Later, when they were packing away the picnic things, she fell quiet. It had been an unforgettable evening and Guy’s inventive lovemaking had been tempered with such sensitivity and tenderness that she felt consumed by guilt over what she was doing to him. She found it difficult to meet his eyes knowing that as soon as possible she would be handing him over to the fraud squad, and he’d learn that she too had been nothing but a fraud, except that she wasn’t faking any longer. She was falling in love with him, and it was like a nightmare come true.
‘I don’t want you to come into work tomorrow,’ he said when they finally arrived back at her house in the early hours of the morning.
‘Why not?’ asked Cressida.
‘Because I want you to rest. We’re going out again tomorrow night, to a very special party, and I think you need some rest after this evening!’
‘What kind of a party?’ enquired Cressida, trying to work out what this all meant.
‘We’re going to visit Sir Peter Thornton and his wife Rose. I’m sure you remember them – they were at Marcia’s dinner party.’
‘Leonora’s parents,’ said Cressida.
‘Well, he’s her father but Rose is just another stepmother. You will come, won’t you? It’s important to me that we’re there together.’
‘Why not Marcia?’ demanded Cressida.
Guy put an arm round the back of her seat. ‘Do you want me to take Marcia?’ he asked.
In a way she did, because she knew that one of Sir Peter’s pictures had been taken away by Guy for cleaning and that at this meeting he might well return it, which meant that the swop would have been accomplished and she would be forced to reveal the truth to Detective Chief Inspector Williams, but it was her job and no matter what her personal feelings were she had to go through with it now. ‘Of course not,’ she said quietly.
‘That’s a relief! I’ll collect you at eight. Don’t worry about what, to wear. I’ll bring something with me and you can change before we go. You see, it’s a rather special evening.’
‘Fine,’ said Cressida, and then to her surprise Guy leant over and kissed her on the mouth, his lips suddenly fierce against hers as though he was trying desperately to make her his, although she knew that he was not a man who would ever want to possess any woman totally.
Her call to her chief that night was brief, and while she made it clear that she and Guy were now lovers she kept all the details to herself. When he heard about the following night’s visit to his friend, Detective Chief Inspector Williams could hardly restrain his delight. ‘I think we’ve nearly got him now!’ he crowed down the phone. ‘You’re doing brilliantly, WPC Farleigh. I just hope it isn’t too much of a trial for you.’ She heard him laugh as he hung up.
It took her several hours to get to sleep as her sense of duty battled with her new feelings for Guy, feelings that she felt sure were reciprocated. Even though he might not be capable of the kind of commitment she would have liked, she sensed that he was attracted to her in several ways, enjoying her company as well as her body.
At six the following morning, after only an hour’s sleep, her phone went and she stumbled out of bed convinced for some strange reason that it was Marcia calling to make a scene. It wasn’t; it was Detective Chief Inspector Williams.
‘I had to call you,’ he said shortly, his voice curt to the point of rudeness. ‘It seems that the Matisse we gave to the gallery for cleaning has been returned and examined by our experts. It’s the original.’
‘The original!’ Cressida’s heart gave a thump and she failed to keep the relief out of her voice.
‘It’s hardly something to rejoice about,’ her chief pointed out. ‘If it had been a fake we would have known for certain that we were right and any information you got would simply have been the necessary corroboration. Now your findings are vital. You have to tie in everyone who works on this; Marcia, Guy Cronje and that artist fellow you went out with before Guy.’
‘Rick Marks,’ said Cressida slowly.
Her boss laughed. ‘That’s right, the excellent climber of gates, Rick Marks. I saw you both that night. You were showing commendable devotion to duty. I was proud of you! Remember, you probably haven’t much time. I imagine that by now Cronje is having enquiries made about you and it won’t be difficult for a man like him to get to the truth within a few days. You must nail him as soon as possible. If what you told me about Sir Peter’s true then it might well be that you can do it tonight.’
‘Yes, I think it might,’ said Cressida slowly, remembering Sir Peter’s Holbein that had been entered in the renovations book.
