guest. She wants to learn more about you.

“Where will you be?”

His eyes burned into hers with their mocking unhappiness. “With you. She’s afraid of barbaric foreigners, you see. I’m to instruct you in civilized behavior.” She
yelped with insult and continued to look at him in astonishment, even as he began tugging her along beside him, to the car.

“You, instruct me?” she said sardonically. “
I’m
not civilized?”

He turned to her in the middle of the dark street, framed by the night, taking her breath away with the unsettling look he gave her. “You will be,” he promised smoothly. “When I get through with you.”

In the moonlight the estate of Mayura’s aunt rose out of the forest in splendor, a collection of peaked roofs with gracefully upturned eaves, like a Thai dancer with her fingers upswept. Kash drove their car through high stone gates, along a winding drive bordered by lawns and trees, into a courtyard dominated by a shrine in the center, surrounded by colorful flower beds.

Kash ushered her inside a bright, modern hall that took her breath away. Under bent ebony lamps that cast angular shadows, ornate teak furniture vied for her attention along with luxurious rugs, ceramics, jade statuary, and vibrant wall hangings.

“Am I really welcome here?” she asked.

He made a soft, deep sound of sharp amusement. The pure male confidence of it annoyed her, but made a heated pool in her belly. “Let’s just say that you’re an intriguing nuisance. Madame Piathip wants to observe you up close.”

“That makes me sound like a strange new species of wildlife.”

“Wild? I’ll have to find out how wild you can be.”

“I’m as tame as a hamster, by your standards.”

“I’ve never known a hamster who could cause so
much trouble.” Kash guided her by her elbow, his grip possessive and controlling, as they followed a smiling, elderly manservant up a long marble staircase. “Piathip Vatan is a little eccentric,” Kash told her. “Just give her your trademark smile and don’t say too much.”

The tiny, white-haired woman sat among gorgeous silk pillows on a curved lounge with elephant heads carved into the armrests. Her doll-like body was swathed in miles of pink-and-gold silk robes, but her hair was done in a short, elegant Western style, and her makeup was as chic as a model’s. Rubies glittered at her ears and throat. Her dark eyes burned from a lined but youthful face. Behind her were arched windows that looked out into the tops of magnificent trees, and underneath her feet was a large Oriental tapestry rug.

Rebecca listened to the sound of her pulse throbbing against her hearing aid as she and Kash crossed Madame Piathip’s chambers. Both of them made respectful
wais
to her. Rebecca felt the searing scrutiny of her narrowed gaze.

“You’re so large and pale!” Madame Piathip exclaimed. “How can you possibly think you belong to my family?”

Rebecca stared at her in surprise. “I only want to meet my half sister. I don’t mean to intrude on the Vatan family.”

“Mayura couldn’t be your half sister. It’s impossible. Why, there’s no resemblance at all!”

“I don’t think that means anything,” Rebecca said as politely as she could.

“It’s certainly ridiculous, your story. Mayura’s father was a British Army officer. My sister married him when she was eighteen years old. He was killed in a military accident not long after she died.”

“She died in a private hospital in Ayutthaya, of hepatitis,” Rebecca said calmly, nodding. “When Mayura was one year old.”

Madame Piathip’s eyebrows shot up. “How do you know these things?”

“My father told me. He was with her when she died.”

“He was quite nosy, quite! How dare he investigate a stranger’s sad circumstances.”

“He was her husband,” Rebecca said between gritted teeth. “I wish the family would acknowledge that. I don’t understand why you won’t. I can’t imagine what you want to hide.”

Madame Piathip gasped dramatically. Rebecca thought of a Siamese cat that had just been goosed. “She’s truly rude and uncivilized!” Madame said to Kash. “You promised to instruct her!”

“I apologize,” Kash answered smoothly, and Rebecca swore she heard amusement in his voice. “I haven’t had much time with her yet. She doesn’t mean to be rude. Forgive her. She’s a foreigner.”

Rebecca swallowed harshly and met Madame’s wide-eyed gaze with a neutral one, though she burned with exasperation inside. Madame said primly, “Mr. Santelli says you’re sincere and harmless. I only invited you here to correct your confusion. I’m sure you’ll see that you and Mayura couldn’t possibly be related. You’ll see that her world is very different from yours. We’ll be patient with you, so you can learn.”

Rebecca chewed her tongue, then nodded stiffly. “Thank you, Madame Piathip, for your consideration.”

“You see, Madame?” Kash interjected quaintly. “Her manners are already improving.”

Rebecca held her temper until they were downstairs, following another servant through a maze of short hallways filled with delicate furnishings, bamboo rugs, and tropical plants. “I guess it would be impolite for me to strangle you.”

“Patience, barbarian. You’re in Thailand now. Be peaceful and open-minded.”

The servant showed them to a large, carved door set in an alcove with white stone walls. Inside was a beautiful little bedroom done in rich silks and teak furniture. A lovely bed piled in pale, shimmering covers
and pillows sat beneath a high, arched window. Outside, the feathery limbs of a tree brushed the window’s stone sill. Her belongings from the hotel were neatly stacked on a table. Through a door in one corner was a modern bath with luxurious scarlet linens and gold wall lamps.

Kash stood behind her in silence. She felt his eyes on her as she wandered around, touching the dark, sleek furniture and rich fabrics. When she turned to him, feeling flushed and aroused for reasons she couldn’t define, he said softly, “This room might corrupt you before I do.”