Summer Mahogany (9 page)

Gina swallowed, pride keeping her head erect. "Did you want to?" she demanded in a low voice, afraid to hear his answer.

"No." There wasn't a trace of emotion in his voice." But that's irrelevant now, since I've made you my wife." He released her from his flat gaze and walked to the telephone. "I'll order your dinner."

A shiver of apprehension raced icily over her flesh. Gina crossed her arms, rubbing her skin to rid it of the foreboding chill, but she only seemed to push it deeper inside. Her knees trembled. She felt weak and frighteningly vulnerable.

Numbly she moved to the bathroom, wishing she had gone there when Rhyder had first suggested it instead of reacting like the child that she kept insisting she wasn't. Gina had learned something that she didn't think she wanted to know. How could the marriage work if they had both been forced into it?

When she returned to the bedroom the question dogged her, nipping and snapping until her nerves were raw. The frayed ends became sensitive to Rhyder's silence. She jumped visibly when a knock at the door announced the arrival of room service and her dinner. Rhyder hadn't ordered anything for himself and Gina had to suffer through swallowing the tasteless food alone.

His jacket and tie had been removed, the cuffs of his white shirt turned back, and the top three buttons unfastened. A brandy he had poured from the portable bar was in his hands as he reclined almost indolently in an armchair. The expression on his hard, tanned features was a study of remoteness.

Gina stared at the food remaining on her plate. With a jerky movement she let the silverware clatter to the tray and pushed herself away from it, rising in agitation, her fingers twisting into knots. She was conscious of drawing his attention.

"Finished?" Rhyder inquired evenly.

"Yes." Gina flashed him a challenging look. His mouth thinned into a grim line. "I wasn't going to tell you to clean your plate," he snapped, and downed the swallow of brandy in his glass.

"That's good," she retaliated sharply, "because I wouldn't have done it."

"I was hoping food would improve your disposition." He rose impatiently and walked to the small bar to refill his glass. "But obviously it hasn't."

"So what are you going to do? Drown your sorrow in drink?" Gina taunted.

Bleak blue eyes held the stormy agitation of her ocean green ones, then cut them free as he took a healthy swig from the glass, not savoring the brandy in sips as it was meant to be drunk. The glass was refilled before he moved away from the bar.

"Maybe I've decided that you were right earlier," Rhyder commented with a sardonic lift of an eyebrow. "This might be the night for getting drunk."

Her pulse throbbed unevenly as he lazily approached her. Minus the jacket and tie of civilized dress, and with the opened front of his white shirt revealing the leanly muscled chest, he appeared more like the man her heart remembered, virile and strong with an impression of the sea about him and a rolling deck beneath his feet. Pain splintered through her nerves.

"I'll join you," she declared in a constricted voice.

She started to walk past him to the bar, but his hand shot out to halt her, his fingers closing around the soft flesh of her upper arm. Sore nerves screamed at his firm grip. A thread snapped inside.

"Don't touch me!" she hissed venomously.

"Don't touch you?" repeated Rhyder with sarcastic scorn, tightening his hold. "That's how this whole situation came about, because you begged me to touch you and I refused."

Scorching waves of shame seared through her veins, bringing high color to her face and neck. Futilely she struggled to twist free of his grip, but his fingers dug bruisingly to the bone. She clawed at his hand, trying to make him ease the agonizing pressure.

"Let me go!" It was a desperate cry for mercy because she lacked the strength to make him obey.

Low, harsh laughter came from his throat. "That's not what you wanted me to do before," he mocked her.

Gina made a backhanded swing at his chin, missed, and knocked the brandy glass from his other hand. It fell harmlessly to the thickly carpeted floor, liquid splashing out in a wet stain.

His free hand imprisoned her other arm to yank her against him. The hint of cruelty in his eyes frightened her and she struggled wildly.

"Let me go! I can't stand you!" she declared, breathing heavily with her efforts.

