by India Grey
Rachel was like a rabbit caught in the headlights of a fast-approaching car. His face was completely expressionless, utterly remote, but the emotion that flared in his luminous eyes was terrifying.
‘I think it’s best that I…know…’ She was backing away from him, unable to bear his nearness and his immeasurable distance a moment longer. ‘I was in danger…in very great danger—’ her voice broke into a dry sob ‘—of falling in love with you, you see.’
She stumbled slightly on the hem of her trailing dress, and then, yanking it up over her knees, turned and fled from the room.
CHAPTER EIGHT
STANDING in the hallway beneath the portrait of his great grandfather, Orlando drained one glass of champagne and picked up another.
The house was filling up. The level of noise rose as more parties of people arrived, greeting each other loudly, their confident voices ringing through Easton’s vast rooms and all but drowning out the sound of Lucinda’s string quartet. The ball showed every sign of being a huge success, and the weather, far from deterring people from coming, seemed to have forged a sort of Dunkirk spirit amongst the guests. In their midst, Orlando felt more isolated than ever.
It wasn’t his damaged sight that set him apart from everyone else, though. It was his relentless, churning rage.
At Arabella. She’d probably told half of London that Orlando the heroic was now Orlando the pitiful. But he’d been a fool to expect anything else; she’d always been as hard as diamonds. It was what had first attracted him to her.
No. It was Rachel who had hurt him the most.
‘I think it’s best that I know—I was in danger of falling in love with you…’
Was.
Not now. Not now she’d found out the truth about him.
There was a blast of arctic air as another group came in, pausing to hand over tickets and coats to the door staff, cheerfully exchanging anecdotes about their difficult journeys as they helped themselves to champagne from the tray. Orlando knew that he should be there, playing the host, but even thinking about the effort required made him feel weary. Turning on his heel, he walked in the other direction—towards the inner hall, away from the throng of people.
The house looked stunning. Even through the acrid fog of his anger and the curse of his reduced sight, he could feel that Easton been brought to life. He had been so used to its shadows and darkness that he had quite simply forgotten that it could be so lovely. He ought to find Lucinda and thank her…
He felt his mouth quirk into a twisted smile.
But he’d have to recognise her first. He’d known her for years, but still his chances of being able to pick her out from all the other pedigree blondes at the party were utterly negligible.
Despairingly he shouldered his way through the groups of people who were clustered, talking in loud, braying voices, in the hallway at the foot of the stairs. He had just reached the door to the dining room when he stopped, his fingers tightening dangerously around his glass as he overheard two men behind him.
‘Check that out. Coming down the stairs…’
The second man let out a low whistle. ‘Hel-lo. Don’t usually go for redheads, but for her I’d make an exception. Look at the t—’
Orlando stopped dead, adrenaline coursing through him. Technically, he was the host of this party. Did that make knocking one of the guests unconscious more acceptable, or less?
‘I say, isn’t it that girl from the posters? The pianist one? Hair’s different, but I’d recognise her anywhere. Huge picture of her at Bank tube station last year. Used to make my journey to work quite uncomfortable, I can tell you…’
As they burst into guffaws of crude laughter, Orlando wrenched open the door into the courtyard and stepped out into the biting cold, feeling a small flicker of satisfaction as he heard one of them say, ‘Bloody hell, it’s freezing!’
He was shaking, so fired up with bitterness and adrenaline that it took him a moment to take in his surroundings.
The high-walled courtyard, where light hardly penetrated for most of the year, was bathed in the gentle glow of scores of candles. They lined the snowy paths, were clustered in flickering groups on the steps opposite and in each corner of the courtyard, and reflected a hundredfold in the rows of windows that looked out onto it.
His footsteps slowed as he reached the point in the centre where the paths converged and turned slowly round, exhaling heavily in a plume of frozen air.
Lucinda had done a great job, he realised with a small frisson of surprise. In truth, he’d only hired her because he’d known her vaguely from the old days and had heard her business was in trouble. But she was good. Amazingly good. The effect she’d created out here and in the house with firelight and candles was magical. Timeless, somehow, as if somehow the years had been peeled back and the house was in its heyday again.
