Celebrate the legend that is bestselling author

PENNY JORDAN

Phenomenally successful author of more than two hundred books with sales of over a hundred million copies!

Penny Jordan’s novels are loved by millions of readers all around the word in many different languages. Mills & Boon are proud to have published one hundred and eighty-seven novels and novellas written by Penny Jordan, who was a reader favourite right from her very first novel through to her last.

This beautiful digital collection offers a chance to recapture the pleasure of all of Penny Jordan’s fabulous, glamorous and romantic novels for Mills & Boon.

About the Author

PENNY JORDAN is one of Mills & Boon’s most popular authors. Sadly, Penny died from cancer on 31st December 2011, aged sixty-five. She leaves an outstanding legacy, having sold over a hundred million books around the world. She wrote a total of one hundred and eighty-seven novels for Mills & Boon, including the phenomenally successful A Perfect Family, To Love, Honour & Betray, The Perfect Sinner and Power Play, which hit the Sunday Times and New York Times bestseller lists. Loved for her distinctive voice, her success was in part because she continually broke boundaries and evolved her writing to keep up with readers’ changing tastes. Publishers Weekly said about Jordan ‘Women everywhere will find pieces of themselves in Jordan’s characters’ and this perhaps explains her enduring appeal.

Although Penny was born in Preston, Lancashire and spent her childhood there, she moved to Cheshire as a teenager and continued to live there for the rest of her life. Following the death of her husband, she moved to the small traditional Cheshire market town on which she based her much-loved Crighton books.

Penny was a member and supporter of the Romantic Novelists’ Association and the Romance Writers of America—two organisations dedicated to providing support for both published and yet-to-be-published authors. Her significant contribution to women’s fiction was recognised in 2011, when the Romantic Novelists’ Association presented Penny with a Lifetime Achievement Award.

Desire Never Changes
Penny Jordan

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CHAPTER ONE

‘SOMER, you’re sure you’ll be all right?’

‘Daddy, of course I will.’ Soft dimples showed briefly in the delicate, pale skin Somer had often been told was a true Celtic heritage, along with her fine black hair and eyes which changed from stormy grey to glowing amethyst, depending on her mood. Today they glowed an excited violet, her impatience with her father’s concern hastily suppressed as she tried to console him. It was barely three months since she had left school and come home to Scotland and her father was still very obviously bemused by her swift transition from girl-child to woman.

He had been concerned when she first told him that she and Andrew wanted to get engaged, pointing out that she was only eighteen and knew nothing of life. Much as her own mother must have been at the same age, Somer had countered resolutely, and yet she had been a mother at nineteen. Her father’s face had clouded when she mentioned her mother. It was ten years since she had died, and Somer’s baby brother with her, but Sir Duncan MacDonald had never married again. He had been just another poor Highland laird when he had married Catriona Sefton, but now he was a very wealthy man; a large shareholder in the North Sea’s privately owned Sefton oilfield, named after his wife, and although he didn’t communicate them to Somer, he had all a wealthy father’s fears for his only daughter. He sighed, looking at her, her small, heart-shaped face glowing with excitement and anticipation. Six months ago at Christmas he had been away in the Middle East on business and she had not been able to come home from school. Instead she had accepted an invitation to stay with a school-friend and her family on Jersey and it was there that she had met Andrew Hollister—had met him and fallen wildly in love with him.

Duncan MacDonald had not yet met his prospective son-in-law. Andrew was in hotel management and worked at an hotel in Jersey. He and Somer had corresponded when she went back to school and Somer had spent Easter with him, returning with the small solitaire engagement ring which she had worn ever since.

She had wanted to be married straight away but her father had prevailed upon her to wait at least until she was nineteen. Because she loved him she had agreed, and now as she waited to board her plane Somer glanced worriedly at him. Although he had not said so, she sensed that her father did not entirely approve of her engagement. She knew that he thought eighteen was too young to commit herself to marriage, but she knew how she felt about Andrew; knew that their love would last for ever. Her father had forgotten what it was like to be eighteen and so deeply in love that every second apart was unbearable agony. She glanced down at her engagement ring, watching the prisms of light thrown off by the small diamond, remembering how tenderly Andrew had kissed her finger as he slid it into place.

Boarding school had kept her rather more innocent than most girls her age; the only boys she had met prior to Andrew had been the brothers of school-friends, or boys from a neighbouring boys’ school. Andrew at twenty-four to her eighteen had dazzled her with his easy charm; his warm smile and the careless touch of his fingers against her skin, promising undreamed of delights and yet experienced enough to know that she wasn’t yet quite ready for the intimacies of lovers. They would wait until they were married, he had whispered at Easter, when his passionate kisses had made her take fright, and her heart had swelled with love and gratitude for his understanding.

But now her father was insisting that they wait until she was nineteen—nine long months away and during that time Andrew could be posted anywhere by his company. The first time they met he had told her of his hopes and plans for the future, unburdening himself to her in a way which had made her feel very grown up. Andrew wanted to own his own hotel, a luxurious Eden catering for the wealthy, preferably in the Caribbean, but he had a long way to go before he reached that goal, he had told Somer ruefully. He had been acting Assistant Manager at the Group’s Jersey hotel for nearly eighteen months and was hoping for an early promotion.

‘Just think, we could start our married life in Barbados,’ he had told Somer at Easter, and although she had been thrilled to hear him talk of their life together, there had been pain as well in the knowledge that a posting to Barbados would take her far away from the father she was only just beginning to know. On her return from school her father had suggested that she might care to act as his hostess. His position as head of Sefton Oil involved a great deal of business entertaining, of visiting other oil-producing countries and of entertaining overseas visitors in return, and after her first month at home which had been filled with apprehension and fear Somer had discovered that she actually enjoyed her new role and that she seemed to have a talent for it. Her father’s Aberdeen home was large and gracious and he employed an excellent cook-cum-housekeeper, Mrs McLeod, who had warmly welcomed Somer’s assistance.

‘There’s my flight now,’ Somer told her father, ‘I’d better go.’ She reached up, kissing his cheek. ‘Daddy, please stop worrying. I love Andrew and he loves me. Everything’s going to be fine.’

The smile he gave her was slightly strained, and he wondered what his daughter would say if she knew of the investigations he had had carried out on the man she loved. They had shown nothing to his detriment. He had no money apart from his salary, but there had been a time when Duncan MacDonald himself had been in that position and he was not the man to hold lack of wealth against another. He had enough money to support half a dozen sons-in-law. He moved closer to the barrier, intent on catching a final glimpse of Somer. Her heritage was all Celtic and there had been times after his wife’s death when he had worried about his delicately strung daughter, so quick to feel pain, both her own and that of others, but there was always that bedrock of MacDonald pride for her to fall back on; that grim resoluteness that acted as a counterweight to her Celtic mysticism. This was her heritage, and he could no more stop her from receiving it than he could hold back the tides.

Safely on board the plane taking her to Andrew, Somer had no inkling of the sombreness of her father’s thoughts. Named after Somerled, the great warrior Lord of the Isles, her mind was not on the past but firmly riveted on her golden future. Of course Andrew would be as disappointed as she was that they could not be married sooner. He had urged her to try to persuade her father to change his mind, but she knew he would understand that she felt that she could not do so. That was one of the things she most liked about Andrew. He was so understanding, so caring of other people’s views; he had even chided her gently when she had come close to losing her temper when her father had urged her not to marry straight away. ‘It’s only natural that he should want to keep you a little longer,’ he had told her with that whimsical smile of his that made her heart flutter so. ‘And I can afford to be generous. After all I’ll have you for the rest of our lives.’

Dear, darling Andrew. She closed her eyes and lay back in her seat, slowly visualising him, her body trembling in anticipation of their reunion. She loved everything about him from the way his fair hair curled round his head to the hard compactness of his muscular body. It was true that he wasn’t quite as tall as her father. Duncan MacDonald was well over six foot while Andrew stopped just short of five foot ten, but since she herself was barely five four, it hardly mattered. Elfin was the way he described her, and a shiver of apprehension suddenly ran through her. She wasn’t particularly beautiful, not blonde or curvaceous; she lacked the self-possession of many of the other women Andrew knew. But it was her he loved, she reminded herself. As though to reassure herself that it wasn’t all a dream she glanced down at her ring, and then extracted a small mirror from her bag, quickly checking her make-up. She wondered if Andrew would notice and approve of the new way she was doing her eyes. Soft, muted shadows enhanced their violet depths, a discreet rimming of kohl adding to their air of mystery. Her skin was without blemish, flawless and very fair. Too fair, she often thought, certainly too fair to expose unwarily to the sun. She thought rebelliously of the tanned holidaymakers frequenting the hotel at Easter, and then reminded herself that she was the one Andrew wanted; that it was her long night-black hair that he preferred; her slender body and pale skin.

