by Penny Jordan
‘Well, unfortunately that wasn’t the case. Despite what you seem to think, and quite obviously unlike yours, my life does not include the kind of…intimacy…the kind of sex life that makes it necessary,’ she concluded stiffly.
She wasn’t quite sure why his obvious belief that she would automatically be using some kind of protective birth control should hurt her so much, but she knew that it did.
‘Besides,’ she added fiercely, allowing her voice to rise slightly as she heard the back door open and then close again and the sound of a car engine firing as Cathy and Stuart left, ‘as far as I’m concerned, we’ve got far more important things to worry about than the unlikely chance—the extremely unlikely chance—of my conceiving your child for a second time.’
For the first time since Cathy had burst into the bedroom, Abbie managed to look directly at Sam. Like her, he had sat up in bed immediately Cathy had rushed in, but unlike her he had made no move to cover his naked body with the duvet—no cowering beneath its inadequate protection with a guilty expression on his face.
In the clear morning his torso looked just as firmly fleshed and muscled as it had felt last night. There was a small bruise at the base of his throat, Abbie recognised, feeling the heat burn up over her body as she remembered how it had got there, and his mouth had that slightly swollen look that came from being passionately and very intensely kissed…like her own. She touched her lips tentatively with her tongue-tip and her face burned an even deeper shade of pink.
‘What’s wrong?’ Sam asked her, frowning. ‘Sore?’
Sore? Abbie stared at him, her colour rising despite her attempt to check it.
‘What’s wrong?’ she repeated. ‘Do you really need to ask? You heard Cathy… I should think the whole town has probably heard her by now. She thinks that you and I…that we’re—’
‘Giving our relationship a second chance?’ Sam supplied for her.
He sounded amazingly unconcerned, Abbie acknowledged, his lack of reaction somehow increasing her own sense of panic and anger.
‘You heard her,’ she repeated. ‘She’s already told Stuart…and right now no doubt she’s on her way to tell everyone else. Why didn’t you say something to her…stop her…?’
‘Why didn’t you?’ Sam countered.
Abbie stared at him.
‘Like what?’ she demanded. ‘Like just because she’d found us in bed together it didn’t mean…it doesn’t mean… You know what I’m trying to say,’ Abbie accused him, looking away from him.
It irritated her that she should feel at such a disadvantage with him, that she should be the one clinging protectively and defensively to what, after all, was her own duvet, whilst he lay there lounging back against the pillows for all the world as though it were a perfectly normal event for them to have spent the night together and then been discovered in bed together by their daughter.
As she shrugged petulantly the duvet slipped down even further, revealing the taut flatness of his stomach. There was another small, betraying bruise right next to his navel, Abbie recognised, unable to tear her gaze away from the small purple mark. How many others were there? she wondered uncomfortably, her face flushing as she wriggled uneasily, unable to accept the physical evidence of her own passion and desire.
‘What is it?’ she heard Sam asking her, and then, as he looked from her flushed, averted face and glanced down at his body, she could hear the amusement in his voice as he murmured, ‘Ah, yes, no communal sports club showers for me for the next few days, hmm? Especially when you think where the others are…’
‘What others?’ Abbie demanded, her head whipping round as she stared angrily at him. ‘Where—’
‘Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten already,’ Sam teased her. ‘But of course if you really want me to refresh your memory…’
He made to throw back the duvet completely, but Abbie stopped him, her face burning a hot, embarrassed red as she remembered exactly where it was that she had bitten so deliberately into the seductive smoothness of his male flesh, and the little trail of tell-tale marks she had no doubt left along the insides of his thighs.
‘What are we going to do, Sam?’ she demanded helplessly, unable to conceal her anxiety and vulnerability any longer. ‘Cathy thinks that we’ve been reconciled…that…that we’re making plans to get back together. That’s what she’s going to tell everyone and we both know that it just isn’t true, that what happened was just…just…’
‘Just what,’ Sam challenged her, his voice suddenly unexpectedly hard, as though he was trying to warn her about something. About reading the wrong meaning into what had happened between them. About assuming that because they had made love, had sex, it meant something more… meant that he still had feelings for her, still cared for her.
