The Lady and the Lion (5 page)

"No, not if you've been taught to believe how you look is the biggest part of who you are."

It occurred to Erin then that Keith Donovan would never tell her what he thought she wanted to hear. He would not make pretty speeches, pay charming compliments, or say anything he didn't honestly mean. She was accustomed to dealing with all kinds of people, but in the social and diplomatic circles in which she'd come of age, Keith's brand of candor was something she had never encountered.

She felt herself smiling. "I think that's been one of my problems. It doesn't seem to be one of yours. Are you impervious to attractive women, Keith?" She thought she saw something in his eyes flare when she said his name, but there was no other change of expression on his faintly smiling face.

"To call you attractive," he said in that dispassionate tone, which robbed his words of compliment, "is like calling the ocean wet; the word doesn't begin to describe the subject. Am I impervious to beauty? No. Even a marble statue would turn his head when you walked by. Would I have asked you to breakfast if you'd been ordinarily pretty or even plain—
probably.
I wanted to meet you. Believe that or not, it's up to you."

"You were attracted by my mind?" she murmured.

"Your voice," he replied calmly. "I don't know enough of your mind.
Yet."

Erin looked at him wonderingly. "Ninety-nine men out of a hundred in my experience would have swallowed that bait without even bothering to chew on it."

Real amusement gleamed in his eyes. "I don't doubt that's just what you have experienced."

"What makes you different?"

He seemed to hesitate, then spoke slowly, the amusement gone, his eyes dimmed. "My sister was beautiful, like you.
 
Different coloring, but
..
heads
turned when she walked by. People stared at her in absolute astonishment. I know what she went through. I know what you've gone through, Erin."

Erin could see the sign warning her of dragons, but the pain she sensed made her ask, "Is your sister—?"

"Killed.
In a car... accident.
Over a year ago."

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Keith."

A quick smile, the automatic acknowledgment of sympathy, was his only response as he leaned back to allow the waiter to serve him. Erin wondered if he would say anything more about his sister, but when the waiter had gone he reverted to the discussion about beauty.

"Most people firmly believe that extreme beauty is a blessing, that it opens doors without effort. It isn't true, of course, but even that isn't the worst of it. We've all been conditioned to judge by appearance. We wrap presents in shiny paper and package cereals in colorful boxes, and stick nice, neat labels on everything we possibly can. Your label reads 'beautiful.' So ninety-nine men out of a hundred will never see past that label even while they assure you it's your mind they were attracted to in the first place."

"And the hundredth man?"
Erin asked softly.

Keith dropped his gaze to his plate for an instant, and when he looked at her again there was something almost grim in his expression. "The hundredth man heard a sweet voice on a dark balcony," he said, his own voice one she'd never heard from him before.

Erin wasn't a blushing
woman,
she'd been flattered by too many men and stared at by too many strangers to be easily disturbed or embarrassed. But she felt heat rise in her face now, and it was strangely difficult to catch, her breath. The sudden change from dispassionate to grindingly intense emotion had thrown her off balance, but it was more than that, and even though she knew it she couldn't define what it was.

One somewhat grim statement, delivered in a voice that had been harsh around the edges, and she felt... What did she feel? Confused, she bent her head over her own plate and began eating her breakfast, though she had no idea at all of what it was she was eating.

What is this?
The question was loud in her mind, bewildered and not quite, but almost afraid. In the first moments of meeting him, her mind had been so active she hadn't allowed herself to realize that a mental response wasn't the only thing she felt toward him. But now she could feel that deeper, more primitive response in every throbbing nerve of her body, and she was at a loss to account for it.

She had never admired very big men, feeling overpowered by them; she had preferred fair men to dark as far back as she could recall; and this man's hawklike face, though certainly compelling, was not handsome and was even—without the surprisingly charming smile—rather harsh. In addition to all that, she was still in the process of adjusting her responses to a man who said he was—and certainly appeared to be—indifferent to the way she looked. As welcome as that might be, it was something she had never encountered before and had found a bit unnerving.

