by Flora Kidd
Dawn answered her and much to her relief the conversation went on along less personal lines and she didn't have to say much because Micaela obviously liked talking, mostly about the travelling she had done. Dinner was served, again by the pool, and with his amiable smile Armando, sitting on her right, devoted his attention to Dawn, talking pleasantly and lightly and often with humour about his own country and its people.
'We Mexicans are a new race of people, historically speaking, with a very mixed heritage,' he said. 'Our paternal ancestors were Spanish Conquistadors who fathered us on the female descendants of the civilised people who had been living in this part of the world for thousands of years, the Aztecs, Mayans and Tlaxclans. You can see the mixed blood in Sebastian and me, even in Micaela, and we are very proud of it. Now there are traces of other origins in us French, German, Italian, Chinese, Negro… '
Only half listening to him, Dawn watched Micaela and Sebastian rise to their feet and leave the table to walk by the pool. After lingering for a few minutes to watch the fish they strolled away down the hall, Micaela doing all the talking and, by the time they reached the archway which led to the salon and went through it, Micaela's hand was through the crook of Sebastian's arm.
'You must excuse Micaela if she seems to have commandeered your husband.' Armando's voice was sharp with irony and Dawn gave him a startled glance. He was watching her through the haze of smoke which spiralled up from the fat cigar which he held between thick brown fingers. 'For the past year or so they have been having an affair which has come close to ruining his career as a politician. It's been a clever move on his part to marry you. Politically speaking a wife is a great asset. Shall we follow them on to the terrace?'
Standing up, he moved round to the back of her chair to ease it from under her as she stood up. Completely bewildered and out of her depth, Dawn turned rather blindly to walk down the hall to the salon and found her hand taken and her arm drawn through Armando's.
'We'll take our time,' he said. 'No need to appear too obvious or jealous.'
'But I don't understand,' Dawn blurted. 'If you know your wife is having an affair with another man how can you stay married to her?'
'Because it suits me to stay married to Micaela,' he replied smoothly. 'She's the daughter of our present Governor who has been very useful to me in the furtherance of my own career. I've no intention of divorcing her. At the moment she is caught up in a fantasy of romance. She was in love with Sebastian years ago, then she lost touch with him. He turned up in her life again when he was elected to the legislature three years ago. Let her have her little fling with her childhood sweetheart and now that he has had the good sense to take a wife of his own, no harm will come to anyone.'
Chilled to the marrow by his cold-blooded attitude, Dawn forced herself to continue to walk beside him. So everything Raquel had told her was true and not merely rumour. Sebastian had had, was still having and probably was going to continue to have an affair with the wife of a political colleague and he was going to use his own marriage to herself as a screen to hide that affair.
She was glad suddenly of the support of Armando's arm, for she felt very faint and sick as if someone had given her a blow to the stomach. No harm will come to anyone. Armando's cynicism appalled her. What about her? Wouldn't harm come to her? More than half in love already with Sebastian… Her thoughts came to a screeching stop. Oh, God, what was happening to her? She must get out, fly away before she became entangled in the web of intrigue which was being spun about her by these worldly, sophisticated people. Hand to her mouth, she pulled her arm free and with a muttered excuse turned and hurried back down the long salon into the hall, up the spiral staircase and into the bedroom she had been using.
Finding she was shaking in every limb, she sat down on the side of the bed and took a deep breath to try and control herself. If only the room had a door with a lock and key so that she could be alone, completely alone to think. If only there was somewhere else she could go to escape from Sebastian, because she was sure that when Armando reported what had happened, Sebastian would come looking for her and using his expertise as a lover would try to obliterate all suspicions from her mind.
'Dawn? Where are you?'
Micaela's deep throaty voice sounded concerned and her high heels made clicking sounds on the polished wooden floor of the gallery. Springing to her feet, Dawn went over to the window of her room to stand there looking out with her hands pressed against her cheeks.
'Ah, there you are. Armando said he thought you were feeling a little sick.' Micaela advanced into the room. 'The food, perhaps? You are not yet used to our spicy sauces? Are you all right?'
'Yes, thank you.' Dawn swung round. 'It… it's kind of you to come and ask.'
'I have really come to say adios. We are leaving now.' Micaela glanced round the room. 'What a pretty house this is,' she said on a sigh. 'This is the first time I have ever been in it. Sebastian has told me about it many times, of course, but somehow it has never been possible for him to invite me here. And now that I've come at last it has to be with Armando and I… I… find you here.' The full red lips twisted into a rueful smile. 'Strange to find a man's wife in the little house which is usually reserved for his mistress.'
Dawn gasped and her eyes went wide, but she couldn't think of anything to say, she wasn't used to dealing with malicious innuendo. Micaela frowned, obviously puzzled by her innocent, slightly shocked reaction.
'Of course, I had forgotten,' she apologised. 'You're not used to that custom.'
'What custom?'
'Why, the custom of a man having a mistress as well as a wife, of course. It still happens in this country. You know Sebastian and I fell in love with each other years ago.'