‘The trouble with you is that you just don’t make enough of yourself.’ That had been the criticism of Somer’s greatest friend at school, the same outward-going, pretty brunette who had introduced her to Andrew. She had gained in self-confidence since meeting Andrew, but she knew she still had a long way to go before she came anywhere near to achieving the same smooth sophisticated self-confidence possessed by say, Judith Barnes, the senior receptionist at Andrew’s hotel.

Judith was tall and blonde, with a heavy mane of hair that cascaded down on to her shoulders. Her face was always flawlessly made up, her clothes discreetly elegant. She had the sort of figure that men always gave a second glance, and Somer had sensed right from the start that Judith despised her, although she had no idea why. When she had tried tentatively to broach the subject with Andrew he had simply shrugged and laughed. ‘Judith’s a woman, little baby,’ he had teased her. ‘The sort of woman who’s only really interested in men.’

‘A man-eater.’ That was how her friend Claire had described the receptionist, and yet Somer had sensed a very real antipathy towards her personally, in the older girl’s manner, despite the politeness with which it was cloaked.

The flight to Jersey was only a short one, and it seemed to Somer that no sooner had she stepped on to the plane than she was stepping off into the bright July sunshine. Andrew had promised to meet her, but there was no sign of him by the time she had collected her luggage. She was just debating whether she ought to hire a taxi when a small white sports car came racing towards her, stopping with an impatient screech of tires only yards away.

When Judith Barnes stepped out, glamorous as always in a pair of dazzling white bermuda shorts and brief top in the same colour that clung to her curves and showed off her deep tan, Somer felt her heart plummet downwards. There would be no doubt that Judith had come to meet her and that she was impatient, it showed in every line of her elegant figure as she strode to where Somer was standing.

‘Look, there’s no hired help around here,’ she announced curtly as she indicated the open boot of her car. ‘The only way those cases are going to get back to the hotel is if you pick them up. I’ve done my bit coming to collect you and that’s only because Drew asked me to. What on earth have you brought with you?’ she added with arrogant amusement staring at the two large cases by Somer’s side. ‘A whole new wardrobe to bedazzle Drew?’ She laughed mockingly. ‘Hasn’t anyone ever told you that all you need is what nature gave you? Although I suppose in your case, she was a bit ungenerous.’

Cold blue eyes flicked from Somer’s neatly suit-clad figure to her own shapely body, and Somer felt a familiar clenching of muscles inside her which she dimly recognised as intense anger. Firmly dismissing it, she picked up one of her cases and carried it to the car, heaving it into the boot before returning for the other.

The drive to the hotel was a tense one. In addition to her disappointment that Andrew wasn’t able to collect her, Somer had to contend with her growing dislike of Judith. The road they took was narrow, as indeed were most of the island roads, and not built for high speeds, but despite this Judith insisted on driving well in excess of the limit, and on several occasions Somer was forced to clutch on to the side of the car as they screeched dangerously round a bend.

‘Scared?’ Judith mocked as she took the turn that led down to the Hermitage Hotel and its private beach. ‘Poor little scaredy-girl, how on earth are you going to keep Drew, if you’re scared of a little bit of speed? Little girls should stick to their own league,’ she added tauntingly.

Somer said nothing, unable to trust herself to speak without betraying the temper she could feel raging through her. ‘Never say anything in the first heat of anger,’ her father had once warned her. ‘It’s a common MacDonald failing, and one our clan has had to pay dearly for in the past. Always count to ten, always think about the repercussions of what you’re going to say.’

It had been good advice; she recognised that and so now she averted her face and concentrated on Andrew’s image, denying Judith the satisfaction of knowing that her barbs had hurt.

The hotel forecourt was full of cars, a sign that business was good, Somer assumed as she opened her door and swung out. The Hermitage hotel was one of the most prestigious on the island although quite small. In addition to the hotel, the Group also owned several acres of land around it and three small private beaches. At Easter Andrew had told her that had the hotel been his, he would have used the land to build small holiday cottages on the same luxurious lines as those favoured in the Caribbean, and she had applauded his eager enthusiasm for his job.

As she followed Judith to the main entrance, sounds of laughter and splashing water reached her from the outdoor pool area.

‘Here’s the key for your room,’ Judith announced ungraciously, walking behind the reception desk and removing a key which she handed to Somer, completely ignoring the other girl on reception—a newcomer since Somer’s last visit. ‘I’ll get someone to take your stuff up.’

The casual comment did not deceive Somer for one minute. She doubted that her cases would appear in her room until Judith was good and ready to see that they did so, and another frisson of anger shook through her. Scrupulously honest herself, Somer had insisted on booking into the hotel as a guest; her room was quite an expensive one, and she had been glad of the generous cheque her father had given her a month ago to cover the cost and allow her a little extra to refurbish her wardrobe, although wisely she had left beach clothes off her list knowing that she would find a dazzlingly attractive selection in St Helier. Now Judith was treating her much in the manner of a grand lady towards a lowly governess rather than an employee to a hotel guest, but both of them knew that Somer would not complain. Even so she found the courage to say coolly, ‘If you’ll just tell me where I can find Andrew, I’ll let him know that I’m here.’

‘He’ll be having his break,’ Judith responded just as coolly. ‘Guests aren’t allowed in staff quarters. I’ll leave a message for him when he comes back on duty.’

Sensing that to argue would simply demean herself, So-mer took her key and walked towards the lift. Another guest was also waiting for it, a tall man dressed carelessly in faded, frayed shorts which had once been pale denim and were now bleached to a soft bluey grey by constant exposure to sun and salt. The rest of his body was bare and richly tanned and against her will Somer found her gaze drawn to the lean muscularity of it. Dark hair formed an aggressively masculine T-shape across his chest, tapering downwards to disappear beneath the faded denims.

A small sound that could have been either derision or amusement jerked her head back, the shock of cool green eyes smoothly sliding the length of her body in sensual assessment that was far more comprehensive and swift than her own bashful study of his body, jolting her into a blushing awareness that the lift had arrived and that he was waiting for her to precede him into it.

The moment the lift door closed she felt uncomfortable with their enforced intimacy. What was the matter with her, she chided herself mentally. The man lounging so easily beside her was far too physically compelling, far too masculinely attractive to need to attack women in lifts to get his sexual satisfaction. A brief darted glance at him confirmed her earlier impression of languid indolence. If she hadn’t stared so foolishly at him outside the lift he would probably never even have noticed her. She had brought his brief, sexual appraisal of her down on her own shoulders.

Instinctively she knew that he was a man who would always respond to female sexuality; that he was one of those men who possess a seventh sense that enables them to tune in to a woman’s response to them. He was the kind of man she could imagine appealing to the Judiths of this world. Undoubtedly sexually skilled and knowledgeable, and yet possessed of a certain basic raw masculinity that meant that despite that skill there would always be an element of subjugation that would always make him the possessor of a woman’s body; the wholly dominant male.

Without knowing why she found herself taking a pace back, as though somehow he threatened her, even though he hadn’t so much as moved. She could sense that he was watching her, assessing her with those incredible jade eyes, the hard-boned masculine face no doubt making no secret of his amusement at her gauche reaction.

When the lift stopped at her floor she heaved a faint sigh of relief, quickly checked when he stepped out of it behind her. The corridor seemed to stretch endlessly in front of her, her legs suddenly as shaky and unsupportive as a newly born colt’s. So aware was she of his presence that she could almost feel the heat of his body against her back, wrapping her in sensual awareness, almost suffocating her, her mind a jumble of confused impressions. She found her door, and then dropped her key as she tried to insert it in the lock, tensing as she felt him stop behind her and retrieve it for her, easily sliding it into place.

When his thumb pushed aside the thick fall of her hair to rub the vulnerable spot just behind her ear she nearly jumped out of her skin, her eyes widening in shocked disbelief, so deeply violet that they were almost black.

Wicked amusement danced in jade-green depths, so deep that she could almost have drowned in them, the hard masculine mouth curling in faint derision as his thumb slid from her ear down her throat resting on the place where her pulse throbbed betrayingly.

‘What on earth do you think you’re doing?’ Her voice, which she had wanted to sound sharp and cold, sounded breathy and faintly husky.

‘Just testing to see if you actually are still wet behind the ears,’ he drawled mockingly in response. ‘I don’t know who let you out alone without your leading reins, little girl, but they sure as hell must be worrying about you.’

