by Penny Jordan
Her heart seemed to do a triple somersault before starting to bounce erratically around inside her chest. Although she automatically started to stand up, the shock of seeing Matt made her sit down again and stare at him in mute disbelief.
‘Christine sent me up to tell you that she’s just about to serve dinner,’ he told her softly, pitching his voice so that it didn’t disturb the little boy sleeping in his bed.
Matt, here? It seemed impossible, like some kind of waking dream. She felt as though if she shook her head she would somehow be able to make him disappear, but when she did so, to her consternation, he remained stubbornly exactly where he was, waiting for her...watching her.
Uncertainly she got to her feet, unaware of how many betraying emotions were reflected in her eyes as she walked tensely towards the door.
Why hadn’t Christine warned her that Matt would be here? Probably because her friend was scatty enough not to have made the connection between Mike’s new client and her own new boss, Nicola recognised numbly as she walked downstairs.
In a daze she walked into the dining-room and was introduced to the other couple. The wife, Lucinda, ignored Nicola completely, focusing all her attention on Matt—in a way that made Nicola’s heart somersault again, but this time in a very different way.
She was an enviably tall redhead with sharp green eyes and a full but somehow predatory mouth. She was wearing a scarlet silk dress which ought to have clashed with her hair but which somehow did not, its neckline displaying a generous amount of cleavage.
It was plain that her husband doted on her, and it was also equally plain as the meal progressed that she was the kind of woman who had very little time for her own sex. All her attention and her conversation was conferred on Matt and, as she struggled to get something more out of her husband than a laconic ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ in response to her questions, Nicola tried to tell herself that it was absolutely no concern of hers if Lucinda flirted with Matt, nor if he chose to respond.
It wasn’t until they had reached the pudding stage of the meal that she finally admitted to herself that the feeling boiling up inside her, as she tried not to listen to Lucinda’s very obvious flirtation with Matt, was one of jealous resentment.
Pushing away her pudding barely touched, she raised her head to discover very disconcertingly that Matt was looking at her.
She could feel the hot tide of colour burning slowly up her body as she wondered how long she had been the focus of his attention and if he could possibly have recognised what she was feeling, while praying that he hadn’t.
It wasn’t until after the meal was over that she realised how quiet and engrossed she must have been, because Christine asked her when she was helping her to clear the table, ‘Are you OK? You didn’t seem too upset earlier when you told me about Gordon, but...’
Numbly Nicola shook her head, unable to explain even to one of her closest friends what she was really feeling.
‘Look, I know I’ve said some pretty callous things about him...and I still don’t think that he was the right one for you...but if you want to talk about it, or just have a damn good cry...’
Again Nicola shook her head, wondering half hysterically what on earth Chris would say if she admitted that she had barely given Gordon a thought all evening, and that instead it was Matt who was occupying not just her thoughts but her emotions as well.
Giving her a quick, concerned look, Christine turned round and then exclaimed warmly, ‘Matt, you shouldn’t have bothered, but thanks anyway...’ as she went to take from him the empty dishes he had carried through to the kitchen.
Nicola almost dropped the things she was holding. She had had no idea that Matt was there. Her heart started thumping frantically. She closed her eyes, visualising what could have happened if she had confided in Christine and he had overheard.
What was there to confide anyway—that once long ago she had spent the night with him, and had been too drunk to have any recollection of what had happened? That he had casually informed her that they had been lovers, and that because of the public way she had left the party with him she had been taunted with her lack of morals and her sexual availability? That because of that she had come running home sick at heart and distraught? That because of that she had shunned all further sexual contact with men, sickened by her own behaviour and knowing that any decent, worthwhile man would feel the same way?
How could she tell Chris that after that she was now discovering a very different Matt Hunt from the one she remembered, and that, even worse, she was finding herself becoming more and more emotionally vulnerable and drawn to him...that she was like a cold and hungry creature fascinated by fire and warmth, and drawn desperately into seeking it...circling it with hunger and fear, wanting its warmth and yet terrified of it at the same time?
She closed her eyes, feeling the tension draining her energy.
What was she trying to tell herself—that she was falling in love with Matthew Hunt? She made a small, derisory sound under her breath, causing both Matt and Chris to look at her.
Skirting past Matt, she hurried back to the dining-room, determinedly busying herself collecting more empty plates, while she tried frantically to deny the knowledge her own brain was giving her.
The rest of the evening was a form of purgatory. Not only had she to contend with the knowledge that no matter what the reason, and no matter how dangerous and self-destructive it was, she was quite definitely emotionally responsive to Matt in a way which had previously been totally outside her experience. She had thought once that she was in love with Jonathon, but then she had been a child, now she was a woman. An adult—it was like comparing the flicker of a torchlight with the full power of the sun. And it wasn’t just that she was emotionally responsive to Matt... Physically, she— She flinched inwardly, knowing that she was so aware of him that even without turning her head she knew exactly where he was in the room...that without looking at him she could conjure up the sensations that invaded and disturbed her whenever he came close to her.
