Forgotten Love (Derrien Island Trilogy) (16 page)

Suddenly her doorbell rang. 

Tying the belt of the short silk robe she’d put on quickly, she walked out toward the door. Briefly checking the video monitor she saw a tall man standing by the door with his head bowed. Thinking that it was Lucas, she just pressed the button that would unlock the door to allow him to come in. After all, he was the only one that knew she lived here. Deciding she would speak to him briefly at the door before making an excuse to get him to leave she folded her arms across her chest. When the knock on the door sounded she said come in and she watched the door open slowly.

“Lucas I thought that you promised that you would give me
two weeks to think about all of this,” she said with a note of warning in her voice.

As the door opened fully, she saw
instead saw a man who was dark skinned, taller than Lucas wearing a black jeans and a long-sleeved hunter green pullover. It was Marcus!

“Marcus? What are you doing he
re? How did you find me?” stammered Natasha in total shock.

Seeing his wife standing there wearing nothing but a flimsy
silk bathrobe, with her hair still damp from her bath Marcus was nearly undone with longing to just to have her wrapped in his arms again. That material clung wetly to her alluring curves and revealed her toned shapely legs. Even from the distance of a few feet that separated them he could distinctly smell the fragrance of peaches and cream body mist that she always used to perfume her still damp skin. She looked good, happy, rested vibrant and totally sexy.

“Honey
, you look so beautiful!” said Marcus softly with his gaze raking her from head to toe.

Caught off-guard by his response Natasha just stood there
staring at him. She never considered that Marcus would find her or at least not until she was ready to be found.

“Aren’t you going to invite me in
?” he continued.

“Marcus, I don’t think we have that much to say to each other”, she lied now feeling nervous and slightly aroused by the smouldering look he was giving her.

“Well I have a
lot that I need to say to you and I don’t want to do it out here in the hallway,” he countered seemingly unfazed by her response. But the truth was that his heart was doing crazy things in his chest just being this close to her again. He prayed silently that she would at least give him a chance to talk.

“Ok
ay come in, but you can only stay a few minutes,” she finally said, terrified by the instant and deep explosion of heat that now filled her inside.

Marcus fought to control the jealousy that began boiling in him the moment he saw what Natasha was wearing and hearing her call out Lucas
’ name as if that man had the right to visit his wife whenever he felt like it.

“Let me go and put on some clothes, I just got out of the bath
, and I wasn’t expecting anyone,” she explained quickly as she noted how his expression darkened when he looked at her clothes or lack of them.

Natasha hurried off to her bedroom and when she got there she shut the door and leaned against it, her heart pounding in her chest. Marcus was outside in her living area and she had just unknowingly called him Lucas. He had somehow found her and now he wanted to talk
. There was nowhere to run. Although she had been telling herself that she needed to talk to Marcus and to find dome kind of closure, she thought that she would be the one to initiate contact when she was sure about what she wanted to say and it would have been through her lawyers. She did not expect to feel the full weight of emotion that just bombarded her just now. All of the defences that she had practiced erecting on Derrien Island were down and she did not expect to notice just how good he looked or the spicy scent of his aftershave or how sexy his voice sounded as he spoke. She did not expect to feel as though someone had set loose a thousand butterflies in her stomach or that her heart would hurt so much or that she would become so aroused when she saw his gaze darken as he slowly surveyed her appearance.

This was the reaction that was missing from her
relationship with Lucas. This raw to the bone attraction and desire were apparently still reserved for Marcus Nicholls alone and that thought made her even more nervous than ever. She had really done a great job fooling herself that she was cold to him these last eight months.

Pacing
back and forth across the floor she took deep lung full’s of air to try to steady her riotous emotions. But nothing seemed to be working. This surprise had totally rocked her off centre and she had no answers for it. Remembering that she was only clad in a short silk bathrobe, she was again filled with embarrassment. Marcus probably thought even less of her now that it was clear that she might be expecting another man at her home while they were still very much married.

She quickly brushed her teeth and slipped on a yellow lounge jumper and quickly blow-dried her hair before emerging again. 

Marcus was standing by the window overlooking the street below and he turned around as she entered the room.

“Sorry that I took so long but
I had just stepped out of the bath when you rang the doorbell,” said Natasha again, pretending to appear composed when inside she was anything else but that.

“Natasha, we need to talk!” said Marcus
with a serious expression on his face.

Feeling panicked again because she was just not ready for this conversation as yet Natasha had to find something to say quickly.

“Look, I was just about to have dinner, would you like something to eat?” were the words that came out of her mouth. How did finding an excuse for him to leave turn into her inviting him to stay? Everything about this whole meeting was going opposite to what she’d envisioned.

Marcus still absorbing his wife’s beauty
wasted no time in accepting her dinner invitation. He had half expected her to make up some excuse about needing to go out when he saw how she was dressed, but an invitation to dinner was perfect. It would give him the time to say the things that he needed her to know.

Natasha felt as though she could kick herself in the shins if that was
even anatomically possible. This was exactly the reason why she had to operate behind shields with Marcus. Whenever she allowed herself to feel what was in her heart for him it made her weak and instead of fighting for her life she was drawn to him like a moth to a flame. It was too late to take back the invitation now without seeming unkind, so she set about placing some plates on the dining table near her kitchen and some forks. Lucas had found a place that sold West Indian food and had some sent to her just in-case she was homesick for the kind of cooking she was used to on Derrien Island. So, she heated the food briefly in the microwave and served it on the two plates.

