by Miranda Lee
With a sigh, Gemma went over and opened the door to find Damian standing there with a smile on his handsome face and what looked like a glass of port in his hands.
'I couldn't possibly drink any more alcohol, Damian,' she said apologetically. 'But thank you for the thought.'
'You're still dressed,' he chided. 'Look, why don't you have a relaxing shower, climb into bed and I'll bring you a mug of hot chocolate?'
'Really, there's no need.'
'There's every need,' he said firmly. 'You should see the dark rings under your eyes. You need a good night's sleep, Gemma.'
'All right,' she sighed, agreeing with him. If she didn't sleep tonight, she wasn't sure what she'd do.
Gemma was under the bedclothes, the sheet pulled well up over her rather revealing ivory silk nightiee she didn't have any other kind-when Damian knocked.
Was it her being in bed that made her feel suddenly vulnerable when he came back in and closed the door behind him? Or was it the way his flashing black eyes narrowed on her near naked shoulders as he walked towards her?
Whatever, Gemma found her whole insides contracting, her stomach fluttering with a funny little feeling something like fear. She was not such a fool as to be unaware that Damian fancied her. She'd been rather expecting him to make a pass some time, but she didn't think he'd try something here, with his sister just down the hall.
Still, her eyes followed him somewhat worriedly when he put the drink down on the bedside chest and sat down on the side of the bed. 'Feeling better after your shower?' he asked, smiling.
She nodded, finding it hard to find her tongue all of a sudden.
'I'm an expert at hot-chocolate making,' he said, and picked up the mug again. 'Here ... Drink up ... '
When he actually held it to her lips instead of handing it her, she automatically curved her own hands around his, lest the liquid spill on the bed. Appalled to find her fingers trembling, she gulped the drink down very quickly, all the while aware of Damian staring at her over the rim with those penetrating black eyes of his. She found herself staring back at him and seeing him in a totally different light.
Where before he'd presented himself as a darkly elegant and very handsome man with flashing black eyes, a boyish smile and an engagingly charming manner, she now noted a wicked gleam in those eyes and a decadent weakness in the slack set of his mouth. Dressed all in black as he was tonight, and with his straight black hair slicked back from his face, he gave off a menacing aura that was making her heart beat faster and her stomach churn. All she wanted was for him to leave her room as soon as possible.
'All gone,' she said with false brightness once she'd drunk all the hot chocolate and was able to take her hands away from his.
'Good girl. Sleep well, now.'
Gemma could not help her look of surprise when he simply stood up and began to walk towards the door.
She was still staring at him when he stopped with his hand on the doorknob and looked back over his shoulder. 'I suggest you sleep in as long as you can tomorrow morning. Unfortunately, I have to show my face in the office, but Cora will be here all day to look after you. Feel free to use the pool-it's heated-or anything else that appeals, and I'll see you when I get home tomorrow evening. OK?'
His smile was so warm and tender that she felt guilty at her earlier bad thoughts about him. Her imagination was definitely getting the better of her. Or maybe her opinion of men had been seriously damaged by what Nathan had done.
'I'll never forget how sweet you've been to me,' she said with genuine feeling. 'I don't know what I would have done without you.'
'Men can be good friends too, Gemma. Always remember that.'
'I will from now on.'
It was after two when Damian slipped back into her room. The sleeping tablets he'd crushed in her drink would be at their peak now. He'd tripled the normal dose, making sure of her unconscious state.
The room was in darkness, the curtains drawn at the windows. Making his way carefully over to them, he very slowly drew them back so that moonlight fell across the bed and the sleeping form within.
Standing next to the bed, he gazed down at her for ages then very slowly peeled the bedclothes back down. Shock riveted him to the spot when she moaned and rolled over on to her side, facing him. But her eyes remained shut, her lips softly apart as she breathed the deep, even breathing of the heavily drugged. His own eyes fell to where her movement had wrapped the nightie tightly around her body, the top awry on her full bosom.
His gut clenched down hard at the sight of half a rosy nipple peeping out at him, his desire flaring madly. The idea of touching her while she was asleep was so exciting that he actually shuddered.
He recalled how her hands had trembled on his earlier tonight. She'd been momentarily afraid of him till he'd managed to allay her fears with his wimpish retreat. But she had every reason to be afraid of him, though, didn't she? Every reason ...
His own hands trembled as he reached out to draw the strap down off her shoulder and down her arm. He was about to was about to expose her breast totally when he heard the sound of the doorknob turning. Reefing the strap back up, he dived under the bed and was hiding there, quivering, when he saw his sister's slippers appear beside the bed.
Holding his breath lest she hear his breathing, he listened to her rearranging the bedclothes, then watched her walk over to the windows where she drew the curtains, blessedly darkening that side of the room. His relief when she left the room was enormous, but for some rotten reason Celeste left the damned door ajar. And the light in the hall was on.
