Secret Passion

by Carole Mortimer

  She had no idea how to approach the subject of a man dying in her bed! How could she even introduce such a thing into the conversation, she thought hysterically.

  ‘You’re very quiet.’ James frowned at her once they were out in the car.

  ‘A long day,’ she shrugged, wondering why he didn’t start the engine so that they could get on with this.

  ‘Where were you when I called?’

  ‘I had to go out,’ she evaded. ‘James,’ she drew in a deep breath. ‘Would you mind if we didn’t go out to dinner tonight?’

  His brows rose. ‘Another migraine?’

  She sighed, knowing what he was thinking. ‘No. I—I need to talk to you. I’d rather do that at your apartment.’ She looked at him pleadingly.

  ‘If that’s what you want,’ he shrugged, sitting back to switch on the ignition. ‘You seem very—troubled.’ He spoke again once they had been travelling for several minutes. ‘You aren’t about to tell me you can’t see me again, are you?’

  There was no teasing in his voice, as if he guessed this wasn’t a time for that. ‘There are some things I have to tell you,’ was her only answer.

  His mouth tightened. ‘Sounds ominous.’

  It sounded like a death-knell to her! Was James going to understand, about Adrian, about Nigel Sutcliffe? Would any man understand!

  He poured them both a drink once they were in his apartment, a brandy for each of them, as if he knew they were going to need it.

  ‘So—tell me,’ he invited, his eyes narrowed as she sat stiffly on the sofa.

  She sipped the brandy, instantly warmed by the unaccustomed alcohol. Start with the lesser of two evils, she told herself firmly. ‘That first day when I came to your office,’ she took another sip of the brandy, ‘I told you that I had dealt with Adrian in the past.’

  James leant against the fireplace. ‘Yes.’

  ‘We—met some weeks before.’ She stared down into her glass rather than at James, not wanting to see the dawning of disgust in his eyes. ‘We went out together several times,’ she added in a rush. When there was no audible reaction she looked up sharply, searching his face for accusation, finding him staring back at her almost questioningly. ‘Did you hear me, James?’ she prompted harshly. ‘I said I went out with Adrian several times!’

  He nodded slowly. ‘And?’

  ‘And?’ she repeated shrilly. ‘And I went out with your partner, your married partner!’

  James shrugged. ‘You didn’t know he was married.’

  ‘How—’ She gaped at him. ‘James, why are you taking this so calmly?’ She shook her head in disbelief.

  ‘Because I already knew about it,’ he told her softly.

  She swallowed hard. ‘You couldn’t have done,’ she shook her head again. ‘You wouldn’t have gone out with a woman who had been involved with Adrian.’

  ‘You’re right,’ James nodded. ‘I wouldn’t. But you weren’t involved with him.’

  ‘How—how did you know that?’ she stared at him.

  ‘I told you that first day I would look into the mistake concerning your lease. Only when I looked into it I found there had been no mistake, that Adrian had left strict instructions for your lease not to be renewed—at least until he came back from his holiday. It didn’t take a genius to work out that you had been the latest woman in his life, or to realise that things hadn’t gone as he wanted them to.’ He shrugged. ‘I knew for certain when I saw you that night and mentioned that my partner had taken his wife away on holiday. You went very white; for a moment I thought you were going to faint. Good God, Aura, I don’t usually reveal the private life of my partner to complete strangers,’ he added harshly as she still looked disbelieving. ‘I told you the truth about Adrian to let you know exactly what a bastard you had turned down!’

  He knew. All this time he had known the truth about her and Adrian!

  ‘I waited for you to tell me, Aura,’ he sighed. ‘I left the way open several times for you to do so. When you didn’t I decided the incident must be too painful for you, that learning that Adrian was married with a child had deeply shocked you.’

  ‘It did,’ she confirmed shakily.

  ‘You aren’t to blame for Adrian’s infidelity,’ he said. ‘He lied and cheated with you, just as he’s lied and cheated all his life!’

  Aura stared at him as if she had never seen him before. ‘You really don’t blame me?’

