She’d never been kissed like that before. It was a revelation. Shocked rigid one moment, then bones fluid the next, grasping for a lifeline, his shoulders, neck, wanting to touch as he was now touching her, a hand on her breast, cupping its fullness through her dress, rubbing against a nipple, found pert and hard despite her clothing.
It was Jack who finally pulled away, but only to rest his forehead against hers while they both panted for breath.
‘See what I mean?’ he said when he could finally talk.
‘No.’ She refused to see.
‘Another man might not stop here,’ he added, muffled as his lips tasted the damp skin at her temple.
‘Then don’t. Teach me a lesson!’ she almost taunted in return.
‘Esme...’ Her name was a groan of protest, lost as, boldened by whisky and love, she sought his mouth once more.
Control went quickly, drowned by need, as they kissed and touched and learnt each other’s bodies. Shy and reluctant with others. Esme felt nothing but overwhelming desire for this man. It was as if she had been born for him, waiting all her life to do this.
When he spread the blanket on the hard boards beneath them, she sank with him onto the makeshift bed.
They kissed again, then he murmured against her mouth, ‘Are you covered?’
‘Covered?’
‘The Pill.’
The barest hesitation, before murmuring back, ‘Yes,’ understanding he would stop otherwise.
Then, legs entwined, bodies straining, he shifted her on her side and she helped him as he tugged off her now ruined dress and unbuttoned his own shirt. Cold earlier, she was now on fire, his naked flesh burning against hers.
He slid down the straps of the camisole she wore underneath until her breasts were exposed, full and ripe, the breasts of a woman. But the flesh was tender, never before touched by a man, and she arched back in surprise and delight as he put his mouth to them and circled the pink aureoles with his tongue until her nipples were so hard she couldn’t bear it. She acted out of instinct rather than experience as she lifted her breast to his mouth, demanding that he satisfy this exquisite need.
And Jack? He was too far gone to do otherwise. His body had long since grown hard, painfully so, made worse as he sucked with teeth and lips on her swollen breasts and she arched beneath him, hips rising, pushing against his own flesh.
It was a shock to find her so willing. He’d thought her different from Arabella but she wasn’t. The realisation at the edges of a brain fuzzy with alcohol stilled any last vestige of conscience over her youth.
They had gone too far to stop and Esme didn’t want to, anyway. Not even when he began to touch her between her thighs and she stirred like a nervous filly about to be broken. She was lucky. He was gentle, oh, so gentle. She felt her body opening to him, let him slide a finger inside, caught her breath when he began to stroke her. Making her ready.
Then he straddled her and she discovered she was not ready enough. It hurt. Goodness, it hurt. She wanted to cry out. Bit her lip instead until the tearing sensation subsided.
He went still, too. As if he’d felt something. Had a moment’s doubt.
Esme tried to conceal it. Her gift to him, but it had to be a secret. She moved. Lifting hips to close round him, a sensual invitation no man would refuse.
Jack didn’t. He turned his head to kiss her once more, then raised himself and pushed again, deep inside her this time. She tensed, waiting for the pain, only it had gone. Or was overwhelmed. Suddenly there was pleasure. Different from any she had ever known. Running through blood and bone. Mounting with each thrust. Filling her. Obliterating self. Till they were one body, gasping and cleaving and coming, one soul, crying out in the darkness, lost to the world.
That was the first time they’d made love.
Remembered perfectly by Esme, ten years on.
Well, why not? It had also been the last.
She stopped herself thinking past that point, though she recalled it well enough, too. What he’d said—a let-down. How she’d felt—crippled by it.
She understood now that she’d been too young, emotionally. She didn’t blame him. Well, she did sometimes when she thought of how he’d been able to walk away while she was still living with the consequences.
Not just Harry. But other stuff. Like the fact she hadn’t gone out with another man for years, hadn’t gone to bed with one for even longer than that. And how it never really worked for her. As if the sexual side of her had been born and died on that one same night.
