‘For appearances?’
She finished pouring herself a sherry and turned back, letting her gaze rest on him. ‘Something like that.’
He clinked the crystal against hers. ‘What shall we drink to?’
Her brow knitted momentarily and then loosened as she smiled. ‘How about we drink to your soldier: Tom Fletcher, wasn’t it?’
He didn’t think he could like her more until that moment. ‘To Tom,’ he repeated, and tried not to stare as they sipped. ‘Ah,’ he said, feeling the liquor’s mellow warmth descend. ‘That is smooth indeed.’ Harry followed his host’s gesture and settled into the armchair opposite her.
‘Single malt from Isle of Islay, off the west coast of Scotland, with a distillation industry that dates back to medieval days. Irish monks began it, apparently. When the excise tax was introduced in the seventeenth century, it became an illicit pastime in the hidden glens of the region and they just got better and better at producing it.’ The detail rolled off her tongue with enthusiasm that fired in her eyes.
‘You sound like you know the history.’
‘Oh, a little bit. Our family used to spend summers in Scotland. My favourite place in the world.’
‘Not any more?’ he queried, noting the wistful tone.
‘No. Not since my brother died in an accident there. We are kindred souls, Harry – both brotherless.’
The disarming directness of the statement convinced him he shouldn’t explore this topic. Instead he nodded and remained silent for several long heartbeats but offered no apology because he loathed the emptiness of placating phrases and he’d yet to think of one that said more than I’m sorry. Harry noted she looked relieved at his lack of further enquiry. ‘This is a beautiful home,’ he remarked.
‘It’s very large. Matthew would prefer to keep an equally large staff but I choose otherwise.’
‘Who helps you run it?’
‘Norma runs the household and we have Joyce, our cook. I did have my lady’s maid, who came with me from my parents’ house when I married, but her fiancé was demobbed last week and of course all she wants to do is marry him and have babies. She’s moved to Cleethorpes by the seaside, with hopes to run her own guesthouse one day. I think his folk are from Grimsby and he’s inherited a little bit of money. Holly will be great at it, but I suspect I shall never see her, or not easily, and she’ll miss her family in Burnley.’
Harry recalled that’s where Tom’s fiancée, Annie, hailed from. He was going to mention Kitty but the wistful way that Alex looked up from where she’d been staring into her glass stopped him. He realised he didn’t want to talk about anyone but her. He kept his silence.
‘Anyway, I have no desire to hire a new personal maid.’ She shrugged with embarrassment. ‘We were friends. I can’t replace her . . . so I won’t try. And frankly, I can dress myself.’ He smiled for her benefit even though he heard her melancholy. ‘Um, we have a scullery maid who does lots of odd jobs but she’s gone to Brighton as her brother was hospitalised there while he recuperates from his injuries. We have a gardener who visits once every fortnight and we hire in people for particular needs.’ Again she shrugged. ‘The house seems to run itself well enough. Most rooms are closed.’
He watched the light cast by the flames dance on her pale face, enjoying the mood of the room she’d achieved with lamps on various side tables. Her furnishings, he noted, were modern with a leaning towards simple, as opposed to the traditional fuss and clutter of his family home.
‘I admire your taste in decor, Alex.’
‘I grew up in a house dominated by my mother’s Arts and Crafts leanings, and while she thought she was getting away from the heaviness of her mother’s Victorian furnishings, I think I prefer Grandma’s velvet and brocade to her daughter’s overwrought use of decoration on everything from windows to walls. I used to have this notion that if I stood still long enough she’d have someone come in and decorate me!’
He chuckled. ‘They say each room should be considered a still-life painting,’ he remarked, watching her over the rim of his glass. Damn, but she looked alluring in her silk blouse of warm florals and pale olive skirt. Did she deliberately dress so simply to show off her beauty? Did she know how the single, floating frill of silk that traced the V-shape of her neckline seemed to accentuate the swell of her breasts? It was a modest blouse, showing no cleavage, and yet it was erotic to stare at the flawless, creamy complexion of the skin beneath her throat and the slight pull of the silk against her breasts when she reached for her glass. No, he didn’t think she was aware of any of this; he believed she chose a simple, elegant outfit that matched her personality and which might make him comfortable because he had not travelled with a formal dinner suit. More importantly, he sensed that Alex set little store in her attractiveness and would rather be noted for her mind, perhaps even her ambition.
