Highland Secrets (English Edition) (6 page)

The excited palpitations
of my heart turned into fear with the hate-filled stare and tone of voice Adam gave me. For a moment, I had hoped that these blue eyes were those of the guy who wore jeans, but the dark, husky voice reminded me of Adam. So it was the son of my professor. But why was he being so stand-offish? He seemed to be much friendlier to me yesterday. Did the mask make me so much more desirable in his eyes. Or did he notice me when I was watching him with the women?

I frowned morosely. Not because I was worried that he had actually spotted me, but I just remembered how
repulsive I found what he had done. The fact that he abused women in such a repugnant way. And because it annoyed me how unbelievably attractive he was to me despite knowing this about him.

And he was attractive. Yesterday, I found him to be interesting and likable, but now without the mask, he took my breath away. He was still not overly handsome, but he was definitely sexy with those tiny wrinkles around his eyes and the
sorrow on his face that surrounded him like a protective shield. His lips warped into a defiant smile when he looked at me. I blinked and squinted my eyes pointedly. What the hell was wrong with me? I indulged here in his attractive appearance, while he looked at me with daggers even though I hadn’t done anything to him.

“And I have to admit that
I couldn’t quite believe that Professor MacLeod could have such a superficial son.”

Adam
started laughing raucously and showed his perfectly aligned teeth. He had definitely had a brace as a teenager. He leaned against the door frame with his arms folded and looked at me in a way which gave me a tingling sensation in a place where I definitely shouldn’t feel tingling. He was staring at my breasts as he did yesterday and like yesterday they immediately reacted to this. My nipples became erect of their own accord and pointed towards Adam. I also folded my arms in anger in front of my upper torso. Adam lifted his right eyebrow and shrugged his shoulders casually.

“Maybe you will feel at ea
se if I tell you that I am not similar to my old man in any other way.”

I wanted to tell him that it
didn’t put me at ease, but I kept it to myself and preferred to concentrate on not noticing that Adam’s eyes had become darker in a very erotic way. Even though he was scowling at me, his face was still filled with the same erotic promise, which he had already shown to me yesterday. Did he do that with all the women? Did he look at them in a way which said that he wanted to devour them at any moment? Then it didn’t surprise me that so many women surrounded him. But I wouldn’t fall under the spell of this gaze. He wouldn’t capture me and take me back to his cave. I wasn’t like that. And any interest I had in him disappeared at that moment because I realized that he was the man who organized this ball. All I had to do now was to make that clear to my body which was all to aware of Adam’s closeness and felt drawn to him like a piece of Devil’s Food Cake. The tastiest and most chocolatey cake on this planet.

“Yes
, because it would have ruined my memory of the professor if it had been different. The professor was a courteous and very likeable man.”

Adam
broke into a fit of laughter. “I remember it differently.” He got up and walked up to the huge desk that was in the center of the room. “I don’t want to ruin the false perception you have about my father, but I think I have to clear something up here.” He pointed to the portrait behind me. “This portait here is just a pretext. It no longer matters to my father if you restore this object and I am not interested either.”

He gave me a
piercing stare that sent a shiver down my spine. “There is only one reason why you are here. My father believed that if he were to lock me in this house with a nice girl for a few days that I might fall in love with her.” Adam gave me a broad grin and leant against the table top and the muscles in his upper arm emerged which I had to admit were really well defined. I swallowed to get rid of the dry feeling that was developing in my throat.

“That’s not true”, I protested and I then focused on Adam’s face again.
Or maybe it was? Was that the real reason why I was staying here which the professor had mentioned in his letter? No, he would never have roped me in to this for his own purposes. “He always appreciated my work.”

Adam
shrugged his shoulders and he had a dashing smile on his face. This smile took my breath away because the sight of it went right to the core of me and caused a slight pull in my stomach. I pursed my lips together and reminded myself that Adam wasn’t a man I wanted to get closer to. My head had understood this, but my body was still refusing to. It reacted in the same way to Adam as it did yesterday at the ball.

“He was certain that you could deal with this problem, but it was never about the picture for him. He hoped that I would still become a “decent” human being if he just found the right woman for me. But he is very much mistaken.” Adam sighed. “He tried to
tie me down to one woman for years. He was even doing it from the grave.”

The last few words that Adam spoke really shocked me. How could he speak about his father who
had only just died four months ago from tuberculosis like that?

