'Nasty,' he said, grinning.
'Finish your spaghetti,' she advised. 'You've deserved it. You ought to eat fish, really, for brain power.'
'Spaghetti works even better,' Chris assured her, turning his attention to his plate.
They walked back to the office in brilliant sunshine, waves of heat coming up from the pavements, the cars driving past giving off metallic flashes of reflected light. Charles was going to be over the moon, thought Lindsay. Chris had come up with his best idea ever.
All that afternoon she was caught up in the maelstrom which Chris's brainwave had caused. She didn't have a chance to do any of the routine work, she was too busy discussing the details of the campaign with Charles and the other top executives of the company. Chris always left such minor matters to other people. Having done his part, he collapsed in a chair like a rag doll and smiled beatifically on them, saying almost nothing. Nobody minded, he could do no wrong today.
While she talked and listened, Lindsay's mind kept wandering away to the subject that was engrossing her secret attention, but she refused to let herself dwell on Daniel's proposition. He had given her until Thursday to make a decision, and it was already Tuesday, which left her only two days. Every time she faced that fact, she felt an icy dart of anxiety. He had left her without options, she couldn't think of any way of saving Stephen from bankruptcy. Glancing at Chris, she wished she had his inspiration—she could do with a brainwave herself.
If Daniel had walked out on her, he wouldn't want to hurt and humiliate her now, but she had committed the unforgivable sin by walking out on him. He might have lost interest in her, he might have regretted getting married at all, but his ego couldn't take the shock of having her end their marriage. That had been Daniel's privilege, his choice—he had decided to marry her in the first place and he felt aggrieved because she had had the temerity to leave him.
Lindsay had no doubts about his motives. He was using her brother as a weapon against her. He must hate her, she thought, staring at the ceiling. It hurt, she felt cold and on the point of tears, but however she felt she still had to make up her mind what to do, and there was no one she could confide in, it would be too painful to tell anyone. This was one decision she had to make alone, without advice.
Aston rang just before she left the office. 'I'm working late tonight, but tomorrow should be an easier day. Could we have dinner?'
'Love to,' Lindsay said warmly. She wished she dared tell him about Daniel's blackmail, but what could he do?
'Miss you,' he said softly and she smiled.
'Same here. Don't work too hard. I'll see you tomorrow.'
'I'll pick you up at the flat at seven,' he said before ringing off. Lindsay put down the phone, sighing. She made her way home in the rush-hour traffic, her clothes sticking to her again, the heatwave showed no sign of diminishing. People were irritable, impatient, flushed, many of them showing signs of sun-worship, their faces and arms reddened. Men were in shirt-sleeves, tie-less. Women were in thin summer dresses, their legs bare. Lindsay wondered if she looked the way they did; her skin beaded with perspiration, her eyes tired, her movements lethargic. That was how she felt, she had no energy at all, she just wanted to flop out and keep still. This was no weather to be in a city, she longed to be on a beach.
When she got back to the flat she showered and put on a brief white cotton tunic cut on simple lines; the neck low and rounded, the hem just above her knees and the sides split for easy movement. It had a Grecian look, she had bought it in Athens on a holiday a year ago but had rarely worn it because the cotton was so thin it was more like gauze and totally transparent. It was not a dress she could wear to the office or in the streets, but it was perfect for relaxing in weather like this; the filmy material floated around her as she walked, she felt free and at ease.
She had a glass of lime-juice and a tiny salad, then lay on the couch listening to Spanish guitar music.
The doorbell went, and her heart skipped a beat, then hammered inside her ribcage, making her feel sick. She stumbled to the floor, dropping her book. She knew who it was before she got to the front door of the flat and opened it—every instinct shrieked a warning.
He leaned against the door; very tall and powerful, a lean-hipped, unsmiling man with narrowed grey eyes that openly took in every detail of her appearance, travelling from her curling, still damp hair to the quivering curve of her pink lips, down over the curve of her body in the far too revealing, gauzy dress. Lindsay bore that look with nervous defiance, her chin up.
