The Only One Read online

  His voice was taunting, his expression one she was familiar with on male faces. So he thought the watch had been given to her by a lover; well let him.

  Pinning a false smile to her lips she responded coolly, ‘Of course…. And now if you’ll excuse me….’

  ‘You’re leaving? Why?’

  His arrogance infuriated her afresh. What business of his was it if she chose to leave?

  ‘Because I’m bored,’ she told him sweetly.

  ‘The company not good enough for you? Perhaps there isn’t anyone here wealthy enough to supply you with another of these?’ His fingers circled her wrist just below her watch, stroking the fragile bones, sensitising her flesh in a way that Brooke couldn’t believe possible. She was torn between wanting to tug her wrist away, and giving way to the melting sensation of pleasure spreading up her arm, making her finger-tips tingle. The intensity of her response startled her to the point of not being able to correlate her thoughts, and the rough drawl of his voice broke the physical spell momentarily binding her to him as he continued mockingly, ‘But I’m sure they’d be willing to give you other if less valuable baubles in return for some of your time….’

  ‘Only my time?’ Inwardly Brooke was seething, but she hid it well, as she had grown used to doing.

  ‘Or perhaps you’re playing for higher stakes,’ the soft drawl continued. ‘One large item is so much more worthwhile than several cheaper ones, and easier to earn,’ he added cynically.

  It wasn’t the first time Brooke had come up against such an attitude, and she doubted that it would be the last. By some trick of fate the delineation of her facial features was such that she possessed a slumberous, almost sensual quality that men automatically assumed meant that she was sexually available. That, in a way, she could understand and excuse, but what she couldn’t forgive was their immediate reaction that being available meant she could be bought—and by the highest bidder. This man it seemed was no different from the rest, and despite the fact that he lacked the smooth polish of many of the other men in the room with him, he did possess all the discreet trappings of wealth. Brooke’s mouth tightened. He was an arrogant, over-confident male who seemed to think he could just reach out and take whatever he wanted from life. Perhaps it was time someone taught him a lesson.

  ‘Meaning?’ Brooke queried, mentally holding her breath.

  ‘Meaning,’ came the audacious response, ‘that I’m in a position to provide the one large item.’ A lazy smile accompanied the lightly spoken words, his expression saying that this conversation was really unnecessary, as the result was already a foregone conclusion. For one moment Brooke was tempted to blast him with the full force of her wrath, but caution, and a searing need to humiliate him as he had just humiliated her, intervened. How dare he imagine that she was his simply for the buying; that she would ever dream of agreeing to the sort of sordid bargain he had just suggested? Her quick brain agilely sifting through their conversation, Brooke thought she had found a way to make sure he would never again look at a woman with the same contemptuous confidence with which he had just smiled at her.

  ‘Which do you prefer,’ she was asked as she remained silent, ‘cash or kind?’ When she turned shocked gold eyes towards cold grey ones, Adam shrugged and said easily, ‘I do prefer to get these annoying details sorted out beforehand, don’t you? It makes life easier all round.’

  ‘You prefer paying for your sex?’ Brooke asked him, hardly able to believe she was having this conversation.

  The broad dinner-suited shoulders shrugged. ‘I believe in an honest exchange of commodities—yes, and women always intend men to pay in one way or the other don’t they?’ He added less pleasantly, ‘It’s just that the majority of them prefer their payment in emotional coin—far more damaging to the pocket in the long run.’

  ‘Meaning?’ Again Brooke put the brief question.

  ‘Meaning that I’m not in the market for emotional involvement,’ Adam told her coolly. ‘I always like to make that clear right from the start.’

  ‘Very wise of you, I’m sure.’ Brooke hid her surprise under a veil of indifference. From his attitude she wasn’t the first woman he had approached in this way, by a long chalk. How had the others reacted? Or was this the first time he had mistaken his quarry? Brooke wasn’t blind to the fault of her sex; there were women, and she knew plenty of them, who would be quite happy to accept his offer—providing it was more prettily packaged to be sure, and yet one look at him had been sufficient for her to know that he possessed a sexual magnetism that few women would be able to resist, and that they would want him for himself alone.

