Tamed By Her Husband

‘So I was wrong.’ He began dropping her belongings back into the bag, but she snatched that from him too.

‘I suppose that’s less of a climb-down than saying you’re sorry!’ Angry colour gave some glow to her cheeks as she began scooping up her possessions. ‘I might not amount to much in your—or a lot of other people’s—eyes, and basically I don’t give a fig! But I do draw the line at—’ her words were punctuated by short, angry breaths ‘—drugs, other people’s husbands, and anything that puts me out of control! And I do happen to value my own body!’

As if that was a cue for them to do so, Kane’s eyes slid, of their own volition, over her slender frame, coming to rest with a wave of heated awareness on the smooth flesh of her naked midriff, that small waist that most women would die for, that enviably flat stomach with its tantalising navel, the creamy camber of her hips. He wanted to coil his arm around her, draw her close as he had done when she had been struck back there on the Ramblas, only not to protect her this time, he realised shamefully, but to feel her warmth, the silky softness of her skin beneath his hands…

Blast her! He was thinking just like some smitten youth. He put a chastening clamp on his thoughts, picking up the small red document still lying on the table and handing it to her.

‘Do you always carry your passport around with you?’ That, too, was whisked from his hand to disappear with the rest of her things into the canvas holdall. ‘I was burgled twice when I was…’ She paused, looking at him as though weighing up what she was about to say. ‘Anyway, ever since, I’ve kept it with me. Anyone who wants it will have to get past me first,’ she told him determinedly, adding as a very pointed afterthought, ‘and that includes you!’

Kane studied her with a dubious lift of an eyebrow. ‘I’m sure you’re strong enough to fend off anyone,’ he commented wryly.

Her smile would have dazzled any man, but he wasn’t fooled. She wasn’t at all impressed by his remark.

‘I don’t think it would be a bad idea for you to lie down for a while,’ he advised, bringing her below into the luxuriously appointed berth of the forward cabin with its pale lacquered furniture and queen-size bed. ‘You look as though a bit of extra rest wouldn’t do you any harm. And the shower…’ He indicated the glass door leading off the bedroom. ‘When you’ve freshened up, I’ll bring you some tea.’

‘Thanks.’

She looked like a waif, he thought, standing there in her shabby combats and little red top with that ridiculous slogan printed across it. Not like the heiress to a multimillion-pound concern whose difficulties she could have no concept of, and in which she certainly had no interest beyond the lifestyle it provided her with, he reminded himself with his jaw tightening. She might have been just some ordinary girl he had plucked off the street, if he hadn’t known better—felt the deadly appeal in that dangerous vulnerability of hers that called to everything that was masculine in him…

‘You said you drew the line.’

‘What?’ She pivoted round, startled. Obviously she thought he had already left.

‘At other people’s husbands,’ he said softly.

She looked at him askance, some dark emotion crossing her lovely face, making him instantly regret having brought it up. Why had he? he wondered. To remind himself of just how dangerous she was? To protect himself? She was just a girl, for heaven’s sake! What protection did he need?

‘Yes.’ She gave a careless shrug. ‘Well, you know how the saying goes. Once bitten—twice shy.’

He couldn’t help the quip that slipped from his lips. ‘Is that why you asked if I was married, Shannon?’

As the cabin door clicked closed behind him, Shannon felt like throwing something at it. So she’d made a mistake. Been a poor judge of character. But why, oh, why, had Kane felt compelled to bring it up?

He was still treating her like the super-rich bitch the taw-drier papers had named her back home, she thought with an aching regret for the reputation she had unwittingly cultivated, and which she had left England to escape. And yet it was Kane’s harsh opinion of her that had hurt her most, and still did, she realised hopelessly, dropping her grubby bag down onto the pale coverlet of the bed, before sliding back the door to the en suite.

The oyster-coloured shower and basin and the blending marble of the counter tops brought a small, appreciative curve to her lips. It seemed a long time since she had enjoyed luxury like this. It was something she had relinquished when she had decided to make a bid for freedom, run from the gossip and the papers, from her father’s dictatorship and increasing disapproval, and stand on her own two feet.

There was no evidence of Kane’s occupation in here though, and, grateful for a few moments’ respite from her profoundly disturbing awareness of him, she ran the taps and splashed water onto her face, wishing, as she watched the water swirl out of the basin, that she could as easily erase her memories of the past.

