by Penny Jordan
Why was Mary-Beth sounding so shocked? Jon and Lillian were staying with her. She must be perfectly aware of the situation.
‘She told me everything,’ Sophy reiterated expressionlessly. ‘About how Jon asked her to come to London…how they stayed there together in an hotel.’ Her mouth twisted bitterly. ‘She even suggested I should ring the hotel and check.’
‘Sophy?’
She swung round to look at Mary-Beth as she caught the anxiety in her voice, but the frown on Mary-Beth’s face suddenly lifted. ‘Oh, it’s all right. You will be staying here?’
‘If Jon lets me. Lillian told me that they don’t want the children and even if I didn’t love both of them very much myself, I could hardly walk out and leave them.’ She saw Mary-Beth look at her watch and then the American was saying hurriedly, ‘Look I must run… Are you doing anything during the rest of the day? Going out?’
She must be embarrassed, Sophy realised, and that was why she was having to take refuge in inane social chit-chat; even so she responded to the questions, shaking her head and explaining that both children were out with friends and would not be back until after supper.
Thunder rolled again, marginally nearer this time and Sophy winced.
‘If I were you I’d go upstairs and bury your head under a pillow,’ Mary-Beth suggested. ‘That way you won’t hear it.’
Sophy walked with her to the door and watched until her car had completely disappeared feeling that somehow she had just severed her final link with Jon. The ache in her temples had become a fully fledged pain; pain, in fact, seemed to invade her whole body. She went upstairs on dragging feet, but instead of going into her own room she went into Jon’s.
The room was clean and tidy just as she had left it after cleaning it yesterday morning and yet overwhelmingly it reminded her of him. One of his shirts half hung out of the laundry basket by the door and she went automatically to push it in, tensing as her fingers curled round the soft cotton and she was irresistibly aware of how the fabric had clung to his body. Like a sleepwalker she lifted the shirt from the empty basket, pressing its softness to her face. She wanted to cry but the tears had solidified in a lump in her chest—a lump that ached and hurt with every breath she tried to take. A scent that was exclusively Jon’s filled her senses with an awareness of him, and almost without realising what she was doing she stumbled over to his bed and flung herself down full length on it, still clutching his shirt. Outside the sky darkened, suddenly split by the first sizzling arc of lightning. Sophy cried out curling up into a tense ball, burying her face in Jon’s pillow.
Her fear of the storm seemed to release the tight knot of pain inside her and suddenly she was crying, tearing, ugly sobs that shook her body and soaked the shirt and pillow she was still clinging to. Outside the storm drew nearer and her tears slowly gave way to terror. Logic told her that she should get up and close the curtains but the fear chaining her to the bed was too great.
An hour, maybe more, passed as she lay there too terrified to move and yet oddly comforted by the indefinable presence of Jon that still clung to the room.
Suddenly it started to rain, almost torrentially so, the sound of it drowning out everything else.
Downstairs a door banged and Sophy listened to it, wondering if she had left a window open. If so the floor beneath it would surely be soaked.
Closer now the thunder rolled, lightning arcing brilliant across the sky, illuminating the darkness of the room. She moaned and covered her ears.
‘Sophy.’
A hand touched her shoulder. Her eyes opened in stunned disbelief to look into Jon’s. He was bending towards the bed. His shirt was soaked through, clinging to his skin and he had brought in with him the cool fresh smell of rain. He opened his mouth to speak, the words drowned out by the ferocity of the storm, the brilliance of the lightning jagging across the sky making Sophy scream out in terror and release her pillow to fling herself against him, burying her face in his shoulder.
She felt him shake and for a moment thought he was laughing at her but then she felt his hand on her hair, his voice roughly concerned in her ear, as his arms came round her, and his voice soothed her fear.
‘I’ll go and close the curtains.’
She didn’t want to let him go but suddenly all that had happened reminded her that she had no right to be in his arms…no place within their security and so she withdrew from him, and watched him walk across the floor.
