by Penny Jordan
‘It’s a pleasure just to watch you walk,’ he commented as they left the restaurant where he had taken her for lunch. ‘I'd love to see you dance.’
Forestalling the invitation she sensed hovering, Jaime took her leave of him. On the drive back to Frampton, her mind was not on the studio and the success she had made of it, but on Blake. Time was running out. Tomorrow was Friday— the day of decision. She had talked the matter over with her mother, and as she had expected Sarah had been in favour of Blake’s suggestion.
‘He is Fern’s father, no matter how much you personally may resent the fact,’ she had pointed out calmly, adding, ‘Sometimes, Jaime, I think you hate him so much now because you resent how much you once loved him.’
Once! What would her mother say if she knew that, far from hating Blake, she was still painfully in love with him? Perhaps if she did tell her, Sarah would understand why she found the thought of seeing more of him, albeit on Fern’s behalf, so very distressing. It required a physical effort not to fling herself into his arms, not to beg him to take her back. As she stopped the car in front of her mother’s cottage she acknowledged that she couldn’t put off meeting him for ever. This afternoon, before she collected Fern from playschool, she would go and see Blake.
Her mother was out when Jaime walked into the cottage. After making herself a cup of coffee and then prowling restlessly round the small kitchen, she realised that, until she had got the interview with Blake out of the way, she would not be able to settle. Before she could change her mind, she picked up her car keys and opened the front door. It was only when she opened the car door that she realised she was still wearing the outfit she had worn to Dorchester, a soft pink silk dress her mother had bought her in Bath, its sleek lines emphasising the fluid grace of her body, her long dark hair a cloud of curls on her shoulders. She shrugged mentally as she slid into the Mini. Far from giving her the confidence to face Blake, in some subtle way the dress made her feel more vulnerable than she would have done in her normal jeans, but it was too late to go back and change now.
Blake’s powerful Ferrari was parked outside the Lodge. Stopping alongside it, Jaime tried to quell the urgent thudding of her pulse. The cottage door stood open, and she approached it hesitantly, knocking briefly on the door. When there was no response, she unconsciously exhaled in soft relief. Blake obviously wasn’t in. On the point of returning to her car, she caught the sound of tearing paper, followed by a muffled curse. The study door was flung open and Blake emerged, pushing irate fingers through tousled dark brown hair.
‘Jaime!’
‘If I’ve come at a bad time, I can always come back.’ Why did she have to sound so nervous? Her eyes shifted apprehensively from the frown on his face, her gaze skittering wildly over the exposed column of his throat and the tanned flesh of his chest where his shirt was unbuttoned. He was wearing a pair of faded, tight jeans, and it required a conscious effort for her to drag her eyes away from the twin columns of his thighs, as she tried to blot out the memory of how it had felt to have the powerful reality of his naked body against hers. A dull surge of colour consumed her body, and she turned away quickly, hoping he wouldn’t guess how desperately hungry she was for the sight and feel of him. With Blake making love had been a feast of all the senses and each one of hers now responded to his proximity.
‘If I’m interrupting . . .’ she hesitated half way to the door, and Blake grimaced saying, ‘You’re not interrupting anything apart from a monumental writer’s block—something I haven’t suffered from before with my other two. Come on in. It will be more comfortable to talk in here than standing out in the hall.’
Numbly she followed him into the small study. The settee and chairs had been pushed to one side to make room for a large desk and chair. An electric typewriter sat on the desk, sheaves of paper surrounding it.
‘I didn’t know you’d written anything other than newspaper articles.’
‘You wouldn’t, would you?’ Blake agreed sardonically. ‘I wrote my first book when I came back from El Salvador.’
Almost automatically, Jaime moved across to the typewriter. A half-finished sheet was rolled into the carriage.
‘Wait there, I’ll go and make us both a cup of coffee, I won’t be long. . . .’
‘There’s no need to bother.’ She said it stiffly, anxious to get their interview over and done with.
‘Maybe not to you, but I haven’t had a break yet today. Wait here.’
