by Daphne Clair
'Wrong.'
She shrugged. 'All right. But you chose to admit' to it because you wanted to embarrass my mother.'
'I chose to admit it because I was asked and because it was the truth.' Shard spoke flatly, not as though he was defending himself, but as though it didn't matter, because he didn't give a damn what anyone thought. He was impervious to her mother's hints, to her own insults. She wasn't as tough as he. His assessment of her character had stung.
'Why did you come to stay?' she asked him. It hadn't been because he had nowhere to lay his head, she was sure, or because he missed having a family round him at Christmas time. 'Did you want to see how the other half lived? I hope we lived up to your expectations—I, at least, seem to have confirmed your prejudices about rich girls.'
He said, 'I came because Gary asked me to, and I like him.'
'I'm sure he's flattered. You don't like the rest of us, do you?'
'Does it matter?' he asked, betraying a hint of curiosity, as though he couldn't quite understand that anyone should care whether other people liked them or not.
'Not to me,' she said. 'Actually, I can hardly wait until you go.'
Then it matters.'
'Not at all.' She stopped on the next breath, a long training in good manners intervening.
As though he knew. Shard said, 'Go on.'
'No.' She wanted to tell him she disliked him, more than anyone she had ever met before. But he was waiting for her to say it, and she wouldn't let him make her do it.
She started the car and turned it in a tight, fast circle, the tyres throwing up loose metal in their wake, and headed for the winding, narrow road that led to the top of that special hill.
She threw the car around the curves recklessly, the headlights plunging ahead of them, the wheel swinging in her hands as she negotiated the blind corners, using instinct and memory as much as sight. She had never driven this way at night before, never driven over this road quite as fast as this.
She looked at Shard once, and saw that he had braced himself in the corner, one arm along the back of the seat, the other lying along the door. The breeze ruffled his hair and his teeth showed white in silent laughter.
She stopped at the top so suddenly that the back of the car swung off the road a little before it came to a halt.
Elise sat with her head thrown back for a moment, savouring the quiet, the sharp, dampish smell of the bush at night, taking a long breath of cool, clean air.
She opened her door and got out to walk to a gap in the trees Where the hillside sloped steeply away and the lights of the city could be just glimpsed between a fold in the hills, malting a faint glow in the sky that merged with the stars. A high moon scudded overhead and silvered the leaves on the dark trees nearby. There were crickets singing and somewhere far into the bush a more-pork called sadly.
Elise heard Shard leave the car and come over the stones of the road. She felt him at her back before he reached her, and whirled about, suddenly finding it unbearable to wait with her back to him.
He stopped three feet from her, and said, 'I wasn't going to touch you.'
'You startled me,' she said.
He didn't answer or apologise, and she thought it was because he knew that it wasn't true.
She said, 'We'll go back.' And he shrugged and stood aside for her to pass him.
As she did so he didn't move, but her skin reacted as though he had reached out and caressed her, a shivering warmth creeping along her bare arms, and as she slid behind the wheel she realised that the hollow sinking in her stomach was disappointment, that the tension that had gripped her was sliding into depression. And she knew with humiliation that it was because she had wanted him to touch her. To put his arms about her and hold her, kiss her...
He got in and as he leaned back to close the door, his shoulder and arm brushed her and she started violently, moving away from him.
He turned slowly to look at her. Elise put out a shaking hand to switch on the ignition, and he caught it in strong fingers, pulling her round by her wrist to face him.
'Don't!' she exclaimed. 'Leave me alone!'
'But you don't really want me to,' he said, and pulled her into his arms.
She fought him silently, trying to push against his unyielding chest, flinging her head back to evade his mouth. But her hands were imprisoned between them, and long, hard fingers held her head still while he found her mouth with a kiss that was like a Wow.
She was conscious of his hand flat against the smooth skin of her back, bared by the halter-necked dress she still wore. His thigh pressed against hers, and his mouth was merciless, pressing her head against the upholstery of the seat back, then his hand shifted to caress her neck, the thumb gently sliding over the little hollow below her ear.