‘Excellent! Good luck then. We’ll be near you tonight, but not too close. He’s clever and we don’t want to scare him off.’
Once she’d been woken Cressida found it impossible to get back to sleep. Instead she drank endless cups of coffee as her mind went over and over the previous evening. The truth was that she didn’t want to come to the end of the assignment and walk away knowing that she’d helped put Guy, Rick or even Marcia in prison. They’d all played such an important part in changing her, in making her aware that there was more to life than police work and basic sex. She felt more liberated and confident in her sexuality since working at the gallery. It seemed a poor way to reward them, and for the first time she was ashamed of what she was doing.
‘It isn’t as though the owners lose out,’ she said to herself as she popped some bread in the toaster. ‘The insurance companies pay in the end.’ But she knew really that this wasn’t the point. Fraud was a serious crime, and so was abuse of trust, which Guy was doing to his friends. If she trapped him by the same method then perhaps there was a strange kind of justice in it, but it still didn’t make her feel good.
After she’d rung in and told Marcia she had a migraine and wouldn’t be going to the gallery that day, she went back to bed and managed a few hours’ sleep. She knew that it was important she didn’t look tired tonight, when Guy had made such a point of her staying at home to rest.
During the afternoon, as she bathed and did her hair and nails, she had time to wonder if he’d wanted her absent for other reasons. In order to collect the false painting to give Sir Peter perhaps, or to give himself and Marcia time to look into Cressida’s background uninterrupted. Anything was possible, and she knew that whatever the truth of it Guy wouldn’t give anything away when he collected her. He was far too professional for that, and she would have to rely on her instinct and training to see her through the night.
He arrived on time, carrying a soft holdall in his hand, and after he’d kissed her passionately he put the holdall down and unzipped it. ‘I expect you’d like to see what you’re going to wear,’ he said with a smile. Cressida nodded. ‘Go ahead, take it out then,’ he instructed her.
Cressida reached inside, glowing with excitement. She’d already decided that it would probably be something long worn with a mask, as a masked ball theme seemed the type of party Sir Peter Thornton and his wife Rose would enjoy.
However, inside the holdall were three items of clothing, and none of them were anything like Cressida had imagined. Firstly she drew out a black satin half-cup bra, underwired, with shoestring straps and a black and white embroidered lace centrepiece and side panels. This was followed by a pair of matching embroidered transparent briefs with a black satin panel that would at least preserve her modesty a little, and finally there was a short, long-sleeved black kimono.
Cressida spread the three garments out on the sofa and shook her head in disbelief. ‘I can’t go out to dinner wearing these!’ she exclaimed.
Guy looked surprised. ‘Why not?’
‘Because I’ll look ridiculous! What will the other guests be wearing? I mean, even a pyjama party doesn’t produce this kind of outfit. Well, not the ones I’ve been to.’
‘We’re the only guests,’ said Guy quietly.
Cressida stared at him. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean precisely what I say. You and I are invited to d
ine with Sir Peter Thornton and his wife, and this is the way Sir Peter wants you to dress. Marcia’s done it before now, although that was for Lord Summers and his wife when he was alive. I’m hoping you’ll prove to be a better companion than she was then. She failed to get into the spirit of the dinner and disappointed poor Michael, which meant that Alice didn’t have such a good time as she’d hoped either.’
‘I’ve no idea what you’re talking about,’ said Cressida, but she was beginning to feel very nervous indeed, especially when she realised that she had to go tonight, no matter how outrageous the demands Guy was placing on her might be.
‘We’re not just guests,’ explained Guy, ‘we’re also the after-dinner entertainment. You see, men like Sir Peter, older men with much younger wives, frequently have problems satisfying them physically and quite often the sight of another couple making love proves to be the turn-on they need to get started. That’s how it was with Lord Summers, and that’s the way it is with Sir Peter as well. Rose often feels very neglected, and I’d like her to enjoy herself tonight.’
‘You mean, we’re going to make love in front of them?’ asked Cressida, stunned by his words.
