Conversation concluded, he put the phone in his pocket and said in his almost perfectly accented English, ‘Everything seems quiet there. The headman says the preacher is with his family high in the mountains—there has been a death.’
‘So we can breathe again,’ she said frivolously, shocked to realise how tense she’d been.
‘I hadn’t stopped,’ he returned on a dry note, and opened the door.
Unclenching her teeth, Lauren preceded Guy out into the darkness, tossing words over her shoulder like hand grenades.
‘I’m glad I can tell my friend that the nut-oil scheme seems to be working. It’s great that the villagers get a reliable income from their land without having to fell the forests for lumber.’ A little more steadily she added, ‘I wish I could have seen what they’re doing, though.’
Locking the door behind them, Guy responded with brutal frankness, ‘They’ve got enough to worry about without trying to keep you safe. What are your plans now?’
Lauren looked at the single naked bulb that lit the stairwell. Fighting back a highly suspect—and dangerous—temptation to linger a few days at the resort, she said too promptly, ‘I’ll leave for New Zealand as soon as I can. Tomorrow, if I can get a seat on an outgoing plane.’
Guy startled her by unlocking the door again. ‘You might, but don’t bank on it. There are only two a day, not counting the twice-a-week flight to Valanu.’
‘Where’s Valanu? I’ve never heard of it. Is it another town on Sant’Rosa?’
‘No.’ Back in the office he picked up a telephone and punched in a few numbers. ‘It’s a scatter of islands to the south, part of another small Pacific nation.’
‘The back of beyond, in other words.’
‘Or paradise, depending on your outlook. It’s a fair way off the beaten track,’ he conceded, a disconcerting thread of mockery running through each word as he surveyed her with unreadable eyes and a tilted smile. ‘But incredibly beautiful.’ His voice lingered half a beat too long on the final word.
Colour tinged the skin along her cheekbones and an odd sensation twisted fiercely in the pit of her stomach. Swallowing, she switched her mind to her half-brother’s holiday home in New Zealand, remote and lovely and utterly peaceful. Until she’d seen—until a short time ago, she amended swiftly, she’d been aching to get there.
And she still was. Jet lag had clouded her mind. As soon as she had some sleep she’d be her usual self. ‘Who are you ringing?’
‘The last flight to Atu will have just left, but someone should still be at the airfield. I’ll book you a seat on the first plane out.’
Oddly piqued that he was so eager to get rid of her, she said lightly, ‘Thank you so much.’
Someone was at the airfield, someone called Josef, with whom Guy conducted a conversation in the local language. When he hung up Lauren lifted her brows enquiringly.
‘You’ve a seat reserved on tomorrow afternoon’s flight,’ he told her.
Formally, her smile set, she murmured, ‘You’ve been very kind.’
His white teeth flashed in a grin. ‘My pleasure,’ he returned easily. ‘Now, as the Chinese restaurant seems to be closed, we can go back to the resort and have dinner or I can take you home and feed you.’
‘The resort,’ Lauren said instantly, stopping when she realised that he’d tricked her. She met his amused eyes and thought with an entirely uncharacteristic rashness, Well, why not?
She was leaving tomorrow, so why shouldn’t she share dinner with the most intriguing man she’d met for a long time? Utterly infuriating, of course—far too macho and high-handed and dominating—but since she’d seen him that dragging tiredness had been replaced by a swift, intoxicating excitement.
They had absolutely nothing in common, and when she was back home she’d wonder what it was about him that arced through her like an electrical charge, but for one night—one evening, she corrected herself hastily—she’d veer slightly towards the wild side. Every woman probably deserved a buccaneer experience once in her life.
But to make sure he didn’t think he could lure her into his bed, she said, ‘It won’t be a late night, though—I’ve had two hours’ sleep in the last twenty-four, and I’m running on empty.’
He understood the implication. Irony tinged his smile as he held open the door. ‘I’ll deliver you to your door within two minutes of the first yawn. Watch where you put your feet.’
The single bulb over the stairs flickered ominously as a huge moth came to rest on it. To the sound of their footsteps echoing on the bare concrete, Lauren gripped the pipe handrail and negotiated the stairs.
‘Now that it’s dark the air is fresher, even though it hasn’t cooled down much,’ she remarked sedately as they walked towards the Land Rover. ‘I can smell the scent of the flowers without any underlying taint of decay.’
‘That’s the tropics—ravishing beauty and rotting vegetation,’ Guy said unromantically, opening the vehicle door.
Lauren slid in, watching him walk around the front of the vehicle, tall and powerful in the weak light of the only street lamp. She felt exposed and tingling, as though meeting him had stripped away several skins to reveal a world of unsuspected excitement and anticipation.
Calm down, she warned herself. Heady recklessness is so not your thing.
She’d built a successful and satisfying life on discretion and discipline; she wasn’t going to allow the tropics to cast any magic spell on her!
Halfway back to the resort, Guy said, ‘It seems a pity to leave the South Coast without seeing our main claim to fame.’
‘Which is?’ she asked cautiously.
‘A waterfall.’
Lauren paused. Maybe it was the soft radiance in the sky that proclaimed the imminent arrival of a full moon, but another rash impulse overrode common sense.
‘All right,’ she said, regretting the words the moment they left her mouth.
Guy swung the vehicle between two dark walls of trees; within seconds the unmarked road deteriorated into teeth-jolting ruts. Nevertheless, he skirted potholes with a nonchalant skill she envied. Clinging to the seat, she looked around uneasily; nightfall had transformed the lush vegetation into an alien, menacing entity that edged onto the track.
Watching large leaves whip by, she decided she’d been crazy to accept Guy’s challenge—because challenge it had definitely been.
He pulled up beneath a huge tree, its heavy foliage drooping to the ground to make a kind of tent around the Land Rover. As he switched off the engine, Lauren groped for the handle and jumped out.
‘This way,’ he said crisply.
After a few yards the oppressive growth pulled back to reveal a swathe of coarse grass. Lauren’s eyes grew accustomed to the darkness as they walked towards a steady soft murmur, infinitely refreshing, that whispered through the sticky air.
‘Look,’ Guy said, stopping.
Water fell from on high, a shimmering veil under the stars. Down the rock face clustered palms, their fronds edged with the promise of moonlight.
‘It’s beautiful,’ she said softly. ‘Oh— I didn’t realise we were so close to the coast.’
The wide pool emptied over another lip of rock into a small stream that wound its way a few hundred yards to the sea. Through the feathery tops of the coconut palms she could see the white crescent of a beach and the oily stillness of a wide bay.
‘I’m surprised there’s no coral reef around the island,’ she said, uncomfortably moved by the