She told herself fiercely that she was glad that Lucinda was monopolising him, because that way she was in no danger of making a fool of herself by... By what? By betraying to him the effect he was having on her?
If Chris hadn’t been one of her oldest friends, she would have made some excuse and left early. But Nicola was already bitterly aware of the fact that Chris was concerned about her and erroneously believed that she was upset about the ending of her relationship with Gordon. If she left early, Chris was bound to think that it was because of Gordon and, no matter how much she denied it, Chris wouldn’t believe her unless she told her the truth.
The temptation to do just that astounded her. She wanted, she realised miserably, to talk about Matt, as though somehow just by speaking his name she would be easing the growing ache inside herself. Then the awareness of how quickly she had travelled down a very, very dangerous road made her feel slightly sick. She wanted to go home...to be alone...to try to find some way of controlling what was happening to her.
Lucinda’s voice had a certain shrill metallic quality to it, and now it intruded into her silence, causing her to turn her head. Lucinda was standing with Matt, her hand on his arm while she pouted up at him. Her body was almost, but not quite, resting against his, the soft thrust of her breasts clearly discernible. Standing so close to her, Matt could not help but breathe in her perfume and be aware of her body.
The sick helplessness that clawed at her own stomach appalled Nicola. She discovered that she was actually physically shaking in reaction, not just to her jealousy but also to her own disgust at it.
When she heard Frank Barrett announcing that it was time he and Lucinda left, since they had the baby-sitter to run home, the relief that flowed through her was so total and immediate that it made her feel physically weak—not because their departure would remove Lucinda from Matt’s presence, but because it meant that she herself could also leave.
She waited for an unbearable ten m
inutes after the Barretts had gone before announcing that she too must leave. Chris tried to persuade her to stay, watching her worriedly as she half whispered, ‘If you want to talk about...things...’
She shook her head in denial, fibbing uncomfortably, ‘I’m just a bit tired.’
Mike, who had caught what she’d said, grinned at her, putting a friendly arm around her shoulders as he teased, ‘Not because this new boss of yours is working you too hard, I hope?’
Nicola hoped she sounded far more natural to their ears than she did to her own as she forced herself to smile and laugh back.
‘Gordon couldn’t make it, then?’ Mike added conversationally, plainly not yet aware of what had happened.
Out of the corner of her eye Nicola saw Chris made a small moue of dismay and shake her head warningly at her husband.
‘His mother isn’t well,’ Nicola responded shortly. With Matt standing there she wasn’t about to explain to Mike that there wasn’t any ‘her and Gordon’ any more.
The entire evening had been a strain on her, which, coupled with everything else that had happened over the last few weeks, was making her feel as though her whole life was somehow slipping out of her control, Nicola acknowledged as she unlocked the door of her car and got inside.
Chris and Mike lived on the other side of the town from her parents, but she was less than halfway home when she suddenly discovered that she was trembling so violently that she could barely control the car.
Immediately she pulled off the road into a convenient layby, quickly switching off the engine.
Everything around her had become frighteningly blurred, but it wasn’t until she raised her hand to her face that she discovered that she was actually crying.
Her chest felt tight with pain and she couldn’t stop trembling. She leaned forward, closing her eyes, resting her head on the steering-wheel, too overwhelmed by what was happening to her to do anything else.
It took the sudden realisation that someone was opening her car door to jerk her back to real awareness of the fact that she was parked on a very lonely stretch of road, that it was dark and well past midnight, and that she was completely on her own.
However, no sooner had a series of panicky thoughts started to flood her mind than she realised that the person opening the door was Matt.
‘I saw you’d stopped and thought you might be having car trouble,’ he explained tersely.
It was too late to make any attempt to hide her tears from him. The swiftly comprehensive glance he had given her in the light flooding the car as he’d opened the door must have revealed her tear-stained face quite clearly.
‘The car’s fine, thanks,’ she told him.
‘It’s him, isn’t it—the boyfriend?’ he demanded almost roughly. ‘I heard you telling Christine that it was all over between you.’
He stood up, closing her driver’s door before she could say anything.
For a few seconds she thought he had gone, and then she realised he had simply walked around the car and was now opening the passenger door and getting in.
While she stared at him, torn between the agonising pleasure of having him there and the realisation of how dangerous to her this kind of intimacy was, she heard him saying huskily, ‘I know you’ll have heard this already, but he really isn’t worth it. The man must be a fool if he doesn’t realise...’
He thought she was crying because of Gordon. Automatically Nicola turned to him to deny it, but he was sitting far too close to her in the small confines of her compact car and, as she turned her head, he raised his hand, his fingers warm and hard as they slid against her face, his thumb brushing away the damp traces of her tears.
‘He isn’t worth it,’ he told her again.
She started to tremble, heat flooding her. Her skin was burning where he was touching it. She had a wild impulse to turn her head and let her lips explore the hand that cupped her face. She trembled again.
‘Nicki, don’t...’
