Shadow Marriage

by Penny Jordan

  * * *

  Some time later she woke and was handed a glass, a smiling but firm uniformed nurse urging her to drink. The fear that her mind had actually gone and she was indeed in some institution began to haunt her, although she was dimly aware that the room she was in was one she recognised and the nurse had been concerned rather than constraining.

  The next time she opened her eyes, the sun was shining. Her body felt strangely weightless beneath the bedclothes and when she turned her head there was a stranger standing beside the bed smiling at her encouragingly.

  ‘Ah, so you’re back with us. You’re to be congratulated, my dear, on your recuperative powers.’

  ‘Where…?’ Where am I? she had been about to croak, but she knew where she was, recognising her surroundings. She was in Ben’s room, in Ben’s bed, although she didn’t remember it filled with these exotic flowers.

  ‘You’ve had a nasty shock to the system,’ her dark-suited companion told her, ‘but it’s all over now.’ He was studying her so calmly and professionally that Sarah knew intuitively what he was. ‘You’re—you’re a doctor?’ She moistened her dry lips. ‘Did… did Ben…’

  ‘Yes, to both questions,’ he agreed, smiling: ‘You’ve given us all a very bad scare, young lady,’ he told her mock-severely, ‘especially your husband. I did think at one time you would have to be removed to hospital, but Ben was most adamant. He didn’t want you waking up to find yourself in strange surroundings.’

  A dim memory of endless nightmares when she had pleaded not to be committed to a mental hospital, crying that she was not insane, pleated a frown across her forehead, as she wondered how Ben could have known of those night terrors.

  ‘What—what exactly happened to me?’ she asked huskily, trying to banish her strange languor. ‘I remember falling in the pool.’ She remembered more than that, but she didn’t want to think about it, much less talk about it.

  ‘As you say, you fell in the pool; a not entirely unusual occurrence and certainly not one which would normally provoke the type of blackout you later suffered, but the shock coupled with the strain your husband tells me you’ve been under made your reaction far more severe than was expected. You’re quite recovered,’ he assured her with a kind smile. ‘My dear, you must accept that sometimes we humans drive our minds and bodies further than they are prepared to go, and when that happens they’re apt to make their objections known. Yours merely chose a particularly forceful way of doing so. You’ll still feel weak for quite some time,’ he told her, straightening up from the bed. ‘I’ve told your husband that you mustn’t even think of working for at least six months, if indeed you ever return to acting.’ He paused and looked sombre. ‘My dear, I am only telling you what you must in your heart of hearts already know. Your temperament is not such that it can absorb the intense emotions you demand of it without some degree of pain. I should think very carefully about the future…’

  In other words she might as well make up her mind that she would never be able to return to acting, Sarah thought bitterly when she was alone. She didn’t need the doctor’s carefully guarded conversation to tell her how close she had come to some sort of breakdown, not entirely brought on by the agony of her love scene; not if she was honest with herself. The strain of keeping her feelings from Ben had exacerbated the situation. She sighed, tensing as the door opened to admit the subject of her thoughts, his face unexpectedly grim. He seemed to have lost weight, his tan less golden than it had been, weariness lying at the back of the green glance that searched her, and then she realised, biting hard on her lip. No more acting for six months, the doctor had told her, which meant Ben would not be able to change the end of the film.

  ‘Doctor Lazelles tells me you’re much recovered.’ ‘Yes.’ How awkward and stilted she sounded! ‘I’m sorry to have been such a nuisance. But now… Ben, we have to talk…’ She bowed her head, not knowing how much Doctor Lazelles had said to him.

  ‘Later.’ Why was his voice so harsh, the planes of his face sharply drawn and the skin stretched tight? ‘This evening,’ he amended huskily. ‘After dinner.’

  ‘I can get up?’

  Her eagerness brought a brief smile to the corners of his mouth, but his negative headshake was firm. ‘I’m afraid not, though…’ he was watching her carefully, ‘… though I could have dinner in here with you, I’m sure Doctor Lazelles wouldn’t object to that, if that’s what you want?’

  Sarah’s heart started to beat heavily, her mind trying hazily to grasp why the thought of their having dinner together in this room should be so much more intimate than sharing their meal in the dining room.

  ‘Yes, yes, that would be… nice,’ she managed shakily, wondering wryly at her inadequate choice of words and then shrinking back against her pillows as Ben approached the bed.

  ‘Sarah?’ His voice questioned her withdrawal, his eyes darkening as they surveyed her flushed face and downcast lashes. ‘I wasn’t going to touch you,’ he said grimly at last. ‘I only wanted to ask if there was anything I could get you.’

  He was gone before she was forced to contradict him and tell him that her withdrawal had been from herself and her own needs rather than any fear of him.

