To Mend a Marriage

by Carole Mortimer

  But Gemini hadn’t actually heard Jemima speak, which must mean Nick was on the telephone to her!

  Gemini stood at the top of the stairs, frozen to the spot, knowing now that it had to have been Nick’s raised voice that had woken her so suddenly, but she was unsure about whether or not to make her presence known to him.

  Had Jemima telephoned here? Or had Nick been the one to telephone Jemima? Because if it had been the latter then Nick must have known where Jemima was all the time. Which posed a whole lot of other questions.

  ‘The day after tomorrow isn’t good enough, Jemima,’ Nick rasped now, in answer to something Jemima had said to him. ‘I want you back here tomorrow. Yes—tomorrow, Jemima,’ he insisted firmly. ‘It wasn’t fair of you to just dump Jessica on Gemini the way that you did. She— Just a moment. I thought I heard something,’ he muttered impatiently.

  The ‘something’ had been Gemini accidentally touching against the vase that stood on a table at the top of the stairs, then reaching out quickly to steady it so that it didn’t fall. But obviously not before Nick had heard the faint noise it had made as it wobbled precariously…!

  Gemini moved back into the shadows of the gallery as she sensed Nick looking up the stairs into the darkness, the decision about whether or not to show herself made for her in those few seconds. Nick would think it very odd now if she were to suddenly appear at the top of the stairs!

  ‘It was nothing,’ Nick dismissed as he returned to the telephone a few seconds later, sounding somewhat calmer now. ‘Jemima, I’ve heard all your excuses before, dozens of times—remember?’ he said wearily. ‘It’s too late for explanations,’ he added hardily. ‘Just get yourself back here, where you belong!’ He slammed the telephone receiver back onto its cradle.

  Gemini moved quickly, her bare feet soundless in the carpeted hallway, reaching the sanctuary of her bedroom seconds later and closing the door behind her to lean back against it, her heart beating erratically against the silky material of her blue pyjama top.

  There had been nothing in Nick’s side of the telephone conversation to tell her who had been the one to initiate the call, and yet… Nick hadn’t sounded as if he were talking to a woman he hadn’t seen or spoken to for over a year!

  Gemini felt sick. Nick and Jemima…? She couldn’t bear it.

  Gemini sprang away from the door behind her as if it burnt her as a soft knock sounded from the other side.

  Nick!

  There was no one else it could be. But if he was knocking on her bedroom door at this time of night then he had to know she had been upstairs in the gallery listening, after all…

  ‘Gemini, I know you’re awake,’ he told her softly, instantly confirming that question.

  She might be awake, but that didn’t mean she wanted to talk to him! Because she was afraid that if she spoke to Nick at this moment she might just say something she would later regret. That both of them would regret!

  ‘Gem, please open the door…’

  She wrenched the door open, glaring at Nick as he stood outside in the hallway wearing only his black silk robe. ‘Don’t call me that!’ she snapped furiously. How dared he? When he had just been speaking to her sister!

  He held his hands up defensively. ‘Sorry,’ he sighed heavily. ‘That was Jemima on the telephone—’

  ‘I’m aware of who it was,’ she bit out, two angry spots of colour on her cheeks.

  Nick looked at her consideringly. ‘Then why didn’t you come down and speak to her yourself?’ Instead of skulking in the shadows at the top of the stairs, his tone seemed to imply!

  She hadn’t been skulking exactly, only shocked into immobility.

  ‘From what I heard, you were saying all that needed to be said.’ More than needed to be said, she would have thought!

  His eyes narrowed to green slits. ‘And what is that supposed to mean?’ His voice was dangerously soft.

  Gemini shrugged. ‘You told Jemima to come back home.’ ‘Where she belonged’, Gemini inwardly recalled painfully. Did that mean Jemima ‘belonged’ with Nick…?

  Because if it did, that put a completely different light on the whole of Nick’s conversation with her sister!

