Treacherous Longings

Quinn’s nerves tightened. What a perfect place for a house, he thought. What an incredible hideaway. No wonder no one had found her. Without foreknowledge, he would never have known where to look.

A shadow moved as he parked the Moke in the shade of a clump of palms. But it was only a fat black cat, which fled away into the shrubbery. No watchdog, then, he decided drily. Yet he had the distinct feeling of being observed.

He cut the Moke’s engine and looked around. It was possible, he supposed, that she was expecting him. That comment yesterday evening about his being on holiday could have been a bluff. And he’d done little to dispel it, struck almost dumb by her appearance.

His first impressions were that someone had taken a great deal of trouble to tame this semi-tropical paradise. The gardens surrounding the house were smoothly lawned, with colourful herbaceous borders and crazy-paving. There was a prettily arched pergola that was covered with flowering vines, and the scent of lime and citrus from a cluster of fruit trees.

A footway led through the pergola, apparently round to the back of the villa. Quinn hesitated, wishing someone would come and confront him, but no one did. He felt uncomfortably like the intruder he was, but he couldn’t stay here indefinitely. For all his uneasiness, he had to make a move.

Behind the villa a paved patio was strewn with terracotta pots of scarlet geraniums. There were flowers everywhere, tumbling out of stone planters and suspended in hanging-baskets. Even the pillars of the veranda that opened from the house were liberally covered with bougainvillaea, its pink and white confection like icing on a cake.

Beyond the patio, and the garden that enclosed it, he could hear the muted thunder of the ocean. An almost white beach, flanked by palm trees, fringed the blue-green waters of a lagoon. The waves crashed on the teeth of a reef some way out, but only creamed in gentle ribbons on the sand.

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