Did he really think that she was idiotic enough to delude herself that, because he had been sexually aroused, it meant that he must also have been emotionally aroused? Hadn’t she already learned the hardest way possible that love was an emotion that just could not exist between them?
‘Just sex,’ Abbie responded lightly, proud of the way her voice didn’t tremble or quiver, betraying what she was really feeling.
‘Just sex,’ Sam repeated harshly. ‘I see. Tell me something, Abbie, how many other men have there been with whom you have had “just sex” since you and I—’
‘You have no right to ask me that sort of question,’ Abbie interrupted him furiously. ‘No right at all. How would you like it if I did the same thing to you? You wouldn’t, would you?’ she told him, answering her own question.
‘You surprise me, Abbie, do you know that?’ Sam told her heavily. ‘Hypocrisy is the very last thing I would ever have expected from you.’
Hypocrisy? Abbie tensed. What was he trying to imply? That he had guessed that she was lying to him when she claimed that last night had been ‘just sex’, that he knew that for her…? She took a deep breath, her heart beating fast as she was brought face to face with a truth she had been fighting to avoid ever since it had first confronted her last night.
She was not still in love with Sam, she denied fiercely. How could she be? After what he had done…after what he had said. What had happened last night had just been a…fluke. A cruel prank on the part of fate. It meant nothing—nothing at all…nothing.
‘You were quite happy to go to bed with me, to have sex with me,’ she heard Sam saying bitterly, ‘just so long as it could be kept secret…just so long as no one else knew—more than happy, in fact, as I recall last night’s events. But when it comes to anyone else knowing what happened between us…’
‘Yes, all right, maybe I am a hypocrite,’ Abbie agreed, too relieved that he hadn’t guessed what she was really feeling to deny his allegation. ‘How would you feel in my shoes? Would you want everyone knowing what you had done? Can you imagine what it’s going to be like for me living here now? It’s all right for you. You can walk away from it all, go back to your real life, walk away from me—just like you did before.’
It hurt unbearably after what they had shared last night that they should now be fighting like this.
‘Oh, God, why did Cathy have to come and find us? Why? I’ll have to tell her the truth, and—’
‘Do you really think that’s a good idea?’ Sam interrupted her quietly.
‘What else can I do?’ Abbie challenged him. ‘She’s got to know the truth sooner or later. I just wish that I could have stopped her before she’d broadcast her story to half the town. I can just imagine what Stuart’s parents are going to say when they find out about this—especially his mother. She already thinks I’m a total failure as a mother…especially as the mother of her precious son’s prospective wife.
‘It isn’t for my own sake I’m concerned. It’s Cathy I’m bothered about. I hate the thought of Stuart’s mother criticising her, finding fault with her, blaming her for what she considers to be my failures. At the moment Cathy is far too much in love to realise the problems she might have to fa
ce with Stuart’s mother, and I hate knowing that I’m probably making them even worse for her.’
‘If Cathy feels anything other than love and immense pride for you and all that you’ve done for her, then she’s not the girl I know she is,’ Sam told her firmly. ‘But as for Stuart’s mother—have you thought that perhaps in the circumstances it might be better to leave matters as they stand?’
‘What matters?’ Abbie asked him suspiciously.
‘Since Cathy already believes that we are attempting to re-establish our relationship, perhaps it’s better to allow her—and everyone else—to continue to believe that,’ Sam explained. ‘At least for the time being. It will, I suspect, be far easier to simply let our new “relationship” flounder and then fail than to force Cathy to accept a truth she quite plainly doesn’t want to see. Easier for her, easier for everyone else and easier for us as well.’
‘You’d do that? Pretend that we…that last night… that we’re planning to get back together again? Make that kind of sacrifice for Cathy’s sake? Why?’ she demanded in disbelief. ‘When…’
‘Perhaps I feel I owe her one or two sacrifices,’ Sam told her sombrely. ‘And besides—’
‘No, don’t say any more. Whatever it is, I don’t want to hear it,’ Abbie interrupted him fiercely.