'I'm busy!'
Daniel smiled with dry sarcasm and walked past her with such cool confidence that she made no attempt to stop him. Closing the door slowly, she followed and found him standing in the sitting-room, looking at the book on the floor, the empty glass. Without a word he went over to the record player and lifted the arm. The guitar music stopped mid-beat.
'Do you mind? You've got a nerve!' Lindsay burst out, and he turned to survey her with a crooked little smile.
'I like the dress.' But it wasn't at the dress that he was looking, it was at what was under it, and Lindsay felt her skin burn. Helplessly, she wished she had put on something else, she might as well be naked.
'What's the matter?' Daniel mocked, watching her with eyes which pinned her to the spot.
'What do you want?' she asked shakily, and he laughed.
'Care to re-phrase the question?'
'Aren't you witty?' she muttered, hating him. 'You know what I mean—why are you here?'
'I can't keep away from you,' said Daniel with the same mockery, and her temper flared.
'You've managed it for two years!'
His smile hardened and the grey eyes were fierce with an emotion she couldn't decipher. 'I wasn't coming crawling after you on my knees.'
Her throat tightened. 'What's different now?' she flung back at him, refusing to believe the force she heard in his voice.
'Now it's going to be you on your knees,' he said through his teeth, his eyes harsh, and she went cold from head to foot. 'I only deal on my own terms,' Daniel added. 'You didn't think I'd accept yours? You left me, I wasn't chasing after you, but now you'll come back knowing I own you.'
What he was saying came as no real surprise to her, she knew she had wounded his ego and she knew Daniel's pride was monolithic, his sense of himself impenetrable, unshakable, but hearing him state his hostility so openly made her tremble in shock.
'You can't own human beings,' she stammered, nevertheless, holding her head up and refusing to betray the fear which had swallowed her.
His eyes flashed with bitter humour. 'Can't you? That depends on your definition of ownership. If you want to save your brother's neck, you'll come back to me, and on my terms.'
She was so angry her teeth were chattering. 'You're crazy,' she said. 'You won't get much enjoyment out of forcing me to…'
'Won't I?' he asked, moving with a speed that made her jump in alarm.
She didn't have time to escape, the next second he had one arm around her while the other forced up her chin. Rigid and shaking, Lindsay looked into the hard grey eyes, her mouth dry.
'Don't,' she whispered, and Daniel's eyes glittered as he smiled in threat.
'That's one word you'll never use to me again.' His mouth came down on her lips, burning with a fever she felt leaping up inside herself, and it did not matter that his hunger was born out of hatred and a wish to humiliate her, the demand of the kiss was met by an answering demand in her, desire fountained inside her body and she weakened in his arms, swaying towards him. Bending her backwards, Daniel slid his mouth down her throat and with closed eyes she trembled, a husky little moan breathed through her crushed lips. Behind her lids, light flashed and gleamed, she was dizzy and hot.
'You want me,' Daniel muttered, his mouth at the base of her throat, and she sighed, shuddering with pleasure, feeling his hand moving under the gauze, stroking the smooth flesh of her thigh.
Her arms went round his neck, she touc
hed his hair, his nape, the muscled shoulders, her lips parted, aching for the touch of his mouth. Her mind had given up trying to think, she was in a state of weak confusion, the throb of desire in her body dominating her. Daniel's hands explored the naked flesh beneath her dress, caressing her warm breasts while she trembled, feeling the urgency inside him and knowing she felt it, too, a mounting need which grew with every movement of his hands. He was breathing quickly, thickly, she could hear his heart thudding in the same wild rhythm as her own.
She began to be frightened by the intensity of her feelings, a part of her standing aside like a voyeur, whispering mental warnings. She was letting Daniel have things all his own way, she was out of control, her mind had no part in what was happening. He was pulling the thin material down from her shoulders, bending his head to kiss the hardened nipples on her breasts, and that separated part of her protested, despised her for the husky little moans he was wringing out of her.
