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Chris Johnson had thought he was God’s gift to girls, with his sun-streaked blond hair and bronzed torso. Sunrise High’s best surfer had reputedly made out with every half-decent-lookirtg bird in school, and had set his sights on the prize of prizes—the beautiful blonde daughter of the richest man in town.
So far, without much success, it had seemed.
Ben had set out to look as good as he could that night. It had been a matter of pride, not hope.
He’d saved every cent for weeks from what he’d earned selling free-range eggs door to door after school, and had hired a proper formal outfit. A smart black tux, a dazzling white shirt and a crisp black bow-tie. He’d even bought new black shoes. He’d also had his unruly black waves professionally trimmed. Gran had pronounced him very handsome indeed as she drove him to the school hall in her rusty old pick-up truck.
Amber had looked more beautiful that night than he’d ever seen her. Her dress had been virginal white, yet very sexy. Just down to her knees, with a floaty skirt and a tight top with tiny straps over her shoulders.
Ben hadn’t been able to take his eyes off her. He hadn’t bothered to hide his feelings this time, letting his crazed but usually controlled desire off the leash for once, gobbling her up with a hungry gaze which no girl could have mistaken.
She hadn’t mistaken it. And she’d looked back. Long, agitated glances which had carried an intriguingly fearful quality, as though she hadn’t wanted to look back at him, but couldn’t help herself.
Her reluctant but compelling interest had stirred a wildly reckless confidence in Ben. When her boyfriend had abandoned Amber to go to the men’s room around midnight, Ben had sauntered across the dance floor towards her.
‘Come for a walk with me,’ he said, his words not a polite request but a blunt order. He often adopted an arrogant attitude with girls these days, and, perversely, it seemed to work. But he’d never dreamt he would talk to Amber Hollingsworth in such an offhanded fashion. Usually just her presence could deflate his confidence, though not a certain part of his anatomy. At this very moment, every single part of him was raging with a wild desire.
Her lovely blue eyes widened. She might have tossed her hair, but it was up, with long tantalising tendrils curling around her beautiful face.
‘Who do you think you’re talking to, Ben Sinclair?’ she retorted, though shakily. ‘I’m not one of those little sluts you’ve been running around with who let you do what you like down behind the gym.’
‘Just shut up and do as you’re told,’ he muttered, and, taking her hand, curled his fingers forcefully through hers. An electric charge raced down his arm—and up hers, judging by the look on her face.
‘Come on,’ he insisted, and began pulling her through the throng of gyrating dancers. Several of their graduating classmates stared after them.
Ben suspected he might have Chris Johnson to contend with the following day, but he didn’t care. At that moment Amber was meekly following his lead, and looking just a little bewildered by her own submissive behaviour. Ben was quite blown away by the dizzying feeling of power charging along his already dangerously heated bloodstream.
He didn’t take her behind the gym. He took her down behind the staff block, which was further away. It was also darker. He drew her into a recessed doorway and pressed her up against the smooth wooden door. He could hardly see her face in the darkness, but he could smell her heady perfume and feel her trembling body.
He didn’t say a word. He just started kissing her. And touching her. All over.
She didn’t stop him. In fact she was soon actively aiding and abetting him. Kissing him back, touching him back. She couldn’t seem to get enough of him.
His own fierce arousal quickly transformed to a passionate resolve. He would be her first. He would show her how much she meant to him, how much he’d always wanted her.
And ten minutes later he was doing just that, doing it while they stood there in that darkened doorway, doing it with a startling and shocking ease. She clung to his shoulders and whispered his name as he surged deeply—and unimpeded—into her.
There was no protest or cry of pain from his supposedly virginal victim, only a low moan of the most ecstatic pleasure. She began moving on him with an amazingly practised skill, squeezing and releasing his flesh as no girl had ever done to him before.
Stunned and stupidly distressed, he’d immediately withdrawn, standing there in a speechless state as he tried to come to terms with his shock. Her only reaction was a dazed groan of disappointment at having her satisfaction snatched away from her at the last moment.