The curtains were thick, old-fashioned ones, and instantly blotted out the storm, together with what little daylight there was. In the gloom she could barely make out Jon’s outline, until he switched on the bedside lamp.
‘That’s some storm out there,’ he told her wryly. ‘I’m soaked…I’ll have to take this off.’ He stripped off his shirt, dropping it into the laundry basket, opening his wardrobe to get another; all simple automatic movements and yet ones that moved her to great joy and pain. He didn’t put the shirt on though, pausing to turn and look across the room at her.
‘Sophy, why wouldn’t you let me talk to you?’
His voice was quiet, and if she hadn’t known better she might have said it was quite definitely edged with pain.
She could feel the tight knot returning to her chest and couldn’t speak, simply shaking her head. She knew he was coming towards her and that she should get off his bed and move away but something told her that her legs simply would not allow her to stand. As he reached her he stretched out his hand, and gently tugged away the shirt she had been clinging to.
A hot wave of colour flooded her skin as Sophy found herself unable to free herself from his gaze. He had taken off his glasses—to dry them, she supposed, and had not put them back, so that she could quite clearly see the wry amusement darkening his eyes to indigo blue.
‘What’s this?’
He said it softly, watching her like a hunter stalking his prey…seeing far too much for someone who was supposed to be so short-sighted.
‘I was cold.’
She saw his eyebrows lift with pardonable mockery, shock jolting through her body as he said softly. ‘How disappointing… I was hoping it was a love-object substitute…’ he sat down beside her and concluded silkily, ‘and that that love-object was me.’
How could he do this to her? Her fingers curled into her palms, not even the dying sound of the storm having the power to frighten her now.
‘Why are you saying these things to me?’ she demanded huskily. ‘Isn’t Lillian enough for you?’
His prompt ‘No,’ stunned her. She could only stare silently up at him, her mouth slightly open. All humour had gone from his eyes now and in fact they were almost frighteningly grim.
‘I could shake you, Sophy, for being so stupid,’ he told her bitingly. ‘How on earth could you be so easily deceived?’
‘Deceived?’
‘I don’t care what Lillian might have told you.’ He reached out and cupped her face. ‘Sophy, Lillian and I were never lovers. Oh, I know what she told you,’ he continued before she could speak, ‘but only because Mary-Beth told me. I had no idea that Lillian had—’ He broke off, his mouth curling in bitter derision. ‘That woman astounds me, astounds and frightens…’
‘Jon…’
‘No…listen to me. Let me tell you the full story,’ he paused and when she made no move to speak he started softly, ‘I told you that I met Lillian when I went to Nassau, but what I didn’t tell you was that she seemed to develop what, for lack of a better description, I can only describe as some sort of fixation about me.’ He grimaced faintly. ‘It got so bad that I was actually having to find ways to avoid her. When she first invited me to use her apartment and pool I had no idea. In the end I had to appeal to Mary-Beth for help and it was then that I discovered that Lillian has a history of these almost violent fixations. It’s a sad story in a way. In many re
spects she’s absolutely brilliant…perhaps almost too much so. Apparently she had some sort of breakdown just after she left university but she’s very good at her job and Harry, who’s a bit of a softie in many ways, took her on to his staff after he heard about her history of mental problems from his predecessor. Workwise he has no criticism of her at all but emotionally, she doesn’t seem to have any conception of reality or self-control.
‘When he told me all this I was glad that I was leaving Nassau so soon—and not only for that reason,’ he added cryptically. ‘I got the shock of my life when I walked into that hotel in London and found her waiting for me there in the foyer. Apparently Harry had had to ring Nassau and he had spoken to her on the telephone—about some problems she was having with her work. She asked him about me and without thinking he mentioned that I was going to London to do some work for Lexicons, which happens to be a company that Nassau deal with.’ He shrugged tiredly.