She managed a little protesting jerk of her head and Shard lifted his lips a fraction from hers and muttered, 'Kiss me back, Elise.'
'Like hell --'
He moved swiftly and captured her lips again, parted on the words. His mouth prised them further apart and began a more gentle, tantalising exploration, and a slow fire seemed to trickle over her skin. She gave a little whimper of stunned protest, knowing her mouth was softening for him, her body losing its resisting stiffness.
Against her mouth, he murmured, 'No, like heaven...' And she felt his hand on her breast as though it was his right to cup and mould it in his palm and enjoy its softness as his mouth enjoyed the softness of hers.
She had stopped struggling altogether, her palms flat against his chest, feeling the pounding of his heart against her fingers, her head still tipped back while Shard dragged his mouth down her throat and kissed her shoulders and lower, where the deep neckline exposed the beginning curves of her young breasts.
His hand moved against her back, and she took a deep breath of pleasure, but when she felt his fingers on the knot at her nape that held the halter top in place, she suddenly recoiled away from him, shocked back to sanity.
She had thrown herself back against the door like an animal at bay, but he didn't try to follow her. He sat still where she had left him and commented, 'You're very true to type.'
'You surely didn't expect me to let you ‑'
'No. I didn't expect it.'
His tone said he had known just what to expect from her, the tactics of a spoiled, rich little virgin, out for thrills. And she wanted to hit him for it. But that would be running true to type, too, she supposed. She wouldn't give him the satisfaction.
. She fumbled in the little shelf by the steering wheel for cigarettes and lit one, took a deep draw and expelled the smoke carefully through pursed lips. 'You don't smoke, do you?' she asked him, in a cold, polite little voice.
'No.'
'You should try it.' She took another deep draw on the cigarette. 'With luck, it might kill you in time.'
His white smile in the darkness acknowledged the jibe. As the cigarette went to her mouth again, he said, 'You'll have to try harder than that.' And he bent swiftly, catching her wrist to hold it away from them while he kissed her, and she felt the smoke on her breath fill his mouth.
The effect was amazingly erotic, and she thought, damn him, damn you, Shard Cortland! She had just been regaining her equilibrium, and now she was shaking again.
She hoped the smoke would choke him, but when he moved away from her again he was smiling.
She opened the ashtray and stubbed out the half-smoked cigarette viciously, snapped it shut and started the engine. She thought, in two more days he'll be gone, and I hope I never see him again!
She tried to forget him, after he had gone. It should have been easy. He left nothing behind, and her mother only once referred vaguely to that 'awkward young man Gary brought home for Christmas.'
'My father seemed impressed with him,' Howard said from behind his paper.
Katherine gave an edgy little laugh. 'Your father would like anyone who had the patience to listen to his interminable reminiscences.'
'Yes, maybe. I believe
the young fellow visited him once or twice.'
'What? Why?'
Howard shrugged. 'He seemed to like the old man.'
'I think you should put a stop to it.'
'For heaven's sake, Kate—!'
'Really, Howard, for a businessman you're surprisingly naive, sometimes. Don't you realise that young man is on the make? He wangled an invitation from Gary, who heaven knows has nothing in common with a boy of his type—he dropped blatant hints while he was here that you should offer him a job—he even embarrassed Peter by positively rudely staring at poor Elise, who fortunately is too sensible to be taken in by that kind of vulgar flattery --'
Elise looked up, flushing and startled. 'Mother, I --'
'I know, dear, you very wisely refused to encourage him, and Peter was quite right to ignore the whole business --'
'Kate!' Howard interposed. 'I think you're letting your imagination run away with you. I don't recall any blatant hints, as you call them—as a matter of fact I thought of offering him a job, but Gary advised me not to.'
There! You see, even Gary saw through him at last!'
'Nothing of the kind. He thought he would be too proud to accept.'
