Tiger, Tiger

Perhaps, but she thought wryly that it probably happened whenever Keane Paget looked up. He had presence, the sort of aura that caught people’s attention.

Paying for the meal took little time, and when they rose Keane once more took Lecia’s arm. Scoffing that the tingle of electricity that leapt from nerve-end to nerve-end when he touched her was not only improbable but a cliché, she allowed herself to be steered across the Italian tiled floor towards the bright sunlight outside.

From somewhere close by a man said something and laughed.

Lecia felt the colour drain from her skin in a clammy rush. Blinking, she forced her gaze in the direction of the voice.

Of course it wasn’t Anthony. A perfectly strange man with a blond moustache leaned across a table and lifted a woman’s hand to his mouth. Anthony had been dark and sophisticated, and he’d no more have kissed her hand in public than he’d have taken his shoes off.

As she registered the sweet rush of deliverance Lecia realised that it wouldn’t have mattered if the stranger had been Anthony. She no longer loved him—had never loved the real Anthony, the married man whose mistress she’d been for a few short weeks until someone had told her about his wife.

Without missing a step, she walked on.

‘Are you all right?’ Keane asked, the sensuously rough timbre in his voice suddenly transmuted to harshness.

Remotely she said, ‘I’m fine, thank you.’

But she wasn’t, because when he said, ‘I’ll drop you off,’ she nodded and thanked him and went into the parking building with him.

In the car, Keane asked, ‘What happened?’ He didn’t switch on the engine, so the words hung heavily in the dim quietness.

Lecia drew in a painful breath. ‘It was just—I was surprised.’

‘Is he the man you were engaged to?’

‘No!’ And before he could probe further she said aloofly. ‘I’m surprised your detective didn’t discover that Barry lives in Wellington now.’

Keane ignored that. ‘Then who was the man who laughed inside the restaurant?’

‘A total stranger. I’ve never seen him before in my life.’

‘But he reminded you of someone you’re afraid of.’

‘No!’ She took a deep breath. ‘I’m not afraid of anyone.’

Only of herself. Of this weakness that made her fall in lust with a certain sort of man.

‘Do you usually go white so dramatically whenever a man laughs?’ Keane touched her cheek. ‘You’re still cold,’ he added judicially, his sharp, perceptive eyes relentless.

His hand slid to the pulse beneath her ear, lingering there for a second. Lecia’s breath clogged her throat so that she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think above the fast chatter of her heartbeat in her ears.

Clenching her jaw, she froze. What prevented her from seeking comfort by turning her face into that warm, strong hand was not willpower; it was an understanding, based on intuition rather than reason, that Keane Paget would take swift advantage of any surrender, however symbolic.

When he pulled his hand away she felt bereft, cold, aching for something she couldn’t even name.

‘Clearly whoever you mistook him for was the last person you wanted to see,’ Keane said aloofly.

Rallying, Lecia told him, ‘He reminded me of somene I disliked.’

Keane must have decided that he didn’t want to get any further involved, for he didn’t press her.

However, after starting the vehicle and avoiding a car that had stalled in the middle of the road, he said thoughtfully, ‘I find it rather difficult to imagine any circumstances that would shock you to that extent. I thought you were going to faint.’

‘Hardly. And, like most other people, I have an occasional skeleton walled up in the past.’

‘Not entirely forgotten.’ Buried beneath the level voice, like hidden rocks in a stream, was anger.

Taken aback, Lecia deliberately stilled her nervous hands and stared out of the side window.

The harbour danced under the summer sun; sails flew above it, white and rainbow-coloured against the low peninsula that ended in the naval base at Devonport. Behind it, separated by a narrow channel, brooded the forest-covered slopes of Rangitoto, the last little volcano to emerge on the isthmus. That had happened only a few hundred years ago, and geologists expected more to thrust up from the hot spot that lurked a hundred kilometres or so beneath Auckland.

Not in her time, Lecia fervently hoped. She felt as though she was sitting over that hot spot right then.

Keane observed, ‘I suppose it was an affair.’

‘I’m sure that if you had a sister she’d tell you to mind your own business.’ She tried to make her voice amused rather than tense, but didn’t think she’d succeeded.