His own far more crippling disappointment suddenly found voice in his tongue, and he tore strips off her in words which he could not remember afterwards. He only knew he called her all sorts of names. He didn’t mean most of them, of course. It was his hurt talking. He’d been a fool to put her on such a pedestal.
But she had the last word anyway. She put the seal on what he meant to her and how she really felt about him...by not saying anything. By turning up her nose and simply going back to the ball and dancing with Chris as if nothing had happened. She looked right through him when he came back inside. When he kept staring at her, she laughed, then curled her arms much more tightly around Chris’ neck.
He’d been shocked. And shattered. He’d never known a girl could be like that. Ruthless. Unfeeling. Cruel. He had heard that laugh in his head for years, repeatedly imagining how that evening had ended for her, wrapped naked in Chris’s arms, giving him all she’d given Ben. But much, much more.
Ben shuddered at his masochistic thoughts, forcibly snapping his mind back to the present. He hadn’t thought about Amber Hollingsworth in such depth for a long time. God knew why she still haunted him. She wasn’t worth thinking about. Females like her were only good for one thing.
Ben strode back into his living room, and there, waiting for him, was his hometown paper, the one which kept him in touch—not only with Sunrise, but with Miss High-and-Mighty herself. It had told him about her marriage to an American playboy all those years ago. It had informed him of her divorce and return home three years back.
Ben had hoped her homecoming after her divorce was only a temporary thing, but when her father had had a stroke early last year Ben had been shocked to read in the paper that Amber had taken the helm of Hollingsworths—a most unlikely event, considering she had never been academically minded. At school she’d been more interested in her hair and her nails than in computers or business studies.
But clearly she’d found her feet being a minor tycoon, and she meant to stay. A week before Christmas he’d read in the Gazette about her grand plans for a shopping and cinema complex for the area.
Her ongoing presence in town was one of the reasons Ben had avoided going home last Christmas. His gran always dragged him along to church, and the thought of running into Amber there, as he seemed to every Christmas, had been enough to make him accept Brenda’s invitation to spend the Christmas break with her and her family.
A mistake, as it had turned out. Even putting up with another disturbing encounter with Amber would have been preferable to enduring four days with Brenda’s incredibly snooty family. They made the Hollingsworths look poor by comparison. And almost normal. Seeing the real Brenda in action—my God, she actually called her parents Mumsy and Daddykins!—had dampened his ardour for her in bed, and he hadn’t taken her out since.
Why was it, Ben wondered, that he knew nothing would ever dampen his ardour for Amber Hollingsworth? She could be as bitchy as she liked. As snobbish. As promiscuous. As ambitious. Anything, really. And he would still want her.
Ben glared down at the rolled up paper. He conceded that it was this ongoing obsession with Amber Hollingsworth which made him keep on subscribing to this pathetic rag. Why couldn’t he get over his masochistic fascination with the female? Why couldn’t he bear to sever the link once and for all by cancelling his subscription and never returning to Sunrise Point, not even at Christmas?
It seemed that such a final action was beyond him. For one thing he could not hurt his gran by never returning to the farm. She was a right pain in the neck, but she had been good to him when he’d desperately needed someone. If it hadn’t been for his gran’s support and encouragement, he probably would have ended up on the other side of the law.
Ben accepted that this coming Easter—which was less than a month away—he would drive back to Sunrise Point and sit in that damned church again, dreading yet aching to see his eternal torment one more time.
He drained the last of his drink, placed the empty glass on the coffee table, scooped up the paper from his armchair and plonked himself down. With angry sweeping movements, he spread the paper out on his lap.
The headline jumped out at him, and then the photo of his gran. His heart began to thump as he read the story, a mounting fury sending his blood charging hotly around his body. But along with the fury was frustration. Why hadn’t his Gran told him? Why hadn’t she rung?
He practically ground his teeth as he thought of Amber Hollingsworth, smugly thinking she could sweet-talk a seemingly defenceless old lady into parting with her home and land. For a pittance, no doubt.
Well, she didn’t know his gran, did she? Amber thought she could have anything she wanted, when she wanted it, simply because she’d been born rich and beautiful. Her motto in life was, ‘I want. And what I want, I get. And when I don’t want it any more, I get out’.
