Surprisingly her father promoted the idea. ‘The wisteria is no longer in bloom,’ he informed Jake. ‘But it’s still a pretty walk. You won’t have a chance in the morning. Have to be at the airport half an hour before your six-forty-five flight.’
Jake hooked her arm around his. ‘Let’s go,’ he said eagerly, his eyes lighting up at the opportunity to do more than stroll.
‘We won’t wait up for you, Merlina,’ her mother hastened to say. ‘Jake, you know where your room is?’
‘Yes, thank you. Danny showed me earlier.’
‘Then sleep well, both of you.’
‘Thanks, Mamma,’ Merlina chimed in quickly. ‘Good night. You, too, Papa.’
‘Oh, to be young again, eh, Maria?’ her father said, hugging her mother as they headed back into the house.
‘You think you are still young, Angelo,’ she tossed back with arch meaning.
Jake chuckled over this sexual allusion as she steered him around the veranda to the south side which faced the orchard. ‘How old is your father?’ he asked, still amused by the exchange between her parents.
‘Sixty-four.’
Another little laugh. ‘Pop thinks he’s still young at eighty.’
The mention of his grandfather stirred a hornet’s nest in Merlina’s brain and she was instantly stung into saying, ‘There’s one big difference. Papa is devoted to my mother. He’d never leave her for another woman.’ She took a deep breath and spelled out her need. ‘I want my husband to feel the same way about me, Jake.’
‘I can understand that,’ he said easily, as though it didn’t personally relate to him.
They walked down the south veranda steps and onto the path leading to the long pergola, which was covered by wisteria. Merlina silently stewed over Jake’s offhand reply until she could not hold her tongue any longer.
‘I don’t want to get married with the escape clause of divorce hanging over my head,’ she stated vehemently.
‘I understand that, too,’ came the tormenting reply.
It said nothing positive to her and she despaired over continuing any kind of relationship with him. It would inevitably tear her apart because in the end she wanted what her parents and brothers and sisters had, and Jake was not about to commit himself to that path.
‘So it’s best that we stop this right now,’ she forced herself to say, her heart breaking at the need to say it.
‘Stop what?’
Her feet stamped to a halt at his infuriating lack of sensitivity to her stated position. She tore her arm from his and swung to face him. Although it was still twilight beyond the pergola, the overhanging wisteria created a darkness that made it difficult to read his expression.
‘You’ve met my family. You know what they’re like and I’m one of them. So don’t pretend you still want to marry me,’ she threw at him.
He stood straight and tall and seemed to be regarding her seriously. ‘Why do you think I’m pretending?’ he asked quietly.
‘Because you haven’t finished winning what you want yet,’ she cried, gesticulating wildly as she drew the picture that made sense of his persistence. ‘You want to keep having sex with me. Maybe get me back to working with you. Arrange your life how you like it.’
‘Is that what you think of me?’ His tone was pained, which upset her even more.
‘It’s my fault. I know it’s my fault. I brought this upon myself, playing that stupid game with your grandfather. And I’m sorry I did it. Sorry I started this whole ball rolling. I should have just walked away instead of…’
‘Instead of coming out of the cake to thumb your nose at me and my playboy style of conducting my life,’ he supplied matter-of-factly.
‘Yes,’ she admitted, relieved that he took that at face value, not digging deeply enough to uncover her other motive—the mad wish to make him desire her and make him regret not having found her desirable until it was too late to keep her in his life.
‘And your decision to marry my grandfather? Was that to spite me, too, Merlina?’
She shook her head in anguished contrition for her sins. ‘I was never going to marry Byron. Your…your reactions to my denial of any further involvement with you amused him and he wanted to continue the fun to see if you’d respond to it. It was obvious there were…issues…between us, and…’
‘And you fell in with his plan because…?’
‘Because I wanted…’ She couldn’t say it. Some instinctive pride stopped her from confessing she’d loved him for so long, she’d yearned for him to realise he loved her, too. But it wasn’t so. Lust had nothing to do with a forever love. She wildly snatched at the words he’d used. ‘Yes, it was to spite you. I tricked you, deceived you, made a fool of you…so you see, you have every reason to want to walk away from me. Let’s end it now. Please?’
‘Little liar!’ he muttered, stepping closer and scooping her body hard against his. ‘You wanted me to care. To come to you. You wanted this!’ His mouth crashed down on hers, plundering it with an angry passion, wanting to dominate, to drive her into surrendering to him, body and soul.
Her own anger surged into a fierce response, her mind screaming it wasn’t right—wasn’t fair—that he could stir such powerful feelings and not be the man who would bond with her for the rest of their lives. The savage urge to make him feel as she did had her hands thrusting into his hair, wanting to claw into his brain and change his thinking patterns. It plastered her body to his, seeking to merge so completely he could never be a separate entity from her.
He kissed her until her head was spinning and the primitive fever had melted into a river of desire that turned her bones to water. ‘You can’t deny this, Merlina,’ he murmured against her lips.
No, she couldn’t, but she desperately wanted to hear other things from him. With a heavy sigh, she dropped her head onto his shoulder, hiding her face against his neck, breathing in the scent of him, wishing they belonged together in every sense.
‘As for your engagement to my grandfather…’ he went on in a wry tone, rubbing his cheek over her hair. ‘I realised that had to be a scam soon after I met your family this afternoon. No way would you have introduced Pop to them as your husband-to-be. I am a far more acceptable son-in law.’
‘Only because you worked at it,’ she mocked. ‘You’re not in tune with my family. In the long run—’ she lifted her head, steeling herself to look him straight in the eye and lay the challenge on the line ‘—but you don’t have a long run in mind, do you? All you’ve done since arriving at your grandfather’s home the other night…it’s about coming out on top. Winning the game. Except this game shouldn’t be pushed as far as marriage because that wouldn’t be playing fair. Not with me, Jake. And that’s why it has to stop.’