by Penny Jordan
Outside in the garden, she did a few basic warm up exercises and then turned to Sophie, showing her a simpler easy version that would not tax her growing muscles. To her delight Sophie responded enthusiastically. She had a natural physical rhythm that helped her adapt quickly to the exercise routine. Chris had deliberately opted for a “fun” tape with lively music including several “pop” songs that had recently been in the charts. She could miss out on serious exercises for one day, and the physical fun of joining in with her would be good for Sophie she was sure. The child must feel the effect of all the adult concern concentrated on her.
They were halfway through the tape when Chris suddenly became aware of a sound other than that issuing from the tape which was playing a popular hit tune. Hardly daring to believe what she was hearing she kept on moving automatically, edging slightly closer to Sophie. Disbelief made her heart turn over with joy as she discovered that she was right, Sophie was actually humming in time to the song. Chris didn’t know what to do. One part of her wanted to hug the little girl and show her excitement and yet another warned her that Sophie’s humming was entirely spontaneous, something she herself was probably not even aware of and that to draw attention to it might cause all sorts of repercussions. Suddenly she wished she knew more about Sophie’s condition; that she could help her; but not daring to do anything she simply carried on with her exercises, trying not to let Sophie sense her excitement.
She didn’t hum with any other songs, and afterwards, thinking about it, Chris realised that that particular tune had been in the hit parade for some weeks prior to Natalie’s death. Could there be any connection? She had to talk to someone. Slater was unobtainable; Sarah she couldn’t bring herself to contact, so that left who? Suddenly she thought of John Howard. He lived locally, so surely he must be in the telephone directory.
Telling herself that he probably wouldn’t even be at home, Chris nevertheless found his number and dialled it, her heart thudding with tremulous excitement.
To her relief he actually answered the ’phone. Quickly Chris announced herself. “I was wondering if you could come over,” she told him breathlessly. “It’s about Sophie…the most curious thing…I thought I heard her actually humming just now…” She held her breath dreading hearing him scorn her discovery, but to her pleasure he seemed almost as excited as she was.
“I’ll be over right away,” he told her.
Replacing the receiver, Chris went in search of Mrs Lancaster. “I’m expecting Dr Howard soon,” she told the older woman, surprised when she frowned and looked rather disapproving.
“Is something wrong?” she questioned uncertainly. “I…wanted to talk to him about Sophie…” Quickly she explained what had happened in the garden and at once Mrs Lancaster’s expression lightened.
“He’ll certainly be the best person to talk to,” she told Chris. “Used to specialise in children’s ailments before he came down here. Said it took up too much of his time.”
“Yes. I can understand that he’d want to spend as much time as he can with his wife,” Chris commented. “It must be dreadful for her, poor woman…”
“Aye, but there’s them as thinks it’s worse for him,” Mrs Lancaster told her obliquely, “being tied to an invalid and all… Of course she’s secure enough. He couldn’t divorce her. He only works part-time now and it’s her money that supports them. Comes from a very wealthy family. Her father was extremely well to do and she was the only child…”
“Oh I’m sure that isn’t the reason he stays with her,” Chris was extremely distressed by Mrs Lancaster’s comment although she couldn’t exactly say why. Perhaps it was because she had suffered so much disillusionment herself that she couldn’t bear to hear of any male betrayal of her sex.
“Maybe not.” Mrs Lancaster’s voice was non-committal but the smile she gave Chris extremely warm.
She was just going upstairs to change when the ’phone rang in the hall. She picked up the receiver, surprised to hear an unfamiliar female voice.
“I’m Helen Howard,” she introduced herself. “My husband asked me to give you a call. He was just on his way round when he was called out to an emergency—a road accident. He’ll be with you as soon as he can. How is Sophie?” she asked in concern. “She was always such a warm, responsive child, I hate to think of her suffering…”
As she suffered, Chris thought intuitively, liking the other woman without knowing her. They chatted for several minutes and then Chris hung up, retracing her footsteps to the kitchen to advise Mrs Lancaster of the changed arrangements.
