by Julia James
But she must not feel emotion. It was forbidden to her. Forbidden absolutely.
So she went on rhythmically squeezing and dipping, squeezing and dipping.
The sound of the key in the lock made her freeze.
Then she jerked around. The kitchen area of the studio flat was separated from the living/sleeping area by a half-wall that was designed as a breakfast bar, with cupboards underneath for compact storage. An archway to the right of it shielded the front door via a tiny coat lobby.
‘Jem?’
Her voice was sharp. He was the only person to have a key both to the block of flats and her own studio.
There was no answer, so she hurriedly, panicking, seized an unwashed garment and hastily mopped the suds from her hands with it. Then she seized a kitchen knife from the knife-block by the toaster. She turned around, heart pounding with fear.
Shock and disbelief blasted through her. The knife dropped from her hand, her fingers suddenly nerveless.
Theo stood in the archway.
He tossed the keys onto the breakfast bar.
‘Jem lent them to me,’ he said.
Faintness washed over her.
‘Jem?’ Her voice was weak. Uncomprehending.
‘He came to see me,’ Theo said conversationally. His voice sounded normal, its familiar deep, faintly accented tones no different from what they had always been in the days when he had spoken to her in such a conversational manner.
But his eyes held the dark glitter that had been in them the last time she had seen him.
Her heart started to pound. Not with the panicked fear of a burglar that she had first felt. With a familiar, heavy pounding that she was very, very used to.
Which was impossible. Because what Theo had just said to her was impossible.
‘Jem’s in Devon,’ she said.
‘Wrong,’ said Theo. ‘He’s in Athens. He arrived this evening. We had a very interesting conversation. A very…enlightening…one.’
His eyes were holding hers, holding them with the power of that dark glitter. He stood still, very still, paused in the archway. Vicky’s eyes went over him. He was wearing evening dress. It seemed an odd thing for him to be wearing in the circumstances.
But then the circumstances were…unbelievable.
She tried to get her head around them, fixing on the thing that was least unbelievable.
‘You were in Athens this evening?’ She frowned. But he was here, now, in London.
‘Then I flew here,’ said Theo. ‘You see,’ he went on, and something altered in his voice, something that slid along her nerves like acid, ‘enlightening as my conversation was, earlier on this evening, it failed to answer all the questions arising therefrom. There are so many questions, but they all have one expression.’
He paused. His eyes glittered with that strange, terrifying darkness.
‘Why?’ he said softly. ‘Why?’
He moved suddenly, and Vicky jumped. But he did not approach her. Instead he walked across to the armchair by the window and sat down. He crossed his long legs, resting his hands on the arms of the chair.
‘Start talking,’ he said. ‘And don’t,’ he instructed, in the same voice that raised hairs on the back of her neck, ‘leave anything out.’
The world was splintering around her. Breaking up into tiny shards, each one so sharp it was cutting her to ribbons. Slowly she reached for a tea towel, dried her hands properly. Then she bent to pick up the knife from where it lay on the floor, wiping it with the tea towel and replacing it in the knife-block. Finally she reached to switch off the radio.
‘Can this be death?’ asked the soprano with tearing beauty.
But death came in many guises. This was one of them.
She walked to the breakfast bar. She needed its support. Her legs had jellied. Shock—that was what it was. Shock was having a physical effect on her that was too great to bear.
‘Talk, Vicky.’
She opened her mouth, but no words came. Then, with a rasping breath, she said, ‘I don’t understand. Why did Jem go to Athens?’
There was a flicker in the dark, glittering eyes.
‘He wanted what you wanted, Vicky. He wanted your money.’ His voice changed. ‘He seemed to think that I was withholding it unreasonably.’ The eyes glittered again. ‘He was quite aggressive about it. Which was curious, really, because, you see—’ the glitter intensified ‘—I only let him into my house on the grounds that I was going to personally beat him to a pulp…’
He paused. ‘It was as well, was it not, therefore, that he spoke first? After all—’ his voice was a blade, sliding between her ribs ‘—what possible cause could I have to beat your brother to a pulp?’