Katherine gave a hard laugh. 'He must have overplayed his hand, there. Gary took him at his word, then, and serve him right. Oh, Howard, can't you see? A boy like that with a criminal background—you know, your father still has control of quite a lot of money, Howard, even since you took over the business and he retired...'
'Yes, but --'
'Well, I've warned you.' Katherine swept out of the room with the air of having washed her hands of the affair, leaving Howard looking thoughtful and vexed, and Elise tense and dismayed.
'My dear,' her father said, 'your mother is sometimes very shrewd about people; I must say Shard didn't strike me as—though I did wonder why an intelligent young man of twenty-five hadn't settled in a regular job ... Did he stare at you, as your mother said?'
'I hardly looked at him,' said Elise. 'How would I know?'
Her father said frowningly, 'He did kiss you, though—'
Her head flew up, eyes wide with shock, even as her father added, 'At the New Year's Eve party --'
But he had seen her face, and as she stammered with relief, 'Oh, that!' his eyes sharpened, and he looked at her closely.
That wasn't the only time, then,' he said. 'Elise?'
She jumped to her feet, her face hot. 'It was nothing. Dad.'
'You should have told me ‑'
There was no need—it only happened once, and—and it simply wasn't important enough to bother about, anyway. I can cope with—boys.'
'Well, as your mother says, you've always been a level-headed youngster, Elise. I suppose—I hadn't thought about it, but you could be a target for an unscrupulous, good-looking layabout. I'm glad you've got Peter. You'll be all right with him.'
Elise had started her second year at art school, glad to be busy once again with classes.
She left the building one hot day at the beginning of March and walked slowly to her car, because the tar was sticky and bubbling on the footpath and the slightest sign of haste was enough to bead her upper lip with tiny drops of perspiration. She kept her eyes on the ground in the car park, because she didn't want her light, high-heeled sandals covered with melted tar and wanted to avoid the soft spots on the heat-shimmering tarseal. The summer lingered late this year, the blistering heat must lift soon into autumn.
She lifted her eyes when she neared her car, and her feet stopped for a split second as she saw Shard leaning against it, in lean-fitting denims and a loose shirt open nearly to his waist.
Elise stepped closer and said, 'Hello, Shard. What are you doing here?' and smiled to cover a flutter of nervousness.
He didn't smile back. 'Waiting for you,' he said curtly.
'Should I be flattered?'
He didn't even bother to answer that. 'Shall we talk here or drive to somewhere cooler?' he asked.
She debated arguing the point about whether they had anything to talk about, but his manner told her he was unlikely to take no for an answer, and she certainly didn't feel up to arguing with him in this heat.
She shrugged and said, 'Let's drive.'
He got in beside her and she took them down Queen Street with its verandahed shops at the top and the tall multi-storey office buildings at the foot of the hill as it swept down to the harbour, then turned right on to Tamaki Drive and followed the route around the edge of the water past Mission Bay.
She drew up finally beneath an old pohutakawa that still held a few scarlet blossoms among the silver-backed leaves that laid a blessed umbrella of shade over them, and stopped with the bonnet of the car facing the sea.
Shard cast a cursory glance at the tanker making its stately way into the harbour, the ferry plying across to the North Shore, squat and busy as it ploughed a foaming wake across the green water, and the distant yachts dipping and careening below the high span of the harbour bridge.
Then he turned to look at her, his grey eyes light and hard. 'What exactly did you say to your father about me?' he asked.
Genuinely surprised, she frowned in puzzlement. 'Nothing. What are you talking about?'
'Your father has given instructions I'm not to be allowed to see your grandfather. At least he had the guts to tell me himself, but what I can't figure out is that one of the reasons seems to be that I'm supposed to have attacked you. So you kiss and tell—lies, do you?'
'Attacked ‑?' Horrified, Elise suddenly understood. Her father had been so certain that if Shard had kissed her, it must have been without her consent, that he had translated that into something much worse. 'Did he say that?'
'He implied it.'
'But—didn't you --'
'Deny it? My word against his darling daughter's?'
