Bronwyn Jameson – The Bought-and-Paid-For Wife (страница 3)

But he’s here, she told herself. He is what he is. Deal with it.

That pragmatic mantra had pulled her through a lot in twenty-nine years—more difficulties of more importance than Tristan. Most of them had been solved by her godsend marriage to Stuart and she could not afford to lose that resolution. Not now; not ever.

She started into the room and at the sound of her first footfall, his head came up. A thousand nerves jumped to life as he swung around to face her. She lifted her chin an inch higher. Straightened her shoulders and fixed her face with the cool, polite expression that had gotten her through the most terrifying of social events.

Let him call her duchess. She didn’t care.

And then she noticed what had held his attention—what he now held delicately balanced in his big hands—and her heart lurched with I-do-care anxiety. It was the Girl with Flowers, the most treasured in her collection of Lladro figurines.

That fretfulness must have registered in her expression because he regarded her narrowly. “Bad news?”

Vanessa knew he referred to the phone call, but she nodded toward the figurine. “Only if you drop that.”

Heart in mouth she watched him turn it over in his hands, first one way and then the other. As a football player he’d been magic with his hands, according to Stuart. But magic or not, she didn’t want Tristan’s hands on her things. She didn’t want to look at them a week or a month or a year from now, and remember this man in her home.

As much as she wanted to keep her distance, she couldn’t help herself. She had to cross the room and take the statuette from his hands.

“When I mentioned bad news, I meant the phone call.”

The brush of their fingers unsettled Vanessa more than she’d anticipated. She felt the fine tremor in her hand and prayed he didn’t hear the telltale rattle as she put the figurine down.

“There’s no bad news,” she said, recovering her poise. She indicated a wingback chair with one hand. “Would you like to sit?”

“I’m comfortable standing.”

Leaning against a cabinet with the heels of his hands resting on its edge, he looked at ease. Except the tightness around the corners of his mouth and the tick of a muscle in his jaw gave him away. Not to mention the intentness of the sharp blue gaze fixed on her face.

Like a lion, she decided, lolling in the grass of the veldt, but with every muscle coiled as he waited for the chance to pounce. Paint her pelt black and white and call her zebra, because she was the prey.

The vividness of that mental image created a shiver up her spine, but she snapped straight in automatic reflex. Do not let the enemy see your fear. It was a lesson she’d learned as a child, one she’d tried to instill into her younger brother, Lew.

One she’d used often in her new life, adapting to the scrutiny of Eastwick society.

As much as she wanted to put distance between herself and the enemy, she stood her ground and met his unsettling gaze. “Would you care to tell me about this new development? Because I can’t think of a thing that would make any difference to your claim on Stuart’s estate.”

“You’re aware of every letter in that will, Vanessa. Surely you’ve worked this out.”

“You’ve tried to obstruct every letter of that will. I can’t believe there’s one you missed!”

“We didn’t miss this one, duchess. You were just clever enough to beat us…then.”

Vanessa huffed out a breath. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. Stop playing games, Tristan. I don’t have the time or the patience.”

For a long moment he didn’t respond, although she realized—belatedly—that he no longer lounged against the cabinet. He’d straightened, closing down the gap between them. But she refused to ask for space. She refused to acknowledge that his proximity bothered her.

“Is he the same one?”

She blinked, baffled by his question. “Who?”

“The man you were expecting this afternoon. The one who put that smile on your face when you answered the door. The one who called.”

Was he crazy? “The same what? What are you talking about?”

“I’m asking if this man—Andy, isn’t it?—is the one who’s going to cost you a hundred million dollars.”

Vanessa’s heart seized with shock and a terrible realization.

“Well?” he asked, not giving her a chance to recover, to respond. “Is he the man you were sleeping with while you were married to my father?”

Two

Oh. My. Lord. He was talking about the adultery clause. The one left over from Stuart’s first marriage, to Tristan’s mother.

