by India Grey
‘I can’t imagine heaven exists at all,’ he said with quiet brutality. There was no such thing as eternal bliss. All joy was fleeting, and came at a price. He had allowed himself this wonderful, unexpected release. But now it was over, and it was time to retreat to the safety of his walls of ice and steel.
In the velvet darkness he felt her hand against his face and tensed against the tenderness in her touch.
‘Oh, Orlando, were you always so cynical?’
‘No.’
‘What happened? Was it Felix?’
He caught her hand, enclosing it in his, feeling the bones and sinews beneath the soft skin—feeling both her fragility and her incredible, surprising strength.
‘Maybe.’ The injustice that his brother’s life—a useful, courageous life—had been extinguished while he was left to struggle on endlessly in a worthless one. That had made him cynical. ‘There were other things too.’
‘Tell me,’ she breathed.
He dropped a kiss into her palm, curling her long fingers around it as if he were saying goodbye.
‘No.’ He got up in one lithe movement and reached for his clothes. ‘There’s nothing to tell. I lost something, that’s all. Something I took for granted. And now I miss it. All the bloody time.’
Especially now. Especially right this moment, when I would give anything to be able to see you…
He turned away and, suddenly aware of how cold it was, reached up onto the high marble mantelpiece to feel for a box of matches. The kindling in the fireplace caught straight away and he straightened up, watching the small, brave flicker of flame take hold of the darkness.
Behind him, Rachel sat up slowly, tucking her knees up in front of her and resting her chin on them. ‘You told me that it’s OK to be afraid—that it’s how you deal with it that counts.’
Orlando said nothing.
‘I think the same could be said of loss. You can’t change it. But you can deal with it.’
He gave a low, bitter laugh. ‘You think so?’
His coldness took her by surprise. Suddenly she was aware that she was naked, and she felt foolish and exposed. It was as if the closeness that they had just shared had never existed. The barriers had gone back up.
‘I’m sorry…I don’t know anything about it. I’m a pianist, not a psychologist,’ she muttered, getting up and looking around for her discarded nightdress.
He turned slowly round to face her, moonlight silvering his devastating, chilly face, firelight gilding his massive shoulders. Once again she was reminded of some gladiatorial warrior from mythology, and she wondered what had hurt him so badly. What—or whom.
‘Why didn’t you tell me you were a pianist before? I didn’t understand about your hands—I thought you were being vain.’
He heard her soft exhalation. ‘I don’t know…maybe I thought you’d know. Some people do, you know—recognise me. Carlos’s PR people did a huge poster campaign for my first CD.’
And in that instant, in a flash as bright, as dazzling as the glowing colours he’d seen earlier, he saw in his mind’s eye the girl in the picture that day outside Andrew Parkes’ office. Realisation hit him like the lash of a whip—sudden and shocking.
‘I’m a philistine,’ he said bluntly, turning back to the fire. ‘I hardly ever leave this place—I’m far too wrapped up in work. The last time I attended a musical recital was in the officers’ mess; it featured songs that I hope you’ve never heard, and it ended with the piano having petrol poured over it and being set alight.’
Rachel gasped. ‘No! Why?’
‘It’s an RAF tradition. It happens every year.’
‘But that’s terrible! How could you bear to do it?’
He looked into the flames. ‘It’s just a piano,’ he said simply, and the implications of his words seemed to drift and settle in the moonlit room.
‘You’re right. I forget. Sometimes I feel like it’s my only friend.’ She wrapped her arms tightly around herself and made an attempt at a laugh. ‘In fact, let’s face it, it is my only friend. I think it really hit me this afternoon, when I was all alone in that room, waiting to be taken to the church, that the only good relationship I’ve ever had in my life has been with the piano.’
Her loneliness was palpable. Orlando was struck by the irony: he had spent the last year brutally trying to shut out the outside world, while this girl was reaching out to it. He felt the ice around his frozen heart crack open a little.