‘He’s my stepbrother.’ Her voice was blank. As blank as the inside of her skull. ‘My stepfather Geoff’s son from his first marriage. We were at primary school together. That’s how Geoff met my mother after his divorce—through my friendship with his son.’
Something flashed in Theo’s face. A fury so deep that it should have slain her.
‘Why? Why did you let me think he was your lover?’
She looked at him.
‘Because it ended our marriage and I wanted out.’
Her voice was calm, so very calm. What else could she be? The inside of her head was blank—quite, quite blank.
At her answer she saw his hands bite over the arms of the chair. ‘A simple “I want a divorce” would have sufficed.’ The scorn in his voice gutted her.
She couldn’t answer. It was impossible. Impossible to say it. To anyone.
It was her own terrible, shameful secret.
No one could know. No one in the world. Not Jem, or her uncle, or her mother. No one.
She watched Theo’s mouth thin into a tight, whipped line. His eyes were like spears touching her skin, ready to indent into the flesh beneath.
‘Your brother is unhappy. He feels—besmirched. Slandered.’
‘He was never supposed to know. He shouldn’t have gone to Athens. He should have gone to Devon, like he said. I told him you wouldn’t give me the money. I told him.’ Her voice was still calm.
He mirrored it back. ‘But you omitted the little detail of why.’
Her eyes flickered. ‘It wasn’t relevant.’
The tightening of his hands over the arms of the chair came again.
‘Nor relevant to your uncle, either, I presume?
‘No.’
‘Nor, of course—’ his voice was very calm now, his eyes resting on her, the glitter gone, quite expressionless ‘—to me.’
She gave a little shake of her head.
‘No,’ she said.
There was silence. Only the sound of traffic in the street below. And the thudding of her heart, beat by beat by beat.
‘Yet you wanted, that money very badly,’ he said. ‘So badly, you made a whore out of yourself.’
She met his eyes. ‘No. Whores get paid. The money was not for me. I expect Jem has told you that.’
‘Yes. He was quite discursive on the subject. You may be glad to know, if you consider it in the slightest relevant, that I have handed him a cheque that will cover the entire restoration and refurbishment costs, plus running costs for five years.’
‘That’s very good of you.’ Her voice was hollow.
‘If you had told me what you wanted the money for I would have given it to your stepbrother. And if you had told me he was your stepbrother, not your lover, I would not have thought you an adulterous slut.’
His voice was still conversational. It sliced through her like a surgeon’s blade.
‘So why did you?’ he asked. ‘Let me think you an adulterous slut? Because you did so quite deliberately. You had so many opportunities to put me straight…’
The glitter was in his eyes again.
‘You didn’t take one of them. Why?’ The softness of his voice eviscerated her, as once his fury had done.
She had thought his fury unbearable. She had been
wrong.
His dark, glittering eyes rested on her across the small space of her studio.
‘Vicky, I have flown fifteen hundred miles. It’s four in the morning for me. I scrambled my pilot when he was having dinner with his wife. So you will give me answers. Believe me, you will give me answers.’
His eyes were slicing through her. Inch by inch.
‘Why did you let me think you were a faithless bitch?’
Her fingers were pressing onto the tiled surface of the breakfast bar. Pressing so hard that at any moment, any moment now, they must surely snap.
‘I told you—I wanted out of our marriage. And it worked, didn’t it?’
‘You slandered yourself and your stepbrother, you shamed your uncle. Or wasn’t that relevant?’
‘No.’ None of that had been relevant.
‘So what was, Vicky?’
She couldn’t answer. She could never answer. Silence bound her for ever. Bound her to her terrible, shameful secret.
‘I’ve had a long time to think about this, Vicky. If you won’t give answers, I will.’ He stood up. The movement made her jerk.