What had he just said? That she would never say no to him again? That would make her a puppet, without a mind of its own, and wasn't that how she was behaving now, moaning in abandoned excitement while he touched her?
This was not lovemaking, it was a deliberate, cynical manipulation of her body by a man who wanted to humiliate her, and she was playing the accomplice to her own destruction when if she had an ounce of self-respect she would stop him and throw him out of her life again.
She wrenched herself away, her breathing husky and impeded. Daniel stared at her and she stood facing him, trembling, her gauzy dress half off, her bare shoulders and breasts exposed.
'No,' she said, her hands clenched.
His eyes darkened, his jaw taut. 'That wasn't the message I was getting a moment ago. You wanted it…'
'No!' she said again, much louder, to drown what he was saying, to drown the feverish admission of her own body.
'What's the matter? Afraid Hill will walk in? Has a key, does he?' Daniel was angry enough now to grind the words out through teeth that barely parted, rage showed in the grey eyes.
'Aston has nothing to do with this!'
'Hasn't he?' '
'It's you,' Lindsay said incoherently. 'I won't let you do this to me.'
'You're lying to yourself if you think I'm doing anything you don't want me to do,' he broke out angrily. 'You wanted me to make love to you. Oh, you'd have died rather than admit it to me, you prefer to get me to force you, don't you? Then you can tell yourself you weren't responsible, I made you do it, but that's a lie. I can have you any time I want you.'
'Get out!' she shouted, tension making her body shake.
'You've always had a frigid fear of sex,' he went on, ignoring her.
'I'm not frigid and I'm not afraid of sex, I don't have to be either to refuse to go to bed with you, you know!' Lindsay was insulted by his accusation.
'When we first met, you were practically walled in ice,' Daniel sneered. 'I had to chip my way through. I got frostbite just touching your hand.'
She was white. 'You swine! I was only just out of school…'
'What was it? A convent?'
'Just because I wouldn't let you rush me into bed on our first date!'
'I had to make it respectable by putting a ring on your hand first, didn't I?' he snarled, and Lindsay slapped his face so hard his head jerked back in surprise. He looked at her with dangerous eyes for a split second and before she had moved again his own hand came up and to her disbelief she felt it sting her cheek. Shock brought tears to her eyes, Daniel was darkly flushed, his brows black above brooding, angry eyes.
'Don't ever hit me again or next time I'll do more than give you a token slap!' he grated.
She touched the hot mark on her cheek with her fingertips and he watched her, frowning.
'Did that make you feel better?' she asked contemptuously. 'You get your kicks in a funny way.'
'You hit me first, but then that's typical — you provoke a reaction, then turn round and complain about it. Right from the first, you've done the same thing. When we met you kept giving me inviting smiles, but promise was one thing, delivery something else, wasn't it?'
'You just had a one-track mind. In my book accepting a dinner date doesn't mean you automatically go to bed with a man.'
His smile was hard. 'How long did Hill have to wait?'
'I haven't…' She stopped, biting her lip, and Daniel's eyes widened and gleamed.
'Well, well, well,' he said softly, and smiled. 'Haven't you, now? He must be one hell of a patient guy—and very frustrated.'
Lindsay did not like his smile, it held too much satisfaction and far too much self-congratulation. If she hadn't been afraid of his response, she'd have hit him again, but the glowing mark on her cheek urged caution.
'And so must you be,' he added slowly, watching her as a hot tide of colour ran up her face. 'Two years is a long time to go hungry, isn't it, Lindsay?'
'Will you leave my flat or do I have to call the police?' c She descended to bluff because she couldn't think of any other way of ending his taunts, she could have kicked herself for giving away the fact that she wasn't sleeping with Aston, it would only make Daniel more sure of himself.
'I'm still waiting for my answer,' he said without showing any sign of leaving, 'The sooner you agree, the sooner Stephen will be put out of his misery. He must be out of his mind at the moment.'
