by Penny Jordan
The tone of his voice had made Livvy shiver. The words, ‘Then why did you marry her?’ stuck to her tongue like burrs to an animal’s fur, but despite their irritation she refused to utter them, caution overwhelming curiosity.
‘I know what you’re thinking,’ he told her. ‘Go ahead, why don’t you ask?’
Livvy had flushed at the scorn in his voice. ‘It isn’t any of my business,’ she told him quietly, putting down her coffee-mug and preparing to turn away.
‘No, you’re damn right it isn’t,’ he had agreed, ‘but I’ll tell you anyway… Sexually she was the most…’
Livvy hadn’t been able to stop herself; she had felt herself starting to flush, a deep burn of embarrassed and uncomfortable colour invading her body. It hurt hearing him talk like this, she had recognised. She had felt degraded somehow, not just by what he was saying, but by her own recognition of that sharp, plunging knife-turn stab of jealousy she had felt, that bitter awareness that she was not the kind of woman he could ever describe in those kind of terms, that her sexuality could ever have the power to entrap and hold a man against his will; and, along with her recognition of her pain and the reasons for it, had come bewilderment at her own reactions, at her even momentarily wanting to have that kind of sexual power, at wanting to be able to make him ache and burn with desire for her.
It had only lasted a second or so, a dangerous surge of primitive madness, soon banished to its rightful place.
She was not that kind of woman, nor did she really have any desire to be; and surely, if Richard Field had been foolish enough to get caught in that kind of trap, then he was not…
Not what? she asked herself shakily now. Not the kind of man who could appeal to her? Not the kind of man she could desire? Not the kind of man she could love?
* * *
She did her shopping, dawdling over it for as long as she could, stopping to have lunch in a café that overlooked a tree-lined square.
A small family were sitting at the next table to hers, the mother young and pretty, bloomingly pregnant, her two daughters, in the manner of Continental children, beautifully dressed and already touchingly and innocently aware of their femininity, allying themselves to their mother as they copied her actions, while at the same time enjoying flirting with their father while their mother looked on indulgently.
‘I hope this one will be a boy,’ Livvy heard her saying ruefully to her husband as she patted her stomach. ‘I think I already have enough rivals.’
‘A boy, another girl, I don’t mind, just so long as you are well and happy,’ her husband responded, leaning forward to touch her.
They looked so happy. It was a pity that Richard Field wasn’t here with her to see them. With her? A small shiver shot through her. She was becoming dangerously obsessed with the man.
‘What if you fall in love?’ Jenny had teased her.
She had denied it, and in doing so had perhaps tempted fate?
But surely fate could not be cruel enough to allow her to fall in love with someone like Richard Field. And surely she had far too much sense?
She delayed going back to the farmhouse for as long as she could. Richard Field was on the telephone when she got back.
Tactfully, she didn’t linger in the kitchen, placing her shopping on the table and then heading for the door without unpacking it. She could do that later when he had finished.
He had his back towards her and he was speaking quietly in monosyllables, as though he didn’t want her to overhear what he was saying.
For some reason, that irked her. He had a right to want to keep his conversation private, of course, but there was no need for him to act as though she was the sort of person who was going to try deliberately to eavesdrop.
Because of the siting of the phone, she had to walk past him to get into the hall, but she kept as much distance between them as she could, intending to make it plain that she had no interest in either who he was talking to or what he was talking about, but naturally, since she had to walk within a foot or so of him, she couldn’t help overhearing his low-voiced curt, ‘No…I don’t think that would be a good idea,’ and could recognise that the person on the other end of the line was a man.
However, it wasn’t until she was upstairs in her own room that she realised why his voice had been oddly familiar.
When she did, she put down her hairbrush and raced downstairs.
Richard was still in the kitchen but he had finished his call.
‘That was George, wasn’t it?’ she demanded without preamble. ‘On the phone just now, you were speaking with George?’
Her anxiety for Gale fuelled her sense of outrage.
‘Why was he ringing you?’ she asked him, something she would never normally have done. ‘Did you tell him how upset Gale is…how worried…?’
‘Don’t you think that’s something Gale is perfectly capable of telling him herself?’
So it had been George. Livvy sat down, her voice quivering huskily with anger as she reminded him,
‘How can she? He’s in Japan and apparently so busy that he hasn’t got time to speak to her properly. He had time to speak to you, though, didn’t he?’
Disillusionment shadowed her voice. ‘I suppose he wanted to know whether or not you’ve decided to buy this place,’ she said dully, talking more to herself than to him. It shocked her that George, whom she had always thought of as so steady and reliable, was behaving like this, even though her conscience prompted her to acknowledge that Gale was perhaps not the easiest woman to live with, and that Richard had been right when he had told her that Gale was inclined to treat her husband more like another child than a man.
‘Gale needs George,’ she said unsteadily. ‘And so do the boys. Can’t you see what you’re doing by encouraging him to behave like this? Just because you’ve got a grudge against the female sex, that’s no reason for you to…to try to destroy Gale’s marriage. You’re not a man…you’re a spoiled child. You—’
She didn’t get any further. He was hauling her out of her seat, his hands locked round her arms, his body blocking her escape, even if she could have pulled away from him.
