by Penny Jordan
‘I didn’t want you to see me cry,’ she had told him when he had stopped the car and taken her in his arms. ‘It hurts so much.’
‘The last thing I want to do is hurt you,’ Silas had told her and meant it.
In her sleep Verity was reliving the events of the final summer of her relationship with Silas. After the two days they had spent together, New York had seemed even more lonely than ever. The work she had been doing with her uncle’s old friend had been mentally and physically demanding and yet, at the same time somehow, very unsatisfying. She hadn’t got the heart for it, Verity had acknowledged. Her heart had been given to Silas. Just how empty her life had been without him had been brought home to her during the two days they had spent together. Then, she had felt alive, whole, complete…When he had gone…It had been less than a week since he had flown home, having begged her to tell her uncle that she had changed her mind and that her future now lay with Silas.
‘I can’t do it,’ she protested.
‘It’s business, Verity,’ Silas argued, ‘that’s all. We’re human beings with feelings, needs…I miss you and I want us to be together.’
‘I miss you too,’ Verity told him.
Initially she had been supposed to be spending four months in New York, but the original four had stretched to eight and then twelve, and every time she mentioned coming home her uncle procrastinated and said that, according to his friend, there was a great deal she still had to learn.
Sometimes the temptation to tell him that she simply couldn’t do what he wanted her to do was so strong that she almost gave in to it, and then she would remember how he had taken her in.
Although it had never been discussed between them, Verity had the feeling that her uncle blamed her for her father’s death. He and her mother had been on their way to collect her from a birthday party she had insisted on going to when they had been involved in the fatal accident which had killed them both, and she felt as though, in taking his place, she was doing some kind of penance, making some kind of restitution.
She had tried to say as much to Silas but he always got so angry when they discussed her uncle that she had simply not been able to do so. And her uncle seemed to dislike and resent Silas as much as Silas did him.
‘Have you any idea just how wealthy you are going to be?’ he demanded of Verity when she begged him to allow her to return home. ‘You must be very careful, Verity,’ he warned her. ‘There are always going to be hungry and ambitious men out there who will try to convince you that they love you. Don’t listen to them.’
‘Silas isn’t like that,’ she protested defensively.
‘Isn’t he?’ her uncle countered grimly. ‘Well, he is certainly a young man with an awful lot of debts—far too many to be able to support a wife.’
‘Come home,’ Silas begged her.
But she said, ‘No…not until I have fulfilled my debt to my uncle.’
Shortly after Silas returned to England, the murder of one of her fellow tenants in the block where she rented an apartment resulted in her uncle insisting that she moved to a safer address.
Verity tried to telephone Silas to tell him that she was moving but, when she wasn’t able to get any reply either from Silas’ home telephone or the garden centre, she had to ask her uncle to pass on to him her new address and telephone number.
She knew from what Silas had told her during his visit that he had several new commissions and was working virtually eighteen hours a day, which explained why she was unable to get hold of him.
A month later when she had still not heard from him she finally made herself acknowledge the truth. She loved him and missed him—dreadfully. He was the most important thing, the most important person in her life, and even though it meant disappointing her uncle she knew that it was impossible for her to go on denying her feelings, her love, any longer. She wanted to go home.
She rang her uncle, who assured her that he had passed on to Silas her new address and telephone number.
Silas was angry and upset with her, Verity acknowledged. It had taken a lot for him to beg her to come home as he had done and, no doubt, she had hurt his pride when she had been unable to say yes.
She knew how little he had been able to afford either the time or the money for his spur-of-the-moment flying visit to her, and she wished she had been able to tell him then how much she was missing him and how much she wished she could be with him.
When another two months passed without him getting in touch with her, she finally acknowledged the truth. She had lost weight; she couldn’t sleep; she thought about him night and day; she ached so badly for him that the pain of missing him was with her all the time. She loved him so much that, even if it meant letting her uncle down, she knew that it was impossible for her to go on denying her feelings. There must surely be a way that she could be with Silas and do as her uncle wished, a way she did not have to choose between them, but if there wasn’t…
If there wasn’t, then she had made up her mind, selfish though it might be: being with Silas was more important to her than pleasing her uncle. She wanted to go home; she wanted to be with Silas; she wanted to be held in his arms close to his heart; she wanted to hear him telling her in that gruff, sexy voice he used after they had made love that he loved her and needed her and that he would never ever let her go. She wanted to hear him telling her how much he wanted her to be his wife, how much he wanted them to spend their lives together.
Reliving the times they had had together over and over again in the empty loneliness of her apartment was no substitute for the reality of being with him.
Without giving herself time to change her mind, she booked herself on the first available flight home, without telling anyone what she was doing. She wanted to surprise Silas, to see the look in his eyes when she walked into his arms, to show him that he meant more to her than anything else, than anyone else, in the world.
Confronting her uncle wasn’t going to be easy, she knew that. She was twenty-two, old enough to know her own mind and to make her own decisions.