  ‘So, do we have a bargain?’

  Caution warned her to refuse—to stop the game while she still could, but a deep inner burning anger overruled caution and she heard herself saying calmly, ‘Yes, I believe we do.’

  ‘So … tonight, then?’

  He didn’t waste much time, Brooke reflected, concealing her consternation. ‘Very well, tonight. I live in the Lodge at the end of the drive.’

  ‘I’ll be there at ten.’

  No pretence of wining and dining her first, Brooke noted, one half of her applauding his cynical down-to-earth attitude while the other half was horrified, cringing away from the implications of his comment. Obviously he was a man well used to getting what he wanted, but tonight she was going to blast a hole into that immense self-conceit which she told herself a little fancifully was going to be not just a blow for herself, but for the whole of womankind—or at least that part of it young and attractive enough to catch the eye of Mr—? She frowned, realising that she didn’t even know his name, subduing the hysterical bubbles of laughter rising up inside her, at the thought that she had verbally committed herself to going to bed with a man whose name she didn’t even know, and who didn’t know hers.

  ‘I’m Brooke Beauclere by the way,’ she introduced herself, rectifying the omission.

  ‘Adam Henderson.’ He watched her carefully, but she made no response to the name, which was unfamiliar to her. Nor did he offer to shake her hand, instead, sliding his grip from her wrist to her hand, lifting it palm upwards to his mouth and placing his lips against it. The brush of his tongue against her palm made her jump in surprise, a thousand tiny nerve endings pulsing into life as his lips moved down to her fingers, nibbling erotically at her skin. When he finally released her hand she felt hot and disorientated. No one had ever made her feel like that before, but as she pulled herself together she reminded herself that practice makes perfect, and that no doubt he had learned long, long ago, just how to make a woman responsive to him. He certainly didn’t look the type of man who would expect his partner to lie back and think of England, and he must want something for his money other than an unresponsively receptive body, Brooke thought cynically.

  ‘Until tonight….’

  He let her go and watched her walk out of the door. Brooke was acutely conscious of his eyes on her back, and only realised when she got outside that she had been holding her breath.

  A brisk walk down the drive to her lodge did much to restore her normal equilibrium, and by the time she reached the Lodge she was mentally berating herself for her stupidity. It must have been the wine, was her only excuse, but as she had drunk only the one glass it was a feeble one. Never one to deceive herself for long as she opened the door and braced herself to receive the enthusiastic embrace of her uncle’s Afghan hound Brooke acknowledged that it was the man himself who had affected her, infuriating her to the point where she felt compelled to give the antagonism she had felt towards him an actual physical life.

  ‘Down Balsebar,’ she commanded the dog, grinning as he dropped pathetically to her feet. Balsebar was a dog of positive and slightly eccentric character; a true ham who loved playing to his audience. Right now he was doing a sterling impression of a down-trodden and mistreated innocent—a picture to tear at the heart of sweet old ladies and innocent children. Remembering his many escapades Brooke was unimpressed.

&n
bsp; Black with golden paws and chest, his eyes could gleam with a wickedness that made him look almost devilish, but apart from his eccentric nature he was a first-rate guard dog. He also had an aversion to the male sex, excluding only her uncle, and Brooke grinned again at his possible reception of Adam Henderson. For some reason, despite all her determined efforts to stop him, Balsebar slept on the floor at the bottom of her bed—nothing could shift him from his chosen spot, and his normal reaction to any unwary male entering the Lodge was so craftily and cleverly worked out that the victim rarely knew what was happening to him until it was far too late. Not for Balsebar the reaction of other, less Machiavellian dogs—the frenzied barking or the doggy sulks. Every encounter involving Balsebar was a triumph of tactics and canine intelligence over his chosen human victim.

  There had been the man who was allergic to dog hairs whose lap he had insisted on sitting on; there had been the one who had announced that he knew exactly the right way to handle recalcitrant dogs—no one was quite sure how it happened, but one moment he had been commanding Balsebar to ‘sit’, the next, for some reason the dog’s claw had caught in the zip of his trousers as Balsebar leapt up in direct disobedience to his command and the poor man had been left standing in her uncle’s drawing room with his trousers round his ankles and his rather stunning striped boxer undershorts on display to the world.