She had been nine years old when her mother had died after a riding accident, and forever afterwards Ranulph Bouvier hadn’t known what to do with his fast-developing, much too adventurous daughter. Her life had become a series of expensive boarding schools and, during the holidays, trips abroad with whatever grudging member of his staff he could pay to accompany her. What she had wanted—needed—was her father’s love and affection, but he was always too busy, too preoccupied to give her any time. Instead he had indulged her to the nth degree. Fast cars. Jewellery. Clothes. And, of course, holidays. She had had it all, but unfortunately, Shannon thought sadly, it wasn’t enough. She would have forfeited all the trappings of her father’s wealth for a loving and harmonious relationship with him—to be able to talk to him about her dreams and aspirations, have her opinions taken seriously—but Ranulph Bouvier wasn’t the sort of man who would listen to anyone.

Perhaps it was his refusal to accept that she wanted to do something more worthwhile with her life than simply support a suitable husband, as her mother had, that had set her on that course of single-minded rebellion. The all-night parties. The publicity. The questionable company. At the time it had seemed to fulfil a need for the love and attention that was missing from her life; a need to be noticed. But the fulfilment was superficial and short-lived, like every relationship she tried to form with any of the men who pursued her. And as her disillusionment grew, so did her father’s disapproval. He didn’t like the way she was behaving: her inability to stick with one boyfriend, the adverse publicity she was courting. Didn’t she know she was making a fool of herself? Developing the worst possible kind of reputation? But she couldn’t help it if every man she took an interest in just seemed to be after her money, her body, or both.

All except Kane Falconer, that was.

Replacing the towel on its gleaming rail, she moved back into the bedroom. The large bed with its plump pillows beckoned invitingly, and the blind at its porthole was pulled down against the fierce heat of the Spanish sun.

Perhaps she would do as he’d suggested, she thought, and lie down for a while. The problem in town was going to take some time to sort out and it would be ludicrous even considering going home until it was safe.

Subsiding onto the sumptuous bed, she tried not to think about where Kane slept when he was on board. Nevertheless, she couldn’t prevent him from intruding unsettlingly on her thoughts, just as he had been doing since she was seventeen.

She had been dangerously affected by the man from the moment she had first set eyes on him, the day she had called into the modern Bouvier office building and seen him sitting there behind her father’s desk, as if he belonged there.

He hadn’t looked up for a moment, but a moment was all it had taken for the full impact of those compelling good looks and that hard virility to print themselves forever on her consciousness.

Staring down at his groomed dark head, at the breadth of his shoulders beneath the sophisticated cut of his dark jacket, she had started fidgeting, a little irritated that he hadn’t noticed her. Everyone noticed her. She had been wearing a black silk suit that day with her hair swept up, and she could still remember how sensuously the low-cut jacket and trousers moved against her body.

He had looked up then, as though it had only just dawned on him that she was there—although she’d known that that wasn’t the case, that very little would get past a man like him—and, tall as she was herself in her four-inch heels, as he’d risen to his feet she had felt unusually eclipsed by his dominating height.

‘Kane Falconer.’ His voice was deep and sexy, and as he reached across the deck her irritation melted under the blaze of his smile. ‘The newest assignee to the board.’ The board of directors, that was, which gave him top-notch status. The fingers that clasped hers were warm and firm, their contact so overwhelming that she completely forgot her manners and failed to return the courtesy of an introduction, hearing herself stammering uncharacteristically instead, ‘W-where’s my father?’

‘Your…’ Clarity dawned in eyes that reminded her of a cool blue alpine lake beneath the thick sable of long lashes. ‘So you’re Jezebel,’ he remarked, with his mouth twitching at the corners, repeating the name that one of the newspapers had so detrimentally used to describe her.

Had she been older, perhaps she would have laughed about it, Shannon decided in retrospect. As it was, for all her confidence, she had been too insecure and already hopelessly ensnared by that hard dynamism of his to take such unprovoked criticism from him lightly.

Feigning nonchalance as a protective armour, she had murmured, ‘If you say so. Didn’t she flout convention and shame herself by wearing red to the ball when every other woman wore white?’ She remembered watching a video once of the old Hollywood film. And when the man behind the desk dipped his head in the subtlest acknowledgment, she’d continued, ‘Perhaps they should have named me Danielle,’ with a forced little laugh. ‘For daring to stand alone.’

