Wonder and Wild Desire

by Jeanne Stephens

  She was sitting at her dressing table in gown and robe, filing her fingernails, when Josh knocked at her door and, without waiting for an answer, walked in. "Mother says you're not feeling well."

  Glancing up at his tall frame standing, legs slightly apart, in the middle of the room as if he had come to do battle, Carrie retorted, "Your husbandly concern overwhelms me."

  "Well, it seems our relationship is back to normal," he commented. "You shouldn't try to schedule your husband and your boyfriend on the same day. Leading a double life is apparently too much of a strain on you."

  Carrie realized that she was clutching the nail file so hard that it was digging into her palm. She relaxed her grip and put the file aside. "I will have to take lessons from you so I will know how to handle it," she snapped.

  His brown eyes glinted. "Does he commiserate with you over what a poor misunderstood wife you are? Does he comfort you?"

  "You're totally irrational on the subject of Kevin, and you know it. There is nothing but casual friendship between us. I'm a married woman."

  "You aren't going to tell me that that makes any difference to Kevin Hamilton! Fortunately, you seem to be more cautious. You brought him back to the plant promptly this afternoon."

  "You timed us, I presume."

  "Yes," he said unabashedly.

  Carrie felt outraged. "Next I suppose you will have me followed."

  "I hope it doesn't come to that, Carrie."

  She felt at a disadvantage, sitting there while he glared down at her from his towering height. She walked stiffly to a window and turned to face him. "Checking up on me is not necessary, nor will it ever be as long as we are together. Is it too much to ask that you at least trust me that far?"

  "I have found little reason to trust women," he responded coolly.

  She swung away to hide the slight tremble of her lips and heard him approaching her. He lifted her hair and brushed the back of her neck with warm fingers. "That doesn't mean I can't appreciate their other attributes." Carrie knew by the sound of his voice that he was smiling.

  She turned swiftly, rubbing her neck as if to rid it of the glow his touch had left. "You expect me to settle for that? You have the arrogance to believe that I am just waiting to fall into your arms the moment you touch me! Josh Revell, you are conceited, self-centered, and—" She floundered, searching for something that would hurt him as deeply as he had hurt her. "And your touch makes my skin crawl!"

  His lips tightened into a thin line. He walked to the door of his suite and slammed it behind him.

  She could not even imagine sleeping after that. She didn't go to bed but sat in a chair, forcing her eyes to scan the lines of a mystery novel she had found downstairs in the study. She was barely able to follow the story and kept running across names of characters whom she could not remember, much less place in the flow of events. Well after midnight, she tossed the book aside.

  It was no longer possible to avoid thinking about Josh. He was cruel and infuriating, but she had had her part in their worsening relationship. Something in him put her instantly on the defensive, and she was always too quick to return taunt for taunt, abuse for abuse. Divorce was inevitable if things continued on their present course, but she admitted to herself for the first time that she didn't really want that. Not only would she run the risk of losing Mike, but in less than seven months she would be responsible for another child. She knew that if anyone was to divert the collision course along which she and Josh were rushing, it would have to be she; she would have to make the overtures. Somehow just admitting this made her feel a little calmer.

  So far she had discovered only one way to communicate with Josh. Before she had time to examine her doubts, she went to the connecting door and, opening it softly, stepped into Josh's bedroom. Faint light from the yard lamps outside revealed his long form stretched full length under the covers. He lay on his back, one arm flung above his head across the pillow. She stared down at him for only a moment, and as she watched, his eyes opened. In the shadowy dimness it was impossible to discern at exactly what instant this had happened, and she started when she realized that he was looking back at her.

  "Are you awake?"

  "Yes." His whisper sounded as insubstantial as the shadows.

  Carrie took a step that brought her next to the bed. Now she could see the bareness of his shoulders above the covers, the hard muscles in his arms. "I came to apologize." There was no response, only that unwavering look. "When you make me angry, I say things that I don't really mean."

  "Don't you?" There was no inflection in the words. He did not believe her, or if he did he didn't care.

  "Please, Josh." She pushed down a sob. "I don't want to live in an armed camp. At the office this morning I felt we were moving closer to each other. I shouldn't have offered to drive Kevin, knowing how you felt. I'm sorry."

  He did not move. "I see. It's forgotten, then. I won't mention it again."

  But there was no kindness in his voice. Couldn't he sense that she was miserable, that she needed love and reassurance? But she had only asked to be forgiven for her actions that morning, and perhaps he really believed that was all she wanted.

  "I—I haven't slept at all. Have you?"

  "No," he admitted.

  "I'm lonely." She had started to shiver, standing there beside the bed.

  His eyes moved at last and ran over her, but she sensed that there was no softening in their shadowy depths. If she were Jessica Thorpe, would he continue to regard her with such detachment? She had an impulse to retreat, return to the chair in her room to wait out the night. But stubborn defiance surged through her. She was his wife. She had the right to be there! Bending, she lifted the covers and slid into his bed. "I'm cold," she said.