To Somer’s relief, he removed his fingers from her skin, although it still burned where they had been, her flesh feeling as though it were on fire. Not until she was safely inside her room with the door locked did she dare to relax, flinging herself face down on her bed and letting the tremors she had suppressed outside race violently through her. Andrew had been at first disbelieving and then faintly annoyed when she had told him that she was still a virgin. When she had questioned him about it, a little hurt to discover that he was not pleased as she had expected him to be, he had said simply that sex was more fun when one had more experience. He must have sensed her distress though because he had taken her in his arms afterwards and told her not worry about it, but comforting though his words had been, she had been left with a tiny nagging core of uncertainty. She had always assumed that the man she loved would treasure the gift of her virginity, not consider it as some sort of nuisance.

Now, alone in her room these doubts returned to plague her. Even a stranger seemed to know that she was inexperienced, ‘wet behind the ears’, as he had said so mockingly, with a look in his eyes that told her that he was anything but the same. For some reason as she lay on the bed it was the stranger’s dark green eyes and thick black shock of hair that forced its way into her mind’s eye and not Andrew’s fair attractiveness.

Suddenly restless she got up and walked across to the window. She had a view of the hotel gardens; the tennis courts and swimming-pool spread out immediately below her flower-festooned balcony, and beyond it the shrubs of the natural garden and the cliff that led down to the sea, an impossible blue on this perfect summer’s day.

Still feeling restless she rang room service and ordered a pot of tea, wondering when her luggage would arrive. The sight of Judith in her brief white outfit and the holidaymakers down below, enjoying themselves by the pool, made her feel dowdy in her sensible lightweight wool suit, smart enough for shopping in Aberdeen, and bought from a very good shop, but somehow out of place in her present surroundings.

When the tea arrived but her luggage still had not she rang down to reception relieved to find that Judith wasn’t on duty. The girl who answered was pleasant and promised to have her cases sent straight up. Encouraged by her friendly manner Somer asked if she knew where Andrew might be found. There was a brief pause and the girl’s voice changed, a faintly hesitant note entering it.

‘I’m not sure,’ she told Somer. ‘I think he might be in the office at the moment.’

Thanking her Somer rang off. Andrew had promised that he would take a few days’ holiday while she was staying at the hotel and that they could be alone together to talk over their plans. Suddenly Somer longed for him to be with her; to take her into his arms and kiss away all her doubts and fears, to obliterate completely the face of the mocking stranger who made her feel so aware of her inadequacies.

When her luggage arrived she unpacked carefully, selecting a pale lemon wrap-round skirt in cool cotton and a toning tee-shirt, which she changed into as soon as she had showered. Feeling more in keeping with the other guests she debated whether to remain in her room and wait for Andrew, or to walk through the gardens. In the event the decision was made for her. She was just finishing her second cup of tea when she heard a rap on her door.

‘It’s me, darling,’ Andrew’s familiar voice called. ‘Open the door.’

‘Andrew!’ Her cheeks pink with excitement Somer flung herself bodily into his arms, her face raised for his kiss.

‘Let me get inside.’ Andrew laughed, but there was faint uneasiness in his eyes as he glanced down the empty corridor. ‘I am supposed to be on duty you know.’

‘I was hoping you would meet me at the airport.’ They were inside the room now, but Andrew had made no move to take her back in his arms.

‘Oh come on, darling, don’t sulk.’ Impatience edged his voice, normally so warm and loving. Tears suddenly, and appallingly, threatened, despite her efforts to blink them away. She was behaving like a child, what was wrong with her? Andrew saw the betraying sheen and was instantly apologetic.

‘Darling, I’m a miserable brute, but it’s just that I’m so tired. I’ve had to put in extra time to make sure I could take a few days off while you’re here. Forgive me for not being there, but I did send Judith, so at least you were met by a familiar face.’

Suppressing the desire to tell him that she would have been far happier with a completely strange one Somer moved back towards him. His hands cupped her shoulders, and he bent, kissing the corner of her mouth lightly, but despite the caress he was still holding her away from him and she had to suppress a feeling of disappointment. Of course he was tired, and probably the last thing he felt like was making love to her. Traitorous as a serpent the thought slithered into her mind that the stranger in the lift would never been too tired to make love, would never hold the woman he loved at arm’s length when she could be moulded against his body, matching the heavy thud of his heartbeat. Quelling the thought she smiled up at Andrew, reminded herself of her recent proud boast to her father that she was grown up and adult.

‘It’s all right, darling,’ she said softly, ‘I do understand. We can talk at dinner tonight.’

His arms dropped to his sides, and he turned slightly away from her, fiddling with the lamp on the dressing-table. Her room was elegantly furnished with pretty cane furniture, its colour-scheme soft blues and greys, a soft, thick pile carpet in soft blue echoing the same colour.

‘Somer, I’m sorry, I can’t have dinner with you tonight. I’ve got a meeting on with the Manager—something I just can’t get out of. Look, why don’t you have something sent up to your room and get an early night. Tomorrow we can talk, make plans…You must be tired anyway after your journey.’

Somer forbode to point out that a flight of little over an hour was hardly an exhausting ordeal, meekly acceding to his suggestion and wishing the tiny nagging pain inside her would go away instead of flaring into life.

With a brief peck on her cheek Andrew left her. Feeling completely deflated, not knowing what to do with herself after the anti-climax of their reunion. Somer stared blindly out across the gardens and then glanced at her watch. It was six o’clock and the evening stretched emptily in front of her, the thought of a solitary meal in her room somehow unappealing.

Crushing the disloyal thought that suggested that Andrew might have made some time to spend with her on her very first evening, as being that of a child, not the adult she had proclaimed so vehemently to her father that she was, Somer decided that a walk through the gardens might help banish the fit of miseries that hovered threateningly.

She found that she had them almost completely to herself when she walked through the foyer and out into the open air, the pool now almost deserted, only one lone figure distorting the smooth blue water as he cleaved it with the sure overarm motions of a strong crawl. The dark head lifted just long enough for Somer to recognise the unmistakable features of the stranger from the lift, and she faltered just long enough to recognise herself and be dismayed by her own reluctance to cross the pool area in case she excited his attention for a second time in one day.

Her thoughts, as she made her way through the gardens, were all of her unsatisfactory reunion with Andrew. Her body ached with that same indefinable torment she had experienced at Easter, and she could only wonder at Andrew’s greater self-control. She wanted to be married to him now, she thought rebelliously, not in nine months’ time. It was all very well for her father to say that they would have the rest of their lives to spend together, but right now the nine months he had said they must wait seemed like a lifetime. After this holiday she wouldn’t see Andrew again until Christmas. He had a month off then and was going to spend it in Aberdeen with Somer and her father. It would be the first time the two most important men in her life met, and she was desperately anxious for them to like one another.

Andrew was already predisposed to like her father, she knew. Even when Sir Duncan had insisted that they must wait before marrying Andrew had not lost his temper or protested. He could understand her father’s point of view, he had admitted, and in fact he had been the one to assure her that her father was only acting out of concern for her, Somer remembered, thinking back to that occasion. Unfortunately she couldn’t entirely escape the conviction that her father was not equally responsive towards Andrew. Nothing specific had been said, but she had sensed a certain lack of enthusiasm which was not entirely connected with her age, a certain tension in her father’s voice whenever she mentioned Andrew’s name.

It was over an hour before she returned from her walk, noticing as she did so that dusk was already crowding the vividly beautiful sunset from the sky, reminding her of how much further south Jersey was than Aberdeen where the light nights continued well into the autumn.

Judith was back on duty on reception when Somer walked in. She was talking to the stranger from the lift, now dressed semi-formally in an open-throated soft white shirt that emphasised the tanned column of his throat and tapering black trousers which drew Somer’s bemused gaze to the leanly muscled power of his thighs. He moved slightly as though aware of her scrutiny, even though he couldn’t possibly have seen her where she stood in the shadows of the doorway, flexing his body slightly like a large muscular cat taking pleasure in the fluid response of bone and sinew. Judith followed the brief movement with admiring eyes, leaning slightly forward across the desk so that her blouse tightened revealingly across her breasts. The dark head inclined and although Somer could not see his expression, she guessed that there was an unmistakable sensual appreciation in the jade eyes as they studied the curvaceous outline of Judith’s breasts.

He moved away at last, his business obviously concluded, and Somer almost shrank back into the shadows as he headed for the open main doors and out into the dusk beyond.

‘Now that’s what I call a man,’ Judith smirked as Somer approached the desk and requested her key. ‘Not that you would know what I mean. A man like that would make you run a mile wouldn’t he, little scaredy-cat?’

The mocking taunt stung, and Somer grabbed for her key, colour high in her cheeks. To hide her agitation she asked huskily, ‘Is he a guest here?’