He’d come too close to the truth, and she couldn’t bear him to learn how stupid and utterly naïve she’d once been. Lecia’s mouth twisted in derision. She’d never thought she’d be glad of Anthony’s sordid discretion, but at least it meant there were no records for anyone to paw through.

‘I rather wish you were my sister,’ Keane said, halting the car outside the entrance to her block.

Of course—his private detective would have told him where she lived.

The hard angles of Keane’s face were much more pronounced, and there was an unsettling watchfulness in the compelling eyes—eyes the colour of the sheen on a gun barrel, Lecia thought suddenly, and shivered, because he’d admitted that she wasn’t the only one fighting the dark temptation of desire.

‘Yes, you’d be much more comfortable as a brother,’ she said quietly, formally. ‘Thank you for lunch; I enjoyed it very much.’

Dark brows pulled together. ‘I’ll come up with you,’ he said.

Shaking her head, Lecia opened the door. ‘There’s no need, I’m perfectly all right. Goodbye.’ And she got out, closed the door firmly behind her, and walked across to the entrance of the apartment block without once looking back.

Nevertheless, she knew that Keane waited until she got to the two shallow steps before he drove away.

Lecia headed straight across the foyer and out into the garden, collapsing on a seat beneath the jacaranda tree.

That had been a nasty moment. Odd that although she no longer cared for Anthony at all she couldn’t get over this sickening guilt.

Staring at the starry flowers of the summer jasmine that draped itself eagerly over a nearby pergola, inhaling the sweet scent drifting on the humid air, she tried to calm herself with the plant’s simple beauty. The flowers blurred and she pressed the heel of her hand to her forehead, holding back a dull throbbing.

However tempting it was to stay there, she had to do something about this headache because she had clients to see in an hour. If she took an aspirin immediately she’d probably be all right.

By the time her clients arrived the headache had dwindled to a drained, dispirited lassitude that made her normal cheerful professionalism difficult to achieve. Fortunately the young couple loved the sketches and the concept, and were very enthusiastic over her cost-saving ideas; although they agreed to think it over and contact her the following day Lecia was almost sure it would be a formality.

She should be celebrating. Instead, she drank a glass of orange juice and gazed blindly at the street below. Because hers was one of the cheapest flats in the development she had no view of the harbour. She didn’t miss it. One end of the sitting room looked down onto the visitors’ parking area and the street, but from her bedroom and kitchen she could see the garden, and usually that was refreshment enough for her soul.

Not today, however.

She’d made the right decision to cut off any communication with Keane Paget—the only decision! The echo of the past that had seen her glimpse Anthony in the man at the restaurant had reinforced it for her. Keane was the same type as Anthony; both possessed enormous masculine charisma wrapped up in a gorgeously male body, both were powerful men, driven to achieve, clever and tough and more than a little ruthless.

Sourly hoping that Keane had more honour than Anthony, she sat down and began to check through yet another set of specifications.

Much later, the irritating summons of the telephone interrupted her concentration. Blinking, she realised that it was getting dark outside, which meant she’d missed dinner again.

Absently, her mind still full of stress loadings and other figures, she got to her feet, knocking a pile of papers to the floor. The answering machine was on, so she bent to pick up the scattered sheets, aware that it might be Peter.

It was not. Instead, Keane’s deep voice said, ‘My great-aunt would be delighted to meet you and thank you for her new house. I’ll pick you up tomorrow evening at seven.’

Click as he replaced the receiver.

Lecia scrambled to her feet, dumped the papers on the desk and muttered, ‘Why didn’t you wait, for heaven’s sake? I’d have got there.’

Damn. Damn, damn, damn! Now she’d have to ring him back and tell him she wasn’t going.

His card! Where had she put his card?

Five minutes later she knew it hadn’t gone into her daily file, and it wasn’t in her bag or her diary. Had she thrown it away? She couldn’t remember doing so, but she must have.

Quite sensible of her unconscious mind if she had! Sighing in disgust, she pulled out the telephone directory. There were quite a few Pagets, three of whom had the initial K. None of those lived on the North Shore. Setting her chin, she rang Directory Service, only to be told that Keane’s number was unlisted.

She couldn’t remember what the name of his business was, and it would be crass to ask Peter, who did know. But there was the article Andrea had given her—no, she’d thrown that away too.

