BACK TO LONG CAY

The little red and cream four-seater plane belonging to Eleazar Denali and piloted by him, soared and dipped like a fledgling learning to fly above the Yellow Banks, those vast mounds of coral sand which lie just beneath the surface of the sea separating the Exuma Islands from New Providence.

Sitting along behind Eleazar Denali, Bella stared down at the sea through a window. It was like flying above an artist's wide canvas which had been daubed with aquamarine and daffodil yellow paint, for the sea looked as idle as if it were painted. No sparkling crests of waves, no arrowing wakes of boats disturbed its surface. It looked completely still as if trapped by the treacherous sands and in the brilliant afternoon sunshine it looked beautiful as dangerous things often are.

Bella sighed and leaning against the back of the seat closed her eyes. She felt exhausted. Setting her will against Edward's, refusing to be stampeded by his lovemaking, had sapped her strength and she was glad he had chosen to ignore her and sit beside Eleazar because she needed the respite offered by the forty-five minute flight to gather together her metal and physical resources.

It would have been so easy to have given in to him on the quiet sunlit beach at Denali's Bay, to fall for that strange, half-mocking suggestion of his that she was an angel sent in disguise to drag him back from the path to hell. How well he had got to know her in the short time they had been together; so well that he had guessed such a suggestion would appeal to her foolish, tender hearts so that now every part of her was clamoring to put her arms about him and save him from hell.

Why? Because she was in love with him? Slowly she opened her eyes and glanced diagonally across to the seat where he was sitting. He was half turned in it and leaning across to catch what Eleazar Denali was saying to him. A shaft of sunlight gilded his face so that the hard bold features looked as if they had been cast in gold. His hair too had the dull sheen of fold. A man of gold; Bella's lips twisted wryly. The description was apt considering how rich he was and he had asked her to marry him. Not only that, he had told Eleazar, his wife Carmen, her sister Tanya and her friend Lauren Mallory that he was going to marry her and she hadn't been able to deny it. The thought of her father had stopped her.

Sighing, she looked out of the widow again. The plane was over land now. Toy-like cars sped along a roadway beside a narrow stretch of glittering blue water, crowded with the masts of yachts. A hump backed bridge leaped over the water joining Paradise Island to the mainland of New Providence. The stretch of water widened out into a harbor where glittering cruise ships were tied up. The plane turned and in the distance the high-shouldered, window-glinting towers of hotels tilted against a background of blue-green surf-edged sea.

Soon they would be landing. Soon Bella would be at Long Cay seeing her father and Nancy. She stiffened in her eat. She had forgotten about Nancy. She had been too busy coping with new and disturbing emotions and with the searing sensual desires, close contact with Edward had so rudely aroused that she had forgotten it was Nancy whom he had wanted to go cruising with him in the first place, whom he would have taken if she hadn't interfered.

A strange feeling twisted through her, a sudden spiteful dislike of her sister which shocked her. She was jealous of Nancy because once Edward had looked at her and had coveted her. She shook her head in an attempt to clear it of such thought but they wouldn't go away.

So that was the truth, was it? She was in love with him and had been since she had first laid eyes on him but it wasn't the bored cynical womanizer with whom she had fallen in love; it was with the reckless, unmanageable, unhappy man whom she had discovered behind the rake and she longed passionately to make him happy.

Then why had she refused his proposal? Because she was afraid he wanted to marry her for the wrong reasons? Because she guessed she might be attracted to her only temporarily, wanting her only because she was hard to get and once she was his, he would lose interest in her, begin to neglect he and would eventually discard her? Bella's hand clenched on her knees, her eyes narrowed and her lips tightened. She wasn't going to let him do that to her. She wouldn't let any man do it to her.

The plane landed with a bump and taxied to the terminal building. Edward jumped out and turned to help her down. They said goodbye to Eleazar Denali and walked round the building to the front entrance where taxis were lined up taking on or discharging passengers. Soon they were in the back seat of a taxi and were being driven swiftly along the airport road.

"I guess you'd like to go straight to the hotel to see your father," Edward drawled.

"Yes, I would," she replied stiffly, sitting as far away from him as possible and staring out of the window, although she hardly noticed the scenery. "But you don't have to come with me."

"I think I do. It's a custom, so I'm led to believe, for a guy to inform the father of the woman he wishes to marry of his intentions," he drawled mockingly, sliding along the seat until he was close beside her. "And I have a feeling your father is going to be glad my intentions towards you are honourable and could be of benefit to him."

