by Penny Jordan
Lucy had another gulp of her favourite caffeine fix and idly scanned the huge double-page spread of photographs from Nat’s christening which, true to form, Dorland had used as his centrepiece for that week’s A-List Life. There was one especially good photograph of her holding her new godson, with Marcus standing at her side.
Marcus. She was doing the right thing in marrying him, she told herself firmly.
There was a loud knock on her half-open office door and she swung round eagerly, hoping to see Marcus, although he had told her that he was driving to Manchester today to see a client.
‘Lucy. Good, I hoped you would be here.’
Andrew Walker.
Lucy stared at her unexpected and definitely unwanted visitor in apprehensive dismay, unable to say anything more than an uncomfortable, ‘Oh! Andrew. You did get my letter, didn’t you?’
‘Yes, Lucy. I got your letter,’ he confirmed, walking past her to stand in front of the window, so that her expression was plainly revealed to him whilst he was just a fuzzy dark blur against the sunlit windows.
‘I was very sorry to learn that you no longer wanted to proceed with our plans. In fact I was so disappointed that I thought I’d come and see you to see if I could find a way to persuade you to change your mind.’
Was she imagining it, or was there a subtle threat in those calmly spoken words? Lucy could feel the sharp hammer-blows of her heartbeat as it mirrored her fear.
‘I explained in my letter, Andrew. I’m getting married and—’
‘Yes, indeed. To Marcus Carring, I believe.’
‘Yes,’ Lucy acknowledged. ‘Yes. And once we are married Marcus wants to become my partner in Prêt a Party.’ That should convince Andrew Walker that it wasn’t just her he had to contend with now, even if she was in reality fibbing to him.
‘Really?’
There was something in the way Andrew Walker was looking at her that made Lucy feel afraid.
‘You know, my dear, you are turning down a wonderful business opportunity here. And as for allowing your husband to be to become your partner... One never knows these days what the future of a marriage will be. Modern marriages are such very flimsy constructions at the best of times, don’t you think? A sensible woman might think it a good idea to maintain her own financial independence from her husband.’
Lucy only just managed to stop herself from gasping out loud. Had Andrew Walker somehow read her mind? What he had just said echoed everything she had been saying to herself.
‘My partners and I are prepared to make you a very generous offer to buy into Prêt a Party, Lucy, and I can give you my assurance that everything will be dealt with very discreetly. The cash could be paid into an overseas bank of your choice, should you want that, and no one apart from ourselves need ever know anything about the whole transaction.’
If she hadn’t known the truth about him she would have been very tempted to accept what he was offering her, Lucy recognised. Because, despite the fact that Marcus physically desired her, her fear that without love their marriage could not survive would not go away. It was that fear that had prevented her from accepting Marcus’s offer of finance and his suggestion that he came into the business, and that fear, too, that made her want to keep Prêt a Party under her own control and not share it with a husband.
But Andrew Walker’s statement had reminded her of everything Dorland had said to her.
‘No, I suppose they needn’t—including those poor wretches whose lives you’ve ruined to get the money in the first place,’ she burst out impetuously. ‘I know all about why you want Prêt a Party, you know—and what you’re doing.’
There was a small, tight silence and then Andrew Walker said sharply, ‘Do you indeed?’
She had made another mistake, Lucy realised. And a very bad one.
How had she ever thought of Andrew Walker’s face as nondescript and pleasant? Now, as he came towards her, she could see the real Andrew Walker instead of the kindly mask he had hidden behind.
Dorland had been right. This was a very bad man. Fear pooled in her stomach and her muscles tightened round it.
Exactly the same feelings of sick disbelief and fear she had experienced when she had first learned of Nick’s treachery were coiling through her stomach now. And, exactly as it had been then, her first thought was that she wished desperately that Marcus were her to help her. Her second was that she was equally desperately glad that he wasn’t here to witness her stupidity.
And yet she was still unable to stop herself from repeating shakily, ‘I do know all about how you and your partners make your money, and why you want Prêt a Party.’
‘You know, Lucy, you really shouldn’t listen to gossip from jealous and unreliable sources,’ Andrew Walker told her evenly. ‘Why don’t you take my advice and think a little bit harder about our offer, and about letting Marcus Carring become your partner? That wouldn’t be a very good move, and my colleagues would certainly not be pleased were you to do that. After all, as I just said, nothing is certain in this life—especially not marriage. You’ve been married once already, and—’
‘I won’t listen to any more.’ Lucy stopped him passionately. ‘There isn’t any point in you trying to pressure me by offering me money. I don’t want it and I won’t change my mind.’
‘Are you sure you’re doing the right thing marrying Carring, Lucy?’
His question caught her off guard.
‘Yes, of course I’m sure,’ she lied. ‘I love him.’ That much at least was the truth. ‘In fact I’ve always loved him,’ she added defiantly.
She could see that her declaration had not pleased him. He doubtless knew that he would not be able to deceive and bully Marcus the way he had tried to do her.
