Valley of the Vapours (The Americana Series Book 4) Read online

  "What will you be having? The bass? It doesn't say whether it's large mouth or not."

  He ignored the dripping sweetness of her voice. "As a matter of fact, I think I'll have the shish-kebab. It suits my taste."

  The meal was a disaster. Tisha ended up ordering a steak, but the succulently juicy cut of beef had no taste for her. She could have been chewing leather for all the notice she paid. Her only thought was to get the meal over with and return to her aunt's. She declined after-dinner coffee and then was forced to sit at the table while Roarke drank his.

  "Are we ready to go now?" she demanded impatiently when he finally placed the empty cup in its saucer.

  "I believe so," he smiled, and signaled to the waiter for their bill.

  There were more moments of waiting while the man returned with the change before Roarke rose from his chair. Tisha walked swiftly towards the exit door, eager to be gone, but his fingers closed over the soft flesh of her upper arm and slowed her down.

  "There's a small dance floor on the other side of the restaurant area. I thought we'd spend an hour or two there."

  Her neck stiffened at his words as she glared up at him. "And if I insist that you take me home?"

  "Ah, but you won't, will you?" He looked down with arrogant sureness. "You wouldn't want to deprive me of your vital company. Or should I have said volatile?"

  "You should have said unwilling," she answered sharply, but didn't resist when he turned her away from the door down the hallway to a dimly lit room.

  The room was crowded with couples gathered around small tables illuminated by flickering amber candles. Tisha had difficulty adjusting her eyes to the relative darkness of the room and was forced to rely on Roarke's guidance as he led her to a small circular table. A combo was playing a selection of slow ballads from a raised platform in one corner of the room.

  "Shall we dance?" Roarke asked after he had ordered their drinks.

  Ill temper had stretched her nerves to the breaking point as she sent him a glance of malevolent dislike. "That's what we came here for, wasn't it?"

  "I have a feeling you're going to walk all over my feet," he murmured as they rose from the table together to traverse the short distance to the dance floor.

  Tisha didn't tell him that he needn't worry on that score. She had no intention of being that close to him. The hand that closed over hers seemed unnaturally warm compared to the icy temperature of her fingers. Her other hand wasn't so much resting on his shoulder as pushing against it while his hand at the back of her waist firmly guided her into matching his steps. Tisha kept her gaze averted from the vicinity of his face.

  His arm tightened around her waist. "Relax," he said softly. The hand holding hers tightened as he folded his arm around hers and drew it forcibly against the hardness of his chest. The action brought her closer to him while his iron grip held her there. Thankfully the music ended and Roarke was compelled to release her.

  At their table, he seemed disinclined to continue the conversation as he leaned back in his chair to study Tisha in quiet contemplation. She took a tentative sip of the drink she didn't want, then replaced it on its coaster. The small band was playing an upbeat tune. She tried to enjoy it, but she found the growing silence of her escort was too disturbing.

  Tearing her swizzle stick apart, she glanced into the shadows that hid his face. "You can't want to dance with me again," she declared, "so why don't we leave?"

  "I think we should stay."

  "Why?" Exasperation blew out the angry, sighing question. "We surely aren't going to sit at this table and stare at each other?"

  The band had switched again to a slower ballad and Roarke was standing beside her chair, pulling her to her feet. The arm around her waist kept her at his side until they reached the dance floor. He turned her into his arms so quickly that she didn't realize what was happening until she discovered both his hands were linked together in the small of her back, moulding her hips against his muscular thighs. Her own hands were ineffectually pressed against his chest to hold some part of her body away from him. There was no mistaking the glare of hostility in her eyes as she looked at the complacent smile on his face.

  Tisha's fingers doubled into tight fists as she fought the impulse to beat at his chest in an effort to be free. She lowered her head, staring at the whiteness of his shirt, determined to endure the embrace without making a scene. The spread of his fingers on her spine burned through the jersey material of her caftan. A liquid fire shot through her limbs as she felt their movement over her hips in a guiding caress while Roarke moulded her against the hardness of his body.

