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MILLS & BOON
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CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER ONE
PARADISE was a sleepy island floating in the Caribbean. It had a bar on the beach, rum on tap and the unique sound of island music, which did seductive things to the hot and humid late afternoon air, while beyond the bar’s open rough-wood construction the silky blue ocean lapped lazily against a white-sand shore.
Sitting on a bar stool with a glass of local rum slotted between his fingers, Ethan Hayes decided that it didn’t get any better than this. Admittedly it had taken him more than a week to wind down to the point where he no longer itched to reach for a telephone or felt naked in bare feet and shorts instead of sharp suits and highly polished leather shoes. Now he would even go as far as to say that he liked his new laid-back self. ‘No worries,’ as the locals liked to say, had taken on a whole new meaning for him.
‘You want a refill for that, Mr Hayes?’ The soft melodic tones of an island accent brought his gaze up to meet that of the beautiful brown girl who was serving behind the bar. Her smile held a different kind of invitation.
‘Sure, why not?’ He returned a smile and released his glass to her—without acknowledging the hidden offer.
Sex in this hot climate was the serpent in Paradise. As one’s body temperature rose, so did that particular appetite, Ethan mused, aware that certain parts of him were suggesting he should consider the offer in the bar-girl’s velvet-brown eyes. But he hadn’t come to the island to indulge that specific pleasure, and all it took was the tentative touch of a finger to the corner of his mouth to remind him why he was wary of female entanglement. The bruising to his lip and jaw had faded days ago, but the injury to his dignity hadn’t. It still throbbed in his breast like an angry tiger in dire need of succour for its nagging wound. If a man had any sense, he wouldn’t unleash that tiger on some poor, unsuspecting female; he would keep it severely locked up and avoid temptation at all cost.
Though there was certainly a lot of that about, he acknowledged, as he turned to observe the young woman who was hogging the small bare-board dance floor.
The serpent’s mistress, he named her dryly as he watched her sensual undulations to the music. She was a tall and slender toffee-blonde with a perfect Caribbean tan, wearing a short and sassy hot-pink slip-dress that was an almost perfect match for the pink hibiscus flower she wore tucked into her hair.
Eye-catching, in other words. Too irresistible to leave to dance alone, so it wasn’t surprising that the young men in the bar were lining up to take their turn with her. She had class, she had style, she had beauty, she had grace, and she danced like a siren, shifting from partner to partner with the ease of one who was used to taking centre stage. Her eager young cohorts were enjoying themselves, loving the excuse to get up close and personal, lay their hands on her sensational body and gaze into big green beautiful eyes or watch her lovely mouth break into a smile that promised them everything.
And her name was Eve. Eve as in temptress, the ruin of man.
Or in this case the ruin of these brave young hunters who were aspiring to be her Adam. For she was the It girl on this small Caribbean island, the girl with everything, one of the fortunate few. A daddy’s girl—though in this case it was Grandpa’s girl, and the sole heir to his fabulous fortune.
Money was one hell of an aphrodisiac, Ethan decided cynically. Make her as ugly as sin and he could guarantee that those same guys would still be worshipping at her dainty dancing feet. But as so often was the way for the fabulously wealthy, stunning beauty came along with this package.
She began to laugh; the sound was soft and light and appealingly pleasant. She pouted at her present young hunter and almost brought the poor fool to his knees. Then she caught Ethan’s eyes on her and the cynical look he was wearing on his face. Her smile withered to nothing. Big green come-and-get-me-if-you-dare eyes widened to challenge his cynicism outright. She knew him, he knew her. They had met several times over the last year at her grandfather’s home in Athens, Ethan in his professional role as a design-and-build architect renowned for his creative genius for making new holiday complexes blend into their native surroundings, Eve in her only role as her grandfather’s much loved, much spoiled, gift from the gods.
