Karen Van Der Zee - Captive In Eden

She asked for a glass of orange juice with ice and went in search of a quiet place and a chair to sit in. The marbled entrance hall was empty. If she sat here for a while, maybe her head would stop hurting. She noticed a door slightly ajar and glimpsed a desk, a bookcase, a large sofa.

A sofa! She pushed the door open and slipped in, closing the door behind her.

She needed to lie down—just for a little while. She was going to pass out if she didn’t. She put the glass down on the massive oak desk, using a discarded envelope from the wastebasket as a coaster. Kicking off her high heels, she lay down, closed her eyes and tried to empty her head of all thought. It was heaven. She heard the muted sounds of talking and laughter from other parts of the house. The quiet in this study was like a balm for her tortured head. In a little while she’d get up and tackle the problem of transportation.

* * *

When she awoke it was too late to tackle the problem of transportation. It was three o’clock in the middle of the night and the house was silent as a tomb. She felt panic rise and forced it down. This was not the end of the world. It was merely excruciatingly embarrassing.

She swallowed back a laugh. Oh, God, leave it to her to get into a situation like this. She struggled into a sitting position and stared into the darkness until her eyes adjusted. It wasn’t all that dark. A wave of moonlight swam through the window, washing the massive wooden desk in a silver sheen.

Her headache was gone. This was good news.

She needed to go to the bathroom. This was bad news.

There was a bathroom off the entrance hall, she had discovered earlier that evening. Unfortunately, running water made noise. What if the green-eyed tiger heard her? At least, she assumed he was asleep somewhere in this mansion. Oh, God. She could see it now. He’d come in search of her in black silk pyjamas. He’d pounce on her.

Well, she simply had no choice. She tiptoed out of the door, across the oriental rug that graced the marble entrance hall. A large, curving staircase swept up regally to the second floor.

She found the bathroom and prayed he would not hear the running of water after she flushed and washed. The mirror produced a nightmarish sight. Her mascara and eyeliner had smeared all over the place. Her hair was standing out in every direction and looked like a bleached mop in the garish light. It wasn’t bleached. It was perfectly honest blonde hair, but somehow she looked like a tramp, especially with her dress now wrinkled disastrously. Poor abused parrots. She bit her lip and chuckled.

She tiptoed back into the study and sat down on the sofa, waiting with bated breath for sounds of footsteps in the house. Nothing. After a few minutes she began to breathe more easily.

She needed to collect her thoughts.

Leaving the house was out of the question. She had no transportation and only a vague idea of the general location of the place. She was at least an hour’s drive away from her barn, not a distance she could walk. Calling Beth, her friend, or her mother in the dead of night to come and get her was asking no small favour, but it would do no good because she couldn’t give any directions. This left her with only one possibility.

She’d have to make her presence known and ask for help.

Help from Chase Montana, who was asleep somewhere in this sprawling plantation house.

For obvious reasons three o’clock in the morning was not a good time to go in search of him and awaken him. Closing her eyes, she visualised him asleep in a big bed, wearing black silk pyjamas, or maybe nothing. Probably nothing. She imagined touching his arm, trying to stir him from sleep. In her mind she could just see him leap, naked from the bed, growling. She grinned to herself. Well, she could still laugh.

There was no good time for this confrontation, but the morning was better than now. She sighed and smoothed the fabric of her dress. Silk dresses were not meant to be slept in. She groaned. She would look a disaster in the morning.

Her eyes caught a framed photograph on the desk, captured by the moonlight, and she could not resist having a closer look. It was a starchy family portrait: father, mother and two young teenage sons. One of the sons was Chase—a much younger version of the one she’d met last night. The other was obviously his younger brother. The portrait was agonisingly formal. The father wore a pin-striped suit and looked grim. The mother’s dress was conservatively elegant and she wore a strand of pearls and a stilted smile. Both boys wore jackets, shirts and dark ties, and their hair had been slicked back. The younger boy’s smile was a frozen grimace, much like Chase’s. Yet there was a difference in their expressions. Chase’s eyes had a devilish gleam in them. She’d seen that same gleam last night. A sudden little shiver ran down her back. She wasn’t looking forward to facing him in the morning.

She went back to the sofa, lay down and closed her eyes. She might as well sleep some more. There was nothing else to do. If only she could pick up the phone and talk to Beth. Beth would die laughing, but not at three in the morning. Sky felt a spasm of pain and pushed it away. Beth and Kevin were moving to North Dakota in a couple of months. They’d been part of her life for a long time, ever since college. They were her only two close friends who had known Josh. Their departure would leave a terrible hole in her life.

She awoke to a grey morning and a sense of doom. No sunlight streamed through the uncurtained windows and it did not look like a spring morning. She grimaced. She could have done with a little sunshine to give her courage. It was just after seven, according to her watch.

Coffee. Her body was begging for a cup of strong coffee. Quietly she moved to the door and carefully opened it a crack. Muted noises reached her ear. Somebody was stirring around somewhere on the ground floor.

Chase Montana?

With her heart in her throat, she slipped back into the bathroom and washed her face and hands. She rubbed at the remainders of mascara and eyeliner with a tissue and some hand lotion that was thoughtfully provided. She had a comb in her bag and she pulled it through her hair. There was nothing she could do about the dress. It was a sorry sight. Quickly, noiselessly, she went back into the office and slipped on her shoes. She straightened herself to her full five feet two inches and took a deep, fortifying breath. It was time to face the tiger.

First, of course, she had to find him. She knew where the kitchen was. Platters of food had emerged from it last night. It was the logical place to start the search.

The kitchen door was closed, but it opened before she could reach to do so herself. And there he was, Chase Montana himself, wearing casual cotton trousers and an open-necked shirt, a cup of coffee in his hand.

His dark brows arched in surprise, then settled in their natural place again. His eyes narrowed and his mouth curled in a predatory grin and the silence crackled with tension.

‘Well, well,’ he drawled. ‘Look who’s here.’

SKY’S heart sank at the tone of his voice and she felt a nervous wobble in her knees. Since she wasn’t given to wobbly knees, this was not promising.

She had decided that the only way to deal with this most embarrassing situation was to come right out and tell it the way it was. His tone of voice, however, was not encouraging and did not help her confidence. The man had a terrible effect on her equilibrium, physically as well as emotionally, and she couldn’t help feeling swamped with trepidation.

‘I fell asleep in your office,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry.’

He put his coffee down and thrust his hands in his pockets, surveying her with narrow-eyed suspicion. ‘It’s an interesting technique,’ he said calmly. ‘Do you do this sort of thing often?’