The Marriage Proposition

‘Really?’ He drawled the word, leaning back against the bar. The dark gaze captured hers and held it, something glinting in its depths. Mockery, she realised, and something less easily recognised. ‘Only a kiss?’ He looked her up and down very slowly, taking in the neat black dress and the matching jacket, the dark tights and low-heeled pumps, and mentally discarding them.

Undressing her, she realised, shocked, with his eyes.

She swallowed, her last vestiges of bravado ebbing away under the calculated insolence of his stare. It was suddenly like one of those awful dreams where you find yourself naked in public, she thought, resisting an impulse to cover herself with her hands. Common sense told her to walk away, but she seemed unable to move.

Helplessly she watched as he reached inside his coat and took out his wallet.

Mesmerised, Paige saw him produce not one but two fifty-pound notes, and hold them up in front of her shocked face.

‘A counter-offer,’ he said softly. ‘But I’ll expect a damned sight more than a kiss—darling. So how about it?’

She needed a response, a swift comeback that would be witty, succinct, and ultimately devastating. Something to leave him with egg on his face, and make her the heroine of the moment, walking away victorious.

Instead, she heard the first ripple of laughter from their audience, and at the same moment felt a great wave of heat enveloping her from head to foot as she was overwhelmed and annihilated by the blush of the century.

She found herself immobilised, crucified with embarrassment as the guffaws rose in volume around her, and she heard the jeering sotto voce comments that accompanied them.

‘In your dreams,’ was all she could manage at last, her voice a stranger’s, as she forced herself to move. To turn and walk back to the table, trying hard not to run. Attempting to hide her discomfiture. Her humiliation.

At the same time trying to accept that she had no one but herself to blame. That she’d been a total idiot to allow the others to persuade her into such a piece of arrant stupidity. Although the realisation did nothing to calm her feelings or heal the wound to her amour propre.

‘What happened?’ Lindsay’s eyes were like saucers. ‘What on earth did he say to you?’

Paige shrugged, thrusting the money back into her bag with a shaking hand. Her skin was still burning, her mouth dry.

‘Just my luck.’ She tried for lightness. ‘A complete sense of humour bypass. He—turned me down.’

And for that at least she had to be thankful, she thought, as she contemplated for one shaken second what it might have been like to feel his mouth on hers, even momentarily, and her senses went into sudden overspin.

‘Miserable bastard.’ Becky turned a rancorous look towards the bar, and the array of grinning faces observing them. ‘Oh, come on,’ she added impatiently. ‘Let’s get out of here and find somewhere more interesting.’

Let’s just get out of here, Paige amended under her breath. She wanted to be outside, breathing what passed for fresh air. Or finding a convenient corner to die in.

She deliberately didn’t look either to the right or to the left as she walked with the others towards the door. The joke was over, and the audience had found other things to occupy them.

But there was always the possibility that he might be watching her go, and the very idea made her flesh crawl.

Once on the pavement, she firmly refused to accompany the others to a club Becky knew of, and thankfully hailed a passing cab.

She gave the address of her flat and sank back into the corner, closing her eyes wearily. But the stranger’s image was suddenly there, in the darkness behind her eyelids, and she sat up abruptly, smothering a faint gasp.

She couldn’t understand why she was so upset. Why she was still shaking and her insides were churning as they were.

She’d behaved like a fool, and he’d treated her with the contempt she probably deserved, but it went no further than that.

So why was she over-reacting like this—when the best thing she could do was put the whole nasty little incident right out of her mind?

I mustn’t let it matter any more, she told herself with determination. I’m sure that he’ll never give it a second thought—in fact he’s probably forgotten about it already. So there’s no reason for me to go on torturing myself either.

It was just a chance encounter, that’s all. I was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and did a stupid thing. But it’s over, and I’ll never have to set eyes on him again as long as I live.

The conviction brought a kind of comfort with it.

But, just to be on the safe side, she would make sure that she never, ever set foot in that particular wine bar again, she decided with a small, fierce nod.

And Becky and the others could read what they liked into that.

I was so sure I was safe, Paige thought, staring sightlessly into the darkness, but what did I know? How could I possibly have foreseen what was going to happen? That within a few short weeks he would be back in my life, and no longer a stranger?

With a faint groan, she turned on to her stomach, burying her face in the pillow.

And now here he was again, she thought restlessly. Turning up like a bad penny. Reminding her starkly of all the past humiliations and hurt she’d suffered at his hands. His very presence a threat to her new-won peace of mind.

If she allowed him to be.

I’m going home tomorrow, she thought. And Nick’s going back to the yacht, and his friends, and his blonde. And, if I play my cards right, the next time we are obliged to meet we should be divorced, and I’ll be free of him for ever.

A reassuring thought to go to sleep on.

She was just finishing breakfast the next morning when Jack appeared on the hotel terrace, looking serious.

‘Brad’s just rung,’ he said. ‘Apparently that storm is building up, and Hilaire would like to be on his way before they close the airport at Sainte Marie.’

‘No problem. I’m all ready.’ Paige hastily downed the last of her coffee and rose.

‘But I’m not,’ Angela wailed. ‘I thought we were going to have a nice leisurely morning together.’

‘You still could, but only if Paige is prepared to stay on until the storm blows itself out.’ Jack gave her a questioning look. ‘You know none of us want you to go.’

‘Then now’s the ideal time—before I outstay my welcome.’ Paige gave Angela a swift hug. ‘Life’s certainly not dull here. I’ve never had to outrun a storm before.’

Although it wasn’t just the weather she was trying to outfox, she thought as she went upstairs to check her room one last time. She wasn’t surprised that warnings were being stepped up. It had been dull since dawn, the sun an orange disc behind a veil of steely cloud. The sea was a grey mirror and in the garden below it was still, the palms hanging their heads, motionless.

Brad was waiting when she came downstairs, and there was a flurry of hugs and goodbyes.

‘Come back soon,’ Angela called as they drove off.

‘I’ll second that.’ Brad shot her a smiling glance.

She said lightly, ‘You couldn’t keep me away.’

The car windows were open as they drove to the airstrip, but there wasn’t even the hint of a breeze to ease the leaden atmosphere. There was an odd threatening stillness in the air, as if the natural order had been suspended and was waiting for what might come.

Formalities at the strip were brief. Brad stood with her while her bags were being stowed on the small, smart plane waiting on the tarmac.

As he bent to kiss her, she was passive in his embrace.

He released her reluctantly. He said urgently, ‘You still have time to change your mind. You could stay.’