'Oh, really. Why didn't you marry?' Dawn tried to sound coolly interested.
'My father wouldn't let me marry him.' Micaela swung round to face Dawn. 'You wouldn't understand that, either, you who are so used to your freedom. He… my father… is a very proud man, proud of his lineage, on one side Spanish and on the other Aztec. He didn't like the idea of his only daughter marrying a man who was born on the wrong side of the blanket.'
'But Sebastian's birth was legitimised,' said Dawn.
'After he was born,' said Micaela softly. 'That was the bone which my proud father refused to swallow. And who was to know where Polly Moore came from? She was a jumped-up little nobody who had probably got her parts in films through distributing her favours to the men who could help her with her career… '
'How cruel of your father to imply that!' exclaimed Dawn angrily.
'I thought so too, at the time, but then I was in love. I was sent away to school in Switzerland to be finished and polished.' Micaela's mouth took on a bitter twist. 'When I came back I was duly married to Armando. And now…' She shrugged and sighed and made a gesture with both hands. 'We are still in love, you know, Sebastian and I. It isn't over, our affair, and it never will be over. I thought you should know that. Buenas noches.'
She went from the room and again there was the sound of her heels clicking on the gallery floor, the sound of her voice calling over the gallery railing to someone who was in the hall.
Dawn stood a long time looking out at the stars, only moving when she heard other heavier footsteps coming along the gallery. Then turning quickly she whisked into the bathroom, shut the door and turned the key in the lock. Bending over the bath, she flicked both taps on. Water gushed out noisily. Impossible with that row going on to hear whether anyone called to her through the closed door or even turned the handle of the door. She had found the place where she could be alone to think, where she could escape from Sebastian.
When the bath was so full of water it was in danger of running over she turned off the taps and listened. There was no sound from the other side of the door, so she slipped off the green gown she was wearing and hung it carefully on a hook behind the door, stepped out of her underwear and got into the bath. There was so much water in it that her legs kept fl
oating up and eventually she let some out.
Think. She had to think of a way out of this new predicament she was in. Oh, it was so easy now to see how she had been manipulated by Sebastian, taunted and tempted by him until she had agreed to marry him. But she couldn't do what he wanted her to do, not now, knowing about Micaela and him. With an indrawn breath of pain she remembered the expression on his face when he had seen the car belonging to the Gonzalez', the bitterness she had seen there. And yet only a few minutes before that there had been a closeness between them which had been more of the spirit than of the body and she had felt strongly that he was in love with her and she with him and that everything was going to be all right, would end happily.
But now she knew he wasn't in love with her. He was in love with Micaela, who was in love with him. They were lovers. That was what was hurting so much, stabbing through her like a knife. They had made love together in the same way that he was expecting to make love with her, now, tonight, because she was his wife! Oh, she couldn't do it. She couldn't, knowing about Micaela.
Knuckles rapped sharply on the bathroom door, startling her out of her uneasy thoughts.
'Who is it?' she called nervously.
'Me, your husband, querida,' Sebastian sounded amused. 'I'm glad to hear your voice and to know that you haven't drowned in the bathtub. You have been in there a long time. The Gonzalez' have gone and we are alone at last. I know you wish to be beautiful for me, but I'm getting impatient. I'll give you five more minutes and then…' He paused threateningly.
'What will you do?' she exclaimed, and stood up in the bath so quickly that the water slid from side to side.
'Break down the door, of course, snatch you up in my arms and carry you off to my bed,' he growled, but there was a ripple of laughter beneath the growl.
'Five minutes, then,' she called out, and grabbed a big towel from the rail. 'Where will you be?'
'Can't you guess?' he replied mockingly.
After that there was silence and she assumed he had gone, returning to his own room. She took her time over drying, letting the five minutes drag out to ten, thinking that if she didn't hurry he might fall asleep. One thing was sure, she wasn't going to his room tonight, not even to put out a light, and if he came looking for her and tried to make love to her she would just tell him that she couldn't, she wasn't in the mood, she had a headache, she felt sick—tell him anything to put him off. And she knew he would withdraw, for hadn't he once said there was no pleasure in making love to an unwilling woman?
When she was thoroughly dry she realised that she hadn't brought the nightgown with her into the bathroom, so she draped the big towel around her sarongwise, unlocked the bathroom door, opened it and peered cautiously round the edge of it into the bedroom. The room was as she had left it, lit only by one lamp whose shaded light slanted across the silken sea-green sheen of the bed, showing it to be flat and uninhabited.
With a quick glance round the rest of the room to make sure no one was there, she went across to the bed, assuming that whoever had tidied the room and had made the bed that day had put the nightdress under one of the pillows. Bending over the bed, she pulled back the covers and slid her hands under each pillow in turn. There was no nightdress.
She straightened up, then let out a cry of fright and surprise when she felt hands, cool, lean and long-fingered, touch her shoulders and slide forward diagonally across her breasts to pull her back against a warm, bare masculine body.
'Forget the nightgown,' whispered Sebastian into her hair. 'You're not going to need it tonight. Nor will you need this.' And with slow caressing movements of his hands he smoothed the towel away from her and tossed it somewhere into the shadows.
