by Anne Mather
‘You live with your father, don’t you?’ he remarked, glancing up at the lace-curtained windows, that looked old-fashioned among so many modernised exteriors. ‘Your mother’s dead, and you’ve got no brothers or sisters, am I right? And your father’s the curator at Harlings.’
Rachel, who had been about to get out, turned to stare at him with incredulous eyes. ‘How do you know?’
‘You forget, it’s my job to sift information,’ he retorted. And then, with less forcefulness: ‘I told you—I was interested.’
‘But why?’ Rachel gazed at him, and his lean mouth twisted.
‘Why not?’
‘But you don’t know me.’
‘Does it bother you? I’ll confess, I looked up your record.’
Rachel shook her head. ‘Why me?’
‘Aren’t you flattered?’
‘Not much.’ She made a helpless gesture. ‘I don’t understand, Mr Shard.’
He half turned in his seat towards her, drawing his knee up on to the seat and laying his arm along the back of hers. It was a warm evening, and he had shed his jacket, so that the lean tanned length of his arm was behind her, bare below the sleeve of his collarless sweat shirt. It was only a couple of inches from her neck, and she was very aware of it, just as she was aware of him, of his masculine scent, and the covering of fine body hair that disappeared below the opened neck of his shirt.
‘Perhaps that’s why,’ he said now, surveying her through narrowed eyes. ‘Because you’re—shy.’
‘Naïve, you mean.’
‘No, I don’t mean naïve.’
Rachel flushed. ‘You’re making fun of me again.’
‘I’ve never made fun of you,’ he retorted crisply.
‘Amusing yourself, then.’
‘No.’
Rachel drew a deep breath. ‘I suppose you know half the girls at LWTV think—well, they’d be very flattered.’
‘But not you.’
Rachel faltered. ‘Why did you pick me up? It wasn’t to make a date.’
‘Wasn’t it?’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Why not?’
She sighed. ‘You don’t make dates. At least, not with the girls at the station.’
Jaime’s eyes grew mocking. ‘How would you know that?’
Rachel bent her head, the heavy weight of her hair slipping forward, exposing the vulnerable curve of her nape. ‘I have to go, Mr Shard. My father will be home soon, and I have dinner to prepare.’
‘Have dinner with me,’ he offered carelessly, his brown eyes probingly intent. ‘After you’ve prepared your father’s dinner, of course.’
Rachel looped the right side of her hair behind her ear, and peered at him. ‘I—I don’t think so.’
‘Don’t you want to?’
Did she want to? Rachel remembered the struggle she had had to disguise how much. But she was very much afraid he was out of her league, and she suspected he would want more from her than just a simple goodnight kiss afterwards.
‘If you’re afraid I’m planning to rape you, forget it,’ he told her then, his tone hard and cynical. ‘I don’t go for that scene. Sex with a prudish little virgin isn’t really my line.’
‘Then why are you asking me?’ she demanded, her face flushed from his insult, and he swung round abruptly behind the wheel.
‘God knows!’ he declared, starting the engine. ‘Perhaps I’m a masochist! Go on, get out. I’m late for an appointment as it is.’
Rachel groped for the door handle, feeling utterly wretched. She had handled the whole affair so badly, and to add to her humiliation, she knew she was denying something fundamental to her happiness.
Biting her lips, she hesitated, her eyes on his hard set face. Then she said doubtfully: ‘Is—is the invitation still on?’
Jaime swore, and turned his head frustratedly. ‘Are you kidding?’
‘Is it?’
‘Damn you, I don’t know.’
‘Because, if it is, I accept,’ she got out breathily, struggling on to the pavement. ‘What—what time will you come back?’
* * *
Rachel got up from the dressing table and walked across to the window. That had been the start, of course. And she had been naïve, she thought impatiently. She had believed what she wanted to believe, and shut her ears to anyone’s advice but her own.
Her father’s voice had initially been the loudest, telling her she was a fool to get involved with a man like him, assuring her that no good could come from it, that a serious commitment was not what Jaime had in mind.