  The exploring caress of his hands became a bit too daring and Tisha could not stop herself from whispering angrily, "Stop it!"

  At the same time, she reached down to put his hands back on her waist. Instantly she realized her mistake. Without the leverage of her hands against his chest, he completed the embrace with one hand between her shoulders bringing her against his chest.

  "I don't like to dance this way," she told his collar while her fingers dug into the expensive material of his jacket sleeves.

  "Why ever not?" he asked, nuzzling her ear.

  "It's my old-fashioned morals again," she muttered sarcastically. "I don't like embracing in public."

  There was no escaping his touch. She felt every muscle contraction in his body and a growing weakness attacked her legs.

  "Don't be embarrassed," Roarke murmured. "Nobody is watching us."

  The warmth of his breath played along her neck. "I don't care!" She tilted her head back to stop the trail of fire along her neck and to let the glitter of her anger be directed to his carved face.

  "Are you afraid of an unexpected kiss?" he taunted her. His lazy, half-closed eyes were focused on her lips.

  "There's no such thing. A girl always expects to be kissed. It's only the where and the when she doesn't know," Tisha answered.

  "We must answer those two questions, then." Warmly and briefly his mouth touched hers, then he was once again looking down at her, watching the hot colour steal over her cheeks.

  "Was that the best you could do?" she asked, surprised to find her breathing was shallow and uneven.

  The glinting humour in his eyes took in the other dancers around them. "In the circumstances," he answered smoothly.

  "I didn't realize discretion was one of your virtues," she taunted.

  "I didn't know you thought I had any virtues," he returned, the quirking eyebrow laughing at her again.

  The instant the song ended, Tisha wrenched herself free of his unresisting arms. She had just seated herself in her chair when Roarke arrived at their table. Instead of sitting down, he stood beside her chair and touched her shoulder, smiling when she shrank away.

  "I thought you wanted to leave," he mocked.

  Tisha sent him another furious glance as she rose to her feet. She closed her mouth on the cutting comment that hovered on the tip of her tongue. She didn't want to take any chances that he might change his mind.

  The moon was a silver cartwheel in the velvet dark sky sprinkled with silver stars winking down at her as she stared out the car window, determined to ignore the man behind the wheel. Her skin still seemed to tingle with the sensual remembrance—of her body pressed against his. It was a disquieting sensation.

  "Am I to receive the silent treatment now?" Roarke asked. "It's hard to believe that you've run out of insults."

  "Spare me your sarcasm," she answered in a tightly controlled voice. "I'm tired. All I want to do is get home."

  "It's been an enervating evening," he agreed.

  "Marked by highlights of boredom," she could not resist inserting,

  A low chuckle sounded from his side of the car. "There, for a minute, I thought your defenses were down,"

  "You can think again!" she retorted.

  "You'll fight me with your last breath, won't you?" he murmured softly.

  "You won't last that long."

  Tall pines on eithe
r side of the country road blocked out the moonlight. Tisha watched the car headlights pick out the turn that led to Blanche's.

  "As the song says, when an irresistible object meets up with an immovable one, something has to give," Roarke chuckled again.

  "I suppose you classify yourself as an irresistible object," she hooted with thick sarcasm. "I have news for you, Mr. Madison, the strong, masterful type turns my stomach."

  "Blanche tells me that your father is a forceful, independent man. Is that true?" he asked, making an abrupt change in subject.

  "Yes, I take after him in that respect. I'm not influenced by outward glitter and charm." Tisha gave him a scathing look that was useless in the dim interior of the car.

  "I've heard it said that girls tend to marry men who resemble their fathers," Roarke jibed.

  Her muscles tensed as a quiver of apprehension attacked her. She had heard that theory before. As a child and teenager she had subscribed to it, thinking there could be nothing more wonderful than to marry a man as masculine and unconquerable as her father. Of course that was before she had to live under his tyranny of the last few years.

  "In some cases it might be true, but not in mine," she averred.

