She needed to leave. They could talk about everything later, when she’d regained her equilibrium. When she wasn’t standing in his hotel suite too aware of her nakedness under the robe... And his prominent morning erection.
Instead of replying, though, he stood and arched his back, then tilted his head to one side then the other. She heard the joints popping in his neck, making the tightness in her throat increase—at the thought that he had slept all night on the couch in his own luxury suite so she could get her first good night’s sleep in weeks.
‘I had them destroyed,’ he said, the husky tone completely unapologetic.
The statement had all her warm feelings evaporating.
‘You...what?’ She wanted to be outraged at his arrogance, but all she felt was more exposed. And wary. ‘Why?’
‘To prevent you from running away while I was asleep,’ he said without even a hint of remorse.
‘But... You... That’s... You had no right,’ she sputtered, finally managing to grab hold of some outrage. She’d had to pay for that uniform out of her own money.
‘I had every right,’ he said as his gaze strayed down to her midriff. ‘I don’t intend to let you vanish again until we have a few things settled.’
‘But I wasn’t going to vanish,’ she said, stunned by the inflexible tone. And the arrogance behind it. And wondering what things he intended to settle. ‘I told you last night I’d come back here to talk to you today.’
He didn’t even give her the benefit of an answer this time, simply lifted one sceptical brow, his expression saying in all but words: Do I look like an idiot?
She wanted to shout and rail against his lack of trust. But she was forced to concede he had a point, given her previous disappearing act. ‘Those clothes were my property. I paid for them and I need them because I’m going to have to find another job today. So thanks a bunch for that,’ she said, trying to hide her distress behind a wall of sarcasm.
Showing weakness to Maxim Durand was not a good idea. She’d shown him weakness last night in her exhaustion and he’d steamrollered over all her protests, not to mention destroying her property.
The cynical expression disappeared but, just when she thought she’d finally scored a point, he said in a voice so calm and forceful and pragmatic it took a moment for her to register the outrageousness of what he had said, ‘You do not need those clothes, as I will buy you better ones. And you don’t need a job, because we are to be married in France as soon as it is possible, in ten days’ time.’
‘Are you...? Are you crazy?’
Maxim watched the light flush on Cara’s cheeks deepen to magenta—and the wary concern in her bright blue gaze turn to panic.
Okay, perhaps that had not been the best way to propose. She’d retreated another step, as if trying to edge away from a dangerous animal which was about to pounce.
She was right to be cautious. His emotions had never been this volatile before, this uncontrolled. As soon as he’d opened his eyes, and seen her standing by his makeshift bed, her hair damp and her curves swamped in the fluffy bathrobe, he’d had to quell the primal urge to leap forward and claim her, scared she would disappear again, as she had so many times before in his dreams, and nightmares.
In fact, for one split second he’d thought she might be an apparition, caused by the loss of blood from his head fuelling the painful erection which had woken him every morning for five long months.
‘Let me explain, Cara,’ he said, taking a step forward. ‘Marriage is the obvious solution.’
She scuttled back another step. ‘Don’t... Don’t touch me, Maxim. I mean it.’ She held her hands up in the universal sign of surrender, her gaze darting across the suite to the door. ‘I have to leave. I can’t...’
She made a dash round the sofa. Without thinking, he leapt over the obstacle and captured her wrist, drawing her to a halt.
She struggled, trying to tug her hand free. ‘L
et me go, Maxim... I want to leave.’
‘Stop, Cara. You will hurt yourself,’ he said, drawing her against his body, quelling her struggles in his embrace as he pressed her gently against the wall, caging her in.
He inhaled her scent, wild flowers and woman, the scent that had driven him mad last night as he undressed her—and forced himself not to touch her more than was absolutely necessary.
At last she stilled and he heard the stifled sob as her forehead pressed against his sternum.
He felt like a brute, a beast. The jagged sound of her breathing—the painful attempt to hold onto her tears, and the hopelessness that he suspected lay behind it—cut into his composure, his equilibrium. His heart expanded in his chest and his throat closed. But he couldn’t let her go, not like this. Not now he had found her. If he let her run, he might never find her again, and he wouldn’t be able to live with himself—knowing she was out there somewhere, surviving on nothing, endangering herself, when he had the means to protect her. He had failed his mother once. He would not fail her.
‘Shh, Cara,’ he murmured against her hair.
She shuddered, the sounds of her breathing cutting off as she tried to hold onto her emotions.
‘I would never hurt you,’ he said, as softly as he could. ‘You have my word. But I cannot let you leave until you have agreed to marry me.’