‘You could say that. He’s Chase Lorimer, the photographer. He’s been here for three weeks—working. If you can call taking pictures of bikini-clad models working.’ Judith gave a softly sensual laugh. ‘I must say if he was photographing me it wouldn’t take him long to coax me out of my clothes and into his arms. He’s all man,’ she said it admiringly, ‘and an extremely experienced one at that, if the gossip’s anything to go by. Why the interest?’ she asked, adding tauntingly, ‘Surely you aren’t entertaining hopes in that direction yourself? You wouldn’t stand a chance, he’s been besieged by beautiful women ever since he got here, and even now that his current girlfriend’s gone back to London with the rest of the models, he hasn’t shown any interest in anyone else. And he’d certainly never show any in a frightened little innocent like you,’ she finished derisively, glancing up and down Somer’s slender body. ‘You just haven’t got what it takes, Somer, and I doubt you ever will have. No girl who’s hung on to her virginity as long as you have will ever make a man a satisfactory bed partner.’

‘Andrew wants me.’

Later Somer was to ask herself what had prompted her into such a rash speech. Surely it wasn’t a desire to score off on Judith; to turn the tables and make her pride sting a little.

‘Does he?’ Judith’s smile taunted her. ‘Are you sure about that, Somer? Couldn’t he wait to take you in his arms the moment you got here? Are you spending tonight in his bed? Does he want you so much that he can’t hide his desire for you every time he sees you. Is that how it is between the two of you?’

Her contemptuous laughter followed Somer as she fled towards the lift, each cruel word a barb biting deep into her heart. How could Judith so easily unearth her own secret fears and doubts; how could she have known of her own disquiet that Andrew had not appeared more eager to be with her; to touch her and kiss her as she was longing for him to do? Andrew respected her innocence and inexperience, she told herself, trying to calm her uneasy nerves as she headed for her room. Of course his self-control must put a strain on him; that same strain she had sensed when he walked into her room. Of course the reason he hadn’t kissed her as she had wanted him to do was that he was concerned that their lovemaking might get out of control. Andrew was only acting out of concern for her, and it was both foolish and childish of her to wish that he would sweep her off her feet and into his bed and that he would tell her that it was impossible for him to resist the enticement of her body; that his love and desire for her were so great that he must possess her.

Thoroughly confused by her own feelings Somer opened the door of her room, locking it firmly behind her before going on to her small balcony, trying to will away the self-pitying loneliness that swept her. In Aberdeen her father would be dining with business associates as he so often did during the week. At the weekend he was going to stay with an old friend. They would spend it fishing, her father’s favourite sport. She sighed, half wishing that her father would marry again. She would have enjoyed having brothers and sisters, and her father would be lonely once she was married, but when she had broached the subject he had told her that he had loved her mother too much to contemplate putting someone else in her place. She hadn’t doubted that he spoke the truth, and she flushed a little remembering her impassioned cry after she had first met Andrew, that her father didn’t understand how she felt.

‘I understand all too well, lassie,’ he had told her grimly. ‘I can remember what it feels like to fall in love, and how impetuous girls of eighteen can be. Your mother was that age when I first met her, and although you were born ten months after our marriage, you could easily have arrived very much earlier. Some things never change,’ he had concluded wryly, ‘and human desire is one of them. You may think because I’m your father that I don’t understand how you feel. It’s because I do that I’m so worried for you, but I doubt that you’ll heed me any more than Catriona and I heeded her father, although these days, things being what they are, I suppose I needn’t concern myself too much with the possibility of an unexpected grandchild.’

That assumption on her father’s part as well as driving the rich colour to her face had brought a stumbled protest to her lips that Somer realised with the benefit of hindsight, had been half surprised. Had her father really believed that she and Andrew were already lovers? From his frank statements to her about his relationship with her mother it seemed plain that they had not waited for marriage before consummating their love.

Thoroughly dissatisfied with the train of her thoughts Somer decided impulsively that she had to speak to Andrew. Not now tonight when she knew he was in conference with the hotel management, but first thing tomorrow morning before his working day started. She knew where his room was, and although staff quarters were forbidden to the guests, she knew she could find her way there unnoticed. Half hidden by the clutter of thoughts milling in her brain was the hope that by taking such action she might precipitate the intimacy Andrew had previously been at pains to avoid and that seeing her in his room might urge him to forget caution and only remember their love. Her blood heated to fever pitch at the thought, her body eagerly yearning for the close proximity of his, sensations as yet only half understood coursing through her veins.

Andrew! His name was on her lips when sleep finally claimed her, but inexplicably her dreams held not Andrew’s fair attractiveness, but the dark compulsion of a far different man. A man who shared Judith’s contempt of her, who laughed at her and called her a silly child, even while his green eyes told her that he found nothing childish in the soft curves of her body and if he wished it he could easily take her beyond childhood and into womanhood. ‘No…’ She moaned the denial in her sleep, moving restlessly beneath the light quilt, trying to escape from her dreams and the threat they seemed to hold.

CHAPTER TWO

SHE was awake in plenty of time to put the previous night’s plan into action. From past experience she knew that Andrew would be on duty at seven, stopping to have breakfast later in the staff dining-room, once his working day had swung into action. It was just after quarter to six when she left her room, using the stairs in preference to the lift, knowing that there were unlikely to be any other guests using them at this time of the morning and also that if she went through the fire door on the third floor it led on to the stairs to the staff bedrooms.

As she had hoped she met no one en route to Andrew’s room, and even better his door was slightly ajar, a used tray of tea outside, suggesting that he had put it there and then forgotten to close his door.

Pushing it open gently, Somer tiptoed inside. Although much less attractively furnished than her own room, Andrew’s room was pleasantly large and as she knew, doubled as a bedroom-cum-sitting room, one wall covered in units that held his books and stereo system, as well as the pull-down desk-top he used to work on, and a small portable television.

Privately she had always considered the room rather bleak, lacking a woman’s touch, but as she hovered in the small hallway, her presence concealed by the door to the small bathroom, she became aware that Andrew was not alone. Her body froze as she recognised Judith’s voice, husky and faintly lazy as though she were still half asleep, the small protesting sound that accompanied it quite unmistakably coming from the springs of Andrew’s bed, her drawled, ‘Umm, darling that was lovely,’ leaving Somer in no doubt as to the intimacy she had interrupted. But worse was to come. While she hesitated like a wooden puppet, still trying to absorb the enormity of what was happening, Somer heard Judith say, ‘Will you think about me while you’re making love to little miss goody two-shoes?’

‘Hardly.’ She barely recognised Andrew’s voice rich with self-satisfaction, replete with sexual pleasure, far different from the voice in which he spoke to her. ‘If anything I’ll think of daddy’s money and the future it’s going to buy for you and me one day. That’s always supposing I can bring myself to make love to her.’

‘Well, I think you’re going to have to take the plunge pretty soon, my darling, otherwise she’s going to get pretty suspicious. Virgin she might be, but she isn’t so innocent that she doesn’t know what she’s missing.’

There was a brief rustling movement and then Andrew groaned, his voice strangely hoarse as he gasped out, ‘Dear God, Jude, I don’t know if I can make love to her. She turns me off completely. She hasn’t got the faintest idea what to do to attract a man. If I hadn’t known about daddy’s money I’d never even have looked at her. It’s no wonder she’s still a virgin. I can’t imagine any real man ever wanting her…’

The scornful words dug into Somer’s heart like poison-tipped darts, unimaginable pain searing through her. She wanted to cry out her agony, to rush into the room and tear and claw at both of them. To…So no real man would want her, would he? If it was possible, knowing that Andrew thought that about her, hurt even more than the knowledge that he had only wanted her for her father’s money—that she had been the victim of a cruel and greedy plot.

‘Just wait until I’m married to her, then we can make plans. First a hotel in Barbados or somewhere else in the Caribbean, financed by daddy’s money, and then once she realises I don’t want her it shouldn’t be hard to persuade her to get a divorce. The hotel will be in my name of course, and just in case daddy proves difficult there’s always the threat of revealing just how inadequate his darling daughter is, if he doesn’t play ball. I can just see it now, can’t you? “Oil magnate’s daughter unable to arouse her husband.” No, we won’t have any trouble getting rid of her when the time comes. I like a woman who’s all woman, who knows how to please a man. A taste I share with our friend Lorimer, unless I’m mistaken,’ Andrew added, jealousy edging under his voice, sending fresh waves of agony searing through her body.

She ought to leave before they realised that she was listening, Somer thought emptily, but the MacDonald pride would not let her, and her Celtic heritage urged her to stay and hear all that there was to hear, to endure everything there was to endure, and so she stayed where she was, opening herself to the torrent of pain sweeping over her, bowing her head beneath it with Celtic stoic acceptance of the inevitability of pain, only her fiery MacDonald pride keeping her from crying it out loud.

‘Jealous,’ Judith teased huskily. ‘He was just chatting to me…’

‘Chatting to you? Are you trying to tell me he didn’t ask you out?’