An iron band crushed her to his chest while hard fingers roughly seized her chin and lifted it upward. "But we're married now, my love," he jeered. "It's all perfectly legal. In fact, it's my conjugal right."

His savage gaze glittered briefly in satisfaction at her fear-rounded eyes before he violently assaulted her quivering lips. He stole the breath from her lungs and drained the strength from her limbs, leaving her limp in his arms. His thirst for revenge wasn't satisfied by simple surrender as he ravaged the sweetness of her mouth, intoxicating brandy on his breath.

Her trembling response to his marauding kiss made little impression on Rhyder. Not until her fingers were curling weakly into his shirt did he ease the pressure of his mouth to masterful possession. His male attraction was something she couldn't fight, nor the wild rapture his lovemaking aroused.

Desire flamed as he plundered the softness of her throat. Her hands inexpertly unfastened the buttons of his shirt so her fingers could glide freely over his hard flesh, smooth as leather.

A gasp of heady pleasure caught in her throat at the touch of his hand sliding open the zipper of her dress. As it fell around her feet, Rhyder lifted her out of it and into his arms. Luminous green eyes blithely met the darkly glowing fires of blue in his gaze.

Without a word, he carried her to the bed and laid her on the scarlet coverlet. A knee rested on the edge of the bed as he towered above her, something primitive and conquering in his stance.

A pagan shiver fluttered Gina's lashes. In the next second, his shirt was discarded and the muscled brown of his naked torso was bending toward her.

Chapter Five

THE PARTIALLY MUFFLED SOUND of voices wakened Gina the next morning. The pillow was damp beneath her cheek and she remembered sobbing into it last night.

Rhyder had attempted to comfort her, but it had soon become evident that he intended to ease her pain with the same tactics that had caused it in the first place. Gina had cringed from him, inciting his anger, but he had left her alone with her tears.

Very slowly she lifted her head from the pillow and glanced over her shoulder. A shudder of relief quaked through her at the empty pillow beside hers. Warily she looked around the room, but there was no sign of Rhyder.

Then she heard his voice coming from the terrace outside their suite. She listened, unable to figure out whom he could be talking to—until she heard a familiar voice.

"My God, I can't believe you actually married her!" came Pete's astonished exclamation. "When they told me at the harbor, I thought they were pulling my leg. But you actually did it?"

"I had no choice," Rhyder replied, his low voice tautly on edge.

Gina tensed herself, her muscles protesting as she slipped from beneath the covers. Her clothes were still scattered on the floor. She sidestepped them, wanting to forget how they had come to be there, and hurried to her suitcase on the luggage stand.

"But how? Why?" she heard Pete's puzzled voice ask as she pulled a pair of slacks and a top from the folded clothes.

She was just stepping into the slacks when she heard Rhyder answer, "I believe it's commonly known as blackmail."

"Blackmail?" Pete breathed. "What happened while I was gone?"

With frozen movements, Gina finished dressing. She now strained to hear the voice she had tried to ignore. She had to know what his explanation was for that statement.

"She came to the boat late one evening. It was raining and she was soaked to the skin," Rhyder began his explanation tersely. "I went to get a blanket to wrap her in. When I came back with it, the damned little Lolita had taken off her clothes and was begging me to make love to her!"

"Oh, my God!" Pete interjected. "Did you—"

"I told her to go home and grow up!" Rhyder snapped. "She went out of there, crying through the streets, half-naked. Nearly the whole damned town saw her leave the Sea Witch."

Gina felt cheap and degraded. The stark truth of his words shamed her, but she hated him for telling Pete about her wanton behavior. It was too demeaning.

"What did you do then?" Pete wanted to know, incredulity running through his low voice.

"I decided I'd better tell my side of the story before the uproar got so loud nobody would listen, so I went to her house to talk to her grandfather," Rhyder sighed grimly.

"And he didn't believe you?"