Glowering balefully at the telephone, she said, ‘Bloody hell!’ and stamped out into the kitchen to prepare dinner. Unless she found that wretched card soon she was going to have to be ready at seven tomorrow evening.

When the telephone rang again she dropped the knife with which she was eviscerating an avocado, put the fruit on the bench and raced to answer it.

This time it was Peter.

‘Hello, Lecia,’ he said, cheerfully buoyant. ‘How nice to see you last week.’

Resigned, she said, ‘We had a super day, didn’t we? I especially enjoyed the fireworks.’

‘I enjoyed looking at you as you enjoyed them,’ he said somewhat ponderously. ‘I wondered whether you’d like to come to Don Giovanni with me next weekend. I hear it’s an excellent production.’

Gently, she said, ‘No, I’m sorry, I won’t be able to do that.’

His voice altered a fraction. ‘Then—dinner?’

‘No, thank you,’ she said.

Recovering quickly, he chatted for a few minutes and then hung up. She would not, she thought, be hearing from him again, and she hoped he hadn’t been building dreams because she hated having to hurt him. He was a nice man.

It was just unfortunate that she seemed attracted to men with an edge to them.

Dangerous men.

Men like Anthony—and like Keane, who was quite possibly having an affair with the lovely woman he’d escorted to the park.

Forbidden men.

Perhaps that was her hang-up. At least she’d learned to stay well away from such men. Never again was she going to endure that guilt and shame and degrading humiliation.

As Keane’s card remained obstinately lost, at seven the following evening Lecia was ready, wearing the shades of peach and gold that best flattered her skin and eyes. For some reason—one she didn’t plan to explore—she didn’t want him to see her apartment; she waited in the garden on a seat skilfully placed so she could see through the vestibule to the main entrance.

And, in spite of the stern talking-to she had given herself, an unwanted, unbidden knot of excitement twisted in her stomach, and she had to keep her hands open because sweat collected in tiny beads on the palms.

As soon as Keane’s tall form appeared at the front doors she got to her feet and walked into the vestibule. Silhouetted against the sunny street outside, he watched her without moving. He was, she realised with a subtle stirring of the senses, a very big man. Within her, tension tightened a notch into anticipation. Hoping that none of her inner turmoil showed, she smiled as she came up to him.

He said, ‘You look almost edible.’ A note of mockery in the deep, sensual voice robbed the compliment of sweetness.

‘Summer fruits. And I look like you,’ she retorted, reminding herself as well as him.

His eyes lingered for taut seconds on her face. ‘Had a bad day?’

Unwillingly her mouth eased into a wry smile. ‘I spent the morning at a building site, arguing with a man who apparently can’t read plans or specifications and is convinced no mere woman can either.’

‘How did you deal with that?’

‘I have this trick.’ She could feel some of her irritation fading as she spoke. ‘I pick up a nail and a hammer, put the nail into the wood and slam it in with one blow of the hammer. For some reason the fact that I can drive a nail straight and true and right in to its head persuades most men that I know what I’m talking about.’

He laughed. ‘How long did you have to practise?’

‘A week,’ she said, straight-faced.

‘There’s nothing like a dramatic gesture to get the picture across. What happened this afternoon?’

‘Ah, this afternoon I discussed costs with a possible client who thought he’d be able to get a mansion at cottage prices. He also thought that I’d be prepared to sleep with him for the honour of being his architect. He’s no longer a possible client.’

Oh, stupid, stupid! Why had she told him?

Keane said something under his breath that made her flinch before demanding with harsh distinctness, ‘Who is he?’

Lecia shrugged, her gaze never leaving the hard-hewn contours of his face as she said evenly, ‘It doesn’t—’

Very quietly he repeated, ‘Who is he?’

Lecia’s throat closed. She stared into eyes as cold and piercing as ice spears, saw his mouth set into a thin, straight line, and the tiny pulse that flicked against his jawbone.

‘Don’t try to be brotherly.’ Her voice sounded strained and unnaturally steady. ‘I’m not your sister and I can look after myself.’

‘Does it happen often?’ His tone was cool, almost impersonal, but she needed only to look at the stark, arrogant line of his jaw to know that he was still dangerously furious.

‘Not often,’ she said, ‘but it does happen. And not only to me—lots of women in business and professional life have to deal with harassment.’