They did not like each other. In fact mutual antipathy ran in a constant stream between them. Ethan did not like her conceited belief that she had been put on this earth to be worshipped by all, and Eve did not like his outright refusal to fall at her feet. So it was putting it mildly to say that it was unfortunate they should both find themselves holidaying in the same place. The island was small enough for them to be thrown into each other’s company too often for the comfort of either. Sparks tended to fly, forcing hostility to raise its ugly head. Other people picked up on it and didn’t know what to do or say to lighten the atmosphere. Ethan usually solved the problem by withdrawing from the conflict with excuses that he had to be somewhere else.
This time he withdrew by turning away from her, back to the bar and the drink that had just been placed in front of him. But Eve’s image remained standing right there, dancing on the bar top. Proud, defiant, unashamedly provocative—doing things to other parts of him he did not want her to reach.
His serpent in paradise, he grimly named this hot and nagging desire he suffered for Theron Herakleides’ tantalising witch of a granddaughter.
Eve was keeping a happy smile fixed on her face even if it killed her to do it. She despised Ethan Hayes with an absolute vengeance. He made her feel spoiled and selfish and vain. She wished he had done his usual thing of getting up and walking out, so that she wouldn’t have to watch him flirt with the barmaid.
Didn’t Ethan know he was treading on dangerous ground there, and that the barmaid’s strapping great sailor of a lover would chew him up and spit him out if he caught him chatting up his woman? Or was it the girl who was doing the chatting up? Then Eve had to settle for that as the more probable alternative, because Ethan Hayes was certainly worth the effort.
Great body, great looks, great sense of presence, she listed reluctantly. In a sharp suit and tie he was dynamic and sleek; now simple beach shorts and a white tee shirt should have turned him into something else entirely, but didn’t—dynamic and sleek still did it for her, Eve decided as she ran her eyes over him. She began at his brown bare feet with their long toes that were curling lovingly round one of the bar stool crossbars, then moved onwards, up powerfully built legs peppered with dark hair that had been bleached golden by the sun.
How did she know the sun had bleached those hairs? Eve asked herself. Because she’d seen his legs before—had seen all of Ethan Hayes before!—on that terrible night at her grandfather’s house in Athens, when she’d dared to walk uninvited into his bedroom and had caught him in a state of undress.
Prickly heat began to chase along to her nerve ends at the memory—the heat of mortification, not attraction though the attraction had always been there as well. She had gone to Ethan’s room to confront him over something he had seen her doing in the garden with Aidan Galloway. Bristling with self-righteous indignation she had marched in through his door, only to stop dead with her head wiped clean of all coherent thought when she’d found him standing there still dripping water from a recent shower, and as stark staring naked as a man could be—not counting the small hand towel he had been using to dry his hair. The towel had quickly covered other parts of him, but not before she’d had a darn good owl-eyed look!
Oh, the shame, the embarrassment! She could feel her cheeks blushing even now. ‘I presume Mr Galloway ran back to his fiancée, so you thought you would come and try your luck here.’ Eve winced as Ethan’s cutting words came back to slay her all over again.
‘Your foot, sorry,’ her present dance partner apologised.
He had misinterpreted the wince. ‘That’s okay,’ she said, smiling sweetly at Raoul Delacroix without bothering to correct his mistake—and wished she’d had the wits to smile sweetly at Ethan Hayes that night, instead of running like a fool and leaving him with his mistake!
But she had run without saying a single word to him in her own defence, and by the next morning embarrassment had turned to stiff-necked pride; hell could freeze over before she would explain anything to him! As a result he had become the conscience she knew she did not deserve, because all it took was a glance from those horribly critical grey eyes to make her feel crushingly guilty!
It wasn’t fair, she hated him for it. Hated his dark good looks too because they did things to her she would rather they didn’t. But most of all she hated his cold, grim, English reserve that kept him forever at a distance, thereby stopping her from beginning the confrontation that she knew would completely alter his perception of her.
Did she need to do that? Eve asked herself suddenly. And was horrified to realise how badly she did.
