To Wear His Ring (17 page)

They arrived back at Summerhill and organized their day. The four hunters, Tom, Stacey the tracker, Magnus and an Indonesian guest, departed. Lucy and Juliette packed and she arranged for Ellie to drop them at the airstrip. Summerhill had its own airstrip. A good proportion of the guests chartered light aircraft for hunting or excursions. The women would first be flown to Aorangi, Australasia’s highest mountain, and then to Queenstown, a popular tourist mecca in the south.

Lucy had put her luggage in the car boot and was walking down the hallway when a hand snaked out of the alcove going into Tom’s office. Suddenly she was
hauled up against a wall of warm skin, taut muscle and bone.

“Not thinking of leaving without saying goodbye?”

“Ethan!” Her heart thumped against her ribs. For one awful moment, Joseph Dunn’s face had flashed through her mind. “What are you…?”

“Told you not to be complacent.”

She relaxed slightly, her eyes adjusting to the gloom with the aid of the gleam of his teeth.

One slick maneuver and she found herself turned, her back against the wall—or at least the wall-mounted firearms cabinet. His teeth flashed again. “Wow. Nice suit. But I’d love to see you in red.”

Lucy felt herself flush. As was her way, she was taking her client’s lead. Juliette favored short skirts, in vibrant reds and pinks. Lucy’s choice was a dusky-pink color with a barely-there skirt and high black pumps. The lacy black cami under the jacket touched it off nicely even though she would be no match for the beauty and wealth of Mrs. Anderson.

“The guys in Queenstown won’t know what hit them when you two roll into town.”

His hands snaked around her waist, inside the jacket. “Ethan, I thought we agreed last night…”

“…that we had a mutual attraction.” He leaned back, smiling and swaying her gently.

“That nothing was going to…” She couldn’t help it, she was smiling back.

“…happen last night,” he finished.

She shook her head. “Ha, ha. I have to go. The plane’s waiting.”

“She can afford a few more minutes.” He leaned in close, eyes slanted down to her mouth. His thighs brushed hers. Lucy’s breath hissed through her lips as
warmth flooded her agitated body. When she felt herself about to sag against him, she put a restraining hand on his chest and leaned her head back.

An unexpected jerk and a sharp click behind her head claimed Ethan’s attention.

He frowned. “Bit lax isn’t it? The firearms cabinet left unlocked?”

Lucy was still concentrating on his mouth, centimeters away. “Tom must have forgotten,” she said dreamily.

The stern, all-business look he gave her snapped her out of her fog.

“Tom forget often?”

“No, I don’t think so.”

This was bad. This was a serious issue, one that could have their firearms license revoked. New Zealand’s firearms laws were strictly enforced. This could impinge on staying in the club. “I’ll get the key.”

Ethan fingered the cabinet’s latch. “It’s not good enough, Lucy. Anyone could have access.”

Lucy did the only possible thing she could think of. She reached up to tangle her fingers in his thick hair and pulled his head down to hers.

His hair was soft, inviting her to twist and tug gently. She felt his hand, still around her waist, spread and lift and next thing she was on tiptoe, planted against the length of him like ivy. He held back slightly, his brow still furrowed in a frown. His free hand moved up to the back of her head and his fingers mirrored what hers were doing.

She tugged him closer and he sank into her mouth. Hot and humid, his satiny-slick tongue danced with hers. Lucy wound her hands around his neck and pressed her tingling nipples into him. She fought to breathe; he took all her air and gave it back in miserly
doses and she heard his breath rasping through his nostrils.

His strength surprised her. The tension in his neck, each and every finger spread wide on her back, the muscles in his thighs pressed up against hers—it was all leashed power.

Her mind shut down. She didn’t care about the key or the cabinet. She didn’t worry that someone would walk down the hallway and see them. Professionalism was as far from her mind as Africa. Her blood was roaring. She wanted him unleashed.

Lucy moaned, a sound of impatience that sounded like “more.” She caged his face with both hands and kissed as she’d dreamed of doing the last few days, since that first long look. His body was firm all over. In one place, cast iron. But all that flashed in her agitated mind. It was his mouth she wanted, his earthy, erotic flavor that went straight to her head like champagne, sweeping all obstacles aside.

Ethan pulled away first. That embarrassed her, though it took a moment or two to understand. She looked at his throat, gulping in some much-needed air. When she dredged up the nerve to look at his face, his pale-blue eyes simmered. He carefully exhaled.