“He definitely didn’t assume that I would be the right woman for you.”
As far as the professor was concerned, I was spoken for. He often saw me with Steven. And I was definitely not the perfect woman for his son, not with my history. We had both lost people close to us in the past.

Adam
groaned in an irritated manner. “That is exactly what he was thinking when he made this damned will. He made me get you to come here and restore these paintings. All he has been doing for years is to try and convince me that women are not how I see them. I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but it will come to nothing. Even if you are as honest, friendly and selfless as he saw you, it won’t change my opinion about women. I have yet to be convinced by anybody that what I think is egoistic and wrong.”

When he was saying this, he looked at the portrait of his father, which is why I was sure
that he meant him. He then looked at me again. “Just to make this clear, I’ll let you do your job here, but there will never be anything between us.” He stepped around the desk and he had a look in his eyes that was cold and full of hate. I was horrified. Had I misheard him? Did he really have such a negative opinion about all women? And why did he think like this?

I moved sideways as he came towards me and he almost touched me with his broad chest. He remained a step ah
ead of me and stared down at me. “It’s a real shame that the matter between us has come to an end so quickly.” He then turned away from me and disappeared.

I
stared at him angrily as he walked off. My pulse was racing in indignation. I just couldn’t believe what Adam had actually just said. And I felt like I was going to explode inside. That’s how uptight I felt. How could a man who constantly got women to go to bed with him just to sleep with them say something like that about women? If I had had any doubt before that he only used his bedfellows to satisfy his own needs, now I was convinced.

And as far as his opinion about his father was concerned, Adam definitely had deeper lying father-son issues. That was the only reason why he believed that his father got me to come here so that we would become a couple. That must have been the reason why
. At least that would explain the resentment that Adam held against his father. And I had to agree with Professor MacLeod on this point. Especially if he had really tried to make a different man out of Adam. Not just somebody who goes to bed with all sorts of women. His son was superficial and he would be better off treating women with more respect.

What did he say? “What did he see in women?”
I was certain that I didn’t want to find out. And it made me angry that he obviously had such a negative opinion of women, but he still used us to satisfy his male urges.

“
Ms. Sands, dinner is ready.” I looked up from my work not happy at the disturbance and turned towards Alfred who was standing behind me and was looking nosily over my shoulder. His face was motionless which didn’t surprise me as I hadn’t made much progress towards restoring the painting, but it wasn’t something I could do that quickly. It would take several days until the painting was back to how it was before.

“Can I not eat something later?” Once I’m immersed in my work, I don’t like having to interrupt it
.

“No, Mr
. MacLeod would like to have dinner with you. He is waiting for you in the dining room.”

I pursed my lips disapprovingly. If he really believed that I was only here so that we would become a couple, why wasn’t he avoiding contact with me and limiting our meetings to just business? That would be more preferable for me at least.
If it was possible, I wanted to stay away from Adam for as long as my body didn’t understood what my head knew. And it still definitely didn’t understand. Because the mere prospect of seeing him again gave me butterflies out of shear anticipation.

I really didn’t want to eat with him
, let alone be in his overwhelming presence. However, it was impolite to say no, so I had to give in. After all, I was a guest in this house.

The dining room was smaller than I remembered from my guided tour in the morning, but that was
not because it had since shrunk. Instead, it was Adam’s presence that made it appear narrower than it actually was.

We sat at opposite ends of the table from each other. The six chairs to the left and right were empty. Alfred served us herb potatoes with roast lamb and buttered vegetables while we sat st
aring at each other in silence. I felt uneasy and therefore fidgeted around nervously on my chair and turned the red wine glass on its stem with my fingers. Adam really appeared to be looking daggers at me. I bit my lower lip feeling somewhat ill-at-ease and grimaced. I looked towards the glass window which led out to a terrace. The sun was about to go under and immersed the small pond in the center of the garden in a flaming red color.

When I turned to my food, I reluctantly noticed that Adam was still staring at me. I forced myself to concentrate on my roast lamb. Even if I was really hungry, it was impossible for me not to notice that Adam was paying all his attention to me.

Perhaps I should make it clear to him that he has nothing to fear about me. I looked up and looked right into his eyes. Even if I didn’t feel it, I wanted to come across as self-confident to him. “I just wanted  to stand by the fact that you have nothing to worry about. I do not intend to tame or control you or whatever you men like to call it. Even if the professor had had such plans, I am only here to do my work. I don’t have a very high opinion of men like you anyway.”

