Force of Feeling

by Penny Jordan

She had even learned to laugh a little at herself, something which was a totally new experience.

  She had expected as their time together grew that Guy’s desire for her would mellow, but instead it seemed to grow more intense.

  Although he was always careful not to hurt her, sometimes when he made love to her she felt as though he was reaching for something he felt was beyond his grasp. Secretly, she began to worry that she was not satisfying him, that there was something lacking in her that caused the ferocity of his passion. And she was too insecure to discuss it with him.

  Sometimes she would see him looking at her as though he was waiting for something. Sometimes when they made love and he made her cry out with joy and need she felt as though he was waiting for more, but what more could there be?

  Not once had he mentioned seeing her when they returned to London; and so, as their last week together sped by, she found she was slowly distancing herself from him, preparing herself for the time when he would no longer be part of her life.

  They still made love; but emotionally she was once again erecting her barriers.

  If he sensed it, he said nothing. If he did sense it, he could only be relieved that she was behaving in such an adult manner, she decided. After all, he was the man; if he wanted to put their relationship on a more serious footing, he only had to say. It must be painfully obvious how she felt about him.

  The night before they left they were going out for dinner to a small restaurant outside Haverfordwest.

  Personally, Campion would rather they had stayed at the cottage, but she suspected that Guy was afraid that if they did she might become too emotional, and that this was his way of making sure that did not happen.

  The restaurant was popular and busy. Campion had bought herself a new dress, surprised to find a very expensive boutique in Haverfordwest that stocked designer clothes.

  The dress was silk jersey, fluid swathes of fabric that moulded her body discreetly, in a pattern designed to suggest snakeskin.

  With it, she wore high-heeled shoes and sheer silk stockings, and even with her heels she was still shorter than Guy.

  Since she did not have a coat with her suitable for wearing over it, she was glad that Guy was able to park right outside.

  They were offered drinks at the bar; Guy ordered champagne cocktails, but she only sipped at hers. She was wrought-up and tense, wishing with all her heart that she and Guy were alone. This was not how she wanted to celebrate their last night together.

  Their last night. Guy looked at her and she trembled. He started to speak, but was interrupted by the waiter informing them that their table was ready.

  As they walked to it, Campion was surprised to be the recipient of several admiring male glances. Men looking at her…

  She did not realise that the lustre to her skin, the confidence in her walk, the air she now carried of being a desirable and desired woman were just as obvious as her old inferiorities had once been.

  When they sat down, Guy was frowning. He looked angry about something and Campion felt her heart flutter. This whole evening was a mistake, and now Guy was annoyed.

  She reached across the table and touched his hand, her eyes anxious and concerned.

  ‘Guy, what is it? What’s wrong?’

  He threw down his napkin and said harshly, ‘Let’s get out of here.’

  And, before Campion could object, they were outside in the car park, and Guy was bundling her into the car.

  Neither of them spoke on the drive back, Campion because she was half afraid to, in case something she said sparked off the anger she could sense from Guy’s tension, and Guy because he seemed to be engrossed in his driving, and whatever it was that had led him to leave the restaurant so precipitously.

  Not until they were inside the kitchen did Campion speak. They were leaving first thing in the morning, and so she and Guy had spent the afternoon making sure that they were leaving everything spick and span.

  ‘I suppose I’d better make us something to eat,’ she suggested, mentally reviewing the contents of the fridge. They had thrown everything out other than bacon, eggs and bread for their breakfast.

  ‘I don’t want anything to eat,’ Guy told her tersely.

  It was so unlike him to be like this. He was one of the most even-tempered people she had ever met, capable of anger, it was true, but also capable of controlling it, of allowing himself to see the justice of someone else’s point of view.

  Impulsively she reached out to touch him, and asked, as she had done in the restaurant, ‘Guy, what is it? What—’

  ‘What is it? It’s this, damn you!’ he told her violently, dragging her into his arms and taking her mouth fiercely, the pressure of his kiss bruising her lips, hurting almost. She must have made a sound of protest, because suddenly he released her, cupping her face with both his hands and resting his hot forehead against hers.