  Now that she was there, she was suddenly amazed at her brazenness and lay stiffly, not touching him. If he told her to leave now, she would die of humiliation. Tears formed and slowly ran down her cheeks. Surreptitiously she wiped her eyes with a corner of the sheet.

  He moved then, turning on his side and wrapping his arms around her shivering body, pulling her against him, where she began to relax in the warmth of his body. His nakedness shocked her momentarily, but she pulled her mind away from it and, sighing, curled closer to him. He raised himself on one elbow and looked down at her.

  As if of its own will, her hand went up to touch his cheek and the cleft in his chin. "Josh," she whispered.

  He caught her hand and brought it to his lips, kissing the palm with a slow gentleness. "Do you know what you are asking for?"

  She nodded.

  "And it's what you want?"

  Again she nodded.

  "Then," he said, sighing raggedly, "let's get rid of all these clothes."

  A moment later she was snuggled against him, her body radiating pleasure all along its length as it touched his. His hand fondled her breast and his lips found the secret places of her body, bringing her quickly to flaming arousal. His body pressed against hers and their lips met, and her arms clung to him fiercely, holding him to her. Oh, this was what she had wanted, to give her body to him with unrestrained love—and more than her body, her heart and soul, herself.

  His lips trailed down her neck and across her shoulders. "Your body is more beautiful to me every time I see it."

  "Josh," she whispered, wanting to break down all the barriers between them, to put her love into words. But he was breathing heavily and kissing her with heightened urgency.

  "I adore your body, Carrie," he groaned and she heard the words in a daze as her pleasure mounted to meet his and culminated with explosive intensity.

  When it was over, she lay still in his arms. She felt the golden glow fading, and she didn't want to let it go. She wanted to tell him everything, even about the baby. "Josh?"

  There was no answer. He was asleep, already separated from her. Feeling utterly bereft, she stared into the shadows for long minutes, remembering the closeness she had felt while he made love to her, remembering t
he other times. "I adore your body," he had said in the throes of his passion. But that was so very different from loving her. Never once, not even when desire drove him, had he said that he loved her. Whatever Josh Revell was, he was not a deceiver.

  She moved from beneath his arm, and he did not stir. She slipped out of bed, picked up her discarded night clothes, and returned to her own bedroom. Unable to make head or tail of her gown in the darkness, she turned on the dressing-table lamp and caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. Dropping the gown, she stared at her naked body, still tender with the afterglow of lovemaking. Her stomach was still flat, but her breasts were already noticeably fuller. In a month or two she would not be able to hide her pregnancy from Josh. Her body was the only thing that drew him, but when she lost her figure would he even want to look at her? Would he find her ugly and repulsive?

  One hand came up to her mouth to stifle a groan of misery. She was helplessly in love with him. There was no hope of changing that now. She had never been in love before, and she knew herself well enough to realize that she would probably never love anyone but Josh, no matter how he hurt her. How often she had heard that trite expression, a one-man woman, and had laughed. Well, trite or not, it seemed that she was such a woman.

  Chapter Ten

  The next morning Josh came into her bedroom before going to work. "I missed you when I awoke to find you gone. I was hoping for a return engagement."

  Why did he say it like that? As if their lovemaking were no more important than a business meeting for which an appointment had to be made. "You fell asleep and I—I saw no reason to stay."

  "You didn't?" He looked at her, sitting propped up in bed with the covers tucked about her body, and shook his head. "Don't tell me I hurt your feelings by falling asleep!" A devilish twinkle came into his eyes. "Didn't I satisfy you, Carrie?"

  She was blushing, and he was enjoying it! "Yes—I mean, no—"

  "No?" His eyebrows rose in amused disbelief.

  "I am more than a body," she said. "I wanted to talk."

  "Talk!" He laughed, and some of the masculine condescension she had come to know so well touched his features. "Why do women always want to talk everything to death? We seem to communicate very well. Why spoil it with tedious analyses?"

  Spoil it! Didn't he realize that it was his insensitive attitude that spoiled it for her? She turned her face away from him. "You will never understand me."

  He gripped her chin and forced her to look at him. All the amusement was gone from his eyes. "What more do you want from me, Carrie? I've given you things you never had—"

  "Things!" she cried.

  His fingers gripped tighter, immobilizing her head. "You are like all women. You want to unman me. You want to pry into all the secrets of my soul so that you will have ammunition against me when you want to manipulate me." His eyes blazed into hers. "Well, forget it, Carrie. I never make the same mistake twice." He let her go suddenly, and she shrank back against the pillow away from his anger.

  He didn't want a real marriage. She was nothing more than a kept woman to him. "All right, Josh," she said huskily. "I see that I've been stupidly naive to expect any human impulses from a—a sex machine. Last night, and the other times, too, resulted from weakness on my part. I may make the same mistake twice, but I don't repeat it indefinitely."

  "Is that a threat?" Every inch of his long, lean body was stiff with outrage.

  "Yes," she returned.

  The hands hanging at his sides clenched, and she knew that his first instinct was to cause her physical pain. She was so angry and humiliated herself that she almost wished he would hit her so that she would have an excuse to claw his taut face. But after a brief moment he had himself under rigid control. "When it comes to a battle of wills, Carrie, you are out of your league!" He spun on his heel and strode out, slamming the door behind him.