Clearly, his sister was having one of her sleepless nights, when she would wander the house at all hours. If he closed the door, she might see it.
Damian lay where he was for some time before slipping out from under the bed and returning to his room. Though furious, he put his frustration on hold with the thought that tomorrow was another day. He determined that it would not only be Gemma's drink he put the sleeping draught in the next time. Darling Celeste was going to have her insomnia fixed as well.
Gemma woke with a terrible hangover. She groaned when she saw the time. Nearly noon. How could she have slept for so long?
Dragging herself out of bed, she visited the en suite then returned to draw on her only modest dressing gown-a floor-length cream silk number whose coverage was adequate, although it wasn't the thickest of material. Still, only Cora would be left in the house at this late hour. Damian and Celeste would have gone to work.
Work ...
Gemma felt guilty about how she'd let her own workmates down yesterday, ringing up at the last moment and claiming she was sick. She would have to ring again today and let them know the real situation, though maybe Byron had already done that. From what Celeste said last night, her father-in-law already knew everything.
Picking up her hairbrush, she began putting some order into her tangled hair. She really had had a restless night, despite sleeping so long. There was a vague memory of dreams which she was rather glad she could not remember. She was sure they hadn't been happy dreams. But they weren't likely to be, were they?
With her appearance in some semblance of order, she went in search of Cora and a cup of coffee. Maybe some aspirin as well. She really did not feel too good. Her head was terribly thick. Not exactly a headache but a woolly feeling.
Gemma glanced admiringly around on her way downstairs, especially at the elaborate stained-glass window rising above the landing halfway down. Her stark outback upbringing made her appreciate beautiful things but she was not naive enough to think that riches brought happiness. Her own marriage to a wealthy successful man certainly proved the saying that money wasn't everything. It was nothing 'if not combined with love and true intimacy. Nathan had showered her with clothes and gifts, given her everything but himself in a real sense. She'd been worried all along by their lack of emotional bonding, worried Nathan's feelings for her didn't go deeper than lust and possessiveness, and she'd been proven right.
The kitchen was empty, and there, on the counter, propped against a bowl of fruit, was a note.
Gone to do the week's shopping. I've put a selection of cereals on the side. Coffee and tea next to them. There's milk and orange juice in the fridge, bread already in the toaster. Help yourself. Be back by three. Cora.
'Just coffee to start with, Cora,' Gemma told the absent housekeeper. 'Pity about the aspirin.'
She took the steaming mug back upstairs with her, sipping down most of it before stripping off and plunging into the shower, in the hope that the hot jets of water would clear her head. No such luck. She really needed a couple of painkillers.
Unfortunately, the wall cabinet in the guest en suite was empty apart from a spare toothbrush, some mouthwash, and a couple of tubes of toothpaste. Gemma didn't think anyone would mind if she searched the other medicine cabinets for something to take, so she covered her nakedness with her robe and walked out of her bedroom into the next.
Clearly, it was a man's bedroom, the furniture dark, the brown and gold furnishings having not a single piece of feminine frippery about any of them. There was also an absence of the type of ornament and knickknack women dotted around their rooms. The bed was made and the room tidy, but the black trousers and shirt Damian had worn the previous evening were draped across a chair in the corner.
Not wanting to linger, Gemma hurried across the room and into the connecting bathroom. This time, the cabinet was full of a wide range of medicine and other items, including several packets of condoms. Gemma tried not to make judgement over this-at least he was practicing safe sex - but seeing so many of them sitting there so openly and so casually sent a funny little shiver down her spine.
Her eyes darted along the shelves and when she spied some headache tablets she snatched them up, extracted a couple and put the packet back, relieved to slide the glass door back into place. Popping them into her mouth, she turned on the tap, cupped her hands and drank from the pool of water that formed in them.
When she lifted her head from this action and automatically glanced in the mirror, she screamed. For Nathan was standing in the open bedroom doorway, glaring over at her as though he wanted to kill her.
She whirled round, and her eyes had never felt bigger as they took in his unshaven face and his chillingly cold grey eyes. Dressed in washed-out grey jeans and a crumpled blue windcheater, he looked far removed from his usual elegant, well-groomed self. He looked far removed from his usual self all round. Dear God, he had never looked at her like that before, so full of hardness and hatred.
After an initial freezing, Gemma's heart jolted into an erratic beat, her headache forgotten in the face of other more frightening feelings.
'So I was right,' he said in a voice made all the more terrifying for its control. 'You were here all along. I just jumped to the wrong conclusion.'
Gemma pulled the robe defensively around her quivering nudity. 'How ... how did you get in here? The gates are locked.'
'There's no lock on the jetty, Gemma. I came by boat.'
'I'm not alone, you know,' she bluffed, sensing his simmering violence. 'The housekeeper. .. '
'Won't be back till three,' he finished frostily, and produced Cora's note from his pocket.