  "Why?"

  "Because the man I marry has to respect me as an individual and not regard me as his chattel to be ordered and dictated to as if I didn't have any sense of my own. He'll not only have to love me, but he'll have to trust me too and not…not…" Her hand waved through the air as she searched for the right word to complete her thought.

  "And not turn on porchlights," Roarke supplied.

  "Yes," she nodded sharply, her hand returning to her lap, "in the sense that he shouldn't feel the need to check up on me."

  "Is that the way your father treated your mother?"

  Tisha sat very still. Of all the arguments between her parents, there had not been one born of jealousy or mistrust that she could remember. Their love for each other had been very strong and displayed in many ways.

  "No, he never doubted her," she answered quietly.

  "Your mother must have been a very passive woman?"

  "My mother?" Tisha laughed. "She was every bit as stubborn as Dad. They argued a lot, never with any bitterness or vindictiveness, though. I remember they would be in the middle of some heated debate and one or the other would burst into laughter and it would be all over. They had a one-in-a-million marriage."

  "When did you lose your mother?"

  "When I was fourteen."

  "Your father must have taken it very hard."

  "He did. He wandered around the house like a lost soul for a long time," Tisha admitted. "Dad and I were very close those first years after Mom died. But these last three years," she shuddered, remembering some of their more voluble quarrels, "he's been impossible to live with."

  "Daddy's little girl grew up on him, and very beautifully, too," Roarke commented. "Being a man who's tasted the wild fruits, your father knows how easily a man can take advantage of an attractive girl like you. No doubt that's why he wants to get you married and out of temptation's path."

  His compliment and the subsequent suggestive statement pulled Tisha sharply out of her reverie of the past. A light in the window of her aunt's home beamed a welcome to her as she realized they were parked in the drive. She chided herself severely for dropping her guard even for a minute. She had no wish for Roarke to know anything about her past life.

  "You can be certain my father would never have let me go out with a wolf like you," she declared, her hand reaching for the door handle.

  His movement was quicker and surer as his fingers closed over her wrist before she could achieve her objective. "Not so fast!" His dark face was very close to hers, causing Tisha to draw back against her seat. "No self-respecting wolf would let a lovely woman like you get away without a goodnight kiss."

  There was a drumbeat in her ears that she finally recognized as the pounding of her blood. "I should have known you were one of those disgusting males who expect payment for taking a girl out," she snapped, but her mouth felt unusually dry.

  "That's right," he agreed smoothly.

  His hand closed over her chin, lifting it to receive his kiss. It was deep and lingering, confirming her assertion that he had known a lot of women. Yet the lack of force in the tantalizing caress made it all the more potent and difficult to resist. When his mouth finally left hers, Tisha felt he had burned his brand into the softness of her lips. She exhaled a quivering breath, relaxing the control that had held her stiffly resistant under his touch.

  "Now may I go?" surprised that she was still able to put so much freezing scorn in her voice.

  His face was still close enough for her to see the deep smiling grooves around his mouth. In answer, he reached down and pulled the handle, opening the door. The interior light flicked on, glimmering on the golden lights in his hair while Tisha slipped out of her seat and quickly slammed the door.

  Billy Goat Gruff was between her and the door, but she scurried past. It wasn't the goat watching her that made her legs tremble, but the man in the car.

  In the relatively small number of years that she had dated, Tisha had been kissed often, sometimes by boys experienced enough to arouse the natural desire of a woman for a man. The difficult thing to comprehend was the feeling she had that she had only felt the surface fire before and not the white hot heat of desire. What was worse, it had been Roarke's kiss that had generated that discovery. And Tisha had always thought herself immune to physical lust, too ruled by her mind to be betrayed by her senses.

  Chapter Five

  TISHA shifted her brush to her other hand and flexed the tense fingers that had been gripping it. Her shoulders sagged as she studied the half-finished painting. It didn't seem to matter what she did today, nothing turned out right.

  "Problems?" Blanche asked, the heavy sigh from Tisha drawing her attention.