He felt sorry for that poor bastard who’d married her. No doubt she’d led him a merry dance. She’d led every male who cared about her merry dances. Chris Johnson had been given short shrift straight after that graduation ball. He’d been no longer wanted once the richest man in town gave his darling daughter a fancy trip around the world. Chris had bad-mouthed Amber around town for months afterwards, finally revealing the true nature of their relationship. His opinion of her was no higher than Ben’s own.
Ben clenched his teeth hard in his jaw. He’d denied her instant gratification once, and, by God, he’d make sure she didn’t have it this time, too.
No way was Ben going to allow his Gran to sell that land to the Hollingsworths. He’d buy the useless damned farm himself, if need be! The time for getting even with the Princess of Sunrise Point had finally arrived.
CHAPTER THREE
‘PERHAPS you don’t realise it, Amber, but, aside from that scandalous business in the paper yesterday, your father is very disappointed in you.’
Amber closed her eyes momentarily, grateful that her back was turned to her stepmother. Every time they were alone these days, Beverly trotted out some subtle criticism or other. Plus some not so subtle criticisms lately.
It hadn’t always been like that. When Edward Hollingsworth had first started dating Beverly, over ten years ago, she’d been all milk and honey around Amber. Amber had quite liked the woman, despite feeling naturally jealous that her father suddenly had no time for her at all. When they’d married, during Amber’s last year at school, she’d tried to be happy that her father had finally found someone to share his life with. His first wife, Amber’s mother, had tragically drowned only three years after their wedding, and less than two years after Amber’s birth.
Beverly had been an attractive widow in her forties back then, with a grown son of her own who didn’t live with her. She’d kept up a very convincing sweet stepmamma act even after the marriage, though Amber had always wondered whose idea it had been to send her overseas as soon as she’d left school. And she suspected Beverly had been thrilled when Amber had married an American.
It was easy to be nice from a distance. Over the telephone she’d been sweet as apple pie. But when Amber had come home to live, suddenly she could do nothing right in her stepmother’s eyes. Yet Amber had tried to stay out of her way, going every day to the office with her father and leaving the home front totally in her stepmother’s hands.
Beverly’s change in attitude had become even more marked, however, after her husband’s stroke. Clearly she had hoped that her own son, Carl—who had a business and marketing degree—would be brought up from Sydney and put in charge of the family company, which had a wide range of business interests. Hollingsworths Pty Ltd owned several shops in town, as well as all over northern New South Wales. They also had investments in holiday resorts, units, restaurants, and a lot of land.
When Edward had given the job as acting managing director to Amber, Beverly had been hard pushed to hide her resentment. When Amber had begun making a success of her new position, the gloves had really come off.
Beverly especially hated the new adult closeness which had developed between father and daughter. She was always trying to drive wedges between them. The article in the paper had provided her with a wonderful weapon over the past twenty-four hours. But it seemed it wasn’t enough.
Amber finished pouring herself a glass of white wine whilst pondering her amazing capacity for making enemies over the years. Most of the girls at school had loathed her. Her stepbrother, Carl, despised her. Her ex-husband, Chad, had tried to kill her when she’d said she was leaving him. Chris, her high school sweetheart, had never forgiven her for making a fool of him on that ghastly night.
But all of them paled into insignificance beside what Ben Sinclair felt for her. No doubt murder would be too good for Amber Hollingsworth, in his opinion.
But she wouldn’t think about Ben just now. Thinking about Ben always disturbed her far too much, and she needed every ounce of composure she owned to combat Beverly once she got on her ‘tear Amber down to size’ bandwagon.
She turned to face her stepmother, feeling oddly curious over what the woman had come up with this time. ‘Really, Beverly? In what other way is Dad disappointed in me?’
‘Just look at you,’ Beverly said, with a faint curl of her thinnish upper lip. ‘Twenty-eight years old and you’re husbandless, childless and sexless.’
Amber’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Sexless, Beverly? What on earth do you mean?’ No point in defending the husbandless and childless part. They were all too evident. And if her stepmother’s tactless remark hurt, she certainly wasn’t going to show it. Amber was a past master at hiding hurts.