  The blood left Carrie's face and she felt lightheaded and nauseated. She pressed one hand against her stomach where his child was growing, and her breakfast rose in her throat. She swallowed convulsively, lying without moving until the nausea subsided.

  She had been incredibly foolish to imagine that going to him last night would change anything. What insanity had prompted her to do it? But she knew the answer to that. Her mind might rebel, but her body craved his touch. Some primitive need in her built and built, fraying her nerves and keeping her awake nights, until every fiber and cell cried out for the assuagement that only he could give. It was just that simple—and that frightening. He had created this sensual need and because of it he had gained a tremendous hold on her. The baby she was carrying would give him another hold. Slowly she was becoming his prisoner.

  Her thoughts were creating such anxiety in her that she couldn't keep still. She got out of bed and dressed hurriedly, going along the hallway to the nursery. Miss Hastings would have a free morning. Carrie would bathe Mike, give him his breakfast, and play with him in order to keep her mind occupied with something besides Josh; otherwise, her nerves would soon be stretched to the breaking point.

  That morning was the beginning of a cold war between her and Josh. If she had thought him cool and aloof before, she soon learned that their former clashes had amounted to mere skirmishes. This was worse, this total indifference which amounted to a virtual refusal to acknowledge her existence. Even when they were in the same room together, she felt as if he were miles away.

  February brought more snow and freezing temperatures, and as the third month of Carrie's pregnancy progressed she was shut in the house with Mike, Ethel, and the servants for days on end, and every single day seemed to drag on interminably. One of the rare occasions during that time when Josh took any notice of her was when she mentioned to Ethel over dinner one evening that she thought she would drive into town the next day.

  "You can't drive on these roads," he had said in a tone that brooked no argument. "It's too dangerous."

  She had been unable to stop some of her bitterness from spilling out. "It would be a shame to damage the car."

  He had fixed her with a stabbing look. "You sound like a sulky child. You'll have to occupy yourself here, and that's all there is to it."

  Then he had left the table, and Ethel had glanced at Carrie with a bewildered look. "I've rarely seen Josh so unapproachable. Something is very wrong, Carrie. Would it help to talk about it?"

  Carrie sagged in her chair, feeling as if her body were made of lead. "No," she said disconsolately. She made an effort to perk up for Ethel's sake. "It's just that being unable to get out of the house for so long is making me nervous. Don't worry about Josh and me, Mother. We'll work things out."

  Her attempt at reassurance sounded false in her own ears. Far from imagining that they would work things out, she was coming, more and more, to accept the inevitable conclusion that she and Josh could not stay together. They would destroy each other.

  During the week following that confrontation, she hardly saw Josh at all. He left the house before she awoke and worked until very late every evening. Ethel told Carrie that Josh was working against a deadline for some large deliveries of both lumber and paper. In what Carrie knew was an attempt to comfort her, Ethel added that the delays in production that were causing the problem didn't happen often. She was sure the situation would improve in a few days.

  One afternoon she was having tea with Ethel in her apartment when Betty appeared to announce Jessica Thorpe. Jessica, wrapped in fur from chin to midcalf and wearing fur-lined boots, swept in, snow frosting her black hair. Her exuberant spirits seemed foreign in the quiet house.

  "I had to come and see how the shut-ins were doing," she caroled as she shrugged off her coat and settled into a chair.

  "We're acquiring prison pallor," Ethel returned with a laugh, "but otherwise we're coping. Jessie, what possessed you to come out here in this weather?"

  "Guilt," Jessica said. "I've neglected you too long." She reached out to pat Ethel's shoulder. "Josh keeps telling me you're all right, but I wan
ted to see for myself."

  "You are so thoughtful," Ethel told her, "but you're taking an unnecessary risk, driving over five miles of snow-packed road."

  "I have snow tires," Jessica said dismissively, "and I drove very carefully."

  Ethel smiled at her, then lifted the teapot which sat on the table beside her, pouring some of the steaming liquid into a cup. "This will warm your insides." She handed the cup to Jessica. "I confess we are delighted to have a visitor, especially one who is in such high spirits. Aren't we, Carrie?"

  Carrie, who had been sipping her tea and watching Jessica over the cup's rim, murmured, "Yes. Ethel and I have about exhausted each other's store of interesting conversational topics." She was wondering when Josh had found time to keep Jessica apprised of Ethel's welfare. As usual, she imagined the worst, but she told herself it would have required only a brief phone call. She suspected that Jessica's avowed concern for Ethel gave the woman an excuse to phone Josh frequently.

  "Then I'll bring you up on all the latest gossip in town. But first, where is your little boy? Josh tells me he's beginning to say a few words."

  Jessica's repeated references to Josh seemed intentional, and Carrie tried not to display any reaction. "He's napping."

  "Well," said Jessica, settling more comfortably into her chair with her teacup in both hands, "I am prepared to stay until he wakes up. Our second meeting has been delayed far too long."

  Sensing an implied criticism, Carrie said, "The weather has been too bad to take him out."