by Penny Jordan
‘Yes. He told me that most of the committee are sitting together on the same table.’
They were, but Christy wasn’t sure whether Dominic intended to join them. She suspected that Amanda would have plans of her own for the evening which wouldn’t include sharing Dominic with the rest of them.
From the top of the stairs she looked down yearningly at where Dominic stood chatting to her father, knowing that she was shielded from him and that he couldn’t see how avidly and needingly she looked at him. He was wearing a dinner suit, and a giant fist seemed to close round her heart as she looked down at him, tanned and dark-haired, and completely at ease in his no doubt expensive evening suit. He wore it with a familiarity that said that he felt completely at home in its tailored smoothness.
Perhaps that was what she needed. Christy thought sadly: to be reminded of the vast gulf in experience that now lay between them. He wouldn’t have lived the life of a monk while he was in America, she was sure of that. He wouldn’t have held himself aloof from sexual experimentation because his heart and mind was full of her image.
She saw him glance at his watch, light bouncing off the thin gold strap, and she started to walk downstairs.
‘Ah, there you are,’ her father beamed at her. ‘Aren’t we going to get a preview of the outfit?’ He turned to Dominic before she could speak. ‘I remember her first grown-up party dress, don’t you, Dominic? She couldn’t wait to show it off to you.’
They all laughed, but her father was the only one whose laughter was natural. There was simply no way she could remove her cloak and twirl round for her father’s inspection with Dominic standing there watching her, and so she shook her head and said in a voice made husky with tension, ‘I’m sorry, Dad, we’ll have to go. We can’t be late…’
She could feel the tension emanating from Dominic as he escorted her to his car, but it wasn’t until she was sitting beside him as he drove down the lane that he spoke to her.
‘What’s the matter?’ he demanded harshly. ‘Were you afraid that your father would recognise it as a dress bought by a man for his lover? Is that why you wouldn’t show it to him?’
For a moment she was too shocked to speak. Did Dominic honestly think that? She remembered how he had looked at the box when they were on the train and opened her mouth to contradict him, but the words died unsaid. What was the point of saying anything? Let him think what he wanted. Surely it was easier to endure his contempt and animosity than to have to battle against his physical desire, especially when she was so aware of her own weakness and how very vulnerable she was to him?
Not that she had anything to fear from him in that regard any longer, and as she met the cold condemnation in his eyes she marvelled that they had ever gleamed hot and molten with desire for her. Looking at him now, it seemed almost an impossibility. But he had wanted her, he had told her so, and she had turned away from him, heartsick because it was only desire and not love.
They weren’t the first to arrive. Several other cars were already parked in front of the house. Anticipating Dominic’s intention of opening the car door for her, Christy beat him to it, feeling idiotically gauche as he stepped back from the car and watched with a grim humourless smile.
‘You’re very wise,’ he told her under his breath. ‘If I put my hands on you feeling the way I do tonight, I might be tempted to indulge myself in violence. You have that effect on me, didn’t you know?’ he asked her savagely as she made a small sound of protest.
‘Then I suggest you go and look for Amanda,’ Christy told him bitterly. ‘She looks to me like a woman who knows how to handle a violent male. She might even like it.’
Aghast at her own jealousy, she half stumbled in the drive. Sickness churned through her stomach. She wasn’t sure which of them she hated the most—Dominic, for getting beneath her guard, or herself for allowing him to do so.
‘Bitch!’ She heard him curse as he caught up with her and took her firmly by the arm. ‘It doesn’t suit you, you know, Christy,’ he told her, swinging her round to face him. ‘Is that what he’s done to you: turned you from a sweet, innocent girl into…’
‘A woman?’ she threw at him, wrenching her arm free. The door opened and she hurried inside. Dominic was close behind her.
With an almost bitter sense of satisfaction she watched Amanda detach herself from her god-mother’s side and hurry across to them, promptly annexing Dominic. Christy already knew which room had been put aside as the ladies’ cloakroom, and she made her way there without giving Dominic and Amanda a second glance.