  ‘Of course I did.’ He nodded tersely. ‘Your sister seems to believe that no one else has work to do, that the whole world revolves around what she wants. I don’t— Hell, I don’t want to talk about Jemima!’ Nick muttered disgustedly, shaking his head. ‘I’m sick of talking about her. We seem to have talked about little else the last few days.’

  Gemini looked at him with apprehensive eyes. ‘Then what do you want to talk about, Nick?’

  He gave a humourless smile. ‘At two-thirty in the morning? I would rather not be talking at all.’ He sighed his impatience with the situation.

  Then what would he rather be doing? Gemini wondered with a frown, at once pushing that thought to the back of her mind. If it involved Jemima, then she wouldn’t believe him…!

  Her marriage seemed to have turned into a no-win situation!

  ‘I’m wide awake now,’ Nick bit out tersely. ‘Feel like joining me for a cup of cocoa?’ he invited.

  She wasn’t sure what she wanted any more. She knew that she loved Nick, but if he were involved with her sister again…! Much as it might grieve her to do it, if that turned out to be the case she knew she would have to be the one to end their marriage…

  ‘It’s only a cup of cocoa, Gemini,’ Nick drawled mockingly, ‘not a life-threatening decision!’

  That depended on what they talked about while they drank their cocoa! But, Gemini realised, burying her head in the sand was not going to change anything.

  ‘Fine,’ she accepted abruptly, turning to get her robe, pulling it on over her pyjamas before following Nick out of the room and down the stairs. The ticking of the grandfather clock in the hallway sounded very loud to her ears.

  Nick didn’t put on the main kitchen lights as they entered the room, moving to click on the light over the Aga, casting a warm glow over the oak kitchen cupboards.

  It was that strange time of night again, Gemini realised with dismay, when nothing seemed quite real. Least of all Nick and herself!

  ‘Would you like me to make it?’ she asked huskily.

  ‘Certainly not,’ he refused firmly. ‘I’m more than capable of making my own wife a cup of cocoa.’

  His wife… Yes, that was what she was. But in name only…

  Once again she wondered if things would be different between them if that were no longer the case. There seemed only one way to find that out!

  But could she do it? she wondered as she sipped at the mug of cocoa Nick had made and placed in front of her. Could she actually change this situation by having Nick make love to her? Did she want to?

  The answer to that was all too easy to find; until she heard from Nick’s own lips that it was Jemima he still cared for, Gemini knew she would do anything to try and salvage their marriage. Anything at all…

  ‘Hey, I didn’t mean it literally earlier, about not talking.’ Nick teasingly interrupted her thoughts, sitting opposite her at the kitchen table now.

  God, he was so good-looking, Gemini groaned inwardly. The darkness of his hair was ruffled, the hard planes of his face softened by the muted lighting in the room, and the warmth of his body seemed to reach out and enfold her.

  ‘Gemini…?’ he questioned uncertainly, his gaze narrowed on her flushed face.

  Flushed because she wanted Nick, wanted him so much she physically ached with it. And the way things stood between them now, she knew she had little to lose!

  So what if she did make a fool of herself? She was twenty-nine years old, for goodness’ sake, not some gauche teenager. Even if she would never get over loving Nick, she would recover if he physically rejected her. And there was no reason why Nick should reject her; he’d found her attractive enough the other night. Besides, she was Nick’s wife, damn it, and if any woman was entitled to share his bed it was her!

  She wo
uld not give Nick up without a fight!

  ‘Nick,’ she returned huskily, putting down her empty mug as she held his gaze.

  Which wasn’t so easy to do with Nick looking at her so searchingly. But she forced herself not to let her gaze waver from his, at the same time doing nothing to hide the desire she felt for him.

  Nick stood up slowly, coming round the table to pull her to her feet; Gemini stood several inches shorter than him without the benefit of shoes. Nick’s hand gently touched beneath her chin as he tilted her face up to his, continuing that searching gaze over her flushed face and feverish eyes.

  ‘Gemini, are you sure this is what you want?’ he finally murmured huskily, frowning. ‘I realise today has been a difficult time for you—

  ‘Nick, why don’t you stop talking and just kiss me?’ she groaned, pushing all thoughts of the disastrous day firmly behind her. She was the one here with Nick now, and it would be her that he made love to. She would make sure of that!