Guy smiled at her. ‘Yes, and if you look as fantastic as you looked last night then Sir Peter’s a very lucky man.’
‘I can’t,’ said Cressida flatly.
Guy stroked the side of her neck and nuzzled her ear. ‘Of course you can. You’re a born exhibitionist. You loved it when you thought there were other people in the woods yesterday; it increased your excitement. You said so yourself and I could tell by your responses. Well, this will be even better.’
‘I don’t want him to touch me,’ said Cressida, horrified at the prospect of ending up like Alice in Marcia’s basement.
‘Of course not. The whole point of this is that he finds he can’t keep his hands off Rose. It would be rather a waste if he used up his energy on you. Come along, Cressida, don’t go all conventional on me at this late hour. I thought I knew you, but it seems I may have made a mistake.’
He started to put the clothes back in the bag and Cressida immediately snatched them away from him. ‘No, you didn’t make a mistake,’ she assured him. ‘I was taken by surprise, that’s all.’ It was true, she had been taken by surprise, but now she was beginning to warm to the idea. It was lucky that she was, because Detective Chief Inspector Williams would certainly be very displeased if she failed to attend the meeting between Guy Cronje and his personal friend Sir Peter Thornton, especially if at that meeting a fake picture was handed over to the unsuspecting older man.
Guy gave a sigh of relief. ‘That’s wonderful,’ he whispered. ‘Now put it all on, I’ll wrap a cloak that I’ve got in the car round you and we can be on our way. You won’t regret this, Cressida. It will be the most exciting evening of your life.’
‘I hope you don’t regret it,’ said Cressida softly.
Guy raised his eyebrows. ‘Why should I?’
She swallowed hard, knowing that she simply couldn’t warn him. ‘I might disappoint you when it comes to the action,’ she explained.
He shook his head. ‘I don’t think so, Cressida. In fact, I find it hard to believe you’d ever do anything that would disappoint me.’
She wished he’d never said those words because they echoed through her head for the entire drive and when she climbed out of his car and he took her hand, giving it an encouraging squeeze before they entered their hosts’ house, she wanted to cry for all that they were both going to lose in the very near future.
Chapter Twelve
NEITHER SIR PETER Thornton nor his wife showed any surprise at the clothes that Cressida was wearing beneath her cloak, which were in stark contrast to Guy’s charcoal striped, three-piece suit and burnt orange open-necked shirt, and after a pre-dinner sherry and some polite smalltalk the four of them moved into a dining room which Cressida thought had probably originally been intended as a study.
It was beautifully decorated, with pale blue walls and matching blinds, hangings and tablecloth in a blue and white replica of the Frey print, ‘Gonesse’. The ladderback chairs had heavily padded seats, a fact which pleased Cressida as she had nothing to cushion her legs since all her clothing ended just below her hips.
‘I think I’d rather like to work at the gallery,’ remarked Rose as they ate their first course of tiny strips of smoked salmon and salad. ‘Everything’s so well hung there!’ She laughed and reached over to stroke Guy’s thigh.
Cressida realised then that Rose and Guy must at some stage have had an affair, but Guy carefully removed her hand and started talking to Sir Peter about stocks and shares. Rose, looking rather put out by his rejection, fell silent.
It seemed an awkward meal to Cressida, and not in the least erotic, but when the dessert arrived that all changed. It was a delicious mixture of crumbled sticky meringue, creamy vanilla ice cream and real apricots. As soon as they’d been served Guy picked up his spoon, dipped it into Cressida’s bowl and started to spoonfeed her. When a few crumbs of meringue escaped from her mouth he leant towards her and slowly licked them away before softly kissing the corners of her mouth.
Cressida saw that Sir Peter was watching them closely, his own dessert untouched as he stared with rapt attention at his guest. Rose however ignored them and ate in a distinctly unerotic sullen silence.