He took one of the paths that crossed the courtyard and stood in the shadows against the wall, eyes closed, waiting for the unexpected tightening in his throat to ease.
The volume of voices and laughter suddenly grew louder for a moment, and then died down again, but the faint strains of the string quartet drifted through the frozen air, like warm, caressing fingers.
‘Orlando?’
Rachel laid a hand on his arm and felt him stiffen instantly. His eyes flew open and, gazing up, she could see the candlelight reflected in their cold, glittering depths.
‘I came to find you. I wanted to apologise…’
He cut her off ruthlessly with a swift, crushing sneer. ‘There’s nothing to apologise for. At least you were honest.’
‘But I shouldn’t have been. It was wrong of me to say that about…about falling in love with you when—’
‘Save it,’ he spat. He made to move past her, but she grabbed his arm, her strong pianist’s fingers gripping him. He froze, holding up his arm where she held him, too bound by ingrained chivalry to shake her off, almost afraid of what might happen if he unleashed the fury that surged through him at that moment. Around him, the candles still flickered serenely, mocking him, taunting him with the memory of his momentary glimpse of a peace that would forever elude him.
‘Let go of me, Rachel.’
‘No! Please, Orlando, I want to explain—about Arabella. I didn’t have a chance to finish before, to tell you that she—’
‘I don’t want to hear it!’ he roared. His fingers closed around her wrist like handcuffs and brutally he wrenched her hand off him. But somehow his grip remained locked fast on her wrist and they struggled, her other hand coming up to his chest, pushing him away, beating against him, until neither of them was sure who was struggling against whom. With a desperate cry Rachel tried to break away, only to find he was still holding her, pulling her back towards him, into his body, and she fell against him, so that he had to grasp her waist to stop her falling.
And then suddenly his hands were on her back, and her lips were parting as his mouth came down on hers, and her fingers were entangled in his hair, pulling, pressing his head down harder, wanting more, wanting all of him. There was no tenderness in the kiss, just an urgency born of despair and frustration and pain and longing. She could feel the wall behind her, cold and damp, but she was glad of its solidity as she leaned back against it, unable to trust her legs to hold her up. Orlando’s hands were on her shoulders now, pressing them back against the brick—or was she doing that herself?—her body helplessly arching towards him in an attitude of transparent need. She could feel her legs part, her hips rising upwards as his hand slipped downwards. His grip was hard, insistent, and it sent her to the brink of oblivion.
So what if he loved Arabella? So what? He was here, with her; this was real—the only reality she could think of. The world beyond this tiny space of shared breath, shared warmth, shared fire, was crushed out of her consciousness by his presence and his nearness and her own self-destructive will.
She needed him.
Now.
She needed him now, and if she didn�
�t have him she thought she would die.
She heard him groan, his lips pressed against her neck, as his hand slid upwards into her hair, feeling the spiky shortness at her nape. She felt the sudden rush of chill air on her heated skin as he drew his head back and, opening her eyes, saw him gazing down at her with a despairing intensity that sent a wave of annihilating desire crashing through her, drenching her from the inside.
‘Your hair…’
She didn’t let him get any further. Taking his face in both her hands, she pulled him roughly down again. For a moment she let her quivering lips hover tormentingly over his, until she heard his tiny indrawn breath and knew he was as lost as she was. The moment stretched, deepened, as she slowly slid her tongue along the taut line of his top lip…
‘Good Lord…’ A woman’s voice cut through the raw air, almost as cold and sharp as the icicles hanging from the eaves above them. ‘I thought it was a country ball, not an orgy.’
Rachel felt Orlando stiffen and jerk upright, heard his low, savage curse.
She recognised the voice from the phone call that morning, but now it was stripped of its veneer of concern, revealing the viciousness beneath. Her eyes flew to the doorway. Silhouetted against the bright hallway beyond, her face illuminated by the candles into a grotesque mask of malice, stood a woman with long blonde hair.
