A Question Of Marriage

‘Tell you what,’ she suggested, ‘I really need to powder my nose. If you could find me a long, cool drink in the meantime, who knows?’ And she regained her hand and melted away into the crowd. A quick peep over her shoulder once she was inside told her that another woman had claimed him.

All the better, she thought as she found her bag, unobtrusively scanned the staircase and, seeing it deserted, slipped upstairs. No one knew better than she that there was a downstairs powder room for just these occasions, but surely a guest in a supposedly strange house could be forgiven for going upstairs?

And, in the proverbial twinkling of an eye, she’d let herself into her old bedroom. The room was in darkness but she waited for a few minutes, then moved forward cautiously, feeling for the bed and finding a bedside table. She had her hand on what felt like a lamp when the door opened and the overhead light went on. She froze, then swung round to see the man she’d danced with anonymously standing in the doorway.

‘So,’ he said with soft but unmistakable menace, closing the door behind him without turning, ‘I was right.’

‘I…I…’ Aurora stammered ‘…I…was looking for a bathroom. I couldn’t seem to find the light, that’s all.’

He smiled grimly. ‘Again? I’m only surprised you didn’t bring your torch with you, Little Miss Spain, who didn’t want to tell me her name.’

Aurora blinked and licked her lips. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’ She backed away as he moved towards her, and sat down unexpectedly on the bed. ‘I don’t know what you’re doing here either. Please leave, and I’ll find the bathroom on my own.’

‘Give me one good reason for not telling me your name,’ he countered.

She swallowed and thought frantically, then decided that the closer she could stick to the truth, the better. She tossed her hair with more spirit than she actually felt. ‘I don’t believe in being bowled over by men on first encounters.’

‘As in allowing yourself to be attracted to them even when it’s already happened?’ he suggested, with a wealth of satire in his dark gaze. ‘Or wearing provocative outfits,’ he added meaningfully.

Damn, Aurora thought, that hadn’t been such a good idea after all; and could think of nothing to say, so she merely shrugged.

‘But tonight was our second encounter, wasn’t it?’ he drawled then. ‘Aren’t you forgetting the way we…bumped into each other at the top of the stairs the last time you invaded my home?’

Aurora’s mouth fell open and her eyes were suddenly huge. ‘Your home! Who…who are you?’ she said in a strangled kind of croak.

‘Luke Kirwan,’ he replied, looking altogether taller, tougher and much more dangerous than she’d imagined earlier. ‘And you’re not getting out of here until you tell me what you’re so determined to steal from me, señorita.’

CHAPTER TWO

‘YOU can’t be!’ Aurora gasped, absolutely thunderstruck.

He studied her narrowly. ‘Believe me, I am. And this is my house, in case you’ve devised a ploy to confuse things somehow or other.’

‘But…but…who’s the other one, then?’ she stammered.

‘Other what?’

‘The man you were standing with next to the piano—the man who looks just like a prof—’ She broke off and bit her lip.

Luke Kirwan frowned and she saw him concentrate for a moment, then look fleetingly amused. ‘Jack Barnard?’ he suggested. ‘He’s my solicitor, but what has that got to do with any of this, señorita?’ he enquired coldly.

Aurora swallowed painfully and closed her eyes as she grappled not only with the folly of judging people on their appearances, but also having that prickling sense of déjà vu explained to her in this manner. She had been in Luke Kirwan’s arms before—not for long before she’d started to pummel and struggle with him, but long enough, obviously, for it to have imprinted itself on her subconscious.

But, it suddenly occurred to her and she clasped her hands together tightly, if that was all he had to go on, a similar sense of déjà vu, then he didn’t have a leg to stand on…

‘I think I know what’s going through your head, my pretty,’ he drawled as her lashes flew up. ‘How do I know it was you at the top of the stairs the last time you tried to rob me? I’ll tell you. Same height, same petite figure, same…’ he paused and looked wry ‘…athleticism but, above all, same unique—as you told me yourself—perfume.’ His dark eyes glinted sardonically.

Aurora’s lips parted and her eyes widened. Then she closed them again and barely stopped herself from saying caustically that, for a man groggy with some kind of virus, he’d taken in an awful lot about her and no one would buy it anyway!

