The Temptress Of Tarika Bay

‘Excuse me,’ she said, and retreated to the cloakroom.

She renewed her lipstick and ran cold water over her wrists before straightening her animal print top, its dramatic contrast of black and white somehow suiting her mood. The black wrap skirt that revealed her legs needed adjustment too, but eventually she had to leave her refuge and set off back to the dining room.

Halfway there she was waylaid by an elderly man Nick had introduced to her at the show.

‘Nice to see you again,’ he said, seizing her hand and pumping it up and down. ‘How did you enjoy your day in the country?’

‘I had a great time,’ she said, smiling. ‘I loved those magnificent cattle of yours—even though I can’t remember what breed they are!’

Just outside her field of vision she sensed the approach of another person. She knew who it was; every cell in her body thrummed with a mixture of apprehension and a steamy, elemental excitement.

The voice of the old man as he informed her what esoteric type of cow she’d admired buzzed in her ears.

Her companion broke off to say cheerfully, ‘Hello, young Hawke. Didn’t take you long to find the best-looking woman in the place, did it?’

CHAPTER THREE

HAWKE grinned, a smile that altered in a thousand subtle ways as he transferred it to Morna. Moving on from respect and comradeship, it somehow transmuted into a molten, masculine appreciation of her femininity that sizzled along her nerves and stopped the breath in her throat.

‘I have excellent instincts,’ he said modestly. ‘I note, however, that it didn’t take you long to find her either.’

Through the clamour of fierce awareness Morna heard the other man’s snorting laugh. ‘I yield my place,’ he said.

‘Oh, no,’ she objected quickly.

But although the older man looked pleased, he said with a knowing twinkle, ‘Morna, I’ve got a good opinion of myself, but I’m certain you’d rather spend time with Hawke than an old codger like me. I’m going to collect a brandy and discuss cattle with Brian over there.’

He smiled at them both and walked away.

Composing her expression, Morna turned to face Hawke. ‘Nice place you’ve got here,’ she observed, her voice so bland it was a subtle insult.

Hawke’s measuring, dangerous smile disappeared, replaced by cool assessment. ‘Thank you.’

The band struck up a new tune, and he offered his arm. ‘Cathy and Nick have gone next door to dance. Would you like to?’

The challenge in his voice wasn’t blatant, but she heard it. He expected her to refuse.

So she would. ‘Not tonight, thank you,’ she said politely.

‘Then come and have coffee while we wait for them.’

She nodded, and they went together into a room with tables and upholstered chairs arranged around the edges of a small dance floor. While Hawke ordered, Morna kept her eyes on Cathy and Nick; although neither carried their hearts in their faces, they moved in an aura of utter happiness.

Blinking, she looked away. ‘What made you decide to build a resort and golf course here?’ she queried, scanning the skilfully crafted decor. Casual and comfortable, like the dining room it showcased pale timber, natural fabrics and a palette of neutral colours that combined restraint with a muted luxury to appeal to ultra-sophisticated tastes.

‘It’s the perfect place,’ Hawke told her with the calm confidence that set her teeth on edge. ‘Close to Auckland, yet with complete privacy and superb scenery. And the land is almost useless for agriculture—old worked-over kauri swamplands, drained fifty years ago but still only growing scrub.’

Her quick burst of laughter eased the tension. ‘There speaketh the farmer,’ she said mockingly, glancing up from beneath her lashes. ‘If land doesn’t produce grass it’s a desert.’

Their eyes met, fenced, and clung. Anticipation fizzed through her, glinting in her eyes, softening her mouth.

‘I am a farmer,’ he agreed, leaning back into his chair and watching her with an intentness that sent kamikaze bumblebees dive-bombing through her bloodstream. ‘You’ve got something against agriculture?’

‘Of course not!’ Calm down, she commanded. He’s just flirting—I’ll bet he was born knowing how to do this to susceptible women. ‘I like to eat as much as the next person, and without farmers we wouldn’t have food.’

Hawke’s green eyes darkened, and for some reason every cell in her body stood to attention.

He said evenly, ‘Some land should never have been cleared of bush; I have a programme for replanting native trees in appropriate places on all my properties.’

So in his own way he was a conservationist, which irritated her because she didn’t want to believe anything good about him.

Before she had time to comment he changed the subject with smooth obliqueness. ‘Do you ever wear anything but black and white?’

‘No,’ she said baldly. If you stuck to basics it made buying in charity shops much simpler. ‘Most women in business and the professions choose from a limited range of basic colours. Black and white both suit me so I wear them a lot.’

