The Russian's Ultimatum(22)

And that was the one thing he could never give her.

Despite his best intentions, he'd climbed the stairs leading up to her   hut in the dead of night, exhausted after the clean-up and little sleep,   and found himself rapping on her door before he'd realised his legs  had  taken him to her door. Even then, he'd tried to convince himself he  was  there to apologise, nothing else. Certainly not to make love to  her  again.

He needed to put some distance between them. Things were becoming too...   He didn't know what the word was to describe the growing connection   between them, knew only that nothing could ever come of it. 'I need to   get going. I have a lot of work to do.'

'I'm going to stay in here and finish this off,' she said, picking up   the bright material she'd been working on when he'd walked in. 'And then   I might take another walk to the waterfall.'

'It will be dark soon,' he pointed out. 'I would prefer it if you held off until the morning.'

He was rewarded for his concern with a soft smile. 'If it makes you feel better, I'll wait until the morning.'

'Thank you.'

'And I'll hold off jumping into the pool until I can see the bottom.'

'Very funny.' Not even Emily would be crazy enough to jump into that pool. 'I'll see you later.'

He could feel her eyes following his movements all the way to his own hut.

* * *

Emily assumed she would spend the evening in her hut alone as she had   the night before. The clean-up was still ongoing, with most of the staff   concentrating on clearing the felled trees and other manual jobs.

When Pascha turned up at her hut not long after sundown, he looked more   relaxed than she'd ever seen him, the lines around his eyes and mouth   softened. Even his clothes were casual, dressed as he was in faded jeans   and a white T-shirt. She would never in a million years have guessed  he  owned a pair of jeans. Or that they would fit so well...

'We're eating on the beach tonight,' he said, not bothering with any preamble.

On the beach...

Had it really only been three days since they'd eaten on the beach, her first night on the island?

It felt a lifetime away. She felt a lifetime away.

She'd placed the dress she'd spent the afternoon making on a hanger. It   wasn't quite finished; it was missing embellishments she wanted to add   to it. But...it was done. A little rough, considering there was no   mannequin or model for her to use, but it was done-the only item of real   colour in the room.                       
       
           



       

She was fed up of the dark.

'Give me a minute,' she said, yanking the dress off the hanger and   diving into her bathroom. In no time at all, she'd stripped off the   black vest and black shorts and donned her creation.

She turned before the mirror, staring critically at her reflection.

Deviating from her original sketch, she'd made it sleeveless, the bodice   smocked and elasticated to hold it in place, the skirt flaring out  into  a 'V' that fell to her knees. She plucked out a couple of loose  threads  from around the hem then pulled her tortoiseshell comb  loose-really,  why did she bother with it? Her hair always fell out.

She dashed back into the main room of the hut. 'Two secs,' she said,   lunging at the dressing table. Not bothering to sit down, she applied a   little eyeliner, some mascara and a dash of coral lipstick.

There was no need for war paint. Pascha had seen her stripped bare, in   all senses of the word. And he'd still wanted her. Just as she'd wanted   him. Just as she still wanted him, more than she'd ever dreamed   possible.

When she turned to face him, the grey of his eyes glittered.

Her thundering heart soared.

'You look...' He raised his shoulders as if to find the word he searched for. 'Like a fire opal.'

Her voice broke. 'Thank you.'

He edged back towards the door. 'We need to go.'

Her skin dancing, she followed him down the steps to the beach.

The staff were already there, setting up long bench tables which were   being covered with crockery, cutlery and plentiful bottles of wine and   beer. Some of the felled trees and branches had been placed in an A   shape to make a bonfire a little further down the beach from where they   would be eating.

'I thought everyone could do with a night off to let their hair down,' Pascha murmured into her ear.

Startled, she tilted her face to look at him. His arms were crossed over   his broad chest but there was nothing defensive about his stance. It   was more a look of a man surveying all he owned and taking immense pride   in it.

'What can I do to help?' she asked.

He gave a brief flash of his teeth. 'You can help me with the barbecue.'

'You're cooking?'

'We all muck in but the barbecue is my domain.'

'You've done this before?'

He raised a shoulder. 'A few times.'

He never ceased to surprise her.

It wasn't long before laughter was the predominant sound, laughter and a   whole heap of chatter, the two-dozen staff all determined to forget   their worries about family and friends on the battered surrounding   islands and mainland for one evening. Plates of food and condiments had   been brought out and the wine was in full flow. The balmy weather and   black sky with stars glittering like tiny jewels only added to the party   effect.

The good humour was contagious and spirits were high. Even Pascha, set   apart from the rest of them at the barbecue, had a smile on his face.   Emily went backwards and forwards from the industrial-sized barbecue to   the tables, delivering trays of ribs, chicken breasts, king prawns,   skewer kebabs... The list of food was endless.

So busy did she make herself, and so many conversations did she strike   up, that she spent hardly any time with Pascha. That didn't stop her   awareness of him.

For a man desperate to get off the island, he was clearly in his   element. No one looking at him would think he wished to be elsewhere.

Noticing his glass of beer was empty, she poured another for him and took it over. 'Are you coming to sit down?'

'I'll get these chops finished and then I'll be over,' he promised, taking the glass from her. 'Thanks for this.'

'You're welcome.' His smile made her belly flip over and her heart soar.   She hurried back to the benches with a skip in her walk.

Pascha watched as Emily sat down with his maintenance guys, an animated conversation breaking out.

He wished he could build a rapport with people as easily as she did but   he was not one for making friends. He'd missed so much of his schooling   due to illness that by the time he'd been well enough to return he'd   become an outsider. Five years was a long time in a small child's life.   He'd been an outsider ever since, never knowing or learning how to fit   in. If it hadn't been for Andrei taking him under his wing, giving him   confidence enough not to care when peers had parties to which he was   never invited, who knew where he would be today? He'd found his own   niche to fit into because he'd always been aware there was nowhere else   he could fit. Even being tucked under Andrei's wing had come at the   price of Marat's hatred for him increasing exponentially.                       
       
           



       

Was that why he'd been so desperate to hold on to Yana-because he'd felt   he'd found a niche with her and had wanted to hold onto it at any  cost?

He tried to imagine what his life would have been like if he hadn't,   finally, recognised that the cloudy diamond she'd turned into had been a   mask for her misery. What kind of a couple would they have been if he   hadn't set her free?

The icy clenching in his guts told him the answer to that.

He looked back at Emily. Had he even stopped looking at her?

That dress she'd made...

His fire opal had come to life, dazzling him with her vibrancy. If she   were to tread the same path as Yana, and be emotionally blackmailed into   forgoing her most basic desires, would her lustre fade too?

He would never know. He would never allow her to set off on that path.

He took a seat at the end of the table and looked at her anew, watching   her be dragged to her feet to dance around the bonfire with a bunch of   his younger staff. The skirt of her gorgeous dress swirled as she moved   to the music being played by his gardener, Oliver, who was singing   reggae songs as he strummed on his guitar. Her delicate arms clapped and   swayed, her black curls fanning in all directions. He could feel the   warmth radiating from her.

It drew him to her.

An ache formed in his chest and he swigged at his beer, as if the act of swallowing could loosen it. It didn't.

From the distance of the bonfire where the embers lit her up, making her   beautiful face seem almost ethereal, she caught his gaze. She stilled   for a moment before one of the girls grabbed her hand and pulled her   into a dance that involved lots of hip-shaking.