The Hawk and the Lamb

'Goodness, Eliza-Beth,' he said wonderingly. 'You do have a naughty imagination. And a most disappointing opinion of my manhood. You think I have to bribe women into having sex with me?'

‘I—no—of course not...' She tried to back-track to no avail. He was right on her heels, enjoying himself enormously.

'Am I so totally unattractive that no woman could find me appealing enough to desire me for myself?'

'Don’t be silly,' she muttered quellingly.

'Or is it that you perceive in me a dark, sexual per­versity that borders on sadism? Maybe I like to see women cower and cringe...' He had moved even closer, lightly, on the balls of his feet, like a boxer dancing up to an opponent he intended to annihilate with a sucker-punch, the brooding menace of his expression a threat in itself.

And it was all show. Elizabeth didn’t know how she knew it—by all rights she should be running away screaming—but she was so certain that he wouldn’t hurt her that she tossed her head disdainfully.

'Then you're picking on the wrong woman. You don’t scare me. I'm not going to play victim for your macho gratification.'

His eyes glowed with a strange yellow colour, like sun trying to break through summer storm clouds. 'So I don’t scare you?'

If her chin tipped any higher she was going to fall over backwards, but she had to do something to counteract his overwhelming physical impact. 'Not a bit!' she defied him.

The sun broke through, but his smile was a twist of irony and his voice disturbingly quiet.

'Then it's purely one-sided. Because, ma chère, you scare the hell out of me.'

That did frighten her. She could fight an arrogant man, but a vulnerable one was capable of undermining her defences. Why should she scare him? Wasn’t he the one with all the money, the p

ower...?

'Why are you doing this?' She summoned aggression to mask her uncertainty.

It was as if he scented her secret weakness. Like a hawk's, his strike was swift and lethal. 'Why? Exactly what I want to know. Did you intend all along for Jules to realise what you were doing? And what were you going to do with the results of your snooping? Sell it on the open market, or did you have a more personal method of extortion in mind?'

He picked up something from the lacquered coffee-table which formed a right-angled corner between two rattan couches padded with brightly coloured floral fabric. With a flick of his wrist he fanned out a series of photographs—pictures in which he and Serena Corvell featured with monotonous regularity.

'How dare you take my film?' Her cry was more of dismay than outrage.

‘I was just checking whether your camera still worked-' With a deft movement of his fingers, remi­niscent of a card-sharp, he closed the fan while simul­taneously flipping another photograph to the front. 'As you can see, it does.'

The photograph was one of Elizabeth, stalking haughtily away from the camera, her beach-shirt floating up around her hips. He must have taken it yesterday, the instant she had turned away from him and her captive camera. Glumly Elizabeth compared the generous breadth of her hips in the shot with the slender memory of Serena's. 'The zoom, too...'

This showed her in profile, skirting a tree. The shirt was breezily plastered against her body. Somehow it managed not only to show the regrettable span of her hips but also the full thrust of her breasts. To her horror she even thought she could see the outline of her nipples, still taut from their encounter with his chest.

She glared at him, trying not to feel fat and frumpy as well as hot and bothered. There was no point in her denying that she had been photographing him. The proof was in his hands. But proof of what, she had no in­tention of explaining.

'You can’t force me to stay,' she said, striving to sound certain.

He looked down at the photograph in his hand, his thick lashes screening his thoughts. 'Can’t I?'

The simple question was enough to make her panic. ‘I'll complain-'

'Who to? The manager?' He dragged his thumb over the photograph, and she felt the shiver from her heels to the nape of her neck, as if he had actually physically reached out and stroked her. He looked up, capturing her in the midst of her unwilling fascination with his caress of the glossy paper. 'Or the police?' he murmured softly. 'Yes, I'm sure you'd rather tell all to the local police, wouldn’t you, chêrie?’

It was Elizabeth's turn to look down, thinking fran­tically. He probably had the local police in his pocket. After she had seen Alain St Clair she didn’t care what happened to her, but until then she would just have to try and outface him.

'That won’t be necessary,' she told him.

'Why not?'

How he loved the word why.

'Because I've decided to take you up on your gen­erous offer.' 'Which one?'