When Tristan had signaled his intention to challenge the will, her lawyer, Jack Cartwright, had gone over every clause with painstaking care, making sure Vanessa understood and that he wouldn’t receive any nasty surprises from the opposing attorney.

She’d given that clause no more thought. She had no reason to. But now Tristan thought she’d had a lover…that she still had a lover.

That comprehension took a moment to sink in, and then she couldn’t prevent her shock from bubbling into laughter.

“You think this is funny?”

“I think,” she said, recovering, “this is ludicrous. Where would you get such an idea?”

“My lawyer’s asked around. There are rumors.”

She stared at him in disbelief. “After almost two years of this dispute, you’ve decided to invent rumors?”

“I didn’t invent anything.”

“No? Then where did these rumors suddenly sprout from?”

He took a second to answer, just long enough for Vanessa to note that the muscle still ticked in his jaw. “I received a letter.”

“From?”

“Does it matter?”

“Yes, it does,” she fired back at him, her earlier disbelief growing indignant. “It matters that someone is slandering me.”

He regarded her in silence, a long taut moment that fanned Vanessa’s gathering fury.

“I’m giving you the chance to deal with me privately, here and now,” he said finally, his voice low and even. “Or would you prefer to take this to court? Would you like to answer all the questions about who and where and how often under oath? Would you like all your society friends to hear—”

“You bastard. Don’t you dare even think about spreading your lies.”

“Not lies.” Something glinted, brief and dangerous in his eyes. “I intend to dig deep, Vanessa, if that’s what it takes to discover all your dirty little secrets. I will find every truth about you. Every last detail.”

Vanessa’s head whirled with the implications of his threat. She had to get away from him, to cool down, to think, but when she tried to escape he blocked her exit. And when she attempted to stare him down, he shifted closer, hemming her into the corner where she couldn’t move without touching him.

Her resentment rose in a thick, choking wave. She wanted to sound icy, imperious, but instead her voice quivered with rage. “You start by turning up at my home uninvited. You manhandle me. You threaten me with your nasty lies. And now you’re resorting to physical intimidation. I can hardly wait to see what you try next.”

Their eyes clashed in a lightning bolt that was eight parts antagonism, two parts challenge. She knew, a split second before he moved, before his hands came up to trap her against the wall, that the two parts challenge was two parts too much. And still she couldn’t back down, even when his gaze dropped to her lips and caused a slow sweet ripple in her blood. Even when he muttered something low and unintelligible—perhaps an oath, perhaps a warning—beneath his breath.

Then his mouth descended to hers, catching her gasp of indignation.

For a second she was too stunned by the sensation of his lips pressed against hers to react. Everything was new, untried, unfamiliar. The bold presence of his mouth, the rough texture of his skin, the elemental taste of rain and sun and man.

Everything was unexpected except the electric charge that flushed through her skin and tightened her breasts. That was the same as when he’d touched her, the same as when he’d watched her walk away, the same as when she’d turned at the library door and caught him staring.

She heard the accelerated thud of her heartbeat and scrambled to compose herself, to reject that unwanted response. But then he shifted his weight slightly and she felt the brush of his jacket against her bare arm. For some reason that slide of body-warmed fabric seemed more intimate than the kiss itself, and the effect shimmered through her skin like liquid silk.

The hands she’d raised to shove him away flattened against his chest and the slow beat of his heart resonated into her palms. With a shock she realized that she wasn’t only touching him but kissing him back, just now, for one split second. Oh, no. A thousand times no. Her eyes jolted open, wide and appalled, as she pushed with renewed purpose.

His mouth stilled for one measured second before he let her go. The message was clear. He’d instigated this. He was ending it. Damn him. And damn her traitorous body for reacting to whatever weird male-female chemistry was going on between them.

Red-hot anger hazed her vision and she lashed out without conscious thought. He dodged her easily, catching her arm before she came close to landing a blow. And that only infuriated her more. She wrenched at her captured arm and the jerky action caught the Lladro Girl with Flowers she’d set down on the cabinet.