by Anne Mather
‘Oh, yes,’ he muttered, and Rhia cast Jared a painful glance as she supported Glyn back to his chair, ‘I’ll feel different all right. The only difference will be that I’ll have plenty of space to fall about in.’
‘Glyn, you won’t fall about.’ It was Rhia who spoke, Rhia who stood beside his chair and allowed him to hold on to her hands. ‘Believe me, you’re going to get better. Just give it time. Give it time!’
Glyn shook his head, looking up at her with those tragic sightless blue eyes. ‘I’m frightened, Val,’ he said, and her heart plunged at his painful vulnerability. ‘I want to go home—’
‘Of course you do,’ Lisa exclaimed, but Glyn ignored her.
‘I want to go home,’ he repeated, ‘but I don’t want to go alone.’
‘You won’t be alone,’ his mother protested, but this time a look from Jared silenced her.
‘I want you to come with me, Val,’ Glyn continued, as if Lisa hadn’t spoken. ‘I want you to come to Moose Falls. You will come, won’t you? If—if you don’t, I won’t go either!’
CHAPTER SIX
‘YOU knew that would happen, didn’t you?’ Rhia faced Jared in the living room of the apartment, her lips trembling as she endeavoured to articulate her indignation. ‘You knew what Glyn would say. You knew how he would react, as soon as his mother mentioned taking him home. Oh, how could you? How could you? You’re despicable!’
Tears were very close, and Rhia turned abruptly away, unwilling for him to see how emotional she felt. Perhaps it would have been better if they had not had this opportunity for conversation, she thought. Given time, she might have been able to marshal her arguments better. As it was, she was too shocked and helpless to offer any coherent objection, and she knew how easily she could say something she would regret.
Shrugging his shoulders, Jared flung himelf on to her couch, and glancing round at him Rhia thought again how easily he could adapt to his surroundings. Compared to someone who flew the Atlantic in his own aircraft, this apartment must seem very drab and ordinary, and yet he used its accoutrements with the minimum amount of fuss.
They had left the hospital three-quarters of an hour ago, and after dropping Lisa at the hotel, Jared had driven Rhia home. She had wanted to take a cab, wanted this time to herself, but he wouldn’t hear of it. And in spite of his sister-in-law’s evident pique, he had got his own way, as usual, and once here he had insisted on accompanying her inside.
‘Okay,’ he sáid, when she persisted in keeping her back to him. ‘So I knew how Glyn would react.’ He loosened the knot of his tie. ‘You must have known it, too, if he has discussed it with you.’
‘ Rhia swung round. ‘He didn’t—discuss it with me,’ she declared hotly. ‘He just said—he just said I would enjoy a holiday at the ranch. That was all—I swear it.’
‘Okay, okay.’ Jared’s night-black eyes showed he believed her. ‘Don’t get so steamed up. You would—you will—enjoy visiting the ranch—’
‘I won’t!’ Rhia clenched her fists. ‘I won’t, because I won’t be coming!’
Jared gazed up at her intently for several seconds, then got to his feet again, tall and broad and distinctly threatening. ‘What do you mean—you won’t be coming?’ he demanded. ‘You told Glyn you would.’
‘I know what I told Glyn.’ Rhia put up an unsteady hand to her head. ‘But—but I can’t. You must see that I can’t. Jared, please, don’t look at me like that. I—I can’t go through with it.’
‘Why not?’ Jared took a step nearer to her, and although she was a tall girl, she had to tilt her head to look up at him.
‘I—I—because I can’t.’
‘You can take a holiday, can’t you? Or leave of absence? I’ve told you, I’d reimburse you for any expense—’
‘It’s not that.’
‘Then, for heaven’s sake, what is it?’ Jared’s face contorted with impatience, and his hands descended painfully on her shoulders, imprisoning her within his grasp. ‘Rhia, I don’t believe you’re so insensitive you don’t know what you’re saying. If you don’t come with us, Glyn will refuse to leave, too, and that will break his mother’s heart!’
Rhia doubted anything to do with her son would truly break Lisa Frazer’s heart. Jared, yes. It was obvious from the way she treated him, from the way they behaved with one another, that their relationship possessed an intimacy only lovers could share, and Rhia’s resentment was fuelled by the awareness that Jared’s concern was as much for Lisa as for his nephew.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said now, keeping her head down, concentrating on the top button of the dark brown waistcoat that matched the rest of his suit, but she could sense his frustration.