His brows lifted. ‘It’s certainly striking.’ The intriguing roughness in his voice had been transformed into a taunting purr. ‘And I like the animal print—does it indicate a strain of wildness hidden beneath that very controlled exterior?’

Morna resisted the impulse to check that her skirt hadn’t fallen away to reveal her legs. ‘It indicates that animal prints have been recently fashionable,’ she said pleasantly. ‘My work satisfies my taste for colour and drama.’

‘According to an article I read recently you’re making quite a splash with innovative ways of using your raw materials.’

‘I like to think so.’ Her shoulders squared and she kept her gaze steady.

Hawke said lazily, ‘The little I’ve seen of your work was exquisite.’

Flooded by alarming pleasure, she wondered if he’d bought a piece—for whom? The actress?

He spoilt it by finishing, ‘You’ve come a long way in a very short time.’

Morna stiffened. ‘Thank you,’ she said with cold formality.

A recent article in the business press had insinuated that her business had been staked by two rich men—Glen and Nick.

Her angry rebuttal of the lie—and, more probably, Nick’s cold fury and power—had won a somewhat snide apology, but she had no illusions. Most people who’d read the original article wouldn’t have read the apology, so they’d believe the insinuation that she was—to use an old-fashioned term—a gold-digger.

Probably Hawke did too, with his hard green eyes and uncompromising mouth. And for some obscure reason that hurt. Which was a danger signal; she was too susceptible to him.

Taking refuge behind her coffee cup, she watched the dancers with determination until the music stopped and Cathy and Nick came off the floor, still wrapped in that sleek, enviable contentment. Morna eased her long legs sideways to let them past, and gratefully relaxed as the conversation became general.

When Hawke asked Cathy to dance Morna leaned back into her chair, pretending not to notice as they walked out onto the floor.

Hawke and Cathy looked magnificent together—he so tall and protective, she slender and graceful in his arms.

‘You can take that look off your face. He’s not interested in her,’ Nick said calmly.

‘I don’t care who he’s interested in,’ Morna said gruffly.

Nick got to his feet and held out his hand. ‘Come on.’

As she had so often before, Morna went with him, only realising when she met Hawke’s hooded, glinting eyes that she now had no excuse not to dance with him. She said a short, explicit, unladylike word.

‘I thought you gave up swearing ten years ago,’ Nick remarked.

‘I did.’ She asked sombrely, ‘How did you dare let yourself fall in love?’

‘I didn’t have any choice.’

Their steps matched perfectly; he and she had learned to dance together. Morna said, ‘God, that’s scary.’

‘At first. What’s with you and Hawke?’

‘Nothing!’

‘But he’s hunting?’

Morna shivered. ‘That’s so un-PC! Even if he is, it doesn’t mean anything. I’m not good victim material.’

‘Is that how you see relationships?’ Nick asked quietly.

She shrugged. ‘Not all. Not you and Cathy—you make me believe that dreams can come true.’

‘They can,’ he said with complete conviction. ‘You just have to learn to trust.’

‘Ah, that’s the problem. I don’t think I want to.’

‘Wanting to is a danger signal,’ he said, ‘but sometimes you have to take the challenge, no matter how risky it might be.’

They danced in silence for a while, and as the music was winding down Nick glanced across the room again. Dark brows drawing together, he said, ‘It’s time I took her home.’

Indeed, Cathy’s smile was more gallant than eager as Hawke delivered her to her chair. He said something that made her laugh, then straightened when his attention was discreetly attracted by a man who wore effacement like a cloak.

Hawke appeared to ask a quick question. As Morna and Nick came up he nodded and said, ‘I’m afraid there’s a minor problem. I shouldn’t be long.’

When he’d left, Nick asked in a voice Morna had never heard him use before, ‘All right?’

‘Fine.’ Cathy smiled, her lips curving softly, tenderly.

‘Nevertheless, we’ll go home.’

The look they exchanged ambushed Morna in some unsuspected part of her heart. Small things slotted into place—the orange juice Cathy had drunk all evening, that inner radiance, Nick’s enhanced protectiveness…

They were expecting a baby.

Cathy said firmly, ‘We can’t go home until Hawke comes back.’ She directed a laughing look at Morna. ‘What do you think of him now?’

‘He’s still too much,’ Morna said succinctly, relieved when Cathy stopped teasing her to discuss the holiday she and Nick were planning in Hawaii.

After ten minutes or so Hawke reappeared, striding across the room with the lithe, expectant grace of a predator. He gave Cathy a keen glance, accepting her thanks for the evening with a smile that tangled Morna’s thoughts and drove her to her feet.