  She slept, and woke to find Margarita in the room, pulling two chairs up to a small table she had set by the window. ‘You’re awake.’ She smiled warmly at Sarah. ‘And getting better. Now perhaps Ben will not spend all night working in his study, and sleeping there instead of here, in his room. He has been like a man demented. All these flowers…’ She smiled again and shrugged. ‘But then that is a man in love for you. Would you like any help?’ Sarah shook her head, only realising when Margarita had gone that she did want a bath and that it might have been sensible to have Margarita on hand in view of the fact that she hadn’t been out of bed for nearly a week. The truth of this suspicion was proved when she swung her feet to the floor and tried to take her first step, the floor coming up towards her at an alarming rate, although she didn’t pass out, and she was just making another attempt when the door on to the balcony opened smoothly and Ben walked in, his mouth compressing when he saw what she was trying to do.

  ‘I wanted a bath, and I never thought until Margarita had gone,’ Sarah protested, reading the disapproval of his unspoken thoughts.

  ‘I’ll help you.’

  Why did he insist on holding her like this when he must be able to guess what it did to her? Sarah wondered weakly as molten fire spread through her veins, her hands automatically clutching at Ben’s shoulders as he bent to take her weight. Inside the bathroom he sat her on a chair as carefully as though she were made of brittle glass, quickly running her bath even though she protested that she could manage.

  ‘I’ll wait outside, but don’t lock the door,’ he warned her as he stood up, ‘and if you feel the slightest bit faint, just holler.’

  The caress of the water against her skin felt like smooth silk. Her illness had drained her of energy and Sarah found it took twice as long to do everything as it had done. Consequently she had barely finished washing when the bathroom door burst open and Ben strode in, his face tight with anxiety, his body stilling as he turned and saw her just about to step out of the bath.

  For one heart-wrenching moment Sarah could only stare at him, hot colour suddenly running up under her skin as she remembered her nudity, her breath caught in a gasp as Ben lifted her bodily out of the water, uncaring of her protests that she would soak his clothes, holding her pinned against him with one hand while the other reached for a towel that reached from her neck to her ankles as he strode into the bedroom with her.

  While she had been in the bathroom dusk had fallen, an electric dinner waggon mute evidence that Margarita had been in with their meal. The rough movement of Ben’s hands over her back, rubbing it dry, was unbearably erotic, her breasts rasped by the crisp body hair darkening his chest where his shirt had come undone. When he sat down, pulling her on to his knees, Sarah’s skin flushed to think of his eyes resting on t
he aroused peaks of her breasts, but he barely glanced at her body as he secured the towel firmly round her, oblivious to his own damp shirt clinging slickly to his skin where her body had pressed against it.

  ‘Ben, there’s something I have to tell you.’ She felt him tense as she spoke, his eyes as green and wary as a big cat’s.

  ‘When Doctor Lazelles was here he said… He said I mustn’t think of returning to filming for at least six months.’ She couldn’t look at him, knowing what her admission would mean.

  ‘And you’re worried about your career? You needn’t be,’ he said lightly. ‘With my fifty per cent interest in the studio I’m sure I can get my wife some work…’

  Sarah shook her head. ‘No, you don’t understand. I’m not sure if I’ll ever act again, so I’m not concerned about future roles, but Richard, Ben, my… my love scene…’ Her voice trembled and threatened to desert her. She couldn’t bring herself to look at him and hoped he wouldn’t see how much she was trembling.

  ‘I told you not to worry about that, Sarah. It won’t ever be shown, I promise you, and if I can’t destroy it—well, you’ll have to put that down to…’

  ‘But you’ll have to show it! Don’t you see? If I can’t work for six months you’ll either have to re-film completely using someone else, or use that scene. You can’t delay completion…’

  ‘Who says I can’t?’ Ben drawled arrogantly, adding huskily, ‘Sarah, if I thought it would atone for the pain I’ve caused you I’d cheerfully consign the whole damn film to the flames. Have you any conception what it did to me standing by that bed listening to you begging me to rescue you from a mental hospital? Dear God, and you thought you were going off your head! It’s nothing to what I felt. And anyway, I wouldn’t use that scene. I couldn’t. When I saw the rushes and saw the look on your face when I made love to you, I knew there was no way I was going to share that with anyone else in the world, and I was only amazed that I hadn’t seen it for myself at the time. My only excuse is that I was raw inside with hurting and jealousy. Wanting you… loving you… hating Dale, as I’d always hated him for taking you from me. You’ll never know how many times in these last years I’ve nearly been on that plane to come and get you, only to tell myself that it wasn’t fair to you; that you didn’t love me, and that the only reason you’d married me was that I’d bullied you into it, and because I’d taken your virginity. Dale lied to you, Sarah,’ he said slowly, ‘there never was any bet. It’s true that I meant to have you right from the first, but as my wife… nothing else. Can you try and believe that?’

  ‘You love me?’ Sarah could hardly believe it. Beneath the protective towel she shivered convulsively, her eyes darkening in awed amazement.

  ‘If you don’t believe me I’ll show you the film. It does more than merely show your feelings, Sarah. If a man’s body can tell a woman that he aches and yearns for her, mine did.’

  ‘But you were always so angry… so…’

  ‘With myself for still loving you, for not being able to stop loving you. God, I damn nearly wanted to kill Paul simply for kissing you, and that was in the script!’

