Jordan St Claire: Dark and Dangerous (14 page)

‘Well, that was pretty nasty even for you,’ Lucan said with disapproval as he closed the door behind him before striding further into the room.

‘I don’t remember asking for your opinion on my behaviour, Lucan,’ he muttered wearily.

His brother frowned. ‘It was possible to hear your raised voice all the way down the hallway.’

His mouth twisted derisively. ‘How utterly shocking!’

Lucan raised dark brows. ‘Exactly what
is
your relationship with Stephanie McKinley?’

‘You were the one who hired her.’ Jordan turned away abruptly and began walking painfully towards his bedroom.

‘That wasn’t what I asked.’

‘It’s all you’re going to get!’ Jordan snapped, as each step he took caused him excruciating agony.

‘Have you been to bed with her?’

Jordan came to a sudden and painful halt before slowly turning back to face his eldest brother. ‘Mind your own business,’ he bit out with slow precision.

‘I’ll take that as a yes, shall I?’ Lucan murmured speculatively.

Jordan glared. ‘You can take it any way you please.’

‘Oh, believe me, I will,’ Lucan said.

‘No doubt,’ Jordan muttered disgustedly.

His brother gave him an arrogant look. ‘That aside, I believe you owe Miss McKinley an apology—’

‘Like hell I do!’

‘You deliberately set out to insult her.’ Lucan gave him one of his superior looks.

Jordan knew exactly what he had done. He just wasn’t sure why he had done it. What difference did it make to him whether or not Stephanie was still panting after some man called Richard she had been involved with before the two of them had even met?

His eyes narrowed. ‘Tell me, Lucan—when you decided to hire her, did you do your usual check into her background?’

His brother looked unconcerned by the insult in Jordan’s tone. ‘Stephanie McKinley graduated top of her class—’

‘I meant her
personal
background,’ Jordan cut in impatiently.

‘I don’t believe her personal life is any of my concern. Nor,’ Lucan added softly, ‘if your lack of interest in her is genuine, should it be any of yours.’

No, it shouldn’t, Jordan acknowledged grudgingly. Except last night had made it so.

Damn it, he had thought Stephanie was different. Had hoped that she was. And all the time she had been in
his arms she had been hankering for some man called Richard.

‘Unless it escaped your notice, Stephanie McKinley was crying when she ran out of here.’ Lucan’s mouth had thinned disapprovingly.

‘I noticed,’ Jordan admitted. ‘But we have much more important things to worry about than Stephanie’s hurt feelings, remember?’

‘Let’s deal with one problem at a time, hmm?’ Lucan insisted. ‘Your first priority is to apologise to Miss McKinley—’

‘For stating the truth?’

His brother looked implacable. ‘I didn’t hear her calling you a cruel and heartless louse, but at the moment
that
happens to be the truth, too.’

Jordan’s mouth compressed into a tight line. ‘Obviously Stephanie is much more restrained than I am. Now, if you wouldn’t mind, Lucan?’ he added pointedly. ‘I need to go and lie down before I fall down.’

He didn’t wait for his brother to answer, but limped the rest of the way to his bedroom and all but slammed the door behind him before collapsing on the bed with a heartfelt sigh of relief.

Hours spent putting on an act for his mother had taken much more out of Jordan than he had expected. The conversation a few minutes ago with Stephanie even more so.

Did he owe her an apology?

Her private life was her business. A few kisses—okay, so it had been more than just a few kisses—didn’t entitle Jordan to know about every man she had ever slept with.

Damn it, Lucan was right; he
did
owe Stephanie an apology!

* * *

‘I’m sorry.’

Stephanie turned her head abruptly on the pillow as she looked across the room to where Jordan stood stiffly in the bedroom doorway.
Swayed
in the doorway, would actually be a better description of what he was doing. He leant heavily on his cane with one hand and held on to the doorframe with the other.

She sat up with a frown. ‘You should be in bed—’

‘I honestly don’t think I can make it back to my own bedroom,’ Jordan admitted ruefully as he staggered across the room and sank down gratefully on the side of her bed. ‘I’m not sure I even have enough energy left to lie down, let alone walk.’

Stephanie was pretty sure that he didn’t; his cheeks were hollow, eyes dark with pain, and his mouth was set in a grimly determined line. The same determination that had enabled him to get to her bedroom and no further.