She looked away, biting her lip. 'I didn't go to him telling tales. Shard. I hardly said anything, just let slip something by mistake, and he jumped to conclusions. I'm sorry. I'll tell him that—that you didn't do anything I didn't ask for.'
'You admit that?'
With difficulty, she said, 'Yes.'
'You wanted me to kiss you, didn't you?'
Her cheeks hot, her eyes on the yachts in the harbour, she muttered between clenched teeth, 'Yes, yes, yes! I wanted you to kiss me!'
'Okay.' His hand closed over her clenched fingers, slipped to her wrist. 'Look at me.'
Elise pulled in a quick breath and turned to stare into his face. It looked grave and gaunt. His eyes were intent, with a silvery-sheen. 'And I wanted to kiss you. I wanted nothing else from the moment I saw you. Or rather, I wanted that and a lot more. To kiss you, to touch you, to make love to you. I want you.'
Her lips parted in surprise and she touched her tongue to them. 'But...'
'Sure, I stayed away from you. Since New Year. I survived—I've never needed anyone, I don't need you. I'm not asking for your love—I've never had any use for love. Only I want you like hell.'
The blunt, brutal statement shocked her into movement. She jerked away the hand that he still held and said, 'Well, too bad. You can't have me!'
Shard just stayed looking at her, unsmiling and still. Then he said, the flatness of his voice making it a denial rather than a query, 'Can't I.'
Elise drew a painful breath and muttered, 'Get out of my car!'
He grinned and opened the door and climbed out, standing with his hands on his hips and watching as she manoeuvred the car back on to the road. The chrome of the bumper grazed his denim pants as she passed, but he didn't move.
'She wanted never to see him again.
But she did. About a week later he was waiting as she left the door of the school, with a couple of brown paper bags in his hands, wearing new but dusty jeans and a neat denim shirt.
'Have lunch with me,' he invited. 'I've brought it,' lifting the bags, and Elise saw that they held sandwiches and sweet cakes and two cans of fruit juice.
They sat under a tree in the ne
arby park, with the other students and office workers who sprawled under the trees or sat on the green wooden seats or on the stone steps that broke the steep paths.
Looking at his clothes, she asked, 'You've got a job?' 'Yes.'
'What is it?'
His eyes gleaming with mockery, he said, 'It's a job.'
Elise picked up a crust off her sandwich and threw it to a pigeon that had alighted near them, gleaming eyes expectant. Let him be mysterious, then! She wasn't going to show any more interest.
Shard took the tab off one of the cans and handed her the drink. It was cool and sweet, and as she tipped her head to drink it she was aware of his eyes on the long line of her throat.
She cradled the can in her hands and looked back at him, her eyes acknowledging the desire in his, her smile deriding it.
He moved, leaning back against the-tree, his head back; lips parted in silent laughter, his grey eyes gleaming at her.
Caught unaware by a sudden spiralling of excitement, Elise looked away, making an effort to breathe normally.
Abruptly, she said, 'I spoke to my father.'
'I know.'
She looked at him quickly, and he said, The ban was lifted—probably because the old man made such a fuss when he heard about it. He thought your father was exceeding his rights—or duties.'
She felt a stirring of anger. It hadn't been easy for her, the interview with her father, and Shard seemed to be saying it hadn't even been necessary. He might at least have thanked her, she thought resentfully.
'I have to go,' she said, standing up.
He sat where he was, perfectly at ease. She said Thanks for the lunch.'
Shard shrugged, watching her face with lazy interest. She thought he looked younger today. She had been surprised when her father mentioned his age; she would have thought he was older than twenty-five. 'Goodbye,' she said pointedly, and he grinned and said casually, 'So long, Elise.'
But he came again, and although Elise had promised herself to have nothing further to do with him, she went along with his casual invitations, salving her conscience by telling herself there was nothing in it but an odd kind of friendship. They never touched, they didn't talk of the pull of attraction that kept them seeing each other, the thing that she knew Shard despised in himself as much as she did in herself.