‘Not this time.’

‘And if he did?’ The jealousy in Andrew’s voice increased.

‘Of come on darling, you can’t expect me to spend all my spare time alone while you’re wining and dining Miss Oil Wells. Like you just said I’m all woman, and I have my…needs…’

Feeling physically sick Somer stepped back blindly searching for the door. She couldn’t endure any more. She wouldn’t endure any more and she would prove to them both that they were both wrong about her; that she could attract a man physically; that she was just as desirable as Judith, every bit as much a woman, and for starters…

Barely giving herself time to think she gathered up all her courage and walked into the room, tugging off the small diamond solitaire and tossing it bitterly on to the bed, standing in full view of both startled occupants. Judith didn’t look quite as glamorous in the dawn light as she did in her full make-up, and in another half-dozen years she would begin to look blowsy, Somer decided with savage satisfaction, but it wasn’t the future that concerned her now, it was the present.

‘Somer!’ Andrew’s voice was startled and urgent, but Somer ignored it.

‘Don’t say a word,’ she warned him bitterly, ‘I’ve already heard enough. If I were you I’d concentrate on satisfying your…’ her lip curled derisively, ‘friend’s “needs”, that is if she still wants you now that I’m not going to provide the pair of you with a meal ticket for life. You’d got it all planned, hadn’t you, but you made one vital miscalculation. I’m obviously not as frigid as you assumed, Andrew, although it’s just as well I discovered the truth the way I did. I imagine it would have been very embarrassing for us both if I’d found you alone this morning. I came here hoping you would make love to me.’ God how it hurt to drag out that admission, but she was going to make herself face up to just how pitiful and contemptible she had been. ‘But it seems you have other prefer-ences…’ She let her eyes slide dismissively over Judith’s naked shoulders, watching the rage simmer in the other woman’s eyes. ‘I just hope you don’t find them too expensive,’ she added softly with a final flourish as she turned towards the door.

Andrew had gone a sickly pale colour while she spoke, but Judith was on the point of exploding with barely concealed anger. No doubt she had looked forward to a lifetime of luxury at her expense, Somer decided. She herself must be growing up quickly because it was easy to see that knowing she was cheating Somer must have added a decided fillip to her affair with Andrew. Now that fillip was gone, Judith just might turn her eyes in other directions; she even found herself hoping that she might, and that Andrew, who was plainly besotted with her, would suffer as she was now suffering.

Somer thought she would die with the mortification of it. Was there something wrong with her? Some vital element lacking? something that made her less feminine than other women, some deep female core that was simply missing from her make up. ‘No!’ The denial was torn from her throat and prompted her headlong flight from the scene of her humiliation. All her fierce MacDonald pride rose up inside her, a look in her eyes that her father would have recognised, her wild untamed Highland blood crying out for vengeance, for balm to soothe her aching pride. She had loved and tasted the bitter dregs of betrayal, she would never touch either again. But first she had to make good her initial promise to herself.

Not stopping to analyse her reaction to the scene she had just experienced Somer hurried on, knowing only that to remain still was to open herself to the same pain which had overwhelmed her in Andrew’s bedroom. Her first instinct to flee, to simply leave the hotel and go home, was lost beneath the tidal swell of a need to prove Andrew and Judith’s cruel comments wrong. She would find a man who wanted her and she would find him before her holiday was over.

Down in the foyer she saw that Judith was just about to take over the reception desk. Another girl, a stranger to Somer, was talking to one of the hotel guests, his broad shoulders bent towards her. Somer felt her heartbeat accelerate as she recognised the male outline of him. A real man, Judith had called Chase Lorimer; a very sensual man Somer would have called him; a man who would not think twice about taking what he wanted from life, a man who would teach her in one lesson far more about the game of love than a thousand fumbling encounters with boys as inexperienced as she was herself. Half a dozen steps away from the desk Somer halted. She could hear him asking the way to a small little-known local cove. The girl behind the reception desk frowned.

‘I’m sorry, Mr Lorimer,’ Somer heard her apologise, ‘I’m afraid I don’t know where it is, but if you’ll just bear with me for a moment I’ll try to find out.’ She glanced round to Judith who was deep in conversation with Andrew and Somer reacted blindly, urged on by the same fierce MacDonald pride which had buoyed her up earlier.

A little to her own surprise she heard herself saying coolly, ‘I know where the cove is.’ She saw Andrew’s head jerk up in recognition of her voice. ‘In fact…’ Chase Lorimer had turned round and was surveying her with that same lazy scrutiny she recognised from the previous day. ‘In fact I was planning to go there myself today. Perhaps we could travel there together? Do you have a car?’

‘Yes, how long will it take us to get there?’

Somer breathed shakily, unaware of how tense she had been until she heard him speak. There was only the cool anonymity of his voice to go on, and that did not give her any clues as to his reaction to her invitation. ‘Half an hour,’ she responded nervously.

Of course in the world he inhabited it was probably quite normal for women to issue the invitations; certainly he didn’t seem shocked or surprised that she had done so, his lounging stance by the reception desk barely altered as he turned to glance at her.

‘Can you be ready in an hour?’ He glanced at his watch. ‘I normally have a swim before breakfast, and then we can meet down here when you’re ready.’

Out of the corner of her eye Somer could see Judith’s stunned, almost bitter expression, but she kept her own features unreadable as she acquiesced. So Chase Lorimer swam every morning; no doubt that explained what he was doing in the foyer so early, well before any of the other guests had put in an appearance.

Confirming their arrangements, Somer headed back to her own room to change her clothes and pack a bag to take with her, a fierce elation filling her. For once the fates seemed disposed to be on her side, and she derived a considerable amount of satisfaction from the looks she had seen on Andrew’s and Judith’s faces when Chase Lorimer accepted her invitation. She had just reached the lift when Judith slipped up behind her, tapping her contemptuously on the arm.

‘It won’t work, you know,’ she hissed tauntingly. ‘Oh, you might have forced Chase Lorimer to accept your company for a couple of hours but he’ll never take you to bed, not once he discovers the truth about you. Men like him don’t go for virgins, especially not plain, uninteresting ones like you. He’s a photographer, and rumour has it that every time he makes love to a woman he takes her photograph—for his own private collection.’

Somer battled against a sudden feeling of revulsion which pierced her newly won armour long enough for her to regret the impetuosity of what she had done, but with the next breath Judith swept aside her doubts, her voice mocking as she drawled, ‘Anyway, even if you did get him to take you to bed, it won’t make any difference to the way Andrew feels about you. It won’t make him jealous if that’s what you’re thinking. Andrew loves me.’

‘Does he?’ Somer was amazed at the cool control of her voice. ‘Funny, I had the impression that his first love was money, and as for making him jealous, I wouldn’t bother wasting my time. In fact seeing the two of you together has made it all much easier for me. I think I realised I’d made a mistake about Andrew, the moment I…’

‘Set eyes on Chase Lorimer?’ Judith suggested sneeringly. ‘For such an innocent you certainly know how to recognise quality goods when you see them, but Chase Lorimer won’t be interested in daddy’s money. He’s got a wealthy uncle of his own, and Chase is his sole heir.’

‘You seem to know a great deal about him. Did you have designs on him yourself?’

The lift door opened just as Judith raised her hand, and Somer stepped smartly into it, leaving the other girl outside. As she pressed the button for her floor she sank back against the metal wall, trying to compose herself. Her legs felt as weak as jelly, her breathing uneven. She had never in her life participated in the kind of row she had just had with Judith and it left a sour taste in her mouth. So Chase Lorimer photographed the women he made love to, did he? She shivered suddenly, stumbling out of the lift when it reached her floor. It isn’t too late to turn back, a tiny inner voice urged her, but to turn back meant admitting that every humiliating insult Judith and Andrew had thrown at her was true; that she didn’t have what it took to be a real woman, and she was determined to prove them wrong.

In her room she riffled through her suitcase until she found what she was looking for, a bikini she had bought in the south of France the previous summer when she was on holiday with Claire. Claire had persuaded her to buy it, and she had only worn it once, scandalised by the brevity of the pink and black striped cotton fabric. She tried it on in front of her mirror, refusing to flinch away from the sight of her barely clad body. The triangles of fabric that tied in bows over her hips revealed the slender length of her legs and far more of her than Scottish prudence thought wise, but how could she expect Chase Lorimer to take the bait unless it was presented to him temptingly? she asked herself with a sudden new cynicism. Judith wouldn’t have wavered for a moment and, in fact, would probably have dispensed with the top half of the bikini altogether. As Judith had told her Chase Lorimer was a man used to the company of beautiful women; he was also a man who was probably not used to a celibate existence, even for a short period of time, and he was alone at the hotel, now that the models had returned to London.

