And, she now knew, the shallower, more selfish and—‘Shaan!’ The sound of that harshly rasping voice calling from the other room brought her eyes jerking open in startled surprise.
‘Coming!’ she answered shakily, jerking off the bed to stand, swaying with a mixture of utter fatigue and miserable confusion as to where her life was going to take her from here on.
She looked down at the bed, imagining two dark heads on the snowy white pillows—and shuddered in utter rejection of what next went skittering through her mind.
‘No,’ she whispered to herself. ‘No. Never. Rafe doesn’t want me like that. I know he doesn’t.’
And with that comforting thought she made herself get dressed, determined to be as cool and collected about all this as he was being.
Even if it killed her to do it.
* * *
Their lunch was just being wheeled in as she let herself into the other room. Rafe’s voice sounded impatient as he instructed the waiter to leave the heated trolley by the dining table before dismissing him.
Drawn by the delicious aroma of freshly ground coffee, Shaan walked over to the table and sat down, her eyes carefully averted from the lancing, probing look Rafe sent her.
The telephone rang again while she was pouring herself a cup of coffee, and it was only as Rafe strode across the room that she realised there was a huge cedarwood desk she hadn’t noticed before, the top of it already lost in a mound of paperwork.
No wonder he looks so impatient, she thought ruefully. While I’ve been hogging the bedroom, he’s been working like a dog!
‘Coffee?’ she offered, striving to sound at ease when really she was strung up like piano wire. ‘Or would you prefer to shower first?’
He glanced at his watch, grimaced, then sighed. ‘Coffee,’ he decided. ‘Black, no sugar.’ And he made a visible effort to relax some of the tension out of his shoulders as he came to join her.
He had only taken one step when the telephone began ringing yet again. On another sigh he turned back to the insistent machine and snatched up the receiver. ‘No more calls for the next half hour,’ he instructed whoever was on the other end, then dropped the phone back on its rest, his expression long-suffering as he came to sit down opposite her.
Mutely, Shaan handed h
im a cup, her gaze watchful as she sipped slowly at her own. He glanced up, caught her studying him and gave a tight, wry smile.
For some reason that smile melted something inside her—gave her courage to smile back and ask quietly, ‘Do you always have to work at such a pace?’
‘One of the trials of being a high-flying businessman,’ he drily mocked himself.
‘All work and no play,’ she joined in the joke.
His eyes came to life suddenly. ‘Not all work,’ he corrected, and watched the embarrassed colour sweep her cheeks as his meaning hit home.
Piers had told her all about his women. And if Piers was to be believed—which she wasn’t sure of any more—Rafe’s women were very beautiful, very sophisticated, and very independently successful—women who did not cling and understood that they took second place in his life to his job.
‘A whole collection of them,’ Piers had described very mockingly. ‘Spread out in a string across the world, all happy to make themselves available to him when he happens to be in town.’
One in every port, Shaan mused ruefully. Did that mean he had a woman in this port?
‘Here,’ he said, placing a covered plate in front of her and removing the domed lid to reveal the lightest, fluffiest omelette she had ever seen. She stared down at it and decided she did not want it. In fact her stomach had just closed up at the very thought of food entering it. She swallowed tensely, aware of his eyes on her, aware that her sudden lack of appetite was due to the sudden suspicion that he had indeed got a woman tucked away somewhere in this crowded city.
And why should that bother her? she asked herself grimly. His private life was none of her business!
‘Eat,’ Rafe commanded, after watching her stare at her food for too long.
She ate, forcing each morsel into her mouth and having to work at swallowing it
It was a relief when the phone started ringing again, so that she could desert what was left on her plate when Rafe got up to answer it
‘Right’ He turned towards the bedroom the moment he came off the phone. ‘I’ll be about ten minutes. If the phone rings take any messages and tell them I’ll get back to them as soon as I can.’
‘But I don’t speak Chinese!’ Shaan protested in alarm as he reached the bedroom door.