And he hadn't
said
anything to do this to her.

Had he? If any other man had said that about a sweet voice on a dark balcony, she thought she would have laughed. But when he said it, she felt as if some barrier inside
herself
had melted instantly in the face of an explosion of heat. What was wrong with her?

"I didn't plan on this," Keith said roughly, almost angrily. "I thought it would be enough, just to talk to you. But it isn't, Erin. It isn't enough. What have you done to me?"

"I—I didn't do anything."

"Yes, you did. You haunted me until I couldn't think of anything else, until—" He broke off abruptly.

She waited, head bent, conscious of the most amazing sensations inside
herself
. She felt hot and cold, tense yet strangely weak, her heart thudding wildly. The desire in his stormy voice was as clear as if it were etched in stone or blazing in neon, and she wondered dazedly how he could be making love to her without either touching her or uttering a single caressing word.

The strange, angry urgency in his voice made her think of some half-savage creature who knew he needed and yet struggled fiercely not to give in.

"Erin?"

She looked up shyly, meeting his steady gaze.

"I'm sorry." His voice was even, the harsh edges smoothed away, and his face was completely expressionless. "I had no right to push."

"Was that what you did?"

"We both know it. You've made it plain you aren't looking for involvement. I have to respect your decision."

Erin realized she should accept what he said. She should nod and change the subject so that this breakfast would be, like the dawn discussions, just an undemanding interlude. But somehow, without her volition, she heard herself ask, "Are you looking for involvement?"

"I wasn't." He hesitated,
then
added in a hard tone, "I shouldn't have come down this morning. It would have been better if things had gone on the way they were."

She felt an odd pang, but kept her voice quiet. "Why would it have been better? Nameless... faceless..."

"You can't deny you wanted it that way."

"No, I can't. At first, that was what I wanted.
But not now.
Not for days." Her voice became a little unsteady as his expression became remote. "I'm sorry if you don't like hearing that, but it's the truth."

"Erin—"

She managed a wry laugh, dropping her gaze to her half-empty plate. "Well, that ought to teach me a lesson. I should thank you, and I do. For the first time in my life, what I look like doesn't seem to matter—and there's obviously nothing else about me to matter.
A very valuable lesson."

"Erin, stop it." He reached across the table suddenly, his powerful hand covering her slim one and grasping it strongly. "It has nothing to do with you."

"Doesn't it?" She looked up at him, a tiny frown between her brows. "I don't know what's wrong with me."

Keith knew, and he knew it was his fault. Her beauty had been her shield, and since no one had apparently tried to get past that barrier, her emotions had remained largely untouched. Whether courted or rejected, she had been able to tell herself it was because of
that,
because of the way she looked. Then he had said her beauty was a fortunate combination of genes and nothing more, and with the shield gone his seeming rejection had touched her rawest vulnerability.

He hadn't meant to blow hot and then cold, to make his desire so obvious to her that she had, surprisingly and shyly, responded before he could withdraw without hurting her. He had hurt her, and he knew it. What he didn't know was where it would end if he didn't back off right now.

"There's nothing wrong with you," he told her, his voice steady.

She was still frowning. "There must be. I feel so strange." Abruptly, she pulled her hand free and leaned back, her face settling into a polite mask. "I'm sorry. I must have forgotten how to flirt. I was taking it all too seriously, wasn't I? Never mind. It's funny, though; I've danced with princes and never lost my head when even Dad thought I might."

"Erin, the timing's lousy, that's all. It has nothing to do with you."

 
She smiled. "Stop frowning, Keith. I obviously misunderstood, and there's no harm done. Shouldn't you be getting some rest?"

Keith signaled the waiter and signed the check, but when they rose he took her hand firmly in his. She didn't protest or say anything at all until he led her through the lobby and back toward the beach.

"Where are we going?"

"We have to talk."