‘Harry admits now that that was a mistake, but as he says, it never even crossed his mind that Lillian would ring Lexicons, pretending to be my wife and find out from them which hotel they had booked me into and when I could be expected there.’ He saw Sophy’s expression and smiled harshly. ‘She was quite proud of what she did, believe me. For me it was like the start of a nightmare. Every time I tried to persuade her to go back to Nassau she started threatening to destroy herself. Finally I managed to persuade her to let me ring Harry and he came down to London straight away to talk to her.
‘The plan was that Harry would see her safely on to a plane to go home and that she would be met at the other end, but somehow it backfired and she managed to give Harry the slip.
‘He rang me yesterday morning to warn me. That was why I went out to see him so that we could try and work out what on earth she was going to do. The last thing I expected was that she would turn up here.
‘Lillian is an extremely mentally disturbed young woman, Sophy,’ he said quietly. ‘If I give you my word that she and I have never been lovers and that I would never want her as my lover, would you believe me?’
‘Where is she now?’ Her throat was dry with tension.
‘With Harry and Mary-Beth. I managed to persuade her to drive me over there yesterday afternoon. I thought you were angry with me because I hadn’t told you what was happening. I should have done but our own relationship seemed too tenuous…so fragile that I felt I couldn’t risk destroying it by burdening you with problems that weren’t really yours. Especially after the shock of Chris’s attack.’
‘She said you loved her…’ Her voice was cracked and uneven. ‘She said you wanted to divorce me.’
‘She’s a very sick person, Sophy, so totally out of touch with reality that I’m afraid she’ll never be wholly sane again. Believe me, I did nothing…nothing to encourage her in her fantasies.’ He smiled rather grimly. ‘There was only one woman on my mind whilst I was in Nassau and that was you. Do you believe me?’
‘Yes.’ She said it huskily and knew that it was true. Her heart somersaulted as he lifted her hand to his mouth and pressed his lips to her palm, caressing it softly with his tongue.
‘How did you know what Lillian had said to me?’
‘Mary-Beth told me. She also told me something else.’ Sophy tensed and looked at him, remembering her own admission to Mary-Beth that she loved him.
‘She said you were frightened of thunder storms,’ Jon told her softly, ‘and that she’d told you to bury your head under a pillow. I’m glad you chose my pillow, Sophy.’
She could feel the heat coming off his skin, and being in his arms was like coming home to safety having known great pain and fear. His mouth touched hers, lightly, questioningly and she clung to him, abandoning all pride as she was swamped by her own shattering response to him.
She could feel his heart thudding erratically against her, his mouth hot and urgent as it moved over her own. She wanted him to go on kissing her for ever, but already he was releasing her, putting a distance between them.
‘I still haven’t been entirely honest with you.’
She thought for a moment her heart-beat had stopped. He smiled gravely at her and said quietly, ‘When I asked you to marry me I had no intention of it ever being merely a convenient arrangement, devoid of love and physical contact.’
‘You hadn’t?’
He shook his head, said ‘No,’ and then laughed at her expression. ‘I begin to think you’re the one who needs glasses, Mrs Philips,’ he teased her softly, ‘otherwise you’d surely have seen that I’d been lusting after you ever since you came to work for me. From the very first time we met in fact.’
She stared at him in disbelief, stammering, ‘But…but I thought—’
‘That I was a sexless, vague, confirmed bachelor, more interested in computers, than human beings,’ he said wryly. ‘Oh, yes, I do realise that and I had been cursing my far too effective armour plating for quite some considerable time. It was the look on your face when you heard David saying that Louise had wanted to get into bed with me that finally gave me hope.’
‘What sort of look?’ Sophy asked him suspiciously.
His smile was both innocent and tantalising. ‘Oh, the sort that said you were looking at me as a man instead of simply your lame dog boss.’
Sophy shook her head. ‘But why pretend to be something you weren’t, Jon? Why pretend to be so sexless and…dull?’
