by Helen Brooks
His mouth was warm and firm and sensual on hers and she knew instinctively he was seeking to break down her resistance with persuasion rather than force. And to what end? she thought desperately. He didn’t really want her any more, he had made it perfectly clear that he considered her damaged goods. No, this was a cruel revenge of the worst kind because once it was over he would leave her without a second thought. But that was what she wanted, surely? her mind ground on as his hands and mouth worked their magic on her shaking body. She’d made the decision three months ago that she had to leave and face the fury and hatred such an apparently motiveless action would bring down on her head; she couldn’t back out now, she just couldn’t. But she hadn’t envisaged this sweet torture, not in her wildest nightmares.
‘I could kill you for what you’ve done …’ His voice was a thick frantic murmur against the smooth white column of her throat as he groaned her name before devouring her lips again in a kiss that was endless.
She was powerless to hide the shudders that were coursing through her body, the touch, the taste of him was intoxicatingly delicious and she felt drunk with the pleasure his lovemaking induced. She knew she ought to continue to fight him, that it was madness to wind her arms round his neck and return his kisses in heated desire, but nevertheless that was exactly what she found herself doing.
The light jacket she had been wearing was at her feet—how it had got there she didn’t know—and now his hands were on the silky skin beneath her open blouse, his fingers gentle but firm as they moulded the soft fullness of her breasts. There was a moment of startled protest as his head lowered to take possession of what his hands had found, and then she was lost completely and utterly in the sensations his lips drew.
She loved him, so much, but she couldn’t—couldn’t …
‘Amy?’ Mrs Cox’s voice cut into the moment like a rapier-sharp blade. ‘Is that you out there, Amy? I heard a noise …’ They were hidden from sight behind the overgrown foliage in the small front garden, but as Blade stiffened and his hands and mouth froze Amy felt a deluge of icy water wash through her veins.
She glanced down at her dishevelled clothing. What on earth had she been thinking of! What she’d been thinking of moved quickly, his voice light and pleasant with just the right touch of embarrassed warmth in it to appeal to an old woman’s motherly instincts. ‘It is Amy, Mrs … Cox?’ Blade moved out of the shadows and walked a few steps into the shaft of light from the open front door. ‘I walked Amy home from the restaurant, Mrs Cox. We were just saying good-night.’
‘Is that right?’ Mrs Cox’s normally slow Yorkshire drawl was tight with suspicion. ‘Where is she, then?’
‘Here, Mrs Cox.’ Amy moved out of the shadows as she pretended to tidy her hair, her clothing now in place.
‘You know him?’ The plump little woman gestured towards Blade’s large masculine figure that dwarfed her by a good foot, looking for all the world like a fat little ruffled hen prepared to face an intruder that had threatened one of her chicks.
‘He’s an old friend, Mrs Cox.’ Amy’s cheeks were burning so fiercely they hurt and she was careful to stand just out of the light. ‘Just popped down from London.’
‘Now that isn’t quite right, Mrs Cox.’ Blade’s voice was infinitely pleasant and warm and the expression he had stitched on to his face made Amy want to hit him, hard. It was one of innocent candour and honest guilelessness, his eyes wide with ingenuous frankness and a desire to please. Amy had never trusted him less. ‘In actual fact I am Amy’s husband, albeit estranged. We separated three months ago,’ he added with just enough unspoken regret to make it clear who had left whom.
‘I see. Well, that’s none of my business,’ Mrs Cox said stiffly, but even from her place in the shadows Amy could see that the little woman’s face had mellowed and her bright button eyes were a good deal warmer as they held Blade’s dark glance. He’s done it again, Amy thought with equal amazement and resentment. Melted all opposition with just two well chosen sentences and a good deal of old traditional charm. Mrs Cox wasn’t really going to fall for this line of artless simplicity, was she? It appeared she was. ‘Perhaps you’d like to come in and have a cup of tea before you leave?’ the little Yorkshirewoman continued quietly. ‘I’ve just made a pot.’