I have t
o admit that did sound a little cocky, but I didn’t mean for it to sound like that. I just didn’t want our relationship to be influenced by what Adam’s father had supposedly intended to achieve. Otherwise, the next few weeks would be unbearable for me. I wasn’t able to deal with it very well when the people around me hated me. That just made me feel even more insecure. And then I wasn’t able to work properly.

“Men like me?
”, he asked and an interested expression appeared on his face.

I swallowed nervously. “Men that see women as playthings.”

“Aren’t you though? Didn’t God create you as our playthings? You do have certain physical attributes which men can have lots of fun with.”

“That probably means that God also create
d you as playthings. We are also able to have fun with you. He also must have created you as a workhorse for women as you are much stronger and more resilient.” I said and I wasn’t able to suppress the hoarseness that his sexual innuendo triggered in me.

He lifted his eyebrows in amusement and bent his torso over the table. His eyes stared into mine when he said seriously: “So
men like me are lost on you? Do you think that somebody like me would leave you cold? He smiled like a predator which caused an immediate pull in my stomach. I cursed at my body in my thoughts which vigorously defended itself against my mind.

“Yes”
, I said with as much self-confidence as I could possibly muster in my voice. “I don’t like it when you treat women like trash. How old are you? Thirty five?” Adam nodded. “And the average age of your bed bunnies is my age, so some ten years younger than you”, I remarked as Kathrin and Mel were both about the same age as me.

He sighed. “I don’t treat them like rubbish. I can’t speak for other men of course, but it is no secret what I want from them
. Women only come to me for one reason because they want to have sex. And they know that they are not going to get anything else from me.”

I thought about the way Kathrin
’s eyes lit up in that lovestruck way this morning and the pain that she would surely feel when her feelings weren’t reciprocated. How many women would have felt this way because of Adam? On the other hand, he did seem to be open with them and explain to them from the start what he can give them and what he can’t. Were they not at fault if they fell in love with him anyway?

“It’s good then that I’m more astute than that. I have to be able to trust a man before I sleep with him. Now that I know how you work, you don’t have to worry about me getting too close to you.”

“How old are you?”

“Twenty four.”

“It’s a shame that you’re more astute. You’re just the right age to go with my average conquests.” Adam winked at me and it made me feel all flustered. I blinked and turned away from him.

Adam laughed out loud
. This dark laugh made me tremble. “Then you won’t mind if we play a little game. Just a harmless experiment.”

Then I heard that carnivorous laugh and
his eyes also started to get darker. I could definitely see the anticipation he had for this game written all over his face. And the hunting instinct. “I’m not playing.”

“If you can really resist me, then you don’t have anything to worry about. Let’s give it a try. I want to know if you
can actually manage it.”

This man was pretty
sure of himself. Of course he was attractive and I couldn’t deny that he did something to my body that I couldn’t escape from. But as long as my brain was still working properly, I really had nothing to be scared of.

That’s why I
said, “I’m sure I can resist you.” Why not, I just had to keep away from him. That shouldn’t be a problem. My body had never triumphed over my spirit before. “You will definitely not be able to put me down on your list of conquests.”

Adam
gave a broad grin and his eyes sparkled in belligerence. “I don’t have that kind of list. But if I did have a list of women I still really wanted to conquer, then you would be right at the top of that list.”

The way in which he said it
gave me that expectant throbbing feeling between my legs and my mouth suddenly became very dry. “If you were to ever have this list, you will never be able to strike me from it.”

“
Is that what you think?”

“Yes
, because you don’t want a permanent relationship and I don’t sleep with men who only want to play games with me, so you’ve already lost.” After what had happened with Aidan, I had sworn to myself that I would never again be taken in by a man like him. And Adam was that type of man: Attractive, dangerous, dark and secretive. These men knew exactly which buttons to press with a woman to get what they wanted.

Adam
got up from the table, came towards me and bent down to put his lips to my ear. His warm breath blew over my cheek and made my skin go red. “If you start playing this game, you will lose. But be warned, you will only have me once. I never sleep with the same woman a second time.”

“
Scared about investing your feelings”, I snapped back and gave him a sweet smile because I knew that I had cut right to the chase of the matter.