The wives of several other members of the committee, plus some of her mother’s friends from the WI, were already there, and Christy exchanged hellos and smiles with most of them before taking off her cloak. She had been carrying her mask on her arm, and she paused in front of one of the mirrors to put it on.
Behind her she heard someone say, ‘My dear, that is the most magnificient costume. I do envy you, even though I don’t have the figure to wear it any longer.’ Turning round, Christy recognised one of her mother’s friends. ‘Where on earth did you get it?’
Smiling, she explained.
‘Oh, well, that explains it. It really is stunning. Yes, I can see Shakespeare’s Kate in that, quarrelling with Petruchio.’
‘I’d better get to the ballroom, and check that the musicians have arrived,’ Christy excused herself.
In the ballroom only the wall lights were illuminated, with low-wattage bulbs, and the soft pink glow they cast had a softening effect on the room. The wooden floor had been polished by volunteers from the WI before being chalked, and the musicians were already in place on the small raised stage. One of them raised his head and whistled appreciately as Christy hurried towards them, and Christy dipped him a mock curtsy, only to tense as she felt the heated pressure of eyes boring into the back of her neck.
She knew before she turned round who was looking at her. Dominic was standing with Amanda, who was chatting animatedly to her godmother, far too intent on her own conversation to be aware of her escort’s slow and thorough scrutiny of Christy’s white and silver figure. It was a long time before he lifted his eyes to her face, and Christy felt the whole room sway around her as she read the savage contempt in their depths. She wanted to cry out against it, and like someone under a numbing spell she moved slowly as though through water as she dragged her gaze away and tried to resume her conversation with the musicians.
‘Ah, Christy. Everything seems to be under control. The ladies from the WI have provided a first-class buffet. Have you seen it yet?’
Thankfully Christy turned to the Major, accepting his invitation to, as he put it, ‘Inspect the troops’.
‘You’re not supposed to be able to recognise me with this mask on,’ she teased him mock-reproachfully.
‘Oh, I’d recognise that red hair of yours anywhere!’
All the women were to retain their masks until twelve o’clock when their partners, who would presumably be quite well aware who they were, could demand their removal or payment of a forfeit. This had been Lady Anthony’s suggestion, and Christy had thought it a good idea, in view of the romantic theme of the evening.
Within an hour most of the guests had arrived, and the ballroom floor was pleasantly crowded. Christy watched the dancers from the sidelines, trying not to notice how well Dominic and Amanda danced together, and how close their bodies were.
She didn’t know how much more of Dominic’s contempt she could take. She had never thought him a particularly egotistical man, but she could only presume that his savagery towards her now sprang from the fact that in his eyes she had turned him down as her lover in favour of David.
She told herself that the Dominic she had loved would never have behaved so cruelly, but it made no difference at all to the way she felt about him.
The Major asked her to dance and she got up to do so, the skirts of her dress swaying gracefully as she moved. She was aware that her dress had caused something of a stir, but
she took no pleasure in the knowledge. That one contemptuous look Dominic had given her had stripped her defences from her, and the evening had become something merely to be endured.
The Major danced surprisingly well, his olde-worlde courtesy balm to her soul after Dominic’s biting sarcasm, but even so, she was aware that she didn’t have all the Major’s attention. She had seen him glance more than once at where Lady Anthony was sitting and on some impulse she was reluctant to analyse she said quietly to him, ‘Lady Anthony looks rather lonely; why don’t you go and ask her to dance?’
‘I would, but I know she’d refuse me.’ He gave a rather humourless bark of laughter. ‘And it wouldn’t be the first time.’ A shadow crossed his face. ‘There was a time when I thought…but I was foolish. Her father wanted to keep the title in the family, and she married Ronnie. We were in the same regiment, you know.’
And the Major had loved her, Christy suspected, her heart aching for him. Just for a moment she had seen behind his stern mask to the man, and as he glanced across the room to Lady Anthony, Christy realised that he still loved her.