It was after lunch before John Howard finally arrived. Chris was sunbathing in the garden, Sophie asleep beside her.
“Sorry I couldn’t get here sooner,” he apologised.
He looked tired, Chris realised, getting up carefully so that she didn’t disturb Sophie. “That’s all right,” she told him easily. “Your wife explained when she rang.”
Something flickered in his eyes and was gone. Pain possibly Chris decided, suddenly aware of how healthy she must appear in contrast to Helen.
“Beautiful day.” He shrugged off his jacket and grimaced. “That’s better.” He was formally dressed, wearing a striped tie that was vaguely familiar Chris realised, mentally comparing it to the one she had picked up in the cottage. Were they the same? She shrugged aside the thought as unimportant and improbable. What would one of John Howard’s ties be doing in her aunt’s cottage?
“I’ll go and make us some coffee,” Chris offered, picking up her robe and tying it. There was nothing indecent about her bikini but nevertheless she felt better a little more covered up.
When she returned with the coffee and some lemonade for Sophie the little girl was still asleep. Encouraged by John Howard she explained what had happened that morning.
“Umm, as you describe it, it sounds like a completely involuntary thing—if nothing else it proves conclusively that there’s no damage to the vocal chords, but then we never thought there was. Was Sophie herself aware of what she was doing?”
Chris shook her head. “I didn’t dare to draw attention to it. Should I…”
He shook his head anticipating her question. “No…no you did the right thing. Does Sophie have her own tape or radio?”
When she shook her head, he mused, “It might be an idea to get her one. If we can get her to respond to music it will help…” He broke off as Sophie woke up, lifting her head. Chris smiled at her, worried by the look of total terror she suddenly saw in the little girl’s eyes. As she picked her up she could feel the waves of tension shuddering through her body, but was at a loss to understand the reason for them. “What is it, darling?” she asked softly. “Did you have a bad dream?”
“Something wrong?” John Howard looked ill at ease.
“She seems terrified of something,” Chris told him. “Perhaps she’s been having a bad dream.”
“Is that what it was, Sophie?” He reached out a hand and Chris was almost overbalanced by the force with which Sophie drew away from him, clinging to her and turning her head into her shoulder. John Howard’s hand dropped away. “It seems she doesn’t much care for me,” he said wryly. “Poor Sophie, I suspect she’s grown very wary of all us medical types, and perhaps it’s no wonder.” He made no further effort to touch the little girl, and Chris was warmed by the expression of guilt and unhappiness in his eyes. He obviously cared very deeply about his patients, but she could understand that Sophie might distrust and perhaps even dislike the medical profession as a body.
“Why don’t you go upstairs and choose a book for me to read from?” she suggested softly, putting Sophie down. “Dr Howard is just going…”
They both watched her run away. “I’m sorry she reacted to you like that,” she apologised ruefully, “but…”
“You’re sorry?” His expression almost agonised he gripped her forearms, his face contorted with pain. “Chris there’s…” He broke off turning to look towards the drive as they both heard the sound of a
car.
“Slater,” Chris murmured frowning. “But he said he wouldn’t be coming home until after dinner.” She could still sense John Howard’s tension and as Slater stopped the car and climbed out, she reached up instinctively to touch his face in a gesture of commiseration, her smile warmly sympathetic. “It must be difficult for you,” she said understandingly, “but…” She had intended to go on to say that he must be used to his small patients reacting against him when they had to endure pain and suffering, but his tortured, “Difficult—my God…” stopped her. Unaware of how close they were to one another, or how their proximity might appear to an onlooker, it took Slater’s harsh exclamation to make her step back involuntarily, her nerves tensing in response to his nearness.
Dimly she was aware of John Howard saying goodbye, and something about getting in touch with her, as he hurried away, her sense totally concentrated on Slater.
“You said you weren’t coming back until after dinner.”
