Contract Bridegroom
Sandra Field
Celia was paying Jethro to be her husband so she was disconcerted to discover Jethro was actually a multimillionaire. Why had he agreed to marry if he didn't need the money…?All Celia had wanted to do was grant her dying father's wish to see her happily married. Now she must spend day and night pretending to be madly in love with her gorgeous new groom. And, although she'd stipulated "no sex" in the contract, it was exactly that clause she was finding impossible to keep….
“Jethro, will you marry me?”
“What?”
For the first time since she’d met him, Celia saw she’d knocked Jethro off balance.
“Did you ask me to marry you?”
“Yes,” she gulped. “I—I should have said I’ve got a proposal for you. A business proposal. I need a husband for three months. A temporary marriage, that’s all, drawn up legally with a contract. I’d pay you, Jethro. Sixty thousand dollars.
“There are conditions to this marriage,” she continued. “One of them is a high degree of privacy.”
“Do tell me the others.”
“No sex. No contact after the time’s up—you’d sign a contract to that effect.”
“Charming,” Jethro said.
“It’s a business deal—not the romance of the century.”
“I get the message. No sex?” he repeated softly. “Are you sure about that?”
Although born in England, SANDRA FIELD has lived most of her life in Canada; she says the silence and emptiness of the North speaks to her particularly. While she enjoys traveling, and passing on her sense of a new place, she often chooses to write about the city which is now her home. Sandra says, “I write out of my experience; I have learned that love with its joys and its pains is all-important. I hope this knowledge enriches my writing, and touches a chord in you, the reader.”
Contract Bridegroom
Sandra Field
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER ONE
CELIA Scott was one hour into her regular twelve-hour shift at the Coast Guard. Her second-last shift, she thought moodily, staring out the wide windows at the sea. One more night after tonight, and she was through.
The Coast Guard offices were situated on the shores of Collings Cove, in southern Newfoundland. It was mid-September, nearly dark, the sky mottled a theatrical mix of magenta and orange. In four days she’d be gone from here. Gone home. Back to Washington and to her father.
Where was home? Here? Or with her father? Could there be any greater contrast than that between the treelined avenue where Ellis Scott’s stone mansion stood and the narrow streets of Collings Cove?
Celia wriggled her shoulders, trying to ease the tension from them. It was time for a change. She’d been here four years, and she needed a new challenge. Something that would stretch her as, at first, this job had stretched her.
Fiercely she fought against remembering the outrageous request her father had broached just before she’d left. If she complied, she’d certainly be taking on a new challenge. But it wasn’t a challenge she’d ever sought out. Or wanted.
She was, of course, totally blocking out how desperately ill her father was. She couldn’t bear to think about it.
She reached for the pile of mail. But before she could open the first envelope, the security buzzer sounded. Celia glanced up at the black-and-white television screen, noticing that a four-wheel-drive Nissan was now parked in front of the building. She clicked to a view of the main door, which was always locked at night.
A man was standing by the door. A tall man, dark-haired, broad-shouldered, in jeans and a leather bomber jacket. Celia zoomed the camera in closer, noticing his rugged good looks, the stillness with which he was waiting for a response. He looked utterly self-contained. He also was quite extraordinarily attractive.
She said into the intercom, “Can I help you?”
His voice surged into the room, a voice she recognized instantly; it was the same deep baritone of the man who had radioed a distress signal a few nights ago. “My name’s Jethro Lathem, skipper of Starspray. Would you please let me in?”
He’d phrased it as a question. But it came across as a command. “I’m sorry,” she said, “no one’s allowed in on the night shifts.”
“Rules are made to be broken.”
“Not this one, Mr. Lathem.”
“You’re the woman who took the Mayday call, aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“I’ve come a long way, Miss Scott, and my time’s limited. This’ll only take a few minutes.”
How did he know her name? “I’m here alone,” Celia said crisply, “and the nearest houses are two miles down the road. The security rules are for my own good—try looking at it from my point of view.”
His face was a hard mask. “What time does your shift end?”
She hesitated. “Seven tomorrow morning. But—”
“I’ll be here,” he said and turned on his heel.
The intercom had gone dead, leaving Celia with any number of retorts on her tongue. Like, no thanks. Like, I’m a zombie at the end of my shift. Like, if I’m going to meet you, buddy, I need all my wits about me. Just don’t ask me why.
Jethro Lathem was walking back toward his vehicle across the well-lit parking lot. In the monitor, Celia watched his long-legged stride, his smooth swing into the driver’s seat. Then he drove away without a backward look.
When she’d taken the Mayday call, his voice had sounded pushed to the very limits of his endurance, yet still very much in control. She hadn’t expected she’d ever see him in person: even in that brief, fraught interchange, she’d gained an impression of someone who wouldn’t take easily to asking for help. Especially from a woman.
Search and Rescue had sent out a helicopter, airlifting him and his companion to the hospital in St. John’s. She hadn’t heard any more than that because, at the end of her shift that night, she’d caught a few hours’ sleep, then flown to Washington, getting back this afternoon in time for work.
If he was a man who hated asking for help, he was also unused to having his orders disobeyed. One look at his face on the television monitor had told her that. She also knew she didn’t want to meet him.
Her reaction puzzled her. So he was a macho hunk, this Jethro Lathem. So what? She could deal with hunks who wanted to invade her personal space. She was considered a beautiful woman—she knew this without any particular vanity—and lots of men in Collings Cove and elsewhere seemed to think she’d spent her entire life waiting for them to carry her off into the sunset. She rather prided herself on the adeptness with which she could defuse such expectations. So why did she feel suddenly and illogically threatened by the prospect of Jethro Lathem turning up at 7:00 a.m.?
He was only a man.
And she was quite sure he had no intention of carrying her off into the sunset. Or, more accurately, the sunrise.
The transmitter rasped out a request for the latest marine weather in the Port aux Basques area. Celia sat down in her swivel chair. Quickly she gave out the information to a fishing captain she’d spoken to many times over the years. They chatted a few minutes, Celia automatically running her eyes over the banks of equipment: computer, digital recall system, scanners and receivers. Sixty percent of her shift was spent sitting here, by herself, waiting for something to happen. It really was time for a change, she thought stoutly, as she said goodbye to the captain and reached for the first letter.
It was a note from her boss. He was pleased with her swift response to Starspray’s emergency call the other night, and he’d be delighted to attend her farewell staff dinner on Saturday. As she picked up the next envelope, the telephone rang. “Canadian Coast Guard, Scott speaking,” she said.
There was a slight pause. “Celia Scott?”
“That’s right. How can I help you?”
“My name’s Dave Hornby…I was crewing for Jethro Lathem the night Starspray sank. I was told this is your first shift since then—so I’m calling to thank you for your part in the rescue.”
His voice was pleasant, very different from Jethro Lathem’s autocratic baritone. “You’re welcome,” Celia said.
“There’s another reason I’m phoning—I didn’t want you thinking Jethro was in any way to blame for what happened.”
“That’s really not—”
“No, let me finish…it’ll be on my conscience, otherwise. You see, we’d been in port in Iceland, and a couple of days later Jethro came down with a bad case of flu; so I was on watch that night. I’m not the world’s best sailor. I fell asleep at the wheel, went off course in a sudden squall and drove Starspray onto the rocks. Not sure Jethro’ll ever forgive me for losing her—he loved that boat like she was a woman. More, probably. Anyway, I fell overboard, he rescued me, then he sent out the Mayday, manned the pumps and in the middle of it all saw that I didn’t die of hypothermia. More than I deserved…I’ll never live it down.”
