Elusive as the Unicorn

‘No,’ he acknowledged thoughtfully, his gaze moving searchingly across her face, his smile tinged with sadness now. ‘Don’t be in too much of a hurry to dismiss me from your life, Eve,’ he murmured softly. ‘I’m a great believer in fate, and so I believe there has to be a reason for the two of us having met in this way.’

‘Fate’s malicious sense of humour, most probably,’ she dismissed scornfully.

‘Or its way of showing you that you’re making a mistake marrying Paul,’ Adam almost whispered the words. The two of them were suddenly locked in a tension-filled spell, their gazes enmeshed, seeming to reach into each other’s souls.

‘I happen to love him,’ she snapped.

‘Do you?’ he frowned.

‘Of course,’ she said irritably, but she was still held captive by that spell, even felt herself moving slowly towards Adam at the same time as he seemed to move compulsively towards her.

And then the spell was harshly broken as the reflection in the driving mirror of the blaze of headlights of the car pulling in behind hers momentarily dazzled her. She shook her head dazedly, frowning as she saw it was taking Adam several seconds to regain his usual bantering manner, too.

‘I’d better go,’ he acknowledged ruefully. ‘But I have a definite feeling you haven’t seen the last of me.’

Eve sincerely hoped that she had! He upset her, disturbed her, and she didn’t need that at this time in her life.

‘Take care driving home,’ he told her softly.

‘Isn’t that being chauvinistic and over-protective?’ she derided, to hide the fact that the last few minutes had shaken her—badly.

‘No,’ he spoke softly, ‘that’s just me being concerned about someone I care for.’

‘How on earth can you “care” for me?’ Eve scorned. ‘You don’t know me any more than you know Paul.’

‘I’ll admit I haven’t known you any longer, but then, that doesn’t mean a thing. It only takes a second, Eve.’

She gave him a startled look. ‘What does?’

He didn’t answer immediately, just looked at her steadily. ‘Knowing someone,’ he finally answered—but Eve was left with the feeling it hadn’t been what he meant to say at all.

‘This is ridiculous,’ she said firmly, refusing to think of that time only minutes ago when she had felt herself being drawn towards him. She loved Paul, always had, and no outspoken stranger was going to make any difference to that.

She pushed firmly to the back of her mind the fact that Adam was no longer a stranger at all, that the very nature of the man made that impossible.

‘You probably have a wife in America and six children!’ she said disgustedly.

He smiled. ‘No wife. No children. And six of the latter at my age wouldn’t be very fair to them; I’d be approaching fifty when the last one was born.’

‘It wouldn’t matter too much if your wife was younger than you,’ Eve said without thinking, her cheeks burning as she saw the speculative look in his eyes.

‘That’s right,’ he said softly. ‘Although I’d be happy with just two—if you would.’

‘Me? But——’

‘I’m afraid your fate was sealed the moment I heard Paul Lester order you to stay put—I know, you didn’t see it that way,’ Adam drawled. ‘But I know what I heard, I also know it made me want to tell him to go to hell, that you were with me. And I rarely, if ever, change my mind,’ he added warningly. ‘Besides,’ he went on mockingly, ‘we’ve already covered one of the subjects that a lot of couples argue about—how many children we intend having.’ His eyes openly laughed at her.

‘We aren’t having any children at all,’ she snapped, to hide how much his outrageous statement had affected her. The children they intended having was the one subject she and Paul tended to disagree about, Paul insisting they could give one child a better upbringing than two or three. Eve, although she saw the point of his claim, didn’t approve of only children; they tended to either be very spoilt or very lonely. And neither was something she wanted for her child. It was something she hoped they could compromise on once they were married.

‘We’ll see,’ Adam murmured softly. ‘In the meantime, bear in mind the fact that if I had been averse to Sophy’s plotting and planning for the two of us, it would have been the simplest thing in the world not to have turned up tonight.’

‘You’re as much a fantasiser as she is,’ Eve bit out tautly. ‘And talking of fantasy, won’t these outrageous ideas you have about me distract you from your real purpose, that of finding The Unicorn?’ Anything to divert his attention from the two of them as a prospective couple!

He sighed. ‘Sophy is being so close-mouthed about him.’ He shook his head. ‘But don’t worry, I have another project moving ahead that should get me that introduction.’

The exhibition in New York. After the ridiculous claims he had already made concerning her this evening, she definitely didn’t dare run the risk of him finding out she was The Unicorn; he would probably carry her off there and then!

‘I’m so glad,’ she said with ill-concealed sarcasm. ‘Now, I really must be going,’ she told him pointedly; he had been on the point of getting out of the car for the last fifteen minutes, and had the attentive doorman in a state of agitation with his indecision.