‘I’d advise you to think very carefully about what I’ve just said,’ he told her sharply. ‘Oh, and I wouldn’t tell Marcus Carring about our conversation if I were you—for your own sake and for his.’ Andrew Walker ignored her attempted reply to that, and stepped past her to open the office door. ‘I shall be in touch.’
He’d gone. He’d actually gone. Lucy felt sick with relief. When she attempted to stand to go and lock her office door, to make sure he couldn’t come back, her legs simply would not support her.
She would have to close down Prêt a Party completely now, she decided shakily. She couldn’t think of any other way to protect both herself and her business.
When Marcus questioned why she was giving up the business she had fought so hard to keep going, she would simply have to tell him that she had been giving the matter a great deal of thought and that she wanted to concentrate on them—their marriage and their future together.
Lie to him, in other words.
The sick feeling in the pit of her stomach increased.
But what other choice did she have? How could she tell him the truth now? If she told him he would stand there and look at her the way he had when she’d had to tell him that Nick had not just been unfaithful to her but that he had also defrauded the business. With angry disbelief, with irritation and with contempt. She just did not think she could bear that.
* * *
‘It’s supposed to be bad luck for you to see me in my outfit before we get married, you know,’ Lucy reproached Marcus.
Marcus had just let them both into his house, having picked up Lucy from her parents’ home earlier.
‘You aren’t in your wedding outfit,’ he pointed out. ‘At least, not unless you’ve changed your mind and you intend to marry me wearing jeans.’
‘Don’t be silly. I’m not wearing the dress now, but I was when you came round.’
‘I didn’t see you in it, though,’ Marcus assured her, but Lucy could see that he had his fingers crossed behind his back, and she couldn’t help but smile, albeit a little bit wanly. These last few weeks had b
een so stressful.
‘Cheer up—it will soon be over now,’ Marcus told her, as though he had somehow guessed how she felt. ‘And then once we’re on honeymoon you’ll be able to relax.’
Lucy exhaled heavily and told him emphatically, ‘I can’t wait.’
There was a small potent silence during which her colour rose. She saw the way Marcus was looking at her, and then he said obliquely, ‘No, I don’t think I can either.’
Silently they both looked at one another.
‘It’s been a very long few weeks,’ Lucy told him breathlessly. The look she had seen in his eyes was causing her heart to jerk about inside her chest as though he was holding it on a string.
As he stood watching her Marcus was suddenly aware of a most peculiar emotion filling him and driving him. A need—a compulsion, almost—to take Lucy in his arms and keep her there, whilst he...
He shook his head, trying to dispel the unfamiliar emotions that were gripping him. ‘Why don’t we...?’ he began slowly, and then frowned as they were interrupted by the sound of the doorbell being rung. He went to open the door and, while Lucy watched, took a package from the waiting courier and signed for it.
‘Do you want to make us both a drink while I check to see what this is?’ he asked her.
She just couldn’t resist the temptation to look at him, Lucy admitted to herself as she lingered to watch him as he began to open the package. When he did so, removing the contents and studying them, a couple of photographs slid free and fell onto the floor.
Automatically Lucy went to pick them up.
‘No—don’t touch them. Leave them.’
The harshness of his grim command instantly reminded her of the old Marcus. ‘What—?’ she began, and then stopped as she stared down at the floor and the photograph that was lying there face upwards.
She had heard of the expression ‘her blood ran cold’, but she had never until that moment imagined she might experience it as a physical sensation—as though the warmth of her blood was draining away to be replaced with something that felt like ice.
‘Marcus...’ Her voice a shocked, disbelieving whisper of anguish, she looked from the photograph to his unreadable face and then back to the photograph again.
On it her own face stared back at her: her mouth smiling, her eyes open, alight with excitement and delight. And the reason for that delight was...
She looked at the photograph again and her stomach heaved. Her body was naked, her arms and legs spread, held down by four sets of male hands, whilst a fifth man was positioned between her spread legs, obviously having sex with her.
Like someone in a trance, she bent down and picked up the other photograph.
‘Lucy! No!’
Marcus made a lunge to stop her, but he was still holding the contents of the package. Ignoring him as though she hadn’t even heard him, Lucy turned over the second photograph. This one was even worse. A woman had joined the men—a woman wearing a dildo—and she—they—she and the men—were all doing the most vile things to and with one another. And she was eagerly and willingly participating in it all.
She looked at what Marcus was holding. More photographs and a video. There was a picture of her on the front of the video—naked, her legs spread. The caption on it read: Lucy Loves Lickin’ Lust. Watch her in action!
Lucy felt her stomach heave.
She ran to the bathroom and was immediately and violently sick. Shivering with disgust, she clung to the basin and turned on the taps, washing her face and then cleaning her teeth. She wanted to tear off her clothes and stand under the hottest, hardest shower she could find. She wanted to scrub at her skin and somehow remove the filth she could almost feel clinging to her.
‘Lucy.’
