by Penny Jordan
‘We did once,’ Lewis told her. ‘I thought of you when I bought this house. It was so like the one you said you wanted.’
She went white with the shock of it, the looked-for cruelty of his casual comment turning her head away with a quick defensive movement that caused her hair to slide silkily across her face, tears blurring her eyes so that she had to blink furiously to stop them from falling.
‘Lacey, what is it…what…?’
He was standing far too close to her, bending towards her, his hand resting on the wall of the summer-house, so that she was virtually imprisoned between it and him.
‘Look, I know how much of a strain this whole thing is for you…for both of us…but for Jessica’s sake…She’s going back to university tomorrow. I do understand how you must feel about the whole thing…but if—’
‘But if what?’ she demanded raggedly, interrupting him. ‘If I hadn’t practically begged you to go to bed with me none of this would ever have happened. Do you think I don’t know that—?’
‘That wasn’t actually what I was going to say.’ His quiet words cut through her own nervously angry outburst. ‘And as for begging me…Look at me, Lacey.’
She darted him a quick glance, her heart suddenly starting to beat far too fast.
‘The way I remember it, it wasn’t…’
He was standing far far too close to her. She felt dizzy from her awareness of him, from her wretched over-responsiveness to him, and it galled her that even now she seemed completely unable to control her body’s physical compulsion for intimacy with him. She could feel herself edging closer to him, feel the soft melting sensation within her, urging her to turn towards him, to…
She must have moved, she realised with sickening disbelief, because suddenly there was no distance between them at all, and the hand which Lewis had been resting against the wall behind her was now touching her shoulder, turning her, holding her.
‘Lacey.’
As he whispered her name the warmth of his breath feathered across her mouth, so that immediately her lips softened and parted, her throat tight with tension and need.
As his mouth settled gently on hers she closed her eyes, her whole body melting yearningly into his, her arms wrapping round him as he drew her closer to him.
He kissed her slowly and lingeringly as though he were savouring the taste and feel of her, his lips caressing hers as though his only purpose in life was to cherish and pleasure her.
She tried to resist, to remind herself that in return for this pleasure now she would pay over and over again in time to come in terms of anguish and loss, but her senses were too overwhelmed to listen to reason.
Beneath his mouth she made a soft little sound of appreciation and need, and immediately he responded to it, his arms tightening around her, his body hardening with arousal, his tongue probing the warm depths of her mouth as she clung to him, holding him, wanting him, her breasts aching for the touch of his hands, her body—
‘Hey, come on, break it up, you two!’
Lacey wasn’t sure which of them was the more shocked by the sound of Jessica’s laughter, but when she tried to pull away from him Lewis held on to her, and muttered in her ear, ‘No, not yet. I can’t.’
She was starting to tremble as reaction set in, but the urgency in his voice made her look at him.
His eyes were very dark, the pupils huge and almost black. There was a thin film of colour under his skin, sharpening the angle of his cheekbones. She could feel the tension in his muscles.
‘Just stand here for a minute until…’
Lacey frowned, confused by the blend of irritation and wryness in his voice until he explained bluntly, ‘I’m still aroused, Lacey, and, while Jessica obviously knows that we are lovers, I’m still old-fashioned enough to feel a little uncomfortable as her father, for her…’
He broke off as Lacey started to blush, a small smile touching his mouth. He lifted his hand to her face, his fingertips cool against her hot skin.
‘So you can still do that. Amazing. Do you remember the first time we made love? How you refused to look at me, and how embarrassed you were when…?’
‘I really think the sooner you two set a date and get married the better,’ Jessica told them both mock severely as she reached them. ‘You’re right, Dad,’ she added to Lewis. ‘It wasn’t a fish after all…’
Lewis was still standing next to Lacey one arm draped casually around her shoulders, her body turned in towards his own.After what he had said to her, she did not dare to move away; her embarrassment would be even greater than his if he was still as obviously aroused as he had indicated.
A tiny frisson of sensation coiled through her, a sweet ache of mingled pride and loss that she could actually have that kind of effect on him.
Don’t be ridiculous, she chided herself bitingly. It’s a physical reaction to sexual stimulation, that’s all. Any woman could have done it. It means nothing in any personal sense…nothing at all.
It was almost ten minutes before Lewis let her go, and even then, as the three of them walked back to the house together, he kept her by his side, his arm still around her shoulders. No doubt such pretend intimacy was for Jessica’s benefit, but, since they had already agreed that the sooner they could start to intimate to Jessica that things were not after all working out between them the better, it seemed illogical of him to be promoting this image of intimacy between them.
The afternoon had tired her. She told herself as Lewis drove them back home that it was the effect of the fresh air that was making her feel so drained and sleepy, but she knew in reality that it was the emotional strain that was exhausting her, draining her to the point where she felt that all she wanted to do was to go to bed and stay there, waking up only when it was all over and her life was back to normal. When Lewis had disappeared from it.
But if that was what she really wanted, why did the mere thought of a life without him make her feel so miserably bleak and full of despair?