‘It’s time I left too,’ she said, skimming the lower half of his handsome face without meeting his eyes. Desperately wrenching her attention away from his sexy mouth, she said, ‘It’s been a pleasant evening, thank you.’

His eyes narrowed and that beautiful mouth compressed, but the charm was still there when he said, ‘I’ll walk you to the car park.’

‘Oh, you don’t need to—’

He slipped a hand beneath her elbow, and to her fury she found herself following the other two to the doors. Pride insisted she say lightly, ‘Nick will protect me from anything nasty in the dark—and I’m certain it’s perfectly safe here.’

‘Nick has his wife to look after. As for safety—you never know,’ Hawke said courteously. ‘You could be attacked by a passing seagull.’

She gave a crack of laughter. ‘Or a carnivorous crab?’

‘Exactly.’ He nodded to the doorman and escorted her out into the warm, humid night.

Although stars danced dizzily in the fragrant sky, the darkness pressed against them, stroking across Morna’s hot face. She clenched her teeth against the siren song winding through her body, emphasising an anticipation that made her both bold and vulnerable.

She hadn’t felt like this when she’d met Glen. This was different—wilder, more tempting, a slow, mesmerising beat of awareness based on starlight and the salty perfume of the sea, and the cloying scent of some flower too close by, and the heady touch of Hawke’s hand burning through the thin material of her sleeve.

Gritting her teeth, Morna fought against a seductive, reckless temptation.

Remember what falling in love got you, she reminded herself trenchantly. Five years of what you thought was happiness, followed by betrayal.

No one could accuse her of being a slow learner, so she’d resist with everything she had.

When the red rear lights of the Hardings’ car drew away Hawke said, ‘Come back inside and dance with me.’

His voice was deep and steady, even slightly amused, but Morna’s skin prickled at the sensual heat smouldering through the words.

In spite of the warnings of her common sense, she wanted more than anything to dance in his arms while music curled around them in lazily erotic expectancy. She wanted it so much she had to force herself to speak, and didn’t dare say any more than, ‘No.’

‘Coward.’ Two syllables said with a taunting flick, but they almost demolished her wariness.

‘Absolutely,’ she said, with such fervour that he laughed, and for a moment she liked him.

Only for a moment, though. Although in the past few hours she’d relished his quick incisive wit, and agreed with much he’d said, he was still a man to be wary of. And she wasn’t going to change her mind because he’d listened to her and discussed her point of view when she’d disagreed with him, without losing his temper.

Unlike Glen.

‘Where’s your car?’ Hawke asked.

As she indicated its whereabouts Morna appreciated the fact that he didn’t try to persuade her. Of course, it might mean that he didn’t really care whether she stayed or not, or that he was sure he’d eventually get what he wanted from her. Whatever that was.

She sent a swift glance his way, her eyes resting for a fraction of a second on that buccaneer’s profile. Sex, probably, she thought cynically. That seemed to be what most men wanted, and they weren’t too subtle about manipulating the situation to get it.

Hawke opened her car door for her, and once she got behind the wheel he said evenly, ‘Sleep well, Morna.’

After a moment’s hesitation she replied, ‘You too.’

‘Goodnight.’

He closed her in with smooth strength, judging the impact to a nicety so that the door didn’t slam.

Biting her lip, Morna set the car in motion. ‘Goodnight,’ she murmured, easing out of the hotel car park. ‘And goodbye.’

Of all the words in the English language, goodbye had to be the one most laden with emotion.

Back at the bach, she parked and got out, gripped by a strange yearning that had absolutely nothing to do with the man she’d left behind her. ‘Nothing at all,’ she asserted vigorously to the silent universe.

And if she told herself that often enough she might even come to believe it.

Instead of going inside she walked across the springy grass, halting in the darkness beneath the branches of the massive Norfolk Island pine. Tiny waves made no sound as they eased in and out, and no moreporks called to break the silence, no wind rustled the leaves above her.

She slipped off her shoes and walked down the beach, stopping when her feet reached firm, wet sand. Above her the stars burned tiny erratic signals into the black vault of the sky, diamonds in ebony, unimaginably far away.

The charmed circle Cathy and Nick had constructed would soon be complete. Morna’s mouth curved tenderly. A baby! Like a renewal, a gift to the future.

She was delighted for them both, yet even as she fixed her eyes on the small cluster of lights on the other side of the wide estuary and listened to the silence, she shivered with a harsh, wrenching loneliness.