The music stopped just as they swung level with Lady Anthony’s table. ‘You dance very well, my dear, and in that dress you are quite the belle of the ball…’ The faded blue eyes grew lightly wistful.
Acting on impulse, Christy said softly, ‘The Major was just telling me that he would love to ask you to dance, but that he was frightened that you would refuse him.’ She didn’t dare to look at her companion, but even without doing so she was aware of his growing anger, and prayed that she had not made a terrible mistake.
To her relief she saw that Lady Anthony was slightly flushed and rather disconcerted, but far from displeased.
‘Oh well…well…I rarely dance these days. My arthritis, you know.’
‘Nonsense,’ Christy heard the Major saying gruffly. ‘Why, I remember when you were the best dancer for fifty miles around, you were so light on your feet.’
Almost unable to believe her eyes, Christy watched the Major reach out and bring Lady Anthony gently to her feet, just as the musicians started to play a waltz. Lady Anthony was smiling at him, as shy as a young girl.
Just as Christy had mentally prophesied, there was no sign of Dominic making any attempt to join the rest of their table when it came to the time for supper. She could see him sitting halfway across the room with Amanda, and she had to fight down the hot, smouldering jealousy corroding through her body.
She didn’t eat very much, and excused herself as soon as possible, going down to the ladies’ cloakroom to check on her appearance. Her face looked too pale, and her hands trembled as she applied more blusher and fresh lipstick.
She didn’t touch her hair, studying herself only briefly as she slipped her mask back on. It transformed her face, giving it an odd, fey quality that was hard to define. Behind it her eyes flashed and glowed, the light playing on the rounded smoothness of her breasts. She still felt uncomfortable with the neckline of her gown, but there was nothing she could do about it, and in reality her outfit was far less revealing than the gauzy creation being worn by Amanda.
She must have stayed in the cloakroom longer than she intended because when she got back people were just beginning to drift on to the dimly lit floor, and as she stood watching them she heard the compère saying, ‘Come on, ladies and gentlemen, in five minutes it will be midnight. Gentlemen, remember that if your partner refuses to unmask for you, you can demand a forfeit…’
She had to get away from here, Christy realised stubbornly, trying to control the pain savaging her. She simply didn’t have the strength to stand and watch Dominic dance past her, holding Amanda in his arms.
She turned to leave the room, and stiffened as she felt a constraining hand on her arm.
‘Our dance, I believe,’ a familiar voice grated in her ear, and she turned in stunned surprise to look directly into the darkness of Dominic’s eyes.
He took full advantage of her momentary shock to steer her in the direction of the dance floor, his fingers biting deep into her skin as he refused to let her pull away.
‘What are you talking about, Dominic?’ she protested as he stopped and swung her round to face him, his arms closing round her. ‘We had no arrangements to dance together.’
‘Didn’t we? I thought it was implicit in the mere fact that I brought you here. Look around you, Christy. I’ll bet there aren’t many women here now who aren’t dancing with the man who brought them.’
What he said was unarguably true, but that didn’t lessen her own sense of shock.
She struggled against his constraining arms, protesting, ‘You should be dancing with Amanda, not me.’
Her struggles brought her into closer contact with his body, her breast swelling tightly against his dinner-jacketed chest as she fought for breath.
All around them couples were swaying together in sensual closeness. Dominic bent his head and she felt the faint rasp of his jaw against her skin just below her mask. As she caught the familiar scent of his cologne all the fight drained out of her and she felt her body go limp against his. Instantly his arm tightened.
‘We’ve always moved well together, you and I, Christy,’ he murmured in her ear. ‘Remember when I taught you to dance?’
‘I’ve danced with a lot of other men since then, Dominic.’
She winced beneath the harsh bite of his fingers into her waist, and wondered what on earth it was that drove her to challenge him in this way. Why couldn’t she just accept what the gods were prepared to give her without wanting more?