  ‘No,’ James bit out grimly. ‘You were so angry that day in my office, as if you knew you had much more than a clerical error to deal with. I can’t say I was surprised when I learnt of Adrian’s part in all this.’

  ‘But you were—disappointed?’ she prompted tensely.

  ‘In you?’ He shook his head. ‘I knew you must have turned him down for Adrian to be so vindictive. And I was already starting to fall in love with you,’ he added softly.

  Aura looked at him sharply, at last able to see the love in his face that she had been afraid to acknowledge. Would that love still be there once she had told him everything?

  ‘I’ve had just about all I can take of Adrian,’ James continued harshly. ‘The partnership is in the process of being dissolved.’

  ‘Because of me?’ she gasped.

  ‘Not completely,’ he said. ‘I continued the partnership originally because of Adrian’s father, Peter. And also because I just couldn’t be bothered to go through all the speculation there would have been if I hadn’t,’ he admitted with a sigh. ‘But learning what Adrian tried to do to you, the intimidation to get what he wanted, made me wonder if he had done the same thing with other women he decided he wanted. That dishonesty is something I can’t accept from my business partner; my lawyers are working out the details for the split now.’

  She was glad, because James was too honourable a man to be classed with a man like Adrian!

  But Adrian had only been the first of her confessions!

  ‘James,’ she began slowly. ‘There’s a very good reason why I—I shied away from a man who tried to buy me!’ She looked at him anxiously.

  His eyes narrowed. ‘The man that hurt you in the past?’

  ‘Yes,’ she acknowledged dully. ‘I—there was once another man in my life who had a wife and children he couldn’t leave!’ Her head went back in challenge, her breathing ragged as she defiantly met his gaze.

  There was new tension about him now. ‘Did you love him?’ he finally asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did he love you?’

  ‘Very much,’ she said without hesitation.

  ‘And he tried to buy you?’ he prompted softly.

  She drew in a ragged breath. ‘He—was very rich.’

  ‘But did he try to buy you?’ James persisted.

  ‘He—bought me things,’ she bit out. ‘Lots of things.’

  ‘What happened to him?’ James rasped.

  She closed her eyes, shaking badly by the time she opened them again. ‘He died.’

  James looked as if she had hit him. ‘And if he—hadn’t died,’ he spoke quietly, ‘he would still be in your life now?’

  Undoubtedly. There would be no question of it. ‘Yes,’ she admitted huskily.

  ‘I’m in love with you, you know that,’ he told her gruffly.

  She quickly averted her face so that she didn’t have to see the pain in his eyes. ‘I only wanted to be with you for a while, to be allowed to love you,’ she choked.

  She heard him move, and suddenly he was down on his haunches in front of her, gently wiping away the tears. ‘What happened to change that?’ His complete vulnerability was clear in his eyes.

  ‘Selina.’

  His expression sharpened, fury glittering in his eyes now. ‘She found out about this and threatened you?’ he ground out.

  Aura sighed shakily. ‘She’s still in love with you. She’s afraid you’ll fall in love with me.’

  ‘She’s already too late to stop that,’ he bit out grimly. ‘My God, she and Adrian surely deserve each
other! But it doesn’t matter, Aura,’ he dismissed impatiently. ‘You’ve told me now, we love each other—’

  ‘There’s more,’ she cut in softly. ‘Much more. You’ve survived one scandal, but this one is much worse than that. We can never have more than we have right now!’ She looked at him imploringly.

  ‘Allow me to be the judge of that,’ he rasped.

  ‘He—Nigel, was at my apartment when he died,’ she told him in a rush. ‘In my bed.’

  Only the darkening of his eyes told her she had hurt him more. ‘So he died in your bed—’

  ‘James,’ she cut in shrilly. ‘His name was Sutcliffe, Nigel Sutcliffe!’

  His eyes widened with shock. ‘But he was—’

  ‘One of the best known businessmen in England,’ she finished. ‘Possibly the best known. His family was worth millions, always have been.’

  James straightened, looking down at her disbelievingly, shaking his head, as if he couldn’t believe it. ‘I remember the scandal,’ he said distractedly, ‘the publicity. But I didn’t read much about it because I abhor that sort of sensationalism.’

