by Daphne Clair
Then she dropped her head tiredly on her clasped hands, and wept.
She was curiously unsurprised to find Alex waiting outside the shop after work the next day. Her mouth dried at the strangely hostile look in his eyes as he took her arm firmly, perhaps expecting her to run away.
The tentative smile with which she had greeted him faded away, and she asked, 'What do you want, Alex?'
'Since you won't take my phone calls, I had to come,' he said. 'You have some things at my house. I'd like you to come and get them, if you don't mind.'
Whatever she had expected, it wasn't that.
'Oh—yes,' she said. 'I'd forgotten. When would you like me to take them away?'
'Now, if that's all right. I have my car, and when we've sorted the stuff out, I'll take you home and transport it for you.'
'Very well. Thank you.' Her Voice was clipped. They sounded like polite acquaintances.
When he had ushered her into the hall and taken her bag, depositing it on the hall table they had chosen together, Alex said briskly, 'Would you like a cup of tea or a drink?'
'No, thanks.' Her throat felt tight, and she fingered the chain that encircled it nervously, until she saw his jaw tighten as he watched her restless fingers, and met his cold eyes.
There were many things she wanted to say to him, but the words would not come in the face of his icy courtesy. He opened the door of the front room, saying, 'There are some books in here of yours, I think?'
There were, and he helped her to remove them from the shelves, going out to get a box to put them in. Stacey picked up a glass peacock that had once graced her bedroom at home, and a tiny ivory clipper ship that had been her father's gift as a child, kept by her mother in a glass china cabinet until she was deemed old enough to look after it. She remembered telling Alex that, and how they had talked about a suitable place for it in their new home.
'You'll want to wrap those,' he said indifferently. 'I'll get some paper.'
She wiped away tears while he was gone, and appeared quite composed when he came back. She wrapped a few more things, and hesitated before the two paintings in small oval frames that hung on the wall.
'You want those back?' he asked harshly.
'No, of course not!' she swung round to face him. 'They were a gift.'
'Aren't valuable gifts supposed to be returned in cases like this?'
'They're not valuable,' she said.
He looked about to say something, but apparently changed his mind.
'I suppose you want me to take the linen, too?' she asked.
'I want you to take everything that's yours,' he said.
'Well,' she swallowed, 'it's upstairs.'
As Alex followed her up, she asked, 'Are you always so quick to get rid of—I mean ‑'
'To cut my losses?' he asked, as they reached the top of the staircase.
She turned to face him as he stepped on to the landing beside her.
'You made it pretty clear the other night,' he said, 'that I can never be as important to you as David was-— and still is. I'm willing to accept that you loved him, but I never said I would take second place, Stacey. So if you're thinking of changing your mind, forget it. I'm not interested.'
She turned blindly to open the linen cupboard and take out brand new sheets and towels. He took them from her as she pulled them out. 'Is this all?'
'Yes.' She shut the cupboard and fiddled with the china handle, a new one bought to go with the house. 'I don't know about the front bedroom.' She had almost said 'our' bedroom.
She walked into it, knowing there was nothing there of hers, but wanting desperately to see it once more.
He had put the pile of linen on the floor at the top of the staircase, and followed her.
'You can have the bedspread if you like,' he said. 'I'll be changing it anyway.'
But she wasn't looking at the lovely white cotton crocheted bedspread they had picked out with such care.
She was staring at the empty space by the window where the Chinese figurine had stood on her own little table.
'Where is she?' she asked, accusingly. 'She belonged here! What have you done with her?'
Ts that your business?' he asked coolly.
'Yes!' She whirled on him. 'You knew how I loved her. You haven't ‑?'
'Haven't what? Smashed her? Thrown her away?'
'You wouldn't?' she gasped, anguished at the thought.
'No, I wouldn't,' he agreed. 'I shall probably sell the thing.'
'Sell it?' Her distress was obvious. 'How could you?'
'I could, and I will. Unlike you, I don't wish to wallow in memories, or expend my emotions on inanimate mementoes of love. Nor on pretty ornaments, even jade ones.'
His eyes flicked to her throat, and she instinctively moved her hand there as though to protect herself, her fingers lifted the chain as she said huskily, 'That's not true. I don't ‑'
'You do!' he interrupted harshly. 'The first sign of any emotion from you since you broke our engagement is. over a statuette—an ornament. You're a lot more upset at the idea of that being broken than over our broken engagement, aren't you?'
'No! I was upset because she was a sort, of symbol ‑'
!Oh, yes! You're very hot on symbols, aren't you? You'd rather have a sentimental symbol than the real thing!'
'Alex, don't!' she begged, in the face of his bitter rage. 'If you don't believe me, at least let's part as friends.'
He visibly took a hold on himself, controlling his anger. 'All right. I apologise for yelling at you, Stacey. As you say, let's part as friends. With a friendly goodbye kiss, perhaps.'
She would have said no, knowing it was dangerous, but he gave her no chance. She saw the glitter of his eyes before she closed hers against it, and knew with an inward tremor that his rage was only fiercely controlled, not abated. But then her body was being pulled ruthlessly against his, and his mouth on hers was pressing her head against the curve of his arm. Deliberately she shut her teeth and closed her lips against the assault of his, but as she raised a hand to push against him, he grabbed at her wrist and twisted it behind her, forcing her reluctant body even closer in the process. Her lips opened in an automatic but silent protest, allowing him to make free of them and annihilate her feeble opposition.