"I think he believed me all right." Rhyder exhaled a savage, mirthless laugh. "The trouble was his granddaughter's reputation had been irreversibly damaged in the eyes of the town, a fact he kept drumming into my head as he kept forcing me to drink his whisky."

"You mean he tried to get you drunk?" Pete chuckled his astonishment.

Gina blanched as she remembered the thud of the whisky bottle on the table at least three times before she had buried her head under the pillow. It had been an underhanded trick by her grandfather, regardless of his honorable motives.

"He nearly succeeded. At first I thought it was some kind of test of man hood I was expected to pass. Then I realized, nearly too late, that he intended to keep me from thinking clearly. Not that it mattered either way when he was through," Rhyder tacked on sardonically.

"If you didn't do anything, how could he blackmail you into marrying her? Gina's a nice kid, but what are you going to do with a child bride?" Pete declared in confusion. "I just can't see you giving in to pressure just because of some small town gossip about you and a girl, Rhyder."

"It depends on the pressure." Cynicism deepened his voice to a rough sound. "I was presented with the choice of marrying Gina or answering charges of molesting a minor and attempted rape."

"Good lord!" Pete breathed in sharply.

And Gina sought the support of the luggage rack as her knees gave way. Yesterday, during the drive, she had thought Rhyder was joking when he said he had married her to save his reputation; but he had been dead serious.

"Drunk or sober, I had no choice," Rhyder continued. "The newspapers would have loved the story, especially considering the investigation going on to see if the political contributions made by my father's firm were legal or not. If I'd fought the charges and won, the publicity would still have been damning for my father."

"I'm afraid you're right," Pete agreed in a reluctant tone.

"Gina's grandfather knew he had me between a rock and a hard place. And he squeezed." The words seemed to be drawn through a jaw clenched in anger.

"Does Gina know? Surely she must suspect. Or do you think she was part of it?"

"What you're really asking is, was it all a conspiracy to snare Gina a wealthy husband?" Gina didn't have to see Rhyder to visualize the coldly mocking smile twisting his mouth. "I have no idea. Gina appears unaware of her grandfather's threats. But she also pretended to be a reluctant bride."

"Pretended? What do you mean by that?" Pete was quick to catch the subtly doubting comment.

Closing her eyes, Gina remembered how easily she had allowed his rough kisses to change her attitude. The bitter regret she already felt toward her surrender was doubled. He had seduced her merely to prove a point, not because he had a marital right. She would make him pay for taking her innocence, she vowed.

"Nothing," Rhyder answered Pete's question. "It isn't important."

Her hatred mounted that he could dismiss it so lightly.

"What are you going to do now?" Pete asked, not pursuing the former topic. "I suppose you'll have to take her home to meet your family. Geez, can you imagine her meeting some of your sister's friends? They'll tear the kid apart! Not to mention the claws that will be out from some of the girls who planned on catching you themselves. Are you going to tell your family the truth? About how you were blackmailed into marrying her?"

"Yes," Rhyder snapped, then paused before adding, "they'd never believe that I could fall in love with a teenager. I would be insulting their intelligence by trying to convince them."

"Your sister would never be able to keep quiet about it," Pete warned. "In a month, Clarise would see that everyone knew. It'll be hard on you and Gina. 'Course, you've got a thick skin; you can take it. But the kid…?"

"Maybe she deserves it," was the impatient reply, and Gina's temperature rose.

"Come on, Rhyder. She's young yet."

"Maybe she'll find married life so miserable that I'll be able to buy my freedom with a divorce settlement," Rhyder growled. "In the meantime I'll have to be careful that she doesn't get pregnant, or I could be saddled with her for the rest of my life, one way or another."

"Divorce is expensive," Pete murmured absently.

"I would have paid not to marry her, but that crafty old man had his eye on the main chance. He kept harping on the damage to her reputation. I'd write out a check now, for any sum she'd care to name, if I thought it would get rid of her," Rhyder declared savagely.