“I’m glad it all ended happily,” Celia said diplomatically, wondering why she should feel so irritated that the high-and-mighty Mr. Lathem was a hero as well as a hunk.
“Jethro’s one of the finest skippers around and the best of friends besides.”
She made a noncommittal noise. After expressing his gratitude once again, Dave rang off. Celia put the receiver back in its cradle. She could picture the scene only too well. The elegant lines of the yacht impaled on the wind-whipped rocks of the reef; the driven spray and terrifyingly tall waves. It was something of a miracle that both men hadn’t drowned. A miracle whose name was Jethro Lathem, the rangy, dark-haired man who was going to meet her after work tomorrow morning.
She always looked her worst coming off a shift. Right now she was wearing her oldest jeans, and her entire stock of makeup consisted of a stub of tangerine lipstick.
The state of her jeans or her lipstick had never bothered her when she’d been out with Paul.
Resolutely Celia marched into the kitchen connected to her office and took a can of soup out of the cupboard. She was hungry and tired, that was all. She’d accept Jethro Lathem’s thanks tomorrow morning with all the grace she had long ago learned as her father’s daughter, and send him on his way. And before she knew it, she’d be in Washington, her job, Starspray and Paul all part of her past. As well as Mr. Macho Lathem.
The hours of darkness passed slowly. Celia ate, wrote some letters and dealt with a few routine calls. There was far too much time to think on her job, especially on the night shifts. She didn’t want to dwell on her father, so ill and so intent on controlling her life to the very end. But it was impossible to keep the images at bay, or to forget that last half hour she’d spent at Fernleigh, his mansion in Washington.
Dr. Norman Kenniston, who’d been the family doctor for as long as Celia could remember, and whom her father trusted more than she did, was finally getting to the point. Celia’s stomach clenched with anxiety. “Three months, Celia…no guarantees after that. Most unfortunate. Tragic. Yes, indeed.” And he’d twirled the ends of his long gray moustache.
She’d known her father was ill; but not that ill. She burst out, “Isn’t there anything we can do?”
“Every possible stone’s been turned,” Dr. Kenniston said huffily. “Do you think I’d—ah, there you are, Ellis…I was about to leave.”
Ellis Scott looked keenly at his daughter’s face. “Tomorrow at ten, Norman,” he said, then waited until the doctor had left the room. “I see he’s given you the prognosis, Celia. Just as well. No use blinding ourselves to the facts. Which brings me to something I want to say to you.”
Numbly Celia sank down into the nearest chair. “I can hardly believe…there must be some sort of treatment or—”
“Apparently not. Norman called in a couple of specialists, top-notch men.” Ellis eased himself into the chair across from her. “There’s something I want you to do for me.”
Celia bit her lip, seeing anew her father’s shuttered gray eyes and rigid shoulders. Had she ever really known him? Or felt close to him? And now time was running out. Fast. “Of course, I’ll do anything I can.”
“I want to see you married. Before I die.”
“Married?”
“Like your brother Cyril. Settled. Safe. Instead of gallivanting around the world taking one ridiculous job after another.”
Her nails were digging into her palms. “Being a Coast Guard operator’s a very responsible job.”
“Utterly unsuitable for a girl.”
“I’m a woman, Father. A grown woman.”
“Then behave like one,” Ellis snapped.
Celia took a deep breath. It would be all too easy to go down a path she’d travelled many times before; but how could she argue with her father or lose her temper when he’d been given so short a time to live? She said steadily, “I told you I’d handed in my resignation and that I’m moving back home.”
Ellis overrode her as if she hadn’t spoken. “You’ve always been foolhardy, Celia. Rash, impetuous, defiant. Time you grew up, took on the duties of an adult. Marriage. Motherhood. There must be someone you’re in love with.”
“There isn’t,” she said shortly.
“You mentioned dating a man called Paul.”
“He’s a friend, that’s all.” Paul was in love with her; but Ellis didn’t need that piece of information.
“There’s no one else?”
“There’s Pedro. He captains a freighter on the St. Lawrence Seaway, and he’d marry me like a shot if he knew I was rich. But I’ve never told him. If I ever marry, I want to be loved for myself.”
Darryl, the only man she’d ever gone to bed with, had wanted her money, not her. Which, at the time, had hurt quite dreadfully.
“I sometimes think you oppose me on principle,” Ellis rapped.
She said with careful truth, “Right now I don’t know anyone I could possibly marry, Father. That’s all I’m saying.”
Ellis suddenly looked exactly what he was: elderly, frail and sick. “So you’re refusing my final request?”
Guilt churned in Celia’s stomach, as no doubt her father had intended. Her second year in university, she and Ellis had had a terrible row, and for the next few years she hadn’t seen him at all; she already felt hugely guilty for that long separation. She, tentatively, had been the one to make the first gesture of reconciliation, just two years ago. Ellis had responded with very little grace. But he had responded, and since then they had at least been in touch.
Now, however, she wanted more than that. Much more.
If only she could rein in her restless spirit. Be more like her brother, so contented with his conservative job, his country estate, his unassuming wife and obedient children. If only she could marry to please Ellis. To make his last weeks happy.
“I promise I’ll think about it,” she said.
Ellis said abruptly and with patent honesty, “I worry about you, Celia. It would set my mind at ease to know you were married to a good man…then I could die in peace.”
Tears flooded her eyes. “I don’t want you to die….”
“Yes. Well. I can’t control that, can I?” He looked at his watch. “Hadn’t you better leave for the airport? That’s another thing, piloting your own plane. A lot of nonsense. Far too dangerous.”
Celia took her courage in her hands. “If my mother hadn’t been killed in a car accident all those years ago, would you be saying that?”
“That’s an impertinent and unwarranted remark!”
“We’ve got to talk about the past! We can’t act as if my mother didn’t exist.”
“I’ll ring for Melcher to bring down your bags.”
Celia pushed back her chair. She felt like the little girl she’d once been, controlled at every turn, unheard and always a disappointment to her father in ways she could scarcely fathom. He’d never allowed her to talk about her mother. Not once. She trailed after him to the front door, where the limousine was waiting to drive her to the airport, and kissed him dutifully on the cheek.
The transmitter rasped. With a jerk, Celia came back to the present, to her office and the demands of her job. But as she spoke to a lobster fisherman about the fog patches down the bay, she found she could no longer push her dilemma to the back of her mind. Hadn’t it been sitting on her chest like a lead weight ever since Ellis had mentioned the word marriage?
It was a dilemma she was no nearer solving now than at the front door of her father’s mansion, where Ellis had offered her a chilly goodbye. She was going to have to refuse his last request—what other choice did she have? —and thereby close another door, one that might have led to a new closeness between father and daughter.
A closeness she longed for with all her heart.
With an impatient sigh, Celia began writing up her log. At six-thirty, she washed her face, brushed her chestnut hair smooth and French-braided it. The tangerine lipstick didn’t look its best with her purple sweater. Too bad, she thought, and put on a pair of earrings that she’d found in the bottom of her backpack, dangly copper earrings that, she hoped, would distract from the smudges of tiredness under her eyes.
Jethro Lathem might not turn up.
However, at ten to seven, the four-wheel-drive Nissan turned into the yard and parked in the same spot it had the night before. Thirty seconds later, Wayne, her replacement, also drove in. But at five past seven, just as Celia let herself out of the office, she saw Pedro striding down the corridor to meet her. His freighter was moored further down the bay; he must be here to say goodbye.