She bought a copy of the local newspaper whilst she waited for a taxi to take her from the station to the garden centre. Without that, without seeing that small, bare announcement of Silas’ marriage to another woman, she wouldn’t have known, would have walked into a situation for which she was totally unprepared.
The taxi driver, seeing her white face, was concerned enough to ask her if she was ill.
Verity looked at him blankly, her gaze returning to the newsprint in front of her. Silas was married. How could that be possible? He had been going to marry her. Was she suffering from some kind of madness, some kind of delusion? Was it all just a bad dream? How could Silas be married to someone else? There must have been a mistake, and yet she knew that there was no mistake, just as she now knew the reason for his silence during these last long weeks.
The pain was like nothing she had ever imagined experiencing: a tearing, wrenching, soul-destroying agony that made her want to scream and howl and tear at herself and her clothes, to ease a grief she could neither control nor contain.
She made the taxi driver take her back to the station. En route to Heathrow and a transatlantic flight back to New York she couldn’t understand why, despite the heat of the day, her fingers and toes felt as cold as ice, so cold that they hurt, her movements those of a very, very old woman.
Back in New York she applied herself to her work with a grim concentration, throwing up a barrier around herself that she would allow no one to pass through.
Silas hadn’t loved her at all. Silas had lied to her. Her uncle was right. From now on she was going to devote herself to the business. What else, after all, was there for her?
Fresh tears rolled down Verity’s face—the tears she had never allowed herself to cry during the reality of her heartbreak at losing Silas but which now, reliving those days in her sleep, she had no power to suppress.
Silas. Not even in the privacy of her apartment had she allowed
herself the weakness of whispering his name, of reliving all the times they had shared together.
‘Silas…’
As he heard her say his name Silas closed his eyes. It hurt him to hear the emotion in her voice and to see the evidence of the distress on her damp face.
Very gently he reached out and touched her wet cheek. Her skin felt cool beneath his fingertips, her eyelashes ridiculously long as they fanned darkly on her cheek. She was lying half on and half off the pillow and automatically he slid his hand beneath the nape of her neck intending to make her more comfortable, just as he often did for Honor. But Verity wasn’t Honor, a child…his child…She was a woman…his woman…
The shudder that galvanised his body was its own warning but it was a warning that came far too late. He stiffened as Verity suddenly opened her eyes.
‘Silas…’
The husky wonderment in her voice held him spellbound.
‘Silas.’
She said his name again, breathing it as unsteadily as an uncertain swimmer gulping air. As she struggled to sit up, the duvet slid further from her body, leaving it clothed only in the soft silver moonlight coming in through the window.
Silas caught his breath. In her early twenties she had had the body of a girl, slender and gently curved, only hinting at what it would be in maturity, but now she was fully a woman, her curves were so richly sensuous that he had to close his eyes to stop himself from reaching out to touch her just to make sure that she was real. He could feel the beads of sweat beginning to pearl his skin as he was flooded with hungry desire for her.
Even though he had looked away immediately, every detail of her was already imprinted on his eyeballs and his emotions. His hands ached to cup the ripe softness of her breasts, to stroke the taut warmth of her belly, to cover the feminine crispness of her pubic curls, to…
The power of his reaction to her, not just sexually but emotionally as well, shocked him into immobility.
‘Silas…’
Reluctantly he opened his eyes as she whispered his name. Her mouth looked soft and warm, her eyes confused and unhappy. He lifted his hand to touch her hair and let it slide silkily through his fingers, his body shuddering as he started to release her.
Verity watched wide-eyed, still caught up in the intensity of her dream, her glance following Silas’ every movement. Pleadingly she raised her hand to touch the side of his face, her palm flat against his jaw where she could feel his beard prickling her skin.
Silas closed his eyes as he moaned her name, a tortured, haunted sound of denial, but Verity was too lost in what she was doing to respond to it. Her fingertips trembled as she pressed them against his mouth, exploring its familiar shape, feeling them move as he mouthed her name. Instinctively she slipped them between his lips.
Immediately her nipples hardened, the muscles in her belly and thighs tautening as she shook with the force of what she was feeling.
Helplessly Silas opened his mouth, his tongue tip caressing the smooth warmth of her fingertips. He could see as well as feel her whole body trembling in reaction to his caress. Holding her arm, he sucked slowly on her fingers.
Beneath her breath Verity made a small, familiar keening noise as she lifted her other hand to his face, stroking him with frantic little movements, far more sensual and exciting for all their lack of open sexuality than a more calculatedly sexual caress could ever have been.
His self-control breaking, Silas caught hold of her hands, bearing her back against the softness of the pillow, his hands now cupping her face as he started to kiss her, opening her mouth with his lips, his tongue, feeding rather than satisfying his hunger for her with passionate, deeply intimate kisses.
As she opened her mouth to him, Verity caught back a small sob of relief. It had been so awful, dreaming that she had lost Silas, but here he was, with her, holding her, loving her, showing her that she was safe.