  ‘God, I’m sorry…’

  She only just heard his muffled apology. ‘I wanted to take you out…to end…’ He shook his head, and when he spoke again his voice was raw and husky, ‘But all I could think of was how much I wanted to make love to you, and how much I hated not being able to touch you.’

  Campion shivered, so closely did his words match her own feelings.

  ‘I was so damn jealous. All those other men looking at you. God, you’re making me react like a Victorian…’

  Guy, jealous? It made her heart melt with tenderness and love. She turned her head and kissed him, feeling the hard smoothness of his jaw against her lips. She touched his throat with her tongue-tip and felt him swallow, his hands tightening on her arms. She unfastened the buttons of his shirt, slowly dragging her open mouth against his skin, thrilling to the increased thud of his heart and the rapid harshness of his breathing.

  They made love as they had done once before, in front of the sitting-room fire, Campion uncaring that her new dress lay in a crumpled heap where Guy had thrown it.

  It was late when they went to bed, as though neither of them wanted to waste a single second of their time together, but Guy had still said nothing about seeing her in London, about needing her in his life…about wanting her.

  He had talked about her forthcoming tour, he had asked her what she intended doing over Christmas, but he had made no suggestion that they spend any time together. This silence, so curiously at odds with the intensity of his love-making, saddened her, but she had to accept it. Guy was as he was. He had given her joy and pleasure; he had given her back her belief in herself; it would be sheer greed to ask for anything more.

  She woke up early, tense and aching, still caught up in a dream where she had seen Guy walk away from her. She reached for him, wanting the comfort of his nearness, touching his skin with obsessive fierce need.

  He woke up, murmuring soft, approving noises of pleasure at her touch. His hand stroked her breast, finding the already erect nipple. His mouth caressed her skin, and she shuddered in pleasure as she felt the light grate of his teeth against the sensitive crest.

  Her body pulsed with need to be filled by him. The aroused strength of him pressing against her increased that need, and she moved against him erotically. She knew now those things that gave him the most pleasure but, when she reached out instinctively to caress him, he stopped her.

  ‘No. No, we can’t…’ His mouth left her breast to mutter harshly in her ear, ‘You won’t be protected. I could make you pregnant.’

  Make her pregnant. Betrayingly, her body thrilled at the prospect. Guy’s child. She could almost feel the spasm of pleasure contracting her womb at the thought of conceiving his child.

  Madness! she told herself. What she was contemplating was madness—folly—crass self-indulgence, but she touched him again, and felt the shudder that jarred his body as he tried to control his need.

  He moved and she moved with him, possessed by an earthly, feminine power that overwhelmed all his protests, gently seducing him to the point where he cried out his great need to her and entered h
er fiercely, each thrust of his body within hers heightening both her pleasure and her instinctive awareness that this would be the last time they shared this very special intimacy.

  It was over too quickly, leaving her both drained and replete. Guy lay on his back at her side, breathing heavily, making no move to touch her.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CORNWALL in December. Not the best time to visit this part of the world, Campion reflected grimly—not for the first time—as she stared out of her hotel bedroom window.

  Almost a week since they had left Wales, and not a word from Guy. But what had she expected? That he would somehow discover in her absence that he couldn’t live without her? Hardly. She had been a temporary obsession, like one of the jigsaw puzzles he had felt compelled to solve; once the picture lay clear before him, he could go back to his normal way of life. She closed her eyes in anguish, remembering. To Guy, she had represented a challenge, that was all. He had meant to make sure she finished her book, and if making her fall in love with him was what it took… Well, he was a professional, and he had certainly managed to make her inject some real emotion into the story.

