Time Fuse

by Penny Jordan

  She was almost on the point of demanding what game he thought he was playing when Sir Gerald came back. The two men soon became re-engrossed in the work on hand but Selina couldn’t settle. Despite her attempts to blot it out, her mind kept showing her pictures of Piers; coolly arrogant and entirely male. What would he be like when he made love? That she should even have the thought shocked her, shocked and excited, she admitted inwardly on a small shiver, trying to imagine the saturnine features transformed by desire; the hard male body possessed by passion. It seemed incredible that after so many years of successfully blocking out any sexual desire or need from her mind and body she should find it so difficult to continue doing so now; and worse that Piers Gresham of all men should be the one to instigate such thoughts. God, if he ever found out… She closed her eyes and opened them to find Sir Gerald studying her with kind concern.

  ‘Selina, my dear, you’ve gone quite pale. Are you all right?’

  ‘Just a little tired.’ It was true. She had spent the previous three evenings repainting her small kitchen, staying up later than usual to do so.

  ‘Poor Miss Thorn,’ Piers mocked. ‘You really must tell your boyfriend to get you home earlier; either that or move in with him.’

  ‘Piers, you’re embarrassing the girl.’ His uncle’s reproof was mild.

  ‘Oh I shouldn’t think so. Sex isn’t a subject that causes embarrassment to today’s younger generation is it, Miss Thorn?’

  Although he had asked her the question Selina suspected that he knew exactly how difficult she found it not to shrink away from it; just as she suspected he had guessed that any discussion concerning sex did embarrass her.

  ‘Not when it’s discussed objectively,’ she replied as calmly as she could. ‘But my private life is private, and I don’t care to have it made the subject of general office discussion.’ She knew that she sounded prim and spinsterish, so she added recklessly, ‘I’m sure you wouldn’t care to have me comment on your sex life.’

  ‘Not unless you were speaking from first-hand experience.’

  Selina froze in her chair, not daring to look either at Sir Gerald or at her tormentor. Picking up her book and pencil she said stiffly, ‘I have some work to do on the Letford case, Sir Gerald, I’ll be in my office if you need me.’

  As she was closing the door, she heard Sir Gerald saying far less mildly to his nephew. ‘That was rather under the belt, Piers. What the devil’s got into you?’

  She closed the door behind her without waiting to hear Piers’ response. His attitude towards her today had been unforgivable, and she sensed that unless she could come to terms with it he was going to make her life while she was at work a misery. Perhaps that was the whole idea, she thought cynically; make her so unhappy that she’d leave. But she wasn’t going to do that; the same stubborn determination that had helped her through her childhood and adolescence, wouldn’t let her give in to his bullying any more than it had let her give in to that of her peers. Besides, the delicate relationship she was developing with her father was far too precious to relinquish.

  She didn’t hear from Dulcie Gresham until the week before the concert. Her ’phone was ringing one evening when she got home from work and to her surprise when she picked up the receiver Dulcie was on the other end of the line. ‘I’m just ringing to confirm our arrangements for next week,’ she told Selina. ‘I’ve got the tickets; it starts at 7.00 and I thought we’d have supper together afterwards if that’s all right with you. I’m really looking forward to it,’ she added, ‘and to seeing you.’

  It was ironic that this friendship should be developing between her and the woman who was really her aunt, and there was a bond of kinship between them; Selina had felt it too. No doubt Piers would disapprove, well let him, she thought childishly. He hadn’t said anything else to her, but whenever he was around she sensed him watching her, waiting for her to make a false move, no doubt.

  Almost as though she had read his mind the very next day he walked into her office just before lunch. She was alone, having promised to keep an ear out for the phones for Sue, who shared the room with her, the other girl having nipped out early for lunch.

  The moment she saw his face, Selina knew that his visit was not a friendly one. His expression was grimly angry, no warmth or amusement in his eyes today as they raked her slender frame from head to foot. ‘All right, what’s it all about?’ he demanded without preamble. ‘What’s all this about you going out with my mother?’

