Daphne Clair - Wife To A Stranger

She helped him clear the table, and watched as he placed the dishes in a machine. ‘It hardly seems worth it,’ she commented, ‘for just a few dishes.’

He straightened, closing the lid, and his brows lifted slightly. ‘You’ve always had a firm belief that laboursaving devices are there to be used.’

‘Well…I suppose…’ She shrugged. There was some sense in that.

For a moment she had a weird sensation of being lost in a dark, unknown place, blindly groping for something to cling to.

‘Capri?’ Rolfe’s hand was on her shoulder, his eyes probing hers. ‘What is it?’

‘I just…I don’t know. For a minute I…didn’t know where I was.’

He grasped both her shoulders, but not hard. ‘You’re home, Capri,’ he said. ‘It’s all right.’

Something snapped. ‘It’s not all right!’ she retorted sharply. ‘I feel like an intruder in my own bedroom, my own wardrobe, I don’t know my way around, and I can’t even remember where the damned knives are kept!’

He gave a small, not unsympathetic laugh, but in her oversensitive state even that stung.

Her voice notched a note higher. ‘It’s not a joke! And how do I know you’re really my husband? I’ve no recollection of being married to you!’

And that, she realised, remembering the wedding photograph in her bag, was a pretty stupid thing to say.

The smile had disappeared from Rolfe’s mouth. ‘Believe me, I don’t think it’s at all funny, Capri. But I am your husband, and you’re my wife!’

The air had thickened between them, and everything seemed to go still. She was overwhelmingly conscious of his strength, his nearness, his masculinity, and her breath caught in her throat, a tiny pulse hammering at its base.

He drew in a breath too, and she remembered that moment in the hospital when he’d seemed to be affected by the scent of her, and she’d seen his nostrils dilate and his eyes darken as they did now.

His hands slipped from her shoulders to the bare skin of her arms. His expression went taut and purposeful. ‘Maybe this will help,’ he said, and pulled her closer, his arms sliding about her as her head involuntarily tipped back, and then he caught her mouth under the warm impact of his.

The kiss was intimate and insistent, the warmth and hardness of his body pressing against hers, unfamiliar and a little frightening, even though her blood sang and her lips involuntarily parted under his persuasion. His hold was firm but deliberately gentle, as if he had remembered that her bruises were still tender.

Now her head was cradled against his arm, and his mouth demanded a response that she gave at first tentatively and then with increasing passion, until he shifted their positions and manoeuvred her up against the workbench, and with his strong hands under her arms lifted her and sat her on the counter, his mouth freeing hers and his hands going to the buttons of her blouse.

But the mindless spell had broken. ‘No!’ Her fingers closed frantically over his, stopping him.

‘No?’ His voice was hoarse, and he spread his hands under the feeble constraint of hers, big palms cupping her breasts through the flimsy fabric. Then his expression tightened. ‘Did I hurt you?’

‘You didn’t hurt me, but—don’t, Rolfe! I’m not ready for this.’

‘Damn it, Capri—’

She gripped his wrists, her cheeks hot and her body trembling. ‘Please—’

His hands moved to her face, his eyes subjecting her to a hard, furious inspection. ‘Are you saying you don’t want me?’

‘I’m saying I don’t want…this.’ She still held his wrists. ‘I know you have every right, but—’

‘Right?’ He dropped his hands then and stepped back. ‘The time is long past when a man could claim his right to his wife’s body, Capri. Do you think I’d force my way into your bed?’

‘No! No, I don’t think that.’ Her hands clenched on the counter on either side of her. ‘But…please try to understand. I’m not…comfortable about going to bed with someone I…feel I hardly know.’

Rolfe gave a short, disbelieving laugh. ‘Really?’ It was obvious she’d thrown him off balance, his rigid control cracking. His eyes were hard and brilliant as onyx. ‘It didn’t stop you before!’

‘WHAT?’ She felt her eyes dilate painfully, her throat lock.

A spasm seemed to cross Rolfe’s face. He lifted a hand and thrust back a stubborn strand of dark hair that had strayed to his forehead. ‘Never mind.’

‘I do mind! What did you mean?’

‘Just that you were in my bed within hours of our first meeting. So excuse me if I find it a bit ironic that you’re being so coy about making love to me now.’

She stared at him in disbelief. ‘Hours?’ She couldn’t comprehend this. It sounded so…wrong.

‘Lust at first sight.’ He grinned narrowly. Then he must have noticed her instinctive recoil. ‘I’m sorry if the word offends you, but one could hardly call it love…’

‘What happened?’ They’d taken one look at each other and fallen into bed? He was a very attractive, sexy man and she could well believe she’d have been tempted, but it seemed so out of character…

Again her lack of real knowledge taunted her. What did she know about her own character, how she might have reacted, what sort of lifestyle she’d led before marrying Rolfe?

‘What happened?’ Rolfe repeated. ‘We met at a party in L.A. You were with someone, I was alone. You were…’ his eyes glazed slightly as though he was looking at a distant memory ‘…stunning.’

Her lips parted, her heart thudding disconcertingly. In some level of her subconscious she was aware this wasn’t the first time she’d been complimented on her looks. Only surely never with the intensity that she heard now m Rolfe’s voice.

