‘Let me go,’ she snapped, trying to jerk her arm out of his grip. ‘How dare you touch me?’
‘These stairs are treacherous,’ he murmured, unmoved. ‘The third duchess tripped and fell down them in seventeen eighty-three, breaking her lovely neck. There is a statue of her in the billiard-room, and they say it sheds real tears on the anniversary of her death.’
‘Very funny,’ she snapped. ‘I know it was you this morning!’
‘And I know it was you,’ he replied easily.
‘Why didn’t you tell me who you were,’ she demanded fiercely, ‘instead of making such a fool of me?’
‘You dragged me out of the water by my beard,’ he reminded her. ‘There wasn’t much opportunity for introductions.’
‘Yes, and what happened to the beard and the long hair?’ she demanded.
‘It’s a long story.’
‘You’ve told plenty tonight,’ she said grimly. ‘Long and tall.’
He chuckled. ‘When you saw me this morning, I had just returned from a—well, let’s call it a field trip.’
‘A what?’ she snorted.
‘A sojourn in a country where all the men wear long hair and beards. It was necessary to blend in.’
‘So you could steal some priceless artwork?’
‘I told you—the scrolls shed vital light on the development of a major world religion.’
She glanced at him quickly. ‘So that’s supposed to be a true story?’
‘Quite true, oh, moon of my delight.’
‘Don’t call me pet names!’ she shot back at him. ‘And was this where they wanted to shoot you?’
‘I had a gun to my head for three days,’ he replied easily, ‘while they argued over whether to execute me or not.’
Despite herself, her hand flew to her mouth. ‘Oh, my God.’
‘Not all the guerrillas wanted to sell the scrolls, you see. There was a faction who were determined to burn them—because they were written by people with a religion different from their own.’
‘You risked your life for money?’
‘Not at all, dear heart. I risked my life to save the historical record.’
She swung on him, her eyes igniting into green fire, her mouth turning into a passionate pink curve. ‘Oh, please! I’m not impressed by you. And I’m not impressed by your stories, either. They’re all lies. You’re not half the man your grandfather was! You’re surrounded by huge wealth, but you still feel the need to go out and steal. You don’t deserve all this!’
‘Perhaps I don’t,’ he said calmly. ‘But you’re being a prig, siren lady.’
‘I am not a prig!’
‘You are a prig, and a naïve one at that. You think that what you see all around you is wealth. It’s not. A Rubens on the wall doesn’t generate a penny. In fact, it costs a fortune just to keep it hanging there. What do you think it costs to keep up a place like this?’
Isobel was silent.
‘My grandfather could afford to bury himself in scholarship,’ he went on, ‘because he was convinced that he was a rich man. He died with that conviction intact, I’m glad to say. But I had to start working at seventeen, Isobel. So that we didn’t lose everything. It took me ten years of hard work to pay off his debts. And another ten years to build up the family fortune again.’ He smiled at her, a subtle and complex smile. They had reached the basement now, and he switched on the arc lamps, flooding the marble expanses with light. ‘Now, please show me your haul.’
‘There’s nothing to impress a man of your tastes,’ she said shortly. ‘These amphorae you see here. A bit of an anchor. And, of course, the coins.’
‘Yes, the coins.’ He peered into the plastic tub. ‘What are they soaking in?’
‘It’s Theo’s secret formula. I don’t know what he puts in it.’
He picked up the plastic tongs and fished in the tub. ‘Ah, here we are,’ he said, withdrawing the gold Poseidon coin. He rinsed it under the tap and dried it carefully. It glinted in the light. ‘The old goat and his fork.’
Isobel knew that her face was flaming red again. Pale skin and auburn hair showed every change of temperature—and right now she was very hot indeed. ‘What were you doing down at the wreck, anyway?’ she demanded resentfully. ‘Stealing from an archaeological site on your own doorstep?’
‘Hardly.’ He studied the coin. ‘It’s a magnificent thing, isn’t it?’
‘There are more important coins,’ she said tersely.
‘Not to me,’ he replied. ‘To me, this will always be the most important coin in the world—because today it bought me the most beautiful experience of my life.’
‘Don’t you ever give up?’ she said, her voice unsteady. ‘You can see I don’t like you. Why do you persist in this flirtation?’
‘But you liked being kissed by me,’ he said softly, his eyes meeting hers directly. ‘Wasn’t it a landmark in your life, too?’
‘I told you—it was very unpleasant!’
‘Do you know what you felt like in my arms?’ he asked. ‘You felt more wonderful than I can tell you. Vibrant, alive, dynamic.’
‘You’re lucky I didn’t scratch your eyes out,’ she panted, her heart pounding now.
‘And your mouth was like a flame,’ he went on, ‘sweet and burning. I felt you catch fire in my arms.’
‘Stop!’ she said, her voice cracking with the strain.
‘That’s the way it’s supposed to be, Isobel,’ he said. ‘You’re supposed to feel wonderful at a moment like that. You can’t live in an emotional ice-box for ever.’
‘You know nothing about me!’ she flared at him. ‘How dare you presume to judge me?’
‘If you had your way, nobody would do anything,’ he replied, his eyes glittering like sapphires as he approached her. ‘We’d all sit around talking ethics while the roof fell in.’
‘If you had your way—’
‘If I had my way, you’d be mine,’ he said softly, reaching out to her.
‘Don’t touch me—’
Isobel gave a little cry as he took her in his arms. It should have been some withering protest that would have stopped him in his tracks, but instead it was more like a whimper; a whimper that was smothered against his mouth as he kissed her.
Her legs felt so weak that she had to cling to him to stay upright. What on earth was this? Could anger turn into lust? Was it her very dislike of the man that fuelled her body’s insane response to him?
He thought she was a prig and she thought he was a scoundrel. So why was it that they were now locked in one another’s arms, kissing like a pair of famished lovers who had been separated by the widest ocean? Isobel had no idea. She only knew that the fiery, engulfing kisses their mouths were hungrily demanding from one another seemed to make them both hungrier, rather than sated.
She had never dreamed that she could feel like this with any man, that passion could ignite in her like a carelessly tossed match landing in gasoline. It wasn’t love, it wasn’t even lust, it was passion, a raw, elemental force, explosive and dangerous.
She had a sudden mental