When he was gone, she studied the bookshelves behind her, recognising many of Blake’s books from the flat they had shared. How long was he planning to stay in Frampton? How long did it take to write a book? She really had no idea. She picked up a novel she had read the previous summer in the paperback version, letting it drop from nerveless fingers when she saw Blake’s face staring back at her from the dust cover. Blake had written this. She remembered how much the book had moved her; how she had felt for the sardonic hero; the power of the intensely passionate love scenes. As she bent to pick the book up she dislodged some of the papers from the desk. Down on her hands and knees she started to gather up the typewritten pages, her movements stilling as she started automatically to read.
The words seemed to leap off the pages to meet her, so tormentingly erotic that she could feel her body’s response to them. What she was reading was a love scene that reminded her so vividly of how it had been when she and Blake made love that she felt that Blake had almost walked into her mind.
She was still kneeling beside the desk, the papers clutched in one tense hand when Blake walked back into the room carrying two mugs of coffee.
‘You’ve written about us.’ Her voice was accusatory and disbelieving. The previous books Blake had written, had they been self-biographical too?
‘A writer uses his own experiences,’ Blake told her emotionlessly, ‘but you’re not a naive twenty-year old any more, Jaime, you must know that this kind of sexual experience is common to the majority of the adult population, although I will admit that the adrenalin of our rows did help fuel my first few hundred pages. Perhaps that’s why I’m having this mental block now—perhaps I need sexual stimulation to release me from it. . .
‘I’m sure you don’t have to go far to find any,’ Jaime said coldly, thinking of Caroline. . . .
‘Not far at all,’ Blake agreed softly, watching her with a narrow-eyed stare that reminded her of a jungle cat stalking its prey. ‘How pleasant to find we’re in agreement for once.’ He put down the mugs of coffee, his hands sliding beneath her arms as he bent to pull her upwards. ‘Or is it just that you’ve suddenly realised what you’ve missed? Thomson doesn’t strike me as much of a lover ... I need you Jamie.’ He jerked her into his arms, cutting off her automatic protest with the hard warmth of his mouth.
Her first instinctive thought that this couldn’t possibly be happening was swamped by the effect Blake had on her senses. The musky familiar scent of him inflamed the hunger she could feel pulsing through her, her fingers instinctively finding their way beneath his shirt to stroke over his skin, exploring the tautness of muscle and bone.
‘Jaime,’ he breathed her name against her mouth, her lips parting to welcome him. When his teeth nibbled tenderly at the soft, inner flesh of her bottom lip, she moaned in pleasure, arching herself against him.
‘Cool, distant Jamie,’ Blake muttered hoarsely, releasing her mouth to taste the warm skin of her throat. ‘When I make love to you, it’s like watching you melt in my arms.’
Her fingernails raked protestingly along his back, so wrapped up in the pleasure he was giving her that she was barely aware of him releasing her zip until she felt his fingers tracing her spine and she shuddered in delicious response. Blake! Dear God, how she loved him.
‘Jaime.’
She was lost in an intensely pleasurable dream from which she never wanted to wake, and the sound of Blake’s voice echoed like a warning bell she didn’t want to hear. She silenced it by turning her head and pressing her mouth f
everishly to his, feeling the pent-up longing she had suppressed all the time they had been apart take over and dominate her actions.
When Blake lifted her and carried her over to the settee she felt only a fierce joy at being in his arms, sliding out of her dress with an abandon that normally would have shocked her. Her dancer’s body curved lithely into his arms, arching hungrily toward him as his mouth left hers to trace a downward path along her jaw, lingering deliberately on the vulnerable spot behind her ear before moving downward with tantalising slowness, along the curve of her throat, pausing against the pulse that thudded at its base, lingering there until she cried out a soft protest, her pliant lips raining soft, delirious kisses over Blake’s face, her hands running feverishly over his body.
‘Jaime, make love to me.’
