Tidewater Seduction

‘Beautiful, isn’t it?’ he observed, and Joanna disciplined herself to make the obvious rejoinder.

‘Beautiful,’ she agreed, looking towards the ocean, creaming on to the crushed coral, beyond the coloured umbrellas, and oil-slick bodies. Although it wasn’t the Caribbean, the waters cradling the sun-rich islands of the Bahamas were every bit as warm and inviting, their blue-green depths a magnet for yachtsmen and underwater explorers alike. ‘I’ve always loved it.’

‘Yes.’ Cole’s mouth compressed. ‘Your family have a villa here, don’t they?’

His brows, distinctly darker than the ash-pale subtlety of his hair, drew together speculatively, but before he could voice the question his words had provoked Joanna forestalled him.

‘Not any more,’ she stated swiftly, avoiding his enquiring gaze. ‘In any case, it’s not important. And I’m sure it has nothing to do with why you’re here.’

‘No.’ Cole agreed with her. ‘But you are.’

Joanna stared at him. ‘You knew I was here?’

‘Obviously.’

‘No, not obviously.’ She felt her nails digging into her palms, and determinedly relaxed herself. ‘I assumed you must be here on holiday. That—that this meeting was accidental.’

‘Hardly.’ Cole regarded her dispassionately. ‘That would be quite a coincidence, wouldn’t it?’

Joanna took a steadying breath. ‘Then I think you’d better leave. Or I will.’

She wanted to get to her feet. She wanted to walk away from the table, and pretend this had never happened. Perhaps, if she pinched herself hard enough, she might wake up. Oh, what she would give to find out this was all a dream—or a nightmare!

But she had run away from Cole once before, and she was damned if she’d do it again. He couldn’t hurt her now. Not any more. And she would just be playing into his hands, if she allowed him to see he had upset her.

So, with admirable restraint, she helped herself to a croissant, from the napkin-lined basket in front of her, and picked up her knife to butter it.

Cole watched her. She was aware of his gaze, though she didn’t acknowledge it. He had always had the ability to make her aware of him, even when she least wanted it. There was a brooding intensity to his appraisal that pierced any façade of indifference she might raise against him. Even now, buttering her croissant, with hands that only by a supreme effort on her part remained steady, she could feel his eyes upon her. What was he thinking? she wondered. What did he want? And how had he known where she was?

‘Prickly, aren’t you?’ he said at last, and Joanna fought back the angry defence that sprang to her lips.

‘I’m—curious,’ she admitted, proud of the lack of aggression in her tone. ‘How did you know I was here?’

‘Grace told me,’ he replied, mentioning his aunt’s name without inflexion. ‘You must know we keep in touch. And just because she’s English, you shouldn’t automatically assume she’ll take your side.’

Joanna swallowed hard. Grace, she thought grimly. She should have guessed. Blood was thicker than water, and the Macallisters—even estranged ones—evidently believed that stronger than most.

‘Don’t think badly of her,’ Cole said now, as Joanna stared down at the croissant. ‘She didn’t have a lot of choice. Not in the circumstances.’

But Joanna wasn’t listening to him. Damn Grace, she was thinking, abandoning the untouched roll in favour of another cup of coffee. She knew, better than anyone, that for the past three years Joanna had done her utmost to forget Cole, and what he had done to her life. How could Grace have told him she was here, taking the first holiday she had had in twenty solid months of hard slog? This was supposed to be her reward to herself for finishing ahead of time. The paintings for the exhibition were completed. She hadn’t even brought her materials with her. She had intended to have a complete break. And now——

‘Where’s—Sammy-Jean?’ she demanded, looking beyond him, as if expecting the other woman to appear. ‘You did marry her, didn’t you?’ She forced a mocking lilt into her voice, as she added, ‘Sammy-Jean Macallister! Oh, yes, that sounds so much better than Joanna Macallister ever did.’

Cole’s lips tightened. ‘You won’t get an argument from me,’ he retorted, but she realised to her amazement—and delight—that, for once, she had got under his skin. A faint trace of colour ran up beneath his tan, and the hands resting on the chair-back balled into fists.

But then, exercising the same kind of control Joanna had used earlier, he expelled his breath. ‘I didn’t come here to talk about Sam,’ he said tautly, meeting her gaze. ‘My father’s dying.’

Joanna gulped. She couldn’t help it. Ryan Macallister had always appeared invincible to her. It scarcely seemed credible that he was mortal, like the rest of them.

