Wedding-Night Baby (11 page)

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Authors: Kim Lawrence

BOOK: Wedding-Night Baby
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‘Do you want marks out of ten?'
He shifted in his seat and tugged unconsciously at the restricting silk tie around his neck. The warm colour seeping beneath his tan revealed that he was not as totally in control of himself as his attitude might imply. ‘Do you want to carry on as though nothing has happened between us?'
‘As far as I'm concerned, nothing—nothing of importance, that is—has,' she said stubbornly.
‘Is that a challenge?' he asked. With an air of quiet desperation she watched his long fingers holding the knife as her stomach tied itself in knots. ‘Don't confuse importance with urgency.'
‘Urgency?' she croaked, feeling her hard-won composure sliding away under the pressure of his voice.
‘I'm just stating what we both know is fact,' he continued inexorably.
‘We're talking about a one-night stand here, Callum. Nice enough as that sort of thing goes, but not mind-blowing enough to make me lose sleep. I know this may
come as a shock but there was nothing wrong with my life before you entered it!'
‘Sure,' he sneered. ‘You have such a fulfilling existence that you were reduced to hiring an escort to save your face. You must really have rubbed your boyfriend's nose in your infidelities to make him break it off. The guy was visibly drooling over you.'
‘He was not!' she snapped. ‘For your information Alex found me lacking in the bedroom department.' Georgina closed her eyes and inwardly groaned as the bitter little response slipped impetuously from her.
‘Did he, now?' Callum let out a silent whistle from between his pursed lips. ‘How informative.'
‘Love and sex are not the same thing,' she said defensively, abandoning all pretence of doing justice to the meal before her.
‘Maybe, but love sure as hell isn't that neat emotion you seem to think it is,' he responded scornfully. ‘Did you fall in love with that guy because he had the right qualifications for the job? Did you believe him when he accused you of being frigid? It must have occurred to you that he might be doing something wrong.'
‘You mean I should have referred him to my previous lovers?' she choked.
‘Awkward,' he agreed. ‘Couldn't you have faked it?'
‘I do not fake it!' she said witheringly.
‘My last nagging doubt is soothed.' He sighed with ostentatious relief.
She sucked in her breath with indignation; he was a smug rat. ‘You're too insensitive ever to suffer a doubt,' she jeered. His confidence was as integral to him as the careless charm of his smile.
‘I can't believe a sensual woman like you was willing to marry an unimaginative slob.'
‘Alex isn't a slob; he's very particular about his clothes.'
Irritatingly so at times, she recalled. She tried to ignore the fact that Callum had called her sensual because it made her feel strangely vulnerable. ‘Besides, I thought you didn't think love had anything to do with marriage,' she challenged.
‘True, but to marry someone you don't find sexually attractive is just making life unnecessarily difficult. I notice you defended his sartorial elegance but didn't deny the lack of imagination. Any man who found you wanting in bed must be a complete clod! There's something about you that excites a man's fantasies, Georgina. A warmth and mystery . . .'
The flicker of his eyes as they moved over her tense face was hot and glittering. ‘I didn't find the reality a disappointment,' he confided huskily. ‘Or do you need anonymity before you can truly lose your inhibitions? Is that what turns you on?'
His crude speculation made her feel sick. She wasn't about to confess that he was the only man who had ever made her feel simultaneously abandoned and fulfilled. ‘There's no fooling you, is there?' she taunted angrily. ‘Who needs psychologists when we have Callum Stewart?'
‘I might not be an expert, honey, but I can claim more insight than you appear to possess. You despise your mother... Why? For being a warm, generous woman, able to express her feelings? I don't think you're in any position to criticise.'
His contempt and disgust made her flinch. ‘If being a warm, generous woman means crying yourself to sleep I'm quite content to skip that stage of development, thank you.' She could recall lying in her own bed, hearing her mother weeping long into the night, and it had always been a man that was to blame. She'd been stupid once, putting her trust in Alex, believing he was different. But Alex had proved he couldn't be trusted either and finding that out had hurt.
‘I can see why you...or any man, for that matter...prefer warm, generous women,' she drawled caustically. ‘Men are such dear, trustworthy little creatures—who can blame her or any other woman? I don't despise my mother—I pity her! I pity her for falling for men like you wheeling out tired old lines.'
‘I don't recall ever skipping out on any female while she was asleep, Georgina.'
The glint of anger in his eyes made her lean back in her seat. ‘What's wrong? Was I supposed to tell you how marvellous you were? Or did you just want to tell me what a fool I'd been?'
She'd never forgive him for making such a total idiot of her. He had manipulated her from the instant they'd met. God, she thought, looking around the restaurant with an incredulous frown, he's still doing it now. I should have just walked out and let him salvage Oliver's company. He's certainly devious enough to achieve anything, she thought as a rush of tears suddenly swam across her vision.
‘I'm going home,' she announced, folding her napkin and placing it on the table. She rose hastily, sure of only one thing...she had to escape from his presence.
Callum followed her example and got to his feet. He silenced a concerned query from the waiter with a white-lipped glare. ‘You're not going anywhere until I tell you,' he snapped.
Not up to his usual standard by any means. . From anyone else such an ultimatum would have sounded foolish and absurd. It sounded neither on his lips, but he must have known that, short of forcing her, which was not really an option even in front of this politely incurious crowd, he couldn't stop her.
‘I don't fancy your odds on that. For a hungry man, Callum, you don't each much. Why don't you sit down like a good boy and concentrate on your food? It might
be easier to accept on a full stomach that I'm not about to become your sexual slave.'
He smiled suddenly and the flash of white teeth made alarm bells ring in her head. ‘Sexual slave—mmm...' His voice had risen several decibels and she could almost see the ears around them pricking up to catch any more juicy slivers of conversation. ‘I don't mind discussing our personal life in front of an audience,' he informed her, his temper becoming benign as her own began to sizzle.
‘Shut up, Callum!' she whispered fiercely. ‘I happen not to like being conspicuous.'
‘A glowering goddess with hair like a burnished cloud is bound to get attention. I don't mind you glowering at me,' he confided in a husky tone. ‘In fact,' he said with breathtaking frankness, ‘I find it...stimulating.' He rolled the word thoughtfully over his tongue, caressing the syllables in a way that anchored her feet to the ground. ‘Let's forget dinner and discuss our communication problem in less public surroundings.'
He walked around the table and placed the suggestion of a hand in between her shoulderblades. Even though several centimetres of air separated them she felt the touch like a red-hot brand. He must have noticed her involuntary shudder but he made no comment as together they left the room.
 