“Oh, boy,” he said softly. “You have my undivided attention.”

“I’d better go,” she whispered back.

Ethan took a reluctant step back and she weaved around him and started to walk, hoping her knees would hold her until she got out of his sight. She made it ten feet before her name clipped her to a halt. Turning reluctantly back because she just
knew
she’d be the color of mortified beetroot, she focused again on the golden skin of his throat.

“The key?” He jabbed his thumb toward the cabinet.

Lucy nodded at him stupidly. “Silly me.”

She walked unsteadily toward him, veered left into Tom’s office and found the key in the top drawer. All the while, his eyes burned into her. He took the key, locked the cabinet then dropped it back into her palm.

“Key should be locked away also,” he told her gently.

“Okay.” She proceeded to replace the key right where she’d found it and walked out past him, still with the stupid half smile on her face. “See ya,” she murmured dazedly, and escaped up the stairs.

L
ucy happily escaped the crowds at the gondola and chose a much quieter observation point, only a couple of hundred meters from the township. The view might not be as spectacular but pretty landscapes were not lacking in her life. Summerhill was her magic place.

She fished in her purse for coins to operate the shiny telescope, new since her last visit.

Bored, bored, bored. Poor Juliette had barely been out of her room since they had arrived, having succumbed to some sort of tummy bug. They’d had such a nice time the first day, flying over Aorangi, then jet-boating on the lake when they got to Queenstown, and a nice dinner last night. Then Juliette canceled breakfast and it all went downhill from there. Her illness set in and Lucy was left to amuse herself.

A noisy family group ascended the lookout platform
and two or three young children scampered about. Lucy panned the township and easily picked out her hotel, the largest in Queenstown and right on the waterfront. Her room on the fourth floor boasted views over the supermarket parking lot. Juliette had the ninth floor Presidential Suite, and a presidential balcony to go with it.

And there she was! Lucy grinned in childish elation. Juliette stood on her balcony, wearing
that
robe. The filmy deep purple number Lucy had admired last night. The robe that would look average on anyone else but Juliette with her statuesque figure.

She was distracted by the determined gaze of the youngest of the family group who fixed her with a come-on-lady! look. When she beaded in on Juliette again, she realized her friend wasn’t alone. It was difficult to discern expression—she fiddled with the focus dial—but Juliette appeared to be shaking her head and her mouth was open.

Then a cocoa-dark head moved into view and Lucy’s stomach lurched. His back was turned, but she would know that haughty bearing, those broad shoulders anywhere. He was jacketless and his shirtsleeves were rolled up midway to his elbows.

Lucy stepped back, her lips moving soundlessly as questions reared up like hands in a classroom.

“Mum, I want a go!” the small boy yelled. Lucy ignored him and moved forward again.

Ethan and Juliette. In her suite. Midday in Queenstown, hundreds of kilometers from where he was meant to be. When Juliette was supposed to be ill and had insisted Lucy follow the schedule they had planned.

With Juliette in
that
robe.

Suddenly Juliette swirled around and made for the
balcony door. Ethan grabbed her arm, holding her just above the elbow. They stood for some moments like that and again Lucy could not focus quite well enough to say for sure what the woman’s emotions were.

But one thing was as obvious as a train wreck. These two people had a lot more going on than they had disclosed.

The little boy sighed loudly. Lucy glanced at him and pulled a scowling face. His eyes widened, but he didn’t say anything.

Over on the balcony, Juliette had tugged her arm away and disappeared into the suite. Lucy watched Ethan hesitate for a second or two and run his hands through his hair. Then he moved inside with a determined stride, closing the glass door behind him. Lucy squinted but the reflection off the glass prevented her seeing inside the suite.

Her head lifted above the telescope. She stared out into space, a million questions pelting her, until a polite cough behind her made her turn. “Oh.” She looked at the entire family line-up in a daze. “Sorry.”

“That’s all right, dear,” the woman said kindly. “Is it a nice view?”

Lucy stepped off the platform. The impatient child scampered up and took her place, and Lucy just nodded and walked away.

“Foreigner, I think,” she heard the woman comment.

As she began the walk down, she attempted to find a plausible explanation. They wouldn’t. They were not cheats. She refused to believe she could be so wrong about people.