And goodbye it would be. No proposals of marriage from her. Smiling at Pedro, she said, “Buenos dias.”
Two people were coming down the stairs.
Jethro straightened. One of them was a sea captain in a smart navy-blue uniform with rather a lot of braid: a good-looking man, his head bent to hear what the woman at his side was saying.
The woman was beautiful.
She was young, her chestnut hair glowing like a beacon, her body, even in an oversized sweater, slender and lithe. She was talking animatedly to her companion.
She hadn’t seen him. She wasn’t even looking.
He moved back, watching as they reached the bottom of the stairs and stood, facing each other, both of them smiling. Then the man raised one of her hands to his lips, kissing it with lingering pleasure. The woman said something else that made him laugh, and then they hugged each other with the ease of long acquaintances. The man, Jethro noticed, was in no great hurry to release her.
But finally he did. With a last salute, he headed down a corridor away from the main door. For a moment the woman stood watching him go, still smiling.
So she had a lover, did Celia Scott; because Jethro was quite sure this was Celia Scott. Or perhaps the handsome sea captain was her husband. It would be a logical choice for a Coast Guard operator.
There was nothing logical about the surge of possessiveness that had rocketed through his body when the captain had kissed her hand. Just as illogical was the way he’d been unable to get the sound of her voice out of his mind, ever since he’d heard it over the radio when he’d sent the Mayday signal. A calm voice, beautifully pitched, as clear and true as a perfectly cast bell. He’d spent the first two days after the rescue in hospital in St. John’s, recovering from exposure and the flu. The third day had been spent in a hotel dealing with various business matters, one of which had been a phone call to the Coast Guard station in Collings Cove to find out the name of the operator who’d taken the Mayday call and when her next shift was.
He’d asked no further questions. Out of pride? Or out of anger that she should even matter, this woman unknown to him?
A woman who was partly responsible for saving his life.
He hated being beholden to a female.
The woman he was watching so intently squared her shoulders and opened the door, stepping right into the early morning sun. Her smile fading, she blinked a little.
Her hair caught fire, gleaming in the light. Her eyes, Jethro saw, were a very dark brown, soft and warm as velvet. Her winged brows, her high cheekbones, the seductive curve of her lower lip were all part of her beauty. The rest of it was more elusive and more complex, he thought, depending on the play of expression in her face, the vividness of her emotions.
He moved forward into the sun himself and said formally, “Are you Celia Scott? I’m Jethro Lathem.”
Because the sun was right in Celia’s eyes, the man’s body loomed larger than life, a dark silhouette that was obscurely threatening. She raised her hand to shield her vision and took refuge in an equal formality. “Yes, I’m Celia Scott. How do you do, Mr. Lathem?”
“Jethro, please,” he said unsmilingly. “Why don’t you join me for breakfast? I noticed a restaurant on the way out here.”
Again Celia had the sense of an order framed as a request. She moved further from the door, taking a moment to assess him.
Dynamite, she thought blankly. Pure dynamite.
Six-foot-two or thereabouts. Brown hair. Although a boring word like brown didn’t in any way do justice to thick, dark curls that had the polish of mahogany. Startlingly blue eyes, the deep, steel-blue of a sky at dusk, set in a face with the weathered tan of someone who spent a lot of time outdoors. A formidable jaw, now marred with a purpling bruise. As for his body…well, she wasn’t going to go there right now. Much too early in the morning.
She said pleasantly, hoping she hadn’t been gaping at him like a groupie, “No, I can’t do that. I’m on duty again tonight, so I have to go home and get some sleep or else I’m dead in the water.” Her smile flickered and was gone. “Sorry, bad choice of words.”
“Dinner before work, then. You have to eat, surely?”
She bit her lip. “Can’t we say anything that needs saying right here?”
“I’d rather not.”
“Then perhaps we don’t have anything to say.”
“We’re talking dinner at the Seaview Grill—not the Ritz.”
“Don’t patronize me!”
“I wasn’t aware of doing so.”
He’d look very much at home at the Ritz, thought Celia. “So what happens if I say no? That I’ve got a date with my fiancé who’s six-foot-five?”
“The man you came downstairs with—is he your fiancé?”
“I don’t think you came all the way from St. John’s to Collings Cove to inquire about my love life, Mr. Lathem.”
“I came here to thank you for saving my life,” Jethro said curtly.
“You don’t look very grateful.”
He said tautly, “Do you have a fiancé? Six-foot-five or five-foot-eight or anywhere in between?”
“I do not. Not that it’s any of your business.”
“What about a husband? Or a lover?”
Celia’s jaw dropped. “What on earth—look, it’s nearly seven-thirty, I’ve been awake all night and I’ve had enough of this. I’m glad you and your friend Dave are alive and well, I’m sorry your boat sank and goodbye.”
His lips thinned. Unwillingly, she added, “Your yacht—you loved her, didn’t you?” Like a woman, isn’t that what Dave had said? Women must flock round this man like gulls round a lobster boat.
“I don’t really think that’s any of your business.”
“Then less and less do I see why you’d have the slightest interest in taking me out for dinner,” she said crossly and turned away from him.
He took her by the elbow, the tensile strength of his fingers making her suddenly wary. “I’ll pick you up at five.”
“You don’t know where I live.”
“I could always follow you home.”
She said sweetly, “Are you aware that right this minute we’re under surveillance? Cameras cover this entire parking lot. All I’d have to do is struggle a little, and someone would be out here. Pronto.”
“All the more reason for you to behave, Miss Scott,” he said, mockery gleaming in his eyes.
“Behave—huh! Do what you want me to do, that’s what you mean.”
“Precisely.”
It was, Celia knew, the moment of choice. All she had to do was look into the camera over the door and signal for help, and this charade would be over. But she’d never been one to play it safe; her recklessness was one of the reasons behind her father’s request. “I’ll meet you at the Seaview Grill sharp at five,” she said. “I’ll have to leave there no later than twenty to seven. And if you follow me home, the deal’s off.”
“In that case,” Jethro said with dangerous softness, “I wouldn’t think of following you.” He ran his eyes down her body. “Sleep well, Celia Scott.”
A blush flamed her cheeks. But he didn’t see it, because he’d already pivoted and was walking toward his vehicle. Standing as if she were glued to the spot, Celia watched him reverse and drive away from her, just as if she didn’t exist.
What had possessed her to agree to have dinner with him? She wasn’t just reckless, she was plain crazy.
CHAPTER TWO
THE alarm woke Celia at four-fifteen that afternoon. After a quick shower, she dressed in a denim skirt and leather boots, with a green silk blouse. No baggy sweaters. No frayed jeans. And plenty of blusher and mascara, she decided, making her face up with care.
Rather pleased with the result, she checked her watch and got up with an exclamation of dismay. She didn’t want to start off this dinner date with an apology for being late. Not a good strategy.
At one minute to five she parked beside Jethro Lathem’s green Nissan at the Seaview Grill and ran up the wooden steps. Jethro had nabbed the best table. Surprise, surprise, she thought ironically, and gave him a cool smile as he got to his feet.
He pulled out her chair and briefly she felt the brush of his hand on her shoulder as she sat down. The contact shivered through her, and it was this that decided Celia to go on the offensive. As he sat down across from her, she said, “So…are you all set to thank me very nicely for alerting Search and Rescue?”
He’d picked up the menu; she watched his nails dig into its laminated covering. “You’re obviously good at your job, and I’m very grateful not to be at the bottom of the sea. So I most certainly thank you for your part in that.”