He had been right, of course, and in the beginning she had argued that she liked it that way. She and Jaime were good friends, that was all. He took her to dinner, and to the theatre, and occasionally to parties, when he was in London, and when he was away she felt free to make dates with other men.
It was a good relationship in those early months, and Kerry, and the other girls in the office, held her in some awe for having succeeded in dating the elusive Mr Shard. They were jealous, of course, and occasionally someone would make some malicious remark about what Jaime did while he was away and with whom he spent his time on those nights Rachel didn’t see him. But, generally, she told herself she was happy with the way things were, and gradually her father’s protests died down.
She supposed it was about a year after they first started dating that the situation between them changed dramatically.
Her father had a mild heart attack, and was taken into hospital for a few days’ observation. Rachel discovered that one of the doctors who was treating her father was the brother of a boy she used to go to school with, and when he offered to drive her home after visiting her father, she invited him in for a cup of coffee.
Jaime was away, on an assignment in Japan, and she knew he wasn’t expected back for another three days, and she was astonished when the doorbell rang while she and Dr Fowles were drinking their coffee.
It was Jaime, unshaven and haggard-eyed, after the long flight from Tokyo, and after bestowing the usual almost-brotherly kiss on her cheek, he told her he had come straight from the airport.
‘It was a lousy trip, and I wanted to see you,’ he said simply, then stiffened abruptly as they entered the living room and found Roderick Fowles getting up from his chair.
What happened next Rachel chose to skim over, recalling Jaime’s insolence with a shiver of anticipation. He had been so rude, so totally lacking in the courtesy and respect she had grown used to expecting from him, and poor Roderick had made his escape as quickly as he decently could.
When they were alone, she had turned on Jaime with a furious sense of outrage. He was not her keeper, she told him. He knew she made dates with other men. And he had no right to behave as if he had exclusive rights to her company.
‘My father’s ill. Rod is one of the doctors looking after him. What do you imagine Daddy will think if Rod tells him how he was treated?’
‘I don’t give a damn what your father thinks,’ Jaime muttered ungraciously, loosening his tie and unfastening the top two buttons of his shirt. ‘I should imagine he’d react as I did, finding you entertaining a stranger alone in the house.’
‘I’m not a child, Jaime!’ Rachel retorted stiffly. ‘And if I choose to invite friends—men friends—into my home, I don’t have to get anyone’s permission!’
Jaime glared down at her angrily, his jaw working, as if he was endeavouring to control some violent emotion. ‘I don’t want you inviting any men to your home,’ he stated grimly. ‘I don’t even want you dating any other men! Hell, I’ve tried to play the game the way you want it, but it’s tearing me to pieces!’
Rachel moved her head disbelievingly. ‘Jaime?’ she breathed, putting out a hand towards him, then felt herself caught, and jerked close against him. For the first time she felt the burning heat of his mouth covering hers, and her head swam beneath the hungry passion of his kiss.
Until that moment her experiences of men had all been innocent. The nearest she had ever come to sex wa
s in allowing a boy during her secretarial college days to stroke her breasts, and that only through the layers of her clothing. She had not liked it. She had resented his proprietorial touch on her body, and since then, none of the young men she had dated had been allowed such liberties.
With Jaime it was different. It was as if she had been waiting for him to hold her, to touch her, to treat her body as his own possession. She had been wearing a shirt, she remembered, fastened through to the waist, and Jaime had disposed of the buttons urgently and exposed her rounded breasts to his view. Those hard brown hands had caressed her jealously, while his tongue played havoc with her senses. Whatever kind of life he had led, he was certainly knowledgeable of the way to arouse her, and her knees buckled weakly as he sought her mouth again.
‘I think you’d better go make some more coffee,’ he muttered at last, pushing her away from him, and she drew back half in protest, drawing the sides of her shirt about her. Jaime shed his jacket on to the couch and raked unsteady fingers through his hair. He turned away to pick up his briefcase, evidently trying to get himself in control, and for what happened afterwards Rachel could only blame herself.