  ‘If you had read about it you would have learnt that Nigel Sutcliffe often visited my apartment, that the night he died he had a heart attack there,’ she revealed dully. ‘The press hounded me, wouldn’t leave me alone, wanted our exclusive story,’ she said disgustedly.

  James didn’t answer, and she looked up at him sharply, finding him deep in thought. What was he thinking, what was he going to say when she told him the rest of it?

  ‘It wouldn’t be fair for me to expect you to involve yourself with a woman connected with such a scandal,’ she said softly. ‘Selina remembered me, and there would ultimately be others. I wouldn’t want to drag you down with me. You’re my secret passion.’

  ‘This is why you’ve been trying to stop seeing me,’ he said. ‘Even though it wasn’t what you really wanted. Was it?’ He looked at her intently.

  ‘I love you,’ she told him shakily.

  He pulled her to her feet. ‘And I love you, have waited a lifetime for you. I’m not about to lose you now,’ he added arrogantly, burying his face in her hair. ‘If we have to we’ll face this together, Aura.’

  ‘I can’t do that to you! I’ll refuse to see you again,’ she added desperately.

  He drew back to smile. ‘Darling, you can’t stop me loving you. And if you won’t see me I’ll just have to camp on your doorstep, and if I do that it’s sure to draw attention to us,’ he warned.

  ‘A married man died in my flat—’

  ‘Yes,’ James cut in softly. ‘But he was your father. Wasn’t he?’

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  AURA swallowed hard, staring up at James as if she couldn’t believe what he had just said. And she couldn’t!

  How had he known? How had he guessed that Nigel Sutclife had been her mother’s lover, not her own? No one else had realised that two years ago.

  ‘Wasn’t he?’ James said again, shaking her slightly.

  ‘Where on earth did you get that ridiculous idea?’ she dismissed brittly. If James wouldn’t walk away from the scandal being involved with her would bring to him then she was going to have to force him away from her. And telling him the truth was now out of the question!

  ‘Just now,’ he said quietly, ‘when you told me the name of the man who died you presumed I was about to show surprise at his identitiy. I wasn’t. I was about to say he was old enough to be your father.’ He shook his head. ‘I’ve come to know you very well, Aura, and involving yourself with a married man is not something I believe you would do. There had to be another explanation for his being at your flat that night. A father is entitled to vist his daughter,’ he shrugged.

  Aura pulled away from him. ‘You don’t believe I’m capable of having an affair with a married man but you believe my mother is?’ she scorned.

  ‘I believe,’ he said softly, ‘that your mother fell deeply, and irrevocably, in love with a man who couldn’t leave his wife.’

  ‘Couldn’t?’ Aura challenged.

  ‘Elizabeth Sutcliffe has been in a wheelchair since she was involved in an accident just after her second child was born. What kind of bastard would her husband have looked if he had asked her for a divorce after that?’ James frowned.

  ‘He—’

  ‘Aura, it would be quite a simple thing to check who your father was,’ he put in quietly.

  She was trembling so badly she had to sit down, falling weakly into the chair behind her. James was right, it would be a simple thing to check the identity of her father, and it said very clearly on her birth certifcate that his name was Nigel Sutcliffe!

  ‘It wasn’t just because his wife was an invalid,’ she said flatly. ‘He loved my mother enough to withstand the scandal leaving his wife would have caused. But he refused to drag my mother through the scandal his wife threatened to bring about them if he should attempt to divorce her.’ Aura looked up at James with tears in her eyes. ‘I feel so sorry for her, know how awful it must be to be confined to a wheelchair. But I hate her too, because my mother and father loved each other very much, and they were never able to declare that love openly!’

  James pulled her to her feet, taking her place in the chair, before settling her on his lap. ‘Tell me about it,’ he urged gently.

  It wasn’t easy to talk about her unorthodox childhood, the father who spent weekends with them, but Monday to Friday with his ‘other’ family, she learnt when she was old enough to realise her father’s behaviour was different from that of other fathers. Her mother could have lied, could have told her he had a job that took him away from them during the week, but she hadn’t done that, had openly told her daughter of the love-triangle that had claimed them.