“What exactly happened?”
“Oh, the usual pile-up of errors,” he said tersely. “Do you want to start with a drink?”
“Not before work, thanks. When I first asked for your position, you took a long time to answer.”
“Things weren’t exactly normal,” he grated. “What do you recommend? Is the seafood good?”
“The scallops are divine.” Clearly, he was going to tell her nothing more, Celia thought, and added, “Your jaw—I presume that very impressive bruise wasn’t from a barroom brawl in St. John’s? Did it happen on Starspray?”
His lashes flickered. “Quit prying.”
“Jethro,” she said, aware of how much she liked the sound of his name on her lips, “you’re the one who insisted we have dinner together. I hate talking about the weather—I talk about it for at least thirty percent of my shift. Dave told me you’d had the flu, that’s why he was at the wheel when you went aground.”
“When did he tell you that?” Jethro lashed.
“He phoned last night. He didn’t want me thinking the Mayday signal was your fault.”
“The skipper’s always responsible. You know that as well as I do.”
“He also told me you saved his life.”
“He told you a great deal too much,” Jethro said tightly. “Are you having the scallops?”
“You bet. With home fries and coleslaw and a big glass of Coke that’s loaded with caffeine so I’ll stay awake all night.” She grinned at him. “So when did you bash your jaw?”
“Just before the helicopter arrived on the scene when I was so close to launching the life raft it wasn’t funny. The yacht was taking on water fast, faster than I could pump.”
Impulsively, Celia leaned forward, resting her fingers on his wrist. “I’m truly sorry about Starspray, Jethro.”
It was her left hand. He said, “No rings. No fiancé and presumably no husband. Although you never did tell me about your lovers.”
Lovers. In the plural. If she wasn’t so angry, she might find this funny. Celia snatched her hand back. “I can see that sympathy is lost on you.”
“I’m not used to failure,” he snarled. “What happened out there on that reef—I blew it. Big time.”
“Come off it,” she said impatiently. “If you and Dave had drowned—now that’s what I’d call failure.”
For the first time since she’d met him, Jethro’s face broke into a genuine smile. “I suppose you’re right…certainly I wouldn’t be around to talk about it. Do you always refuse to tell people what they want to hear, Celia Scott? Or is there something special about me?”
His smile crackled with masculine energy. “I don’t have to answer either of those questions,” she said weakly, and turned to the waitress. “Hi, Sally. I’ll have my usual, please, along with an extra slice of lemon.”
“The same, but beer instead of Coke,” Jethro said.
Sally gave him a smitten grin. “Yes sir. Right away.”
Once Sally was out of earshot, Celia said peevishly, “Do women always fall all over you like that?”
“If they do, you’re the exception that proves the rule.”
She gazed at him thoughtfully, noting the marks that exhaustion and illness had left on his face. His clothes, while casual, were top of the line, and she was quite sure the air of command he wore like a second garment wasn’t due merely to skippering Starspray.
But there was more. A lot more. She wasn’t an exception; she was no more immune to him than Sally was. Because close-up, Jethro Lathem was easily the sexiest man she’d ever laid eyes on. Sexy didn’t begin to describe him. The curl of dark hair in the neckline of his shirt, the way the fabric of his shirt molded his shoulders, even the angle of light across his cheekbones… She found herself longing to rest her fingertips on his sculpted mouth, to trace the long curve of his lower lip and feel it warm to her skin. To lean forward and kiss him?
Cool it, Celia! You’re not into sexy men. You thought Darryl was sexy, remember? And look where that got you.
Jethro, she saw with a flutter of her pulse, was watching her. Watching as intently as a hawk over long grass, waiting for the prey to reveal itself. Panic-stricken, she muttered, “You have the advantage of me—you know how I earn my living. What do you do, Jethro?”
As though he’d read her mind, he reached over and stroked the soft line of her mouth, his finger lingering at one corner. She jerked her head back. “Don’t!”
“You wanted me to do that.”
She tossed her head, refusing to deny what was so obviously the truth. “You’ve been around the block a few times—you know you don’t always have to act out your impulses. Only children do that.”
“Sometimes adults do, too.”
“Not this one.”
“I could persuade you.”
The same panic was rattling round her ribcage like a terrified bird. “Perhaps you could. Although I’m surprised you need to get your kicks that way.”
He said, as though the words were being dragged from him, “Your voice…that night on the radio. There was something about it…I didn’t really come here to thank you. I came because I had to meet you. See what you were like.”
“Oh,” said Celia; and knew that she believed him instantly.
“Your voice is beautiful—I wondered if you sang?” Jethro added. He was now toying with the handle of his fork, and she didn’t need a degree in psychology to tell he was wishing this conversation had never started.
“I used to sing in a choir,” she replied; it had been in the expensive private school her father had sent her to at the age of fourteen, from which she’d managed to get herself expelled by the age of fourteen and a half. She’d been big into rebellion as a teenager. But she’d loved to sing. She did remember that.
“Soprano,” Jethro said with a twisted smile.
“That’s right.” Quickly she changed the subject. “You were going to tell me how you earn your living.”
“Oh, I’m in the boat industry,” he said vaguely, “I’ve always loved the sea.” As Sally plunked down their drinks, he took a white envelope out of his jacket pocket. “Celia, I wanted to help you out in some way—a more tangible expression of gratitude. I don’t know what your salary is—”
“I should hope not!”
“—but you could buy something with this, or take a trip… When you live in Collings Cove, the Bahamas must look pretty good in winter.”
“Money,” Celia said in a hostile voice.
“Yeah, money. Well, a check. You got anything against that?”
“I was just doing my job that night. For which I get well paid.”
She could see the effort it took Jethro to rein in his temper. “I expect you do. I’m talking about the jam on the bread, the icing on the cake.”
“I couldn’t possibly take your money.”
“You’re being overly scrupulous,” he said impatiently, passing her the envelope. “Everyone can use more money.”
She took the envelope from him and tore it in half, and all the while her eyes never left his face. Then she put the two pieces on the table near his plate and picked up her glass.
“How very melodramatic,” Jethro sneered.
Her nostrils flared. “You can pay for my dinner. Then we’re square.”
How ironic if she were to reveal to Jethro that her father was rich; added to which, at the age of twenty-five Celia had inherited her mother’s trust fund. She didn’t need Jethro’s money, she had more than enough of her own. But she wasn’t going to tell him that. Back in Washington she’d been chased too often for her money, Darryl Coates being the worst offender.
The thought of Darryl could still make her wince.
One of the blessings of Collings Cove was her anonymity. Her town house was modest and her vehicle was one she could afford on her salary. Her Cessna, bought when she’d inherited the first lump sum from her mother, was parked at the airport twenty miles from here. Her secret, shared only with Paul.
The thought of Paul could also make her wince, although not for the same reasons.
Jethro said tautly, “So how am I supposed to thank you if you won’t take money?”
“That’s easy. Two words. Thank you.”
“Words come cheap,” he said with a depth of cynicism that rang all her alarm bells.
“Not to me, they don’t.”
“We sure don’t agree on very much!”
“We don’t have to,” she said.
His eyes narrowed; he took another gulp of his beer. “You’re not from Newfoundland, Celia, the accent’s all wrong. The eastern states?”
“Washington.”
“So why are you working in Canada?”
“I have dual nationality—my mother was Canadian.”
“Was?”
“She died when I was five,” Celia said. And overnight her life had altered irrevocably. Her father’s crushing control over her had only started after he was widowed.
