She wondered how long it had taken Chris to realise she had gone and to guess who had taken her away.
Chris had lost last night. He might be the ruthless thug Luc had called him, but Lissa had known him for so many years." She covered her face with her hands, feeling sick with pain. Poor Chris! She didn't know if he loved her, but he would have lost face with his men, he would be feeling humiliated, angry. Old affection for him made her wish he had not had to lose quite so openly.
Fortune was finishing her breakfast greedily. Lissa put an arm around his neck and hugged him. Burying her face in his coat, she muttered to him, 'I despise myself, Fortune. I'm crazy!'
Fortune licked whatever part of her he could reach, aware of her need for comfort and ready to supply it in his own fashion. She laughed, tears on her lashes, then jumped as someone knocked loudly on the cabin door.
'Come in,' she quavered huskily.
Dandy put his grizzled head around the door. 'Morning, princess. Your ladyship's clothes.' He had them over his arm, neatly pressed. 'All present and correct,' he told her, draping them over the end of the bunk. He reached a long arm over and plucked the dog out of her arms. 'While you get dressed I'll take the little dog for a walk.' He held Fortune up by his neck and grinned at him as he growled. 'What sort of dog d'you call that?'
'He's a poodle,' Lissa said indignantly.
'Poodle, is he? Come on, horrible, Dandy is going to show you the deck.'
When he had gone she slid out of bed. The cabin was large and elegantly furnished, she found on inspection. There was a narrow shower cubicle in one corner of it and the furniture was all fitted so that it did not shift as the yacht rolled with the waves. However Luc made his money, it was clear he had it. Lissa couldn't even begin to guess how much this yacht was worth. She had never seen one like it.
It was, she thought wryly, like a floating hotel. Last night in the shock and depression of her arrival she had barely taken in any of it, but she had retained an impression of size which had stayed with her.
A long, narrow mirror lined a wardrobe. Lissa studied herself in it. The loose sweater fell to her bare thighs. She looked dishevelled and very flushed. Grimacing at her own reflection, she pulled off the sweater and went into the cubicle to shower.
When she had dried herself she dressed in her own sweater and the neatly pressed jeans. They had, she-suspected, been washed overnight. She made her bed and tidied up the cabin before she went on deck.
She could hear the low throbbing of the engine vibrating through the timbers. At a glance she could only guess at the number of cabins, but there were a row of doors leading off the gangway running from the base of the steps. Everything gleamed with polish, the wood, metal and glass immaculate.
When she emerged on deck she found Fortune being dragged to and fro on the end of a long thin rope. Dandy grinned at her. 'Seasick,' he told her. 'He doesn't like the sea much, does he?'.
Fortune was whining, trying to get back to her.
'Take him below,' said a voice behind her, and she stiffened, swinging to face Luc.
Dandy picked the little dog up and marched off with him. Luc met her eyes coolly. 'He'll feel better below. He won't notice the motion so much.'
She moved to the rail and leaned on it, watching the flying white wake streaking behind them. Luc moved to stand beside her. She looked at his long, brown hands on the iron rail and her throat filled with dry tension.
How did you manage to get away?' she asked huskily.
'How could he stop me?' Luc asked with a grim smile. 'I had a car waiting at the hotel and a boat waiting in the town. He thought I was making a getaway with the money I'd won.' He laughed. 'He didn't realise precisely what stakes we were playing for.'
Lissa shivered. 'He won't come after us, will he?'
Luc glanced over his shoulder at the empty blue water. 'Even if he did he wouldn't catch us. The Queen has too much of a headway.'
'I shan't feel safe until I'm in England,' said Lissa, and Luc gave her a long, sardonic smile.
'I'm sure you won't,' he drawled, and there was a threat in the softness of his voice.
She shifted uneasily at the sound of it. Luc turned to lean his back on the rail, glancing up at the burning, untiring sun. 'Why don't you take a lounger and sunbathe for an hour? I've got some work to do.'
He went below and Lissa stretched out on the padded lounger which Dandy put up for her on the deck. Occasionally one of the crew came up and moved around, but although they always gave her a polite nod they did not speak to her. She counted four of them and wondered how many more there were on the yacht.
Dandy called her down to lunch just as she was falling asleep under the spell of wind and sun. Flushed and drowsy, she went down to wash and followed Dandy to the cabin two doors down from her own. She found herself eating alone with Luc at a polished rosewood table guarded at the edges with low rims of silver which stopped things sliding off the table.
They ate well-cooked and elegantly served food of which Lissa barely tasted a morsel. She ate it but she only vaguely realised what she was eating. Luc was quiet and when their eyes met she could not see a flicker of expression in the dark blue ones opposite her.
After lunch Luc suggested a tour of the yacht. Lissa followed him from cabin to cabin, surprised by the luxury of the surroundings, puzzled by the size of it.
'What do you do with the yacht while you're in London?' she asked.
He shrugged. 'She either lies up or I lend her to friends. Dandy sails her for them. I keep the crew on throughout the year. I know them all and I don't want to lose them. If you're going to spend time cooped up with someone on a yacht you need to be sure you're going to like and trust them.'
Lissa stood by the porthole in his cabin staring out at the sunlit water. 'You're very rich, aren't you?' Her voice came thin and dry like smoke.
Luc didn't answer for a moment, then he said in a flat voice, 'Yes. Very.'
'You lied to me about your job, didn't you? You don't deal in stocks and shares.'
'Yes, I do,' he said. -
She swung then, her face angry. 'Dandy laughed when I asked him if you were a stockbroker.'
Luc's mouth flicked sideways in grim amusement. 'Did he, damn him?'
'What do you do? Who are you?' she insisted.
'I am myself,' Luc said calmly. 'That's all you need to know.'
'Are you a criminal? Are you a gangster like Chris?' she asked feverishly. 'I've let you talk me into leaving Chris, but what do I know about you?'
Luc surveyed her without speaking, his face taut and set. 'You don't know anything,' he agreed. 'You're going to have to take me on trust, Lissa. You've little choice.'
'Why won't you tell me anything about yourself?' she demanded in rising tones.
'Why should I?' Luc asked drily. 'If you can't bring yourself to accept me without some sort of affidavit for my character, you're going to have to grin and bear it.'
'I don't trust you,' she muttered hoarsely.
'So I see,' Luc drawled.
'You can't find that surprising!'
'You trusted Brandon until I made you see him as he really was,' Luc came back tightly.
'I've known Chris all my life. He's looked after me and cared for me.'
'And wanted you,' Luc said in a low harsh voice.
Lissa bit her lip and looked at the floor.
'You were ready to give yourself to him without knowing a damned thing about him. You can do the same for me,' said Luc, and her throat hurt as she swallowed.
She couldn't look up or answer. Luc waited, watching her,
'No comment?' he asked coolly. 'Very wise.'