‘What brought you here? To a tiny place in the middle of nowhere like Easton?’ He had to make an effort to keep the frustration out of his voice, but he needed to ask the question. Why had fate brought her here, to scrape the tender flesh off scars that were still healing, still hurting?
She sank back down onto the fur rug and pulled her knees up again, wrapping her arms protectively around them. ‘Carlos’s PR people found The Old Rectory, and thought it would be the perfect place for the wedding. Very English, very quietly grand—which all fitted in with the brand they created for me. They took out a six-month lease on it, but until the day before yesterday I’d never seen it. It could have been anywhere.’
The fire stretched long fingers of warmth into the room and painted her skin in peach and gold. Orlando had heard about the brain compensating for what the eye couldn’t see, but until now he had never experienced it, or believed it was possible. But in that instant he could picture vividly the sadness in her amber eyes, the gentle swell of her upper lip, her delicate chin.
She got up slowly and walked towards him, her head bent so that the firelight made her hair glow like vintage cognac. Standing beside him, she pressed a hand against his chest, over his heart.
‘I’m so glad it wasn’t anywhere else,’ she said with quiet ferocity. ‘I’m so glad it was here.’
He took a deep breath and very gently moved her hand, turning away to spare her from reading the truth on his face; the selfish, hateful truth that he wished she’d never come into his life and smashed up the fragments he’d been painstakingly piecing together again. But then his attention was suddenly drawn away from her to a movement beyond, in the clear periphery of his vision. He walked towards the window, where the piano stood bathed in blue light.
Behind him Rachel stood, washed in fire-gold and spilling out warmth and softness. In front of him was a featureless wasteland of white.
He felt his lips twitch into a smile of irony as the symbolism hit him.
‘It’s snowing.’
‘Oh…’ She came to stand beside him, staring out in wonder at the enchanted garden. Snow already lay like icing on the clipped box spheres, making them look like fat cupcakes, and it had turned the bare branches of the trees into elaborate confections of spun sugar which sparkled in the moonlight. It was like a scene from The Nutcracker ballet. ‘It’s lovely…you’re so lucky to live in such a gorgeous place…’
He smiled, and it was as cold and beautiful as the silvered winter garden in front of them. Goosebumps rose on her arms and a shiver rippled through her.
‘Let’s just say it’s rather wasted on me.’
He stooped to pick up her nightdress from where it had been thrown, down by the piano, and untangled it, holding it out ready to slip over her head. Obedient as a child, she raised her arms, suddenly feeling very, very tired.
‘What time is it?’
‘After three.’
She stifled a yawn as it suddenly occurred to her that he had still been dressed when he’d found her. ‘But you were still up…’
‘Working. And checking over the arrangements for tomorrow.’
‘What’s happening tomorrow?
He took her hand, pulling her gently towards the door. ‘The annual Easton Ball, to mark the end of the shooting season. It’s an old tradition.’
‘Oh, how lovely…’ Rachel’s drowsy mind was instantly filled with pictures of ladies in beautiful swirling dresses, men in black tie…Orlando in black tie…
Orlando gave a dry laugh. ‘Lovely?
No. I can assure you it’ll be like the seventh circle of hell. The estate still makes a large part of its revenue from pheasant shooting, mainly by organising shooting parties for groups from big corporations and finance houses in London, and they all come down here solely to prove how macho they are. Tomorrow night the house’ll be full of drunken City boys determined to down as much champagne as possible and impress everyone with their lord-of-the-manor credentials.’
‘And you have to organise this thing?’
They were out in the darkened hallway now. The snow had changed everything, making the shadows blue and giving the air a muffled sense of suspended time. Rachel faltered, flinching as her feet touched the ice-cold marble tiles, and in an instant Orlando had scooped her up into his arms and was carrying her towards the stairs. Her eyes were on a level with his. They were narrow, slanting, impenetrable.
‘Not really. I employ caterers and a party planner, and my extremely capable housekeeper does the rest.’
Above her, Winterton ancestors scowled down through the ages and through the darkness as they passed
‘It must be horrible to have your house overrun with strangers.’