He was starting to come towards her. Tall and lean and dark. And terrifying. Her eyes distended. Flaring with terror.
The unfastened jacket of his tuxedo swung, revealing the muscled narrowness of his waist, the whipped leanness of his hips.
She could feel his power. She had always felt it.
And it had always, always terrified her. Time dissolved away and she saw him again, turning to be introduced to her, those dark eyes looking down at her so impassively. She had felt his power then.
She felt it now.
Desperately she clawed her hands over the surface of the breakfast bar.
‘Stay back, Theo—’
The words broke from her.
‘Answers, Vicky.’
He stood there, on the far side of the bar, a foot away from her. So close. Terrifyingly, terrifyingly close.
‘Tell me why you let me think you had a lover. Tell me—’
His voice impelled her. His gaze compelled her.
Terror consumed her. Terror and desperation.
She threw back her head.
‘Why do you think, Theo? You’d just had sex with me!’
There was scorn in her voice, forcibly injected under an intensity of pressure. Her fingertips were still pressing into the tiles, the veins on the backs of her hands standing out like ropes.
‘Sex with the only woman you were going to allow yourself so you didn’t have to be celibate while married to Aristides Fournatos’s niece! So don’t damn well stand there and look for answers—because that’s the reason! I met Jem at the airport because I picked up a text message on my mobile from him, saying he was Athens. I was so upset over…what had happened on the island…I just had to get away. We went sightseeing and talked about the house he was sent to inherit, how it would be brilliant for a youth centre, only we would need a lot of money to do it up. He asked me if I could line up the funds out of what you’d promised to release to me when our marriage ended. The time away from you had me realise that I had to get away from you—permanently. So when you threw those vile photos in my face I grabbed at the chance to make it the reason for ending our marriage immediately. And it worked, didn’t it? Didn’t it? You couldn’t wait to lay into me—to slash me to pieces! And then throw me out like garbage!’
She fell silent, finishing on a harsh, indrawn breath, her eyes spitting at him.
He was standing very still. A nerve was ticking in his cheek.
His voice was controlled. Very controlled. ‘When you came to the penthouse you accused me of adultery myself. All through our marriage you assumed I was sleeping with other women. Was that why you let me think you had a lover, too? To get even with me?’
‘It was to get away from you! What the hell does it matter whether you were carrying on with other women or using me as some kind of bloody sexual relief?’
His eyes were resting on her. ‘You’re right, it doesn’t matter. Because neither is true. But what does matter…’ his voice was conversational again, but the nerve was still ticking at his cheek in his stark, expressionless face ‘…is why you thought either was true—and why that upset you.’
‘I wasn’t upset—I was angry! Angry at being used like that!’
‘But I didn’t use you in that repellent way. Nor did I commit adultery with any other women during our marriage. So now you don’t need to be angry any more, do you?’
Her face contorted. ‘How the hell can you say that?’ she demanded viciously. ‘After the way you treated me—forcing me to have sex with you for the money, saying what you said to me!’
He gave a shrug, his eyes never leaving her. ‘I behaved like that to you because I thought you had taken a lover, that you still had a lover, and yet were prepared to have sex just to get the money you thought you were entitled to. All you had to do to stop me behaving like that was tell me the truth. But you didn’t, did you? You let me go on thinking that about you even when it was no longer necessary. So why, Vicky? Why did you do that?’
He had cut the ground from her feet. She felt herself falling—falling down into the bottomless pit that waited to consume her.
But she mustn’t fall. She must fight. Fight with all the weapons she could.
There was only one problem—she had no weapons left. No words. Only a terrible, gaping hollow of horror opening up inside her. She stared at him, wordless, defenceless.
His eyes were moving over her face. The nerve at his cheek had stopped. His voice, when he spoke, had changed.
‘Tell me something, Vicky. If I do this now, will you be angry?’
His hand reached to her. Thumb moving across her lips.