He sat up and squinted his eyes. “Maybe.”

“You don’t have to worry about me then, you won’t have me at all.” I also stood up and walked towards the terrace door. I really needed some fresh air.

I opened the door and was about to step outside when Adam said
silently “I will have you.”

That took my breath away because I knew that he would do everything
in his power to deliver on his promise. And the way in which he said it suddenly made me feel not quite so sure who would emerge victorious from this little competition.

“Then I hope for your sake that you don’t get your
fingers burned and then have to admit that you are not actually protected from love.”

I left
the house and took in the cool evening air with a deep breath. The air was clean and aromatic and smelt of fresh grass. The chirping sound of the tiny grass-dwelling insects reverberated in the dusk. The sun had now gone down and everything was grey. I was unable to see far into the distance, but I picked out a group of trees from among the dark shadows between which a light flickered.

I knew that the small pond was there. As I came closer, I was amazed about the lit water fountain that was the only light in the middle of the pond and offered everybody a beautiful and romantic view. The drops of water that the fountain hurled into the air sparkled in the light. It was
not too high and exactly the right height for the small pond to not appear overloaded, but high enough to blow droplets in my face as I sat on the park bench that I knew from the painting of the professor’s wife.

I hesitated before
sitting down because I felt as if I wasn’t actually allowed to sit here. This was her place and I felt a little bit like I was intruding. But I wanted to see what she had seen and what made this location her favorite place to come to. And despite the fact that it was dark, I understood what Adam’s mother found so wonderful about this place.

I looked at the
glittering water, listened to the noise of the water display that was almost like a melody when the water sprayed up into the air, sank completely and then came out again in short splashing bursts. Birds and cicadas joined in with this song and everything sounded incredibly peaceful and beautiful. I hadn’t seen it during the day before, but I was certain that the view at night couldn’t be surpassed by anything.

I listened to the cicadas making music and thought about Adam. I found this man
confusing. I had expected to find him more repulsive because I couldn’t really deal with knowing what happened between him and the tourists. On the other hand, I doubted whether these women didn’t know what they were letting themselves in for. However, I could well imagine that he knew exactly what kind of influence he had on the opposite sex and used it to his advantage. They had to recognize that if they dreamt of it becoming something more, then they were hoping in vain.

Mel and Kathrin at the very least didn’t hide the fact this morning that they knew it had just been a bit of fun for him. And yet, Kathri
n had developed feelings for Adam. This just went to show what I always knew, that it is impossible to separate one from the other.

I never loved Steven and at the beginning I didn’t know that. What I believed to be love was just my longing for physical closeness. I was fond of him and for a while he was also happy with what I gave him. Only when he started to want more, that was when I realized that I wasn’t treating him much differently to how Aidan had treated me.
I was taking advantage of his feelings for me to get physical warmth from him. My guilty conscience still haunts me today. Maybe I wasn’t actually that different to Adam.

Aidan had stopped me from feeling love so that I wouldn’t get hurt and abandoned again. And this is exactly what turned me into somebody who used people. When I became aware of this, I decided to leave Steven. But
it was different with Adam than it was with Steven. He triggered emotions in me that made me scared. I could already sense that he got under my skin. And that’s why I would never let Adam win because I didn’t want to be left in the lurch and used. I wouldn’t allow that to happen to me a second time.

I
just wished that I wouldn’t get butterflies in my stomach every time I thought he might appear behind me at any moment. I wished that I wasn’t overcome with nerves when he smiled at me. And I wished that my body would not become aroused at the fire in his eyes when he looked at me. Did he really look at every woman like that? Of course he did. He played games with all of them.

Was I just a game to him as well
? Did the prospect of a good hunt excite him? I wouldn’t make it easy for him.

And yet, when I thought about Adam, he aroused something in me that left me wishing I would break my own rules just once. All of a sudden, I wanted to be a little bit more adventurous and less rational. But I was scared of what might happen if I did that. No, I knew long ago what happened when I did that. But Adam had definitely gone astray. My ex-boyfriend Steven was exactly how my grandmother imagined the perfect man for me to be. He was conscientious, respectable, career-oriented and hard-working. But compared to Adam, he was dull, boring and ordinary. I didn’t feel butterflies in my stomach and there was no spark there during our relationship. Everything was predictable, planned and thought out. Sometimes I was sure that Steven didn’t invest any true feelings in our relationship either.