‘It’s Travis, isn’t it?’ he snapped angrily, bringing her head up in protest as his fingers bit into her bones.
‘No,’ she exclaimed, ‘that isn’t the reason. If you must know, I can’t go through with it because of Glyn.’
‘Glyn?’ Jared’s eyes narrowed. ‘What has he done?’
‘It’s not what he’s done,’ retorted Rhia, wincing at his continued violence. ‘Jared, you’re hurting me!’
‘Tell me how Glyn presents any obstacle to you,’ he commanded, and realising he was not going to let her go until she did, Rhia drew a deep breath.
‘He—he and Val had—had a relationship.’
‘God, I know that.’
Rhia gasped. ‘And that doesn’t suggest any obstacles to you?’
‘Not insurmountable ones, no.’ He sighed. ‘Rhia, I’ve seen him kiss you, and you don’t exactly object—’
‘You—bastard!’ Rhia gazed up at him resentfully, and Jared’s face darkened with hot colour.
‘Am I?’ he muttered, looking down at her with smouldering impatience. ‘Because I tell it how it is, you call me a bastard.’
‘That’s not how it is,’ cried Rhia fiercely. ‘I—I don’t like it. I don’t want him to kiss me. But I have no choice.’
‘You’re not frigid, are you?’ he asked, his voice harsh and insulting, and Rhia caught her breath, hardly capable of believing this was happening.
‘I don’t know whether I’m frigid or not,’ she declared proudly. ‘I haven’t felt the need to find out. I’m not in the habit of indulging in promiscuous relationships—’
‘Then let’s find out, shall we?’ Jared muttered, jerking her towards him, and before she had a chance to offer any protest, his searching lips had captured hers.
It was not as if she had never been kissed before, Simon had kissed her many times, but he had never aroused the wild singing in her ears that Jared aroused. Although his lips were hard and angry, she responded without volition, her mouth opening under his and evoking an intimacy he could not have expected.
With a groan of anguish, he moved his hands from her shoulders to her throat, and for a heart-stopping moment she thought he meant to strangle her. But instead his palms cupped her nape and held her closer, his mouth softening and gentling to a blinding sweetness.
Weakness made Rhia’s knees sag, and she clutched at him helplessly, her arms sliding beneath his jacket to encircle the leanness of his hips. Her action brought the lower half of his body closer to hers, and with a trembling sense of recognition she felt the swollen hardness of muscle probing against her.
‘God—Rhia!’
Before her own scattered senses could form their own assessment of what was happening, Jared had propelled her away from him, raking back his hair with shaking fingers. ‘I think we can safely say you’re not frigid!’ he muttered, with a bitter attempt at humour. ‘God, Rhia, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to do that, and God help me, I didn’t expect it to go as far as it did. I’m sorry.’
Rhia said nothing. She felt too stunned, too numb, to make the kind of casual comment he no doubt expected of her. Perhaps he was doubting her earlier protestations of innocence. Certainly, he had every reason to do so. She had not acted like an innocent, and she could hardly tell him that he was to blame, that until h
e kissed her she had not believed herself capable of emotions like she was experiencing now. He was prepared to accept responsibility, and she had to let him, even while her body ached for him to touch her again. Her eyes drifted down, over the taut muscles of his thighs, and her senses reeled.
‘Don’t look at me like that,’ Jared said harshly, tipping back his head, as if the muscles at the back of his neck ached. ‘Rhia, I have got to go. Lisa,’ she thought he said the name deliberately, ‘Lisa will be wondering where I am.’
‘Of course.’ Rhia got the words out with difficulty. ‘Don’t—don’t let me detain you.’
‘Rhia!’ The near-black depths of his eyes were tormented as they sought hers. ‘Don’t make this any harder than it already is. I guess I’ve done enough damage for one afternoon, don’t you?’
Rhia turned abruptly towards the door, but he caught her arm and swung her back to face him. ‘I suppose there’s no way you could not let this influence you, is there?’ he demanded, and his lean face had a disturbingly defeated vulnerability.
‘I—I did say I couldn’t—go,’ she said jerkily. ‘Be—before you touched me.’
