Robyn Donald - Prince Of Lies

But the little posy made a pleasant spot of colour, and in some odd way reassured her. Turning her head, she surveyed the other side of the room. The bedhead was against the straight wall that divided the room from the bathroom and the landing. The other walls stretched around her, enclosing and comforting, as though they were holding her in a protective embrace.

‘It must be a tower room!’ she said out loud, delighted, and flung the covers back.

Still stiff and sore, she staggered as renewed pain throbbed through her, but even so she was halfway to the window when she was caught and pulled back, whirled abruptly and held by a cruel grip on her shoulders, to meet the impassive, glittering eyes of her rescuer. Yesterday she had been too dazed to realise just how unusual they were, although she had registered their concentrated compulsion. Now, imprisoned as unequivocally by them as by his hands, she almost gasped. Instead of the warm, brilliantly clear sapphire she was used to seeing in the mirror, this man’s eyes were so pale as to give an impression of translucence, with white flecks in the iris that made them look like splintered glass. Such was the intensity of those eyes that Stephanie’s struggles stopped immediately. Her own widened, darkness swallowing up the colour; she shivered with some strange inner confusion.

‘Don’t go near the windows,’ he said roughly.

The fragile moment of happiness shattering irrevocably, she nodded. Instantly, he let her go.

It was the most difficult thing she had ever done, but she managed to look fearlessly at him. He had freed her, slept with her, comforted her and finally held her, his strong arms and the solace of his presence banishing the nightmares. Then he had unfeelingly rejected what her innocent body had offered of its own volition.

Those powerful hands held her life and well-being. He could snuff both out as easily as he had pulled her away from the window.

He made her heart falter. Partly it was his amazing eyes, but they were merely the most arresting part of a truly formidable man. At five feet nine she was accustomed to looking many men in the eye, but he towered above her by at least six inches—possibly seven, she thought, gazing up into a face far more impressive than handsome. Slashing bone-structure formed the basis of features that reminded her of an eagle, the fiercely hooked nose and dominant, angular lines of jaw and cheekbones reinforcing an arrogant authority. His straight mouth warned of self-possession and fortitude, although she recognised something ambiguous about that mouth, a hint of sensuality in its sharply cut outline that set female nerves jangling at some hidden, primitive level.

From the top of his blue-black head to the soles of his feet he was all edged, confident masculinity, but it was a masculinity tight-leashed by an almost inhuman will.

‘Who are you?’ she blurted.

Apparently not in the least affected by her bold survey, he’d waited until she spoke. At her question his lashes drooped, and a smile, mockingly amused, curved his mouth.

‘Duke,’ he said laconically, and to her astonishment held out his hand.

Most men looked stupid with a hand held out, a hand that was ignored. This one didn’t; completely relaxed, he merely waited. Once more Stephanie glimpsed a monumental, hard-headed patience that sent a cold shiver flicking down her spine as she reluctantly accepted his invitation. She had long fingers and a strong grip, but in his clasp her hand seemed small and white and powerless.

‘You know who I am,’ she said uncertainly.

‘We haven’t been introduced.’

Later she would wonder whether he had enough intuition to realise that this introduction was a wiping clean of all that had happened previously, and even before entertaining the idea would dismiss it. In spite of his care of her the preceding night he’d been more forceful than sensitive, and his abrupt rejection in the morning hadn’t revealed any insight or empathy at all.

At that moment, however, saying her name, asserting an identity, was a reclaiming of something that the calculated inhumanity of her imprisonment had taken from her.

‘Stephanie Jerrard,’ she said, and her head came up. While they shook hands she asked, ‘Just Duke?’ and thought how strange it was that she had called him a prince, an ice-prince. He looked more like a prince than a duke, and yet the name suited his careless arrogance.

‘That’s all you need to know,’ he said, an indifferent note in his voice warning her off.

As their hands fell away he ordered curtly, ‘The windows look out over the valley, so the only people we have to worry about are ones with binoculars on the far side. Still, remember that if anyone does see you here word may reach the men who kidnapped you.’

At her involuntary shiver he nodded, pale eyes ranging her face. ‘And if that happens we could lose not only the small men but those who gave the orders. Then there are your brother’s negotiations; while you’re thought to be safely stashed he’s working from a position of power. If we can fool them into thinking that you’re still their pawn, we’re going to catch them all, including the ones who’ve kept their fingers clean.’

‘I only saw two men. What makes you think there might be others?’ she asked swiftly, striving to hide the sick panic that clutched her for an unnerving moment.

Broad shoulders lifted in a gesture oddly at variance with his poised, controlled persona. ‘Rumours,’ he said without expression, his eyes searching her face keenly. ‘I need to know everything you can remember about the kidnapping.’

‘Now?’ she asked, realising that she was still in the thick T-shirt she’d worn as a nightgown. From the way it slid down over her shoulders it was one of his.

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