Or maybe it was just asleep. Like in a fairytale, needing the handsome prince to unlock the spell. Only in her case the handsome prince had returned to give her a dose of realism. Perhaps that would work just as well.
A good thing, maybe, that Jack had reappeared, enabling her to confront the past. As long as that was where he stayed. A quick walk-on part, then out of her life for ever.
Once again she considered the possibility of him actually buying Highfield, then shook her head over it. No. Not likely. He wasn’t a sentimentalist. Highfield was needing major restoration. And, as he said, there were other places.
No problem, then.
CHAPTER FOUR
A month passed and Jack Doyle failed to reappear. Esme began to relax, almost back to normal, no longer thinking of him daily. She had other concerns: Harry turning ten and even more insular, problems with work, her changing relationship with Charles.
The latter was her own doing. A few days after Jack Doyle had viewed Highfield, Harry had gone to stay overnight with a friend while she went to a dinner party with Charles and some mutual friends.
They had had an enjoyable evening and, once back at the cottage, she’d invited him in for coffee. It hadn’t been the first time. Or the first time he’d tried to make their goodnight kiss more intimate. What had been different was her reaction.
Not spontaneous. Definitely not. Planned even when she’d been donning her glad rags for the party. That night, if Charles kissed her, she wouldn’t do her usual turn and slide out of his arms. She would let him kiss her and kiss him back in the hope that she would feel all the right things.
So what had gone wrong?
Nothing really. He had kissed. She had shut her eyes and kissed back. Fine so far. A brief flare of passion. Better. Dying quickly. Then over.
Not the kiss. That had gone on as long as Esme considered polite, but it had been a relief when Charles had finally come up for air. Less of one when he’d smiled as if he’d just won the prize.
Hadn’t he noticed? Maybe not. Maybe he was used to kissing emotionally repressed girls. Poor Charles.
Sympathy, however, only extended so far and, when he’d begun to kiss her again she’d pushed at his shoulders until he released her.
He had looked confused, unable to see why a green light had suddenly turned red on him.
Esme had felt he deserved some kind of explanation and launched into a ‘not being ready for involvement’ speech.
But Charles hadn’t been listening. He’d been too busy apologising for ‘rushing her’ and promising to ‘be patient,’ and before Esme had been able to finish he’d been out of the door with a, ‘Call you soon.’
Infused with guilt, Esme had watched him drive away. Far from killing his hopes, she’d somehow left him with the impression that it was only a matter of time. But she had known it wasn’t. Had known from the start, if she was honest.
As for his rushing things, that was more sad than funny. Six months they’d been seeing each other, and all that time he’d scrupulously respected the distance she kept, believing, despite Harry’s existence, that she was a nice girl.
She wondered now how he would feel if he ever discovered the real her or that other her, anyway, the one who’d gone from a kiss to full, consensual sex with Jack Doyle in a relationship that had lasted all of forty minutes from start to finish.
Appalled, she imagined. She was herself. She had been within hours of the d
eed. Afterwards she’d blamed the demon drink.
It wasn’t me, Your Lordship. It was the whisky.
Tough. I sentence you to teenage pregnancy and a lifetime of penury.
Well, hardly that. She had Great-Aunt Jemima’s money, though as it was only a small annual sum, she hardly qualified as a trust-fund baby. Still, it was more than some had.
So count your blessings and be grateful.
Good old Jemima, pincher of cheeks, scorner of men, an all-round scary old lady.
Esme smiled briefly, before she became aware of what she was doing. Having conversations with herself again. Well, where was the harm? So maybe she’d turn a little batty, like her maiden aunt, but there were worse things on heaven and earth. Like dating suitable young men simply to avoid talking to oneself.
She had gone to bed that night resolved to finish with Charles, and woken in the same frame of mind. She’d tried to do it gradually, with work and childcare excuses, and had hoped Charles would take the hint, but he hadn’t. When he’d finally pressed her into accepting a restaurant date, she had gone with the intention of making a clean break, only to discover that the dinner was to celebrate his birthday.
