Captivated

father, he and Court had exacted a promise from Gerard that he would leave St. Faubonne Parish and relinquish any idea of contactingher again.

'Oh, he will run his little businesses in New Orleans,' her father told her a week later, coming to visit when he was certain her anger had died and that she would forgive him. 'And he will find eventually another wealthy dupe, another innocent girl, you can be sure of that.'

She wasn't quite in the mood to forgive. She felt ill-used, as if she had been nothing more than a puppet, caught between her father's cupidity and Court's avarice.

Nor did she like her father's assessment that reduced her feelings for Gerard to those of a raw, simple- minded, green girl.

'Youknew how much I cared for him…' she said testily.

'Exactly,' Victor said. 'I owed him so much money; I was sure you would marry him just to cancel the debt, but I couldnot have that upstartparvenu in possession of property that has been in my family for generations.'

'So you sold me to Court,' Drue interpolated, unable to keep the bitterness out of her voice. 'He's probably the only one in the whole of St. Faubonne who could afford youandme.'

'It's an excellent match, my dear. I knew what I was doing,' Victor said breezily.

'I wish you had told me,' Drue grumbled, but in point of fact he had:She'd be taken care of, he'd said of one of the advantages of her marriage to Court, and he had been so right. He had no idea how right.

'You were in love with that bastard,' Victor went on. 'You would have defended him to the deathandmarried him to spite me.'

She clenched her fists. She probably would have. She probably wouldn't have seen the vast, eager scheme behind Gerard's sensual seduction of her. She certainly wouldn't have believed her father's interpretation of it.

And so Court became the villain.

And Gerard had been so enraged, he probably would have done anything to dishonor Courtifshe had been willing.

Willing. The key, the prime word. Willing. There had never been a woman so willing as she, once she comprehended the depths of her body as an instrument of pleasure.

The real point was, Court had readboth of Gerard's notes. Court had been in the arbor, listening, watching. Assuming.

'And that beast did try to kiss you' Victor added somewhat righteously.

And then getting her father to do his dirty work. 'So you tried to killhim thus the code of honor has been satisfied,' Drue finished caustically. 'And it doesn't give you one moment of pain that you allowed Gerard to get such a hold over you?'

'Oh, no… never think that. I was in absolute turmoil before Court agreed to marry you. It was the most humiliating thing, the deepest secret. And I let Gerard believe until the very last that a deal for Oak Bluffs was possible. I thought that was clever, actually. That way, Gerard had good reason not to expose my depravity. And after it was over, he still didn't want to lose you. Of course, down the line, he might well have used the fact that he had held my notes to hurt you and Court, but to what harm, after he had been paid off? The marriage was irrevocable, and the best he could hope for was that you still loved him and might consider running away. But I never thought you'd do that. Too much was at stake. So it was just a matter of time until it was completely over, and it happened sooner than I ever thought, I'll tell you.'

He was as smooth as glass, her father: everything slipped off him. Gerard was right, she thought. The cardswould get him again, and nothing, not even the possible loss of Oak Bluffs, would stop him because he had the ability to slough off what was distasteful, and focus on the pleasurable.

And what was more pleasurable than seeing his daughter married, a dynasty created, his enemy vanquished, his coffers full of money and his plantation out of debt?

For the moment.

'So you see, my dear, everything worked out just fine,' he said, as he took his leave of her.

For you, she thought.Always for him. Even when he lost, he won. And he always had someone to clean up after him.

Her. Court.

But what had Court gained? A reluctant wife whom he'd taken on at the cost of doing business with her father, even knowing that her heart belonged to another man.

And who believed it still, in spite of all evidence to the contrary. He might never again come to her, and she felt the thought of that as keenly as the cut of a blade.

No. She wasn't going to let that happen.

How did her father do it?Even when he lost, he won.

Was she not her father's daughter?

She hadn't lost yetshe was going to be married to Court forever.

She had all the time in the world.

But Court didn't make it easy. He spent all of the succeeding week at Oak Bluffs, and the nights at the St. Faubonne planter's hotel, and she knew immediately that winning him was going to take some drastic measures.

Besides, she was getting more than a little annoyed that he was avoiding her.

She needed a plan. She couldn't just continue to walk around Wildwood naked when he was already exercising that monumental control of his to shut her out.

Her nudity would not seduce him now. He was too angry to allow himself to want her.

She had to conquerhim.

And she liked that idea. It all came down to the power and control that seesawed between them.

But she was going to win now. She was going to go after him aggressively. She would be mysterious and elusiveforget all that business about his conditions and his rules. She wasn't going to do anything he wanted her to do.

Irresistible.

Scary.

What if?But she wouldn't think about that.

Very soon he would start spending his nights at home, and then the games could begin…

Slowly, at first…

He didn't give an inch.

One had to have the patience of a saint

Until the night, five days later, she heard him climbing wearily up the steps.

It was late, late, late, surely well past midnight. The heat was, as usual, oppressive, the darkness formidable.

She had been waiting so long. She had prepared so well. But she had to be sure he was sound asleep.

She waited. A half hour later, dressed in a thin muslin nightgown and carrying a candlestick, she slipped into the hallway and listened at his bedroom door.

No sound. No motion.

She eased open the door and, shielding the candle, she crept inside.

He lay sprawled on the massive bed, as if he had just dropped his clothes and fell onto the mattress naked. His breathing was deep, regular, the sleep of someone who was exhausted.

The heavy sleep of someone who might have an involuntary erotic dream. Especially someone who didn't hesitate to employ a sexual apparatus that was still suspended in the shadows.

That was a good sign, that he hadn't yet taken it down.

She set the candlestick down in the fireplace cavity so that its glow was muted, and approached the bed, unsure just yet what she would do.

She wanted to touch him everywhere. His body was so smooth in some places, and yet so rough with hair elsewhere, she just wanted to slide her hands all over him and feel the heat and texture of him.