Mistletoe Mistress

'Is it?' She licked a blob of strawberry ice-cream from the corner of her mouth, and Hawk's eyes followed her pink tongue, his gaze slumberous and hot. She was looking at a real flesh-and-blood sculpture that would knock the Well of Moses into a cocked hat, Joanne thought silently, with an irreverence that would have made Claus Sluter turn in his grave. 'I don't mind what we do.'

'A submissive and beautiful woman… My cup runneth over,' Hawk drawled mockingly.

Later that evening, after they had dined at the elegant and luxurious hotel where Hawk had reserved rooms- 'Two singles,' he had emphasised sadly as they had sipped their pre-dinner cocktails. 'Now, I deserve some credit for that at least, Joanne-' He suggested a walk in the beautifully landscaped gardens that were lit as brightly as day with hundreds upon hundreds of tiny swinging lanterns.

She stared at him warily. From what she had seen of the gardens earlier that evening as they had watched a sunset that was all vermilion, glowing mauve and deepest rose-gold, they were the epitome of a romantic stroll for two-complete with hidden bowers, tiny fountains and the inevitable love-seats dotted about the most intimate corners.

'I don't know…' The mellow, incomparable wines of the region, two of which she had imbibed pretty freely at dinner, were not conducive to good control.

'Well, I do.' He solved her dilemma by taking her hand and drawing her up from her seat, and again she found herself relishing the power, the authority, the sheer masculinity in his lean, stron

g frame, which had drawn the eyes of more than one predatory female during their meal.

And she knew what most of them were thinking. Why, why, is he with her? But he was, and it was her he had asked to walk with him…

This intoxicating thought carried her out into the gar-dens in something of a smug daze, but as the cool night air stroked her face, its warning caress carrying the scent of starry, frost-touched nights, cold reason asserted itself.

Her mother had been the sort of woman who had allowed men to use her, time after time after time, and then walk away when they had had enough. She didn't know if her mother had loved these men-she had certainly felt more for them than she had her own flesh and blood, that was for sure-but there had been something, some elemental driving desire to be loved, that had proved weakening and dangerous. Could those sorts of things be passed on in the genes?

As Hawk tucked one of her arms in his, the strength and bulk and smell of him overwhelmingly intoxicating, her mind raced on.

She knew he couldn't-or wouldn't-accept the concept of a monogamous lifestyle, that he didn't want to even try. She was a passing whim with him, perhaps a challenge that had stirred his jaded appetite for a while, added to which her usefulness at Bergique & Son couldn't be ignored. In fact-and here her mind balked a little as she made herself face the truth-he was a loner, a man who answered to no one, kept his own counsel and liked it that way. He would never settle down, he just wasn't the type, and that was exactly- exactly-the sort of man her mother had been inexplicably drawn to, despite all rhyme and reason, in the same way a moth was drawn to the bright light that would ultimately spell its destruction.

'What are you thinking about?'

His voice was soft and deep, and its very gentleness made her speak before she considered her words. 'My mother, actually,' she said quietly.

'Do you miss her?' There was no shred of surprise in the calm voice, although it couldn't have been the answer he was expecting.

'Not in the way you mean; she wasn't that sort of mother,' Joanne said with painful honesty.

They had walked into a part of the garden that was almost Victorian in its layout, very sheltered and pretty, and now, as he drew her down on to a lacy wooden seat, it felt as though they were the only two people alive in all the world. The night was breathtakingly still, not a sound from the hotel in the distance disturbing the tranquillity, and when Hawk said, 'Tell me about her, about you, about your childhood,' the strange, almost dreamlike quality of the night loosened her tongue.

He was a good listener-too good-and when she fell quiet, some twenty minutes later, it was with the realisation she had said far more than she intended.

'I'm sorry, Joanne.' And he was, and also murderously angry with the woman who had borne her and then cast her aside at such a young, vulnerable age. The anger he was trying to hide made his voice grim, hard even, and she cast a quick troubled glance at him before looking straight ahead again.

'It's all right,' she said stiffly. He was annoyed with her for going on the way she had, she thought wildly. She shouldn't have said all that-she couldn't believe she had; he had probably just wanted a few light facts about her early life, not an in-depth year-by-year account. He must think she was pathetic-

'No, no, it isn't,' he said flatly, still in the same forbidding voice. 'Every child should know it's loved and wanted.'

'Were you?' She wouldn't have dared to ask normally, but here it seemed right, and she wanted to turn the conversation from her.

'Loved and wanted? Very much,' he said quietly. 'My mother…my mother was the sort of person who lived to make others happy, and her whole life revolved around my father and me, and her friends. You could say she was her own worst enemy.'

'By loving her family?' Joanne protested.

'By caring too much-for my father at least' He raked a hand through his short black hair. 'She never revealed, by one word or action, the misery he inflicted upon her. She simply fought through every day of her life trying to make things right that could never be right I can't accept that sort of emotion can be called love-it is obsession, the most damaging sort of obsession.'

'You're saying that simply because you can't handle the fact that love exists,' Joanne said quietly. 'Perhaps she considered that the good times she had with him were worth all the pain and anguish.'

'Then she was a fool.' The words were dragged out of the depths of him, his voice harsh and jagged. 'Just as your mother was a fool. And I still think that what my mother felt for my father, and your mother felt for her husbands and lovers, was obsession, not love. I can't accept-' He stopped abruptly, a muscle clenching at the side of his jaw, before he said, 'What the hell? None of it matters in the long run.'

'Hawk-'

'I'll show you what's real one day, Joanne.' His voice was savage and cold, and made his following words all the more chilling. 'I'll make love to you until nothing and no one exists, until the earth melts away and all you can see and hear and touch is me. I shall kiss every inch of your body, see you mindless beneath me, begging for what only I can give you. And you'll want me-you'll want me so badly you'll be on fire-but we'll both know exactly what we are doing.'

'And it won't mean anything?' she asked faintly, caught up in his blackness.