Burning Obsession

‘Appealed to your jaded senses, did it?’ she taunted.

‘You see?’ he snapped impatiently, swinging her round to face him and knocking the vase out of her hand in the process. It shattered at their feet. ‘Oh hell,’ he swore, ‘now look what you’ve done!’

‘What I’ve done?’ she looked at him with accusing eyes, that vase a particular favourite with her. ‘You’re the one who had to use brute force—as usual,’ she sneered. ‘Take your hands off me, you—you——’

‘Yes?’ His narrowed eyes levelled on her mouth.

Kelly could tell he was going to kiss her and she jerked back, regretting her impulse as she saw the mockery in his eyes. ‘Just don’t touch me! I hate to be touched.’

‘That’s not the way I remember it.’

She blushed at his implication, remembering the nights when she had almost begged for his possession of her. Memories of other nights spent in his arms, of his lithe muscular body working a familiar magic on her, made her glare her dislike of him. ‘Forget the way you remember it. I don’t want——’

‘Here we are, then,’ Mrs McLeod bustled in with the tea things, beaming happily at the two of them. ‘Oh dear,’ she spotted the shattered vase, ‘did you have an accident?’

‘It slipped out of my wife’s hands,’ Jordan said smoothly.

Kelly compressed her lips to hold back her angry retort. After all, what he said was the truth, but it had only happened because of him. His touching her had been provocation enough for her to drop the vase.

‘Never mind,’ the housekeeper picked up the pieces. ‘It’s only glass.’

Kelly could see Jordan’s mouth twitch at the understatement. It had been a very valuable vase, one she had been very fond of, and although Jordan didn’t share her enthusiasm he could appreciate its value.

She sat down in front of the tea-tray. ‘Milk or lemon?’ she enquired coldly of her husband.

‘Milk,’ he drawled slowly. ‘There’s enough sharpness in this room already.’

Kelly glared at him, conscious of Mrs McLeod still picking up the broken glass. ‘Sugar?’ she asked with exaggerated politeness.

‘No, thanks.’ He sat down, his long legs stretched out in front of him. ‘But you have some—you need the energy,’ he added tauntingly.

She knew he hadn’t meant that at all, and her mouth tightened angrily. ‘How kind of you to think of my health. Isn’t he a considerate husband, Mrs McLeod?’

‘Well, of course he is.’ The housekeeper finally stood up. ‘We’ve all been very worried about you, Mr Lord most of all.’

‘But you had no need to be worrried,’ Kelly smiled warmly at the other woman. ‘I’m young and resilient.’

‘Of course you are. But I was telling Mr Lord he should take you away for a holiday, get you away from here and into the sunshine.’

‘No! No.’ Kelly studiously erased the sharpness from her voice. ‘I—I’d rather not.’ She didn’t want to go anywhere where she would have to be alone with Jordan.

The mockery in his eyes told her that he knew exactly the reason she had turned down the idea of a holiday. ‘Maybe later on,’ he said smoothly. ‘I can’t get away at the moment.’

He couldn’t leave his secretary! Angela Divine was beautiful, a tall shapely blonde. She was in her late twenties, ten years Kelly’s senior, and Kelly felt sure the other woman would make sure Jordan appreciate her added experience.

Kelly shivered as she remembered what it was like to feel like a woman in Jordan’s arms, to know the wonder of his caresses that could quickly turn to demanding passion.

He had been so patient with her on their wedding night, had gradually introduced her to the delights of her own body, until the initial pain of their consummation had seemed as nothing compared to the blinding pleasure that quickly followed.

She pushed these erotic thoughts to the back of her mind as she remembered the day of humiliation that had followed in Jordan’s office six months later.

Because of Jordan’s inability to get away Kelly had suggested that perhaps she could go away on her own. She had known she had to get away from Jordan; the love she had had for him had turned to hate in such a short time, the love that had seemed to be the pinnacle of her life.