Behind the dark glitter of Blake’s eyes she could see a passion that matched her own, a fierce intensity that swept aside the final barriers. His fingers trembled oddly against her skin, as he lay back pulling her down on top of him.
‘Jaime.’ He strung a line of tender kisses along her breasts where they met the barrier of her lacy bra, and then returned to stroke his tongue along the same line. Her nipples burgeoned into life, pushing tautly against the fragile lace, a husky moan leaving her throat as Blake’s tongue pushed past the lace barrier, stroking the curve of her breast, igniting a burning coil of pleasure that seemed to reach out and engulf every part of her body. As tense feverishness possessed her, sensations which were familiar and yet strange, flooded to every nerve ending. Her fingertips stroked Blake’s skin, her mouth tasting the warm salt of his throat as she inhaled the male musky scent of his body.
His hands gripped her waist and slid down to her hips, holding her against the male outline of his body, the fabric of his jeans rough against the tender skin of her thighs and stomach. Her briefs and bra were barriers she no longer wanted between them, and she stroked her tongue moistly along Blake’s skin trying to convey to him without words what she wanted.
His hoarse moan of pleasure rasped against her ear. His eyes were closed; the thick fan of dark lashes making him seem unusually vulnerable, the hard line of his mouth relaxed and almost tender. Jaime traced it with her fingernail, supporting herself with her free hand, watching his lips part and his white teeth, nibble on her finger, strong fingers closing round her wrist, forcing her palm against his open mouth. ‘Two can play at that game,’ he murmured softly, the caress of his tongue against her vulnerable skin making her shudder with a pleasure that threatened to break over her in drowning waves when he took her fingers in his mouth and sucked them gently.
His erotic stimulation of her senses demanded a response she was powerless to refuse. His skin tasted faintly salty beneath the slow exploration of her lips, her tongue slowly circling one flat male nipple until she felt the responsive shudder jerking through Blake’s body, his fingers curling into her hair as he muttered a husky imprecation and pulled her away saying hoarsely, ‘Let’s see how you like being teased like that.’
She was still wearing her bra and the moist probing of his tongue beneath its fragile barrier was an incitement her body couldn’t ignore.
It wasn’t just teasing! It was torture to feel his tongue brushing so close to the aching peak of her breast and then withdrawing, and Jaime didn’t think she could have borne it, if she hadn’t been aware that his fingers were slowly, barely a centimetre at a time, drawing back the lacy covering until she could feel his fingertips grazing against her nipple.
‘Blake. . . .’ His name was a tormented protest on her lips, her eyes feverish with a desire she couldn’t hide.
‘Ah, ha, so you don’t like it when the boot’s on the other foot, do you.’ He reversed their position, and now she was lying on her side almost beneath him, her fingers curling into the smooth muscles of his back. He raised his head to study her for a second and then lowered it again. A long slow shudder rippled through Jaime when, with one hand, he pulled the lacy bra free of her breast while the other dealt efficiently with the clasp at the back, freeing her tumescent nipples to his avid gaze. Strangely enough she felt none of the shame or embarrassment she had so often experienced during their marriage, when he had managed to arouse her to the point where nothing mattered save the ultimate culmination of his lovemaking, and her body arched instinctively upwards, the desire-swollen curves of her breasts rising and falling swiftly with the rapidity of her breathing.
As though unable to resist their temptation, Blake lowered his head. His hand cupped one breast whilst his tongue circled the nipple of the other, somewhat unsteadily; the aroused weight of him pressing Jaime back against the settee, her thighs parting automatically to cradle the male power of him.
She heard Blake groan and the tenor of their lovemaking which he had controlled suddenly changed, a dark tide of colour sweeping over his face as his mouth closed over the nipple his tongue had been stroking, subjecting it to a roughly urgent suckling that sent fierce spears of pleasure lacing through Jaime’s body.
Almost delirious with pleasure, she was aware of Blake’s hand on her thigh and her body shuddered in anticipation. At the same moment, she heard his voice in her ear, and his words were like a cold shock of reality as he muttered, ‘If I’m still suffering from a mental block after this, I’ll. . .