  That last day they had had together, he had deliberately talked about her future in terms that made it clear he intended to play no part in it, mentioned her forthcoming tour, but sidestepping any mention of Christmas, giving her no indication of where he would be or how he would be spending his time. There had been no mention of him seeing her again. In fact, his conversation with her about this tour had been purely practical: questions about where she would be staying and for how long, and in which shops her signing sessions were being undertaken. Questions, surely, that any concerned agent might ask an author, but hardly those of a lover.

  In fact, the only person who had seemed concerned about her was Lucy, who had been in touch to confirm their Christmas arrangement before the tour started. Campion had promised to arrive early, so that she could help her friend prepare for the onslaught of expected guests.

  Campion shivered. Lucy had noticed the change in her immediately, commenting on her unconfined hair and searching her face closely. ‘It must be a man,’ she had said at last. ‘Do I know him?’

  ‘No,’ Campion lied, not denying the first charge.

  ‘Am I going to?’ Lucy asked in a more gentle voice.

  Campion knew what she was really saying. She managed a wry smile, hoping it successfully masked her inner pain. ‘No, I’m afraid not,’ she said as lightly as she could. ‘It wasn’t that sort of relationship.’

  ‘Married?’ Lucy guessed, plainly rather disconcerted.

  ‘No.’ Campion drew a deep breath. ‘I decided I’d let Craig spoil enough of my life. The—the man I was with—made me realise that I’d been alone too long, that’s all.’

  It sounded plausible enough, and perhaps her tone warned Lucy not to press any harder. Lucy smiled and said lightly, ‘Well, whoever he is, he’s certainly transformed you. I’m going to have to keep an eye on Howard while you’re around from now on, that’s for sure.’

  Yes, Guy had transformed her, inwardly as well as outwardly. Campion levered herself away from the window. This tour was giving her too much time to think, to remember. She was reduced to poring over the past, looking for significant details that she’d missed in the joy of Guy’s company. And suddenly the memory of Craig, whose very existence she had forgotten until she needed an excuse to give Lucy, began to nag like a toothache. Craig had come from a poor family, just like Guy, and had got rid of all the traces of his past. He had seemed charming, attentive, caring…just like Guy. And Craig had never seen her as a person, only as a means to an end. If he hadn’t wanted something Campion could give him, he would never have come near her. Craig hadn’t got what he wanted, but it was beginning to look as though Guy had.

  She would be better off working, she thought with sudden savagery, turning her talent of invention into a new book. Guy had promised to let her know what the publishers thought of her changed manuscript, but as yet she had heard nothing. He would have to contact her at some point, she thought wryly, or else she would be looking for a new agent.

  All she could do was to try to live each day at a time, and to hope that somehow the pain would ease. Already she had lost the weight she had gained; already her face had a fragile quality of vulnerability about it, a yearning, lost loneliness that people saw and wondered about, but dared not question for fear of trespassing.

  Tonight, she was having dinner with the owner of a local bookshop; tomorrow, there was a radio interview and a signing session. Once, the publicity might have unnerved her—now it was a way of filling in time before she heard from Guy French.

  She looked at the dress she had hung up, ready to wear. It was the dress she had bought for Guy, the dress she had worn on their last night together… A quiver of emotion darted through her, and she fought to keep it at bay. She had known there would be pain, but she had never imagined it could be like this. When Craig had left her she had been hurt, but much of it, she now recognised, had been shock and the spiteful destruction of her self-confidence…Craig’s retaliation for not getting his way. But this pain was different in quality. So intense, so overwhelming, that nothing else mattered…nothing.

  It amazed Campion that she could feel so unhappy, and yet at the same time look so—so blooming. Her skin glowed, her hair shone, and she couldn’t help but be aware of the interested and approving looks that men now gave her.

  She had Guy to thank for that, for the almost visible patina of womanliness that now clung so alluringly to her. She hadn’t gone back to wearing her hair up; instead, she had had it trimmed to accentuate its thick curl, and she had even started experimenting cautiously with make-up. She used some now, wondering what it was that Antony Polroon, the bookshop owner, wanted to discuss with her.