Had he any idea how much what he had just said—what his words had just revealed—shook her emotionally? How much it hurt her knowing that he was prepared to make sacrifices for Cathy’s sake, knowing that he wanted to protect Cathy from the potentially unpleasant fall-out of malicious gossip about what had happened, whilst at the same time he made absolutely no acknowledgement of the fact that she too might be in need of some protection from those same wagging tongues? But then she, of course, did not matter. She had never mattered. How could she have done when all she was to him was someone who aroused his most basic sensual male drive, someone who aroused him physically but who failed to touch his emotions?
‘Abbie.’
She froze as she felt him touch her lightly on her arm, wrenching herself away from him, unaware of the pain in his eyes as he saw the way she was withdrawing from him—a sure sign, if he needed one, that she was already regretting what had happened last night. Unlike him. He…
‘I’m sorry if I’ve upset you,’ he began quietly.
But Abbie wouldn’t let him continue, her eyes bright with emotion as she turned back to him and told him sharply, ‘You have not upset me, Sam.’ She added for good measure, ‘You could not upset me. You don’t have that power. Not any longer. For someone to hurt me emotionally I have to care about them emotionally.’
‘Abbie,’ Sam began again, but Abbie shook her head.
‘We could never convince people that we’re thinking of getting back together again,’ she continued starkly. ‘No one would ever believe it.’
‘Cathy already does,’ Sam pointed out dryly. ‘And so far as I can see it certainly seems the most practical solution to our present situation—the only really viable solution, in fact,’ he added, before Abbie could deny what he was saying.
‘You really mean it, don’t you?’ Abbie asked him in disbelief. ‘Cathy would be flattered if she knew the lengths you’re prepared to go to to protect her and make her happy—’
‘Cathy must never know,’ Sam interrupted her curtly.
‘Never? Just how long do you envisage us playing out this ridiculous charade?’ Abbie challenged him, adding, ‘It will never work.’
‘It will if we want it to, and besides, it won’t be for that long. Only until Cathy is married,’ Sam argued.
‘What?’ Abbie was appalled. ‘But they’re not planning to marry until next year. ‘You can’t—we can’t… Oh, no, Sam…’ she protested. ‘That’s impossible.’
‘Nothing is ever impossible,’ Sam corrected her. ‘Difficult, impractical, hazardous and foolhardy, maybe, but impossible—no.’
Against her will, hearing the wry note in his voice and seeing the glint of humour in his eyes as she listened to him, Abbie felt her own sense of humour bubbling up in response, soothing away her tension and anger. A small responsive smile curled her mouth in rueful acknowledgement of what he was saying, much as she struggled to suppress it, to remind herself that this was a man who in the past had hurt her very badly, and that her own fear of that hurt was not confined just to the past.
Last night in Sam’s arms she had forgotten how much he had hurt her and remembered only the intense pleasure of their shared sensual need for one another. But she was too mature, too wise now, surely, to deceive herself that last night had been love.
‘We can’t do it, Sam,’ she protested, and then added quietly, ‘I can’t…it’s too difficult.’
‘Would it be any easier telling Cathy the truth?’ Sam challenged her.
Abbie looked at him and swallowed hard, knowing when she was beaten, shaking her head as she admitted reluctantly, ‘No. But I can’t just lie to everyone and pretend—lie about a relationship between us that just does not and could not exist,’ she added, her revulsion and distress evident in her voice. ‘This is my home,’ she reminded him. ‘And it’s my family, my friends, my…business contacts you’re talking about deceiving. As I said, it’s all right for you—you can just walk away and—’
‘And what? Be branded the bad guy for the second time round?’ Sam suggested grimly. ‘Oh, yes, I know perfectly well exactly what everyone here thinks of me. The man who was so possessively jealous of his wife, so afraid of losing her that he prompted the very thing he most feared by his own idiotic behaviour. All right,’ he told Abbie angrily, ‘so you can’t lie. So what exactly do you suggest that we do? Tell the truth, whatever that might be?’