‘Does that make you angry, Vicky? What about this? Does this make you angry?’
The backs of his fingers drifted over her cheek, then turned to stroke with soft, searching movements over the delicate flesh of her ear, spearing gently, so gently, into her hair.
‘What about this, then? Do you feel angry when I do this to you?’
His fingers closed around her nape. Drew, with ineluctable pressure, her face towards him, as with slow, aching descent his mouth moved down to hers.
His kiss was velvet, his lips as soft as silk, his touch as smooth as satin.
He lifted his head away from her.
‘Angry, Vicky?’ he asked softly, so very, very softly.
Her body was boneless. Her palms collapsed against the cool surface of the tiles. She looked into his eyes. Deep, fathomless. Eyes to drown in.
His face swam before her. On the surface of the breakfast bar a single tear splashed like a diamond.
‘Theo, please—don’t do this to me. Please.’ Her voice was a whisper. ‘Please.’
Another tear splashed.
He was looking at her. She could not see him. He was out of focus. Tears were spilling from her eyes.
‘Please don’t do this to me. Please.’
Greek broke from him. She did not know what it meant, but she heard the shock in his voice. The disbelief.
She knew why. She wanted to die. Fall through the earth into that bottomless pit beneath her, the one that swallowed up all those like her. The fools of the world.
She stared at him through the tears blurring her vision.
‘Please go, Theo. Please. Just go. Just go.’
She felt her body slacken, felt herself grope for the high stool and heave herself onto it before she collapsed. Her head bowed. Tears were streaming down her cheeks.
‘Vicky! Cristos! Vicky!’
He had come around the edge of the bar, his arms enfolded her. For one brief, anguished moment she let herself cling to him. Then she drew away. Dragged herself from him.
‘Is this answer enough for you, Theo? Is it? Is it? Are you happy now? Have you got what you wanted? Just like you got what you wanted from me when you hunted me down? Got me into your bed! And you’re right—so bloody
, bloody right! What does it matter whether you used me or not? It was all the same to you in the end! Sexual relief or sexual ego! What did it matter? What did it matter? It was all the same to you and—oh, God—it didn’t make any difference to me! How could it? How could it? You made a fool of me either way! A stupid, idiotic fool!’
A laugh broke from her. High and humourless.
‘Did you read me wrong, Theo? Did you think I was like all those other women, falling over themselves to tell me they’d had affairs with you, or wanted one, or wanted another one? That I’d just be like them? Enjoy the physical pleasures you had to offer, be chic and sophisticated and blasé about the whole thing like them? Well, I couldn’t! And I knew I couldn’t! I went into that marriage never thinking for a single instant that you’d take that line! I never for a moment dreamt you’d think anything else! Our marriage was a sham, just for show—of course you would go on having your normal sex life! When you turned on me I didn’t know what to do! I tried to stonewall you—tried so damn, damn hard. But you wouldn’t lay off! You kept right on coming. And I tried to stop you—I tried and I tried. And it was the same when you pulled that devil’s deal on me! Making me go back to you if I wanted my money for Jem’s project! Do you know why I went along with that—do you?’
She glared at him, her face contorted through the tears still running down her cheeks.
‘Do you think I did it for the damn money? Well, I didn’t!
I wanted the money for Jem, but that wasn’t the reason I did what you wanted me to do! I did it to show myself—to show you!—that I could be just like all those bloody other women! I could have totally meaningless sex with you—the only kind you like! The only kind you want! I did it so I could make myself immune to you. To make myself hate you, big-time! And, my God, it should have worked! After everything you did to me, said to me, and that very last nightmare time of all—my God, I should have hated you! You were so vile to me, and horrible, and…and…’
She couldn’t go on. Couldn’t do anything. She had told her terrible, shaming secret, the one she shouldn’t tell anyone—anyone at all. And she had told it to the very worst person in the world to tell.
‘I should have been immune to you,’ she whispered.