Forbidden Pleasure

‘Can you manage?’ he enquired evenly as he opened the door.

‘Yes.’ Refusing to acknowledge the ache in her leg, she climbed in, took a deep, steadying breath and reached down to clip on her seatbelt. She didn’t look at the man who walked around to his side and got in.

‘I presume you left your car at the gate,’ he said as he started the engine.

‘Yes. In the pull-off.’

He handled the big machine with skill on the narrow gravel road. Ianthe sat silently until she saw her car huddled against a pine plantation, shielded from the dusty road by a thick growth of teatree and scrub.

‘Here,’ she said.

‘I see it.’ He drove in behind her car and stopped.

As she got quickly down and limped across to her elderly Japanese import, Ianthe repressed an ironic smile. The only things her car shared with the opulent Rover were the basic equipment and a coat of dust.

The sun had sailed far enough across the sky to bypass the dark shade of the trees and heat up the car’s interior. With a last uncharitable thought for Mark, Ianthe wound down windows and held the door open, wishing desperately that her unwilling host would just get back into his big vehicle and leave her alone. She felt balanced on a knife-edge, her past hidden by shadow, her future almost echoing with emptiness.

‘There, that’s cool enough,’ she said with a bright smile. ‘Thank you.’

‘I should be thanking you for not prosecuting me,’ he said, amusement glimmering for a second in the frigid depths of his eyes. ‘The only recompense I can make is to offer the beach to you whenever you wish to swim.’

‘That’s very kind of you—thank you.’ The words were clumsy and she couldn’t keep the surprise from her voice, so she nodded and retreated to her car, thinking, Not likely.

Pity had produced that offer, and she loathed pity. Since the accident she’d endured more than a lifetime’s quota, defended from its enfeebling effects only by a stubborn, mute pride.

With a savage twist she switched on the engine, furious when it grumbled and stuttered before coughing into silence. Thin-lipped, she tried it again, and this time it caught and purred into life. Smiling politely, she waved.

Before she let the brake off he leaned forward. ‘I’ll follow you home, just to make sure you’re all right.’

‘There’s no need,’ she began, but he’d already stepped back and headed towards the Rover.

Unease crept across her skin on sinister cat’s paws. For a moment she even toyed with the idea of going to someone else’s bach, until common sense scoffed that a few questions would soon tell him where she lived.

She wasn’t scared—she had no reason to fear him.

So she drove sedately down the road until she came to the third bach by the second lake, and turned through the shade of the huge macrocarpa cypress on the front lawn, then into the garage. The Range Rover drew to a halt on the road outside, its engine purring while she got out of the car, locked it, and went towards the door of the bach.

He waited until she’d actually unlocked it before tooting once and turning around.

The last Ianthe saw of him was an arrogant, angular profile against the swirling white dust from the road and the negligent wave of one long hand. Her breath hissed out. For a moment she stared at the faded paint on the door, then jerkily opened it and went inside.

Heat hit her like a blow. Pushing wide the windows, she thought briefly of the wall of glass, open to the lake and the air, then shrugged. When this bach had been built bi-fold windows that turned rooms into pavilions had not been a part of the ordinary house, let alone a holiday place like this.

Who was he? And why did he feel the need for someone like Mark in a place like New Zealand? Perhaps, she thought, curling her lip, he had a fragile ego that demanded the reassurance of a bodyguard.

It didn’t seem likely, but then what did she know of the very rich? Or the very beautiful? If the camera liked his face as much as her eyes had, he might well be a film star. As it was, his face had seemed vaguely familiar, like a half-remembered image from a stranger’s photograph album.

From now on she was going to have to confine herself to the shore of this lake, which meant curious looks and often audible comments about her leg. She looked down at the scar. Purple-red, jagged and uneven, it stretched from her thigh to her ankle. She’d damned near died from shock and loss of blood. Sometimes she even wished she had.

Her capacity for self-pity sickened her. It was new to her, this enormous waste of sullen desperation that so often lay in wait like quicksand.

Determinedly cheerful, she said out loud into the stifling air, ‘Well, Ianthe Brown, you’ve had an experience. Whoever he is, he’s not your common or garden tourist.’

Lifting heavy waves of hair from her hot scalp, she headed for the bathroom.

Tricia Upham, the friend whose parents owned the bach and had lent it to Ianthe for as long as she needed it, had said as she handed over the key, ‘Now that your hair’s grown past your shoulders, for heaven’s sake leave it alone. Chopping it off and hiding it behind goggles and flippers was just wicked ingratitude.’

‘Long hair’s a nuisance when you spend a lot of time underwater in a wetsuit,’ Ianthe had replied.

Now it didn’t seem as though she’d ever get back into a wetsuit.

In fact, she’d be glad if she could just get into the water. Setting her jaw, she washed her face and towelled it dry. ‘Self-pity is a refuge for wimps,’ she told her reflection, challenging the weakness inside her.

Soon she’d be able to swim again.

Surely.

She only needed determination.

The man behind the desk called out, ‘Come in.’

Mark appeared. ‘Before you tell me how big a fool I am,’ he said stiffly, ‘I’m sorry.’

The frown that had been gathering behind Alex Considine’s eyes vanished. He smiled with irony. ‘Just don’t let your enthusiasm override your common sense again.’

‘I won’t.’

‘If you see anything suspicious, report to me.’ His smile broadened. ‘I gather my mother got to you.’

Mark grinned and relaxed. ‘Several times,’ he said, adding, ‘She said you were in danger and emphasised that I should treat everyone with suspicion.’

So why bring a trespasser into the house? Alex wondered drily. Still, his mother was very persuasive, and Mark was a caretaker, not a bodyguard. ‘She’s spent her life worrying about me. I’m not in danger, especially not from slight young women of about twenty-five with a limp. Don’t take any notice of my mother.’

He hadn’t been able to convince her that, although there were people who’d rejoice at the news of his death, nothing was likely to happen to him in New Zealand. It had its problems, this little South Pacific country, and was fighting the worldwide increase in crime like every other country, but a man was probably as safe here as he would be anywhere.

He looked down at the pile of faxes on his desk and asked, ‘Who is the trespasser?’

Mark gave him a startled look. ‘How did you know I recognised her?’

‘If she’d been the usual tourist you’d have escorted her to the gate and sent her on her way.’

‘Yeah, well, I knew I’d seen her somewhere, and I knew it was on television, so I thought she was a reporter. That’s why I brought her back here. I thought you might want to interrogate her.’

Alex Considine nodded. ‘But?’

‘When I came in with the tea-tray I remembered who she was. She fronted a series of wildlife documentaries a year or so ago, until she got bitten by a shark somewhere up in the Pacific.’

So that was what had given her the limp and that hideous scar. Alex’s blood chilled. ‘What’s her name?’