"It doesn't make any difference to the way I feel about marrying you if he is glad. I'm of age, I'm responsible for myself and I make my own decisions. . . "

"But your reputation, sweetheart," he drawled insinuatingly and she felt his shoulder heavy against hers as he leaned towards her and his hand slid enticingly up her arm. "After spending two nights alone with me it's going to be in shreds," he scoffed.

"My reputation is my own concern and not my father's nor yours. Besides, once I've left Nassau and returned to England, no one is going to be interesting in my brief association with you," Bella retorted, then feeling his lips trail tantalizingly along the line of her chin, she gasped in outrage, "Oh, get away from me! You can't kiss me here in front of the taxi driver in broad daylight."

"Behind the taxi driver, you mean," mocked Edward and sliding an arm about her shoulders, pulled her against him. Once more his fingers at her chin forced her face up. For a moment the measured glances then his lips touched hers, lightly at first, their pressure increasing slowly and provocatively as she managed to maintain a sort of passive resistance until his fingers fanned gently over her breasts and she moaned at the exquisite torture his touch aroused. At once his lips were quick to plunder her parted ones so that her resistance melted, giving way to active participation in the act of kissing.

"I love you," he whispered, his tongue tickling the tender lobe of her ear.

"You're crazy, she muttered weakly but did not push him away.

"A man in love often is."

"You can't be in love with me. It isn't possible," she protested and this time she did move away. "And I'm not in love with you. You only want me because I've refused you. I'm sure that if I'd given in yesterday and let you seduce me, you wouldn't have asked me to marry you today."

"You could be right," he replied equably. "You present a challenge I have to overcome somehow." He stroked her throat from the shoulder upwards. His hand moved about her jaw, the tips of his fingers tickling the sensitive hollow behind her ear. "When you're angry your eyes blaze with little golden flames," he whispered, his lips approaching her again. "You're like a tigress, snarling and snapping and I want to stroke you, soothe you, kiss you until you . . ."

"Until I submit to you," she interrupted him in a fierce hissing whisper, jerking her head back and banging it against the window of the car. "That's what this is all about, isn't it? Domination and submission. You dominate and I submit. Well, I refuse to play that game. I'm not going to marry you. When I marry – if I marry – it won't be someone powerful and domineering like you. I'll marry someone with whom I'm equal.

"But we are equals," Edward argued. "Haven't you noticed? You're almost as tall as I am and you're strong-armed as well as strong willed." His mouth curved ruefully and he touched the plaster on his forehead. "You've proved in no uncertain way that you refuse to be dominated," he went on dryly. "added to that you're reckless, don't give a damn for convention and you like to have your own way as much as I like to have mine. Oh, yes, we're equals all right, Bella. Two halves of a whole."

"No, no! How can you say that when you're rich and I have nothing, only the salary I earn as a cub reporter," she retorted and looked away out of the window quickly because the nearness of him was having a weakening effect on her again. She wanted so badly to frame his face with her hands and kiss away the bitter lines she could see setting about his mouth. "If . . . if . . . I marry you," she went on in a shaken whisper, "everyone will say I've married you for your money and I couldn't bear that. Besides, I like my job and I want to go back to England and do it, prove that I can be just as successful a newspaper reporter as my grandfather was. If. . . if. . . I marry you, I'd have to give up so much and I don't think I could do that."

She heard the slithering sound of clothing rubbing against the vinyl covered seat and knew with a sense of relief in which regret mingled that he had moved away from her.

"Then you don't care about what will happen to your father if you continue to refuse to marry me," he drawled softly.

"Yes, I care," she murmured, keeping her head averted. The car was passing Windward Cottage. Pale green walls glimmered among the dark foliage of flowering shrubs and the frond of palms. "But I don't believe he's done anything wrong and . . . and I care more about what would happen to . . . to . . . us, you and me, if we married for wrong reasons." Her voice shook again and she had to stop and take a deep breath to steady it. "Edward, please try to understand. It would be another disaster, not only for you but for me too."

"I don't believe it would" he retorted coolly. "Okay, so it's deadlock again but don't think I've given up. In a few minutes we'll find out whether you're right about your father and once we do that the pressure will be on again, sweetheart. I'm going to marry you before the end of next week."