‘Arabella.’
With lightning speed Orlando moved so that he was standing between them, shielding Rachel with his body from the basilisk stare of the blonde.
‘I told you I was coming,’ she drawled. ‘You should know me well enough to know that when I say something I mean it. I suppose I should consider myself lucky to have arrived in the middle of a party, when there was someone to show me in, since you’re obviously far too preoccupied.’ She tossed her blonde mane disdainfully. ‘I left my things in the study and helped myself to a drink—you don’t mind, do you?’
‘Yes. I told you to stay away.’
‘You did, didn’t you?’
Slumped, shivering, against the wall, Rachel could hear the spiteful relish in her tone. She’s enjoying this, she thought dully. Her moment of victory as she returns to lay claim to her man. She could picture the triumph on that tight, hard face, but could see nothing but the broad spread of Orlando’s shoulders. She pressed her hands against the bricks to stop herself from reaching out and sliding her arms around him, desperate for the warmth and strength of him, but suddenly realised why he had positioned himself like that. Not to protect her from Arabella, but to hide her.
He was ashamed.
‘But,’ Arabella continued, ‘unfortunately, darling, you Wintertons aren’t the gods you once thought you were. You don’t command the universe any more, and things happen whether you like it or not.’
He had taken a step forward as she spoke. Behind him, Rachel could sense his tension in the set of his shoulders, the proud tilt of his head. She closed her eyes, wishing she didn’t have to endure the torture of seeing him go to her.
‘What do you want, Arabella?’
‘I have something to show you,’ Arabella said matter-of-factly. ‘Oh, dear—maybe that’s not a very tactful way of putting it. Sorry, darling. But you’ll forgive me when you find out what it is. It’s in the library…’ And with that she disappeared back into the noise and warmth of the party.
For a moment Orlando didn’t move. Standing there, in the centre of the candlelit courtyard, he suddenly reminded Rachel of some early martyr, alone and palpably suffering. Slowly he turned his head. The candles cast deep shadows in the hollows of his face, making him look gaunt and haunted.
‘Go,’ Rachel croaked. ‘Go. This is what she told me on the phone. What she asked me not to tell you. This is what I was trying to explain…’
He shook his head, frowning.
‘What? What?’
‘She told me that she was coming down here…coming to see you. She wants you back, Orlando. She told me not to tell you.’
‘God, Rachel…I got it wrong. I thought…’ His head dipped and he thrust his hands into his hair, then took a couple of steps towards her. She held up her hands.
‘Doesn’t matter. Please. I’m fine. Just go to her.’
She said the words. But she couldn’t bear to watch him as he walked away.
‘Sorry to drag you away from your guests,’ drawled Arabella bitchily as she stood at Orlando’s desk in the library. ‘Not that you were doing much in the way of socialising. I must say I’m stunned to find you haven’t lost that Winterton magic, Orlando darling. I’m delighted to see you’re as attractive and commanding as ever.’
‘Are you? I see no reason at all why you should care, as there’s absolutely nothing between us any more.’
Arabella gave a dry, humourless laugh. ‘Oh, darling, you don’t know how devastatingly ironic that remark is.’
She paused, and he saw her walk around to the other side of the desk and bend to pick something up. He tilted his head back, trying to see what it was. Something large and cumbersome. He heard the heavy thud as she placed it on the desk, but couldn’t make sense of the awkward shape.
‘There. There, darling, is the reason why I care. Do you see it now?’
Her tone was spiteful. Orlando felt hatred harden into chips of ice in his heart.
‘No, Arabella, I don’t see,’ he said in a low, savage tone. ‘As you very well know.’
‘I don’t know, actually. I know what the doctors said, of course, and I thought by now you’d be helpless—an invalid.’ She sounded aggrieved, as if she were almost disappointed to be proved wrong. ‘But you seem completely normal—as that little nobody out there would obviously agree. I take it she doesn’t know?’
‘That’s none of your business.’