  Nigel Sutcliffe had been living with his wife, but separately, for over three years when he met Aura’s mother. She had been his temporary secretary, and from that brief meeting had come a love so strong that, although they had both fought against it, and had deliberately not seen each other for six months, it just wouldn’t be denied.

  Nigel had tried to do the honourable thing, had asked his wife for a divorce, genuinely believing that they would both be happier apart. His wife had flatly refused, had threatened to expose Aura’s mother for the home-wrecker that she was.

  Again her mother and father had tried to stay away from each other, but they had loved so deeply that they just couldn’t do it. When Aura’s mother became pregnant with her Nigel had again asked his wife for a divorce, but this time she had warned him that if he asked again she was going to go to the press about his little affair, to make sure that everyone knew about the woman who had stolen the husband of a woman confined to a wheelchair. Nigel refused to have his beloved Meg slandered in that way, especially as once his wife found out about their expected baby she would denounce that as a bastard too.

  Aura pressed her face against James’s chest. ‘They never did marry, but they loved each other more than any other couple I’ve ever seen.’

  ‘And you lied two years ago to protect your mother,’ he guessed.

  ‘I didn’t lie,’ she said. ‘No one ever asked me if Nigel Sutclife was my lover, they all just assumed that he was.’ She drew in a ragged breath. ‘Mummy was with him that night, they had both been over for dinner. When he—when he collapsed, we managed to get him on to my bed, and Mummy sat with him while I called a doctor. By the time I got back to the bedroom I could see it was too late, and we—we both held him until he just stopped breathing.’ Tears fell unheeded down her cheeks. ‘Mummy went into shock, and—and she’s never come out of it. I couldn’t let those people ask her the questions they asked me.’ She shuddered. ‘Perhaps they shouldn’t have fallen in love, and they should certainly never have had me, but Elizabeth Sutcliffe made us all pay for the fact that she wasn’t prepared to relinquish her role as Mrs Nigel Sutcliffe even though she hadn’t loved her husband for years! Love isn’t about owning or possessing, it’s about just wanting to be togethe
r.’

  ‘The way we want to be together,’ James put in softly.

  She looked up at him. ‘I decided in the end not to tell you the truth because it would have been easier to let you believe Nigel Sutcliffe really had been my lover, but even now that you do know the truth it makes no difference to us.’

  ‘I agree,’ he drawled. ‘And not telling me the truth wouldn’t have either. You see, I would have known the moment I made love to you.’

  ‘James, haven’t you heard a word I’ve just said?’ She sat up. ‘I can’t be involved with you—’

  ‘Loving me isn’t being involved?’ he mocked.

  She gave a shaky sigh. ‘I will not expose you to the lies the press will print about me if they ever find out we love each other!’

  ‘It wouldn’t bother me in the slightest,’ he dismissed. ‘I don’t give a damn about their lies. But if it bothers you we can have a quiet wedding—’

  ‘Wedding?’ she spluttered. ‘I’m not going to marry you!’

  ‘Of course you are—’

  ‘No!’

  He stood up with her still in his arms. ‘I insist on being your husband as well as your lover,’ he smiled.

  ‘But we haven’t—I mean, we aren’t—’

  ‘No,’ he acknowledged softly. ‘But we’re about to!’

  Her cheeks were fiery-red as he carried her through to his bedroom, placing her gently down on the bed. ‘James, let me out of here—’

  ‘No,’ he told her firmly. ‘I don’t intend to release you until you admit you belong to me and agree to marry me.’ He threw off his jacket and began to unbutton his shirt.

  She should be running for the door, should make her escape before it was too late, but she lay weakly back on the bed, watching his every movement, marvelling at the beauty of his body as he stood completely naked before her.

  Her clothes were removed with the same unhurried care, and as the lean length of his body lay beside hers she gave herself up to the magic of his touch.

  Languor gave way to passion, deep and all-consuming, their kisses fevered, their caresses heated, each of them desperate to imprint the image of sight and touch in their memory for ever.