He hesitated for a moment and then said slowly, ‘I know this will make me sound unattractively vain but when I first went up to Cambridge, like many another before me I wanted to have a good time. My father was comfortably off…those were the days when teenagers didn’t have to worry too much about getting a job…when, in fact, our generation thought it was the hub of the whole world. It was my first real time away from home, I had a generous allowance and a small sports car my father had bought me when I passed my ‘A’ levels. I wasn’t short of congenial feminine company. In short I lived a life of hedonistic pleasure rather than scholarly concentration. That all came to an abrupt end just after my third term. My tutors started complaining about the standard of my work…that sobered me up quite a bit, until then I’d never really had to work, you could say that it had all come too easily to me. Then a friend of mine was sent down—drug trafficking; a girl I’d gone out with died—all alone in a filthy squat with her arm all bloated out with septic poisoning from using a dirty needle—she was mainlining on heroin. I had to identify her. It all brought me down to reality.
‘When term resumed after the Christmas recess I decided I was going to turn over a new leaf. I’d talked to my brother—Hugh was eight years older than me, already married then, but still enough in touch with his own youth to listen sympathetically to me—but it seemed that my friends or at least some of them didn’t want me to change. Then I had to start wearing glasses. I discovered quite quickly that people who didn’t know me reacted differently to me…and so gradually I evolved a form of disguise and somehow it stuck with me. There was nothing to make me want to abandon it, until I met you and even then it seemed I wasn’t going to be able to reveal myself to you in my true colours, so to speak.’
Sophy looked questioningly at him and he said drolly,
‘Ah, well, you see I had observed how you reacted to me…and how you reacted to any male who was even just slightly aggressively masculine and I didn’t want to frighten you off. You felt safe with me, that much was obvious and because of that I could get closer to you. Some disguises are used for protection,’ he told her, ‘some for hunting…’ He laughed at her expression. ‘Ah, yes, my poor little love, I’m afraid you…’
She didn’t let him finish, flushing suddenly as she remembered his bland and extremely irritating indifference to her timid sexual overtures in the early days of their marriage…an indifference which she had naïvely thought sprang from unawareness.
‘You knew…
’ she accused.
‘Knew what?’ He was smiling dulcetly at her.
She swallowed, and said huskily, ‘That I wanted you.’
‘After the way you looked at me when I came back from Nassau I hoped you might,’ he agreed tenderly, ‘but I had to be sure it wasn’t merely that I was a challenge to you, Sophy. I had gambled too heavily for that. You see,’ he told her quietly, ‘as I soon discovered well before I married you, what I once thought was merely lust turned out to be love and that love hasn’t diminished for knowing you…quite the contrary. That is what I have been trying to talk to you about, Sophy.’ He touched her face lightly with his fingers and she trembled wildly, hardly daring to look at him. ‘We have been lovers, and you have given yourself to me physically with a generosity that no one else has ever matched or ever could, but have you given yourself to me emotionally, Sophy? Can you give yourself to me emotionally or is it still Benson, despite all that he has done to you?’
‘Chris?’ Sophy stared at him. ‘I never loved Chris. Not really, not like…’
‘Not like?’ His voice was placid, belying the expression in his eyes. It made her heart race and suspended her breath until she realised he was still waiting impatiently for her response.
‘Not like I love you,’ she told him.
He expelled his breath on a harsh sigh and said roughly, ‘God, Sophy, you don’t know how you’ve tormented me.’
She smiled at him, going willingly into his arms as he dragged her against him. ‘Oh, I think I’ve a fair idea,’ she told him demurely, ‘after all you’ve done your own fair share of tormenting.’
From the shelter of his arms, she looked up at him, watching the way his eyebrows rose in query.
‘All that parading around practically nude,’ she elucidated for him, ‘making me want you, making me love you…’ She looked up at him again and smiled, ‘and probably damn well making me pregnant into the bargain.’
‘Have I done?’ He looked smugly and irritatingly malely pleased at the prospect.