When all of Cressida’s dessert had gone, Guy ate his own, but as he ate he kept reaching across and gently caressing the exposed tops of her breasts through the open front of her kimono. Once or twice he allowed a finger to slip lower and tease one of her nipples, which soon started to swell so that they were clearly visible through the satin bra.
‘I think we’ll take coffee in another room,’ said Sir Peter in slightly strangled tones. ‘Rose, my dear, bring it upstairs if you please.’
He led his guests into the same bedroom where, unknown to him, Guy and Rose had made love to Leonora and her boyfriend a few weeks earlier. There he settled himself back on the bed, sitting propped upright against a mound of pillows. ‘As soon as Rose gets here you can continue,’ he said to Guy, giving Cressida a rather shy smile of appreciation.
Cressida was surprised to find that she didn’t feel shy. She felt surprisingly comfortable with what was happening, and she thought this was partly due to the fact that Rose was obviously not enjoying it as much as her husband. She was jealous, and she couldn’t hide it. The moment Rose joined them she too went and sat at the head of the huge bed she shared with her husband, and her short shift dress rose up to enable him to easily caress her thighs if he wished.
‘Cressida, come and lie down across the foot of the bed,’ said Guy, taking her by the hand and leading her towards the other couple. Then he slipped off her kimono and spread her across the width of the bed with a pillow beneath her head and another one beneath the middle of her back so that her belly was lifted higher.
‘Where shall I begin?’ he asked her quietly. Cressida’s breasts were already aching from the caresses they’d received during dinner and she touched them with her right hand. ‘Say it,’ he urged her. ‘Sir Peter likes to hear women begging for what they want.’
‘I want you to start by massaging my breasts,’ said Cressida, and higher up the bed Sir Peter’s breath caught in his throat and he reached over to his wife who parted her legs slightly so that he could stroke the soft skin of her inner thighs as the pair of them watched their guests. Rose was beginning to enjoy herself because Cressida was good, and when Sir Peter was sufficiently aroused he was an expert lover.
Guy poured massage oil into his hands and then carefully removed Cressida’s bra before starting to massage the swelling globes until her nipples turned dark red and stood proudly erect. Then he tongued at each of them in turn, alternating between rolling his tongue around the circumference of each nipple and drawing them into his mouth with gradually increasing pressure until finally he nipped sharply at each of them in turn and Cressida’s belly arched off the pillow in a jerk of ex
citement.
Now Guy moved down to the exposed abdomen, and he massaged in the oil so slowly and carefully that a heavy sweet ache suffused every inch of her stomach and she felt slithers of tight excitement moving deep within her. Her breathing became more audible and Sir Peter’s hand crept higher up his wife’s leg until he was stroking her vulva through the silk fabric of her panties. Rose squirmed with eager pleasure, but she kept her eyes on Guy and the slender young woman beneath him. She’d never imagined him capable of such tenderness.
For Cressida the rising desire was like a forest fire, starting with a tiny spark but quickly spreading so that within a few minutes it was threatening to consume her. However, Guy slowed the pace, anxious that the display shouldn’t be over too soon. This wasn’t just for Sir Peter’s benefit, he was enjoying himself as well – enjoying Cressida’s responses and her frantic need for the pinnacle of ecstasy that only he could help her attain.
Some of the massage oil trickled into the creases at the tops of her thighs which made Cressida give a muffled cry of pleasure, but to her disappointment Guy didn’t continue there. Instead he moved and began to massage her feet, creeping with cruel deliberation up her legs until she felt that she’d scream at him if he didn’t soon reach her vulva and clitoris which were aching with a painfully tight throbbing sensation.
Finally Guy spread her legs a little wider and began to massage her pubic area, then when he knew she was desperately aroused he slid two fingers inside her and began to play with her cervix, slowly moving it around. With a soft cry Cressida shuddered and found a moment’s relief in her first orgasm.
‘She came!’ exclaimed Rose. ‘That’s much quicker than Marcia’s ever managed her first orgasm.’
Cressida opened her eyes and looked at Guy. ‘I didn’t know you and Marcia had done this here,’ she murmured.
The Gallery Page 23