  He was a thin, dark man in his mid-thirties, wiry and slightly intense, and very Cornish.

  Normally, he was the kind of man she would have avoided on sight, but her new-found confidence had helped her to see him as a fellow human being, and not another man who was bound to condemn her as unworthy of his attention.

  They were dining at the hotel. Campion arrived downstairs several minutes late and found him waiting there for her.

  His admiring glance told her that he approved of her dress, and she tried desperately not to remember another man’s attention focusing on it, another man removing it from her body and caressing her until…

  She realised that Antony was watching her curiously.

  ‘I’m sorry… This tour has been something of a strain, and I’m beginning to feel it. What was it you just said?’

  ‘Nothing important. Only that you’re a very beautiful woman,’ he told her wryly.

  A very beautiful woman. Two men had told her that now. Funny how meaningless the words were. She didn’t want compliments, adulation, attention; she wanted Guy. She wanted his presence at her side, his smile, his warmth in bed, she wanted his love.

  ‘Shall we go into dinner?’ Antony suggested.

  He was an entertaining companion and, in other circumstances, Campion would probably have enjoyed the evening. As it was…

  As it was the ache of missing Guy had become a physical pain inside her, a pain so intense, in fact, that half-way through the main course she had to excuse herself and rush to the ladies’ cloakroom.

  When she came back, looking slightly green and very apologetic, Antony got to his feet.

  ‘I’m sorry. Will you excuse me? I must have picked up a bug of some kind. I’m afraid we’re going to have to call it a day.’

  ‘I’ll see you to your room.’

  Campion demurred, but Antony insisted and, if she was honest, she was feeling slightly dizzy, as well as very queasy.

  Too many hours spent travelling, too many new faces, or simply too much heartache over Guy.

  Riding in the lift increased her feeling of nausea, and she was glad to lean on Antony when it rocked to a standstill and he helped her out.
She had never fainted in her life, but now she was desperately afraid that she was about to do so.

  Her room wasn’t very far from the lift, and she nodded weakly when Antony asked if she had her key.

  ‘It’s here in my bag,’ she told him, passing the small evening purse over to him. While he opened it and removed the key, she leaned weakly against the wall.

  She felt terrible, even worse than she had done one year when she had had ‘flu.

  She heard the sound of the lift doors closing; it seemed to fill her head like a dull roar.

  Antony opened the door of her room and held it open with his foot while he supported the sagging weight of her body in his arms.

  ‘Would you like me to find a doctor?’

  Even to take those few steps that would get her inside her room was an appalling effort. She shook her head, unable to speak. Several yards away from them, down the corridor, the lift door opened.

  ‘I’ll be all right in a few minutes…’ All she wanted was to be left alone. She felt terrible, but if she said as much she suspected that Antony would insist on informing the hotel, and then they would fuss, when all that was really wrong with her was that she was missing Guy. Missing him? She almost laughed aloud. Without him, her life was an empty desert, a wasteland, a landscape scoured and ravished and left for dead.

  ‘Come on. You should be in bed.’

  As Antony helped her inside, she was dimly conscious of a man walking down the corridor.

  ‘That’s odd,’ Antony commented as he closed the door behind them. ‘He must have got the wrong floor or something. He got as far as your door and then he turned back. Looked furious about something as well.’

  Campion’s head was pounding, her mouth felt dry and sour, and the last thing she was interested in was her fellow guests.

  ‘Are you sure you’ll be all right?’ Antony pressed. ‘You…’

  ‘I’ll be fine. I’m sorry I spoiled our evening.’

  ‘I’ll ring you in the morning.’ Antony walked back to the door and opened it.

  In the morning she was leaving for Falmouth, but Campion didn’t have the energy to tell him so. She heard the door click locked as he left, and she didn’t even have the strength to get undressed, but instead fell asleep as she was.