  ‘Are you going to regret this tomorrow?’ Still Nick hesitated.

  ‘Has no one ever told you, Nick? Tomorrow never comes!’ Gemini dismissed unflinchingly.

  ‘That won’t stop you hating me,’ he sighed.

  She put her arms about him, pressing her body warmly against his. ‘I like and respect you too much, Nick, to ever hate you,’ she assured him huskily.

  And it was true. No matter what happened, she wouldn’t hate Nick. He had been completely honest with her from the beginning of their marriage, had never made any pretence of loving her, of marrying her for any other reason than that her sister and his brother had both let them down so badly; she was the one who had changed, not Nick.

  ‘Famous last words, Gemini?’ he said ruefully, but his arms moved about her waist, pulling her closer against him.

  ‘I don’t care—as long as they’re the last ones for some time!’ she returned dismissively, her face raised invitingly as his mouth at last lowered to hers.

  It was as if the hours since Saturday night, since she had last been in Nicks arms, had never happened; that fiery passion was instantly rekindled, setting Gemini on fire, her body curving into the warm hardness of his.

  He felt so good, his shoulders broad and muscled beneath her fingertips, his chest lightly covered with dark hair as she pushed aside his robe, the nakedness of his thighs strong and powerful.

  ‘Gemini—’

  ‘No talking,’ she reminded him, placing her fingers lightly over his lips.

  He smiled down at her, gently kissing each fingertip before removing her hand, but keeping it held tightly in his. ‘I was only going to suggest we go upstairs to bed—unless you want me to make love to you on the kitchen table?’ he teased huskily.

  She laughed softly. ‘Novel—but I doubt it would be very comfortable!’

  Her hand remained clasped in his as they went slowly up the stairs together. Gemini was feeling slightly shy now, but determined, nevertheless, to see this through. Anything to make it harder for Nick to end their marriage!

  By tacit agreement it was her bedroom they went to, the bedside lamp still on from when Gemini had switched it on earlier, after being woken by Nick’s raised voice down in the hallway.

  ‘Leave it,’ Nick encouraged softly as she would have reached out and switched off the lamp. ‘Unless you mind—?’ Being swept away on a tide of passion as they had been on Saturday night, and again a few minutes ago downstairs, was one thing, but— ‘No,’ she assured him huskily. ‘I don’t mind.’

  Nick drew in a ragged breath, reaching out to untie her robe and slip it off her shoulders before letting it fall onto the carpeted floor at their feet, the blue silk top quickly following it.

  ‘You’re beautiful, Gemini,’ he murmured throatily, gently cupping each of her breasts before bending his head and kissing each fiery tip.

  She groaned low in her throat, her legs feeling suddenly weak. Her back arched as Nick’s tongue moistly caressed each breast, seeming to savour the taste of her, and trembling pleasure coursed through the whole of her body.

  Nick’s lips blazed a trail of fire down her ribcage to her navel, his tongue caressing the tiny cavern before his lips moved even lower. Gemini’s blue silk trousers fell fluidly to the floor as he released the single button from its fastening, leaving her completely naked before him.

  Gemini gasped, her fingers becoming entangled in the dark thickness of his hair, her body arching in aching need as those caressing lips moved across her thighs.

  Nick’s eyes were dark with passion as he looked up at her. ‘If you want me to stop—’

  ‘I don’t,’ she assured him breathlessly. ‘Please!’

  ‘God, Gemini..!’ His arms were about her thighs as he briefly held her to him before standing up. ‘Now me,’ he invited huskily, standing back slightly so that she could reach the belt to his robe.

  But even so Gemini’s fingers fumbled with the single fastening. She was trembling with desire, and yet at the same time wanting to savour Nick’s body as he had just drunk in all of her.

  Totally naked, there was only one word to describe Nick, the same word he had used to describe her minutes ago: beautiful.