‘Ah now, Harry, you have allowed me to glimpse your breeding.’
‘What do you mean?’ He had to remember his previous comment about still life.
‘I think you masquerade as a simple soldier, but that classic thinking comes from education and also breeding.’ She smiled, taking a small sip of sherry. ‘What line of work were you in before the war, may I ask?’
‘The same one I’m in now. I suppose you’d call it importing.’ He tried not to sound evasive.
‘Importing,’ she repeated, as though testing the word to understand it. ‘What sort of imports?’
‘All manner really.’ He could hear the evasion; could she?
‘A family firm?’
‘Yes, nothing I brag about.’
‘I can tell. Are you a secretive person, Harry?’
‘Not especially,’ he lied. ‘I just don’t consider my background particularly interesting to talk about. I find others far more intri-guing.’
‘Are you married?’ she asked suddenly and looked surprised by her own question.
He covered his shock with a small cough as though he had swallowed his whisky the wrong way. ‘No. And before you ask, I have never been married.’
‘Odd for someone like you . . .’
‘“Odd”? Why? “Someone like me”? I’m not sure what that means.’
‘Oh, come on. There must be women panting and hammering at your door.’
He could see from her horrified, darting gaze that he embarrassed her with his explosion of laughter. ‘Forgive me. You painted quite a mental picture for me then.’
‘It was an ugly one that I’m ashamed of,’ she said, touching her cheek. ‘I really don’t know what came over me to be so blatant or intrusive. Forgive me, I’m clearly channelling my mother and it’s good practice for you later. Don’t claim I didn’t warn you,’ she jested. ‘Let’s change the subject, shall we?’
‘Let’s,’ he said, relieved to be off the hook. ‘So your husband is away, you said?’
‘Yes,’ she said, looking towards the fire. ‘He often is.’
And there it was. He felt sure he had found the source of Alex’s lack of balance and the reason she was at times prickly, other times needy. Her enquiry about his relationships was revealing; he wasn’t imagining that something was building between them. ‘You sound sad,’ he offered, hoping it was an opening for her to walk through, to tell him more.
‘Which wife wouldn’t be if her husband was so rarely at her side?’ She sighed. ‘And there I go again, letting my mouth spill whatever’s in my head. I have no idea what Norma has laced this sherry with, Harry, but you’re going to have to put it down to me feeling far too comfortable in your presence.’
‘I’m charmed you feel that way. I also admire your honesty,’ he said.
‘Honesty? No, that seems to be in short supply.’
‘What does that mean?’ He forced himself not to swallow.
‘I sometimes think we’re all telling ourselves little fibs to maintain the status quo, to not have to face the truth.’
‘What truth can’t you face?’
‘Oh, li
ke there’s not some gorgeous woman pining for you at home.’
He wasn’t ready for the spotlight to be turned back on him so brightly. Her aim was deadly. ‘I didn’t say that,’ he countered, sipping carefully.
‘So there is someone waiting for you at home?’
‘I didn’t say that either,’ he added, hoping he was achieving a playful tone but not convinced he had. All he heard was sidestepping. ‘I think my mother would love me to be home, now you mention it.’
She wasn’t buying it, he could tell, but he liked that she played along. It gave him time to shore up his defences.
‘Where does she live?’
‘In East Sussex. My father’s dead, before you ask.’
‘No other siblings?’
‘None,’ he said, hoping that ended the line of questioning.
‘Sorry to sound nosey; these are everyday polite questions, of course, but somehow you make me feel like I’m prodding at a bruise.’