He straightened after dropping the briefcase beside his jacket, putting his hands into his pockets as if searching for his key. As he did so, Rachel crossed the space between them, sliding her arms around his waist from behind.
‘Thank you,’ she said, pressing herself against the hard expanse of his back, and felt the convulsive shudder that went through him.
‘Rachel,’ he said, and his voice was harsh with warning now. ‘Rachel, don’t do this. Don’t play with fire!’
‘And if I want to?’ she breathed, allowing her hands to slide down over his flat stomach to the thrusting muscles of his thighs. ‘Why shouldn’t I touch you? You wanted to touch me.’
‘Rachel, for God’s sake!’ He caught her hands and stilled their sensuous exploration, expelling his breath on a gulp. ‘Rachel, we’re alone here, and this is madness. Don’t do something you’re going to regret.’
‘Why should I regret it?’ she demanded, her voice half resentful. ‘Why shouldn’t I do as you do? I bet your other girls do.’
‘What other girls?’ he grated savagely, twisting round to face her. ‘There are no other—girls! And you—you’re different.’
‘A virgin, you mean?’ she choked. ‘Of course, you don’t like virgins. You told me that once. I’d forgotten.’
‘Don’t be so bloody stupid!’ he snapped, taking her by the shoulders and shaking her angrily. ‘I said you could trust me, and I haven’t done anything to betray that. But God knows, I’m only human and I do want you, those inquisitive fingers of yours must have discovered how much!’
Rachel’s lips quivered. ‘Oh, Jaime!’ she breathed, tugging his shirt apart, and pressing herself against the fine dark hair on his chest. ‘I’m so glad you came home so unexpectedly. I thought I just didn’t turn you on…’
Of course, he did not return to his apartment that night, nor in fact for any of the nights that her father spent in hospital. Indeed, it was difficult to get him out of bed in the mornings, and being late for work became almost a daily hazard.
Looking back on it now, Rachel knew she had never been happier than when she and Jaime were together. They were good together, both in bed and out of it, and when her father returned from hospital she began to spend nights at his apartment.
Eventually one of their neighbours thought it her duty to tell Rachel’s father that a green Ferrari had been parked outside his door during the nights while he was in hospital. She just thought Mr Williams ought to know what was going on, she said, and Rachel’s father had thanked her, before confronting his daughter with the gossip.
‘I thought you said you were only good friends,’ he accused her tautly. ‘Rachel, don’t let him use you like this. It’s for your own good I’m telling you.’
Naturally, Rachel didn’t believe him. She was too much in love with Jaime to listen to any criticism about him, and the weeks when he was out of the country dragged by on leaden feet. When he first took her north to meet his parents, she had been in seventh heaven, convinced he intended to marry her, and even indifferent to the implications of overhearing another woman’s name mentioned in protest by his mother. It was the first time she heard of Betsy, and her stomach contracted now in memory of what that name came to mean to her.
Her father was taken ill again, and spent three months in a nursing home. Jaime was sweet to her, taking her to visit him every day, arranging for her father to have a private room and colour television, and anything else he required. Mr Williams had protested that he didn’t want anything from a man like Jaime Shard, but Rachel knew that he secretly enjoyed his privileges, and began to look forward to the games of chess that Jaime instigated.
When her father was well enough to come home, Jaime arranged for him to have a private nurse, and then took Rachel to Northumberland again. He said she needed the break, and she did. The worry over her father had drained her, but during the two weeks in August they spent with his family, she grew relaxed and strong again, blossoming daily in her love for Jaime. They were never apart. They could never get enough of one another. And if his parents suspected that Rachel did not sleep in her own room, they kept their opinions to themselves.
Of course, eventually, they had to go back, and almost immediately Jaime was sent abroad. He had succeeded in avoiding all overseas assignments during the summer, but now his work caught up with him, and Rachel had to content herself with taking care of her father.