  There had been countless others who had retreated in disorder, and Brooke wondered idly as she prepared his meal how Balsebar would deal with Adam Henderson. She also wondered how Adam would react when she told him she had changed her mind and that no matter how expensively he paid her she wouldn’t go to bed with him. Now that she had left the party the tension which had led her to betraying her antagonism towards him had gone and in its stead was the uneasy knowledge that he was not a man who would take kindly to being duped. Her hand brushed the dog’s head and he glanced up at her in mute enquiry. At least she could rely on Balsebar to defend her honour she thought wryly, even if she was incapable of doing so herself.

  CHAPTER TWO

  BY the time the grandfather clock in the small living room struck quarter to ten Brooke was an aching mass of too tense nerve endings, one moment mentally berating herself for her stupidity, the next telling herself that it was time that someone cut Adam Henderson down to size.

  She had changed out of the suit she had worn to the cocktail party—an outfit left over from the days when she had worked as a secretary in an upmarket advertising agency and had had to dress accordingly. These days she thought herself fortunate if she was able to buy herself a decent skirt and blouse, never mind blowing half a month’s salary on an expensive cocktail outfit. Glancing through her wardrobe she had dismissed most of its contents as unsuitable almost instantly—they were ‘officey clothes’, geared to executive lunches and board meetings. The odd dress she possessed was equally unsuitable, which left her normal uniform of jeans and a sweater or the pleated skirt and jumper she had worn when nursing Uncle James—he had hated the sight of women in trousers, and seemed to think that her soft heathery skirt and its toning cashmere jumpers were the right sort of thing for her to wear, and knowing how ill he really was she had purposely dressed to please him.

  What did women normally wear in these circumstances? Her mind switched irresistibly to glamorous black silk négligés heavily trimmed with lace; but somehow she couldn’t imagine Adam Henderson being impressed by such a garment, even had she possessed one.

  In the end she compromised with a plain black skirt and a pretty cream angora jumper with some self-embroidered detail on the boat-shaped neckline. She was still wearing the sheer silk stockings she had worn beneath her suit and she left these on, slipping her feet into a pair of lower heeled shoes.

  Ready by nine thirty, she had spent the intervening fifteen minutes prowling restlessly round the small living room, much to Balsebar’s annoyance.

  Fifteen minutes later when the imperious rap on the old-fashioned door knocker heralded Adam’s arrival, Balsebar did not, as other, less intelligent canines were wont to do, burst into a volley of barking. Instead he slid silently from his perch on the chair he had adopted as his and padded silently behind Brooke as she headed for the door.

  The rooms in the Lodge were small, especially when compared with both Abbot’s Meade and the Dower House that went with it, but that surely did not account completely for the sense of suffocation she experienced when Adam stepped into the tiny hall, Brooke thought breathlessly.

  Like her he had changed, switching the formality of his dinner suit for a pair of dark trousers in fine mohair and a white silk shirt, open at the throat beneath a grey leather blouson jacket.

  ‘Very prompt.’ He congratulated her as she closed the door behind her. Unlike his clothes his manner was anything but casual, his grey eyes moving over her with a gleam she recognised from her days working at Harrods during the New Year sale. Stepping hastily away she cannoned into Balsebar who signalled his disapproval with an unnerving howl.

  Having seen the effect of this peculiarly nerve-shattering sound on the unsuspecting before, Brooke was a little surprised to see Adam’s grin.

  ‘Let that be a warning to you,’ he murmured as he followed her into the sitting room, ‘it isn’t always wise to step too hard on a member of my sex.’

  ‘Sometimes it’s unavoidable,’ Brooke snapped back feeling thoroughly unnerved, ‘you will get underfoot.’

  ‘What a strange attitude in a lovely lady. I thought that was where you loved having us—right under your dainty heels.’