  It seemed a strange word to associate with the hard, arrogant man who was her husband, but it was still the only word Gemini could think of to describe the lithe planes of his body, the dark hair on his chest, moving in a vee down to his muscular thighs, his legs, long and powerful. There was not an ounce of superfluous flesh on the whole of his body.

  Gemini moved, kissing his chest as he had kissed her, rewarded by his sharply indrawn breath as he tried to stay motionless before her. Tried, because as her lips ad hands followed the same path over his body as his had over hers Nick was finding it more and more difficult to withstand those kisses and caresses.

  ‘No more, Gemini!’ he groaned. ‘Not unless you want me to totally lose control!’ He reached down and pulled her effortlessly to her feet, his face contorted almost painfully at the effort it had taken to stop those caressing hands and lips.

  He threw back the bedclothes before gently laying her down, quickly joining her, his mouth once more claiming hers.

  It was like drowning, being washed away on a tide of weightlessness, no thought possible, only feeling. Feeling such as Gemini had never known before. Nick taking her again and again to the brink of total mindlessness.

  No part of her remained untouched or unkissed by him; every curve and hollow, explored and captured, became his for the taking.

  And Nick’s body became as familiar to her as her own, every muscle, every smooth contour lovingly touched as she kissed him in return.

  She was so roused now that the low sounds in her throat had turned from ones of pleasure to pleading; she wanted him inside her, to know his full possession.

  ‘Not yet,’ he groaned, his head against her breasts. ‘I never want this to end!’

  She didn’t want it to end, either, wanted it to be their beginning…!

  ‘Please, Nick,’ she sighed achingly, her legs moistly entwined with his, reaching down to cup his face with her hands, looking down intently into his passion-flushed face. ‘Say it, Nick,’ she encouraged longingly. ‘Say my name!’ Her voice broke emotionally.

  ‘Gemini…?’ he repeated dazedly. ‘Gemini, Gemini, Gemini!’ He groaned shakily.

  She gave a breathless laugh. ‘Make love to me, Nick. Please!’

  With one last slightly puzzled look he shifted slightly, and they were finally one…

  So closely entwined were they now that Gemini wasn’t sure where she ended and Nick began, and as he began to move slowly inside her she didn’t particularly care!

  He had filled her with burning pleasure before, but now she was consumed, totally lost, falling over that precipice time and time again before she felt Nick totally lose control himself, his body arching slightly before he surrendered to his own pleasure, taking her with him to a plateau of sensation she hadn’t known existed.

  Only the so
und of their ragged breathing filled the air now, and Nick reached down to pull the bedclothes up over their rapidly cooling bodies, resting her head on his shoulder as his arms gathered her close against him.

  Gemini knew she should say something, anything, but as deep, satisfied tiredness washed over her she knew it would have to wait, that she couldn’t have spoken now even if she’d tried.

  But she was with the man she loved, held protectively against the warmth of his body. And he was going to stay exactly where he was, had no intention of returning to his own bedroom after their lovemaking, as she had once dreaded he might. For the moment it was enough…

  Gemini had no idea what time it was when she woke the next morning, but she could see the sun shining brightly behind her bedroom curtains so it had to be somewhere around breakfast time. Not that she had any appetite. Not for food, anyway…!

  She smiled to herself, remembering all that had happened the night before, that smile fading as she turned over and discovered she was alone in her big double bed, that there was no Nick lying beside her.

  But he had been there—hadn’t he…? It hadn’t all been a dream, as it had so many other nights—had it?

  No, it hadn’t been a dream, she realised as she moved, her body aching from the unaccustomed lovemaking, a pleasurable ache. She remembered that Nick had woken her again some time during the night. Their second lovemaking, now that they were familiar with each other, had been even more enjoyable than their first.

  But where was Nick now?

  She sat up on the side of the bed, her cheeks feeling hot as she looked down at her own nakedness, seeing the marks of Nick’s passion against her creamy breasts, the slight redness that indicated he had been in need of a shave.

  But she was glad of those marks, knew they were confirmation that everything about last night was real, and not a dream after all.