Something must have shown in her face. Jethro put down his beer glass and covered her hand with his own. “I’m sorry.”
He’d invested the commonplace words with real force. Celia stared down at the back of his hand, feeling an absurd urge to cry. She’d learned very soon not to cry for her mother; Ellis had seen to that. She tugged her hand free of Jethro’s lean fingers, with their scarred and bruised knuckles, their warmth that seared through her own skin. “It was a long time ago,” she mumbled.
“Is your father still alive?”
“Yes.” Just. And still trying to smother her with that confusing combination of over-protectiveness and emotional distance that had characterized their relations ever since her mother had died. For Ellis had retreated into a white-faced grief for his dead wife, grief that had been his companion for years, and that had shut Celia out as effectively as if he’d slammed a door in her face.
“You don’t want to talk about him any more than I want to talk about Starspray.”
With a wry grin, she said, “There’s always the weather. A ridge of high pressure is moving into the area. Visibility excellent, southerlies decreasing to ten knots.”
“Back off—that’s what you’re saying.”
“Hey, you’re quick.”
Anger glinted in his steely eyes. “You sure know how to get under my skin, Celia Scott.”
“I’d be willing to bet a night’s pay you’re used to women who bend over backwards to agree with every word you say.”
“And who’d take money from me any chance they got.”
Again there was real cynicism in his tone. She said lightly, “Kind of drastic that you just about had to drown yourself to meet someone who won’t let you go past $11.95 for a plate of scallops.”
“You’re forgetting the Coke.”
Celia laughed outright. “And the tip.” Her brow furrowed. “What’s the matter?”
He said roughly, “You’re so goddammed beautiful when you laugh.”
A blush scorched her cheeks, and for a moment that felt as long as an hour, Celia could think of absolutely nothing to say. Then she sputtered, “I’ll make you a deal, Jethro. You talk to me about Iceland and I’ll talk to you about Newfoundland. We’ll omit any mention of gratitude, fathers, lovers and money. Okay?”
“Why aren’t you married?”
“Because I don’t want to get married!…Oh thanks, Sally, that looks great, and you remembered the extra lemon,” Celia babbled.
“Can I get you anything else?” Sally asked, eyeing Celia’s scarlet cheeks with interest.
“That’s fine, thanks,” Jethro said, with a note in his voice that sent Sally scurrying back to the kitchen. Then he said flatly, “That sea captain—he’s your lover, right?”
“Pedro? Oodles of charm waiting for the right heiress to come along. Pedro and I are friends, Jethro. Friends.”
“Friendship’s impossible between a man and a woman.”
“I disagree!”
“Do you mean to say you never got into his bed?” he grated. “Or should I say his bunk?”
“That’s precisely what I’m saying,” Celia announced and ferociously stabbed a scallop onto her fork.
Jethro leaned back in his chair. “Don’t take it out on your dinner, Celia. Tell me to get lost.”
“I’m going to finish eating first. I’ve got a twelve-hour shift ahead of me, or are you forgetting that?”
“Friend,” he repeated in an unreadable voice.
“That’s what I said. Why do you find it so hard to believe?”
“Oh, that’s a long story and not one I’m about to tell. So why don’t we talk about Iceland instead? We were only there three days—just long enough for me to contract the flu. But while we were there, a friend of Dave’s drove us to the Hekla volcano.”
As he kept talking, Celia ate another scallop, willing the color to fade from her cheeks. But Jethro was both entertaining and informed, and soon she forgot her self-consciousness, asking questions, telling him about her trip up the Labrador coast on the freight boat, and some of her adventures in scallop draggers offshore. Sally brought two pieces of chocolate cream pie, followed by coffee. Celia was leaning forward laughing at something Jethro had said, when he remarked, “I think that man wants to talk to you.”
Celia glanced up; her smile vanished as if it had been wiped from her face. “Paul…” she faltered.
Dr. Paul Fielding ran the clinic in Collings Cove. He was pleasant-faced, hard-working, and head over heels in love with her. She’d done nothing to encourage him, even while wondering why she didn’t—couldn’t—fall in love with him. He was everything Darryl wasn’t, he’d be unfailingly good to her, and he didn’t care about her money.
But she’d never felt impelled into his bed. He’d have been willing; she was the one with the problem.
“Paul,” she said, “this is Jethro Lathem. You remember I told you about the Mayday call last week? It was Jethro’s boat.”
“How do you do?” Paul said, without any real warmth.
“Why don’t you join us for coffee?” Jethro said smoothly.
Sally was hovering in the background, as bright-eyed as if her favorite soap opera was playing. “Want a piece of pie to go with your coffee, doc?”
“Just the coffee, Sally, thanks.” Paul switched his attention to Celia. “All set for the dinner on Saturday? Six-thirty, isn’t it?”
He was, with no subtlety whatsoever, laying claim to her. Why couldn’t she have fallen in love with him? If she’d accepted the heirloom ring he’d kept pressing on her, it would have made her father happy. She’d be married. Settled in Collings Cove for the rest of her life, and what could be safer than that? “Six-thirty for seven,” she said, and started describing the clinic to Jethro. She didn’t want Jethro knowing it was a farewell dinner.
Sally brought the coffee in record time. Her blond curls bobbing, she said, “Celia, you make sure you come back here before you head to Washington. I’ll see you get a piece of pie on the house, you betcha.”
“You’re leaving here?” Jethro demanded.
“Tonight’s her last shift,” Paul said glumly.
“You didn’t tell me that,” Jethro said.
“Why should I?” Celia responded in open defiance. She glanced at her watch. “Talking of shifts, I’ll have to go in five minutes.”
Sally brought the bill, Jethro paid, and all three of them got up. As Celia walked past the cash register, Sally winked at her. “Have a good evening.”
“I’m going to work,” Celia said repressively, stomped down the steps and marched toward her car, Paul hot on her heels. As she unlocked the door, he grabbed her in his arms, planted a clumsy kiss in the vicinity of her mouth and said loudly, “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
With a brief nod at Jethro, he climbed into his battered Jeep and drove off, gravel spitting from his tires. Jethro said, “Why don’t you marry him and put him out of his misery? The man’s besotted with you.”
“I know you must find this difficult to believe—most men do—but I don’t want to marry anyone!”
“I could better that kiss.”
The keys dropped from her hand. The evening sun gilded Jethro’s dark hair, the breadth of his shoulders in his leather jacket, his flat belly under his denim shirt. He was three or four inches taller than Paul; he possessed in spades what Paul lacked. Sex appeal. Charisma. Animal magnetism.
And didn’t he know it!
She picked up her keys, swung into her seat and slammed the door. “You’re not going to get the chance to try. Thanks for dinner. You can write me off the books—you don’t owe me a red cent.”
He was rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet. “I’ll decide what I do or don’t owe you, Celia.”
If only he wasn’t so devastatingly attractive. If only he didn’t make her blood thrum in her veins and all her recklessness leap to the fore. As she turned the key in the ignition, she found herself gazing at him as though she wanted to imprint him on her memory; because, of course, she wouldn’t be seeing him again. “Goodbye, Jethro,” she said, and suddenly gave him a wicked grin. “You’ve left Sally with enough gossip for the next week. Not bad for one scallop dinner.”
“Then maybe I’ll have to eat there again.”
She didn’t want him staying in Collings Cove. She wanted him gone. Out of her life. She said coolly, “Stay away from the steak, it’s as tough as your hide.”
Unexpectedly he began to laugh. The way his eyes crinkled at the corners made her want to salivate. Get me out of here, Celia thought wildly.