Marcus was standing in the open doorway to the bathroom, an expression in his eyes that she distantly thought looked like pain, but which she knew must be disgust.
‘It isn’t me,’ she told him, slowly and carefully, fixing her gaze on the far wall so that she didn’t have to look at him and see in his eyes what she knew would be there. If he had looked at her before with irritation and contempt, that was nothing to how he would be looking at her now. ‘I know it looks like me, but it isn’t.’
Silence.
What had she expected? That he would sweep her up into his arms and tell her that he loved her? After seeing that?
‘You won’t want to marry me now, of course. How could you?’ She was amazed at how calm and accepting she sounded. How reasoning and distanced from the wild, shrieking agony of pain and disbelief inside her.
‘I’d better go home and tell everyone.’ How was she managing to sound so polite? So much as though she were attending a formal tea party at her great-aunt’s rather than experiencing, enduring what she was going through?
She certainly felt as cold as though she were at her great-aunt’s, she admitted, as her teeth started to chatter and rigours of icy cold gripped her body.
‘Lucy.’
Marcus’s hands felt so warm as they cupped her face, and his body was so reassuringly close, even though she hadn’t even seen him cross the space between them.
‘Please don’t,’ she begged him piteously, as her body caved in to her shock and tears welled in her eyes to roll down her face. ‘Please don’t make it harder for me, Marcus. I know what you must be thinking, and how you must feel.’
‘Do you?’ he demanded, so savagely that she flinched. ‘No, I don’t think you do,’ he told her harshly. ‘I don’t think you can know how I feel knowing that you have been exposed to this kind of...of filth. That you have been dragged into it and degraded by it.’
‘Marcus, I haven’t. It isn’t me. Please believe me. It isn’t.’ She couldn’t hold back the words any longer, even though she knew he would not and could not possibly believe her. Not with the evidence of those horrible photographs.
She could see how darkly he was frowning at her, probably thinking she was compounding her guilt by lying about it.
‘I know it isn’t you,’ he said, with an almost dismissive shrug. ‘It’s obvious that it couldn’t possibly be you. How could it be?’
He believed her?
‘You...you know that it isn’t me?’ Lucy repeated cautiously, afraid to trust in her own hearing.
‘Yes, of course I know it isn’t you,’ Marcus replied, with familiar sharp impatience.
‘But how? How can you know?’ Lucy asked him shakily.
‘Apart from anything else, you have a small but very identifying mole, high up on the outside of your left thigh,’ Marcus told her calmly. ‘And whoever posed for the body shots for this—this abomination doesn’t.’
‘Oh!’
How very weird that the most important thing in her whole life should hang on the existence of one tiny brown mole; that something not much larger than a pinhead could make the difference between happiness for the rest of her life or misery until she died—between trust and doubt, between truth and lies, between being married to Marcus and being rejected by him.
‘It’s obvious that someone has superimposed your face on the body of someone else.’
‘But someone else without my mole,’ Lucy said, as lightly as she could.
Marcus was frowning at her now.
‘The mole is simply a confirmation of what I already know, Lucy,’ he told her coolly. ‘My own judgement is all I need to know that you could never be the woman depicted in those photographs.’
To Marcus’s own disbelief he realised that he wanted to reach for her and hold her; that he wanted to tell her he would kill, breath by breath, painfully and slowly, whoever was responsible for what had happened; that he wanted to tell her that he knew not just with his intellect but also with his heart, with the deepest part of himself, that she would never ever indulge in the kind of scenario t
he photographs depicted. He wanted to tell her that he knew that she was a sensualist, a woman who loved the intimacy of one-to-one lovemaking, a woman who celebrated her womanhood in the act of sharing pleasure with just one man.
But how could he be feeling like this? He did not feel things. He thought through his decisions logically and calmly. He did not ‘sense’ them. He did not allow his emotions to sway his judgement. And, most of all, he did not allow himself to feel his heart turning over inside his chest in a roll of raw agony because Lucy’s pain was his pain. Because if he did, then that meant—
Angrily he slammed the door against the knowledge he did not want to accept.
‘But why would anyone want to do such a thing?’ Lucy was asking, giving him something logical to focus on and deal with. ‘Never mind send those...those things to you?’
‘It’s probably just someone’s idea of a joke,’ Marcus told her, intent on refusing to analyse what was happening to him inside his head. No, not his head but his heart—that part of him that he had told himself, when he had finally accepted that his father had deserted them, would in future only be allowed to operate physically, never emotionally.
‘A joke?’
‘Yes, it happens all the time.’ He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Young idiots like your cousin Johnny, for instance, who have nothing better to do and—’
‘But, Marcus, something like this isn’t a joke,’ Lucy protested.
‘Look, let’s just forget about it, shall we?’ Marcus told her briskly. ‘After all, we’ve both recognised it for what it is—at best a stupid, senseless and very tasteless joke, and at worst a malicious attempt to damage our relationship.’
‘But who would do a thing like that?’ Lucy asked, worry crinkling her forehead.