’Daniel,’ he corrected, releasing her at last, ‘was a man. And he faced lions—which I would have said was far preferable to a gossip-hungry press. And you’re just a girl.’ He might have thought so, but in that moment when those cool eyes moved over the smooth length of her throat, touched on the swell of her pale breasts beneath the low-cut jacket, she grew up; knew that she had met her match and, with a throbbing recognition, her mate. ‘Doesn’t it hurt or bother you?’ he said. ‘What they’re printing?’

Of course it did, but let anyone know it and they would have won—torn her to pieces, she thought bitterly. So, with the slightest movement of her shoulder that unintentionally exposed more of her breast to that hard masculine gaze, she answered, ‘What? That I’m seen at every wild party from here to John O’Groats and that I change my boyfriends as often as I change my underwear?’ She couldn’t believe she was quoting such derogatory statements to him, not only because they were totally untrue, but also because she had never in her young life met a man on whom she had so instantly wanted—no, needed—to make a good impression. Nevertheless, she felt herself cringing as she shrugged again and said, ‘Why should it?’, knowing that she couldn’t have sounded less bothered—as he’d put it—if she’d tried.

‘It hurts your father.’ He rocked back on his heels, surveying her with narrowed eyes and a dark heat that startlingly she recognised as something other than anger; something basic and feral. ‘But perhaps that’s the intention.’

Even while reeling from the shock of a mutual sexual chemistry, Shannon felt the sting of his remark like a whip across her face. Who did this man think he was? What right did he have to speak to her like this when he didn’t even know her? When he didn’t know anything about her—or of her unhappy relationship with her father?

‘I don’t know who you are, or what you’re doing here, Mr Falconer. But I don’t think my private life—or anyone else’s in this family—is any of your concern! Unless you think your duties include trying to take me in hand and dragging me back onto the straight and narrow—in which case I can tell you now, you’re wasting your time!’

He was moving some papers on the desk with those long, well-shaped hands, but glanced up, looking totally unperturbed by her outburst.

‘I’ve no intention of dragging you anywhere, Shannon.’ It was the first time he had spoken her name and, despite everything, hearing the way he said it in that deep, rich baritone voice made the hairs stand up on the back of her neck. ‘Much as I wouldn’t balk at the challenge, I’m rather opposed to seeing my name in the tabloids.’

She walked out of the office that day with her head held high, yet close to tears, having completely forgotten why she had gone there in the first place.

After that she tried to avoid him, but, of course, it was impossible. Having struck a hit with Ranulph Bouvier from the outset, Kane was often invited to the house for dinner. Sometimes she found herself having to speak to him if he rang her father at home—totally unaware of how even his deep, disembodied voice had the power to make her insides melt; her loins burn with a tense and feverish heat. And then, of course, he was at every company function that Ranulph insisted she attend.

‘How old are you?’ she found the courage to ask him after he had asked her to dance at that last company dinner.

And he replied, ‘Too old for you.’

Approaching nineteen, confident of her looks and a sexuality she had sometimes despaired of, she laughed up into his strong, exciting face and, using everything that was feminine in her to try and break through his hard imperviousness towards her, answered sweetly, ‘And what makes you think that that simple question suggests I’d want you?’

Her boldness surprised him, but he merely laughed under his breath and pulled her shockingly close.

‘Because I’m probably the only man in London who hasn’t shown any inclination to bed you,’ he returned, his smile blazing, his eyes coolly sardonic. ‘And one thing I strongly suspect about you, Shannon, is that your greatest challenges are the things you know you can’t have.’

Though she laughed it off, his remark depressed her, assuring her that, when it came to getting Kane Falconer to like her—let alone want her—she was wasting her time. He was too experienced, much too clever for her to outwit, argue with or even try to use her teenage charms on, and in his company she merely suffered one frustrating humiliation after another.

When she started seeing Jason Markham and he asked her to spend the summer with him at his lochside cottage in Scotland she grabbed the chance, as an opportunity to escape not only her father’s increasing domination, but also her hopeless feelings for Kane. They were, she decided, blind and stupidly juvenile; outrageously sexual; agonisingly intense.