But he spoke again, and this time there was a grim warning underlying his words that caused her to tremble inwardly. ‘Of course, finding you creeping around my bedroom, when there’s a clear sign downstairs directing people to a downstairs bathroom, adds a lot more weight to my evidence, don’t you agree?’

Aurora looked around properly for the first time. It had never occurred to her that the new owner would not use the master bedroom, but that was exactly what Luke Kirwan appeared to have done. Her old bedroom was now definitely, although luxuriously, furnished for a man.

‘I preferred the view from this room,’ he said, as if reading her thoughts.

Damn, she thought again, and forcibly prevented herself from wiping her face.

‘Well, Mr Kirwan,’ she said after a moment’s thought, ‘I am sorry for inadvertently invading your bedroom but you’re mistaken. I didn’t see the sign downstairs so it couldn’t have been so very clear. As for all the rest of it, whatever it is, I…’ she tilted her chin and gazed at him imperiously ‘…I’m happy to forget about it if you would be so kind as to direct me to a bathroom. I’ll even leave your party then, since you cherish these amazing suspicions about me. In fact, nothing would induce me to stay,’ she finished proudly.

He laughed softly as he took in the hauteur of her expression, the set of her small chin, her very straight back and the outraged bearing of her slender figure—even seated on a bed. ‘You’re a rather brilliant actress, aren’t you?’ he commented. ‘But the only thing that’s going to get you out of here is telling me who you are and why you’re here—’

‘I’ve told you that!’ she interrupted.

‘So you have. It doesn’t wash, though.’ He studied her comprehensively, right through her clothes again, in fact, so that she started to boil beneath that dark, insolently intimate gaze. ‘What is beginning to wash is something a little different,’ he continued leisurely. ‘Could you even be a groupie, señorita, who devised a rather novel way of getting through my secretary’s net?’

Aurora’s mouth fell open. ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about!’

‘No?’ The scepticism in his expression was chilling. ‘Never heard of student groupies? Girls? Believe me, it’s an occupation for some of them; it would appear to be the only reason they’re at university in the first place,’ he said with damning scorn.

Several things suddenly came clear to Aurora, including his secretary’s manner and why he never answered the phone himself, but the shock of it all rendered her speechless.

Giving him the opportunity to continue with lethal satire, ‘Why, yes. Heaven alone knows what bizarre scheme you’d concocted the other night—looking for something to steal from me to blackmail me into bed with you, perhaps?’ He raised an eyebrow at her. ‘But your actions tonight have been loud and clear—coyly refusing to tell me your name, being a seductively mysterious guest—and so on,’ he finished flatly.

To be thought of as a coy, student groupie throwing herself at his feet in a rather ‘novel’ manner caused Aurora to lose her temper completely. ‘Look here—’ she bounced off the bed ‘—I’ve had enough of this. Will you get out of my way before I scream the place down?’

‘Scream away,’ he invited. ‘The only thing that will achieve is to have me call the police.’

‘What?’

‘Oh, yes,’ he said. ‘In fact, you have a choice. I’ll leave you here for a period of sober reflection. When I come back, either you tell me the truth or I do get the police.’

‘If you think I have any intention of staying here,’ she spat at him, ‘you’re mistaken!’

‘No, I’m not. I propose to lock you in, you see.’

Aurora flew at him, prepared to scratch his eyes out, only to find herself caught in a grip of steel. ‘Let me go!’ she gasped through pale lips.

‘I’d rather let an enraged tigress go.’ He pinioned her hands behind her back. ‘I’ve also got something of a score to settle with you, Miss Spain. Let’s see if you kiss as well as you do—other things.’

‘I never kiss under these circumstances. I’m perfectly capable of biting, however,’ she warned through her teeth.

He smiled crookedly. ‘What circumstances do you kiss under?’

‘I need to be in love or on the way to it, like any normal girl,’ she replied scathingly. ‘The last thing I can imagine with you, Professor. For one thing, you’re too old for me, for another the mere thought of doing it under duress turns me right off!’ Her green eyes were proud and defiant.

‘OK.’ He released her pinioned hands but transferred his hands to her waist. ‘In exchange for no duress, could I get a promise that you’ll keep your fists to yourself?’

‘I’m not promising anything!’