Her full skirts padded the sensation of Dominic’s body moving against her own, but she was still aware of it, aware of him, and aware of the fact that beneath her stiffened bodice her breasts felt swollen and tender. Tears clogged her throat, and when the music stopped and Dominic made to remove her mask she checked him instinctively, not wanting him to see her weakness.
Too late she realised her mistake, as she heard him murmur sardonically, ‘No? People are watching us, Christy, so I’ll just have to take the forfeit instead.’
Lost in her own misery, she hadn’t realised why Dominic had been attempting to remove her mask, and now, with several amused dancers watching them, it wasn’t possible for her to protest that it was all a mistake. Even the compère had seen them, and around them people laughed as he called out, ‘Well now, it seems as if we have at least one reluctant maiden in our midst. Tell me, sir, what do you intend to claim as your forfeit?’
Dominic seemed totally unfazed by all the amused attention and simply gave their audience a wholly deceptive and, to Christy at least, heart-stopping smile as he drawled laconically, ‘What do you think?’ And then he was tipping her head back against his arm and kissing her in full view of their delighted audience. Christy thought she had never been so embarrassed in her life, but she sensed that to say or do anything as the musicians struck up the opening bars of a deliberately provocative love song could only make matters worse.
Amanda was the first one to reach them as they left the dance floor, her eyes spitting venom at Christy as she slid her arm through Dominic’s. She was wise enough to say nothing there and then, but Christy had no doubt that the other woman was far from pleased, for all the teasingly pouting looks she gave Dominic.
Christy excused herself, saying that she had promised to help the WI ladies clear away after supper, although in point of fact all she really wanted to do was to escape from the amused and, it seemed to her in her highly sensitive state, very knowing eyes that observed her hurried progress from the dance floor into the supper room.
After that she kept well away from the ballroom, parrying all the teasing remarks that came her way.
‘My goodness, it was almost as good as watching Gone With The Wind,’ one plump matron teased her, eyeing Christy with the sort of speculation that made her heart sink. She had little doubt that in no time at all she and Dominic would be the talk of the village, and how long would it be after that before pe
ople started remembering her old teenage crush on him—if they had ever forgotten it?
She was carrying plates out to someone’s car when she realised how cold it had gone. The sky was brilliantly starry, the air so crisply fresh that it almost hurt to drag it into her lungs.
‘We’ll have more snow soon, you mark my words,’ someone commented lugubriously. ‘I can smell it in the air.’
So could she, Christy acknowledged, shivering as she hurried back inside.
People were starting to leave, and she would have given anything to avoid accepting Dominic’s lift home, but it was too late now to order a taxi.
She went reluctantly to the ballroom, surprised but pleased to see that Lady Anthony and the Major were sitting together, apparently deep in conversation. The Major smiled at her as she walked past. ‘Excellent affair, my dear.’
‘Yes, it quite took me back to my girlhood,’ Lady Anthony agreed.
Several other members of the committee added their praise as they started to drift away, and although Christy searched the ballroom twice, there was no sign of Dominic.
Fear and something else clutched at her heart. Perhaps she would have to organise that taxi after all, or beg a lift from someone else.
There was no sign of Amanda anywhere either, she noticed jealously.
She was just beginning to think she genuinely would have to make her way home alone when Dominic walked into the ballroom.
Amanda wasn’t with him, but Christy could see quite distinctly the smudge of dark red lipstick staining his mouth. Amanda’s lipstick.
Her whole body seemed to seize in one vast, agonising surge of pain so intense that it rooted her to the spot, unable to drag her eyes away from Dominic’s face and that tell-tale scarlet brand.
‘I think it’s time we made a move.’
‘I’ll go and get my coat and meet you downstairs.’
She moved away from him like an automaton, passing Amanda on the stairs. Triumph gleamed febrilely in the older woman’s eyes, and Christy knew that that smear of lipstick was both a deliberate declaration and a warning.