  Just for a moment Selina quailed beneath his icily controlled anger, but her spirit re-asserted itself and she returned his look with an equally disdainful one of her own, her chin tilting defiantly as she looked at him. ‘Your mother very kindly invited me to accompany her to a Vivaldi concert and I agreed.’

  ‘So she tells me…Vivaldi? I shouldn’t have thought that was your scene…’

  The arrogance of his assumptions about her was infuriating. Her fingers curled angrily into her palms and the weight of twenty-four years of rejection and taunting was behind her as she said scornfully, ‘Shouldn’t you? Why not I wonder? Aren’t humble PAs allowed to enjoy the classics? Just because we do not aspire to the heights inhabited by superior beings such as yourself must that mean that our tastes and dreams must be as squalid as our lives sometimes have to be?’ She was in a fine temper now, her cheeks flushed; her eyes a deep smokey amethyst. ‘How dare you sit in judgment on me?’ she demanded huskily. ‘How dare you make arrogant and incorrect assumptions about me? You know nothing about me…nothing at all…’

  The force with which he grasped her upper arms at any other time would have made her wince in pain, but now she was too angry to feel anything other than the rip tide of adrenalin flooding through her veins.

  ‘I know you’re not here simply because you want a job,’ he told her thickly. ‘Every instinct I possess tells me that… Why are you cultivating my mother? What do you hope to gain from her? An introduction to a wealthy mate?’

  His cynicism stunned her. How dared he assume that she wanted anything? How dared he catalogue her as a scheming, grasping woman bent on using everyone who came her way, for her own selfish ends…?

  ‘Don’t think I haven’t seen the way you pander to my uncle,’ he told her raspingly, before she could speak, ‘but you’re wasting your time there, it’s been tried before…’

  For a moment she was terrorised by the fear that he would suddenly realise who she was, but almost immediately it receded to be replaced by a tearingly bitter pain. Unable to cope with the implications of it she lashed out bitterly, ‘And of course your concern is only for your uncle; your motives completely pure and having nothing to do with…’

  ‘With what?’ he asked her gratingly. ‘The fact that sexually I find you desirable? Not to the extent that my need to possess you outweighs everything else. You have the intelligence to be doing a job far more demanding than this; you could use it to forge a career for yourself, but you haven’t done, have you? No. Why I wonder?’

  ‘Then keep on wondering.’ Selina snapped bitingly back at him. ‘Because you’ll never find out from me!’

  ‘You think not. I wouldn’t bank on it, my dear.’ He was sneering at her now and Selina found it incredible that he could ever have admitted wanting her. ‘There are ways of making even the stubbornest person talk.’

  ‘Is that how you win your cases?’ Her own voice was as cutting as his now. ‘By bludgeoning your victims verbally until you’re ready to confess to anything to escape you?’

  ‘I think you’re accrediting me with powers no human being could possibly possess.’ He drawled the words in cool mockery, but there was a tinge of dark colour burning along his cheek-bones that told Selina that her jibe had gone home.

  ‘I take it you still intend to attend the concert with my mother?’

  ‘Unless she changes her mind.’

  ‘I don’t want you involved with my family, Miss Thorn,’ he told her cruelly. ‘In fact I find the very idea extremely disturb
ing.’

  ‘All because you suspect me of some unknown ulterior motive?’ She was using words to conceal from him her pain. ‘What is it you’re frightened I might do? Steal the silver?’

  ‘Don’t push me too far,’ he warned her quietly. ‘Believe me right at this minute, it wouldn’t take very much to push me over the edge.’

  Selina could well believe it, but she wasn’t going to be browbeaten into giving up her friendship with his mother she told herself stubbornly, ten minutes later, running cold water over her wrists in the hope that somehow this would reduce her thudding pulses and cool down the hectic colour burning her skin. Now that she was safely away from him she could let her body relax and give in to the tremors of reaction shuddering through it. He found her sexually desirable he had said, but there had been no warmth in his eyes as he made the admission; no caring…nothing other than dislike and distrust.

