‘I might just do that!’ Cyril had responded.
But it seemed that now Berenice was out of the picture. Obviously, his father had thought twice about making a simple village woman the fifth Mrs Antonakos.
Instead he had chosen this English girl who was less than half his age. A girl who was not at all the type his father usually went for.
Berenice was much more his father’s type. Cyril Antonakos was drawn to that small, black-haired, dark-eyed, full-bosomed type of woman. Not the tall, slim, Titianhaired seductress that Skye Marston was.
A woman who, simply by existing, made Theo live in a state of constant hunger, of a desire so hot and painful that it was an agony of frustration to sit so close to her in the confined space of the car. An agony of yearning to inhale the delicate fragrance of her skin with every breath he took, and not do anything about it.
A woman who made him want to slam on the brakes, bring the car to a screeching halt and turn in his seat, reaching out for her in desperation. Made him want to drag her into his arms, haul her close and take her mouth, kissing her hard and long, demandingly, until they were both senseless with heady desire, an explosive cocktail of hunger and frantic passion impossible to control.
‘Theos…’ Cursing under his breath, Theo gripped the steering wheel so tightly that the knuckles on his hands showed white under the tanned skin. Pebbles flew up from underneath the tyres, clanging against the underside of the car and making Skye look up in stunned confusion.
‘Is there a problem?’
‘I forgot how primitive the island roads can be. You can’t afford to let your concentration slip for a moment.’
‘The view has much the same effect,’ she smiled. ‘I never knew the sea could be so many wonderful shades of blue.’
If she smiled at him like that once more, then he was lost. Theo forced his attention back to the road
‘This is October. You should see it in the summer—it’s like the most brilliant jewel in all the world then.’
‘I’d love to see it.’
Skye’s voice had an odd little break in it, one that made it sound suddenly vulnerable and dangerously appealing so that Theo had to clench his jaw tight against the way that that softness twisted in his guts.
‘You will do,’ he said, the fight he was having with himself making his words come out far more harshly than he wanted. ‘You’ll be living here then—as my stepmama.’
If he had reached out and slapped her hard across the face, it couldn’t have had a more dramatic effect on her. She shrank back inside herself like a small, frightened rabbit retreating into the protection of its burrow. The sudden clouding of her eyes and the way that her sharp white teeth dug into the softness of her mouth were like a reproach to him, making him curse himself for the roughness of his reply.
But at least she had lost that tempting smile. And the way that she turned from him, fixing her concentration back onto the azure spread of the ocean at the bottom of the dramatic fall of the cliffs, meant that temptation no longer tormented him with thoughts of the softness of her breasts beneath the lilac dress, the shortness of her skirt.
If she kept her back turned to him, her gaze on the view before her, then he might just be able to keep a grip on the hunger; stop it from running away with the last bit of sense he possessed.
If she kept her back turned to him, her gaze on the view before her, then she might just be able to keep a grip on her emotions, Skye told herself. She had made a near fatal mistake in turning, in smiling at him, as she had.
Turning had brought her too close to him. It had made her so intensely aware of his physical presence beside her. She had inhaled the scent of his body with her swiftly indrawn breath, and her smile had been directed straight into those watchful black eyes. And she was sure there had been some flicker of response in them that had had her holding her breath in disbelief.
But then suddenly he had changed. She had seen it in his face, heard it in the tone of his voice as he had drawled cruelly, ‘You’ll be living here then—as my stepmama.’
Did he know how much it hurt to be slapped in the face by that reminder? He had to. It was why he had done it. He was making sure that she remembered exactly where she would stand with him if she went through with the marriage to his father.
A marriage she had to go through with if she was to have any chance of ensuring her parents’ future.
And any chance of saving her mother’s life. The memory of the phone call she had had with her father last night invaded her head, dragging dark shadows with it. She had wanted to speak to her mother, but Claire Marston had been sleeping. They weren’t prepared to wake her…
A tiny gasping sob escaped her, impossible to hold back. She had been a fool to think that she could ever go through with this stepmother act.
‘What’s wrong?’
The hard demand sliced through the atmosphere inside the car like a slashing knife, making her jump with the force of it.
‘Nothing.’
Her heart lurched painfully as she heard his muttered curse and felt the car come to an abrupt halt, spraying pebbles wildly around the tyres.
‘Something has upset you and I want to know what.’
‘Do you really have to ask?’ Skye twisted in her seat, turning back to face him, blinking ferociously to drive away the weak and revealing tears in her eyes.
‘I mean—I’m sure you know only too well. Or can guess. Why are you so determined that I shouldn’t marry your father?’ she demanded when she saw his dark frown of incomprehension. ‘Why does it matter so much to you?’
‘Because you would be living a lie—we both would.’
‘We had one night together! It doesn’t have to affect the rest of our lives.’
‘One night I can’t forget. And I don’t believe you can either.’
There was no hint of yielding in his face. His features were set in hard, ruthless lines, his eyes glittering with the coldest anger.
‘You were a virgin—you know what they say about always remembering your first.’
That burned so much into her already wounded soul that Skye closed her eyes briefly against the pain. But then she immediately forced them open again, dragging herself back into the role of careless indifference she had chosen for her own protection.
‘Well, don’t flatter yourself that that’s true for me. You might want to imagine that you were unforgettable, but I’m afraid that’s just not the case.’
Not true, her outraged conscience reproached her, crying out against the betrayal of the truth. She hadn’t forgotten Theo’s touch, his kisses, his lovemaking. The vivid intensity of her memories, the blazing Technicolor brilliance of her dreams, left her in no doubt at all that the images would never fade.
She’d insulted him savagely too. She could see it in the flaring rage in the black brilliance of his eyes, the tightness of every muscle in his face that scored white lines of fury around his nose and mouth, stretched the skin ferociously over the broad cheekbones. It hurt to see what she had done, and she longed to open her mouth and protest sharply, to take back the terrible words. But even as her conscience lashed at her for the lies, her sense of self-protection recognised the need for it; the shield she had put up against the dangers of letting this man get too close.
But he was already too close, she admitted miserably. He was in her mind all day, every day. In her dreams each night.
In her heart.
But no! She wouldn’t allow herself to let that idea into her head. She couldn’t risk it, didn’t dare to even consider the possibility that she had come to care for Theo