You are. ‘No need to apologise. Um, how about you? Looking forward to children?’
Alex didn’t answer immediately and then they were interrupted by the arrival of the housekeeper precisely as the mantelpiece clock gave a soft chime to confirm it was eight-thirty.
‘Over here, Norma,’ Alex said, standing to meet her at the round table. ‘We can turn it into a sort of picnic by the fire.’
Norma gave her mistress a look of practised disdain. ‘As you wish. We’ve got simple fishcakes with a parsley sauce and garden cake for later, plus there’s some cheese, of course.’
‘We’ll have the cake with my parents when coffee is served.’
‘I’ll forget about the cheese then, I take it?’
Harry watched the mistress give a tiny nod.
‘Er, is Mr Britten-Jones definitely home tomorrow? It’s just that Joyce is leaving now and said she would pick up the chicken tomorrow morning on her way in.’
He noted Alex’s frown. ‘No. He rang to say it will be Thursday now.’ She blinked as if admonishing her cook.
‘I see,’ Norma replied. ‘Well, call me if you need anything, madam.’
‘Thank you,’ Alex murmured. When the door closed, she uttered a low growl. ‘I do love that woman but she pushes her luck sometimes. Please, come and help yourself.’
Even that polite invitation seemed to carry a note of undertone that she knew he registered by the way his expression sparkled barely couched amusement.
Harry arrived at the table. ‘I gather the enquiry about your husband was for my benefit?’ he asked, and was as surprised as his host was when he lightly touched her hand. ‘I think she’s making sure I know my place.’
Alex gazed down at their fingers, not intertwined, but the warmth between their skin, the affection he suspected she could feel coming through that simple touch, was presumably palpable for her too because she seemed lost for how to respond. ‘Er . . .’ She hesitated and then cleared her throat as he pulled back. The touch had been brief, meant as reassurance, but in the heartbeat of reaching for her and making contact Harry understood the connection lacked the simple innocence he intended.
‘Forgive me. That was inappropriate. Should I leave?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous. Norma would kill you.’
‘Nevertheless,’ he said, as the scent of fish and creamed spinach wafted up, making him feel both hungry and vaguely ill, ‘I had no business —’
‘Harry, there’s no need. Look . . .’ She spontaneously leaned towards him and kissed his cheek. ‘There we go. Friends do touch, you know,’ she said, shrugging. ‘Nothing to feel odd about.’
But Harry could see in her face, lit now only by diffused light, that she was telling a lie and they were both trapped in tension created by a blooming of desire. He could feel the shape of her lips against his freshly shaved face and although he knew it was wrong, he wanted to feel them once again, but next time on his mouth.
14
His sudden and unexpected touch had sent a thrilling pulse through her that, coupled with Matthew’s absence, had somehow shaped her mood to flirtatious. Without Harry’s presence she would have got through tonight’s disappointment over her husband’s prolonged absence most likely with a bath to help soak away her sorrows and then soothed herself to sleep, dreaming of ideas for chocolate. But this feeling of skin on skin was instantly erotic and deeply unsettling.
No matter her public face, she could hardly deny to herself her attraction to Harry. The sweep of licorice-coloured hair that he had slicked back neatly tonight was threatening to topple forward beneath the burden of its own thickness. Witnessing this battle alone was desperately alluring and she defied any woman not to want to reach for that hair and run her fingers through it to settle it back into place. She felt his gaze like velvet caressing her in a manner that spoke of sensuality and ardour. What had possessed her to place her lips against his cheek with such careless affection? In that moment it had seemed an ideal steadier to his worried apology but she couldn’t persuade herself now that he’d read it as innocent. And if she were honest, it possessed the quality he sensed . . . one of powerful attraction, a need to press close, to touch again, to give in to all the nerves jangling on the precipice of desire. She hated the weakness of wanting to topple into that gaze and be lost for a while.
Alex was aware how they now stood awkwardly: him watching her while she did her best to appear distracted by the food. She needed to move again and made a decision in the same second he did; reaching for a plate their hands touched once more, this time forcing both to withdraw as if stung by angry wasps.