Jordan waited for the housekeeper to leave them before vetoing that idea. ‘You aren’t going anywhere without me,’ he snapped. ‘Even if you do have this ridiculous aversion to me at the moment.’

Kelly stood up. ‘Go to hell!’ she said fiercely, turning in the direction of her bedroom, the bedroom that she had slept in alone since telling Jordan of her pregnancy.

He swung her round before she reached the door, a dangerous glitter in his cold grey eyes. ‘Don’t ever talk to me like that again, little girl!’ he rasped. ‘I won’t stand for it.’

Tears flooded her huge navy blue eyes. ‘And what happens if I do?’ she choked. ‘I suppose you’re going to beat me.’ She gave a bitter laugh. ‘I suppose you’d like that.’

He shook his head impatiently. ‘You ridiculous child,’ he chided gently, pulling her against him to bury his face in her thick black hair. ‘Cry, Kelly,’ he encouraged. ‘It will help.’

She at once stiffened in his arm, feeling as cold to human warmth as a beautiful statue. ‘I have no intention of crying,’ she told him in a stilted voice, shrugging out of his arms with a cool dignity that didn’t encourage further contact between them. ‘Why should I cry?’

She had cried almost hysterically after losing the baby, and felt as if she had cried herself out. All that was left was a numb feeling—and her hatred of Jordan.

‘The doctor told me I have to expect strange moods from you,’ Jordan eyed her thoughtfully, ‘but don’t expect my patience with you to be limitless.’

‘I don’t expect anything from you,’ she said tonelessly. ‘Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to my room to rest before dinner.’

‘Our room, Kelly,’ he corrected softly.

She gave him a sharp look, dark colour creeping into her pale cheeks. ‘I consider it my room, as you haven’t chosen to share it with me for several months.’

‘I intend changing that now that——’

‘Now that I’m no longer pregnant!’ she finished shrilly. ‘You can do what you choose, but don’t expect me to welcome you back.’

‘Kelly——’

‘I believe I’ve already said this once today, Jordan, but go to hell!’ This time she managed to escape to the bedroom without further interruption.

Once inside she almost collapsed on to the bed, feeling curiously weak. If Jordan was serious about sharing her bed once again then she knew she had to get away from here as soon as possible. Not that she thought he would expect a physical relationship from her just yet, but she couldn’t even bear to have him sleeping in the same room as herself.

Why on earth had he married her? In the six months they had been married not one word of love had passed his lips, words of passion and possession, but never love. This had never particularly bothered her, their lovemaking seeming to show her the depth of his feeling for her, and yet even that hadn’t been hers alone; she had been sharing him with his sexy secretary, and heaven knew how many other women.

She had fallen asleep soon after going to her bedroom, woken up to find there was only half an hour left before her father arrived. As she swung her legs to the floor Jordan came in from the adjoining bathroom, dressed only in a navy blue towelling robe, Kelly instantly stiffened at the intimacy of the situation, although the cool look she gave him showed him none of her tumultuous feelings inside.

‘You should have woken me,’ she remarked distantly.

‘Should I?’ he drawled, rubbing his damp hair dry with a towel. ‘You said you wanted to rest.’

‘But not for this long.’ She pushed her hair back, forcing herself not to be aware of the way Jordan’s towelling robe had fallen open at the chest to reveal his smooth dark skin and the silky mat of dark hair that grew there. ‘You’ll have to entertain Daddy while I shower and dress.’ She turned away.

Jordan threw the towel on the huge double bed they were to share from now on, moving towards her with a determination she knew of old. ‘Entertaining your father wasn’t quite what I had in mind for my immediate future,’ he murmured, his eyes on her mouth. ‘Come here,’ he ordered huskily.

‘Not just now.’ She stood up to begin looking through her numerous evening dresses in the floor-to-ceiling wardrobe, dresses she hadn’t been able to wear the last few months with the thickening of her waistline. Looking down at her slenderness, it had seemed hard to think that she had ever been carrying Jordan’s child.