  ‘It appears to me that you have a very jaundiced view of the relationship between the sexes,’ Brooke told him, indicating a bottle of sherry and asking if he would like a glass.

  After briefly scrutinising the label he nodded his head. ‘Full marks,’ he told her accepting the glass she handed him. ‘For some reason that escapes me, the majority of your sex seems to prefer a revoltingly sweet version of what is really a most pleasant drink. Perhaps they think it reinforces the sweetness inherent in their natures.’

  ‘Or perhaps they think that your sex prefer pure syrup to something a little more astringent,’ Brooke retaliated. A little to her surprise amusement tugged at the corners of his mouth. He was, she realised on a small start of shock, the most compellingly attractive man she had ever met, and not just on a physical level.

  ‘Well,’ he drawled in the soft way she was becoming familiar with, when he had finished his drink, ‘that was the appetiser, now I’m ready for the main meal, but first….’

  Balsebar, who had thus far ignored the presence of their guest, got slowly to his feet as Adam produced his cheque book.

  Watching him in fascinated horror Brooke saw him flick it open and produce a pen.

  ‘You’re very businesslike,’ she managed to mutter faintly, hoping that the frail stem of her sherry glass wouldn’t snap beneath the tense pressure of her fingers.

  ‘I’ve found it pays.’ Adam agreed urbanely. She wasn’t quite in the same mould as his previous conquests, this tall redhead who was looking at him as though he had suddenly crawled out from under a stone. Fool, he mocked himself cynically, they’re all the same inside the packaging, every last one of them, and this one had made no secret of the fact that she was available—at a price.

  As though he sensed her tension Balsebar gave a warning growl deep in his throat, padding silently to Adam’s side, the teeth that Brooke knew could deliver a painful little nip, slightly bared.

  Adam merely laughed, and said, ‘I think it might be best if we conduct the rest of our business upstairs—without the presence of your watchdog. As it is …’ he glanced at his watch and frowned slightly, ‘I have to be back by twelve, I’m expecting an overseas call….’

  His sheer cold-bloodedness made Brooke seethe. Even if she was madly, desperately in love with him, his attitude would chill her, freezing her into an inability to respond to him. Was he always like this, she wondered in awed fascination. If so, no wonder he
had to pay his women to…. She shivered slightly her thoughts skidding to a standstill as she looked into his eyes. Cold he might seem outwardly, but inwardly…. The heat of that grey glance seemed to sear deep into her skin, warming her blood to a pulse beating rhythm that was totally alien and yet somehow intensely familiar.

  ‘What’s the matter? Having second thoughts?’ The grey eyes narrowed; the effect of his total concentration on her almost hypnotic. It was very disturbing, this ability he seemed to have to follow her thoughts, and now perhaps was as good a time as any to let him see that on this occasion his male aggression and the power of his cheque book weren’t going to be enough to get him what he wanted.

  As this was the conclusion she had anticipated when she agreed to see him Brooke couldn’t understand the too dry tension of her mouth; the emotion that could almost be fear which crawled down her spine. Unconsciously straightening her back she stared up at him. He must be at least six foot two she thought irrelevantly, because she had to tilt her head back to look him in the eyes—an advantage he was making full use of as he stared assessingly back at her.

  ‘I’m afraid I am,’ she agreed, giving him a small smile, ‘Naughty of me isn’t it?’

  At any other time the sickening coyness of her response would have nauseated her, but now there was only a primaeval instinct for survival; an inner voice that urged her to turn and run and which she determinedly withstood, praying that the man standing opposite her wouldn’t guess that her knees were shaking and that her stomach was churning sickeningly.

  ‘Naughty?’ One dark eyebrow rose. ‘Oh I wouldn’t say that. Unwise perhaps … maybe even greedy….’ He moved as he spoke, grasping her arms with a swiftness that left her in a state of acute shock. No one had ever ignored the keep off signs she posted round her the way this man was doing.

  The low growl coming from Balsebar’s throat brought her back to reality, steadying her shaken nerves. ‘I don’t think Balsebar likes the way you’re touching me,’ she told Adam pleasantly. He looked at the dog, and to Brooke’s disbelief he grinned.