Stupidly she made the words sound like an accusation, and Slater’s mouth hardened. “This does happen to be my home,” he ground out bitterly, “and I won’t have you tainting it by filling it with your lovers. What’s the matter, Chris?” he demanded thickly when she simply stared at him, totally non-plussed by his accusation. “Came back at the wrong moment did I… Your body still aches for completion, does it? Well I might not be John Howard but I reckon I can satisfy you as well as he could…”
“No…” The panic-stricken word was clawed from her throat.
“Yes…”
She had always known that Slater was strong, but how strong she had not realised until he picked her up, clamping hard arms round her, carrying her over the grass despite her desperate attempts to escape. He was heading for the summerhouse, she realised dazedly gasping as he opened the door and slid her to her feet, securing her wrist with one hand, while the other deftly locked the door. She tried to escape, using her nails on his hand to try and prise them free, but apart from a brief grunt of pain there was no response. Red weals lined his tanned skin, his expression savage as he followed her glance down to them.
“My God I’ll make you pay for that,” he muttered thickly, and Chris wondered fearfully if he was temporarily deranged. There was no smell of drink on his breath, and in most respects he appeared completely normal, but there was nothing normal about the way he had dragged her in here, locking the door behind and then pocketing the key. Neither was there anything normal about the way he was watching her, the gold eyes dilated, burning with a fever that was mirrored in the dark surge of colour running up under his tanned skin. He was almost savage with rage, Chris acknowledged, shuddering deeply. He reminded her of a wild animal penned up in a cage, secured for the time being but relentlessly determined to escape, infinitely dangerous in his captivity. What was it that held Slater in captivity? The memory of Natalie? Was that why he was here? Did he share her cousin’s hatred of her? Was this his way of showing his grief? A sacrifice of her on the altar of his guilt towards Natalie?
His relationship with her cousin had obviously been particularly complex, if he was to be believed at least…but they had stayed married, and he had tolerated her infidelities.
“Is that what you like, Chrissie?” His voice was almost hypnotic. The purr of the jungle panther before it tore out its victim’s throat Chris thought trembling. “Sex mixed with violence? Is that what excites you…drawing blood physically as well as mentally?”
His words seared through her, shocking her and making her ache with renewed pain. This was not the Slater she had cherished in her memories; the lover she had dreamed of at night, even though in the morning she had managed to deny those dreams to herself.
“What I don’t like is being forced against my will, Slater.” She managed to utter the words with some semblance of self-assurance, using her model’s poise to conceal her fear. “If you just unlock the door, I’ll forget this ever happened… If not…”
“If not, you’ll what?” he jeered bitterly. “Cry rape?”
The jibe stabbed right through her body, making her tense in shock and anger, the ugliness of the word bringing a hideous reality to her situation.
“Oh no,” Slater muttered savagely. “It won’t be rape, Chrissie…that wanton body of yours is going to want me just as much as it wanted John Howard. Funny about you and Natalie, how you always wanted the same man…”
The cruel taunt robbed her of the ability to speak. She hated him for choosing now to remind her of her vulnerability to him. Of course he felt confident that he could make her want him. He knew how she had responded to him in the past. What she couldn’t understand was why he thought she had even contemplated making love with John Howard but that hardly mattered now. Somehow she was going to prove to him that she could resist him and that would take every ounce of will power she possessed.
As he came towards her she refused to move, even though every nerve in her body cried out for her to back away. Her best form of protection was cold rejection. Flight would only increase his belief that he could subdue her.
His hands untying the knot of her robe and then sliding up over her body were a shocking reality. Fiercely keeping her face averted, Chris willed herself not to react. She was simply posing for an ad, she told herself frantically, Slater’s hands were simply those of another model… But no other man had ever touched her like this, and her body refused to accept her deception. She shuddered as Slater’s fingers bit into her shoulders. “I think we can dispense with this,” he told her softly, adding mockingly. “Why are you shivering, Chrissie? You can’t possibly be cold.”