‘Yes, but for God’s sake, Rhia, Glyn needs you! We all—need you!’
Rhia pulled away from him. ‘I—I think you’d better go—’
‘Rhia!’
‘I can’t go with you,’ she insisted. ‘You can’t make me!’ But when he gave her one last brooding look before striding out of the flat, she knew he would not give up that easily.
* * *
She was expected to go to the hospital that evening, and unable to disappoint Glyn this last time, Rhia rang Simon and asked him if he would take her.
‘And then what am I supposed to do?’ he demanded. ‘Sit outside like a banana, while my girl-friend plays nursemaid to a spoilt little rich boy!’
‘Oh, Simon, Glyn’s not spoilt—at least, not a lot anyway. And it will only be for an hour. We had arranged that you should pick me up there, hadn’t we?’
‘And so I will,’ agreed Simon pedantically. ‘Eight o’clock, didn’t you say?’
Rhia’s nerves tightened and her patience, drawn to a feverish thread by what happened between her and Jared, snapped. ‘Don’t bother!’ she said tersely. ‘I’ll take a bus there, and home. That way, you won’t have to leave the comfort of your mother’s fireside!’
‘Rhia!’ Simon sounded hurt now. ‘There’s no need for you to take that attitude. I think I’ve been very patient this last week, putting up with all these unnecessary visits to the hospital. You can’t expect me to play chauffeur every time you need me.’
‘This is the first time I’ve asked you,’ declared Rhia tensely. ‘And they haven’t been unnecessary visits. Glyn’s blind! Can’t you at least try to imagine how he must feel? And how I feel, too, knowing my sister was responsible!’
‘I think you’ve flogged that particular horse to death,’ retorted Simon, recovering his indignation. ‘As Mother says, your sister appears to mean more to you than I do.’
‘Oh, Simon!’ Rhia felt an intense weariness. Then, remembering the rapture she had felt in Jared’s arms, she nodded to herself. ‘Perhaps—perhaps you’re right,’ she agreed heavily. ‘Maybe it would be an idea to give our relationship a breathing space.’
‘What do you mean?’ Simon was anxious now. ‘Look, Rhia, just because I’ve made a bit of a stand about being made use of, it doesn’t mean you have to go off the deep end!’
‘I’m not.’ Rhia felt incredibly weary suddenly. ‘I accept what you say. I have expected a lot of you. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you.’
Simon made a sound of impotence. ‘You haven’t hurt me, Rhia,’ he protested. ‘Angered me, yes, but that’s nothing new, is it? It’s not the first time you’ve annoyed me over Val, and I don’t suppose it will be the last.’
‘What do you mean?’ Rhia was confused. ‘How have I annoyed you over Val?’
‘It doesn’t matter.’ Simon was irritatingly smug.
‘It does matter.’ Rhia insisted on knowing. ‘What did I do? I want you to tell me.’
‘Well—’ Simon drew the word out, ‘it’s just the way you make yourself responsible for her. I mean, when she was younger, running around with that fast crowd, I used to get really angry when you went chasing off to get her out of one scrape or another. I mean, it’s not on, is it? You’re not her mother. And what’s your father doing, that’s what I’d like to know!’
It was amazing, thought Rhia incredulously, how by setting one pebble rolling one could cause an avalanche. She had never suspected that Simon seriously objected to her taking care of Valentina, or that he considered her father less than responsible by leading his own life.
‘I think this conversation has gone far enough, Simon,’ she said now, the coolness in her voice unmistakable. ‘Obviously, we both need some time to think about the situation. I suggest I give you a ring when I’ve got things into perspective. I don’t think raking up old scores is going to help either of us.’
‘You’re not serious!’
‘I am serious.’
‘You’re saying, we shouldn’t see one another any more?’
‘Not right now, no.’
‘I won’t let you do this.’ Simon snorted. ‘It’s the Frazers, isn’t it? They’ve put you up to this. I might have known Jared Frazer had some ulterior motive for persuading you to pretend to be Val. What do they want you to do? Go back to Canada with them?’
For once, Rhia was astounded by his perception, but perhaps it wasn’t so extraordinary after all; as Glyn hadn’t regained his sight, it was a not unnatural conclusion.
‘I don’t think there’s anything more to say, Simon,’ she averred firmly. ‘And anything I’ve done for Glyn, I’ve been happy to do. Remember that!’