She had no awareness of either of them moving, but one or both of them must have done because suddenly there was no distance between them at all. Matt’s free arm was holding her against him, while his hand slid into her hair, the touch of his fingers against her scalp almost—almost tender, she recognised dazedly.
She looked up at him, mutely searching his face, not really understanding what was motivating his intimacy with, and concern for, her.
Shadows cloaked his features. All she could see was the dark glitter of his eyes, the male outline of his mouth as he turned his head towards her.
Her heart jerked painfully inside her chest. She discovered that, having focused on his mouth, she could not bring herself to look away.
Her throat had gone dry, her lungs seemed incapable of drawing in enough air, her lips parted, a million tiny, aching pulses beating through her body.
‘Nicki...’
His voice was rough, its timbre making her shiver as though he had actually touched her skin, caressing its most sensitive points.
When his lips first touched hers, it was no more than a whisper of sensation, a soft brushing of flesh on flesh, but it sensitised her so much that she trembled bodily.
Immediately Matt made a soft sound of reassurance against her mouth. His tongue stroked her lips, and instinctively she felt herself trying to get even closer to him. Her arms were wrapped around him, although she had no real awareness of how they had got there.
The slow stroke of his tongue against her lips was dangerously erotic, making her ache for something more intimate. Her muscles clenched fiercely as her senses reacted to her mind’s imagery of how that yearned-for intimacy would make her feel.
Matt wasn’t wearing a jacket, and beneath her fingertips she could feel the hard play of his muscles.
Overwhelmed by her own physical responsiveness to him, she caressed his back and then his shoulders, mindlessly letting her emotions and desires take control of her.
This must be something she had done before, surely, otherwise how would her hands, her entire body, yearn for such intimacy?
When Matt’s mouth left hers to caress her throat she made a small, keening sound of distress, her body trembling with urgency, an ache of need coiling tautly through her.
She must have said his name, although she had no knowledge of having done so, because almost immediately his mouth returned to hers and he was kissing her not as he had done before—gently and exploratively—but with an intimacy that made her body arch and her mouth open in eager invitation.
She felt the shudder that convulsed him, her own body registering it and reacting in an after-shock of small tremors. Her breasts were pressed hard against his body and had started to ache almost unbearably, not from the pressure of their embrace but from a far more private, primitive and sensual cause.
She wanted his hands on her body, she recognised, and not just his hands... She closed her eyes, shivering, drenched by the hot tide of need that rocked through her.
Outside, beyond the intimate darkness of the car, a horn blared, tyres squealing in protest as one car overtook another, the noise shocking her into abruptly focusing on what she was doing.
As he felt her tense, Matt let her go, his voice low and slightly rough as he apologised.
‘I’m sorry. I never meant...I didn’t intend...’
This time, the burning sensation under her skin was caused not by desire but by embarrassment, the embarrassment of knowing what Matt was telling her.
‘Look, why don’t you leave your car here and let me drive you home?’ he continued. ‘You’re upset and—’
‘I’m perfectly capable of driving,’ she told him brittly. She wasn’t and she knew it, but she felt as though if she had to spend any more time with him she would shatter like a piece of over-stressed glass.
She still wasn’t sure quite what had happened to her, or how what she knew Matt had only intended as a gesture of comfort had turned into the fiercely burning physical desire she had experienced.
If that was how she had behaved that night, no wonder he had looked so—so smug and self-satisfied in the morning, she thought sickly.
She closed her eyes briefly against the hot burn of fresh tears and said thickly, ‘Please, go...I want to get home...’
She tensed as she felt him hesitate, knowing that if he argued with her now she would probably break down completely.
‘Go, Matt,’ she demanded. ‘Please...’
To her relief he opened the car door and made to get out, pausing to tell her, ‘I still don’t think you’re in any fit state to drive, so I’ll follow you to make sure you get home safely. No arguments,’ he added curtly. ‘Otherwise, I’ll carry you out of this damn thing by force if necessary...’
Silently Nicola watched him go, suppressing the temptation to race off into the night before he could return to his own car, knowing that he’d been quite right when he’d said she wasn’t really fit to drive.
Luckily the roads were quiet but, despite the fact that she applied all her concentration to the task of driving, she was very conscious of the fact that physically she felt oddly weak, and that her mind kept straying, drawn dangerously into a whirlpool of thoughts and fears which had nothing to do with what she was doing and everything to do with what had happened with Matt.
When she turned into her parents’ drive, she glanced in her driving-mirror and saw that Matt’s car was parked at the end of the drive.
He had been behind her all the way home, monitoring what she was doing, watching over her. What had motivated him to do that? Guilt, because he felt responsible for her distraught state? But why should he feel guilty when she had been the one...?
She shuddered as she stopped the car, remembering how she had moaned beneath his mouth in aching frustration, wanting more...wanting him... Her skin flushed and she was glad that there was no one to see her, to witness her shame and anguish.
That Matt had never intended to do more than offer her a comforting male shoulder to cry on she already knew. Even that first tentative pressure of his mouth on hers had been comforting rather than arousing.