She stood up hastily to move round to Jordan’s side of the bed. ‘Are you going to let me help you this time?’ She was hesitant about even touching him again after the way he had reacted earlier.

He gave a pained wince. ‘If you don’t then I’ll probably just slide onto the floor before passing out.’

Stephanie shook her head even as she took away his cane and slipped off his shoes, before helping him to lie back against the pillows and carefully swing his legs up onto the brocade bedcover. ‘You shouldn’t have strained yourself by even attempting to come in here.’

He glanced up at her. ‘Lucan seems to think I owe you an apology.’

Stephanie stilled. ‘Do
you
think you owe me an apology?’

‘I was out of line earlier,’ Jordan murmured honestly
as he saw the way Stephanie’s gaze was avoiding meeting his.

‘Yes,’ she agreed flatly. ‘And, as I have no intention of explaining who Richard is, I think it would better for all concerned if I went back to my own flat now, and recommended someone else to take over your therapy.’

‘Lucan assures me that you’re the best there is,’ he said.

‘Even so …’

‘He also told me that your private life is none of our concern.’ Those gold eyes were narrowed guardedly.

‘Your brother is very—opinionated,’ Stephanie acknowledged dryly.

‘But he’s usually right,’ Jordan pointed out.

‘Perhaps.’ Stephanie nodded, not sure whether she was relieved or disappointed that Jordan felt the same way as Lucan. If he had continued to demand to know who Richard was, then it might have meant that he was genuinely interested in her himself. As it was, he had obviously decided, on his brother’s advice, that her private life was none of his business.

A complete change of subject was necessary. ‘How was your mother earlier?’

‘As bright and positive as she usually is.’ Jordan sighed heavily. ‘The two of us put on quite a show, I can tell you—my mother pretending she’s only here to shop, and me pretending that everything is going well with my recovery.’

Stephanie had yet to meet Molly St Claire, but she had no doubt that she would like her; she had to be quite something for the three formidable St Claire men to adore her in the way they obviously did. She also doubted, if Molly St Claire was as close to her sons as
she appeared to be, that the other woman had been any more fooled by Jordan’s act of wellbeing than he had been fooled by hers.

‘You shouldn’t have tried to manage without your cane,’ Stephanie scolded again, as Jordan gave a low groan of pain when he tried to move his leg into a more comfortable position.

‘It’s never been as bad as this before,’ Jordan grated, a nerve pulsing in his tightly clenched jaw. ‘The muscles in my leg seem to have seized up completely.’

Stephanie no longer felt hesitant as she sat down on the side of the bed and gently ran her hands over Jordan’s right leg and felt the way his muscles were locked into place. Her glance flicked up to his rigidly set face. ‘Perhaps some painkillers to relax the muscles—’

‘No,’ he told her grimly.

Stephanie chewed on her bottom lip. ‘I could probably ease some of the tension by directly massaging the muscles. But it’s going to be painful,’ she warned regretfully.

‘Can’t be any worse than it already is,’ Jordan muttered through gritted teeth, his fingers curled into the brocade cover at his sides.

‘It will work better if we take your trousers off.’

‘Are you trying to get me naked, Stephanie?’ he teased, even as he concentrated on controlling the pain.

‘I believe I said your trousers, not all your clothes!’ Her cheeks flushed a fiery red.

‘Go ahead,’ Jordan invited, and he stared rigidly up at the canopy overhead, knowing that the depth of his pain was his own fault after trying to manage without his cane for a couple of hours. ‘I’m certainly in no condition to stop you,’ he added slightly bitterly.

Stephanie tried hard to maintain a professional façade as she unbuttoned and unzipped Jordan’s trousers, before sliding them down his thighs to reveal the figure-hugging black boxers he wore beneath. Inwardly it was a different matter, however, as her fingers brushed lightly over his muscled abdomen and legs before she removed the trousers altogether and forced her gaze down to look at his legs.

His left leg was lean and muscled, covered in a dusting of dark hair and slightly tanned, but his right leg showed the white scars from the operations he had undergone these last six months, with the muscles in his thigh visibly knotted beneath the tautly stretched skin.

Stephanie winced inwardly at the thought of the pain Jordan would experience when she attempted to massage those locked muscles without the help of painkillers.