He’d come with a message from Magnus. He was bored and looking for Lucy. It wasn’t him. She could not be one hundred percent sure…

Disappointment turned her mouth down. Of course that was Ethan. No one could emulate those endless legs, that eat-up-the-miles gait as he’d followed Juliette inside.

That made a lie of his assertion that he’d never met Magnus’s wife before his arrival at Summerhill. She had been right beside them at their odd, tension-filled introduction. Then there were the loaded looks he shot Juliette when he thought no one was watching. Lucy thought it was because of his disdain for wealthy women, especially after hearing the story of his childhood. It would be strange if he weren’t carrying around some residual prejudice.

A couple of anguished hours later, she knocked on Juliette’s door. That took a lot of courage. If he’d been there, Lucy had no idea what she would have said. But he wasn’t—unless he was hiding in the shower. And Juliette was still pale and subdued.

“Have you been out?” Lucy’s voice caught in her throat as she walked into the suite and saw through to the rumpled bed.
Stop.

“No,” Juliette said.

“Did you get the doctor?”

“No. I’m feeling a little better.”

“Poor you,” Lucy mumbled. “You must have been bored silly today.” Her eyes searched Juliette’s face.

“I just read.” The woman shrugged.

Lucy left to arrange the charter flight that would leave half a day earlier than they had planned. Her feet dragged. It was true. If it had been an innocent visit, Juliette would have mentioned it.

They were lovers. Liars. Betraying Magnus.

Oh, they made a handsome couple. Juliette was exactly the sort of woman she would expect Ethan to have
on his arm—lovely, sophisticated, worldly. He wouldn’t seriously be interested in an undersized airhead like her. No brains to save her. No qualifications. Poverty grinning over her threshold.

Oh, he didn’t know that. That was the whole point…

But he seemed to like her. His eyes told her he liked her very much. His mouth told her he was hungry for hers. He didn’t even seem to mind that she walked around with her big, fat foot in her mouth all day.

Lucy’s chest tightened. How could someone you barely knew have the power to hurt you this much?

He wouldn’t take her in again. She did not mind being thought of as an easy touch, but she was damned if she would let that man kindle hope in her again. She was nothing but a diversion. A subterfuge. It was Juliette he wanted.

The morning flight back to Summerhill was a quiet affair. Juliette still claimed to feel awful. Lucy’s suspicions and hurt had ballooned overnight but she did not broach the subject. She was torn. She wanted to know—
how
she wanted to know. But one word from Juliette could make or break Summerhill in Magnus’s eyes. Lucy could not afford to alienate her.

They arrived back at Summerhill in the early afternoon, much more restrained than before. Lucy jumped out and hefted Juliette’s classy luggage and vanity from the boot.

Ellie welcomed them back. “Let me,” she ordered.

Lucy normally wouldn’t dream of letting the older woman carry luggage upstairs, but Summerhill wasn’t her comforting refuge today. She had no wish to run into Ethan while she felt so raw.

Citing an appointment, she bade them a brisk goodbye and roared off into town.

It was the morning from hell.

At ten-thirty, Summerhill’s former meat supplier from the village turned up at her apartment, saying he had already been to the lodge looking for Tom. It transpired that he had instigated proceedings against Summerhill for unpaid accounts. Tom was to have responded to the civil court claim to pay the arrears within thirty days or dispute the claim. Time was up. The civil court, in the absence of any action by the lodge to respond, had made judgment in favor of Hogan’s Meats.

Lucy was stunned. It was the first she had heard of it. She and Tom had known the Hogans all their lives. Mr. Hogan told her that Summerhill owed several thousand to the family-owned business, which had been chasing them up for over a year.

Mr. Hogan warned her that if full payment was not received within a month, he would make application to put Summerhill Lodge Holdings into liquidation. In that event, he said, he would be at the front of a very long queue.

She sat at her desk with the official documents in her hand and Mr. Hogan sitting across from her. Staring blindly at the papers, she apologized again and again and promised to make Tom write the check the moment he returned from the hunt.

Then Mr. Hogan passed a comment that stopped her in her tracks.

“I’m talking now as an old friend of your father’s. Well, used to be. There are a lot of people getting pretty tired of dealing with Summerhill. You’d better shape up. Someone’s sniffing around. People don’t know if it’s the Inland Revenue Department or a liquidator. Hell, could be a private investigator. I personally wish you no harm,
at least I won’t once I get my money. But there are others who would gladly blab. Missed payments, wages held back, bad debts. Watch your back is what I’m saying.”