'I… thought you'd gone to bed,' she gasped, closing her eyes and willing herself to ignore the wantonness which was leaping through her at the feel of his muscular pulsing body pressed closely against her back and the delicate seductive touch of his fingertips as they caressed her.
'Without you?' he queried, and hands resting lightly on her waist turned her so that she faced him. In the lamplight his eyes were opaque under heavy lids as they studied her face. 'I couldn't,' he added softly. 'I want you too much.'
'Sebastian,' she said urgently, putting her hands behind her back and gripping them tightly together there because she had an overwhelming desire to touch him, to slide her hands about his waist and over the curve of his hips, but she mustn't, because it had to be said before those devastating fingers of his could find the hidden sensitive nerve-endings and light the flame which would run along the fuse and lead to an explosion of desire in her. 'There's something I must say to you.'
'Important?' he murmured.
'I think it is.'
'Are you going to say you want me very much too?' His voice was slightly muffled as he kissed her throat. 'Because if you aren't don't talk at all. There is a time for serious talk and a time for love-talk, and now is the time for love-talk…' He went off into Spanish as he gathered her against him, his hands stroking her back with long slow caresses until she was moulded so closely against him she caught her breath as excitement beat through her.
'I don't understand what you're saying.' It came out in a sort of gasping sigh, half protesting, half exulting as, suddenly beyond her control, her body arched against his.
'I'm saying only that I'm in love-desire and I can wait for you no longer,' he whispered breathlessly, and suddenly he lifted her and then somehow they were both lying on the bed, mouth to mouth, breast to breast. 'You are so small and pretty, querida,' he went on huskily, 'and I don't want to hurt you, but I don't think I can be gentle… '
But by now Dawn didn't care what happened. All thought was in retreat before the strength of the life-force which was throbbing through her in answer to his demands. Holding him closely she whispered two of the few Spanish phrases which she knew and which came most closely to expressing how she was feeling.
'De nada, el gusta es mio. You're welcome, the pleasure is mine.'
And then it was as if a dam which had been holding back a torrent burst. His mouth was against hers bruisingly so that breathing was almost impossible, he pinned her with his weight against the bed and after that it was like drowning again as she was swept along on the tumultuous torrent of his desire for her. Yet through the painful bursting darkness she was aware suddenly of joy like a great flash of light exploding all about her. And afterwards there was a warm sensuous afterglow and the wetness of tears on her face and on his.
Curled up in his arms, her cheek against the smooth silky hardness of his shoulder, she fell asleep, motionless, lying in the kind of peace she hadn't known since childhood, and didn't wake for a long time.
When she did wake she felt different and for a while she lay with her eyes closed, wondering why she should feel that way, for she knew she was alone. No arms held her comfortingly and there was no smooth hardness of skin-sheathed muscle beneath her cheek.
It was full daylight, she could tell by the brightness, she could sense through her eyelids and she was still in the comfortable bed—she could tell by the silken feel of the sheets against her bare skin. But there was a difference. She was different. She was lighter than air, floating like a feather, happy because at last she knew what heaven was like.
She opened her eyes, saw the rumpled head-dented pillow beside her and the creased tangle of the sheet. Beyond the bed was a splash of green on the floor which was the towel Sebastian had taken from her. Then it all came flooding into her mind, the memory of what had happened, the pain and the ecstasy, the warmth and whispers of passion, and with a little groan of dismay she turned her head and buried her face in the pillow.
The slithering sound made by rope-soled sandals moving over the wood of the gallery floor meant that Manuela was coming. Dawn turned on to her back, making sure that she was covered by the sheet. The woman appeared in the archway carrying the breakfast tray which she set down on the bedside table. Her dark eyes slanted a sideways glance at Dawn a
nd she smiled, just a little.
'Buenos dias, seňora,' she said expressionlessly, and had whisked away out of the room before Dawn had time to remember the Spanish for 'where' so that she could ask where Sebastian was.
She couldn't help feeling disappointed because he hadn't stayed in her bed, she thought, as she slid off the bed and went to the closet to take out the silk dressing gown. But she supposed, with a new and disheartening cynicism, that having got what he wanted he had seen no reason to linger with her. And yet, yesterday, he had indicated that he would once they were alone, here in this house.
Perhaps he had felt unsatisfied. Perhaps he had found her too innocent. After all, if he were accustomed to making love with a knowledgeable sophisticated woman like Micaela… Her hand shook suddenly so that she had to put down the glass of fruit juice which she had picked up from the tray. Sitting down on the side of the bed, she buried her face in her hands as she remembered how she had intended to refuse to let Sebastian make love to her last night because she couldn't bear the idea of doing it after what Micaela had told her.
How easily he had been able to defeat her intention. Once he had touched her she had been lost, betrayed by her foolish susceptible body. And that was how it was always going to be if she stayed here and lived with him. He was always going to be able to silence her with kisses and caresses, and all the time she would know that when he wasn't with her he would be with Micaela…