‘So?’ she stated briskly, heading for the bach. ‘Apart from Nick, you’ve always been alone.’

Even during the years she’d spent with Glen she’d been on her own, although she hadn’t realised it; besotted with love, she’d let down her guard and surrendered everything, even her career, until his cruel dismissal shattered every foolish illusion.

In the narrow bathroom off the bedroom she creamed the cosmetics from her skin, examining herself in the mirror with clinical dispassion. Everything about her face was too strongly marked—nose, eyes, full mouth, square jawline. Pride demanded that she dress with chic sophistication, but it was brains and talent and gritty determination that had propelled her from life as a fatherless child in a poverty-stricken suburb of Auckland.

Sometimes though, when she looked in the mirror she saw that child looking back at her.

‘Wallowing in self-pity is not your style, so forget it,’ she said aloud, turning away to undress.

Hawke seemed to like what he saw…

Halfway through stripping off her silk shirt she stopped, remembering the heat of his lips against her wrist the previous day. And the way her hand had curled against the silken abrasion of his jaw, testing its contours, her fingertips so absurdly sensitive she thought she could feel that slight roughness even now, right down to her toes.

That was why she’d refused to dance with him. In conversation she could use words to keep the distance between them; dancing was too intimate, and she’d be unable to hide the tiny treacheries of body language that would tell him far too much. And perceptive as he was, he’d seen though her—she was a coward, afraid of revealing more than she already had.

When he’d kissed her wrist she’d lost control; she couldn’t afford to let that happen again, so the forbidden pleasure of dancing in his arms would remain on the ‘stupidly dangerous’ list.

Suddenly taken over by a yawn, she climbed into the bed she’d placed so that every morning she could pull back the curtains and start each day with the exquisite vista. She’d grown up in squalor, surrounded by the grey tragedy of crumbling dreams; now she lived with a view of beach and water backed by the smooth blue contours of the hills on the far side of the estuary.

She had a career and a future no one could take away from her. She had friends. And she was going to be an aunt! She had all she’d ever wanted.

One emotional entrapment was enough; never again would she follow her mother’s example and look for security in a man.

After a restless night she opened the curtains onto the blue and gold freshness of sun and sea and dew-wet grass, of champagne-coloured sand cooled by an overnight tide. A slight autumnal haze silvered the far end of the beach.

Her smile fading, Morna detected the sound of thudding hoof-beats; with a frown she watched a man and a horse coalesce out of the radiant mist. They came down from the hill like some image from the barbaric past, sand spurting from the animal’s hooves as the wind of its movement sent tail and mane streaming.

Morna shrank back. The horse was huge, its bronzed hide gleaming like satin. And the man was a brilliant rider, blending seamlessly with the animal so that together they seemed some composite being.

‘He can’t be…’ she breathed, squinting into the brightness outside as her mouth dried and her heart bolted out of control.

No, the rider wasn’t naked, although his black shorts barely qualified as clothing. Sunlight poured over him like a blessing, burnishing him bronze. Acutely responsive to the primal beauty of man and beast silhouetted against the dawn sky, Morna watched as they galloped towards the bach.

Just short of it the animal checked, began to ease off its headlong gallop into a more sedate gait. As they came level its rider looked towards the building, and Morna knew he’d seen her. Feverish anticipation shortened her breath.

‘Get a hold on yourself!’ she muttered.

Once horse and rider had disappeared she hurled back the bedclothes and scrambled into her jeans, adding a sleeveless funnel-necked top and low flat shoes. When the horse appeared again, this time walking sedately along the sand, she was as ready as she could be—hair severely pulled back, face washed, teeth cleaned, and a black enamelled cuff pushed up almost to the elbow of one arm.

In complete armour, she acknowledged with a tight smile, whereas Hawke was only in swimming shorts.

Nerves buzzing, she walked out onto the wide deck and watched as he brought the horse to a halt on the sand a few metres away.

He didn’t get down, or say anything, just surveyed her with unreadable eyes. Morna bristled. Talk about a cliché—the landowner out exercising his favourite stallion, looking from a position of dominance down on the trembling peasant girl…

But she was not a peasant girl, and neither was she trembling, although her pulse was erratic.

Angry, because all the cynicism in the world wasn’t going to divert the chaotic tide singing through her body, she said with ridiculous formality, ‘Good morning.’

‘Good morning.’ His voice was disturbingly objective. ‘How did you sleep?’

‘Very well,’ she lied. She’d dreamed long, languorous dreams of a silent, invisible man kissing her in the darkness—and the kisses hadn’t stopped at her wrists…

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