Carefully packing her beach bag with oil, towels, a paperback and other bits and pieces Somer firmly refused to listen to the tiny corner of her mind still pleading sanity, telling herself that there might never be an opportunity like this again. If she failed with Chase Lorimer…But she would not fail. He was a man who needed women and the look in his eyes yesterday had told her, despite everything that Judith and Andrew had said, that he had been interested enough to study her carefully.

Pulling on a pale pink cotton top and matching shorts, and throwing a casual button-through dress into her bag, Somer slipped on her mules, and headed for the door. A glance at her watch confirmed that she still had fifteen minutes to go before she was due to meet Chase. Just enough time to have a cup of coffee in the Continental coffee shop on the ground floor of the hotel.

Somer ordered a cup of coffee and some toast, trying to stem the growing protest of her nerves as the minutes ticked by. Eight o’clock came and went, and perspiration broke out on her skin. He wasn’t coming. He had changed his mind. She wanted to be sick, and kept imagining Judith’s gloating face. She had a good view of the foyer from where she was sitting, and she could see everyone who came in or left.

At ten past eight she conceded defeat. No doubt he had never meant to meet her, and had merely agreed out of politeness. Sick with humiliation and misery, Somer searched feverishly through her bag and withdrew her small make-up mirror, flicking it open to scrutinise her too-pale features and tell-tale bruised eyes. A surreptitious glance into the foyer assured her that at least Judith wasn’t there to witness her humiliation, although no doubt she would get to know about it and she and Andrew would laugh about it together. Too engrossed in the bitterness of her thoughts to hear the footsteps approaching. Somer tensed in shock as she felt the cool drift of lean fingers against her arm, whirling round, white-faced to confront the inscrutable features of Chase Lorimer.

‘So this is where you’re hiding. Have you forgotten about our date?’

He had changed into slim fitting off-white jeans, a black shirt open at the throat, the sleeves rolled back. A gold watch glinted through the dark hair on his arm, and Somer had the sudden panicky impression of a man who for all the trappings of modern-day sophistication was as much a pirate in his way as the inhabitants of this particular stretch of Jersey coastline had once been.

‘I…I hadn’t forgotten. I just didn’t see you in the foyer.’

‘I’ve just been out to put some petrol in the car, that’s why I’m a few minutes late. This yours?’ He picked up her bag, and stood waiting for her to join him, and Somer knew that now it was too late to listen to all those warning voices she had ignored so strenuously earlier on.

‘I hope you’ve brought plenty of suntan cream,’ he warned her. ‘I’ve been told that this particular cove is a sun-trap and quite remote. There’s no shop or cafe there.’

Did his warning hold another meaning? The suggestion that perhaps he regretted allowing her to come with him and that he would prefer to spend the day alone? As Somer knew from past experience, the path down to the beach was narrow and in places almost unsafe. She had gone there at Easter with Andrew, and although it had been a pleasant, warm day, she had come back feeling edgy and yes, disappointed. Because Andrew hadn’t made any attempt to make love to her, she acknowledged, filled with bitter resentment again. The cove was an almost idyllic place for lovers; secluded; sheltered, not overlooked by houses or roads.

‘Here we are.’ She came to an abrupt halt as Chase Lorimer stopped beside a gleaming black Porsche with the top folded back. ‘Are you going to wear your hat, or shall I put it in the boot?’

‘I…in the boot please,’ Somer mumbled handing it over to him and then snatching her fingers back as though they had been burned the moment they came into contact with his. It had been the briefest contact imaginable and yet she had shied away from it like a…like a terrified virgin, she castigated herself mentally. How on earth did she expect him to make love to her when she recoiled from even the slightest physical contact with him?

‘I’ve had the hotel pack us up some lunch. I take it you do plan to spend most of the day there? There’s no public transport there…’

And by inviting herself to join him as his guide, she had also invited herself to be his companion for the day, or as much of it as he chose to share with her, Somer acknowledged. ‘I’m in your hands completely,’ she responded daringly, holding her breath and looking away when she felt him move towards her, but he stretched past her, opening the passenger door, and she slid inside the car on shaky legs, wondering if there was ever going to come a time when she felt completely at ease in the company of men like Chase Lorimer, able to flirt and tease them in the way that seemed second nature to the Judiths and Claires of this world.

‘It all depends how long it takes me to take the photographs I need,’ Chase told her as he slid into his own seat and slipped on a pair of sunglasses. ‘I want to take some background shots to use in the studio, just in case any of the work I’ve already done doesn’t work out. Ready?’

Somer nodded, carefully giving him instructions as to their route as he turned out on to the road that led away from the hotel.

‘Left here, is it?’ he checked once they gained the main road. Somer nodded, her hand going up to secure her hair, already thoroughly tousled from their short drive. If she’d known he was driving an open-topped car she would have tied it back with a ribbon, but it was too late to do anything about it now, other than to try and keep it out of her eyes.

‘Leave it,’ Chase ordered softly when she made another bid to capture the errant strands. ‘With it loose and tousled like that you look the epitome of wanton innocence. Is it naturally that colour?’

‘Yes.’ Somer’s cheeks stung with bright colour.

‘No need to look so outraged, most models tint theirs, these days, and it isn’t often you see someone with true blue-black hair and such a pale skin. Coupled with your eyes, I’d say that was a Celtic heritage, Irish perhaps?’

‘Scots,’ she corrected him briefly. This man knew far too much about her sex, far, far too much, and she shivered slightly despite the growing heat of the sun. What had she committed herself to? Why had she allowed her fiendish MacDonald pride to hold sway the way she had? She had been warned on many occasions by her father to treat the MacDonald curse carefully, but she had ignored him, and now she was seated in this car with this stranger heading for a remote beach where she had planned that he would make love to her.

What was the matter with her? Was she really going to back out now? Coward, coward, an inner voice mocked her. You haven’t got the guts to go through with it. I have, Somer gritted mentally, I have got the guts and I shall, I shall.

‘You’re looking very serious, something on your mind? Second thoughts about spending the day with me perhaps?’

Somer glanced in shocked response into Chase’s shuttered face. His sunglasses hid his expression from her, her heart pounding in frightened reaction to his astute perception.

‘No…’

‘You don’t sound very sure. Don’t worry about it, whatever you might have heard to the contrary, I don’t go in for rape. I don’t need to,’ he told her wryly, ‘and now that we’ve got that out of the way how about telling me what you’re doing here on holiday alone.’

‘I…I was going to come with my boyfriend, but…but we had a row and…’

‘And now you’re looking for a substitute,’ he suggested drily. ‘Well why not? Strange, from the tragic look on your face earlier this morning, I thought the roof had fallen in on you at least. You looked like a tormented lost kitten whom someone had kicked once too often,’ he mocked, smiling into her pale, stunned face.

‘You felt sorry for me?’ Somer blurted out. ‘Is that why…’

‘I let you pick me up?’ he offered, smiling sardonically at her. ‘Not entirely, I’m no altruist. If you’d been forty and plain I dare say I wouldn’t have felt anything like as sympathetic. I suppose I should have guessed it was all down to some man. You’re just the right age for emotional hysterics, aren’t you? How old are you?’

‘Eighteen.’ She didn’t even consider lying, but flinched when his fingers tightened momentarily on the steering wheel and he murmured mock piously, ‘Dear God, as young as that. I’m twenty-eight—a whole generation older—or are you going to tell me you prefer older men?’

‘My tastes are pretty catholic,’ Somer retorted, her chin jutting defiantly under his mockery. ‘In everything.’

There was a moment’s silence, and when he glanced at her again there was no humour etched against the curling mouth, only a grim appreciation of her closing remark.

‘Is that so?’ he drawled. ‘Well then it looks like we’re going to have an enlightening day. I would have thought that eighteen wasn’t old enough to have tasted all the pleasures life has to offer, but it seems that I’m wrong, and a girl like you wouldn’t be short of tutors. That pseudo air of innocence must have deceived more than one member of my sex in the past. How many lovers have you had, just as a matter of interest, or don’t you bother to count any longer?’

Half appalled by the direction the conversation had taken, Somer reminded herself that to tell the truth at this stage would probably wreck all her plans. Her mouth opened and almost without her having to think about it, she was saying flippantly, ‘Why do you want to know? Are you hoping to become one of them?’ She had a moment in which to be horrified by the cheap provocation of her remark and then Chase was saying smoothly, ‘So that’s your game, is it? Well, time alone will tell, won’t it? You know the odds better than I do, and you’ve got all day to persuade me that it might be worth my while, haven’t you?’

‘Turn right here,’ Somer interrupted shakily. The conversation had taken a turn she had never envisaged, but surely the fates were playing into her hands once again in allowing her to deceive Chase Lorimer into believing that she was sexually experienced, and that by inviting herself to spend the day with him, she was inviting him to make love to her?