‘That’s really very kind of you.’ As he followed Mrs Cox into the house he turned once at the threshold, allowing Amy to precede him into the hall, and as she glanced at his face it was as hard as iron.
What was all this about? Amy thought helplessly. He had never willingly drunk tea in his life, preferring strong black coffee, and she knew him well enough to know that he never did anything on impulse. But of course … As she sat down by the heavily banked coal fire in the small sitting-room and listened to Blade charm Mrs Cox out of the trees, the reality of what he was about came to her in a blinding flash. This was her bolthole, her refuge, and he wanted to destroy it for her. He had spoken of punishment, retribution, hadn’t he? He was going to let Mrs Cox, and everyone else who had befriended her in the small village, know that she had left him for another man after a few months of marriage. This was a small community and a highly moral one with certain codes and rules that were adhered to as strictly now as at the beginning of the century. She would still be treated politely, with the well-mannered courtesy that was an integral part of village life here, but Blade would have stamped her as ‘that’ type of woman, on a par with her predecessor at the restaurant who had run off with her lover and left a desolate husband and children. And in a few days, maybe one or two, he would leave. Fait accompli!
It came to her, as she sat there in the dim warm light that reflected the glowing fire’s flickering shadows on the old, highly polished furniture, that all this wasn’t going to be as straightforward as she had imagined. And the thought terrified her because he mustn’t, he mustn’t, find out the truth. She would do anything, anything at all, to prevent that.
She glanced at his hands as they rested on the old leather arms of the chair. Solid gold watch on one tanned wrist, the signet ring inset with a single large diamond in one corner that she had given him on their wedding day, all the trappings of fabulous wealth that had surrounded her from their first meeting.
But all the opulence, the rich affluence, had been no protection against the long hand of fate. It had reached out through all Blade’s hard-won assets, the cleverly amassed fortune, and touched her with its icy fingers.
That had been one of the things Sandra had snarled at her that day, she remembered with a painful thudding of her heart, as she pictured her sister’s twisted angry face in her mind.
‘You thought you had it all, didn’t you? A millionaire and a handsome one to boot.’ Sandra’s voice had been shaking with rage and bitterness. ‘But you’ve got nothing now, little sister, nothing at all, in the end you’re just as naked and cold as the rest of us. Your looks will mean nothing once the disease strikes. Look at me, have a good hard look. This is you in a few years’ time. And he won’t be able to do anything, if that’s what you’re thinking. All the money in the world can’t. I know, I’ve asked.’
Sandra’s tormented face had glared at her with raw frustration in every pore. ‘He thought he was getting a beautiful little doll to show off to all his jet-setting friends and instead you are going to be a millstone round his neck! That’s really very funny when you think about it. Can you see the joke, Amy? Can you?’
‘You’re sick in more than body, Sandra,’ Amy had whispered faintly as she stared back into the maddened eyes. If it weren’t for the fact that her sister was a prisoner in the wheelchair, she was sure she would have leapt at her face like a small demented goblin. As it was, her hands were gripping the arms of the wheelchair in a claw motion that was infinitely chilling.
‘What do you know about it?’ Sandra had screamed bitterly. ‘You were always the favoured one, so pretty, so perfect. You’ve had a charmed life so far with everything going your way. Not like me!’
‘
No, I haven’t.’ Amy had stood for a moment poised on the threshold of Sandra’s room in the old terraced house in the heart of Glasgow, her hand clutching the chilling medical report Sandra had given her a few minutes before, her sister having watched with fiendish satisfaction as she absorbed the portent of the doctor’s statement. ‘I had a miserable childhood with Aunt Alice and Uncle Julian. The only real happiness I’ve known has been since I’ve met Blade.’
‘Well, excuse me if I don’t shed any tears for you.’ There had been something truly malignant in Sandra’s dark eyes. ‘I hate you, Amy. I’ve always hated you. I shall die hating you.’
She had left then, stunned and broken, still clutching the damning evidence in nerveless hands, and it had been a miracle she had ever reached London safely the way she had been feeling. She couldn’t remember the journey at all.