The smell of him, the sight of him, the feel of him, totally overwhelmed her starved senses, her body, so sensitive to him that her breasts were aching for his touch even before she felt his hands reaching out to cup them. Eagerly she moved to accommodate and help him, shivering in mute pleasure as she felt the hard familiarity of his palms against the taut peaks of her nipples.
Beneath his robe he was naked and it was heaven to have the luxury of sliding her hands up over his shoulders and down his back, to feel the solid male warmth of his skin, his body beneath her hands, to have the longed-for male reality of his flesh against her own, to feel that she was totally and completely surrounded and protected by him.
‘Silas.’ As she said his name she moved beneath him, silently inviting him to increase the intimacy between them.
As he felt her lifting her body towards his Silas groaned. He could feel her trembling as he touched her and he knew that he was shaking just as much. There hadn’t been this much sexual tension between them even the first time they had made love. It felt as though their bodies were waiting to explode, to meld, to come together so completely that they could never be parted again.
She felt so good, so right…so…so Verity. He wanted to touch her, kiss her, possess her so completely that she would never be able to leave him again.
His hand touched her stomach and she rose up eagerly against him. He bent his mouth towards her breast, holding his breath as he started to lick delicately at her nipple, half afraid he might accidentally hurt her as he forced himself to go slowly, but Verity seemed to have no such inhibitions, her hand going to the back of his head as she pulled him closer to her body so that his mouth opened fully over her damp nipple.
Shuddering, he drew it deeply into his mouth and started to suck rhythmically on her. Beneath his hand he could feel the flesh of her belly grow hot and damp. Her face was flushed with desire, her body trembling as she made small, pleading cries deep in her throat.
Wordlessly he parted her thighs. The room was light enough for him to be able to see her naked body, and her sex. He could remember how shy she had been the first time he had whispered to her how much he wanted to see her, to look at her. But she had still let him and he could still remember the sense of awe and love he had felt, knowing just how much she trusted him.
He could see that same trust in her eyes now and, even though he knew he was deluding himself, it was almost as though there had never been anyone else for her but him, as though her body had never known any other lover, as though it had memories of only him, his touch, his need, his love.
Sombrely he parted her soft outer lips, exposing the secret kernel of her sex. His heart was thudding frantically fast, his own body stiff with arousal and need. He could see her looking at him, silent and wide-eyed as she reached out to caress him with her fingertips.
Very gently he touched her, coaxing, caressing.
Verity gave a low, aching groan, her hand tightening around him. She could feel her body responding to him, aching for him. It had been without him for so long that it needed no preliminaries, hungry and eager now for the longed-for feel of him within it.
‘I want you, Silas,’ she told him jerkily. ‘I need you…now…Oh, yes, now…’ she whispered frantically. ‘Now. Now…now…’
The rhythm of their lovemaking was fast and intense, their shared climax a juddering, explosive catalyst of release that left them both trembling as Silas held Verity in his arms.
‘Stay with me,’ Verity whispered to him as her exhausted body slid into sleep. ‘Don’t leave me, Silas. Please don’t leave me…Not this time…’
As she slept Silas looked down into her face. She was a woman now, a woman with a woman’s needs, a woman’s sexuality. If she hadn’t loved him enough to put their love first before, she was hardly likely to do so now. She might want him sexually, she might even stay for a while, but it wasn’t just his own emotions she was likely to hurt this time, his own heart she could easily break. There was Honor to consider as well.
‘Stay with me,’ she had begged him. But she was the one who had left him
. She was the one who had refused to stay.
Very slowly he eased himself away from her, picking up his discarded robe as he looked down at her.
‘Stay with me,’ she had said. As he bent and kissed her cheek a single tear rolled down her face, but it wasn’t one of her own.
Clenching his jaw, Silas walked towards the door, closing it quietly behind him without daring to look back.
CHAPTER NINE
VERITY surfaced slowly from the deepest and most relaxing sleep she could remember having in a long time. She stretched luxuriously, a womanly knowing smile curling her mouth. Her body felt deliciously, blissfully satisfied. Even her skin where the sunlight shone warmly on her exposed arm on top of the duvet seemed to have a silken, sensuous shimmer to it. She closed her eyes and made a purring sound of female happiness deep in her throat as she savoured the novelty of feeling so good. It was as if she had opened a present, spilling out from it a glowing, sparkling, magical gift of happiness and love. Mmm…Her eyes still closed, she rolled over and reached out for Silas.
Abruptly, Verity opened her eyes properly, her body tensing as her hand rested on the cold empty space on the other half of the bed. Of course. She had known Silas wouldn’t be there in bed beside her—he had Honor to think of, after all—but the pristine smoothness of the unused pillow next to her own suggested that he had left her on her own as speedily as he could, not even pausing for a few moments to savour their closeness, and that hurt!
Her happiness and joy evaporated immediately.
Once before, he had left her like this and she had woken up alone. Then, he had returned carrying arms full of flowers and fresh bagels he had bought from a bakery in her New York neighbourhood.