She jammed the Toyota into reverse, swung round and drove away as fast as she could.
Jethro watched Celia drive off. Then he went back to his motel, where he phoned the airport, discovering there was a flight out early in the morning. “I’ll call you in five minutes to confirm,” he said.
Going straight to the top drawer of the bureau, he unfolded the weekly issue of the local paper that was stashed there. It had come out two days after Starspray had sunk. Quickly he ran his eyes down the column. The journalist had done her homework. The article referred to Jethro as an international financier, owner of a huge fleet of oil tankers and container ships. Filthy rich, in other words.
Celia would have seen the paper. In a place this size, she couldn’t have avoided it. So, was her refusal to take any money from him genuine? Or merely a clever ploy?
She was highly intelligent. It was one of the several reasons he was so attracted to her. Intelligent enough to play a double game? He was rich beyond anything Collings Cove could imagine. Was there a woman born who could turn her nose up at his money? More to the point, was Celia Scott that woman?
Did he want to hang around long enough to find the answer?
He’d never chased a woman in his life. Never had to. And anyone who was as prickly as Celia, he dropped quicker than a plugged nickel. Why bother with a female who wasn’t going to come across when the world was full of those who would?
Anyway, he’d known a lot of women more classically beautiful than Celia. Certainly more sophisticated. She wasn’t his type.
So why was he so intrigued by the way her flame-filled hair contrasted with the dark pools of her eyes? How temper painted a flush over her cheekbones and the hollows beneath them? The delicious curve of her mouth when she laughed?
She laughed as though she meant it. Yet her dead mother still caused her sorrow.
Dammit, man, will you forget Celia Scott? You’re going to go back to Manhattan tomorrow morning and start planning your next challenge. After all, isn’t your whole life organized around challenging yourself? You can’t do any more solo races in Starspray. But those peaks in the Andes in Peru, you could take an expedition down there in the next six months….
Impatiently Jethro reached for the phone.
A gray jay squawked from the trees. The breeze smelled pungently of resin and peat, and impetuously Celia pulled off the elastic holding her ponytail and shook out her hair for the wind to play with. A seagull swooped overhead, pristinely white. Free, she thought. Free.
She’d broken her own record. Normally it took her an hour and a quarter to climb Gun Hill, the small mountain behind Collings Cove. But this afternoon she’d done it in sixty-five minutes.
Because she didn’t want to think about Jethro, who must have left town this morning on the early flight? She sure didn’t want to think about the dream she’d had, in which they’d both been stark naked in a bunk on a scallop dragger.
Or was her headlong rush up the hill to keep at bay the dilemma of her father, who wanted her married and settled and safe. What was she going to do about his request?
What could she do?
Nothing.
Celia sighed. She was glad she was going back to Washington. Even if she couldn’t get married to please Ellis, she could at least spend these last few months with him. And who knows, maybe they’d be able to bridge the gap that had widened so drastically with the years. She’d like that. She’d like it very much—enough to put all her energy and imagination into bringing it about.
She sat down on the wind-scoured rocks of the peak and took out an apple, chewing with keen pleasure, then tossing the core to a passing raven.
Behind her she heard a scrape on the rocks.
The hair rose on the back of her neck. She stood up. Picking each step so as not to make a sound, she crossed the rocks to the crest of the north face. Even though logic was telling her it was an unlikely place to find a wild animal, a rattle of falling stones came to her ears. A bear? And her face-to-face with it? Holding her breath, she peered over the edge.
A man was climbing the last few yards of the northern escarpment, every movement smooth and economical. Jethro.
He hadn’t left on the morning plane.
Her first reaction was sheer joy, her second dismay. She had no desire to come face-to-face with him, either, she thought, stifling that treacherous—and meaningless—surge of pleasure. Swiftly, before he could look up, she retreated from the edge. But there was nowhere to hide, and even if she scuttled back down the trail, Jethro would see her: the treeline was well down the slope. Is that what she wanted? To be found in retreat, scurrying for shelter like a frightened rabbit? No way.
So Celia stood her ground, and as Jethro’s crop of dark hair appeared over the crest of rock, she said cordially, “Good afternoon, Jethro.”
His body froze to utter stillness, his fingernails digging into the rock. He hadn’t known she was here: that was obvious. He must have parked on the north side of Gun Hill, where he wouldn’t have seen her car.
In a single lithe movement he hauled himself onto the peak: he wasn’t even breathing hard. Standing up, he rubbed the dirt from his fingers down the sides of his shorts. “Celia.”
She had no idea what he was thinking; inscrutability had been invented with him in mind. Of its own accord, her gaze fell lower, to his long, strongly muscled legs. In her dream, they’d wrapped themselves around her thighs, molding her to his body. She blurted, “I came up here to be alone.”
“So, oddly enough, did I.”
“I’ll leave then, I have to go home and get ready for the movers, they’re coming first thing in the morning and—”
Jethro took two steps toward her, put his arms around her and kissed her.
CHAPTER THREE
FOR A FULL two seconds Celia stood rigid with shock, too startled to struggle. Then the firm pressure of Jethro’s lips, the warmth of his skin, the sureness with which he was coaxing her lips apart, flooded her with a wild, sweet pleasure that rippled through her limbs as inexorably as the tides rose on the beach. Sheer heaven, Celia thought, and kissed him back, her body pliant in his embrace, her hands sliding up his chest to circle his nape.
He was the heat of the sun and the freedom of the wind: everything that was elemental. He was her dream, flowering into reality in her body.
Then Jethro strained her toward him, pulling her the length of his frame, one hand burying itself in her hair, the other moving from her waist to clasp the swell of her hip.
He was fully aroused. Desire was like a sunburst in her belly, aflame with hunger and golden with pleasure, to which she surrendered with a low moan of delight. As Jethro thrust with his tongue, the flames leapt higher, encompassing her in their implacable demands. She felt his hands sweep the curve of her spine, drawing her still closer, heard him mutter her name against her lips. Her nostrils filled with the male scent of a man she had expected never to see again.
Briefly he loosened his hold, his hands reaching for the hem of her sweatshirt. Her breath caught in her throat as desire was suddenly eclipsed by terror. Darryl had done the same thing. Kissed her, then tried to fondle her breasts. But Darryl hadn’t listened when she’d asked him to stop.
She pulled back with an inarticulate cry. “Don’t, Jethro! Please, don’t.”
Her palms were flat against his chest; he was wearing a T-shirt that was like a second skin, through which she could feel the taut curve of his ribs and the heavy pounding of his heart. He said tersely, “What’s wrong?”
“Everything! We shouldn’t be doing this, it’s crazy—”
“Don’t try and tell me you didn’t like it—I know better.”
“Maybe I did like it. But not any more.”
Very deliberately he released her, stepping back, his face like a carved mask; the bruise on his jaw stood out like a brand. “Why not?”
“We don’t even know each other, we—”
“I’d say we found out one hell of a lot about each other in that kiss.”
“I’m leaving here on Sunday and we’ll never see each other again—what are you looking for, a quick lay?”
His jaw tightened. “Why were you up here waiting for me, then?”
“Waiting for you?” she squawked, almost inarticulate with rage. “You think I was waiting for you?”
“You must have known I was coming up here—I don’t believe in coincidence.”
“Then you’d better expand your horizons. I most certainly didn’t know you were up here or I’d have stayed away. I told you, I wanted to be alone.”
“Come off it—you saw my Nissan parked down below and you climbed the south slope because it’s quicker.”