  As she prepared for her evening out with his mother, Selina forced herself to think about the implications contained within her physical responsiveness to Piers. He had breached all the barriers she had put up against his sex like a hot knife melting butter; anger; resentment; desire; none of them were emotions she had ever allowed herself to feel, or wanted to feel before. Almost without being aware of making a conscious decision on it she had grown from childhood suspicious and wary of committing herself to another human being—she had no close friends; no confidantes; no lovers past or present and yet this was the first time that she had seen that lack as something to be regretted. If she had allowed herself such relationships she might not be so acutely vulnerable to Piers now she acknowledged; she would have learned from them and been able to gauge and assess her reactions to him more realistically.

  It didn’t help that she also had to take into account their blood tie; they were cousins, son and daughter of a couple who were sister and brother; and yet it was laughable to imagine Piers ever accepting her as such she thought, with wry self-mockery; he would move heaven and hell to deny such a relationship; she knew that instinctively. And there could certainly be no question of her confronting him with the truth; scorning him to deny her fathering. She shivered a little, recalling his insistence that she was hiding something; that she had an ulterior purpose in working for Sir Gerald. What did he really suspect her of?

  Even if she were to overcome his dislike and suspicion of her there could be no peaceful co-existence for them; not when he had admitted his sexual desire for her. She shivered a little in the warmth of her bedroom; the resentment and revulsion she ought to feel at such an admission was frighteningly lacking; rather there was a frisson of something along her spine and nerve endings that might be a reckless kind of excitement.

  Every logical instinct she possessed warned her that if she did want to experiment with sex, Piers was the very last person she should choose as her partner; he would destroy her, she acknowledged inwardly, and having done so would turn his back on her without a second thought. If he didn’t dislike her for any particular reason, simply the fact that he desired her would have been enough. She had sensed that when he told her about it; and male-like she would be the one he would punish for that desire; not himself.

  Stop thinking about him, she told herself as she finished dressing. She hadn’t been quite sure what to wear in view of the fact that they were eating out after the concert and in the end had opted for a plain silk dress in a soft grey printed with lemon and white flowers. The slightly thirties style of the dress suited her slender figure and with it she wore a plain grey jacket. Tonight for some reason she had felt impelled to do more to her appearance than usual. She had been shopping with Sue the previous lunchtime and the other girl had persuaded her to buy some new makeup. The salesgirl they had approached had been very helpful and the misty grey eyeshadow did add depth and a faint mystery to her eyes she acknowledged, studying her reflection thoughtfully.

  Working for her father was changing her; she was losing her fear of other human beings and of expressing herself freely to them; she was no longer as afraid of rejection as she had once been; and yet it was not just that, she mused, looking at herself. Somehow she looked different…more alive… Shaking her head, she picked up her bag and headed into her small sitting room. Her taxi would soon arrive. She had decorated the room herself, using primarily neutral colours and she frowned over it now feeling that something was missing…lacking… That was it, she decided in surprise, it lacked colour and warmth. Did she too project the same cold image as her home?

  Before she could dwell too long on the thought her taxi arrived. She had arranged to meet Dulcie Gresham just outside the Opera House, and she eyed the crowd already gathered there with some misgivings hoping that they would not miss one another. Her fears were misplaced. No sooner had she stepped out on to the pavement than Dulcie hailed her.

  Turning to greet her, Selina felt the smile freeze on her face as she saw Piers standing behind his mother. Her heart seemed to miss a beat and thud erratically. Anger flashed bitterly in her eyes for a moment as they challenged his. What possible harm did he really think she could do to his mother; or more to the point want to do? If he knew the truth… It was several seconds before she was able to acknowledge that being the cynical soul that he was if he knew the truth he would be at even greater pains to keep them apart.

  ‘Isn’t it marvellous,’ Dulcie crowed, ‘Piers was able to come after all.’