  "Yes, a lack of talent," Tisha declared disgustedly.

  Blanche laid her own brush down and, wiping her hands on a rag, walked over to her niece's side of the studio. Reaching into the pocket of her smock, she took out a cigarette and lit it before placing a hand on Tisha's shoulder.

  "What's wrong?" she asked.

  Tisha glanced upwards. "This bouquet is all wrong. It looks as if I'd stuck the violets on a straight line. I did the same thing with the daffodils earlier." Her shoulders moved in a deprecating shrug. "I can't do anything right today. I know what I'm doing wrong, but I can't correct it."

  "You can't just learn what your mistakes are, Tish, or you end up only learning mistakes and making them. Discover the right things you do so you can do them more often."

  "Blanche, you are a gem!" The scowl left Tisha's face as her mouth turned up at the comers in a rueful smile. "How do you come up with all those pearls of wisdom?"

  "Common sense and experience," smiled Blanche, flicking back the natural white streak in her hair that had fallen forward over her dark brow. "Experience also tells me that you're as strung up as a high-tension wire. Sometimes tension can stimulate creativity, but in your case it's only causing frustration."

  "What's your suggestion?" asked Tisha.

  "Let's take the rest of the afternoon off." Her brown eyes glanced at the skylight and the windows, continuing from ceiling to floor. "The light has gone anyway."

  Tisha's own gaze shifted to the windows. Through the panes, she saw the rolling dove-grey clouds that blotted out the early afternoon sun. The tops of the pines were gently swaying, yet there was nothing threatening about the clouds. But the good light was gone, as Blanche had said. Her aunt had returned to her easel and was busy cleaning up her brushes.

  A sigh broke from her lips as Tisha followed suit. All her effort had been wasted motions. Nothing she had done was of sufficient quality for resale. All because of the face that kept dancing in front of her eyes, the face with golden-brown hair and velvet-dark eyes. It would have been so much better if she hadn't gone out with him the night
before. She would rather have considered herself a coward for refusing his challenge than face the discovery that he had the ability to sensually arouse her.

  "Tisha. Tisha, are you listening to me?"

  With a start, she realized Blanche had been speaking to her. "I'm sorry, I was daydreaming. What did you say?"

  "I asked if you'd ever been to the Crater of Diamonds," her aunt repeated, a curious frown marking her forehead.

  "No. A bunch of us were going to go once as a lark, but we never did. Why?"

  "I thought we might drive over there this afternoon."

  "To hunt for diamonds?" Tisha laughed shortly, not quite able to visualize her creative aunt digging in the dirt.

  "We could," Blanche agreed with a knowing smile. "But I had in mind to do some character sketches. A busman's holiday."

  "I'll endorse any suggestion," adding to herself, "that will detract my thoughts from Roarke Madison."

  "Everyone has a bad day now and then. Don't let it get you down," her aunt said. The soothing tone was prompted by the desperate ring in Tisha's voice.

  And Tisha could hardly correct her. Blanche liked Roarke and wouldn't understand the abhorrence Tisha felt about the way she kept dwelling on him. Nor could she express her gratitude for the way her aunt had abstained from questioning her about the events of last night, because Tisha wasn't prepared to talk about it.

  "I would not change into anything too nice," Blanche called after her as Tisha started from the studio after straightening her things. "You might decide to do a bit of grubbing in the earth."

  Tisha thought it unlikely, but she put on a pair of faded jeans and a scooped-neck knit shirt of olive-green. A pale yellow scarf secured her long hair at the nape of her neck and grabbing an equally faded denim jacket from her closet, she wandered outdoors to wait for her aunt.

  It was mid-afternoon before Blanche turned her car down the graveled road carved out of a thick stand of pines. A light breeze whispered through the needles while an Indian summer sun peeped through a cloud and streamed down to lay golden bars on the ground. The stillness surrounding them was so profound that Tisha could almost imagine she and Blanche were the only humans for miles. The rows of cars in the car-park came as something of a surprise.