Then, one afternoon in early October, Betsy came to see her.
She said she was Jaime’s wife, that she had been his wife for five years, and that she had come to Rachel in a last attempt to save her marriage.
Rachel was shaken, appalled, incredulous: and finally bitterly humiliated. No one, but no one, had ever mentioned that Jaime had been—or was—married. It had never been mentioned. Of course, she had heard the usual gossip, particularly the story that he was keeping a woman somewhere, but she had stopped believing it when she and Jaime became lovers. She would never have believed he had anyone else, would never have thought him capable of such duplicity. But now this woman, Betsy, was telling her that he owned a house in Buckinghamshire, near Aylesbury, in fact, and that he still lived with her there, when he could find the time.
All those occasions when he had supposedly been out of the country poured back into Rachel’s mind like a flood. How did she really know he had been out of the country as long as he said? He could easily have come back a few days earlier, as he had done from Japan, she remembered chillingly, and she felt physically sick as she faced his wife.
But there was worse to come. She was pregnant, Betsy said. With their first child. She had wanted a baby for so long, and now that it had happened she had discovered he had another woman. Another woman! Herself! Rachel blenched. No wonder Jaime had never spoken of marriage—to her!
She didn’t know how she got through that interview, or indeed, remember much of what Betsy looked like. She was small, she thought, blonde, and rather delicate-looking, with limpid blue eyes and rather wet lips, that she continually moistened. The things that really stuck in Rachel’s memory were the wedding ring on Betsy’s finger, and the legality of her marriage lines.
After she was gone, so many things fell into place in Rachel’s mind, not least Betsy’s name, which she had heard mentioned in an undertone at Clere Heights.
When Jaime arrived back from the Middle East, she at first refused to see him, but then, realising she could conceivably be doing him some terrible injustice, she agreed to speak with him.
She knew at once that he knew about Betsy’s visit, and that seemed to settle everything. The fact that he was still seeing his wife said it all, and she refused to listen when he tried to tell her that they were separated, and had been for the last three years. He did not deny that his wife lived in Buckinghamshire, he did not deny that he had never sued fo
r a divorce, and although he denied all knowledge of it, the fact remained that Betsy was pregnant.
It was the end. They both knew it. Rachel resigned her job at LWTV and took another one with a rival station, while Jaime was forced to go on with his commitments. He tried to telephone her several times, and when that didn’t work he wrote her letters. Although she wanted to send them back unopened, curiosity got the better of her, and through them she learned that Betsy had had a miscarriage. But she never replied, though she did keep in touch with his parents, and forgave them for their part in the deception.
Curiously enough, her own father took their break-up badly. After all the things he had said about Jaime in the past, he defended him when Rachel reviled him for his deceit. Things were not always what they seemed, he said, advising her not to be hasty, but the facts were there, and Rachel could not look beyond them.
She ran an unsteady hand over her hair now, gazing out over the frost-rimed lawns with unseeing eyes. She wondered where Betsy was now, what she was doing. Did she still live in the house near Aylesbury? Was she still his legal wife? And did Jaime ever stay there, as he had used to do in the past?
CHAPTER FIVE
RACHEL’S PALMS were moist as she turned away from the window, and needing to escape from the increasing desperation of her thoughts, she opened her door. The corridor outside was quiet. The family was still sleeping, she guessed, and closing her door behind her she went softly down the stairs.
The house was still quite chilly. The central heating system had not yet gained its full strength, and she hunched her shoulders against the cold as she opened the library door. Like the sitting room, there was usually an open fire in the library, and if Maisie was already about, which seemed likely, she had probably lit it by now.
Rachel stopped short at the sight that confronted her. Jaime was stretched out, asleep, on the leather sofa to one side of the empty grate, an open book spreadeagled on the rug beside him. She guessed he had been reading when he fell asleep, and as she automatically bent to pick it up she saw the empty bottle of Scotch that had rolled beneath the sofa.