by Penny Jordan
After this she didn’t know how on earth she was ever going to be able to face him again. How she was ever…
She tensed as the car stopped, flashing him a quick anxious look. He wasn’t looking at her, she realised, and no wonder.
It was only when he offered curtly, ‘If you’d like me to come inside with you and check…’that she realised they were parked outside her house.
Quickly she assured him, ‘No. I’ll be fine.’ She was already struggling with the door-handle, desperately anxious to get away from him before he started thinking that she was deliberately delaying in the hope that… That what? she asked herself self-castigatingly. That he might kiss her again…touch her again…caress her again. She took a deep breath, and half fell out of the car as the door finally opened.
Gareth had, she noticed, switched off the engine, and as he too made to get out of the car she protested quickly, ‘No, please stay where you are, Gareth. There really is no need.’
‘If that’s what you prefer.’
His voice was terse; clipped. He wasn’t looking at her, she recognised without surprise. He must be nearly as embarrassed as she was herself, although for very different reasons. He must be cursing ever having offered a lift. What on earth was wrong with her, letting a simple kiss between two friends get out of hand like that…practically inviting him…begging him almost? She shuddered hotly, conscious of a wave of humiliation burning her inwardly and out.
All she wanted to do was to escape from him, to be on her own, to come to terms with the folly of her behaviour.
‘Sybilla—’
‘No, Gareth, please just leave me alone.’
She almost ran up the path to her front door, her fingers trembling as she inserted the key into the lock. Once inside, she closed the door and then locked it, leaning heavily on it as she waited for the sound of Gareth’s car driving away. Only once she had heard it did she make her way slowly and painfully upstairs.
CHAPTER EIGHT
IT WAS the racking sound of her own coughing that woke Sybilla up; her throat was so sore that she could barely swallow, her eyes felt gritty and hot and her body ached all over. She shivered under the bedclothes, muzzily torn between going downstairs to make herself the soothing drink her throat cried out for and staying right where she was, closing her eyes as tightly as she could while she curled up under the duvet into a tight defensive ball, retaining what body-heat she could.
In the end the pain in her throat won out. Shivering, she crawled out from under the bedclothes, dismayed to discover how weak she felt, how unsteady her balance was as she walked towards the bedroom door.
Halfway down the stairs she was seized by such an intense bout of shivering that she had to cling on to the banister rail to prevent herself from falling.
In the kitchen she opened the fridge and suddenly realised that her fresh milk must still be outside. She unlocked the door and retrieved the two pints from the doorstep. The night held that quality of dense silence that always seemed to occur in the hour or so just before dawn. Less than a mile away, Gareth would be lying in his bed at the Cedars. Would he be thinking of her…remembering how…?
This time when she shivered it wasn’t with cold but with self-revulsion.
How could she have allowed her guard to slip so devastatingly? How could she have been foolish enough to actually…?
She tried to swallow but her throat was too swollen and sore. She felt too ill to dwell on her disastrous behaviour with Gareth, and as she ransacked her fridge, finding the three lemons she had vaguely remembered seeing there the last time she’d opened the salad box, she tried not to admit the uncomfortable suspicion that the dramatic acceleration in her illness from a heavy cold to full-blown flu might be a bit of determined coat-trailing on the part of her body in its attempt to escape from the third-degree inquisition it might otherwise have been subjected to by her brain.
Her brain! And what exactly had that been doing while she had been flinging herself headlong into danger…headlong into Gareth’s arms? Sleeping? Turning a blind eye? Why hadn’t it reminded her, protected her? Why had it allowed her to behave so foolishly…so…?
She winced as the lemon she was squeezing dripped some juice into a tiny cut on her finger, licking it off and instantly grimacing at its bitterness.
Was she crazy, she asked herself despairingly, wandering around her kitchen at three o’clock in the morning, making herself a hot lemon drink to ease a sore throat which common sense had already told her could only properly be treated by either time or a course of antibiotics?
If she had any sense at all she would take a couple of aspirin and go back to bed, and pray that when she woke up the events of the evening would have been wiped from her mind completely. And from Gareth’s.
Sighing, she was forced to acknowledge that this was unlikely to happen. The best she could hope for was that Gareth, who would surely have as little desire to dwell on which had occurred as she had herself, would follow her example and ensure that in future they met as infrequently as possible.
What hurt her the most, she acknowledged as she stirred her drink and then sat down on a chair, sipping the hot liquid, was that she had been so confident, so sure that she was safe…that the past and her adolescent love for Gareth were no longer of any importance…that, no matter how much pain they had caused her, she was past that pain now and that there was no way she could be hurt by Gareth again.
It had taken her less than ten seconds in his arms tonight to realise how wrong she had been. Ten seconds…the time it had taken for his mouth to brush hers, for the heat of his body…for the touch of his hand—
She gave a sharp exclamation of pain as the hot liquid slopped out of the mug and scalded her skin. As she put the mug down she realised she had been trembling so much that she had caused the lemon drink to spill.
The best and safest place for her was in bed, she told herself firmly, holding on to the mug with both hands while she drank the contents, and then going back upstairs.