If she had any sense, she’d run straight back down the south slope: Jethro looked angry enough to be a greater threat than any bear. “I’ve got better things to do than chase men up mountains,” Celia blazed. “I said goodbye to you last night and I meant it. I don’t play games and I sure didn’t climb all the way up here just to have a fight with you.”
“So what was wrong with that kiss, Celia? Because that’s all it was—a kiss. You think I was about to make love to you on top of a chunk of solid rock? I’m not that desperate.”
“Aren’t you? You were giving a damn good imitation!”
“Do I have to spell it out for you?” he sneered. “You’re beautiful and sexy and it’s been a long time since I’ve bedded anyone. A very long time. Get the picture?”
“I sure do. You have a real way with compliments—that kiss was nothing to do with me, any female would have done.”
“It had everything to do with you!”
“Oh yeah?”
“Oh yeah.” He raked his fingers through his hair. “Why did you get so frightened?”
Her temper died. He’d just asked the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question, the one that led her straight back to Darryl. But her heart was no longer trying to batter its way out of her ribcage and Jethro had, after all, let her go when she’d asked him to. Perhaps she owed him the truth. She said, choosing her words, “I had a bad experience with a man once, and I don’t want to repeat it.” From somewhere she dredged up a smile. “The way I backed off—don’t take it personally, in other words.”
His face had hardened. “Were you raped?”
“No. A friend turned up at the door so he stopped.”
“Son of a bitch,” Jethro said in a ugly voice.
Her tension collapsed in a smile. “For once, we’re in agreement.”
“How long ago did it happen?”
“Four or five years ago.”
“You’ve gone to bed with the doctor since then.”
She tossed her wind-tangled curls. “I have not.”
“You’re not telling me you’re a virgin?” Jethro said incredulously. “I don’t believe you.”
“Imagine that,” Celia said nastily. “Jethro, this has been all very entertaining, but I have to go home. I’ve got a ton of things to do.”
He looked like a man doing some hard thinking. “We can walk down together.”
“Your vehicle’s parked in the north lot.”
“If I can climb K2, I’m sure I can walk as far as my car.”
“K2?” she repeated, and wondered why she wasn’t surprised. K2 was probably the most difficult mountain in the world, a much more demanding climb than Everest. No wonder Jethro hadn’t been breathing hard at the top of Gun Hill.
He gave an exasperated sigh. “Back home, I have a reputation for being close-mouthed—that’s a laugh.”
Celia said evenly, “Why didn’t you fly out this morning?”
“Wasn’t ready to.”
“You had this sudden, irresistible urge to climb Gun Hill,” she said sarcastically.
He raised his brow. “One thing I like about you is your intelligence.”
It was on the tip of her tongue to ask what else he liked. The way she’d kissed him as if there were no tomorrow? As if they were standing on top of the world, responsible to no one? “Let’s go,” she said stiffly. “I shouldn’t even have come up here—my cupboards are a disaster and the movers arrive first thing in the morning.”
She started down the hill ahead of him, picking her way through the boulders and pockets of soggy peat to the treeline, where rusty-tipped ferns brushed her knees. And with every step she took, she was trying to banish the memory of a kiss that had turned her world upside down. She’d never felt even remotely like that when Paul had kissed her; which must be the reason she’d stayed out of his bed.
A flock of kinglets peeped in the trees; shadows slanted across her path. Then Jethro touched her shoulder from behind. “Look, Celia, an eagle.”
Shading her eyes with her hand, Celia watched the great brown wings circle the thermals, the sun dazzling on the bird’s white head and outspread tail. “Wonderful,” she murmured. “Look how it soars…now that’s freedom.”
His dark blue eyes resting on her face, Jethro said, “Freedom…is that why you haven’t married?”
Married. Her father. Jethro.
The words fell together like the last pieces of a very complicated jigsaw puzzle. Without stopping to think, Celia gasped, “Jethro, are you married?”
“Nope.”
“Engaged? Living with someone? Otherwise spoken for?”
“No, no and no. What are you getting at, Celia?”
She gaped at him. “N-nothing, I was just curious,” she stammered, turned on her heel and started down the path as though ten black bears were after her.
She couldn’t. She’d be out of her mind.
Ask Jethro Lathem to marry her? A man compounded of sex appeal, rage and mystery? A man who had only to kiss her to make her understand, truly understand for the first time in her life, the meaning of desire?
Get a life, Celia.
But who else could she ask?
Forcing herself to concentrate on the rough trail, skidding on stones, Celia leaped from rock to rock with the agility of panic. She wouldn’t ask Paul to take on a fake marriage, he’d be horribly hurt. Nor could she ask Darryl or Pedro, either of whom would be delighted. Or any of the men back in Washington who’d been more interested in her father’s fortune than in her.
Jethro didn’t know about her money. And there was no way she could hurt him; she knew instinctively that he’d never let her close enough to do that.
She couldn’t ask him. She couldn’t.
Out of the question.
A spruce bough slapped Celia’s cheek. Her heart was racing in her breast in a way that had nothing to do with her precipitous descent of Gun Hill. She’d never been a coward before. Was she going to start now? Her father could be dead in three months, any chance of reconciliation gone. Is that what she wanted?
How far was she willing to go to set Ellis Scott’s mind to rest in the short time he had left? A long way, she thought. A very long way. Deep down she was still bitterly ashamed of their last horrific argument. At the age of nineteen, in her second year at Harvard, she’d discovered that her father had been having her watched; she was being followed by a bodyguard he’d hired. And she’d lost it.
She’d taken the first train home and confronted Ellis, and as though a lock had broken on her tongue, the pent-up feelings of years had poured out: her loneliness in those bleak months after her mother’s death, when her father had retreated from her in all the ways that mattered. Her resentment of his unceasing control of her actions, the nannies who’d forbidden her to climb trees, the directives to the schools banning her from the high-diving towers and the gymnastic equipment. Her fury when he’d refused to sponsor her for the junior slalom team when she was fourteen; too dangerous, he’d said.
Control, control, control.
She’d yelled at him, her fists clenched at her sides, tears streaming down her face. He hadn’t yelled back. She’d have preferred it if he had. In a cold, clipped voice he’d accused her of ingratitude and wanton rebellion; she was anything, he’d said, but her mother’s daughter. Which had been the unkindest cut of all.
He’d been cruel, certainly, that day eight years ago. But was that how she wanted to remember him?
It was all too easy to interpret his wish to see her married as yet another strand in that stifling over-protectiveness, as one more link in those manacles of control. Older now, perhaps a little wiser, Celia was finally prepared to consider the possibility that this was the only way Ellis knew how to say he loved her.
She loved him, too. Of course she did. Although it was a very long time since she’d told him so.
She could stand anything for three months, surely? Even a fake marriage whose sole intent was to relieve her father of a burden of anxiety he’d carried for years.
She bit her lip. Do it, Celia. Do it. Now.
Because there’s nobody else to ask. And you’ll regret it for the rest of your life if you don’t make peace with your father.
She stopped dead in her tracks. Jethro cannoned into her, his arms going round her in a reflex action, circling her waist. She twisted in his embrace and said with the bluntness of desperation, “Jethro, will you marry me?”
“What?”
For the first time since she’d met him, Celia saw she’d knocked Jethro off balance. He’d paled under his tan; his eyes were like twin blades of steel. She bit her lip. “Oh God, that’s not what I meant to say. At least, it is, but not—”
“Did you ask me to marry you?”