Even so, he had never been any friend of hers, and her dark brows rose without sympathy. ‘Is that supposed to mean something to me?’

Cole regarded her grimly. ‘He wants to see you.’

‘To see me?’ Joanna’s voice came out several degrees higher than normal, but Cole only nodded.

‘That’s what I said.’

Joanna caught her breath. ‘You can’t be serious.’

‘Why not?’

‘Why not?’ She made a sound of disbelief. ‘Why—he doesn’t even like me!’

Cole’s eyes dropped. ‘Maybe he does,’ he said, picking up the spoon that was lying beside the unused place-setting in front of him. ‘Maybe he doesn’t.’ He spun the spoon between his fingers. ‘In any case, he says he wants to see you, and that’s all there is to it.’

‘You wish!’ Joanna stared at him incredulously. ‘If you think I’m going to give up my holiday to go and see an old man who never even gave me the time of day, if he could help it, you’re very much mistaken!’

Cole looked up, and the blue eyes were as cold as steel between narrowed lids. ‘Are you really that hard?’ he asked, his lips curling contemptuously. ‘God, Ma said you wouldn’t come, but I didn’t believe her.’

‘Believe it,’ said Joanna flatly, pressing her hands down on the table and getting to her feet. ‘I wish I could say it’s been a pleasure, Cole, but lying was never my strong point!’

‘Like hell!’

Cole had kicked the chair out from under him, and was up on his feet to confront her, before she could make good her escape. And, even though she stood a good five feet nine inches in her ankle boots, she was no match for his six feet plus. Add to that broad shoulders, a flat stomach, and long muscular legs, and she could see no means of retreat. Short of causing a scene, of course, and Joanna didn’t want to do that, when this was only the second morning of her holiday.

‘Isn’t this rather ridiculous, Cole?’ she asked, looking up at him rather tensely. ‘What do you hope to achieve? You can’t force me to go with you.’

‘Can’t I?’

Cole’s response was predictable enough, but it lacked conviction, and Joanna realised that, for all his belligerence, he was unsure of his ground. It gave her a feeling of triumph just watching him—a rippling sensation of pleasure she hadn’t felt before.

‘I think you’d better get out of my way,’ she said, not afraid to meet his gaze. ‘What can you do to me—that you haven’t already done?’

‘Son of a——’

Cole bit off the expletive, but not before Joanna had glimpsed the raw frustration in his eyes. It was the first time she ever remembered him being at a loss for words, and there was a tantalising enjoyment in watching him squirm.

‘So, if you’ll excuse me——’

Brushing his chest with just the tips of her fingers, Joanna edged around him—and he let her. It was rather like baiting a tiger, she thought, the fluttering excitement in her throat threatening to choke her. It was so intoxicating that she felt quite high, and she could hardly contain herself as she deliberately sauntered across the terrace and into the hotel.

She knew his eyes followed her. She could feel them, boring into her back, as she swayed provocatively between the tables. And she was glad he would see nothing to betray the emotional trauma he had once wrought in her life. Her figure was as slim now as it had ever been, due as much to hard work as careful dieting. Her legs were long, and shown to some advantage in the frayed Bermudas she was wearing with a buttoned vest. Even her hair had the shiny patina of good health, longer now than she used to wear it, and caught at her nape in a silver barrette.

Of course, she came down to earth again as quickly as she had gone up. As soon as she was inside the glass screens, which had been folded back to allow free access between the indoor and outdoor sections of the restaurant, the sense of exhilaration she had felt while she was with Cole quickly abated. Besides, once the desire to thwart his plans had been accomplished, she was troubled by an annoying twinge of conscience. Whatever Cole thought, she was not as hard as he imagined. And, although it was true that Ryan Macallister had never accepted her as Cole’s wife, he was an old man, and dying, if Cole was to be believed.

She paused in the lobby of the hotel, not sure now of what she wanted to do. She had been intending to get a book from her room and spend the morning sitting in the sun, but her confrontation with her ex-husband had left her disturbed and restless.

She needed her swimsuit anyway, so, forcing thoughts of Cole aside, she took the lift up to her room. She was on the fourth floor just one below the penthouse suites. She had a large room, that was part-sitting-room, part-bedroom, with a wide balcony overlooking the Atlantic. All the rooms had balconies, but they were made private by the solid walls that divided them.