‘It’s the first time I’ll have done it on my own.’ For two years Arabella had taken over the job, with obsessive attention to detail, and she had organised lavish themed occasions that had looked marvelous on the pages of Hello! but had intimidated the Easton locals deeply. ‘Last year it was cancelled because it was right after Felix’s death.’
Safe in his arms, Rachel let her head fall against his shoulder. She could feel the steady, soothing beat of his heart against her ribs and looked up, seeing the strong lines of his jaw, the sinuous column of his throat. Emotion she was too tired to analyse solidified in her chest.
‘It’ll be hard without him,’ she murmured.
‘Yes.’ Briefly he glanced down at her, and smiled. ‘Though the year before he caused an awful lot of trouble by disappearing upstairs with the wife of a hedge fund manager. I had to give the guy a crate of vintage port to keep the peace. At least I won’t have that to worry about this year.’
Rachel felt a small stab of surprise. ‘Really? I imagined Felix would be like you, but you must have been very different.’
‘No. We were as bad as each other. It’s just that as the oldest I always had the most to lose.’
They were at the top of the stairs now. No moonlight penetrated the courtyard beneath the windows, and the corridor was in deep shadow. Rachel’s head fell back onto Orlando’s chest. He stared straight ahead, trying not to think about how good she felt in his arms, how right.
Because it wasn’t right. It was impossible.
‘Don’t you ever turn the light on?’
‘I don’t need to. I’ve lived here all my life. I know my way around this house with my eyes closed.’
That, after all, was one of the reasons he’d come back.
In the bedroom he laid her on the bed and folded the covers over her, then stood back abruptly, his arms falling to his sides. Already they felt empty.
Turning to go, he had ruthlessly to suppress the masochistic part of his brain that was at that moment taunting him with thoughts of how it would feel to lie down beside her and hold her against him through the freezing hours of darkness, to wake up with his cheek against her hair and know that that red, vibrant, living blaze of colour would be the first thing he would see.
One night…just one night…
The agonising irony of the situation hit him like a punch in the ribs, momentarily winding him. He wanted her. He wanted her and the terrible thing was that having her just now had made him want her all the more.
How very optimistic of him to think that once would be enough.
But he’d had his chance to be open and he hadn’t taken it, and his punishment was knowing that everything that had just happened between them was based on a lie. He’d deceived her into thinking he was something and someone he could never be. The person she’d just made such glorious, abandoned love to was the old Orlando Winterton. The one who had died a year ago.
He had almost reached the door when she spoke.
‘Thank you.’ Her voice soft and heavy with sleep.
‘What for?’
‘For having me.’ He heard a breath of drowsy laughter which seemed to caress him in the dark. ‘Not like that. I mean, having me to stay. Although…’ There was a pause. ‘Actually…like that too…’ Her voice was slowing. She was almost asleep ‘It was the first…time…’
He froze, adrenaline and guilt and remorse hitting him like a tidal wave. ‘The first time?’ He crossed the room again, back to the bedside, where she lay perfectly still.
He reached out a hand, finding the velvet-soft skin of her cheek. ‘The first time, Rachel? You were a virgin?’
She stirred and exhaled—deeply, contentedly. ‘No. But…it was the first time…I’ve ever wanted it.’
CHAPTER SIX
RACHEL ran lightly down the wide staircase, running her fingers through her wildly sleep-tousled hair as she went. As she’d hurried along the corridor upstairs she’d seen that the courtyard at the centre of the house lay under a covering of white as thick and luxurious as the goosedown duvet which she had slept beneath last night.
And had, in the end, slept wonderfully well. It was as if Orlando had hushed the storm that had been raging inside her for as long as she could remember. She felt…liberated.
She had escaped from Carlos, and in the process she had discovered herself. Maybe she wasn’t the incompetent idiot it had always suited him and her mother to make her out to be. After all, he’d said she was frigid, and he’d certainly been wrong about that…
This particularly enticing train of thought was interrupted by the sudden shrill ring of a telephone, echoing through the silent house. Looking round, Rachel traced it to a table in the entrance hall, and hesitated, not knowing what to do. There was no sign of Orlando—but then might he be in his study and would pick it up there? She walked on a few steps, but the ringing continued in a way that seemed to Rachel to be getting increasingly urgent.