Crippling it into a ball, he threw it in a corner. 'I came here,' he ground out, 'hoping and praying that somehow I'd be proven wrong about you, that all I had to do to set things right was say I was sorry for being so stupid as to have Lenore over. But I wasn't wrong about you, was I? You took the first flimsy excuse you could find to run to your lover. You blackened my name to my whole family while all the time you were letting that bastard Campbell screw you silly!'
Gemma hadn't realized till that moment what impression her presence in Damian's room would give, especially with her not being properly dressed. Any irony over Nathan's turning things around and making her the accused one was lost in the wake of her anxiety to make him see the truth.
'You've got it all wrong!' she defended. But in vain, she thought. There was no reasoning in Nathan's face. No capacity to listen. Yet she had to try. Having him believe such a thing of her was untenable. 'I. . .I only came in here to get some aspirin. Here .. .look!'
She slid back the cabinet and pointed to the packet of tablets. Nathan's chilling gaze moved from the aspirin to the other packets on the shelf, then returned to survey Gemma's swiftly flushing face with a chillingly mocking expression.
Oh, why do I have to look so guilty? Gemma agonized.
'I know what you're thinking but you're wrong!' she cried. 'There's nothing between Damian and myself. I'm staying here as a guest,' she explained desperately, 'and I have my own room. I'll show it to you. It has my things in it.'
When she hurried forward and went to brush past him, Nathan grabbed both her arms and swung them behind her, holding her wrists in an iron grip while he pushed her back into Damian's room. He slammed her face-down on to the bed, his breathing ragged behind her.
'You might have your own room but this is where you've been spending your nights, you lying, cheating bitch! I've known it from the moment that hotel clerk described to me the man who came to collect you. You've been seeing Damian Campbell ever since that night of the ball, haven't you?'
'No!' she cried, terrified now. 'I swear to you, I haven't. I. . .I did run into him one day, but we ... we only had coffee.'
Nathan laughed. 'Damian doesn't just have coffee with women, Gemma. He doesn't just have anything. The man's well known for his perversions. One in particular. '
Gemma was horrified when she felt her robe being pushed up to her waist, exposing her bare buttocks.
'It seems you haven't progressed to that yet,' he muttered darkly. 'But you will. And he's welcome to you. You know, I sometimes wondered when you would change, when you would fall "out of love". I always knew you were far too young for true love. And far, far too beautiful. Extremely beautiful women rarely love. They're too bloody self-centered!'
'I do so love you,' she sobbed.
'Do you?' he jeered. 'Do you really? In that case you won't mind if I have a little of what you've been denying me these last couple of weeks.'
Gemma gasped when she felt him cruelly enclose her two wrists in one brutal grasp on the small of her back, when she heard the sound of his opening his trousers. He jammed a knee between her thighs, forcing them apart.
'Oh, God ... no, don't. .. don't do this, Nathan!'
But it was already happening before she'd finished her plea. Disbelief brought a type of horrified submission, his harsh panting echoing in her ears. When he finally ejaculated and withdrew, she just lay there, stunned. Silent tears began to stream down her cheeks and she couldn't bear to turn over and look at him.
She vaguely heard him mutter something, heard him rearrange his clothing. Stiffly she closed her legs and buried her face in the quilt. When he laid a perversely gentle hand on her shoulder, she shuddered, and his hand retreated.
'I'm sorry,' he said in the most hollow-sounding voice. 'God .. .'
There was the sound of footsteps gradually receding and then there was an awful silence. It was ages before Gemma could bring herself to move, creeping back off the bed and running back to her bathroom where she turned on the shower and climbed in despite still having the robe on. The water gushed over her, soothing, cleaning water. But she couldn't seem to get herself clean.
No matter what she did, she felt dirty and unclean and ugly. In the end she had to get out of the shower before she turned red-raw. Fresh underwear and a soft flannel tracksuit went some way to making her feel better in a physical sense but she suspected that emotionally and mentally she was walking a razor's edge. If only she had a mother to confide in, someone who loved her unconditionally, who really cared what happened to her.
The image of Celeste's sympathetic face last night came to mind. While she was hardly a mother
figure, she was a woman of the world. She would understand what had happened here today, would perhaps help her put it into perspective. One part of Gemma almost understood Nathan's reaction to finding her in Damian's bedroom. Another part was so outraged she couldn't bear to think about it. On top of everything else, she’d begun to doubt what she had heard with her own ears in their apartment the other day.
Nathan had acted the wronged husband with such vehemence! Could she be wrong? Had she misheard something? How could she have? What Lenore and Nathan had said to each other was crystal-clear, and so utterly, utterly damning. There could be no excuse. No explanation.
And yet. ..
Gemma forced herself to return to Damian's bedroom to check that she had left no evidence behind of what had transpired there. For a long moment, she stood in the doorway, staring at the indentation in the bed. Luckily, there was no stain, but still, she felt sick just looking at it. She would never forgive Nathan. Never!