‘Have dinner with me tonight…’ Her present dance partner was suddenly crowding her with his too eager hands and the fervent darkening of his liquid brown eyes. ‘Just the two of us,’ Raoul huskily extended. ‘Somewhere quiet and romantic where no one can interrupt.’
‘You know that’s a no-no, Raoul.’ Smiling to soften the refusal, she also deftly dislodged one of his hands from her rear. ‘We’re here as a group to have fun, not romance.’
‘Romance can be fun.’ His rejected hand lifted up to brush a finger across her bottom lip with a message only a very naïve woman would misinterpret.
Eve reached up and firmly removed the finger and watched his beautifully shaped mouth turn down in a sulk. Raoul Delacroix was a very handsome French-American, with eyes dark enough to drown in and a body to die for—yet he did nothing for her. In a way she wished that he did because he was her age and her kind of person, unlike the disapproving Ethan Hayes who added a whole new meaning to the phrase, the generation gap.
And what was that gap—her twenty-three years to his thirty-seven? Big gap—yawning gap, she mocked it dryly. ‘Don’t sulk,’ she scolded Raoul. ‘Today is my birthday and we’re supposed to be having lots of fun.’
‘Tomorrow is your birthday,’ he corrected.
‘As we all know, my grandfather is arriving here tomorrow to help me celebrate, which means I will have to behave with proper decorum all day. So tonight we agreed that we would celebrate my birthday a day early. Don’t spoil that for me, Raoul.’
It was both a gentle plea and a serious warning because he had been getting just a little bit too intense recently. Raoul Delacroix was the half-brother of André Visconte who owned the only hotel on the island. So like the rest of the crowd whose families owned property here, they’d all been meeting up for holidays since childhood. They were all good close friends now who’d agreed early on that romance would spoil what they enjoyed most about each others’ company. Raoul knew the rules, so attempting to change them now was just a tiny bit irritating—and a shame because he was usually very good company—when he wasn’t thinking of other things, that was.
‘The beach is strewn with good prospects for a handsome Frenchman to play the romantic,’ she teased him. ‘Take your pick. I can guarantee they will swoon at your feet.’
‘I know, I’ve tried one or two,’ Raoul returned lazily. ‘But this was only in practice, you understand,’ he then added, ‘to prepare myself for the woman I love.’
Implying that Eve was that woman? She laughed, it was so funny. After a moment, Raoul joined in the laughter, and the mood between them relaxed back into being playful. The music changed not long after, calypso taking the place of reggae, and Eve found Raoul’s place taken by another admirer while he moved on to pastures new.
Viewing this little by-play via the mirror on the wall behind the drinks optics, Ethan wasn’t sure he liked the expression on Raoul Delacroix’s face as he’d turned away from Eve. Raoul’s look did nasty things to Ethan’s insides and made him curious as to what Raoul and Eve had been talking about. They’d parting laughing, but Raoul’s turning expression had been far from amused.
None of your business, he then told himself firmly. Eve knew what kind of dangerous game she was playing with all of these testosterone-packed young men. My God, did she know, he then added with a contempt that went so deep it reflected clearly on his face when, as if on cue, Aidan Galloway walked into the bar. The darkly attractive young Irish-American paused, found his target and made directly for Eve.
The last time Ethan had seen Aidan Galloway had been a month ago in Athens when he had been a guest of Eve’s grandfather, along with several members of the Galloway family. On the face of it, the younger man had only had eyes for the beautiful fiancée he’d had hanging from his arm. But since coming to this island, Ethan had seen no sign of the fiancée and Aidan Galloway now only had eyes for Eve.
Someone slid onto the stool next to him, offering him a very welcome alternative to observing the life and loves of Eve Herakleides. It was Jack Banning who managed the only hotel on the island for owner, André Visconte. Jack was a big all-American guy, built to break rocks against but as laid-back as they came.
‘Marlin have been spotted five miles out,’ Jack informed him. ‘I’m taking a boat out tomorrow. If you’re interested in some big-game fishing, you’re welcome to come.’
‘Early start?’ Ethan quizzed.