  Selina felt acutely uncomfortable. ‘You should have told me. Piers could have had my ticket, after all you only invited me in the first place because he could not go.’

  ‘Rubbish.’ Dulcie’s voice was firm. ‘I invited you because I enjoy your company. That’s not to say that I’m not glad he is with us.’ She turned to her son and said anxiously, ‘Where’s Verity, there’s such a crowd here that…’

  ‘She’s here now.’

  Selina’s stomach muscles tightened as she saw the tall dark woman coming towards them, although older than she would have expected one of Piers’ dates to be, in every other way she fulfilled her mental image of the type of woman he would escort. Dark and soignee; she wore her silk evening suit with an elegance that came from years of wearing expensive clothes. The pearls round her throat and in her ears were real, Selina suspected, and her beautifully made-up face was smooth as a girl of twenty’s.

  Just for a second her eyes met Piers’ and as though he knew of the feelings tormenting her, his mouth twisted in a taunting smile.

  ‘Selina come and meet my niece Verity Graham.’

  It was so totally unexpected that Selina couldn’t move. Her niece… Her eyes widened fractionally, faint colour creeping up under her skin. Unaware how closely Piers was watching her, she fought for composure.

  ‘I believe you work for my father, Selina.’ Verity’s voice and smile were warm, totally without guile or suspicion. ‘We’ve all heard what a paragon you are.’

  ‘Oh, very much so.’

  Was she the only one to hear the faint malice in Piers’ drawled words. ‘But I think we’d better go in. We don’t want to miss anything do we?’

  In other circumstances Selina would have been in seventh heaven, content simply to enjoy the music, but tonight she was unable to do so, unable to relax and stop herself from stealing glances at Verity Graham. They were half-sisters, Selina thought, on an inward shiver…suddenly overwhelmed by a surge of emotion so strong that she felt tears prick her eyes. Fortunately the others were too engrossed in the music to notice her emotionalism, or at least she thought they were until she saw Piers looking frowningly at the betraying handkerchief balled up in her small fist. Let him stare, she thought stubbornly; let him think what he liked; only she knew the truth.

  Being brought face-to-face with one of her half-sisters so unexpectedly robbed her of any desire to eat. She had already decided before they left the concert hall that she would bow out of the supper and go straight home, but as soon as she started to say so, both Dulcie and Verity started to protest.

  ‘N
o please do come… I’ve been telling Verity about you. Like us she’s another Vivaldi fan.’

  ‘Yes,’ Verity laughed. ‘In fact it’s something of a family joke. You see my father adores him, and so does Aunt Dulcie, but I’m the only one of his children who shares his passion for music. Mummy always says the other two take after her. In fact if James, my husband, hadn’t been away on business this week I would have had to miss this concert.’ She wrinkled her nose pertly.

  All through her supper Selina was conscious of Piers studying her. He had been very quiet since they entered the restaurant, leaving the conversation to his mother and cousin. Selina too found she had very little to say, and when at last she left the family trio to climb into the taxi Piers had hailed for her, she let her eyes sting with fresh tears; suffering a pain she had not known since her schooldays, when the sight of happy family units had had the power to tear her apart.

  Leave; an inner voice urged her as she let herself into her flat. Leave now, before it’s too late, and yet she knew that, against all logic, she would not do so. Fool, fool, she chided herself and that night in bed for the first time in years she allowed herself to cry; deep, rending sobs that shook her body and soaked her pillow, leaving her feeling oddly cleansed and relaxed.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  AFTERWARDS she was to acknowledge that the traumatic meeting with her half-sister had marked the point where her attitudes to life began to change. It was as though seeing and talking to her had operated some secret lock allowing emotions she had denied to herself for years to become part of her life.

  Almost before she had been aware of what she was doing she had trained herself to accept that her father could not exist for her and although she had daydreamed of growing up to impress and astonish him, until Judge Seaton had suggested she apply for her present job she had always shrunk from the thought of seeing him; dreading a rejection, unable to bear seeing him turn away from her in denial.