Once she was back in bed, though, she found it was impossible to sleep. Every time she closed her eyes she was immediately tormented by mental images of Gareth. Not the familiar Gareth of her adolescent daydreams, but a new, older, more mature and infinitely more disturbing Gareth…a Gareth whose kiss, whose touch wasn’t merely the emotional fantasy of her teenage yearnings…but instead had a reality, a substance that no amount of imagining on her part could ever have conjured up.
* * *
She couldn’t remember a Saturday that had ever made her feel more alone, more of an alien in a world of couples and happy families, Sybilla reflected miserably as she unpacked her shopping.
She wasn’t sure if it was the virus that was making her feel as though even her bones were cold and aching or if the wind had been as raw and demoralising as she had thought.
She didn’t even want to think about how much of her intense inner sense of coldness could be attributed to the realisation that she was still as much in danger from her emotional vulnerability to Gareth as she had ever been, perhaps even more so.
Her hands shook a little as she unpacked the fresh bread she had collected from their local bakery.
There had been a man standing in the queue in front of her, two small children, obviously his, clinging to his side.
He had been about Gareth’s age, although nothing like as physically compelling as Gareth…even so, to see the way his two small daughters clung so adoringly to his side had brought a lump to her throat and had made her body ache in a way which was totally unfamiliar to her.
She had looked round the bakery then, and it had seemed to her that everyone else was in pairs, in family groups, that she was the only person there on her own; and she had suffered such an acute and overwhelming surge of loneliness that she had had to grit her teeth and will herself not to give way to the tears of self-pity she had felt threatening to flood her eyes.
What on earth was wrong with her? She had never minded bein
g alone before, never even given it a passing thought. After all, over the years there had been more than enough men who would have gladly changed her single state had that been what she’d wished.
But she had not done so…had not wanted a partner…a lover…commitment…home… children. Until…
Until Gareth had taken her in his arms, had kissed her and touched her, and even though their lovemaking had stopped short of complete intimacy it had still left her with an unfamiliar ache within her body, an ache not just for him as a man—as her lover—but an ache for all that loving him meant she could never have.
Standing there in the bakery, watching that unknown man with his daughters, she had suffered such an overwhelming sense of loss, of emptiness, that its echoes still tormented her now.
She moved restlessly around her kitchen. Outside, the sun was shining even if the wind was cold. If she had any sense she would put on her outdoor clothes and go outside and do some much needed digging. The physical exercise would soon help to banish her unhappy mood, and the fresh air would probably do her good.
Could fresh air cure her malady? She doubted it!
Gareth had been as good as his word, and when she’d woken up and gone downstairs she had discovered that her car was parked neatly outside its garage.
She wondered what time he had driven it back; she had certainly heard nothing. She tried to tell herself that she was glad that she hadn’t had to endure the humiliation and embarrassment of seeing him, but inside she still ached…still yearned…still loved, she admitted tiredly.
She looked through the window and out into the garden. The sun was gone now, the blue sky turning grey as the sharp spring wind whipped up the rain clouds.
Her phone rang and she went to answer it, her heart beating rapidly and shallowly, but when she picked up the receiver it was her mother’s voice she heard—enquiring anxiously if she was feeling any better—and not Gareth’s.
Gareth. Why on earth had she thought it might be Gareth? She had already told herself that the last thing she wanted was any kind of contact with him. It was too potentially humiliating…too potentially dangerous.
She didn’t have the emotional resources to cope with the physical reality of him, not after having so newly discovered that she loved him.
She loved him. Her mouth twisted bitterly. What a cruel, unfair stroke of fate had brought her full circle like this to find herself face to face with exactly the same heartache she had suffered at fifteen.
No, not exactly the same; then pride, youth and resilience had been on her side. Now…
Now she knew with heartaching certainty that, unlike her physical illness, her love for Gareth was a malady from which there was no hope of recovery.
Having put away her shopping, she admitted that, sensible though it might be for her to go outside and do some work in the garden, what she really felt like doing was curling up in a chair in front of the fire with a cup of tea and one of her ancient and very well-read Georgette Heyers to make her both laugh and cry and to give her an escape route for a short space of time.
She unearthed one of the books from the back of a cupboard, lit the sitting-room fire and filled the kettle.
Later she decided that the reason she didn’t hear Gareth’s car was because she was wallowing so deeply in self-pity, but by then it was too late to look for excuses: the damage was done.
It happened just as she was reaching for her tea-caddy, or rather for the china pig Gareth had won for her all those years ago, and which she had cherished ever since, preferring—for a reason which was unhappily no longer obscure to her—to have an excuse to touch the object every day than to store it away somewhere where she might have to give herself an excuse to do so.
Perhaps her hands were still too cold, or perhaps they were slightly damp, she didn’t know; all she did know was that the shock of seeing Gareth walk past her kitchen window just as she was reaching for the pig was enough to cause her to let the heavy china slip from her fingers and crash down on to the terracotta floor-tiles.
Of course, she knew that it would break, but that didn’t stop her diving to catch it and then staring in distress at the broken shards of china when she’d missed.