“You can sit Marcus,” she said noticing that he had not moved from the spot near the window.
When he turned around to face her she thought that he was going to sit but instead he bypassed the table and walked straight up to her and before she had time to react he held her face between his hands and kissed her. Threading his fingers through the hair at the nape of her neck he continued his assault on her mouth and she felt powerless to stop him. In fact, she felt herself responding and wrapping her arms around his neck as she pulled him closer. All hope of having clear thoughts now were now totally erased with Marcus making such a sweet and thorough invasion of her mouth. His hands drifted down her spine and he pulled her entire body against the lean, muscular contours of his body. She could feel the unmistakable evidence of his arousal and she knew then what Marcus intended to do. As his lips blazed a trail of kisses along her neck, she was finding it very hard to remain on her feet as her legs trembled beneath her. Feeling her trembling against him, Marcus picked her up and strode to the direction of her bedroom. Letting her slide down his body as he opened the door he walked her backwards until she fell on the bed beneath him.

“Marcus” Natasha began, but he silenced anything she had to say to him by continuing to kiss her and to embrace her. He felt like a man who was starving, who had not eaten for days. This was not the plan, but seeing Natasha looking so beautiful, he had a natural reaction to the woman who had been his wife for the past six years. From her
immediate response to him, he knew that this marriage was not over. He knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that letting her go was not an option and he would do whatever it took to convince her of that.

Pushing the straps of her jumper off her shoulders he made quick work of removing it deftly from her body before removing his own clothes.

Natasha has almost forgotten how attracted she had always been to Marcus’ body, so well chiselled with muscles bunching in his shoulders chest and arms. Even when he took off his clothes he never broke his gaze with her. She had never seen him this intense and it thrilled her that he seemed to be somehow staking his claim on her.

Taking her in his arms once more,
Marcus kissed and touched every inch of her body before joining their bodies intimately and making love to his wife until they were both covered in perspiration and the sheets were soaked. Hearing Natasha cry out with pleasure and say his name, filled him with a possession that he had never known before. This was his wife and he would be damned before he let another man take her from him.

It was around midnight when they finally collapsed against one another completely weak and sated and they slept in each other’s arms until morning.

Natasha awoke in the early hours as was her custom and was startled to discover the form of a man in her bed. So, it wasn’t just another hot dream and all that happened last night was real. Natasha sat up in her bed and looked down at the face of her sleeping husband whose features were still shrouded in shadow. Instead of feeling that she wanted him gone, she had an insane desire to lie down against him and allow him to wrap his strong arms around her again. All of the memories of the night just past came flooding back and the strong desires that accompanied them. Marcus had found her apartment and before they had a chance to eat and talk, they kissed like they hadn’t in a long time and ended up making love for hours.

“Natasha this is crazy”, she told herself still feeling aches in all the right places and touching her still swollen lips with her finger
s. She had said all kinds of things last night including how much she still loved him and he said the same to her. It was as if she became another person, or rather someone she had lost touch with a long time ago.

Feeling hungry, and remembering that the food she heated
the night before still lay uneaten on her dining table, she got up slowly trying not to wake Marcus and walked quietly to the kitchen to dispose of it. She put on the kettle to make some tea for herself, and as she did so, hundreds of thoughts and questions were racing through her mind. Last night things had gotten out of control so fast that it was like dropping a match on dry wood soaked with jet fuel. What had happened to her resolve to keep Marcus at a distance? What was Marcus going to think of her now? Would he be expecting her to come back to Derrien Island with him just because they made love?

Last night she responded to Marcus as though it was the most natural thing to do. There were no inhibitions, no second thoughts, no fear, just desire and
a powerful need to connect with him. Every fibre in her body was screaming yes, that this was what she wanted, craved and missed and to finally have him there was better than any of the dreams that were filling her mind every night.

After cleaning up the dishes
, she sat and drank a cup lemon tea and watched as the sunlight outside of the window grew steadily brighter and brighter. She only wished that could have been the case with this relationship. Last night confirmed something for her though, something that she was having trouble coming to terms with now that she was alone with her thoughts. She was still very much in love with and attracted to her husband Marcus.

She
had almost convinced herself that the feeling of constant numbness which she became used to on Derrien Island was actually the way that she felt about Marcus. But now, in addition to her knowing the truth about her feelings, Marcus now knew too and that would only make things even harder when she told him that she still wanted to end their marriage. It was the only way that she could guarantee that she could keep her freedom and her new contract. They just had different goals in life and now that she was in reach of hers she had to see it through to the end this time.

“You
’re up early Nat”, said Marcus standing across the room leaning against the archway leading to the bedroom. The sound of his voice startled her and some of her tea spilled on the table when her hands shook.

Looking up
, she saw that Marcus had put back on his jeans and they rode low on his hips.  He hadn’t put on his shirt as yet and crossing his arms over his chest only served to cause the muscles there to bunch up and tighten. He looked so attractive and she felt herself being drawn to him again. Forcing herself to remember her last thought she tried to get herself back under control. Clearing her throat she replied,

“You know that I’
ve always been a morning person,” she said stiffly while grabbing some napkins to absorb the spill.