She turned and looked back at the phone nervously. She’d never had to answer the phone for anyone else before. In fact she’d hardly had any need to answer the phone at all…
Courage.
For goodness’ sake—it was a telephone, not an explosive device, she told herself disgustedly and seized the receiver.
‘Hello, Easton Hall?’ Pride suffused her at her new-found competence. ‘Can I help you?’
‘Ohh…?’ It was a woman’s voice, smoky, drawling, surprised. Rachel felt the confidence of a few moments ago evaporate. ‘That’s not Mrs Harper, is it?’
‘N-no.’ Rachel stammered. ‘Can I take a message?’
‘Well…’ said the woman, and the short word seemed to crackle with indignation—as if Rachel was personally responsible for Mrs Harper’s absence and had organised it on purpose. ‘Could I speak to Orlando, please?’
‘Oh…I’m sorry but I don’t think he’s here,’ Rachel said faintly. ‘I mean, I’ve only just got up and I haven’t seen—’
‘Got up?’ repeated the voice, in a tone of utter disbelief. ‘I see. In that case I do apologise.’ The woman gave an incredulous laugh. ‘I assumed you were one of Mrs Harper’s helpers…’
She left the sentence hanging, making Rachel feel compelled to rush into an explanation. ‘No—no, I’m just a friend…of…of Orlando’s…’
Rachel winced at the blatant cliché.
‘A friend?’
The woman’s voice was suddenly sharp with animosity, and Rachel held her breath, wondering whether she should just put the phone down now, before she incriminated herself even further. There was a long pause, but then the woman at the other end started speaking again, her voice suddenly syrupy with concern.
‘In that case, as you’re a friend of Orlando, I wonder if you could maybe just…tell me how he is?
Rachel swallowed, caught off-guard
by this change of tack. ‘He’s…fine.’
There was a small sigh. ‘I’m sorry. I know this must sound mad and you don’t know me, but I don’t know who else to ask. How is he really? I mean, as a friend? Does he seem miserable to you?’
Pieces of the jigsaw were flying into place with a speed that took Rachel’s breath away. And her foolish, naïve happiness along with it. Her throat suddenly felt very dry. ‘Yes,’ she croaked. ‘He seems miserable.’
‘Oh, God…what a mess,’ the woman said slowly. Her sexy, lightly accented voice was choked with emotion, and Rachel was ashamed of the strength of her hostility. She wanted to hurl the phone at the wall, as if that could somehow hurt the person at the other end. The person Orlando loved.
‘But thank you,’ continued the woman. ‘It helps to know he’s as unhappy as I am. It’s mad that we’re apart…you’ve told me all I’ve needed to hear to convince me to come back.’
‘I’ll tell him…’ Rachel just managed to mutter through numb lips.
‘No!’ The response was instantaneous, and surprisingly sharp. ‘No. Don’t tell him. Don’t say anything. I’d like to surprise him.’ She gave a breathy, intimate laugh that contained no trace of any unhappiness at all. Only triumph.
Nauseous, Rachel was just replacing the receiver with a shaking hand when the front door was flung open. Orlando stood in the doorway, his broad shoulders blocking out the white glare behind him, snowflakes resting on his dark hair. He came towards her, a sharp line carved between his dark brows.
‘Who was that?’
‘She didn’t give a name,’ Rachel muttered, and jumped as the phone rang again. Orlando snatched it up instantly, his eyes blazing.
‘Arabella?’
Rachel took a few stumbling steps backwards.
So that was it. She really should be grateful. It was far better to know before she made even more of a fool of herself than she had already.
Going into the kitchen, she tried to quell the biting sense of disappointment and hurt that burned in her chest. Last night had come with no promises, she had understood that perfectly, but she had at least wanted to be allowed to believe that for as long as it had lasted it had meant something.