‘So I’m not a man?’
It had been there between them all week, smouldering dangerously like a peat fire, just waiting for something to fan it into an open conflagration. And she had just supplied that something.
She tried to stop him, to make her protest, both verbally and physically, but deep down inside her there was some reckless, wanton part of her that actually gloried in what she had done, feeding on the shock of frightening excitement that ran through her.
When he kissed her, although neither of them acknowledged it, both of them knew that what was happening had nothing to do with the challenge she had given him and that it was simply an excuse, a sop to the convention demanded by their minds and their stubborn rejection of the deeper, far more primitive needs which really motivated them.
This time her mouth was aware of the taste and texture of his, aware of it and hungry for it, the hands she had curled into tight fists to push him away straightening, flattening against his chest, feeling its heat, moving exploratively over him, no longer pushing him away, exploration giving way to something that was far more of a caress. And all the time he was kissing her, holding her, his hands, like hers, spread flat against her skin, moving down over her back and on to her hips.
She tensed for a moment as he drew her closer to him, shivering as she recognised that the reason for her hesitation was not because she didn’t want to experience the physical knowledge of his arousal, but because she did.
She trembled as she took that final self-betraying step, the small moan she made in her throat a surrender, not so much to him, but to her own feelings. He couldn’t know how alien all this was to her, how aloof she had always held herself from such casual intimacy, how bemused she had felt when friends had tried to explain to her how such sexual intensity felt, how it could overwhelm common sense, caution, and even reality
. No, he couldn’t know any of these things, and he wasn’t going to know. Let him think that, like him, she was simply overwhelmed by the ferocity of the sexual tension which had built up between them.
She felt his hand on her breast and instinctively moved her body to accommodate its touch. A fierce shudder of pleasure ripped through her. She moved closer towards him, shivering as he responded by deepening his kiss, his free hand burrowing under her hair, holding her against his mouth as though he was afraid that she might try to break away.
His mouth tasted of coffee and wine, caressing hers, probing hotly. Her hands curled frantically into his skin as she reacted to the need he was generating.
She had never felt like this before…never…never wanted, ached, needed, hungered for a man with this wanton, tormenting urgency.
She felt his hand slide down her neck, searching for the top of her zip, and wanted to tear herself free of her clothes, to feel his hands on her naked flesh, touching her, stroking her, caressing her.
Somewhere in the distance she heard a sound. Muzzily, she opened her eyes. It was the cat, she recognised. She had just jumped in through the window.
Dizzily she focused slowly on him. His pupils were huge and dark, his expression almost ecstatic, drugged…
Her heart missed a beat and then kicked heavily against her ribs. Looking at him, seeing him, watching him, seeing the need she could already feel in his body was so powerfully erotic that she could feel her body responding to it.
‘God, I want you.’
She heard him mutter the words and knew they were only an echo of her own need.
She looked at his mouth, watching as it formed the words, and then reached up and touched it with her fingertip, trembling as she felt his lips caress it. Soon now he would pick her up, take her upstairs, undress her and…
She froze as she heard the van driving into the yard. Instantly Richard released her, a dark flush staining his skin as he stepped back from her.
‘It’s Monsieur Dubois,’ she heard herself saying, but she could scarcely recognise her own voice, it sounded so strained and unfamiliar.
Now what on earth had she been doing? How on earth could she have let him…encouraged him…?
A wave of mortification burned through her, her body hot and then cold as the full impact of her own behaviour hit her. It gave her very little comfort to realise that Richard was as stunned and shaken by what had happened between them as she was.
It gave her no sense of triumph to know that physically he was as vulnerable to his desire for her as she had been to hers for him, not even when she could see that, far from revelling in what had happened, he actually looked visibly disturbed, his face drained now that the initial burn of colour had gone.
While he was outside dealing with the farmer, she retreated to her own room. If she had any sense, she would be packing her things now, she admitted to herself, not standing staring into space, but how could she leave when she had given Gale her promise that she would stay? And surely she owed it to her cousin at least to make some attempt to find out if Richard had told George how anxious Gale was to speak to him?
Or was it too late for that? What had happened to her cousin’s marriage, that her husband could take time to ring a casual friend and yet could not apparently find time to speak to his wife?
CHAPTER TEN
FROM her bedroom window Livvy could see down into the yard where Richard was talking to Monsieur Dubois. The farmer was talking volubly, gesticulating towards the sky and then shrugging his shoulders before going back to his truck.
Richard watched him go before turning round and walking back towards the house.
As she watched him, Livvy felt the desolation of self-knowledge wash over her.
It wasn’t just that she was sexually responsive to him. She loved him. That was why his attitude towards her sex didn’t just incite her to defensive anger, but made her ache with pain as well. That was why she wanted so desperately to hear him say something, anything which would allow her to believe that beneath his cynicism there were still emotions…feelings, needs.