If anything the summerhouse was over-warm, and his mockery broke through the fade of her control. “Don’t call me that,” she demanded huskily, referring to his special use of her name.
“Why not? You used to like it… I was the only person who called you Chrissie, you once told me, and you said just hearing my voice saying your name brought you out in goosebumps.”
She had said that, Chris remembered achingly and although he had laughed gently at her naïveté she remembered that always after that when they were alone Slater would murmur her name against her skin, savouring her instantaneous response to him.
His hands slid the robe off her shoulders and much as she would have liked to have fought to retain it, Chris let it go. It would be undignified to struggle she told herself, and besides the best way of resisting him was simply not to respond. Her bikini wasn’t particularly brief by modern standards, but she felt acutely uncomfortable as Slater studied her.
“You always did have a beautiful body, Chrissie.” He murmured the words against the vulnerable skin of her throat. Chris gritted her teeth together, willing herself not to respond, and hating Slater with a wave of feeling so strong that it dizzied her as he laughed gently, his thumb registering the hurried thud of her pulse, his mouth, moving with unerring precision against her skin, closer and closer to the base of her throat.
Wild surges of desire tormented her, every instinct urging her response. It was so tempting simply to arch her throat against his mouth; to curl her fingers into his hair and hold him locked against her while her heated blood pounded out its message against his lips, but she wasn’t going to give in.
“Still the same old Chrissie.” His mouth left her skin, but his thumb continued to torment the thudding pulse. “Ready to cut your nose off to spite your face. You know you want me, and I know it too…”
“I don’t.” The hot denial was out before she could silence it, temper glittering greenly in her eyes. To her surprise Slater laughed, a rich, triumphant sound that skittered dangerously over her taut nerves. “Now that’s better. Real emotion at last. You’re lying, Chris,” he added sleekly. “You want me all right. I can see it here.” His thumb touched her pulsing throat, in a tormenting caress that forced her to smother an aching groan. “And here.”
His hand moved, and Chris closed her eyes in fierce pain as his thumb moved with insolent appraisal over the
hardening nub of one breast. She didn’t want to open her eyes but something forced her to do so. She didn’t want to look down at Slater’s lean brown hand where it rested against the underside of her breast, but she felt impelled to. Against the thin cotton of her bikini top her nipples strained in unmistakable arousal, panic clawing in the pit of her stomach, mingling with her aching muscles until she felt she would snap in two with tension.
“You want me,” Slater insisted thickly, “and although I’ll probably be damned for it, I ache for you.”
“No…” Her wild moan of denial seemed to unleash something deeply primitive inside him, because Slater’s restraint snapped and he pulled her fiercely against his body, brushing her against his chest, his hand trapping hers against his thigh, forcing her to acknowledge his arousal as he muttered rawly. “Yes… Yes… Chris… Feel how much I want you, and you want me the same way…I know you do.”
It was useless to keep on resisting him. The heat of his body beneath her hand in those few seconds before he had let her pull away had left her with a suffocating emotional response. She was a fool to be swayed simply by his desire for her; hadn’t she learned just how little male desire really meant? And yet the knowledge of his need of her touched off something elemental buried deep inside her that once awakened could not be subdued.
She was barely aware of her own soft moan as Slater untied her bikini top, her sense all too attuned to him; to the hurried rise and fall of his breathing; the darkening glitter of his eyes as he pushed her away from him to study the full perfection of her breasts. Heat rose up in a dark tide under his skin. He thrust off his jacket, wrenching impatiently at his tie, and as though the impatience of his movements were an echo of her own feelings Chris felt the surge of desire sweep tormentingly through her body, including a yearning ache in her lower stomach and making her breasts swell, her nipples rosily erect.
Chris had never posed for any photographs that involved her going even topless, never mind nude, and she was torn between shame and excitement as she saw Slater’s reaction to her evident arousal, and discovered the sensual pleasure of knowing he was watching her, his body taut with hunger.