She had stumbled into the beautiful city garden, her face white and stiff and her whole body shaking, and sat for hours as her tired mind screamed back and forth as she tried to come to terms with what she had read. In a few years she was going to die.
She shook her head blindly. Slowly, very slowly, Sandra had emphasised. Day by day, week by week, month by month, her strength would ebb and her muscles wither as her body gave up the fight to go on. She was going to die. She had ripped the report into tiny tiny pieces but had found each word was imprinted on the pages of her mind.
Blade’s deep voice suddenly cut into her thoughts as he replied to something Mrs Cox had said, and she came back to the present with a little jerk of her body, amazed to find herself in the small room with its old heavy furniture and glowing fire.
Yes. She would do anything, anything, to keep the truth from him even if it meant he would leave this place hating the very sound of her name.
CHAPTER THREE
SHE had half expected Blade to do a repeat of the previous day’s fiasco, but when he didn’t appear the following lunchtime, far from being reassuring, it turned Amy into a veritable bag of nerves. Every jingle of the old doorbell, every muffled male voice, and she shot over to the kitchen door or swung round in the restaurant until by the time she was ready to leave at eleven her head was pounding as though she had been hit by a sledgehammer.
As she stepped out into the quiet village street just after eleven the cool sweet air, redolent of large open spaces and high empty skies, was wonderfully soothing to her overheated metabolism.
She stood for a moment on the narrow stone step and breathed deeply with her eyes shut. As she opened them again two events happened simultaneously. A large dark figure detached itself from the shadows and began walking towards her at the same time as John called her name from his cheerful little Morris Minor parked a few yards down the road. ‘Amy? Over here.’
She felt for a moment as though she were caught up in a play, a macabre twisted play. Blade had frozen in mid-stride, his eyes flashing from her horrified face to the car partially hidden by the darkness, and then he moved like lightning, reaching the car before she could even pull herself together sufficiently to move.
‘The elusive John Davies, I presume?’ His voice had all the warmth of cold steel. ‘Let me introduce myself. I am Blade Forbes, Amy’s husband.’ He wrenched open the driver’s door with such force that Amy wouldn’t have been surprised if it had come off in his hand. ‘I think there is a little matter we need to discuss, Mr Davies, if you would like to step out of the car.’
‘Leave him alone, Blade.’ She had reached his side now, her frightened eyes taking in John’s startled face as he peered upwards at Blade, whose chiselled features were icy with rage and hate.
‘Leave him alone?’ Blade growled softly. ‘Later, much later, my sweet unfaithful little spouse. Now, Mr Davies.’ He swung back to focus directly on John. ‘Are you going to leave this car of your own free will or do I have to drag you out?’
‘I have to say neither option appeals,’ John murmured wryly as he stared up at Blade’s wide powerful six-foot frame, ‘but if you insist, you’ll have to pass those crutches in the back seat.’
‘What?’ For the first time that she could remember Amy saw Blade momentarily nonplussed as he glanced from John’s round, bespectacled pale face to the pair of steel crutches lying in the back of the car.
‘The crutches,’ John repeated patiently. ‘Owing to an unexpected nosedive off a mountain in Spain some months ago I’m afraid those things are essential, so if you wouldn’t mind …?’
‘I don’t believe this.’ Blade flicked his head at Amy furiously. ‘Is this guy for real?’
‘It’s as he said,’ Amy said quietly, as she swallowed back the panic. ‘John was living in Spain, he’s a writer, and he went on a walking expedition into the mountains with some friends. There was an accident—’
‘I don’t want his life story,’ Blade interrupted bitingly. ‘Can he walk?’
‘Yes, I can walk.’ John’s voice was tinged with acerbity, which was unusual for him, Amy reflected agitatedly. She hoped he wasn’t going to pick this moment to step out of character. He was normally so mild-mannered, so easygoing …
‘Then I still want you out of the car.’ As Blade reached down and opened the back door to pass the crutches to John, Amy’s stomach took a crazy dive into her feet. What was he going to do? He wouldn’t attack John now, would he? Not knowing John was injured? She glanced round her frantically but the dark street was quite deserted.