He sighed and stepped back from the table. ‘Can I be honest?’
She breathed out. ‘Please.’ She’d tried to make it sound effortless but what occurred was a forced gesture and her tone was far from easy – if anything, she heard a choke in it. ‘Do,’ she tried again.
‘Alex, I think I will be doing us both an enormous service if I thank you, bid you goodnight and leave you to make apologies to Norma. Use any excuse you please. Look, I can lift the receiver on your phone, if you’ll permit, and I shall make a pretend call and then we can say that I had to rush away.’
Her frown had deepened as he’d thrown all of this at her. More out of reaction than good sense, her reply sounded particularly dense. ‘But why?’ Clearly, they both knew why.
‘We both know why,’ he said, as if hearing the echo of her thoughts and bouncing it back at her. ‘Another few minutes and you’ll regret we met.’
She didn’t want him to leave. He was feeling like a drug in this moment. She needed to have just a little more to numb the disappointment of her marriage, which was not desperately unhappy but so far from deliriously happy that it could only be described as neutral. And she couldn’t think of a worse description about anything she might be connected with. Neutral was surely damning. No highs, no lows, no arguments, no genuine joy, little intimacy or passion. There was amusement, conversation, mutual respect. She’d swap all three for a night in the arms of a man like Harry. The revelation came hard and without warning to make her gasp. She stammered a response. ‘I d-don’t agree,’ she said, naked feelings surfacing and dodging her usual filter; she should have just accepted his offer and politely wished him goodnight and a happy life.
Instead she watched the angle of his jaw beneath his ear grind, and wanted to trace its line with a finger to calm it. His voice sounded raw as he explained, going straight to the heart of their dilemma. ‘As a single man I have nothing to lose. You have everything at stake and I couldn’t bear to hurt you.’
And in that instant of both pain of realisation at the lacklustre private life she led, coupled with a helpless and sudden longing for this relative stranger, she no longer cared. If Matthew didn’t keep up appearances, why should she?
‘Harry?’
‘Yes?’
‘Ignore your upbringing and mine. Hold me and just do whatever it is you’re trying to avoid.’
His eyes of silvery green darkened and narro
wed. He didn’t move fast as she’d anticipated he might have at her wanton invitation. Instead he took a single step closer until the waterfall frill of her blouse was flattened and she could feel the press of his body against her.
And he waited, gazing at her as if needing to fix the planes of her face and the colour of her eyes into his memory; she wasn’t used to looking up at a man, and why did that sense of dense, strong maleness feel so good? Wasn’t she supposed to be an independent woman who needed no man, not even her absent husband, to help fill her life? Alex recalled something Matthew had once said to her: There’s no accounting for what lust can do to one’s sensibilities. She knew he hadn’t been referring to her when he’d made the remark. Lust. She’d never felt it for anyone. Passion she felt for chocolate. Desire she felt for her ambition. Affection she felt for Matthew. Love for her family, and she reserved that it would be lavished on children once they came, although that required desire . . . intimacy.
However, the idea of a sudden rush of carnal need was disturbing in every sense of that word. Her focus was dropped to the flat, hard breadth of his body; Matthew was narrower, corpulent by comparison. Tentatively she reached to place her palm against Harry’s unyielding rib cage that was sculpted beneath warm, firm flesh and the arousal it pulsed through her from throat to thigh was so fast it trapped itself as a breath of sighing pleasure. She could feel the dull thud of his heart quickening within the chamber of his chest and knew he was feeling the sensuality of the moment right alongside her.
‘What are you thinking?’ he murmured in a voice that was suddenly raspy, his breath stirring her hair. Still she wouldn’t look up.
Be honest! ‘Of Matthew,’ she answered.
Now she felt him become so still she could believe even his heart had paused momentarily. ‘I understand,’ he said, and Alex sensed his body about to create a gap between them.
The Chocolate Tin Page 20
