Forgotten Sins

‘No, thank you,’ Aline said, appalled by the cold reptilian scud of fear down her spine. She saw the camera focus and had to hide an impulse to scuttle inside to safety.

‘It won’t take a moment—it’s about Stuart Freely’s biography of your husband.’ The woman gave a persuasive smile. ‘We thought you might like to make some comments.’

‘You heard Ms Connor,’ Jake said briefly. ‘She doesn’t want to comment.’

Smirched and sickened by the determined interest she saw in the woman’s face, Aline unlocked the door and walked inside.

‘It must be a quiet weekend for news,’ she said bitterly as Jake closed the door behind him.

‘Change your mind and come with me. The uproar will die down in a week or so—the media will soon find something else to feed on.’

‘You’re very kind,’ she said, fear mingling with a restless longing, ‘but it would be cowardly—’

‘Cowardly? To stop them putting you in a pillory to entertain an audience?’ Each scornful word cut through the armour of aloofness she’d erected. ‘Come up with a better excuse than that, Aline.’

Aline looked around the sitting room she and Michael had furnished with so much care, so much pleasure. Black anger and despair gripped her. The thought of spending one more moment in this shrine to a lie was beyond bearing.

At least in Jake’s abrasive company she wouldn’t wallow in self-pity, imagining Michael and Lauren in each other’s arms, hearing him whisper his love to another woman…

‘All right, I’ll come,’ she said, weakly surrendering.

‘Get some clothes,’ Jake commanded. He took a mobile phone from his pocket and began to punch in numbers. She watched as he held it to his mouth, his keen raptor’s eyes fixed on her. ‘Sally?’ he said. ‘I’ve got a couple of jobs for you, both urgent—’

Aline ran up the stairs and flung clothes from her wardrobe into a weekend bag. Feverishly but automatically, she stuffed cosmetics and toiletries on top, grabbed a pair of shoes, and changed from her silk suit into black trousers and a polo-necked T-shirt the same colour. After pushing the long sleeves up to her elbows, she slung a black linen shirt around her shoulders in case it got cold on the boat.

Abruptly her energy drained away; she stood for a long moment, staring blankly around. Michael smiled at her from the dressing table. Eyes filling with tears at the loss of a lovely dream, she walked over and put the photograph face down in the drawer. One day perhaps she would accept that to have loved him was worth it; all she could feel now was outrage and humiliation—and an angry, unexpected sympathy for Lauren, because Michael had betrayed them both.

‘Have you finished up there?’

‘Yes,’ she said promptly, and came out of the room. Behind her, jerked by her ungentle hand, the door closed with a small crash.

Six foot three of virile, compelling male, Jake waited at the foot of the stairs, the autocratic angles of his bronze profile gilded by the late-afternoon sun. Tawny lights glimmered in his black hair and a cynical smile hardened his mouth.

He was the ultimate challenge, she thought, stabbed by an urgent, primitive response—a challenge she wasn’t up to.

‘Do you need help with that bag?’ he asked briskly.

Heat burned along her cheekbones. ‘No, thank you,’ she said, lifting it and walking down the stairs. Instinct warned her that by going with Jake she was setting out on an unknown journey into perilous seas, a journey with no map and no compass. And she was a very weary wayfarer.

Perhaps her mental and emotional exhaustion showed in her face, for Jake took the bag from her and asked in a different voice, ‘Do you have a back door?’

‘Through there.’ She indicated the direction. ‘It leads into the garage, and then into an access alley.’

‘Good.’ His smile twisted as he glanced at her. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen you when you haven’t been dressed in perfect taste. Those are ideal clothes for a fast getaway. Can you walk half a kilometre or so up to the golf course?’

‘Of course I can—but why?’

‘Because that’s where the helicopter will be.’

‘The helicopter?’ Her voice sounded flat, without inflection, but she didn’t care; she struggled to reach that shroud of grey nothingness that shielded her from pain and shock. She’d come to know it well after Michael’s death, but it was no longer there for her and she knew why; Jake’s raw masculinity had blown it into wispy shreds, leaving her quivering and exposed.

Patiently he said, ‘The chopper was to have picked me up in Auckland, but it’s on its way here now.’

‘What about your car?’

‘Someone will drive it back to town,’ he told her.

Because it seemed reasonable, Aline nodded and followed him through the back door, docilely handed him the keys and waited while he locked up behind them.

‘I’ll go ahead,’ he said.

But nobody ambushed them in the alley behind the townhouses.

‘Most people never think to check the back,’ Jake said, locking the gate behind Aline and pocketing the keys. ‘Let’s get out of here.’

Sometimes, she thought, donning sunglasses as they strode away from the house she’d shared with Michael, it was easier and simpler to give in to an irresistible force. And if that was just another way to say she was a coward—well, so be it.

They had almost reached the golf course when they heard the helicopter coming across the ocean, descending rapidly.

‘Walk faster,’ Jake said calmly as the whump-whump-whump of its engine began to echo. ‘No, don’t run—we don’t want to attract any attention.’

But no one took any notice; people living around this superb golf course were accustomed to the arrival and departure of helicopters. The street was still empty when they turned into the gate and headed for the concrete pad where the chopper was settling with cumbersome accuracy.

The pilot lifted a hand. The door slid open and another man leapt down, crouching as he ran towards them. Jake dropped something into his palm, then grabbed Aline’s hand.

‘Keep your head down,’ he commanded, and towed her up to the open door.

The blast of turbulent air whipped long strands of black hair from the neat coil at the back of her head, tossing it around her cold face. Jake dumped the cases, and in spite of her protests lifted Aline into the machine.

The way her eager flesh reacted to his impersonal grip finally robbed her of any chance of reaching that barren, emotionless refuge she longed for. She might have been able to put the swimming in her head down to the thud of the rotors, but what set her heartbeat pummelling her breastbone was Jake’s touch, the faint salty fragrance of his skin, and his effortless strength.

She pushed the tangled locks from her face with shaking fingers.

By then in the front, Jake turned. ‘Seatbelt,’ he mouthed, pointing to the belt with one imperative hand.

Biting her lip, she nodded and groped for the straps. After watching until she’d buckled them across her waist, Jake pushed the door closed before reaching for a pair of headphones. Beneath the fine material of his shirt his body flexed with spare masculine grace.

Aline watched his lips move as he said something to the pilot. Was she being incredibly stupid to go with him?

Well, if she was, who cared? She closed her eyes. Michael, she thought drearily, oh, Michael…

Yet deep in her innermost heart she’d always known she wasn’t enough of a woman to keep Michael satisfied. Lauren’s ripe femininity was what men wanted.

A howling increase in the blast of the engines was followed by a sudden lurch and then lift-off. Aline settled back and let her eyelids drift up. With bent head, Jake was checking something in his lap. The westering sun painted a wash of gold over his face, emphasising its bold stamp of authority, its stark, forceful command.

Heat seared through her, smashing past the layers of weary grief. She shivered with muted apprehension as they flew away from the sunset over water the colour of wine, heading over peninsulas and bays and islands. How on earth had she let herself be hijacked like this?

Cowardice, she decided, and Jake’s uncompromising will. She should have seen it coming; she’d soon learned to respect his intelligence and his grasp of business. He’d known exactly what he wanted from his association with the bank, and he’d used his clout and a certain amount of ruthless power in negotiation, although the final deal satisfied both partners.