‘I prefer to remain in public surroundings with you,' she managed huskily as she fought against the dragging sensation that stroked her senses into a state of quivering hunger. ‘Why can't you just accept that what we had was a one-night stand and nothing else? I think we'd both be disappointed if we tried to resurrect what happened.'
Callum caught her arm and swung her around to face him. ‘We have no trouble communicating when we don't talk. In fact, non-verbally, I think we've got the nearest thing to telepathy I've ever experienced.'
It didn't take three guesses to realise what particular form of non-verbal communication he was talking about. ‘Sex is not the answer to everything.'
A glint of humour slid into his darkened blue eyes. ‘It would make me feel one hell of a lot better at this particular moment,' he admitted candidly. ‘You must know you're driving me crazy!' he added, rotating his neck slowly as if to relieve tension. It was true—wanting her was becoming an obsession. He told himself it was the chase that was bewitching him. Once he'd reached his goal he'd be able to work her out of his system.
‘You did mention I'm a distraction.' The sort of relationship he had in mind had a built-in obsolescence for her. The hunt...the capture—that was all part of the game for him. Once the novelty wore off he'd move on. All they had in common was sexual attraction.
I want more...so much more. She acknowledged the fact with reluctance. The ache of steel-edged frustration inside made her wonder whether she had the strength not to accept what he was offering, and to hell with the consequences.
‘So you are,' he agreed ruefully. He reached out and touched the fine mesh of her hair. The movement had all the hallmarks of compulsion about it. He watched the light dancing along the tawny fibres as they slipped through his fingers, almost as if he'd forgotten how they came to be there, and she saw the muscles in his throat work hard as he swallowed. ‘I'm not into self-denial as wholeheartedly as you are. Do you like driving men a little crazy?'
Crazy? Me? She thought of her not quite pretty face and not quite slim enough figure and tried to see if he was mocking her. No, there was no sign of humour in his set features. ‘Men?'
‘Simon May, my uncle...'
‘Simon hates me, I think, and your uncle was never...'
She coloured self-consciously and glared at him indignantly. ‘He was always the perfect gentleman.'
‘Probably what sent him to an early grave,' Callum mused callously.
‘What a totally disgusting thing to say!'
Callum's lips twisted in an obdurate grimace. ‘Foul and repellent,' he agreed. ‘But accurate. For once in your life be honest and accept you want the same thing I do. Do you need to justify your urge to mate, Georgina?' he asked, his voice as insidiously caressing as a swirling current in dangerous waters. Did being in love mean you had to allow yourself to drown? The nature of her thoughts made her freeze. I don't love Callum Stewart! She screamed the words within the confines of her skull.
‘Do you want me to talk of love and commitment?' And for one awful moment she thought the words had left her lips. ‘Your faithful Alex did all those things. Don't put your faith in words; accept instinct. Every instinct is telling you to come with me, isn't it?'
She'd forgotten the casual passers-by in the foyer and the focal point that the tableau of their immobile figures made. His voice and the wild response it was evoking were all she was aware of. ‘You're asking me to put my faith in you?' I must be mad to even consider this! she thought.
‘Cal!' The cheery hail made Callum spin around, a dark scowl on his features. ‘Thought we'd be too early.' A tall young man with collar-length blond hair and a square jaw identical to Callum's slapped him enthusiastically on the shoulder. ‘Introduce us to the lovely lady,' he demanded in an attractive accent more pronounced than Callum's.
‘Hello again.' As Georgina tried to regain her composure—the transition to reality was bewildering after the intense concentration of moments before—the dark girl of earlier that day moved into her line of vision. ‘I did try to hold him back,' she said softly, her voice apologetic, ‘but
tact and discretion are not my husband's strongest points. Hi, Cal, darling... My, doesn't he look delighted to see us, Rick?'
She hugged Callum and with a rueful bark of laughter he responded, relaxing his broad shoulders as he hugged the girl, but his eyes when they met Georgina's were seething with frustration.
‘Is this a bad time?' With a puzzled expression Rick looked from Georgina to his brother.
Tricia, once more replaced on her feet, let out a crow of laughter. ‘When they handed out intuition he was at the end of the queue, poor lamb,' she observed drily. ‘Do you want a drink, Cal, or shall I drag him off?'
Her forthright approach and the dawning curiosity in Rick's grey eyes were making Georgina acutely uncomfortable. ‘Actually I should be going,' she murmured faintly.
The young couple's admonitions were sliced neatly by Callum's incisive ‘No!'
Georgina felt her temper surge into life. Where did he get off with all that you'll-jump-when-I-speak rubbish? she thought, her eyes smouldering dangerously.
‘Very masterful, Cal,' his brother observed in a voice that didn't hide his curiosity at this unusual behaviour.

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