‘Right.’ It had taken John a few seconds to manipulate himself from the interior of the car and she could tell he didn’t like it. His pale face was flushed and pink and his five-foot-eight frame fairly bristling with dislike as he stared straight into Blade’s furious countenance. ‘What’s this all about?’
‘What’s this all …?’ Blade’s voice trailed away as he stared at the smaller man propped up with the crutches under each arm. ‘Oh, you English. What the hell do you think it’s about? A small matter of adultery, or maybe that has slipped your mind.’ His teeth were grinding together in his rage. ‘Or are you going to deny it?’
‘Deny it?’ John’s round pleasant face flushed a deeper shade of red. ‘Do I take it you are accusing me of sleeping with Amy?’
‘Got it in one,’ Blade said viciously. ‘And believe me, if it weren’t for the fact that you are obviously unable to defend yourself—’
‘I can see now why Amy felt it necessary to leave you,’ John said tightly. ‘I’m only amazed it took her all of three months to find out she’d made such a bad mistake. How dare you—?’
‘How dare you?’ Amazingly, as John got angrier and angrier Blade became more calm and composed, his dark satirical features setting into cold ironical lines and his black eyes cynically cool. ‘I rather think in the circumstances that’s my line, don’t you?’ He smiled chillingly. ‘How long have you known my wife?’ The last two words were stressed, very slightly, with biting contempt.
‘Years,’ John answered irritably.
‘Could you be a little more precise?’ Blade eyed the smaller man expressionlessly, his voice dripping ice.
‘We met when Amy was doing A levels,’ John said testily. ‘Some of her college friends had a flat next to mine and in the evenings we all ate together. Amy moved in with them after a time when things became impossible for her at home. We found we had a lot in common,’ he added with spitefulness that was unusual to him. Amy glanced at him in horror and shut her eyes for a split-second as she drew in air between her teeth. What was the matter with him? she asked herself silently. Had he a death wish or something?
‘How cosy.’ Blade’s rapier-sharp gaze switched to Amy and then back to John’s defiant face. ‘And do I presume your relationship blossomed in the normal way?’
‘That would depend on what you consider normal,’ John said tightly. I—’
‘John lived with a girlfriend at that time,’ Amy put in desperately, ‘a very nice girl. We got on really well—’
Blade silenced the flow with one fiery glance before turning to John agai
n. ‘And do I take it the girlfriend has long since been history?’
‘I’ve lived in Spain for the last three years and my private life is nothing to do with you,’ John said angrily as he drew himself up to his full height, his chin thrust out aggressively. ‘Amy is a dear friend of mine and I was honoured that it was me she came to when she left you.’
‘Were you indeed?’ For a moment Amy thought Blade was going to leap on the smaller man, crutches and all.
Why are you saying all this, John? she asked silently. Tell him you tried to persuade me to go back and sort it all out. Tell him you were against me hiding like this, especially when I couldn’t give you a good reason for leaving Blade. Tell him—
‘Yes, I was,’ John continued. ‘And I can understand a little better now why she was so terrified and upset when she came to me. What on earth did you do to her, anyway?’
Amy anticipated Blade’s reaction just in time, flinging herself in front of John as Blade moved forward, his eyes murderous. She should have told John the real reason why she left, she thought frantically as she looked up into Blade’s blazing eyes. But she hadn’t wanted his pity or compassion to weaken her and bring on the bouts of self-pity at a time when she needed to be strong. And so she had just said the marriage wasn’t working and John, being John, hadn’t probed. But it had been a mistake. A bad mistake, she realised now as John spoke just behind her.
‘I can look after myself, Amy; get out of the way.’
‘Blade—please.’ She put both hands on Blade’s chest as the black eyes flicked over both of them. ‘Please …’ She didn’t know quite what she was pleading for but the fear in her eyes spoke volumes to the tall, hard man in front of her.
Blade held her glance for a long piercingly taut minute and then, as the stiff body relaxed slightly, she felt faint with relief. ‘To hell with it, with you both,’ he said quietly, a curious lack of expression in his voice. ‘If he is what you want—’