Abbie felt unable to answer him.
‘Well, come on, then—or have you got some other solution, some other alternative? Look, Abbie,’ Sam told her more gently, ‘you can see how much it meant to Cathy to believe that the two of us were getting back together again. Why spoil things for her and create a hell of a lot of problems for ourselves by forcing her to accept a truth she just doesn’t want to know? Why not let her have the reassurance of believing what she wants to believe? She wants to believe that you and I are rebuilding our relationship—why disillusion her? After all, these months leading up to her marriage are going to be difficult enough for her anyway—I remember how tense and on edge you were, and you didn’t have Stuart’s mother to contend with. You are quite happy about Cathy marrying Stuart, aren’t you?’ Sam probed, watching her closely.
Too closely, Abbie acknowledged as she defensively turned her head away so that he couldn’t look straight into her eyes.
‘Cathy loves him,’ she responded neutrally.
‘Yes, she does, and he loves her,’ Sam came back. ‘So what’s bothering you, Abbie?’ he asked her, and then thoroughly undermined her determination not to confide in him by adding quietly, ‘And don’t bother denying that there is something. It might be one hell of a long time ago, but that doesn’t alter the fact that there was a time when I knew every nuance of every expression that crossed your face—and what they meant.’
Had she really been so open to him? So vulnerable? Abbie wondered achingly. If so…
‘Abbie,’ Sam warned her.
‘All right, if you must know, I’m concerned about Stuart’s relationship with his mother—about the fact that she has such a strong influence over all her family.’
‘Does she?’ Sam looked unconvinced. ‘I rather got the impression that Stuart was very much a young man who made his own decisions about his life. He loves Cathy and—’
‘Yes, he loves her now,’ Abbie agreed. ‘But what if…what if there was ever a situation when Cathy needed to be able to rely on him, on his loyalty, on knowing that he would be strong enough to support her, to protect her, to…to love her no matter what or who?’ she demanded passionately. ‘What if—?’
‘This isn’t about Stuart and Cathy at all, is it?’ Sam interrupted her roughly. ‘It’s about
you and me. It’s about what happened between us and the fact that in your eyes I did not have the loyalty, the strength, the trust to believe in you…’
‘I don’t want to talk about that…about us,’ Abbie told him huskily. ‘You say that Stuart and Cathy love one another, and I know that’s true, but once you and I loved…believed we loved one another, and look what happened to us. It takes more, much more than just physical desire to build a strong marriage. After all,’ she added bleakly, ‘you and I both proved last night it is possible to desire someone, to want them, without…
‘I don’t want that for Cathy,’ she told him, unable to finish what she had been about to say, all too aware of how precariously fragile her self-control was when it came to putting into words just how she felt about what had happened between them. ‘I don’t want her to have to wake up one morning and discover that the man she loves, the man she trusts…’
‘Isn’t very much of a man at all,’ Sam supplied harshly for her when her voice faded into silence.
‘I knew you wouldn’t understand,’ Abbie told him defiantly.
‘On the contrary, I understand too well,’ Sam responded grimly. ‘But Stuart isn’t me, Abbie, and Cathy isn’t you, and they have to be left alone to take their own chances, make their own future. All we can do is give them our support and our love.’
‘And you think that letting Cathy believe that we’re getting back together is doing that?’ Abbie challenged him.
‘Yes,’ Sam confirmed.
He was already halfway out of bed and Abbie quickly turned her head away, not wanting to watch him walk away from her, leave her. Last night everything had been so different, had seemed so right, but now, this morning, she was having to face the consequences of her own wilful refusal to see the truth.
As he saw the way Abbie turned her head, dismissing him from her line of sight in the same way she had dismissed him from her heart, Sam wondered why on earth he had ever hoped that last night could possibly have changed anything.
Yes, she was sexually responsive to him, and God knew he still wanted her, but then it was different for him; he wanted her emotionally—God, and how. Had she really not guessed how hard it had been for him to stop himself from telling her how he felt, how much he felt and for how long?