‘Think sunrise,’ Jack suggested. ‘Think deep yawns and black coffee and no heavy partying the night before if you don’t want to spend your time at sea throwing up.’
The barmaid interrupted by appearing with a glass of rum for Jack. The two of them chatted boss to employee for a few minutes, but the girl’s eyes kept on drifting towards Ethan, and when she had moved away again Jack sent Ethan a very male glance.
‘Considering a different kind of game?’ Jack posed lazily.
‘Not today, thanks.’ Ethan’s smile was deliberately benign as he took a sip at his drink.
‘Or any day that you’ve been here, from what my sources say.’
‘Was that an idle question or a veiled criticism of my use of the island’s rich and varied hospitality?’
‘Neither.’ A set of even white teeth appeared to acknowledge Ethan’s sarcastic hit. ‘It was just an observation. I mean—look at you, man,’ Jack mocked him. ‘You’ve got the looks, you’ve got the body parts, and I know for a fact that you’ve had more than one lovely woman’s heart fluttering with anticipation since you arrived, but I’ve yet to see you take a second look at any of them.’
He was curious. Ethan didn’t entirely blame him. The island was not sold on its monastic qualities. The women here were, in the main, beautiful people and a lot of them had made it clear that they were available for a little holiday romance.
But Ethan was off romance, off women, and most definitely off sex—or at least he was in training to be off it, he amended, all too aware that his body was trying to tempt him with every inviting smile that came his way.
Then there was that other sexual temptation, the one that hit him hard in his nether regions every time he looked at Eve Herakleides and recalled an incident when she’d walked into his room to find him standing there naked. She’d looked—no stared—and things had happened to him that he hadn’t experienced since he’d been a hormone-racked teenager. What was worse than the reaction was knowing she’d witnessed it.
So why his eyes had to pick that precise moment to glance in the mirror was something he preferred not to analyse. She was dancing with Aidan Galloway, and the body language was nothing like what it had been when she’d danced with the other men. No, this was tense, it was serious. It reminded him of that kiss he had witnessed in her grandfather’s garden in Athens. The two of them had been so engrossed in each other that they hadn’t heard his arrival—nor had they known they’d also been watched by Aidan’s fiancée, who’d almost fainted into the arms of another young Galloway.
Eve was a flirt and a troublemaker, a woman with no scruples when it came to other women’s men. Her only mission in life was to slay all with those big green you-can-have-me eyes.
Ethan loved those eyes…
The unexpected thought jolted him, snapped his gaze down from the mirror to his glass. What the hell is the matter with you? he asked himself furiously. Too much sun? Too much time on your hands? Maybe it was time he got back into a suit and unearthed a mobile telephone.
‘And you?’ He diverted his attention back to Jack Banning. ‘Do you sip the honey on a regular basis here?’
Jack gave a rueful shake of his head. ‘The boss would have my balls for trophies if I imbibed,’ he murmured candidly. ‘No…’ picking up his glass he tasted the rum ‘…I have this lovely widow living on the next island who keeps me sane in that department.’
With no ties, and no commitment expected or desired, Ethan concluded from that, knowing the kind of woman Jack was talking about because he’d enjoyed a few of them himself in his time.
‘She’s a good woman,’ Jack added as if he needed to make that point.
‘I don’t doubt it,’ Ethan replied, and he didn’t. In the time he had been here, he had got to know and like Jack Banning. Being in the leisure business himself—though in a different area—he wasn’t surprised that André Visconte had a man like Jack in place. In fact he was considering doing a bit of head-hunting because they could do with Jack running the new resort his company was in the process of constructing in Spain.
Though that idea was shot to pieces when Jack spoke again. ‘Her husband was caught out at sea in a hurricane four years ago,’ he said quietly. ‘He left her well shod but heavily pregnant. Left her with a badly broken heart too.’
Which told Ethan that Jack was in love with the widow. Which in turn meant there was no hope of getting him to leave for pastures new.
‘So what’s your excuse for the self-imposed celibacy?’ Jack asked curiously.