But for how long could she continue to deceive him? Cold reality intruded. Surely he would know the minute he touched her that she had been lying? Was she trying to give herself an excuse to back out again, the voice of her MacDonald pride demanded relentlessly. Didn’t she have the guts to go through with it?

They were driving down a narrow country lane, empty of traffic, a dazzling blue carpet melting into the horizon in the distance.

Directing Chase from memory, Somer heaved a faint sigh of relief when they turned into the small car park at the top of the cliff. The path she remembered was indicated by a small gate in the perimeter of the dusty clifftop.

‘Just how steep is this path?’ Chase asked when they were out of the car.

‘Very,’ Somer told him.

‘Umm, then I’d better make two journeys. I don’t want to risk damaging my camera, but at least we should have the place to ourselves, if it’s as inaccessible as all that. Not the spot to take the kids, I take it?’

‘Not unless they’re the four-legged variety,’ Somer responded humorously, catching the mobile lift of his eyebrows as Chase registered her comment.

‘A sense of humour as well. My, my, things are looking up. Can you manage your own stuff, or…?’

‘I can manage it.’

‘Ah yes, I forgot you’re a product of a new generation aren’t you; a girl who probably imbibed liberation with her mother’s milk. Just as a matter of interest, what do your parents think of your present life-style?’

‘My mother’s dead,’ Somer said shortly, ‘and my father…’

‘Is an ex-sixties hippy who approves of free love and has brought up his daughter to share his views. Well, who am I to complain?’ He shrugged broad shoulders and went to the boot of the car, levering it open.

‘Here you are. You can start down if you like, I’ll get my stuff together. Gorgeous day,’ he added, stretching with the same languorous movement she had noticed the previous day. ‘You’ll have to watch that skin of yours. You’ll find a bad case of sunburn will cramp your style very effectively.’

Her face flushed, Somer grabbed her bag from him and headed for the cliff. The hot weather had dried out the path, clouds of dust and small pebbles were disturbed by her steady progression downwards. Several times she had to grab hold of tussocks of grass to prevent herself from falling and when she eventually reached the small cove Somer let out a sigh of relief.

The cove was every bit as attractive as she remembered, guarded on three sides by the cliffs and on the fourth by the sea. There was no one else in sight, the sand smooth and unmarked, the tide lapping gently at the soft golden sand. Slipping off her mules Somer let her toes curl luxuriously into the sun-warmed fine grains, feeling the tension ease out of her as she breathed in the clear, fresh air, only to tense up again as she heard sounds of movement behind her, and turned just in time to see Chase depositing several pieces of equipment on a small tarpaulin behind her.

‘Umm, we really have got the place to ourselves, haven’t we,’ he commented as he headed back for the path. ‘I shan’t be long—why don’t you make yourself comfortable while I’m gone?’ he mocked her. ‘I’m sure a freethinking, modern liberationist like yourself feels more at home on the nudist beaches of the continental holiday resorts than the family ones of Jersey, but no one’s going to see you if you strip off here. I might even join you.’

With his last threat ringing in her ears, Somer turned her back on him, leaving him to return to his car while she wandered over to the tide-line, watching the small waves lapping at the sand, gradually receding as the tide went out.

By the time Chase finally returned from his second journey, her nerves were coiled as tightly as an overwound spring and she was bitterly regretting her foolhardiness in coming with him, but something stronger than her fear, stronger than her natural reluctance to experiment with what every instinct told her should be a beautiful and precious moment in her life, not something done in anger and a mood of bitter resentment, overrode everything else, urging her to stick to her original plan drowning out all he other warning voices clamouring for attention, telling her that she must seize the moment and make the most of it.

Almost defiantly she retraced her footsteps along the beach, coming to a standstill several feet away from Chase’s equipment. He was standing with his back to her, opening a zipped bag from which he removed a towel, dropping it on the beach, and then glancing at his watch. ‘I can’t do any work for a couple of hours yet, the angle of the sun isn’t right. I’m going for a swim, want to join me?’

‘Not yet. I want to sunbathe first.’

His hand went to the buttons on his shirt, casually flicking them open, whilst Somer watched, almost transfixed, only able to draw her eyes away when the mat of dark hair shadowing his skin was finally revealed. A curious sensation of weakness swept over her, and she shivered, suddenly caught up in a mental vision of what it would be like to feel Chase’s body against her own; to smooth her fingertips through that dark arrowing of hair, her naked breasts pressed close to his skin. She closed her eyes, and then opened them again to find that Chase had removed both shirt and jeans and was standing in front of her, studying her with a frown, his only covering a brief pair of swimming shorts, the white fabric contrasting starkly with his deep tan. His body was as leanly muscular as she had imagined, but far more sleekly powerful, the sight of it sending frissons of awareness shuddering through her as she felt the power of his raw masculinity.

She watched him lope down to the water’s edge and beyond until he was swimming strongly away from her. Only then did she drag her eyes away from the clean lines of his body, her fingers trembling as she pulled off her tee-shirt and shorts to reveal the scanty bikini she was wearing underneath.

She had just finished carefully anointing her skin with suntan lotion when Chase came striding towards her. Moisture glinting on his skin, tiny droplets running down over his chest, tangling in the dark hair. He raised one hand, smoothing his tangled hair back off his forehead, and grinned down at her, his eyes narrowing as he took in the brevity of her bikini, coming to stand over her, making her feel like a slave girl cowering before the pirate who had stolen her away.

A droplet of water splashed from his arm on to the vulnerable skin between her breasts making her jump. Almost instantly the jade eyes darkened and Chase bent down, swift as a hawk to the lure, his tongue brushing roughly against the curves of her breasts as it dipped into the valley between and found the errant drop of moisture. At the touch of his tongue a thousand emotions assailed her; her body both hot and cold at the same time, tense and feverish as she tried to assimilate her response to his brief caress.

‘You’re trembling.’ His fingers cupped the shoulder nearest to him and he lifted his head to frown.

‘I…it was just the cold water,’ Somer lied, knowing she was abandoning her last opportunity to draw back and tell him the truth. ‘It made me shiver.’

‘Umm. You’re all goosebumps.’ His thumb trailed lightly down the tender underside of her arm, increasing the frissons of awareness racing under her skin. ‘Why don’t you take this off? After all there’s no one to see but me.’ His free hand tugged at the straps of her bikini top, gently pulling them loose.

‘No…I…I don’t want to burn,’ Somer protested, knowing with fatalistic intuition that he wasn’t going to listen to her as his fingers found the front fastening of her bikini and easily unclipped it. His eyes held hers in some sort of magnetic spell as his fingers brushed aside the brief triangles of cotton and his hands, warm and slightly work-roughened, cupped the smooth fullness of her breasts.

‘Umm. Nice.’ His fingers spanned the full warmth of her, the intimacy of his touch stealing away her breath and making her heart pound frantically. Chase freed one breast, his eyes never leaving her face as he reached for her discarded suntan lotion, slowly uncapping it. ‘Put some in my hand,’ he ordered softly. Panic seared through her, and she struggled against both it and a craven impulse to push his hand away and cover her breasts from him. ‘What do you want it for?’ How breathy, and in some way provocative her voice sounded, almost unfamiliar to her own ears.

‘I’m going to make sure you don’t burn,’ he returned lazily. ‘Isn’t that what you wanted?’

A thousand denials sprang to mind, but he was watching her too closely. Somer moistened her dry lips, flicking round them with the tip of her tongue, startled by the way his pupils dilated following the brief movement. Having gone so far it would be folly to pull back now. This was what she wanted, she reminded herself, but somehow she had just never envisioned this particular intimacy. She had wanted Chase to make love to her but…

Too confused to deal lucidly with all the conflicting emotions rioting through her she weakly did as he asked, pouring some of the creamy lotion into his open palm, and then watching like someone hypnotised as he transferred the cream to her breast, smoothing it in with long, languorous stokes that explored and moulded the shape of her, slowly circling her breast until she was aware of nothing apart from the knowing touch of his fingers. A tight coiling feeling built up inside her; an awareness of her breasts she had never known before, her nipples tingling and aching in a way that was both alien and frightening, the soft pink aureoles springing to life in a way that was openly provocative.

‘No wonder so many of my sex have found you irresistible,’ Chase marvelled huskily, his eyes no longer on her face but resting instead on the quivering peaks he was still anointing. ‘This…’ his thumb brushed lightly over one tormentingly erect nipple, ‘is incitement enough for a saint, never mind a mere male. I had planned to sunbathe a little myself, but perhaps another cold dip is more in order.’ He squeezed more lotion into his other hand, reaching towards her as he kneeled at her side, lowering his head towards her breast.