‘You know very well what I mean,’ Beverly continued curtly. ‘Oh, you’re beautiful enough, I suppose, though far too thin in my opinion...’
Amber’s blue eyes moved tellingly over her stepmother’s growing bulk, but she said nothing. She didn’t have to. Beverly’s snaky remark had said it all.
‘You haven’t dated once in the three years you’ve been living at home since your divorce. Clearly you don’t care for male company.’
Amber sipped her drink as she walked slowly across the finely furnished lounge room and settled herself on the silk brocade sofa. Beverly was sitting in her usual chair, nursing a generous whisky and soda.
‘You’re wrong, Beverly,’ she said, quite calmly. ‘I like male company a lot. I prefer it, actually, to female company. I enjoy talking with Father and the other men I work with very much. As for your accusation about my dating, I’ve been out to dinner with several men this past year.’
‘That’s not what I mean and you know it,’ Beverly snapped. ‘They were just business dinners. One could not call them proper dates by any stretch of the imagination.’
‘Oh, I see—you’re talking about sex!’ Amber said bluntly, having learnt since going into business that, occasionally, attack was the best defence.
‘That’s right. I’m talking about sex. Is that a dirty word with you?’
‘Not if it’s accompanied by the word ’love’, Beverly. I’m one of those peculiar girls who needs to be in love to enjoy making love.’
And that’s the most hypocritical thing you’ve ever said in your life, whispered her conscience. A lie of the most mammoth proportions. A whopper, in fact. The most memorable lovemaking you ever experienced in your life was when love had nothing to do with it.
Amber tried to keep the hot memory of that incredibly brief and incredibly torrid encounter from tumbling into her mind. But it was impossible.
She was back there in her head, and in her body. Behind the staff block, pressed up against the darkened door, panting as Ben pushed her panties aside and entered her as they stood there.
My God, she could still remember how it had felt as he’d done it to her! She’d been consumed by a wild, hot pleasure, plus the most compelling need. How would it have felt if he’d continued? she’d often wondered since.
She hadn’t been sure why he’d stopped at first. Till he’d sneered his contempt at her.
‘You might be incredibly beautiful,’ he’d snarled, ‘and you might be filthy rich. But underneath that high and mighty touch-me-not air you’re nothing but a slut, Amber Hollingsworth. A cheap little slut! Don’t go imagining for one moment I really like you. I just wanted to show you how easily I could have you. But, quite frankly, I’ve never been partial to girls who open their legs at the drop of a hat.’
If he’d been expecting her to argue, or cry, or fall apart, he’d been sadly mistaken. Amber had always possessed a fierce self-protective pride which made her react to hurt and embarrassment—and, yes, shame —by withdrawing behind a façade, a shell of cool, even icy indifference.
People often thought her a snob at times like that—or a hard-hearted bitch—but that was not so. It was simply a survival mechanism she’d learnt as a little girl when she hadn’t had a mother to advise or protect her. In those days her father had rarely been home, leaving the childminding to paid help who hadn’t given a damn about Amber on a personal level. It had been easier to withdraw from a distressful or confusing situation than ask a virtual stranger how to handle it. Eventually it had become an automatic behaviour pattern to deal with any kind of emotional conflict.
Which was why she’d always behaved so badly around Ben Sinclair. From the first moment he’d walked into their class, when she’d been fifteen, she’d been bewildered by her feelings for him. She’d been strangely drawn to those dark, angry eyes and his intriguingly antisocial personality. She hadn’t liked him, but she’d been attracted nevertheless. Oh, how she’d wanted him to look at her, to chase after her like most of the other boys in school. When he hadn’t, she’d tried to rouse some sort of reaction by making sarcastic remarks.
On the one day she’d caught him actually staring at her, with undisguised lust in that brooding black gaze of his, she’d been in danger of self-combustion. So rattled had she been by the instant heat he’d evoked in her, she’d only just managed to hide her fluster behind another of her highly caustic comments.
There was no doubt she’d hurt him that time with her barb, for he’d glared at her with hatred in his eyes. After that encounter he had not looked at her again with anything other than contempt.