‘I want to know who he is.’

She met the fierce glint in his eyes just as fiercely. ‘I’m not going to tell you.’

And she saw the leash of his will rein in the killing fury, watched it die down until his face reflected nothing but a flinty, unyielding detachment.

‘Very well.’ He took her arm and led her around the corner towards the narrow parking lot for guests’ cars. ‘Come on, we’d better be on our way or Aunt Sophie will think I’ve forgotten.’

Lecia had to remind herself to breathe. Although she’d sensed that uncompromising temper right from the start, she hadn’t understood just how formidable he could be. And yet, in spite of it, just to be with him caused a white-hot anticipation mixed with pleasure of such intensity that she’d already relegated the frustrations of the day to limbo.

And that’s how it started last time, she reminded herself grimly as he put her into the front of his large, opulent car. Anthony made you laugh and scrambled your brain until you couldn’t think straight.

Just remember how you dealt with that!

CHAPTER THREE

SOPHIE WARBURTON was tall, elegant and aristocratic, with the same blue eyes as her great-nephew and the nose, cleft chin and cheekbones Lecia shared with them both. She looked at least twenty years younger than her age.

‘Good heavens!’ she exclaimed after one comprehensive glance at Lecia. ‘Oh, yes, you are definitely one of us!’

She was charming, thanking Lecia for the house, showing her around it with pride, and insisting Keane drink a glass of her favourite whisky with her when Lecia decided in favour of sherry.

Only then did she say, ‘My dear, since Keane told me about you yesterday I’ve had a quick look through the records and there’s no sign of any link across the Tasman. The logical assumption, of course, is that somebody’s illegitimate child is the connection, but I can’t see when it could have happened.’

‘Neither can I,’ Lecia said. ‘I don’t know much about my father’s family, but my mother has told me that as far back as anyone can remember they’ve only ever had one child a generation, and from photographs I know they all looked like each other. And like Keane,’ she said, adding with a half-smile, ‘except that they were all bald. Even my father had lost most of his hair when he died.’

‘Whereas all of the Pagets have excellent heads of hair,’ Aunt Sophie said, nodding.

A teasing smile softened Keane’s hard mouth. Hastily Lecia said, ‘I assume the pattern goes right back to when the first one emigrated.’

Keane’s aunt laughed. ‘In genealogy it never pays to assume,’ she said. ‘Our ancestors were a formidable and upright lot, but they committed all the sins we do and they lied a lot more about some of them. It’s quite possible that a Paget might have paid a visit to Australia—or a Spring to New Zealand—and been reckless. We’re going to have to track down all the documentation and read it with an astute and sceptical mind. And then see if there’s anything to be picked up between the lines.’

Clearly the idea filled her with the zeal of a true enthusiast. Lecia exchanged an involuntary glance with Keane, noting the amusement and affection in his eyes.

Oh, hell, she thought despairingly. It was much easier to keep behind her defences when he was being aloof and detached.

‘Of course,’ Mrs Warburton pursued, ‘it could well have been back in England.’

Lecia nodded. ‘Although—woutd the genes predominate through all those generations?’

‘They’re good, strong genes,’ the older woman said, smiling as she looked from Lecia’s face to her great-nephew’s and then back again. ‘What do you know about your forebears?’

Acutely conscious of Keane’s speculative, intent regard, Lecia told her what small amount of family history she’d heard, ending, ‘I think I can find out more from my mother, although she doesn’t know a lot about my father’s family.’

‘My dear, would you mind? Shall I write to her?’

‘No,’ Lecia said, making a spur-of-the-moment decision, ‘I’ll ask her.’

An eager, vital smile, the expression of a woman with a mission, lit up Mrs Warburton’s face. ‘How exciting to discover a fresh branch of the family! And such a talented one! My dear, you must call me Aunt Sophie.’

Lecia flushed, aware that by accepting the compliment she was making it more and more difficult to keep a sufficient distance between her and Keane. ‘Thank you,’ she said without looking his way, ‘I’d like that.’

She had cousins and uncles on her mother’s side, and a big, extended family belonging to her stepfather, but the knowledge that she might have relatives from the Spring line filled a vacuum she’d never acknowledged until then.