She had got over loving and losing him once, she reminded herself grittily later on when she was changing for the evening. She would get over it again. Or would she? She had been younger then, stronger…with a very definite purpose in life. She had had to think of Jessica, her child. She still had to think of Jessica, of course, but not in the same way. Jessica was an adult herself now.
Her small house only had two bedrooms, fortunately, so Lewis was staying at a local hotel instead of driving home after their meal. Jessica had teased them both about it, remarking that, since she had already caught them in bed together, there seemed little point in Lewis’s returning to his hotel.
‘I’m going to miss you both once I’m back at university,’ Jessica commented as she walked into Lacey’s bedroom. ‘Still, it won’t be long. We’ll all be together again at half-term, and Ian has arranged for me to have my tests then as well…which reminds me, I must ring him and check on exactly when my appointment is.’ Her face shadowed a little. ‘I was thinking only the other night how lucky I am. Not just in being born, but in living now, when I will have a choice, when I don’t have to make the kind of decision Dad had to face. I was wondering, Ma. The other woman…the one he left you for—’
‘Jess…please, I don’t want to discuss it.’ Her hand shook as she tried to fasten her earring. ‘Jess, don’t get too…too excited about the thought of Lewis and me getting back together. I mean, it’s early days yet…it may not…it may not work out.’
‘What?’ Jessica stared at her and then laughed. ‘Don’t be an idiot, Ma. It’s plain to see that the pair of you are madly in love. The way Dad looks at you when he thinks no one can see him reminds me of a hungry dog eyeing up a very, very delectable bone.’
‘Thanks a lot,’ Lacey responded drily, dipping her head so that Jessica couldn’t see the betraying emotion in her eyes.
Lewis was an excellent actor, she had to give him that, but she wasn’t sure that his acting was doing either of them any good. Sooner or later Jessica wou
ld have to know the truth. But not until after they knew the results of her tests. As Lewis had pointed out, she would need them both then, especially if the tests proved positive.
‘Why don’t you go back with Dad tomorrow when he goes home?’ Jessica suggested. ‘After all, there’s nothing to stop you, is there?’
‘No? I do have a job, remember.’
‘Yes, but you’ll be giving that up once the two of you remarry, won’t you?’ Jessica told her confidently. ‘I know you’ll want to continue with your fund-raising work, and, from what Dad’s been saying to me about his involvement in the research into the effects of the disorder, he’ll more than support you in that, but if you do have a baby…or two…’
Sighing to herself, Lacey stood up.
‘We’d better go downstairs,’ she told her daughter. ‘Lewis will be here soon.’
CHAPTER EIGHT
THEY were having dinner at the same restaurant where Lacey had taken Jessica on the night of the presentation.
Then she had looked up and across the restaurant, had suffered the shock of seeing Lewis, and hadn’t dreamed then for one moment that there would ever come a time when she might be seated opposite him at a table in that same restaurant; she had certainly not envisaged that Jessica would be with them, nor that she would be trapped in a situation where she had to pretend that she and Lewis were considering remarrying.
She had as little appetite now as she had had then, and for the same reason, although now Lewis was sitting a lot closer to her than he had been on that occasion.
To an outsider, no doubt, they presented a picture of happy family intimacy, a close-knit, loving family unit. She closed her eyes against the pain of her own thoughts. Only she knew how much she wished that picture was a true one.
‘Are you OK, Ma?’ Jessica asked her anxiously. ‘You’ve gone very pale.’
‘I’m just tired, that’s all,’ Lacey fibbed, forcing her mouth into an unwilling smile. For Jessica’s sake she had to go along with this charade, at least until they had the results of her tests.
She shook her head when Lewis asked her if she had any preference as regarded their wine, absently noticing that Jessica leaned over to him and whispered something to him as he was beckoning the wine waiter.
Later, when they brought the ice bucket and champagne to the table, she looked at it in bewilderment.
‘Jessica’s idea,’ Lewis explained briefly. ‘She thought we ought to celebrate our reconciliation, and to toast the future.’
Once Lacey had loved champagne, enjoying its ice-cold taste on her tongue and the excitement of the bubbles as they slid down her throat; now it made her feel slightly queasy, just as did the food in front of her.
She tried to make an effort, to appear happy and relaxed, but she knew from the brief looks that Lewis occasionally gave her that, although she might have deceived Jessica, she had not deceived him.
It caused an odd weakening sensation in the pit of her stomach to realise that it was not her daughter who knew her the best, who had registered her real feelings, but Lewis.
It was a relief when the evening finally drew to a close and they left the restaurant.
In the comfort of Lewis’s car, with the tyres swishing soothingly on the tarmac, she found her eyes closing and her body growing heavy with sleep, and several times during the short journey she discovered that she was having to force herself to stay awake.
When Lewis brought the car to a standstill outside the house she fumbled automatically for the door-handle, tensing when he reached across her to open the door for her, drawing her body back into her seat to avoid coming into contact with him.
She saw from the look he gave her that he recognised what she was doing, although she couldn’t understand why her action should make him look so bitterly angry. Jessica wasn’t watching them. She was already out of the car.
‘You look exhausted,’ he told her flatly and unflatteringly. ‘I shan’t stay. I’ll see you in, but I shan’t stay.’
