Carole Mortimer Romance Collection. Carole Mortimer
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now.
She gave a frustrated sigh. ‘Whatever,’ she said wearily, shaking her head. Arrogant, arrogant man. ‘The kitchen is through there,’ she pointed to the door on their left.
He nodded abruptly, not showing by so much as a twitch of the eyebrow his satisfaction at once again achieving his own way. Which was just as well—Silke would probably have hit him if he had looked in the least triumphant. But then he probably knew that too!
‘Go and get into bed,’ he told her again, walking with long strides towards the kitchen.
Silke’s frustration with the situation increased as she stood in the middle of her lounge listening to the sounds of him going through the cupboards, looking for the makings of the tea. If she didn’t soon sit or lie down she had a feeling she was going to fall down, but the thought of Lyon bringing her a cup of tea in bed—! Oh, damn it, what did it matter? They weren’t likely to leap on each other just because she was in bed. In fact, they weren’t likely to leap on each other at all!
One glance in the bathroom mirror at the paleness of her face, the dark shadows under her eyes more visible against that pallor, and Silke knew she had nothing to worry about; she looked ghastly, not in the least alluring!
She bathed her face in cold water before getting herself ready for bed, already safely under the covers by the time Lyon came into the bedroom with the tray of tea things. And two cups, she noticed as he put the tray down on the bedside table.
‘I had trouble finding the sugar,’ he explained the length of time it had taken him to make the tea.
Silke was still eyeing those two cups on the tray. ‘I don’t take sugar,’ she told him distractedly.
‘But I do, in tea,’ he said arrogantly, pouring the tea into the two cups before adding a liberal amount of sugar to one of them.
Silke watched him over the top of the bedclothes. He looked slightly incongruous standing there with the teapot in his hand, pouring tea into two delicate china cups; Silke couldn’t help wondering if he had ever done anything like this in his life before.
Dark brows rose over quizzical grey eyes as he turned to look at her. ‘What are you smiling at?’
She hadn’t realised she was smiling, but she could feel the grin on her lips now, straightening her expression with effort. ‘You do like sugar in tea,’ she dismissed lightly, having no intention of telling him what she had actually been grinning at; he had actually looked quite endearing carrying out the mundane task of pouring tea for them both! Lyon—endearing; the two just didn’t go together!
One brow rose sceptically at her explanation, but he didn’t question her further on the subject. ‘Sit up,’ he instructed abruptly. ‘You can’t drink your tea flat on your back like that.’
She had deliberately lain ‘flat on her back’ so that she could have the bedclothes up to her chin, but of course he was right, she couldn’t drink tea like this, not with any degree of success anyway!
His mouth twitched with humour as she sat up to reveal the print on her cotton nightshirt; the pig pattern was hardly sexy, she ruefully acknowledged. But she was very fond of the busy pig pattern—and she certainly didn’t want to look sexy!
‘Trying to tell me something?’ he drawled, sitting on the side of her bed to drink his own tea.
Silke wished he hadn’t done that; the last thing she needed was to have him close to her like this. But as he continued to sip his tea he showed every sign of being comfortable exactly where he was. Comfortable was the last thing she felt herself; she was unnerved by this intimacy, her hand shaking slightly as she lifted her own cup to her lips.
‘Hardly,’ she answered him dismissively. ‘I wouldn’t presume to tell you anything!’
His eyes warmed with humour. ‘I don’t think sarcasm becomes you!’
‘I wasn’t—’ Her cheeks were slightly flushed. ‘Perhaps I was,’ she admitted ruefully.
He took her empty cup out of her hand, putting it back on the tray with his own, before making himself more comfortable on the bed. ‘You look about ten years old with your hair brushed back like that, no make-up, and wearing that nightshirt!’
Her inner turmoil at his closeness wasn’t that of a ten-year-old! She only wished it were. He looked so attractive in the black dinner-suit and white shirt, was so close she could smell that elusively tangy aftershave he wore. As for his hands, she refused to look at them!
‘Your daughter would be beautiful, Silke,’ he said huskily.
Her eyes widened. Daughter? Oh, no, he wasn’t back on that subject! She couldn’t—
‘You’re beautiful, Silke,’ he added softly.
He was too close now, his head bending towards her, his lips only inches from her own. Silke’s gaze was fixed on the beauty of that mouth, remembering all too well the emotions his kisses had evoked in her last time. Last time? God, she couldn’t seriously be contemplating letting him kiss her again, not after what had happened between them last week! Letting him kiss her—she knew all too well that if Lyon decided to kiss her then it wouldn’t be a case of ‘letting’ him do anything; Lyon was a law unto himself.
‘Cameron was a fool.’ His warm breath stirred her silky fringe. ‘How could he have been engaged to you and not made love to you?’ He shook his head disgustedly.
His mention of James was enough to free her of the sensually mesmerising spell he had been casting, and Silke drew back abruptly—she hadn’t realised until that moment that she had half moved up from the pillow to meet his kiss!
But talking about James was enough to put a dampener on anything, reminding her all too forcefully of the meeting she had had with him in her mother’s office last week. He had ‘made a mistake’ marrying Cheryl, he claimed, explaining that the marriage was now over, that he now realised he still loved Silke. And then he had asked her if they couldn’t try again, if the two of them couldn’t marry, as they had once planned, once his divorce from Cheryl was through!
Silke had been astounded at his cheek, that he had thought he could just walk back into her life, with the declaration of still loving her, and expect her to welcome him back. With open arms, apparently!
Needless to say she had told him exactly what he could do with his suggestion, had advised him to go back to his wife and try to make his marriage work. He had been furious at her lack of understanding, that Cameron temper quickly showing itself once he realised she wasn’t about to fall back into his arms. Silke had been speechless at his nerve in even thinking he could come back to her after the way he had walked out on her a year ago—but she had quickly regained her voice when she ordered him to leave. And not to come back! His silence since that day seemed to confirm that he had taken her at her word. Thank goodness! It was up to him whether or not he took any notice of her advice about his marriage; as long as he stayed away from her she didn’t care what else he did.
And she certainly didn’t want to talk to Lyon about him now, in any context. ‘I would like to go to sleep now, Lyon, if you don’t mind,’ she told him distantly, not really caring whether he minded or not; she just wanted him to leave.
His gaze narrowed on her thoughtfully—and what he read in her glittering green eyes must have warned him not to push her any further at the moment, because he straightened before standing up in preparation of leaving.
Silke moved uncomfortably under the intensity of that steely gaze, but her own gaze didn’t drop, meeting his steadily as she willed him to just go.
‘I’ll take the tray back out to the kitchen,’ he gave an abrupt nod—as if he had just come to an inner decision. ‘Can I get you anything else before I leave...?’
‘No,’ she answered forcefully. Why didn’t he just go and leave her in peace!
‘OK,’ he accepted smoothly. ‘I’ll see you in my office