She had a sensation she was floating. What was he trying to do to her? And why? There were so many unanswered questions spinning around in her head. “I’m dazzling all of a sudden?” she questioned, lifting sceptical eyes no longer hazel but pure green.
“Let’s just say you’ve been dazzling me for quite a long time—though, very modestly, you’ve appeared unaware of it.”
Modesty didn’t prevent a highly explosive recklessness surging into her. Whatever it was that was happening between them, it was moving way too fast. Mistakes carried penalties, she reminded herself. “Who are you tonight, Guy?” She tipped her head back, to ask, “Do I really know you?”
“I don’t think you do.”
His voice held the faintest rasp to it, yet it was very seductive. His evident experience made her acutely conscious of her own lack of it. She was still a virgin, probably the last one left in the Valley, but that had never mattered to her. To date she hadn’t met anyone she had wanted to enter into a serious love affair with. She hadn’t even glimpsed anyone who didn’t pale before Guy Radcliffe. Now she was discovering there was a lot of emotion locked up in her. Passion. Desperate hunger. She didn’t want to feel this vulnerable. Up until now she had been rock solid, in control. A whole person, not part of someone else. Falling madly in love didn’t guarantee happiness. Love could be abruptly withdrawn, leaving the rejected one to battle the pain.
“Wait.” She placed a shaky hand against the snowy-white of his dress shirt Immediately his expression turned to concern. “What is it?”
“Nothing really. I just feel a little odd.” Her emotions, of course, were getting too hard to handle. But she couldn’t tell him that.
“Let’s go out onto the terrace. Get some air.” His hand moved beneath her elbow guiding her outside.
The mingled scents from the garden were like incense on the warm air. Couples were standing laughing, talking, on the lush sweeping lawn; others were wandering the many stone paths, one with a little bridge that spanned a man-made pond where black swans sailed majestically and came at your call. The way was lit by hundreds and hundreds of twinkling white lights that had been placed in the density of the overhead trees.
The night was all around them, the vast dome of the sky thickly studded with glittering stars. There was Orion, the mighty hunter with his jewelled belt. The Southern Cross was so bright she understood perfectly why the aborigines worshipped it, and the Milky Way was a broad sparkling stream, the resting place of the great tribal heros.
Thoughtfully Guy produced a handkerchief to dust off the wide surrounds of a stone pillar—one of eight that supported the roof of the loggia. “Sit here. There’s a lovely breeze.”
“How good it feels!” she sighed, letting the breeze slide over her to cool her heated skin. Hadn’t her inner voice always warned her it would be dangerous to get too close to Guy Radcliffe? And with good reason. Now that she had done so, however lightly, she realised she couldn’t go back. His magic had already worked its way into her. She should do something to counteract it. But what?
He stood with his tall elegant body eased back against the pillar, looking down at her. “You’re very like your mother,” he told her quietly. “She was such a radiant woman. The Valley isn’t as bright without her.”
The gentleness and the compassion in his voice overwhelmed her. She was so incredibly touched she feared she might burst into tears. She remembered how her mother had always laughed merrily when Alana had made her tart little comments about Guy Radcliffe, Lord of the Valley. Of course her mother, skilled at recognising the truth of it, had seen through her. Now she thought there was a possibility Guy might tell her what she had so recently learned about her mother and his father. She desperately wanted to know.
Had they once had a relationship? Even a brief flutter that had burnt itself out? She had always felt a decided resistance to her from Guy’s mother, Sidonie. Not that Mrs Radcliffe, who lived near Alex these days, wasn’t always gracious. But she was ultra-reserved, withholding any real warmth.
“Guy?” She lifted her head to him, her voice betraying strong emotion.
He looked down on her. The exterior lights were making a glory of her beautiful hair, and burnishing the golden-green of her evening dress, its long skirt pooling around her. “If it’s what I think you’re going to ask, the answer is no!”
She felt the powerful rejection. “You can read my mind?”
“This time I can. You forget, I’ve known you since you were a little girl. I’ve a pretty good idea where you’re heading. You were bound to hear something from your father at some point.”
“And so I have—just a comment. I want you to tell me.” She shifted position so she could look directly at him.
For a fraught moment he seemed to consider. “Alana, you shouldn’t listen to gossip,” he said finally.
“Gossip?” The tightness that had gathered in her throat was reflected in her voice. “There’s always gossip in the Valley, but my father never gossips. I’ve never heard this before.”
“And you’re not going to hear it from me.”
He said it so decisively it had the power and authority to stop her in her tracks. She rose to her feet, not knowing how to continue.
“Is that a warning?”
“No, of course not!” His brooding expression almost immediately lightened. “I’m simply stating my feelings. Leave it, Alana, please. There’s nothing to be gained. Tell me how you feel now.”
Rocked to my soul!
Her old self seemed to have disappeared for ever. “Much better,” she lied.
The playful breeze sent a long golden strand of hair flying across her cheek. Guy reached out to smooth it back, his fingers making contact with her skin, electrifying it.
She inhaled sharply.
“Alana,” he said, his hand slipping to the nape of her neck.
The depth of feeling in his voice dazed her. For a crazy minute she thought something cataclysmic was about to happen, something that would change her life. Was he going to draw her into his arms? Was he going to kiss her? Kiss her in front of all these people? Unbelievably, it felt like it. Her feelings were rubbed raw. She had a sudden overpowering urge to lift her mouth to him, but instead she moved back, the flutter in her voice betraying her state of agitation. “What am I getting myself into, Guy?” she whispered.
His answer was equally quiet and equally intense. “I guess it’s about time to find out.”
“You’ll have to tell me what you mean.” Her voice was charged with tension.
“Just let yourself go with it,” he said, in a near-hypnotic voice.
Neither of them was moving. They were standing perfectly still, staring at one another; two people who were finally admitting they were powerfully drawn to each other. Alana felt her mind and body beginning to reel. She wanted to lie down. With him. She wanted his arms around her. Some part of her had always been tamped down. Now it was breaking out. Or trying to. She could feel it beating strongly against her ribcage. The safe option was to break the link—
only she wanted whatever it was between them to bind them closer together. The ambivalence that had been in her was no more than a defence. How long had she expected to hide behind those defences? She knew they wouldn’t protect her anyway.
“Are you trying to hypnotise me?” The tension in her voice betrayed the emotional storm that was in her.
“I think you could be hypnotised,” he said gently. “Are you brave enough to let me?”
“I