‘Perhaps you should drink a couple of glasses of wine before I start—’

‘Just do it, Stephanie,’ Jordan encouraged gruffly, obviously guessing the reason for her hesitation.

She drew in a controlling breath as she firmly reminded herself that she was a professional. That she had to forget she had been intimate with this man and just do the job Lucan St Claire had asked her to do.

Jordan closed his eyes and clenched his teeth tightly together as he felt the first touch of Stephanie’s fingers against the rigid hardness of his thigh. Keeping his eyes closed and teeth tightly clenched, he concentrated on not crying out as she began to massage and work those tense muscles. Over and over again. Until Jordan finally began to feel a slight lessening of that tension, and the rest of his body also began to relax as the pain began to ease.

‘Magic,’ he murmured huskily minutes later, as he finally found he could ease back onto the bedcovers.

‘Training,’ Stephanie dismissed briskly.

Now that the pain was easing slightly Jordan had a chance to look up at Stephanie as she continued to massage his thigh. To note how her cheeks had become flushed by her exertions. How the tip of her tongue was caught between her teeth as she concentrated. How several wisps of her fiery hair had come loose from her plait to fall unnoticed against those flushed cheeks.

‘I think you can stop now.’

Stephanie gave Jordan a startled glance, having been concentrating so intensely on easing his pain that she hadn’t noticed that the pain had obviously stopped and his attention had now shifted to her.

She stopped massaging his thigh to sit back abruptly. ‘You should be able to sleep now.’

‘I intend to,’ Jordan said. ‘Join me?’ He held out his hand in invitation.

An invitation that Stephanie didn’t take. Instead she looked down at him warily.

Jordan knew that his behaviour earlier had been completely out of line. That things had happened between the two of them so fast at Mulberry Hall, so intensely, there had been no real opportunity for either of them to talk about past or present relationships.

Maybe Stephanie
did
still have a thing for some guy she had known in the past—but it hadn’t stopped her from responding to him, had it?

‘Please?’ he invited huskily.

Stephanie had no idea what Jordan had been thinking about during the last few minutes’ silence, but after their earlier conversation it didn’t take a great deal of imagination on her part to guess what it might have been!

Or for her to know that Jordan had completely the wrong idea about her relationship with Richard Newman. She wanted to tell him, but she knew that the truth would be even less acceptable to him.

‘I promise I’ll be good,’ Jordan added cajolingly.

Stephanie gave a little laugh. ‘Does this little-boy-lost act usually work?’

‘On doting mothers and dedicated physiotherapists? Hopefully, yes!’

She gave a rueful shake of her head. ‘You’re impossible.’

‘But endearing?’ He held his hand out to her once again.

After the briefest of pauses Stephanie put her hand into his and allowed him to pull her down beside him on the bed, shifting slightly onto his side as he took her into his arms.

A few minutes of heaven couldn’t hurt, could it? Stephanie promised herself.

Just a few minutes.

I
T WAS
already starting to get dark outside when Jordan woke up from the most refreshing sleep he’d had for months, with the still sleeping Stephanie held tightly in his arms.

Her hair had once again come loose from that confining plait, and now lay in a silky curtain of fire and gold across his chest and shoulder. Her lashes were long and dark against her creamy cheeks, and that smattering of freckles on the bridge of her nose totally enticing. Her lips were slightly parted as she breathed softly.

Jordan could feel the warmth of her hand as it lay against his chest, and the heat of her leg as it lay lightly entangled with his. A heat that seeped deep into Jordan’s own body as he felt himself becoming aroused by Stephanie’s proximity.

He turned carefully onto his side in an effort not to wake her, knowing that if Stephanie were awake she would probably insist that nothing of a personal nature be allowed to happen between them.

Such as Jordan running his hand slowly down her spine. Such as allowing that hand to trace her waist and hip. Such as cupping her bottom as he fitted the length of her body perfectly against his. Such as placing his mouth against her brow and temple before exploring
the soft curve of her warm cheek in a direct path to the lips he longed to claim with his own.

Stephanie was sure she had to be still dreaming when she woke in the semi-darkness and found herself pressed against a hard male body. She felt warm and sure hands moving over her in exploration, the hot caress of lips against her brow, temple, cheek, and—