How could she have fallen in love with him? She had always thought of herself as someone who had too much self-regard, too much self-esteem, too much common sense to be drawn into such a potentially destructive situation.
Even if he had returned her feelings. Returned them? Now she was being ridiculous, entering the realms of total fantasy.
He didn’t love her. He couldn’t love her. He despised her, disliked her…and desired her…
She held her breath as he stood still and looked up towards her bedroom window. Her heart turned over inside her chest.
Yes, there was no doubt at all. She loved him.
She heard him coming upstairs, his footsteps hesitating and then stopping outside her bedroom door. He knocked on it and called her name. Reluctantly, she went to open it.
‘That was Monsieur Dubois,’ he told her unnecessarily. ‘He wanted to warn us about the weather. Apparently bad storms have been forecast and there could be some flooding.’
‘But we’re too far away from the river here, surely, for it to affect us?’ Livvy protested.
‘It wasn’t the river he was bothered about. It was the lane. It seems that at one time it must have been the bed of a stream. The stream long ago ceased to exist but during heavy storms the lane acts as a natural channel for any flood water and becomes waterlogged. He said something about a tractor…’
‘Oh, that must have been the one he wanted Gale to buy. She thought he was trying to palm it off on her and refused.’
She was keeping as much distance between them as she could. She couldn’t look at him without remembering how it had felt to be in his arms and how much she had wanted to go on being there…how much she had wanted him.
‘We have to talk.’
The quiet words caught her off guard. She looked at him and then flushed, turning quickly away.
‘I don’t…there isn’t…’
‘We’re adults, not teenagers,’ he told her, overruling her stammered denials. ‘It’s pointless either of us pretending that we don’t know what’s happening between us.’
Livvy held her breath. Her heart felt as though it had stopped beating, as emotion, shock and hope choked her.
Could she have been wrong after all? Could he actually share what she was feeling? Could he actually love her as she loved him?
She could feel herself starting to tremble, her heart thudding frantically against her ribs as she waited for him to continue.
‘Neither of us can deny that there’s a certain very strong physical attraction between us—even though it might be something that neither of us wants.’
Livvy felt physically sick. How could she have been so stupid, so self-deluding? Of course he didn’t love her, and from what he was saying it was obvious that emotions were the last thing on his mind.
‘As I said, we’d be foolish to pretend any different; to ignore what’s happening.’
Livvy lifted her chin, her pride smarting from the blow he had just delivered.
‘If this is some ploy to persuade me to go to bed with you—’ she began, but he wouldn’t let her finish.
‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ he told her curtly. ‘What I want to do is to make sure that both of us are on our guard to ensure that that is exactly what does not happen.
‘I’d be lying if I tried to deny the sexual chemistry that’s developed between us, but, logically, giving in to it will only lead to complications which neither of us can really want.’
Livvy’s face flushed. He was making her feel worse, not better. What kind of man was he, to be able to say openly that he wanted her one minute and then to tell her the next that he wasn’t going to do anything about it?
An honest and responsible one, her conscience suggested, but her sense of rejection, coupled with the knowledge of her love, was too strong to allow her to listen to it.
‘Your sexual urges might be so strong tha
t you feel you can’t exert control over them,’ she told him coldly. ‘But I assure you that mine are not.’
‘No?’ he challenged softly. ‘Then what was all that about downstairs in the kitchen just now? If Monsieur Dubois hadn’t arrived when he did, you know full well I could have had you right there and then, and it wouldn’t have mattered a damn if I’d taken you across the kitchen table—to either of us,’ he added thickly as the flush which had stung Livvy’s face earlier became a searing burn of shocked heat.
Shocked, not just because of what he had said, nor the graphic picture he had drawn for her, but because of her own body’s reaction to his words, that sudden, fierce aching pulsing low down in her body which made her want to turn away from him to conceal herself, not just from his eyes but from her own awareness as well.
‘As I’ve just said,’ he repeated, ‘both of us are too intelligent to pretend it isn’t happening, and too adult not to acknowledge the danger.
‘Promiscuity and sexual greed are not labels I want to hang round my neck…’
‘Meaning that you think I do?’ Livvy challenged.
Suddenly she was furiously angry, and not just with him but with herself as well. Surely she had the strength of character to recognise how pointless and self-destructive it would be to get any further involved with him?
How much further involved could she be, though? Loving him…
She wasn’t going to think about that now. She was going to concentrate instead on denying what he had just said.
‘After all, we both know your opinion of me, don’t we?’ she demanded bitingly. ‘I’m surprised that you’re prepared to admit to wanting me. Wouldn’t it be more in character for you to blame me, to accuse me of trying to seduce you?’
‘I wish I could,’ he told her flatly. ‘At least that way…’
Livvy frowned. Why wasn’t he making use of the opportunity she had given him to underline his original condemnation of her? She wanted him to, she acknowledged fiercely, needed him to do so to help her reinforce the wall she was trying to erect between her feelings and what she knew to be reality. The more he showed himself to her as a man it ought to be impossible for her to love, surely the easier it would be for her to get over her ridiculous feelings for him?