She closed her eyes, wincing, and knew he was watching her, calculating the effect of what he had just said. Opening her eyes again, she looked at him with a mixture of bitterness and regret. Why was he such a swine? His features held such strength: lean and hard-boned, with that firm jawline and beautifully shaped mouth, those cool, intelligent grey eyes. What sort of mind lay behind them? He was using a cruelly effective blackmail, enlisting her own emotions against her, how could he bring himself to do it?
'You're ruthless, aren't you?' she whispered, and he shrugged.
'If I have to be.'
'Why do you want to humiliate me?' she cried out, her voice shaking, and Daniel's brows jerked together, his features all tightened, his mouth levelling, his cheekbones angular, a tiny muscle jerking beside his mouth.
'If it humiliates you so much, I'm prepared to marry you first,' he said, and laughed, but it was a humourless laughter. 'I know how you insist on that wedding ring,' he added. 'That was what you held out for last time, wasn't it? And you got it, but even that wasn't enough, was it? You still couldn't bear being touched, you bolted. You're a psychological mess, do you know that? When I'm touching you, you burn. It drives me insane to feel that response one minute and the next have you freeze on me and push me away. What happens inside your head to make you ice up like that? Is it guilt? Are you afraid of sex?' His voice held an impassioned pleading now, Lindsay looked at him in shock, her eyes wide. He took a step closer, putting out his hand, and she flinched involuntarily.
'Don't move away from me like that!' Daniel snarled, then he turned away and walked to the. door in three strides. 'I said I'd give you until Thursday—I will, but remember, Stephen is waiting for your answer just as much as I am, so don't prolong the agony.' The front door slammed and Lindsay sank on to the couch, trembling, her thoughts in chaos. Daniel had come strangely close to the truth in his accusation that she was afraid of sex, but it wasn't sex she feared, it was love. Sex was merely the symptom of the disease, love was the sickness itself. Her love for Daniel had been too intense, too devouring: she hadn't been able to control it, she had wanted him too much, been jealous of everyone who came near him, and her jealousy had taken over her whole life in the end, she hadn't slept, hadn't thought about anything else, it had been a permanent torture.
She had thought Daniel knew. Had he forgotten her constant probing, her questions about what he had done, where he had been and with whom? She had thought she was so obvious—hadn't he realised, after all?,
She sat in the darkening room, a slender white statue on the couch, unmoving. Daniel seemed to see their marriage from an entirely dif
ferent angle—he remembered everything in a totally different way. But he had one thing right—she was a psychological mess, she couldn't deny that. Her jealousy was a desire for total possession, she had long ago faced that, and that was abnormal; she had had to leave him to escape the endless maze of that bitter, unrewarding emotion. She did not want to be drawn back into it, but if she allowed herself to love Daniel, she was afraid that she would.
CHAPTER EIGHT
'You're looking rather wan,' Chris told her next morning, eyeing her through half-closed lids as he lounged back in his swivel chair in his favourite position, feet on the desk and arms behind his head.
'The heat,' Lindsay lied, and looked out of the window at the blue, blue sky that floated overhead, unconcerned that London was suffering, far below, from the remorseless heat of the sun. 'Another scorching day,' she added. 'You're lucky I came to work at all, I was thinking of going off to the local swimming pool.'
'Poor little dear,' said Chris, and nudged a pile of reports with one beautifully shod foot. 'Take these and skim through them for me, will you? I'd like a brief resume by lunchtime.'
'Yes, boss,' she said with venom. 'Anything else I can do?'
'Not just now,' he decided, settling back for a nap with his eyes shut, and she left the office with a crash as the door banged behind her and the glass shook in all the windows on that floor.
'Temper, temper!' Chris yodelled after her.
Her secretary grinned as Lindsay passed her. 'Pleased with himself, today, isn't he?'
'As Punch,' Lindsay agreed, going into her office and dumping the reports on her desk with a groan. That lot would take her all day, Chris could wait for his resume.
She rang Stephen before she began work on them. Alice answered the phone and told her Stephen had gone to work. 'He insisted, I couldn't persuade him to stay at home any longer.'
'How is he?' Lindsay couldn't get out of her mind the haggard face of her brother last time they met. ,
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