Not till the night of the graduation ball...
Dear heaven, she’d nearly died when he’d walked into the school hall that night. He’d been smoulderingly handsome in that black dinner suit. He’d looked a man where the rest of her classmates had been just boys.
And he’d looked at her as a man would have looked at her.
His very adult desire had seared across the dance floor, sending darts of fire licking along her veins. She hadn’t been able to stop glancing back at him; hadn’t been able to stop wanting him to ask her to dance. Yet when he’d finally come over, he hadn’t asked her to dance. He’d asked her to go outside with him.
She’d known what he wanted. She’d heard the recent rumours about him, how he only took girls outside from school dances for one thing.
Yet she’d gone with him. Not only gone with him, but let him. Let him kiss her, touch her. Let him do what she had never let Chris do, never let any boy do before.
Not for one moment had she even thought of stopping him. Her body had had a mind of its own. Had been burning for him. Reaching for him. Begging for him. It was only afterwards that she’d realised it hadn’t hurt. No pain at all. Only the wildest, sweetest pleasure. Her flesh had opened and closed around his as though it had had a secret agenda, as though this had been what it had been waiting for all its life.
The hurt had come later—when he withdrew, when he spat his appalling contempt at her, when she understood that he’d done what he’d done out of some kind of sick revenge for all those times she’d looked at him with seeming contempt
Naturally she’d had to protect herself from the blinding emotional pain which had threatened to overwhelm her. Dear God, she’d just given her virginity to him. And there he was, calling her a cheap slut!
Spitting back a counter-attack in words would have been not only inadequate but impossible at that moment. So she’d retreated behind her usual hard-nosed shell. She’d managed somehow to return to the dance, to find Chris and pretend she’d just been outside for some fresh air. He hadn’t found out the truth till later, when her female classmates had been kind enough to tell him. She’d steeled herself when Ben had walked back inside. She’d even managed to laugh at something Chris had said, and, when she’d looked over Chris’s shoulder at him one last time, Ben’s face had been filled with even more contempt than before.
‘The only person you have ever loved, Amber Hollingsworth,’ her stepmother sniped, snapping Amber back to the present, ‘is yourself!’
‘You’re entitled to your opinion, Beverly,’ Amber said coolly. ‘But you’re wrong. I love my father very much. And he loves me very much.’
‘Oh, I know that. Your father is a fool when it comes to his precious darling daughter. He gave you the business to run in the same way he let you trot along to work with him every day. Just to keep you happy. To make up to you for your supposedly miserable marriage and divorce.
‘As if you ever loved that Chad person in the first place!’ she raved on. ‘All he was to you was another sugar-daddy who indulged you as shamelessly as Edward did. But when his money started running out, you left him. If you cared for your father at all,’ Beverly scoffed, ‘you’d stop playing at being a tycoon and give him what he really wants. A grandchild.’
Amber was taken aback. ‘A grandchild!’
‘Yes, of course. Men like Edward like to see their line continued. Unfortunately I was too old when we married to give your father more children.’
‘Dad has never said anything to me about wanting a grandchild,’ Amber said stiffly.
‘Neither would he. But I know he would like nothing better than to see you happily married and pregnant. But you and I know that isn’t going to come about, don’t we, Amber? You were married six years and never had a baby. But there again, having a family wasn’t the aim of that marriage, was it? It was money. Too bad there wasn’t much left for a decent divorce settlement. And now...now you’ve got your sights set on other goals. You’re into power these days. Power and position.’
Amber could only stand so much. She stood up, her hand tightening around her glass to stop it from shaking. ‘Now you look here, Beverly. I’ll have you know that—’
The telephone ringing interrupted her counter-attack. Amber knew June, the housekeeper, was busy cooking the dinner, and Bill was giving her father his evening massage, so she strode across the room and out into the hallway, sweeping up the receiver.
‘Amber Hollingsworth,’ she said, her businesslike tone a reflection of the control she was trying to muster. But her temper was fairly bubbling at Beverly’s unjust accusations.
‘Hello, Amber,’ a cool male voice drawled down the line. ‘I’m so glad to find you home.’