Seductive Stranger

She stared back. 'But . . . you are, that's just it! From the minute we met, you flirted, kissed me, made passes, and we were total strangers!'

'Not exactly,' he said. 'I'd known you from the day you were born until you were thirteen—that doesn't make you a stranger.'

'We hardly ever met then! You were already grown up. I don't think we exchanged two words.'

'We kissed,' he said, the sardonic glimmer stronger.

She frowned. 'You said that before, but I don't remember ever kissing you!'

He laughed. 'We had a Christmas party up at Killane House, for Lynsey, not me—all the children living on the estate, all our tenants'

children, and friends of Lynsey's from school. We gave them tea and organised the usual games kids love: murder in the dark, charades.'

Prue was very still, remembering her strange dream. 'I was there, wasn't I?'

His dark eyes mocked. 'Oh, you were there,

sweetheart. You were wearing a very pretty dress, I remember—very simple white organdie in the Regency style, high-waisted, with a long, straight skirt and a little round neckline, a green velvet sash round your waist. You looked charming, with that red hair of yours hanging down in ringlets. You suddenly didn't look like a little girl, any more. It was obvious you were going to be a beautiful woman before too long.'

Prue was disturbed; she could remember, her dream of the other night but she couldn't remember the party, which was odd. Flushed and uncertain, she watched Josh, and he looked back at her searchingly, hunting in her face for the memory he wanted.

'One of the games we all played was hide and seek,' he said, eyes narrowed, and Prue took a sharp breath. 'Yes?' asked Josh, but she shook her head.

'I didn't say anything.'

'I thought you were going to—never mind,' he said. 'I hid in a cupboard up in the attic and after a while the door opened and . . .'

'Oh,' Prue broke out, trembling, and he put a hand to her face, stroking her cheek, his index finger softly following the line of her mouth.

'Yes, you were there, and I pulled you into the cupboard and kissed you.'

How had she forgotten it for so long? she wondered. Had it been such a traumatic shock that she had wiped out the memory rather than face up to what it meant?

Josh grimaced. 'Then a whole lot of other people came past and you ran after them, and I stayed in the cupboard, feeling pretty stupid. I was almost twice your age, you were just a kid, a little girl of thirteen—and I was in my twenties! I didn't know what had come over me, except that you looked so different that night, you were lovely, and I'd been staring at you all through the party, thinking how you were growing up, and how gorgeous you were going to be.' He cupped her chin with his palm, tilting her head back so that she was looking up at him. 'You do remember, don't you? Did I scare the living daylights out of you?'

'No,' she said slowly, her green eyes thoughtful, 'it was what happened the next day, I think.'

He looked baffled. 'What happened the next day? I don't remember anything.'

'My mother burst out with all her jealousy of your mother—she hated the Killanes, and I . . .'

Shrewdly he finished for her, 'Felt guilty because you had let a Killane kiss you?'

She nodded, mouth wry. 'I didn't remember the party or that you had kissed me, you know—I do remember it now that you've reminded me, but until this minute I seem to have suppressed the whole incident, maybe because I was afraid that if she found out, my mother would hate me too?' She thought for a moment, then added huskily,

'Especially . . .' Her voice broke off and she swallowed, her face dusky pink.

'Especially?' queried Josh, arching his brows, but she didn't answer, and after a moment he softly suggested, 'Especially as you'd liked it when I kissed you?'

She looked down, half smiling, but didn't answer. She had already admitted too much.

'I wonder if that's why you were so virulently against my whole family, but especially me, when you came back here?' Josh thought aloud, 'it wasn't just your mother that had made you see us all in the role of seducers and flirts. I'd helped to give you that impression, even if you were suppressing the memory.' He laughed shortly, 'I was my own enemy without realising it!'

'Possibly,' Prue said a little sadly. 'We're all our own worst enemies, aren't we?' Why had she dreamt about that party, the kiss, except that her own subconscious had been trying to tell her how she really felt about Josh? She had dreamt she was a child, and in emotional terms she was still half childish—that was why she had fixed on David for a life partner, because he didn't come anywhere near touching her at that deepest part of her emotions. She was fond of David, she liked him, but she would never have loved him with the intensity she felt for Josh—she had chosen David because he was safe and would never hurt her.

'At least I never forgot you!' Josh said drily. 'Far from suppressing the memory of kissing you that day, I kept remembering it year after year. I wouldn't go so far as to say that that was why I never married, but I think that at the back of my head I had this image of the girl I was looking for and none of them matched up to her.' His dark eyes glimmered with passion and mockery. 'None of them had the right shade of red hair or the right slanty green eyes!'

Her breath caught.