Jessica, though, had other ideas. As the three of them walked towards the house she announced blithely, ‘Now I intend to have an early night, so you two needn’t worry about my playing gooseberry. To judge from that kiss I witnessed this afternoon, you’d both appreciate some time on your own.’
Lacey stumbled on the path, and instantly Lewis reached out to steady her. The last thing she could handle right now was time alone with him, and yet if she objected…protested, Jessica was going to start asking questions.
Once they were inside and Jessica had said her goodnights, Lewis said quietly to her. ‘I’m sorry about this. Look, why don’t you go and sit down? I’ll make us both a cup of tea.’
It was only as she nodded her head and opened the kitchen door that she realised that this was her house, and that she should be the one playing host, instead of allowing Lewis to take charge.
And yet, instead of feeling resentment or irritation, it was almost a relief to open the sitting-room door and to slip off her shoes and curl up on the settee.
She was asleep when Lewis came back in with the tea-tray. He studied her broodingly for a time. This afternoon in his arms she had felt so…so right, as though she belonged there; as though she wanted to belong there, and then he had kissed her and she had aroused him so damn much. He put down the tea-tray quietly so as not to disturb her, and then walked over to her.
‘Lacey.’
The sound of Lewis’s voice brought Lacey out of her sleep. She blinked in confusion as she looked up at him, realising that he must have switched off the light when he came into the room because now it was only illuminated by the soft glow of a table-lamp.
‘I’m sorry to wake you, but if you stay curled up like that for much longer you’ll get cramp. I’ve made some tea.’
Lacey looked towards the tray on the coffeetable. She felt disorientated, tired, as though she had been asleep for much longer than a few minutes.
She struggled to sit up and put her feet down on the floor but, as she moved, Lewis’s prediction came true and agonising cramp shot through her leg.
She cried out automatically, reaching towards her calf, but Lewis beat her to it, his fingers curling firmly round her skin, massaging the cramped muscles.
Almost immediately the pain started to recede, relaxing its grip on her body.
‘It’s…it’s gone now,’ she told Lewis huskily, drawing herself away from him and trying to sit upright.
He had been leaning towards her while he massaged her leg, but now as he released her he sat down beside her on the settee, his body far too close to her own.
Had she thought about it she would have chosen one of the chairs to sit in, but it had never occurred to her that she might get cramp, nor that he would actually choose to sit beside her. Perhaps he was thinking of Jessica, she reflected painfully, although it was highly unlikely that their daughter would come downstairs, not after what she had said to them before going to bed.
‘It’s rather like being two teenagers again, knowing someone is upstairs, listening,’ Lewis commented ruefully as he reached across her to pour the tea. ‘Only in our case it’s not being caught out doing something we shouldn’t that’s the problem, but being caught out not doing something we should.’
‘I don’t think Jess will come down,’ Lacey told him, unable to stop her glance from straying to the clock on the video.
‘It’s too soon,’ Lewis told her, reading her mind. ‘I know we’re supposed to be impatient and in love, but I think that, no matter how impatiently I might be supposed to have made love to you, Jess would consider it less than romantic of me to leave so quickly. After all, as far as she’s concerned we have plans to make…a future to discuss.’
Lacey bent her head so that he wouldn’t see the emotion in her eyes. When he talked of their being lovers…of their having a future, no matter how hard she fought against it, she couldn’t help being emotionally affected by the difference between the fiction and the reality.
&nbs
p; Already, after so short a space of time, she had grown so dependent on his being there, on being able to see him…talk with him…so that, no matter how much pain his pretence caused her, once he was gone what she would have to endure would be even worse.
To try to distract herself and keep her mind off her emotional vulnerability, she said unsteadily, ‘It must have been very difficult for you when you discovered…when you learned about…about the disorder, especially since, like Jessica, you had had no idea when you were growing up.’
She looked across at him and saw the emotion flicker through his eyes.
‘Difficult. Yes, I suppose it was, although at the time there was almost too much to do…too many other things to think about. I didn’t really have time to dwell on it or…’
He stopped abruptly. His voice had been clipped, his words terse as though even speaking about the subject at all was something he would have preferred not to do.
Realising that he had most probably only discovered the truth at about the the time he had divorced her and was living with his new love, Lacey could well understand what he meant, although it still must have come as a terrible shock, to him and to the woman he loved.
She tried to imagine how she would have felt had he still been married to her when he made the discovery. How would she have reacted? How had that other woman reacted?
Not wanting to probe, and yet feeling that she had to ask, she enquired softly, ‘How did you find out, Lewis? You told me that you didn’t know about the inherited tendency when you and I married and…’
‘It was my father. He told me. Or, rather, he wrote to me.’
Lacey stared at him. ‘Your father?’
‘Yes. Remember how you encouraged me to contact him by making enquiries through Australia House? When eventually the authorities there managed to trace him, I wrote to him explaining who I was, telling him that Mother had died, telling him that I was m…that I would like to make contact with him.
‘Quite some time went by without any response, and then one day there was a letter. Not the letter I had hoped for,’ he told her bleakly.