Aunt Sophie entertained them for another half-hour before Keane got to his feet and said, ‘We have to go, I’m afraid.’

His great-aunt smiled up at him, her expression making it clear that she loved him dearly.

‘Thank you for bringing Lecia,’ she said. ‘I now see whole new fields of endeavour opening out in front of me. I can’t wait!’

In the car, Keane asked casually, ‘Have you had dinner?’

‘I’m not hungry,’ Lecia lied.

His mouth tightened as he put the vehicle in gear and directed it down the drive. ‘Coward,’ he said. ‘You can come and watch me eat mine.’

‘No, thank you, I have...’ Her voice trailed away. She was not good at lying, and he didn’t believe her anyway. Her hands moved, caught each other, clung.

‘Why are you afraid of me?’ he asked.

‘I’m not!’

‘Afraid of yourself, then?’ His swift sideways glance caught the truth. ‘Yes, that’s it, isn’t it? Why?’

‘It’s got nothing to do with fear,’ she said, grabbing desperately at some semblance of calmness. ‘It just makes me feel strange to look at you and see my own face. I feet—invaded. No, cloned. Oh, I don’t know what I feel, but I don’t like it!’

‘If we’d had brothers or sisters we’d be accustomed to it,’ he said imperturbably.

‘Well, yes, but...’ Again her voice faded. She certainly wasn’t going to explain that she couldn’t control her wildfire, unwanted attraction to him, and that she found it threatening.

Especially as she had no idea what he felt. Curiosity, of course; both he and his great-aunt were intrigued by the discovery of a new member of the family, and Lecia thought that they both liked to get to the bottom of things.

As she did.

Apart from that, his feelings were as suspect as hers. The ugly word ‘narcissism’ covered that sort of attraction—making her recall the sad legend of the Greek youth who fell in love with his own reflection and died because he couldn’t see anyone else more worthy of his love.

Or was this pull between them nothing more than an instinctive recognition of blood ties, a recognition she was mistaking for desire?

Anyway, there was the woman who’d been with him at the opera, who might be his lover. A network of nerves woke to instant heat. Hastily banishing the feverish images that ambushed her from some hidden part of her psyche, Lecia looked around, for a moment not realising where they were.

He was turning the vehicle into the car park of a restaurant perched halfway up one of Auckland’s little volcanic cones. ‘We’ll get used to seeing ourselves in each other’s face,’ he said, with a confidence that irritated her anew.

So he intended to keep in touch. In spite of her good intentions the prospect lifted her spirits, adding more fuel to the unruly bonfire of emotions that fed her responses.

‘I don’t think I ever will,’ she said neutrally.

As they were shown to their table—one overlooking the city and the sea, of course—he asked with an oblique smile, ‘What’s your decision?’

‘What?’ No, her heart wasn’t beating faster, nor were her eyes sparkling beneath her lashes. She wouldn’t allow herself to be overcome by sexual hunger.

‘You appeared to be weighing up two courses of action, neither of which appealed,’ Keane said smoothly.

The last of the daylight was fleeing, sinking into swift, sudden darkness. When it became too risky to hold his gaze, Lecia turned her head and concentrated on the view outside. She could just make out the saturated brilliance of bougainvillaea flowers tossed over a trellis; within moments the lights in the harbour leapt into prominence and all colour was smothered by the inexorable arrival of night.

She retorted, ‘I was mildly annoyed by your calm assumption that I’d go out to dinner with you. I like to be asked.’

A dark eyebrow lifted. ‘But as it’s in the family...?’

When she shook her head he looked at her with narrowed eyes and said deliberately, ‘No, I don’t feel related to you either.’ Before she could respond to this he went on, ‘Tell me, do you have to show every foreman on every building site that you can drive a straight nail?’

‘Only the most recalcitrant.’ Lecia’s gaze drifted down to the crystal vase of lime-green zinnias and gypsophila in the centre of the table, scanned the shining silverware, the white linen napkin in her lap, the way her hands were folded on top of it.

Keane said, ‘Obviously sexism is alive and well in the trade.’

Everything seemed to be moving in slow motion, as though they were under some kind of spell. A little too loudly she said, ‘There are still a lot of men—not only on construction sites—who believe that women just naturally don’t understand technology. Add to that many builders’ distrust of architects, and you get some real diehards.’