“Yes,” she gulped. “But it’s not what you think, it’s—”
“You don’t have any idea what I’m thinking,” he said with menacing softness. “Nor do you want to know.”
“I-I should have said I’ve got a proposal for you. A business proposal.”
“You’re just like the rest of them.”
His voice was as caustic as acid. “What do you mean?” she blurted.
“For a while I thought…but I should have known better. You saw the newspaper article, didn’t you, Celia? Of course you did. Although I’ll give you this—your tactics are different than most.”
“I don’t have any idea what—”
“Oh, for God’s sake!” he exploded. “Quit pretending, will you? The game’s over.”
“If you’d keep quiet for a minute and listen, I’ll tell you what I’m—”
“The voice of an angel and a beauty that knocks me sideways—I thought I was too old to fall for that crap.”
“Jethro,” Celia said tautly, “stop looking at me like I’m some kind of disgusting squishy thing you’ve turned up under a rock. My proposal’s strictly business—do you hear me?”
Her voice had risen. “Yeah,” he drawled, “I hear you.”
She was still standing locked in his embrace, her palms flat to his T-shirt. He smelled faintly of sweat; he looked thoroughly dangerous and not at all business-like. The trouble was, she didn’t feel business-like, either. Not with his mouth only inches from hers, his lean, hard body pressed against hers. She said frantically, “Strictly business,” and struggled to keep her wits. “I need a husband for three months. A temporary marriage, that’s all, drawn up legally with a contract.”
“That’s all?” he repeated, with a depth of sarcasm that made her flinch.
“I’d pay you, Jethro. Quite a lot of money. You’d be able to put it toward another boat to replace Starspray.”
“You let me worry about Starspray,” he snarled. “You don’t know the first thing about me and you’re asking me to marry you? I take back what I said about your intelligence. You’re out to lunch, lady.”
Every nerve pulled tight, Celia gazed up at him. Beneath a formidable level of rage, he looked…was disappointed the right word? Ferociously disappointed, as though somehow she’d let him down. In a major way. She said defiantly, “I know quite a lot about you. You’re courageous—you rescued your friend, didn’t you? You’re an adventurer, with the guts and determination to climb the most challenging mountain in the world. You’ve got class. Tons of it. And up there on the mountain top when I said no, you backed off.” Suddenly she pushed away from him. “I’m doing this all wrong!”
“You finally got something right. Why three months, Celia? And where are you going to get the money to pay me? Rob a bank?”
The wind wafted a long strand of hair across her face. She pushed it back and said steadily, “My father’s a rich man. And two years ago I inherited my mother’s trust fund. Sixty thousand dollars, that’s what I’m prepared to pay you.”
The amount she named didn’t even make him blink. He pounced with the speed of a predator. “So why are you working for the Coast Guard if you’ve got that much money?”
“There are conditions to this marriage,” she said flatly. “One of which is a high degree of privacy.”
“Do tell me the others.”
She hated that note in his voice; it made her feel about ten years old. “No sex. No contact after the time’s up—you’d vanish from my life and you wouldn’t come back. Ever. And you’d sign a contract to that effect.”
“Charming,” Jethro said.
“It’s a business deal—I told you that! Not the romance of the century.”
“I get the message—I’m not totally devoid of brains. Although I must admit when I offered to help you as a way of thanking you for saving my life, marriage wasn’t what I had in mind.” He picked up a handful of her hair, running it through his fingers; in the afternoon sun it glinted like the most delicate copper wire. “No sex?” he repeated softly. “Are you sure about that?”
She pulled back, feeling the tug at her scalp, panic nibbling at her control. “No sex. That’s what I said.”
His hands dropped to his sides. “The answer’s no.”
“But—”
“I don’t give a damn how rich you are, I’m not into being bought.”
He meant it. The contempt in his face seemed to strip Celia naked, leaving her utterly defenceless and deeply ashamed. He loathed her, she thought numbly. Despised her for trying to buy him as though he were a stick of furniture. Oh God, why had she started this?
With a tiny whimper of distress, she whirled and ran down the slope, tears blurring her vision. What a fool she’d been! Why hadn’t she stopped to think? Isn’t that what had so often angered her father, that she acted before she thought, leaping before she looked?
All too close behind her she heard the scrape of Jethro’s boot on a boulder, heard him say roughly, “Celia—God almighty, slow down before you break your neck!”
It could have been her father speaking. Don’t do this, don’t do that, it’s not safe, you’ll hurt yourself. She hated Jethro, hated him. As she swiped at her eyes, her toe hit an exposed root, tumbling her forward. She flung out her hands to protect herself and thudded to the ground, her shoulder crushing the ferns, the dirt scraping her palms. One cheek struck a rock with bruising force. She cried out with pain and found she was weeping as though her heart was broken.
Then Jethro was lifting her. “Are you hurt? Let me see your face.”
There was a note in his voice Celia hadn’t heard before; it had nothing to do with contempt. She burrowed into his chest, feeling his arms go around her, and sobbed, “He’s dying…don’t you see? He’s dying—that’s why I’ve got to get m-married.”
“Who’s dying?”
“My father,” she wailed. “Three months, that’s what the doctor says. He and I, we haven’t—for once I just want to be a g-good daughter. Oh Jethro, I don’t know what else to do!”
Jethro said incisively, “I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about. But this is what we’re going to do. I’ll carry you down the rest of the slope, drive you home and clean up your hands, and then you’re going to tell me why you have to get married because your father’s dying. Here…blow your nose.”
A clean white handkerchief was being held to her face. Celia, who hated being told what to do, blew her nose. “You can’t c-carry me, it’s too far,” she hiccuped.
“Try me.”
Kneeling, he gathered her into his arms. Then he stood up and started picking his way down the hill. “And keep quiet,” he added. “You’ve said more than enough in the last ten minutes.”
“You sure like giving orders,” Celia said, leaning her sore cheek against his chest and closing her eyes.
She felt utterly safe.
She hated safety. So why did it feel like heaven on earth to surrender herself to Jethro? A man—despite what she’d said—she scarcely knew.
Her cheek hurt. So did her hip and her knees and her hands. But it was her pride that was hurt worst of all.
Jethro had said no.
Jethro was breathing hard by the time Celia’s Toyota came in sight. He’d let himself get out of shape since K2, he thought, and glanced down at the woman in his arms. Her eyes were shut, tear tracks still streaking her face. Her bare knees were scraped and dirty. There was something so trusting in the way she’d curled herself against his chest; it touched him in a place he very rarely allowed himself to be touched.
With good reason. Women who knew how rich he was weren’t to be trusted. In consequence, there was only one kind of touch he allowed from a woman, and it wasn’t the emotional kind.
Had he ever been quite so angry as when Celia had asked him—out of the blue—to marry him? What did she think he was—a total fool? And naive as a five-year-old into the bargain? How dare she try and jerk him around like that?
The trouble was, if he was honest, he’d be forced to admit that under his rage was a disappointment bitter enough to choke him. She was like the rest. No different from Elisabeth, who’d tried to persuade him she was pregnant and he was the father; or Marliese, who’d threatened him with a lawsuit for breach of promise. Or Candy or Judith or Noreen who’d spent his money like it was going out of style.
Celia—or so he’d thought—was different. She genuinely hadn’t seem interested in his money, no matter that she’d read the newspaper article. Nor in pursuing him in any way. Which—again if he were honest—had irritated the hell out of him. He was used to fighting women off. Not chasing after them. But wasn’t the decisive way she’d said goodbye last night one of the several reasons he hadn’t gotten on the first plane out of here this morning?
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