By the time he released her mouth from its sensual captivity, she was incapable of any resistance, and his hand against her heart, the thumb gently moving over the curve above it, was well aware of her response.
'You see,' he said thickly in her ear. 'This is reality, Stacey. Not a sterile sentimental memory. Look at you !' He suddenly pushed her back against the wall, his eyes cruelly intent on her, sweeping unmercifully over her dishevelled hair, her wide, drugged eyes, her softened, swollen mouth, even the rounded breasts that strained against the thin material of her dress. 7 did this to you. I'm the man you want right now—and you do want me, as much as I want you.'
She shook her head, from pride and humiliation and a sense of futility as much as anything. What Alex was saying was true, but did he want to taunt her into admitting it just to salve his own pride? He had told her he was not interested in her love any more.
'Yes, you do, Stacey,' he said. 'It's me you want, not your dead boy-lover. I'll bet you can't even remember his face. You have to wear this to remind you!'
She was too late to stop him as he grabbed at the chain about her neck and pulled the loop of it free of her dress. Her hand grabbed at his wrist and then fell to her side hopelessly as his fingers closed over the slight weight of the object on the chain, and slowly opened in puzzlement.
She held her breath as he stared down for what seemed endless moments at the jade ring in his palm. And then as his eyes blazed into hers in sudden comprehension, Stacey panicked and ran from him, hardly feeling the tautness of the chain against her neck before it snapped in his hand.
The pile of linen at the top of the stairs stopped her, and as she made to leap over them, a hard hand caught at her arm and spun her
back.
'Let me go!! she cried, flailing out blindly with her fist.
'All right, all right, darling, I will.' There was pain behind the determined control in his voice. 'I've manhandled you enough, God knows. But please, promise not to jump down those stairs. You don't have to break your neck to get away from me.'
It was the 'darling' that penetrated her near-hysteria and stilled her struggles. She stood limp and beaten before him, and he let go her wrist and moved away from her.
'I promise I won't touch you again unless you want me to;' he said quietly. Stacey was silent, her head bent, one hand curved around the newel post at the top of the stairs. 'I've handled this very badly,' he went on. 'But—Stacey,' his voice roughened a little. 'I can think of only one reason for you to wear my ring around your neck.' His silence pleaded for an answer, but she stayed motionless. 'You never told me you loved me, Stacey,' he said quietly. 'Was I wrong when I said you never had? You were wearing my ring on this chain ‑' he held it out to her, the broken gold links dangling from his hand. 'My ring, not David's picture. It's got to mean something to you.'
'I meant to come and see you,' she said. 'I wanted to —talk to you.'
'What did you plan to say?'
'That I ‑' she flickered a glance at him, and licked her lips. 'That I'd changed my mind.'
'Why?' The question was hardly more than breath, a sigh.
'Because I realised that ‑' She was afraid to look at him, but that was a cowardly reaction. If she had to say this, she would say it to his face. She raised eyes that were close to tears. 'I love you, Alex. I didn't realise how much until last night. You were probably right about David. He was young, and young men are often selfish. And he knew I would walk over broken glass for him,' she quoted with a tiny smile. 'I would for you too, if you asked.'
With an answering glimmer of a smile, he held her eyes with his. 'You're quite safe and you know it,' he said. 'I wouldn't ask it.'
'Then how do I convince you that you're not second-best? Or are you going to stand by your statement that if I changed my mind, you're not interested?'
'Convince me.'
He let her come to him, but the gentle welcome in his eyes was enough to encourage her to slide her arms about his neck. And after that there was doubt as to who was kissed and who did the kissing.
Later he slid the ring back on to her finger and kissed her palm, saying, 'Why didn't you tell me before I went berserk? What a brute I was—I'm sorry, darling.'
'You were so cold and angry. You convinced me all you wanted was to be rid of me and everything that reminded you of me, as soon as possible. And then, when I'd almost decided to try and make you listen anyway, you turned round and snarled that you were no longer interested.'
'So I did. I had meant to bring you home to talk, try to convince you that even if we had to differ about David, you did really love me. I was almost sure of it, and I hoped you would eventually admit it. Then I saw that you were wearing what I thought was that locket.
Perhaps you were right about my being jealous. It sent me into a towering rage.'
'No, I don't think I was right. Of course you don't want to be second-best. And you're not. I think I was so upset partly because David was no longer first with me, and in a way I felt guilty about it. So I had to over-defend him to you, out of sort of misguided loyalty,'
'Perhaps.' Alex's tone was non-committal, and Stacey realised that he was not going to be drawn into discussing David under any circumstances.
'By the way,' she said suddenly, 'where is the jade girl?'
'Here,' he said contentedly, pushing aside her hair to drop a kiss below her ear.
'No, silly! The real one.'
He raised his eyebrows and she said, 'You know quite well what I mean. What did you do with her?'
'She's in my room. And there she stays to keep me . company until you both occupy that room that was made for you.'
'That's next week,' she said happily.
'Yes, jade girl. Next week, we're going to be married, so you'd better make up your mind to it, because I won't stand for your changing it again.'
'Won't you?' She slanted a glance up at him. 'Convince me!'