He broke off as Jaime tensed, repudiation in every stiff line of her body.
‘What’s the matter?’
She forced herself to look into his frowning face, praying that he couldn’t read her thoughts; that he knew just how incredibly stupid she had been. For a moment she had actually believed that it was possible to turn back the clock; that it was possible for him to love her as she loved him. Now she felt sick with shame and shock, unable to believe the reality of her own actions.
‘Fern,’ she heard herself say sickly in an unfamiliar voice, ‘I must go and pick her up. I don’t like being late. . . .’
‘I remember,’ Blake said derisively. ‘You always used to refuse to make love in the morning because you thought it might make you late for work. . . .’
‘Not always. . . .’ She pulled away from him, groping for her clothes, hoping he wouldn’t guess the real reason for her scarlet face.
‘I wonder what dear Charles would say if he knew what just happened?’
‘Nothing happened,’ Jaime said fiercely, not wanting to admit to herself that if Blake hadn’t spoken when he had she would still be in his arms and their lovemaking would have been much closer to completion and, worse still, her body ached intolerably because it wasn’t.
‘Does he know how hungry you are for love, Jaime? So hungry that you’d even let a man you hate make love to you?’
‘Does Caroline know that you make love just to get copy for your books?’ she challenged back.
His mouth hardened, his eyes as dark and cold as flint. ‘I never like to refuse a lady,’ he mocked, watching the vivid colour run up over her skin, ‘especially when that lady’s already the mother of my child. We still haven’t talked about Fern.’
‘I . . .’ She couldn’t come back here and talk calmly to him, not in the room where she had so nearly forgotten all the hardwon lessons of the last few years and begged him to make love to her, as she had begged him without words so many times in the past.
‘I’ve got to go to London for a few days,’ Blake interrupted before she could speak. ‘I’ll come and see you when I get back. We’ll talk about it then.’ He bent his head briefly before she could move, brushing his lips against hers. ‘I can taste my skin on your mouth,’ he told her softly. ‘How many men have made love to you since you left me, Jaime? One . . . two?’ His eyes narrowed cruelly. ‘I’d take a bet that it was none. . . .’
‘I have to go.’ She was out of the room before he could say any more, shocked that he could speak so tormentingly to her.
She was still shaking when she got out of her car at the playschool. Fern, fortunately, didn’t seem to notice anything amiss, and Jaime was glad to di
scover that her mother was still out when she got back to the cottage. Settling Fern down with a drink and something to eat, she hurried into the bathroom, stripping off her clothes and standing under the harsh sting of the shower until she was sure that she had washed her body completely free of the clinging scent of Blake’s; only then did she dry herself and dress again, but although she might have washed her body free of the scent of him, nothing could cleanse her mind of the mental images it insisted on relentlessly parading before her; Blake’s body, sleek and supple, his skin taut and firm beneath her finger tips. The way he touched her body and her acutely abandoned response to him. But what was most agonising of all was the knowledge that he had simply made love to her because she happened to be there, and that any woman would have served his purpose equally well. Would the way she had responded to him be faithfully recorded in his book? She shuddered, glad to hear her mother’s key in the door forcing her to abandon her unprofitable thoughts.
There was a meeting in the village school that night to discuss Caroline’s plans to sell off the Abbey. Jaime was late setting out for it, and she rounded the bend by the Abbey gates just in time to see Blake’s Ferrari emerging. Blake was driving, Caroline seated in the passenger seat, the brief play of her own headlights revealing Caroline’s shoulders and the expensive evening gown she was wearing.
White-hot, searing jealousy poured moltenly through her veins. She wanted to stop the car and drag Caroline away from Blake.
What was happening to her? She was losing all sense of pride and reality. It was no concern of hers any more whom Blake chose to date. She had always known that he hadn’t spent their years apart living the life of a monk, but that was before he had held her in his arms and made her body ache for the fulfilment of his lovemaking.