"The thought did occur to me."


"But you were so wonderful, so gallant about it." She gazed up at him through a puddle of besotted

tears. "Why, you smiled at me like an angel."


He pried her arms off his neck and stood, brushing the sand from his knees. "My manners at guppoint have always been impeccable."


He walked to the edge of the waves and stared out to sea.


Emily trailed after him. "I had to do it, you know." She waded out in front of him, heedless of the foam washing over her skirt. "It was your face." Reaching up, she cupped his cheeks in her hands. "Your beautiful face. It's so expressive. I had no choice. You could have never maintained the charade. Nicky would have seen right through you. To make him believe I hated you, I had to make you believe it, too."


The planes of his face were cold and stony now. Only his eyes revealed the depths of his stormy thoughts. "You did an admirable job."


Emily dropped her hands. She paced back and forth through the waves, frantic to make him understand. "Saleri started harping about this land grant he claimed you altered to cheat him and Daddy out of their shares of the mine. He was going to use it to have you put away for life. I was afraid if he came here alone and got his hands on it, he would destroy it, or, even worse, doctor it himself to have you brought to trial for my father's murder."


Justin's voice was chillingly devoid of emotion. "Are you sure that's why you came with him?"


She wheeled to face him. "What do you mean?"


His eyes narrowed. "Maybe somewhere in your mind was just the tiniest smidgen of doubt. Maybe you wanted to see that land grant for yourself and find out if I really did murder your father."


"No!" She lifted her sodden hem and stumbled toward him. "I believed in you. I swear it. You're all

I ever believed in."


Snorting in disbelief, Justin scooped up a shell, then drew back his arm to toss it into the sea. "What

were you going to do after he took you to the land grant? Shoot him in cold blood?"


She grabbed his arm, not even realizing herself the full import of her words. "I didn't even think about what would happen next. I knew you'd come for me."


The shell slipped from his fingers. He slowly swung around to face her. "And if I hadn't come?" he

asked brutally. "If I had decided a woman like you was hardly worth chasing halfway across the world?"


She bowed her head, wondering if he would ever understand or be able to forgive her for her own dark passions. She lifted her head, her heart in her eyes. "I would have done what I had to do. He killed my father."


A strange expression passed over Justin's face, then was gone, leaving it as impassive as before.


He ran his thumb over her cheek to flick away a tear. "Then you'll understand when I do what I have

to do." With those words he gently disengaged her hand, turned, and walked away.


Emily's hands hung limply at her sides. "Where are you going?"


His stride did not slow. Desolation overwhelmed her with abandonment nipping close at its heels. All

she could see was Justin Connor walking away from her one more time.


She trotted after him, pausing to hop up and down on one foot to peel off her sodden slipper. "Go on, you coward!" she yelled. "Run away from me. It's what you do best, isn't it?"


She hurled the slipper. It struck him solidly between the shoulder blades. He hesitated for a heartbeat, then kept going.


Her voice rose. "I don't need you. I never needed you. The day Emily Claire Scarborough needs

anybody will be the day they grow tulips in hell!" She took a few more stumbling steps, then sank to

her knees in the sand. "I don't need you, you bastard." Tears blinded her. Her voice faded to a mumble. "I don't need anyone."


* * *


Emily sat on the bluff where her father was buried, hugging her knees to her chest. She watched as Justin's clipper unfurled its sails and set for open sea. The same warm wind that tossed her curls around her face filled its billowing sails, sending it slicing for the horizon. It was a magnificent sight, silhouetted against the pagan moon like a ghost of days long gone. Its beauty would have broken her heart if it

hadn't already been broken.


The lights of the ship slowly faded over the horizon, leaving her alone with the brilliant glitter of the

stars. She tangled her bare toes in the tussock grass and laid her damp cheek against her knee.


An unearthly sound filled the night. Emily lifted her head, stiffening. She was afraid to turn around,

afraid she might have imagined the hymn brightening the darkness, afraid it might be only the stars rubbing points or the melodic wanderings of a lost choir of angels. The music rose on magical wings, drifting through the wind to her ears.


Her hands clenched into fists. She stood and dared to turn, only to find a shimmering line of torches winding their way down the beach toward the bluff. Her breath caught in her throat.


The procession topped the bluff. Among their well-loved faces stood Trini in full ceremonial garb,

running his hands down the lapels of a rumpled coat of the finest Egyptian linen; Dani and Kawiri, their lithe naked bodies draped with shells and fragments of polished amber; the stern ariki, his mouth folded

in what might have been a smile on a more expressive face.


But Emily had eyes only for the man at the head of their procession. A barefoot king in a pair of ragged dungarees.


The silence rustled expectantly around them.


"You're late again," she said, swallowing around the knot in her throat.


"Not too late, I hope," Justin replied. "It's bad form to be late for your own wedding."


Emily pressed her fingers to her trembling lips. She understood that he was offering her his life as

bravely and as gallantly as he had on the beach. Not to end it in a flash of smoking gunpowder, but to

cup its fragile moments in her palm, to nourish it and protect it as she would her own through all the sweet years to come.


She opened her mouth to give him her answer.


A silver tray popped into her vision, crowned by a conch shell brimming with amber liquid. Penfeld bowed. "A spot of tea, perhaps, my dear? To celebrate this momentous occasion. '


He didn't utter a protest when she shoved the tray aside and flew across the bluff into Justin's waiting arms. Trini's deep-throated laughter pealed out as Justin rocked her in his hard embrace.


He swept out an arm toward the wind-battered cross. "I wanted David to share the moment with us."


"Oh, he is," Emily breathed in wonder. "Look."


They both stared at the base of the cross to discover a single fragile pohutukawa bloom had pushed its way up through the sandy soil, its tender petals unfurling in a fresh promise of new life.


Their lips met in a melting caress, making promises and vows they would gladly spend their lifetimes keeping. As the natives danced around them, Justin stroked her hair and pressed his lips to her ear, whispering the words she'd once thought never to hear again except on the distant wings of the wind-


"Stay with me always, my sweet, my love . . . my Claire."

About the Author

A self-professed army brat, Teresa Medeiros was born in Germany. She wrote her first novel at the

age of twenty-one and enjoyed an earlier career as a registered nurse before realizing her dream of

writing full time before the age of thirty. She lives in a log home in Kentucky with her husband

Michael, five neurotic cats, and two gracious dogs.