‘It’s rather obvious from the way that she looked at you that she doesn’t—like you’re Prince Charming and Sir Lancelot all rolled into one. I’d keep it that way, if I were you—telling her that her hero is flawed would be like telling a child that Father Christmas doesn’t exist.’
Orlando spun round, feeling for the door handle, knowing that if he stayed in the same room as her no amount of chivalry, training or good breeding would prevent him from giving vent to the violent impulses that fizzed and burned like overloaded electrical circuits through his nerve-endings. He wanted to get back to Rachel, but he paused for a moment and said, with quiet venom, ‘I don’t know why you came back, Arabella, but you needn’t have bothered. There’s nothing you can say that would—’
Orlando stopped dead as a thin, quavering cry rang out into the tense air from the direction of the desk. His hand froze on the door handle as his blood froze in his veins.
‘Nothing?’ challenged Arabella in the silence that followed. Her voice vibrated with unconcealed triumph. ‘How about come and meet your son?’
Back in the hallway, the light and noise of the party were like an assault after the tranquil courtyard. Rachel looked around in bewilderment. Her lips were swollen with Orlando’s kisses, her hair mussed from his questing, hungry fingers, and a combination of surging hormones and desperate longing made her feel edgy and wild. Thrusting her way through the crowd, she ignored the comments and whistles of the financiers and hedge fund boys in her wake, and made her way resolutely to the library.
She had to find out what was going on.
Her heels tapped on the marble tiles of the hallway as she approached the half-open door. She could see Orlando standing there, his hand on the handle, but then she felt her confident footsteps falter as she heard Arabella’s voice…
‘Come and meet your son…’
Rachel stopped dead. Through a crack in the door she saw Arabella’s face. She bore the look of a chess grandmaster who had just uttered the word checkmate.
On the desk, from the depths of a bulky infant carrier seat, Rachel caught a fleeting glimpse of a tiny flailing hand before Orlando slammed the door shut, leaving her shivering on the outside.
’Is it mine?’
<
br /> Arabella made a sharp, scornful exclamation. ‘If you could see him you wouldn’t be asking. He’s Winterton through and through—from the top of his very dark head to the tips of his long, elegant fingers,’ she sneered. ‘If he wasn’t I wouldn’t be in the mess I am now.’
Orlando walked slowly over to the window, trying to keep as much distance between himself and Arabella. And this child. His head felt as if it was full of sand, and he rubbed his forehead with his undamaged hand, trying to clear it. Trying to rub away the images of Rachel that wouldn’t seem to leave him.
‘What mess?’
‘Jamie’s kicked me out,’ she said dully. ‘I thought the baby was his, but, given that Jamie is deliciously Scandinavian and blond, it’s painfully bloody obvious that it isn’t.’
‘You must have known that from the dates?’ Orlando ground out from between gritted teeth. Arabella left nothing to chance. Her body ran to the same strictly controlled timetable as the rest of her life.
He heard her sigh. ‘It must have happened that last couple of weeks. When you were…told. Diagnosed. Whatever. Felix was home…’ For a moment her voice faltered, and then hardened, almost defensively. ‘It was a horrible time for me. I was so confused. I didn’t have anyone to talk to…’
Orlando’s face was a mask of contempt, and it dripped from every sneering word. ‘Poor you.’
‘It was hell! You never talked to me. You just pushed me away!’
‘Funny,’ said Orlando acidly. ‘That isn’t how I remember it. As I recall, you ran out of the room when I told you what Parkes had said, and went back to London that afternoon for some party.’ He swore softly. ‘Oh, God. What a coincidence. Jamie van Hartesvelt’s party…’
‘I was shocked…devastated—surely you can understand that! I needed space to think—to adjust,’ Arabella protested. ’Suddenly you weren’t the same person any more, the man I’d fallen in love with. And then, when I came back the next day, you hardly acknowledged my existence. If it hadn’t been for Felix I don’t know how I would have coped…’ She was silent for a moment, and then added, almost in an undertone, ‘Felix was good to me.’