It said it all, really, that she’d forgotten. And, typically, Charles hadn’t fanfared it. He was too diffident, maddeningly so. But how could she have said, Happy Birthday, followed by, You’re dumped!
She couldn’t have and didn’t, had even let Charles kiss her again. Still no fireworks. Just guilt that she’d allowed this situation to develop.
She’d felt no better when her mother had called later the next morning to enquire, ‘How was your dinner?’
‘Dinner?’
‘Last night with Charles. You were seen. Bibi Masterson.’ Esme sighed inwardly. Her mother seemed to have spies everywhere.
She continued relentlessly, ‘Bibi wanted to know if there were wedding bells in the air or what.’
‘I hope you told her or what,’ Esme said with grim determination. ‘I’m certainly tired of telling you, Mother.’
‘Fine. You live your life the way you want to,’ her mother said in slightly offended tones, ‘I just felt I should call and tell you: I’ve sold the house.’
‘What?’ exclaimed Esme, closely followed by, ‘When? Who to?’
‘To whom,’ her mother corrected, before answering first, ‘It was finalised last Monday.’
Six days ago and she was only telling her now? Still, it was done, a fait accompli.
Esme accepted that, even as she persisted, ‘To whom, Mother?’
‘An American buyer,’ her mother replied on a vague note.
‘Peter Collins showed him round. He thought it best. I mean you didn’t exactly do a great selling job on the house the last time.’
‘That was Jack Doyle, Mother,’ Esme reminded her heavily-
‘So?’ her mother dismissed. ‘I don’t care who buys Highfield. A ghastly pop star or even more ghastly footballer. They’re welcome to it.’
Had her mother ever loved the house? It seemed not.
‘Anyway,’ she ran on, ‘as far as the cottage is concerned, the new people have been made aware you’re a sitting tenant and, as such, can’t be evicted provided you pay your rent.’
‘Rent?’ Esme’s voice rose with anxiety. ‘But I don’t pay rent!’
‘Yes, I know, darling.’ Her mother’s tone was heavily patient. ‘But if we’d admitted you were merely the daughter of the house, they could have insisted on vacant possession.’
‘But won’t they find out?’ Esme queried.
‘Eventually, perhaps,’ her mother agreed, ‘but meanwhile our solicitor has backdated a tenancy agreement in the name of E.S. Hamilton and no one has made the connection... Of course, you will have to pay rent to them.’
How much? Esme could have asked, but she knew her mother wouldn’t have a clue.
‘I’ve done my best for you, darling,’ her mother concluded at Esme’s silence, ‘and a little gratitude wouldn’t go amiss.’
Esme counted slowly to ten before responding, ‘Thank you, Mother.’
Her mother didn’t seem to notice how forced it was as she went on to what she regarded as a more important matter— Arabella and her intention of returning to England in the summer.
Esme listened with half a mind, and only when her mother rang off did she realise that she still didn’t have an idea when the new owners would be moving in.
She debated whether she should go up to the house on the Saturday, as usual, to clean and dust, but, in the end did so partly to say goodbye to the house.
Harry tagged along, earning his pocket money by brushing and dusting while she cleaned windows. Halfway through she let him disappear outside to the garages, where various boxes and ramps provided an ideal practice strip for his skateboarding.
She went upstairs to tackle sinks and baths, which seemed to collect dirt even when unused. It was hardly a sentimental way of bidding farewell to Highfield and she was surprised how little she felt, perhaps because it was now such an empty shell.
She was finished and contemplating the furniture left in her old bedroom when she heard footsteps on the stairs.
Harry, she assumed, until a female voice called, ‘Hello, is anyone there?’
The new owner, Esme concluded, and wished she could just disappear.
She walked out of the room to find a smart-suited woman standing on the upper gallery and felt at an immediate disadvantage in old jeans and T-shirt.
‘Hi,’ the woman drawled in an American accent, ‘I guess you’re from the cleaning company?’