After he’d gone, Lucy succumbed to a teeth-clenching tension headache, accompanied by a fit of self-indulgent crying. God, she was so stupid, so naive to think she could help run this business. Everyone would be so much better off without her.

Foreboding prickled at the back of her neck. There was something going on here that she had no comprehension of, and Tom obviously found her too lacking in business sense to share his problems.

Why had she come back? She had never been wanted here. What was different? So much easier to run away, as she always had when their indifference rankled.

The doorbell rang again. Now what? She hurriedly blew her nose and wiped her face on the way to the door. Ethan Rae, looking dangerously alert for the hour, strolled into the hallway. “Morning.”

Too surprised to protest, she took a step back and he walked past her. Closing her eyes, her body sank back against the wall for a few fortifying seconds. This was just what she needed. She pushed herself away from the wall. “What can I…” Hurrying after him, she almost ran into the solid wall of his back, finding he’d stopped to let her catch up. She dug her toes into the floor and suppressed a sigh of frustration. “Do for you?”

Ethan stepped back against the wall and motioned her past. “
This
is where you live.”

She led the way into her little office. He followed at his own pace, giving her living room an interested study.

“Is that a McCahon?” He gestured to a painting in the dining area by a well-known New Zealand artist
whose works spanned the fifties through to the eighties. “That must be quite valuable.”

“A twenty-first-birthday present from my father,” she told him. Her father had used money as a way to keep distance. Like this apartment he’d bought for her when she was barely out of school—it had kept her away from Summerhill and out of his hair.

Lucy sat at her desk, turning the legal documents facedown. It was so unfair. After the morning she’d just endured and before she could compose herself, Ethan was the very last person she wanted to see.

He did not budge when she indicated the chair behind him, just stood looking down at her intently. Could he see how upset and tense she was? It was her curse to have a damn face that showed everything. She dragged on all her reserves in a massive effort to relax.

He looked so good, still in snappy black pants but a more casual butter-colored shirt that did wonderful things for his eyes. It was hard to recall what she was angry with him for.

“Can I help you with something?” She focused on a spot over his shoulder.

“Spend the day with me.” No hesitation. Just like that.

Her eyes skidded to his and astonishment pushed her voice up high. “What?”

“It’s what you do, isn’t it? Entertain clients?”

“Um—today?” Her voice sounded thready.

His eyes narrowed with something like concern. “Yes, today. What’s wrong, Lucy?”

If he starts being nice to me, I’ll burst into tears, she thought frenziedly. Forget this morning, and
be careful.
She must not let on about the morning’s events. She cleared her throat, seeking a firmer tone. “I can’t today. You should have given me some warning.”

He perched on the edge of her desk and she tried not to be riveted by the pull of expensive black fabric stretched across long thighs.

“What are you doing?”

“What?” she squeaked, dragging her eyes back to his face.

“Today. Meetings? Clients to keep waiting at the airport? Lovely trophy wives to entertain?”

That comment jabbed her right in the heart. He had been the one entertaining a lovely trophy wife. Should she casually ask, “By the way, how long have you and Juliette been lovers?”

Lucy took a deep breath, wishing him away. Wishing her brain would unscramble enough for her to give him a professional and firm negative. Above all else, she couldn’t afford to show her distress. If he knew of the financial problems besetting Summerhill, Magnus would hear of it and Tom would go ape.

She kept her eyes down, ineffectually moving things around on her desk and mangling the tissue in her hands into a mess of tufts.

But her heart leapt into her throat when his index finger landed under her chin, tilting it up.

“You’ve been crying.” His voice was gentle. It nearly did her in completely when he pulled another tissue from the box and handed it to her.

Ethan sensed the moment he walked in that she was upset, shaken even. Why that should concern him, he had no idea, yet it did. He wasn’t even sure why he was here, except that he’d utilized his time well in the last couple of days and felt he deserved a break. He’d spent hours preparing for the Turtle Island meetings. Made a few inquiries around the region regarding Summerhill.
Today he had come straight from the Seabrook MacKenzie Dyslexia Center in town and had a pocketful of leaflets, but stayed his hand from reaching for them.

He was looking forward to some more of the easy, flirting banter they seemed to draw from each other. Maybe looking forward to another delicious kiss.

Okay, maybe hoping for a lot more than that.

But something was badly wrong. She looked beaten. Forgetting the brochures, he pulled a tissue from the box on her desk and handed it to her.