His eyes refocused, studying her, and the intensity changed to self-mockery. ‘It was like all the romantic movies you’ve ever seen. We looked at each other across a crowded room and from that moment there was no one else there for either of us. You smiled, I walked over and introduced myself. I tried to be civilised, talk to the man you were with, other people. I have no idea what I said to them. We danced. Your date…’ He paused, a faintly regretful expression darkening his eyes. ‘Your date got drunk and aggressive, and I offered you a lift home. In the car I asked if you’d like to come to my hotel for a nightcap, and you looked straight into my eyes and said yes, that would be nice.’ Again he paused. ‘We hadn’t even kissed. But when we got to the hotel I gave you the choice of having a drink in the public bar or raiding the minibar in my suite. You chose the suite.’ He smiled crookedly, reminiscently, his eyes gleaming under hooded lids as he looked at her. ‘We never did have that nightcap.’

She was staring at him. He shoved his hands into his pockets. ‘You don’t remember any of this?’

Silently she shook her head. He might have been describing some other woman entirely. A woman who was sexually confident to the point of recklessness, willing to take incredible chances with an exciting stranger. ‘Had I been drinking?’

His brows rose. ‘It was a party. But you weren’t drunk. I wouldn’t take advantage of a tipsy woman, Capri.’

But maybe she’d had enough alcohol to affect her judgement, to topple her inhibitions and send her into a stranger’s arms. A stranger who had attracted her so strongly that she’d boldly beckoned him with a smile, had neglected the man who’d accompanied her to the party, and gone home with the interloper. Not only gone home with him, but slept with him that same night. She had no reason to doubt Rolfe’s account of their meeting, and she could believe that she’d been fascinated by his striking looks, his confident sexuality, and his overt interest, but at the same time she was convinced that the behaviour he described wasn’t normal for her.

Rolfe moved towards her, his hands going to her waist. He studied her face, his eyes very dark and enigmatic. Then he tightened his grip and lifted her down, and she felt his lips brush her forehead before he let her go. ‘Maybe we were in too much of a hurry back then. This could give us another chance.’

‘Another chance?’

‘To get to know each other again,’ he suggested. ‘It’ll be…different this time.’

‘I want to get to know you,’ she told him, still feeling breathless. ‘Thank you for being so understanding.’

His continued scrutiny of her turned curious, even puzzled. He nodded. ‘It could be…my pleasure,’ he said rather obscurely.

She looked away from the disturbing light in his eyes. ‘Do you mind if I wander around—familiarise myself with the house?’

‘It’s your home, Capri. Would you like me to come with you?’

‘In case I get lost?’ She gave him a pale smile. It was a big house, but hardly a castle.

‘In case you want to ask questions.’ His eyes cooling, he asked abruptly, ‘You’re not faking this, are you?’

She blinked. ‘Faking?’

Impatiently, Rolfe shook his head. ‘No, of course not,’ he answered himself. ‘There’s no reason—’

‘Well, you’d know better than me about that!’ she said with a spurt of indignation. ‘Why would anyone want to fake amnesia? It’s no picnic!’

‘It was just a thought.’

‘You have very strange thoughts!’

‘You don’t know the half of them.’ His eyes held hers, sending hot shivers down her spine. He moved away from her. ‘Go and take your tour of the house,’ he said. ‘I’ll be in the lounge if you want me. You do know where that is?’

‘Yes, we passed it on the way in.’

She left it until last, after she had seen the several bedrooms and another bathroom, the utility room, and one that must be Rolfe’s office, with bookshelves, filing cabinets and a desktop computer. And a room that held a sewing machine, a work-table strewn with paper templates, and shelves filled with pattern books, fashion magazines, and piles of fabric, a sumptuous collection of colour and texture. A dressmaker’s adjustable form stood in one corner, and here too there was a computer, with a box of disks beside it.

She retraced her steps to the wide lobby-cumpassageway and the double doors leading to the lounge. Like the rest of the house, the large room was furnished with taste and discernment—she could almost picture the words in some glossy magazine.

Rolfe was sprawled on a long off-white sofa, reading a newspaper and listening to something she vaguely thought was Mozart. She said, ‘I found the sewing room.’

‘Yes?’ He swung his feet onto the carpet and picked up a remote control, muting the music to a low background sound.

‘Am I a dressmaker?’

Rolfe smiled with a hint of incredulity. ‘A dressmaker? You’d hate to be called that. Come over here.’ He indicated the space on the sofa beside him and folded the paper, putting it aside on an elegant glass table.

Tensely she walked over and sat down, leaving two feet of space between them. ‘It doesn’t look like a home sewing room,’ she said. ‘It’s a workroom. What did I do?’

‘You do some fashion design,’ he said patiently. ‘You’re quite talented. Although…’

‘Although what?’

He shrugged ‘You’ve come close to winning awards a couple of times, but…your temperament isn’t suited to steady work. You have flashes of inspiration, work on them like mad for a few weeks, and need as many weeks to recover—and, I suppose, to allow the creative juices to flow again. It isn’t a style that adjusts well to the business world.’