‘Sybilla…what happened? I heard a crash.’
She must have left the door unlocked, she acknowledged numbly, refusing to turn round, unable to turn round as she continued to survey the mess on the floor. China mingled with split tea-bags, and, even though common sense told her that the jar was far too badly smashed to ever be repaired, she discovered that she was down on her hands and knees, frantically trying to extract the pieces from the rest of the disorder.
It took Gareth’s sharp, ‘Don’t touch it, you could cut yourself. Where do you keep your brush?’ to make her realise what she might be betraying to him, causing her to kneel back on her heels, keeping her back towards him, as she responded as evenly as she could.
‘It’s all right, Gareth. I’ll deal with it.’
She could hear the tension in her voice, feel the sharpness edging up under it, a sharpness she was using to mask the despair and distress she was suffering.
That pig had been something she had cherished…a gift from Gareth to a much younger Sybilla, but a gift given with affection…with even, perhaps, love, although admittedly not the love of a man for a woman. She had cherished that pig…had loved it…and now it was gone. Broken…destroyed by her own clumsy carelessness, and in part by Gareth himself.
She could feel the hot tears of pain burning behind her eyes. There was nothing she wanted to do more than to stay where she was on the floor and give way to her grief, howling like a small child with a bloody knee, to cry the tears now she had never allowed herself to cry before…but Gareth was here…standing behind her…watching her…and suddenly, briefly, she hated him almost as much as she loved him, getting up and turning on him to demand angrily, ‘What is it you want, Gareth?’
He literally stepped back from her as he registered her anger…her rejection, a subtle tightening of the bones in his face sending warning signals to her own brain, reminding her that there were more ways than the obvious of betraying one’s true feelings.
‘I just came round to check if you were OK. After last night.’
The blood literally seemed to freeze in her veins. How could he do this to her? If she had expected nothing else from him she had hoped that he would at least have the courtesy, the compassion never to mention what had happened between them last night, either to her or to anyone else, but to tactfully blank it off, to pretend that last night…that her responsiveness to him…her desire for him…her love for him had never existed; and yet here he was, walking into her kitchen, carelessly asking her if she was ‘OK’.
A sick feeling of light-headedness swept over her, a mingling of anger and pain, and as she turned away from him she said as steadily as she could, ‘Why on earth shouldn’t I be? I have been kissed before, you know.’
The words had an acid ring to them, a bitterness that shocked her. A terrible silence followed them, an awareness burning through her that she had said totally the wrong thing.
‘Yes, I should imagine you have,’ Gareth agreed lightly. ‘However, it wasn’t that I was referring to. You weren’t in evidence earlier on when I returned your car. I had to pass here on my way home, so I thought I’d call in and check that you were all right.’
Each word was delivered lightly and without emphasis, in complete contrast to her own scornfully acid statement, and yet she knew…oh, how she knew that, beneath his apparent outward calm, Gareth was furiously angry.
She was starting to feel sick again, but not this time because of her virus. No, this time her nausea was the result of pure gut-churning fear, she acknowledged shakily. This time her sickness was a direct result of her own idiocy.
What on earth had possessed her? Surely common sense should have warned her that the last thing Gareth would want to do was to refer to what had happened between them last night, that he wo
uld have as much desire to put the whole incident behind him as she had herself?
He was still standing behind her, showing no sign of leaving; there was only one thing to do. Taking a deep gulp of air, she walked over to the cupboard where she kept her sweeping brush, opened it and removed the brush, and then, keeping her head down as she swept up the mess from the floor with fiercely short strokes, she muttered huskily, ‘I’m sorry. That was…that was childish of me…but as you can see…’ she paused and looked briefly at him and then back down at the floor before finishing ‘…I’m not in the most rational of moods this morning. In fact I was just about to make myself a cup of tea and go and curl up in front of the fire with an old Georgette Heyer.’
‘A sovereign remedy for a fit of the sullens,’ he commented, giving her the brief heart-catching smile she had once known so well. It made her heart shake and her throat ache as she fought the urge to drop the brush and run headlong into his arms and once there to give way to a good old-fashioned cry.
‘Look, Syb, about last night; I did—’
She could feel her body tensing, rejecting what she knew was going to come. The typical embarrassed-male admission of having been carried away by sexual desire, of having made a mistake…of wanting to apologise for any misunderstanding.
‘Please don’t say anything,’ she interrupted him. ‘It was a mistake. We both know that. I don’t want to talk about it, Gareth, and if you don’t mind I’d like you to leave.’
The barrier between them, which had fallen so briefly when he’d teased her about her love for her Regency romances, was firmly back in place. She kept her back towards him, telling him with her body language that he wasn’t welcome, no matter how much doing so might be tearing her apart inside.
She heard him open the door, and she held her breath.
‘I’m sorry…about the pig.’
It was like a blow to her heart. Did he know how much that cheap piece of china meant to her? How often over the years she had looked at it and seen his face…heard his voice…felt the warmth of his hands…the sound of his laughter? And now it was gone.