  Sarah laughed huskily, remembering Eva’s comment that he was jealous. Then she hadn’t believed her, but now…

  ‘After Richard I’m not doing any more directing,’ Ben told her. ‘I want to concentrate on writing, but we won’t be paupers, I’ve still got my interest in the studio, or am I going ahead too fast? Will you stay with me, Sarah, live with me; love me; bear my children? You know, Dale made one big mistake,’ he told her quietly. ‘He thought because I’d made you do that scene that I no longer loved you, and so he told me everything. What he didn’t realise was that I was punishing myself, forcing myself to endure watching you in someone else’s arms, telling myself it was either kill or cure.’

  ‘And then you had to take Paul’s place.’

  ‘And I saw in your face how much you dreaded the thought of me doing so and saw red…’

  ‘Because I knew I wouldn’t be able to resist you,’ Sarah said dreamily.

  ‘And does that still hold good now?’ The teasing quality had gone from Ben’s voice, his face strained and vulnerable. Sarah let her fingertips explore the newly sharpened angles, realising with a pang that they were there on her account.

  ‘For God’s sake, Sarah,’ he muttered thickly, grasping her wrist and turning his mouth into her palm. ‘Don’t toy with me, even though I know I deserve it. You haven’t answered my question. Do you still love me?’

  ‘So much,’ Sarah admitted shakily. ‘So very, very much!’

  The pressure of his lips was no longer that of a supplicant, but Sarah didn’t object, not even when his hands pushed aside her towel to study the pale curves of her body, her movements deliberately teasing as she stretched provocatively beneath his glance, yawning against her hand, claiming that she felt tired.

  ‘You’re no actress, my lady,’ Ben muttered thickly against her ear, ‘and as your director I ought to beat you for that hopeless performance—as it is I think I shall merely have to punish you by accepting the invitation this…’ and he ran his hands slowly over her body, ‘… has just proffered. Unless of course you’ve any objections?’

  ‘None, unless it be your tardiness, my lord,’ Sarah drawled languidly, matching his mood, watching the little flames of green burn within his eyes, boneless and sensual as a small cat as her skin luxuriated in his touch, her ears filled by the sound of his murmured love words, feeling her body quicken in sexual excitement, Margarita’s dinner forgotten as the shadows of dusk gave way to darkness and she finally rested in the sanctuary of her husband’s arms.

  * * * * *

  If you enjoyed this story by

  NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author

  PENNY JORDAN,

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  Raul Di Savo desires more than Lydia Hayward’s body—his seduction will stop his rival buying her! Raul’s expert touch awakens Lydia to irresistible pleasure, but his game of revenge forces Lydia to leave…until an unexpected consequence binds them forever!

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  Read on to get a glimpse of

  THE INNOCENT’S SECRET BABY

  CHAPTER ONE

  ROME AGAIN… ROME again…

  The City of Love.

  Wrapped in a towel, and damp from the shower, Lydia Hayward lay on the bed in her hotel suite and considered the irony.

  Yes, she might be in Rome, and meeting tonight with a very eligible man, but it had nothing to do with love.

  There were more practical matters that needed to be addressed.

  Oh, it hadn’t been said outright, of course.

  Her mother hadn’t sat her down one evening and explained that, without the vast and practically bottomless pit of money that this man could provide, they would lose everything. Everything being the castle they lived in, which was the family business too.

  And Valerie had never said that Lydia had to sleep with the man she and her stepfather were meeting tonight.

  Of course she hadn’t.

  Valerie had, however, enquired whether Lydia was on the Pi
ll.

  ‘You don’t want to ruin your holiday.’

  Since when had her mother taken an interest in such things? Lydia had been to Italy once before, on a school trip at the age of seventeen, and her mother hadn’t been concerned enough to ask then.

  Anyway, why would she be on the Pill?

  Lydia had been told to ‘save’ herself.

  And she had.

  Though not because of her mother’s instruction—more because she did not know how to let her guard down.

  People thought her aloof and cold.

  Better they think that than she reveal her heart.

  And so, by default, she had saved herself.

  Lydia had secretly hoped for love.

  It would seem not in this lifetime.

  Tonight she would be left alone with him.

  The towel fell away and, though she was alone, Lydia pulled it back and covered herself.

  She was on the edge of a panic attack, and she hadn’t had one since…

  Rome.

  Or was it Venice?

  Venice.

  Both.

  That awful school trip.

  She had said yes to this trip to Rome, hoping to lay a ghost to rest. Lydia wanted to see Rome through adult eyes, yet she was as scared of the world now as she had been as a teenager.

  Pull yourself together, Lydia.

  And so she did.

  Lydia got up from the bed and got dressed.

  She was meeting Maurice, her stepfather, at eight for breakfast. Rather than be late she just quickly combed her long blonde hair, which had dried a little wild. She had bought a taupe linen dress to wear, which had buttons from neck to hem—though perhaps not the best choice for her shaking hands.

  They are not expecting you to sleep with him!

  Lydia told herself she was being utterly ridiculous even to entertain such a thought. She would stop by for a drink with this man tonight, with her stepfather, thank him for his hospitality, and then explain that she was going out with friends. Arabella lived here now, and had said they should catch up when Lydia got here.