Somer closed her eyes in mute agony at the first brush of his tongue against her nipple, waves of shame coursing through her at the first wanton stirrings of response springing to life inside her. This was something she had not bargained for. She wanted to lose her virginity but she had never dreamed she would feel like this; that she would experience this stomach-twisting, yearning need to arch blindly beneath the rough lash of his tongue; to capture his dark head and hold it against her breast, savouring the pleasure that was almost pain as his tongue ceased its torment and his lips took its place tugging gently until she was lost in a feverish surge of pleasure that breached every virginal defence.

‘Later,’ Chase muttered as he released her breast and lifted himself away from her. ‘I’ve got work to do. Remember?’

Flushed and feverish, aching with tormenting desire So-mer could only stare up at him, appalled by what was happening to her. She had desired Andrew of course, but that desire was a tepid, insignificant emotion when compared with what she had just experienced. The hot sun heated her skin as Chase drew away, and far from wanting to cover her breasts any more, Somer admitted that she wanted him to look at her; to desire her; to touch her and kiss her until she felt that pulsing, jerky pleasure pound through her body.

‘Don’t look at me like that,’ Chase warned huskily, his voice intruding on her private daydream. ‘You look like an innocent girl who’s just discovered the magic of sex and wants to learn more. Much, much more.’

‘I am and I do.’ The admission hovered on her lips only to be forced back. What good would it do now to admit that she was a virgin? Chase would probably turn from her in disgust just as Andrew had done. Scarcely admitted, but there at the back of her mind was the knowledge that she no longer wanted him to make love to her simply because she wanted to rid herself of the burden of her virginity. She wanted him as well. As Chase moved away she arched seductively back on her towel, knowing with some deep feminine instinct that his eyes would be drawn to the full curves of her breasts still taut from his lovemaking. As he started to turn away she ran her hand lightly up over her body, her eyes slumberous and heavy with desire.

‘Try and tempt me, would you?’ Chase growled. ‘Well, there’s a cure for that.’

Before she could stop him he scooped her up in his arms, striding out into the sea with her, until he was standing chest high in the waves.

Somer shrieked protestingly as he let her go, startled by the impact of the cold sea water against her skin, but swimming away as agilely as an eel once she had recovered from the shock. She had learned to swim almost before she could walk and was used to the cold water of the North Sea. As she swam away Chase came after her, grabbing her ankle and tugging her down below the water, following her up to the surface, his hands grasping her waist as he pulled her hard against him, stroking her mouth with his tongue. ‘Mmm. You taste of salt.’

‘So do you,’ Somer responded daringly, letting her own tongue repeat the caress and then breaking away to swim back to the shore. Chase didn’t follow her, and gradually as she watched him Somer felt her pulse-rate subside to normal.

He followed her on to the beach five minutes later, and lay down beside her on his towel, letting the sun dry the moisture from his skin, but not making any move to touch her.

Suddenly sleepy after the physical exercise and mental strain of the morning Somer rolled over on to her stomach, burying her face in her hands. Gradually she felt the tension easing out of her body. She closed her eyes, dimly aware of firm sure hands moving over her back, inducing a delicious sensation of lethargy that made her want to stretch and curl her body like a small cat, but before she could do so sleep claimed her.

Finishing his self-imposed task Chase Lorimer studied the female form stretched out beside him. Very, very enticing; there had been a moment earlier on when he had come dangerously close to losing his self-control. He had thought the first time he saw her in the lift that she was still a child, shy and nervous. How wrong he had been! He grimaced faintly to himself. He ought to be used to it by now; after all she wouldn’t be the first female to pick him up thinking she was taking the first step up the ladder to becoming a top model. A touch of contempt darkened his eyes, his expression faintly bleak. Funny, but this time it really hurt.

Shrugging mentally he got to his feet, telling himself sardonically that he was a fool to let himself get involved, but he knew he wanted her; against all logic and common sense maybe, but still he wanted her. But before he took her he would lay it on the line for her, tell her that no way was making love with him the equivalent of the modelling world’s casting couch. He frowned as he glanced down at her. Lying like that with her head pillowed in her arms she looked like a child, innocent, untouched. He grimaced faintly. He was getting far too sentimental, surely life with Laura had taught him that. He had believed himself in love with her and her with him, but all she had wanted was to use him. She had laughed at him when he proposed marriage, and inflicted a painful blow to his twenty-two-year-old ego, but the tables were turned now; now that she was a fading star, a model who was finding it more and more difficult to get assignments, who needed all the tricks a clever photographer could use to preserve the illusion of youth; who at thirty betrayed in her face the way she had lived—and loved, if you could call the casual sexual encounters she indulged in, that. Now Laura wanted to marry him, especially now that she knew that he was his uncle’s heir, but he wasn’t twenty-two any longer; he had grown older and wiser; there had been far too many Lauras in his life for him to be deceived.

As he glanced down at Somer again his eyes were tinged with sadness and a hint of self-contempt, and here was another. A potential Laura, young enough to have the bloom still on her skin and the illusion of innocence but in reality…Picking up his equipment he headed for one end of the beach and soon became engrossed in his self-imposed task, glancing up only once to stare at the sleeping figure.

CHAPTER THREE

IT WAS the chink of a bottle against glass that brought Somer out of her light sleep, her eyes hazy with uncertainty. The sun was hot on her bare shoulders, its angle in the sky telling her how long she had slept—payment for her inability to do so properly last night.

‘Good, you’re awake, I was just thinking I would have to eat my lunch alone. Are you hungry?’

A picnic hamper was open on a towel next to him, and Somer peered into it, trying to suppress the agitation prickling her skin. Had she been completely mad? she wondered muzzily. Had she really intended to…to seduce this dark, arrogant stranger into making love to her? She jumped when Chase reached across and touched her shoulder, his eyebrows drawn together in a frown.

‘You’re not suffering from sunstroke, are you?’ he queried, letting his fingers absorb the heat from her skin. ‘I did cream your back for you but you have been lying there for a couple of hours.’

‘I’m feeling fine,’ she lied brazenly, bending her head over the wicker basket so that he couldn’t see the faint tell-tale flush on her skin. ‘I just couldn’t remember where I was when I first woke up.’

‘Or who you were with,’ Chase supplemented drily, ‘but then I suppose you’re used to that. Pass me something to eat, will you, while I pour the wine.’

Two plates of chicken salad were attractively arranged under a protective film, and investigating the basket further Somer discovered crusty French bread, salmon paˆte´, and some Brie. In one corner of the basket were peaches and grapes, and the appetite she had lacked earlier suddenly made her feel quite hungry. She handed Chase his plate, trying not to recoil from the brief brush of his fingers against hers.

‘More wine?’

Somer glanced into her glass surprised to see that she had almost drained it.

‘Please.’ She was thirsty and besides wasn’t alcohol supposed to have a relaxing effect on the nervous system?

They ate in silence with Somer stealing brief, nervous glances at Chase’s inscrutable face, her eyes sliding against her will to the broad expanse of his chest with its fine covering of dark hair, and lower, almost hypnotised by that same arrowing of hair over his body.

As he bent to replenish her glass for the third time Chase mocked softly, ‘You’re looking at me as though I’m the first man you’ve ever seen, and it’s having a highly combustible effect on my nervous system.’

‘I wasn’t looking at you, I was thinking,’ Somer lied protestingly, hanging her head so that he wouldn’t see her betraying blush.

‘About touching me instead of merely looking at me,’ Chase agreed. ‘You were looking at me like a little girl let loose inside a toyshop.’

‘I’ve told you I was miles away,’ Somer protested hotly. ‘I’m sorry if you thought I was staring at you…’

‘Why get so het up about it? I’m flattered. Or isn’t that part of the game? Does the man have to let you know how hungry he is for you before you’ll deign to admit you want him in return?’

Somer could only stammer, ‘No…I…I don’t want you.’

‘No?’ Just for a second she had a brief glimpse of something fiercely bitter burning in the depths of his eyes and then it was caged, his voice urbanely amused as he reached out and stroked his thumb across her chin. ‘Peach juice,’ he murmured when she shied away. His fingers curled along her jaw holding her captive, and Somer felt her breath explode in a tight knot inside her chest as he bent his head, his tongue touching her skin as he licked away the small trickle of juice.

Every nerve in her body seemed to lock, and yet at the same time a wild fluttery excitement pulsed through her, her dazed eyes holding the impenetrable gaze of the dark green ones now close enough for her to see their tiny gold specks like a dusting of gold in jade malachite.

A dizzying sensation swept through her and she clutched automatically at Chase’s arm to prevent herself from overbalancing. Beneath her fingers his muscles tensed and then relaxed, his maurauding tongue stroking hypnotically along the tremulous line of her mouth.

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