An uncertain laugh escaped her. "The men in my life always want to talk."

He led her partway down the path,
then
angled off away from the cabanas and the increasing activity on the beach. In this area, the hotel provided a small gardenlike area with a neat lawn, well-tended palms and shrubs, and cozy little benches scattered invitingly in the shade. No one else was taking advantage of the invitation—not that Keith would have given a damn.

Stopping near one of the benches, he turned to face her, releasing her hand because he didn't trust himself to go on touching her. It had hit him with brutal force as he looked at her across the table, a wave of desire so powerful that he had only barely been able to control it. Until then, he had been fine, he thought, completely able to think of the shared breakfast as just another interlude. Her eyes and voice had tugged at him, but he had managed to hold himself steady.

He was a long way from steady now, and he knew it.

"Keith, there's no need to talk about this," Erin said in a firm voice. "It isn't important—"

"The hell it isn't. You
did
misunderstand, and I don't know how to convince you without making bad worse." He hesitated,
then
said flatly, "Dammit, Erin, I want you. Do you understand that? I want you."

She stared up at him, faint color blooming and then fading in her cheeks, confused and beginning to be angry about it. "No, I don't understand! Is this pity? Are you trying to be kind to a stupid woman who threw herself at you?" It occurred to her, vaguely, that she and Keith were still reacting to each other as if they weren't strangers, but her own emotions were so chaotic that she hardly paid attention to the uniqueness of the entire situation.

"You didn't throw yourself at me." He was trying very hard to keep his voice calm. "I'm the one who crossed the line, and I
shouldn't
have. Erin, you don't know me, but I sure as hell do. I'm no prize even in a good mood, and I'm a bad-tempered bastard most of the time. I'd hurt you without meaning to, and I'm not going to let that happen."

"Oh, excuse me, I didn't realize you were being noble," Erin snapped, too angry to wonder where it was all coming from.

He gritted his teeth visibly, his striking eyes more brilliant than ever under heavy lids. "Nobility might fit those princes you danced with, but don't throw it at me."

"It certainly doesn't fit you," she shot back at him. "So why don't you stop trying to be something you aren't?"

"All I'm
trying
to do is keep you from making the worst mistake of your life! What do you want, Erin, a fling? You want to go up to one of our rooms and climb into bed with a man whose name you didn't know until an hour ago? Is that the way you mean to prove to your father that you aren't his little girl any more?"

She slapped him.

In the utter silence that followed, they stared at each other, both pale, the reddened imprint of her fingers marking his cheek. Her eyes were wide, almost blind, her breasts rising and falling rapidly beneath the thin cotton of her T-shirt. His face was stony, his mouth a grim slash.

Then an odd little sound escaped Erin, not nearly a laugh, and she said unsteadily, "It must be that, mustn't it?
The reason.
Because it doesn't make any sense.
You are a stranger. And I can't feel like this about a stranger without some reason. So it must be that. It must be—"

Keith closed his eyes briefly, then reached out and pulled her roughly into his arms. "I'm sorry," he muttered in a rasping voice, holding her strongly against him.

She was stiff, but not struggling, her hands lying still on his chest. "No, if I hadn't been so stupid, you wouldn't have said it—
And
it was the truth, I shouldn't have hit you for telling the truth—"

"Shhhh."
He turned her face up, one big hand surrounding it with surprising gentleness. "It wasn't the truth. Look at me, Erin."

Tumbling from one emotion to another since she had first seen him, Erin was by then almost numb. The arm holding her so close to him was hard but not painful, the hand on her face gentle, and his deep voice softer than she'd ever heard it. She wanted to cry, but obediently raised her eyes to meet his.

"It wasn't the truth," he repeated quietly. "If you don't know you could never be so reckless, well at least I do."

"Then why did you say it?" she whispered.

A nerve throbbed at one corner of his mouth. "Maybe I wanted it to be true. Maybe I hoped it would shock you enough that you'd realize how insane this is and tell me to go to hell."