Same as you, Ethan thought grimly. I fell for a married woman—only her husband is very much alive and kicking. ‘Too much of a good thing is reputed to be bad for you,’ was what he offered as a dry reply.
Glancing at him, he saw Jack’s gaze touch that part of Ethan’s jaw where the bruising had been obvious a few days ago. He had been forced to wear the mark like a banner when he’d first arrived on the island. Speculation as to how he’d received the bruise had been rife. His refusal to discuss it had only helped to fire people’s imagination.
But the expression in Jack’s eyes told him that Jack had drawn a pretty accurate conclusion. He sighed, so did Jack. Both men lifted their glass to their mouths and said no more. It had been that kind of conversation: some things had been said, others not, but all had been taken on board nonetheless. Turning on his stool, Jack offered the busy bar room a once-over with his lazy-yet-shrewd manager’s eye, while Ethan studied the contents of his glass with a slightly bitter gaze. He was thinking of a woman with dark red hair, silk-white skin and a broken heart that was in the process of being mended by the wrong man, as far as he was concerned.
But the right man for her, he had to add honestly, felt the tiger stir within and wished he knew of a good cure for unrequited love.
‘Try the sex,’ Jack said suddenly as if he could read his mind. ‘It has to be a better option than lusting after the unattainable.’
Unable to restrain it, Ethan released a hard laugh. ‘Is that advice for me or for yourself?’
‘You,’ Jack answered. Then he grimaced as he added, ‘Mine is a hopeless case. You see, the widow’s son calls me Daddy.’ With that he got up and gave Ethan’s shoulder a man-to-man, sympathetic pat. ‘Let me know about the Marlin trip,’ he said and strolled away.
Turning to watch him go, Ethan saw Jack stop once or twice to chat to people on his way out of the bar. One woman in particular came to meet him. It was Eve the temptress. A quick look around and he found Aidan Galloway standing at the other end of the bar. He was ordering a drink and he didn’t look happy. Join the club, Ethan thought, as his eyes then picked out Raoul Delacroix who was watching Eve with an expression on his face that matched Aidan Galloway’s.
As for Eve, her long slender arms were around Jack’s neck and she was pouting up at him in a demand for a kiss. Amiably Jack gave it and smiled at whatever it was she was saying to him. Without much tempting she managed to urge the manager into motion to the music, his big hands spanning her tiny waist, his dark head dipped to maintain eye contact. Like that, they teased each other as they swayed.
Suddenly Ethan knew it was time to leave. Downing the rest of his drink, he came to his feet, placed some money on the bar and wished the girl behind it a light farewell. As he walked towards the dancers he thought he saw Eve move that extra inch closer to Jack’s impressive body.
Done for his benefit? he asked himself, then shot that idea in the foot with a silent huff of scorn to remind himself that Eve Herakleides disliked him as much as he disliked her.
Outside the air was like warm damp silk against his skin. The humidity was high, and looking out to sea Ethan could see clouds gathering on the horizon aiming to spoil the imminent sunset. There could be a storm tonight, he predicted as he turned in the direction of his beach house. Behind him the sound of a woman’s laughter came drifting towards him from inside the bar. Without thinking he suddenly changed direction and his feet were kicking hot sand as he ran toward the water and made a clean racing dive into its cool clear depths.
‘Don’t even think about it,’ Jack cautioned. ‘He’s too old and too dangerous for a sweet little flirt like you.’
Dragging her eyes away from the sight of Ethan Hayes in full sprint as he headed for the ocean, Eve looked into Jack Banning’s knowing gaze—and mentally ran for cover. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ she said.
Jack didn’t believe her. ‘Ethan Hayes could eat you for a snack without touching his appetite,’ he informed her without a hint of mockery to make the bitter pill of truth an easier one to swallow.
‘Like you, you mean,’ she said with a kissable pout, which was really another duck-and-run. ‘Big bad Jack,’ she murmured as she moved in closer then began swaying so provocatively that he had to physically restrain her.