When she rang off, she was half afraid Simon would try to phone her again, but while she went into the bathroom and rinsed her hot face with cold water, the telephone remained blessedly silent. However, his defection did mean that she had less time than she had expected to get to the hospital, and without stopping to get anything to eat, she restored her make-up and hurried out into the Fulham Palace Road to hail a taxi.
To her surprise, Glyn was alone when she entered his room, and after exchanging the increasingly urgent kiss he seemed to expect, she sought the chair that was situated some yards from him. His small side ward had gradually gained the appearance of a sitting room, with two armchairs, two upright chairs and a table, as well as the usual fitments of bed and trolley-type units.
‘Well?’ he said, after she had seated herself and folded her hands together in her lap. ‘What’s your decision? You are coming with me, aren’t you? If you don’t, I don’t know what—’
‘Oh, Glyn, don’t say it!’ Rhia drew an unsteady breath. ‘I—I can’t come with you. You know I can’t. I’m—I’m in the middle of my—training.’
‘Don’t I mean more to you than your bloody career?’ he demanded, his hands curving and uncurving over the arms of his chair. ‘Val, I need you. I never thought I’d ever say that to anyone, but I’m saying it to you.’
‘Glyn—’
‘All right, all right.’ He held up one hand. ‘Look, I didn’t want to have to say this, but—well, don’t you think you—owe it to me?’
Rhia closed her eyes in despair. ‘Glyn—’
‘No, listen: it’s true. I—I’ve never involved you in any of this, but that doesn’t alter the fact that you were driving, weren’t you?’
Rhia raised her eyes heavenward. ‘You—you shouldn’t have let me!’ she protested.
‘Agreed. But I did, and now look at me! At least you can!’
Rhia quivered. ‘I—I can’t give up my job—’
‘I’m not asking you to. Like Jared says, you have holidays, don’t you?’
‘Jared—Jared said that?’
‘Sure he did. And you do, don’t you? Everybody does.’
Rhia shook her head. Of course she had holi
days, but after what had happened this afternoon, she had even less reason to want to go with them. It was worse than madness to consider living in the same house as a man who could evoke such an emotional response inside her, and yet who evidently shared a similar relationship with his sister-in-law. And surely by persisting in this charade, she was only compounding an impossible situation.
‘Glyn, it’s not that easy.’
‘Why isn’t it?’ Responding to the sound of her voice, he got up from his chair and groped his way to hers, sinking down rather heavily on to the arm and putting his arm about her shoulders.
Immediately, Rhia froze. Just one movement of his hand in the direction of her hair, and it would all be over. He had only to brush the silken coil that circled her head like an amber halo to realise it was not the bouncy, bubbly style Val had adopted, and in those revealing moments she realised that she didn’t want him to find out.
‘All right,’ she said, the words spilling from her lips in her haste to evade discovery. ‘All right, I’ll come with you. But just for two weeks!’
‘Four,’ he said huskily, his hand groping for her chin, turning her face up to his, and Rhia trembled.
‘Compromise,’ remarked a dry voice behind them, and to Rhia’s intense relief Glyn got to his feet to greet his uncle and his mother.
‘Okay—three,’ he agreed, pumping Jared’s hand with vigour. ‘Hey, did you hear that, Mom? Val’s going to come with us. Isn’t that great news?’
‘Great,’ echoed Lisa Frazer without enthusiasm, and Rhia, meeting her chilly eyes, knew there was one person who would not welcome her to Moose Falls.
Jared’s feelings were less easy to define. He was evidently relieved that she had agreed to come for Glyn’s sake, but she suspected he was not indifferent to the complications that the afternoon’s events might create. But he needn’t worry, Rhia thought tautly, meeting his guarded gaze with cool hostile eyes. She had no intention of remembering that particular incident. It was over, it was done with; and she wanted to forget it…
* * *
Leaving England was easier than she had imagined, or perhaps it was Jared Frazer’s influence that only made it seem so. It was he who went to see Mr Wyatt and arranged for Rhia to take two weeks of her holiday immediately, commencing Wednesday, with the added bonus of a further week’s leave of absence. Her boss was unexpectedly understanding when Rhia attempted to explain why she needed this holiday so urgently, and she could only assume that Jared possessed some authority she was unaware of.
