Jealousy--it's a relationship killer.

Here's another chapter from my fourth novel. The hero has decided to break it off with his fiance and pursue this other woman. (The women he played tennis with in a previous post.) However, he comes back to his resort and finds the woman in the arms of another man, two men actually:


Anger and betrayal replaced the searing burn of jealousy. What kind of a woman—a newly widowed woman,goes around throwing herself at all kinds of men—any age apparently. He was so angry by the time he reached them he could barely control the urge to pop his brother in the nose.

He stepped closer as they swirled around the floor. Tony stopped dancing for a moment and bowed Claire backwards in a sensuous dip that had her giggling like a school girl. Disgusting, revolting!

Claire saw him for the first time upside down, her hair hanging all the way to the floor. She smiled warmly. "Alex!"

"Is this the best two out of three?" Alex snarled.

"What?" Tony asked, but brought Claire back upright with a snap. "When did you get back?"

Alex ignored his brother.

"Alex.” Her face was flushed with excitement and the heat of the dance. "We didn't know you were back."

"Obviously," he snapped and grabbed her hand off Tony's shoulder. "I'm cutting in."

"Okay." Tony's expression was mutinous but he relinquished Claire and stepped back to his table where Sara was sitting.

Alex wrapped his arm possessively and none to gently around Claire's waist and dragged her hard against him. She let out a little whimper as she contacted with his chest and stared up at him with frightened eyes. He cursed himself but seized her hand in a vice-like grip.

"Didn't you have a good trip?"

"Yes, I had a great trip," he snapped then grimaced when she looked at him like she had to ward off a blow.

"Is something wrong?"

They danced in sharp staccato steps with their bodies fused tightly together. He fought his anger and frustration. "No."

"Then will you tell me why my fingers and the small of my back are going to be black and blue tomorrow morning?"

Her words didn't sink in for a few moments until her smile faded into a scowl.

"Sorry," he sighed but didn't ease his hold. "You've been very busy while I've been away."

She looked up at him, puzzled. "I don't know what you mean."

"I mean you've obviously made up with your boyfriend."

"Excuse me?"

"Boyfriend. And Tony. You seem to be getting along very well with both of them. Can't say as I blame you. They're both very attractive. I guess a merry widow like yourself can't really help it. You’ve obviously been playing the field while I’ve been away. Trying to scope out your next victim…er…husband?"

She looked up at him now those eyes turning to flat smoky blue like the sea before a squall and Alex could feel the controlled rage screaming for release. "How dare you!" she growled in barely tempered fury. "For your information, that attractive young man is my son." Her voice began to inch up in volume. "And you're the one who threw Tony and me together. But he was gentlemen enough to know I wasn't interested in him that way. He’s just a friend. And yes, I am having fun with them. They don't seem to want to accuse me falsely with suppositions that I was sniffing out a new mate like an animal in heat." She stopped dancing forcing him to stop as well. "You can release me now. I don't care to dance with you anymore."

Could there be a big enough rock for him to crawl under or a hole sufficiently large enough to plummet into? If he was going to eat crow he was going to have to do it, and quickly. "Claire...I...I'm so sorry. I'm such an idiot."

"You've got that right. Now let go of me." She twisted in his arms.

"No," he grumbled. "I need to talk to you."

"I said let go of me!" Her eyes were large and no longer blue. Gray, steel gray, hard and enraged.

"Please…please let me explain," he stuttered.

"There's nothing to explain. Your opinion of my character is crystal clear, Alex Cole. I really don't understand how you have the nerve to criticize me for my choice in men in the first place. Who the heck are you to tell me who I can see and who I can’t? You're not my father or my boyfriend or my fián..." she trailed off, grinding her teeth. "And I don't care to stand here anymore and be humiliated further. So take your hands off of me and let me go."

He released her reluctantly, sheepishly and watched her race back to where her son was sitting with his daughter. How could he have made such a stupid mistake? Just to look at the boy now he could see Claire. The golden hair, the ocean blue eyes. Could he be anymore more of a fool? Perhaps if he was lucky a comet would race out of the sky and obliterate him where he stood.


This is turning into a rather long novel. But there's so many twists and turns in the plot of getting these two people who are meant to be together--together. So we'll see. This is the point where I'm at right now.