Esme admitted it looked that way, with her clutching a feather duster in one hand. And, yes, she supposed that was what she was—the cleaner. At any rate, it seemed easier to accept that role.
‘I didn’t realise anyone was moving in today,’ she responded. ‘If you want me to go—’
‘Hell, no!’ the woman dismissed. ‘From what I can see we’ll need an army of you. How long since this place has been occupied?’
‘Three years almost.’
The woman wrinkled her nose. ‘Looks more like ten. When did they last decorate, I wonder?’
Esme could have answered that, too, but let it pass. She didn’t think this woman would appreciate hearing it was more than a decade ago.
‘Still, it has possibilities.’ The woman was speaking more to herself this time. ‘Although personally I prefer my houses new and draughtproof.’
Esme was confused and a little rankled. ‘You must have liked something about Highfield to have bought it.’
‘Heavens, no, I haven’t bought it!’ the woman denied with a laugh. ‘It’s J.D.’s baby. He’s downstairs, checking the place out.’
Esme’s heart went into freefall: J.D.? As in...?
No, she told herself. Ridiculous. Why should it be? There were lots of people with those initials and this woman was American, so wouldn’t J.D. be, too? An American buyer, that was what her mother had said.
‘Hold on while I holler—’ The woman leaned over the banister —J.D., it’s all right. Up here. Someone from the cleaning company.’
It drew no response.
‘We thought it might be burglars,’ she continued to Esme, ‘because the alarm wasn’t activated. I assume you switched it off.’
Esme nodded mutely. She considered explaining who she really was, then remembered she couldn’t be daughter of the house and tenant of the cottage. So she just stood, staring silently at the other woman, conscious that she must be giving a good impression of being as vacant as the house.
‘I’ll go down,’ the American finally added. ‘He’s obviously not heard me. I’ll leave you to get on.’
‘Yes, fine.’ Esme watched the other woman descend the staircase, wondering what she should do.
Instinct told her to pack up quickly and leave rather than stick around to discover the identity of J.D. The problem was she couldn’t see a way of getting out of the house without encountering someon
e. And there was Harry.
The thought of him sent her back inside her bedroom and over to the window. He was still in the courtyard, practising turns on his board. No sign of anyone else. She considered tapping on the glass but that might bring him inside. What to do?
She was still deliberating when she heard footsteps ascending the stairs. The man? Probably. She looked round the room for somewhere to hide, then told herself to stop being ridiculous. What were the chances of it being Jack? And even if it was, how pathetic to hide from him!
So she stood there, listening to footsteps echoing on bare boards as they approached her door, the only one open.
The surprised, ‘You!’ came from the man as he entered, not Esme, dreading yet half expecting Jack Doyle, expensively casual in chino trousers and designer polo shirt.
‘Me,’ she agreed simply.
He frowned, glanced at the feather duster in her hand, the brush leaning against one wall and back to her, dressed in knee-ripped jeans and smeared T-shirt with her long blonde hair caught up in a pony-tail.
‘I thought you were joking,’ he said at length, ‘about doing people’s houses.’
She had been. This was the only house she did in that sense.
But a devil inside made her say, ‘We all have to make a living.’
‘True,’ he conceded, ‘but it’s hard to reconcile—you a cleaner.’
‘It’s called social mobility,’ shrugged Esme. ‘Some people go up in the world and some down. I’m not your cleaning company, by the way. Your friend misunderstood.’
‘I know.’ He nodded. ‘They aren’t due till Monday... What are you doing here exactly?’
Esme would have thought it obvious, so couldn’t resist a dry, ‘You’ll need a domestic. What better way to interview for the post?’
He smiled quizzically. ‘Are you serious?’
‘My life’s ambition—’ this time the sarcasm in her voice couldn’t be missed ‘—to grow up, lose my family home to the cook’s son, then be reincarnated as his Mrs Mop.’
She didn’t care if the ‘cook’s son’ comment epitomised snobbery. She had to have some weapons against him.
The Mother And The Millionaire Page 6