Charlotte Lamb - Pagan Encounter

by Charlotte Lamb

That we have a serious problem,' she murmured quietly.

  Philip groaned. 'Oh, God,' he said under his breath.

  He took her face between his hands and stared into her eyes "Leigh, kiss me.' he said huskily.

  She bent forward and kissed him tenderly, sliding her arms around his neck, and he sat still under the kiss, his eyes closed. A husky sound came from his throat. His arms closed round her tightly and he pushed her back against the seat, his mouth hungry, parting her mouth in endless exploration. Leigh yielded, her slender body plastic in his arms, kissing him back, her hands gently stroking his hair.

  When he drew back, his face very flushed, his eyes bright, she smiled at him. 'And does that make up your mind for you, Phil?' There was affectionate teasing in her voice.

  'You know damned well I'm insane about you,' Phil said unevenly. 'What bothers me is you, Leigh ... you're very responsive when we make love, but there's always that restraint. You hold something back. I never feel sure of you.'

  'If you're asking if I love you,' she said gently, 'I do, Phil, very much. I thought you knew that. I'm sorry if you don't find my response satisfactory.'

  He groaned again. 'You have the damnedest way of putting things! Darling, when you're in my arms I get dizzy and the blood rushes to my head. What do you feel?'

  She frowned, a look of faint unease crossing her calm face. 'I enjoy it too, Phil. What do you want me to say?'

  'God knows,' he said bitterly. 'That you feel the same way about me, I suppose.'

  'We're two different people,' she pointed out. 'Just because I don't swoon when you kiss me it doesn't mean I don't love you. I enjoy being with you, I enjoy it when you make love to me. I'm looking forward to our wedding day. Don't ask me to be something I'm not. I thought you fell in love with me, not with someone else. Are you asking me to be different now?'

  Philip slid back to his own side of the car and started the engine. His face was sombre as he drove away from the kerb, and Leigh sighed.

  'If you would prefer to postpone our marriage,' she said lightly, 'that's up to you.'

  'No,' he said.

  'Are you certain, Phil?' She watched the dark structure of his face as street lamps shed their light over it.

  'I'm going to marry you and take my chances,' he said.

  Leigh smiled. 'Don't sound so resigned! If the prospect makes you gloomy we can go on as we are for a while. There'd be no harm done. I'm not in a tearing hurry to get married.'

  'I'm well aware of that,' he said flatly. 'The trouble is, Leigh, I am. I want you so badly I'm going out of my mind, but if you don't feel the same way life will be hell for me.'

  A curious little smile lit her blue eyes. She laid her hand on his knee and he started, looking down at her long fingers.

  'I want you, Phil,' she said softly.

  His eyes swivelled to her face. 'Enough to come to London with me this weekend?'

  She looked at him, her eyes narrowing. 'What?'

  He grinned. 'Oh, don't look so damned offended. I only meant I'd like to have you along.

  I'm not suggesting we anticipate the wedding, darling, much as I'd like to do just that.'

  She considered the idea. 'This is the Euro Conference, is it?'

  He nodded. 'Most of it will be pretty dull stuff, but there's a dance on the Saturday night, and unless you want me to spend it with the redheaded girl from Accounts you might like to come along for that.'

  Leigh's eyes danced. 'Red-headed girl from Accounts? '

  'Is that the one who glares at me every time I visit your office?'

  Philip grinned. 'At the risk of sounding like Mattieson Hume, I've taken her out to dinner a couple of times, and she gives me the green light every time she sets eyes on me.'

  Leigh thought of the girl with amusement. 'She's no vulnerable kid like Ann,' she commented.

  'Tough as cow hide,' Philip agreed. 'She's going to the conference with Jefferson, the head of Accounts. His wife is in the States for three months, visiting their son.'

  Leigh's mouth tightened. 'Poor woman.' She gave him a cool look. 'If she's going with Jefferson she won't have time to flirt with you, then.'

  'Jefferson's married, I'm not,' Philip said teasingly. 'I'm a better prospect. But if you don't care to defend your property, Leigh ...'

  He pulled up outside her home and she turned to look at him, her eyes narrowed.

  'Why have you taken her out to dinner, Phil?'

  'Ha, jealousy at last,' he said, slightly breathless, but smiling. 'Purely business, actually. Clients who liked female company.'

  She raised a cool eyebrow. 'Oh?'

  Philip began to smile. 'Darling,' he said, reaching for her. 'Oh, darling!'

  She surrendered, her mouth coolly receptive under his, and his arms tightened around her possessively. He stroked her blonde hair back from her face, looking into her blue eyes.

  'Will you come?'

  'If you want me to,' she agreed.

  'I booked two rooms six-months ago.' he said. 'I would have taken my secretary if you'd refused, but at that time it did cross my mind we might even be married by now.'

  She was surprised. 'We'd only just met.'

  His brown eyes rested on her cool face. 'I know,' he said thickly.

  Leigh was touched. 'You're so impulsive, Phil. You're like Ann, you jump into situations without thinking.'

  'And you think too damned long before jumping,' he said drily. 'Especially into bed.'

  She laughed. 'I prefer to be wise before the event rather than after.' She gave him an odd little glance. 'II marriage had entered your mind six months ago why did you wait four months before proposing?'

  'Because it hadn't entered yours,' he said in that dry tone.

  She considered his answer thoughtfully. It was true. She had liked Phil on sight, but she had not taken him very seriously for some time. By the time he had proposed she had begun to realise she was growing very fond of him, but she had asked for time to think before she answered. A week later she had accepted. As she had told him, she enjoyed his company and liked it when he made love to her. Her character made it unlikely she would ever meet a man more suitable as a husband, and, during the weeks of their engagement she had grown to care for him dearly.

  A kind, warm, impulsive man of thirty, Philip worked for a large Leicester electronics firm. His good looks were subdued. His nature was reflected in his eyes and mouth, He smiled a great deal and laughed often. She found him fun, and respected him.

  "How did you know I hadn't thought of marrying you?' she asked, without disputing his assertion.

  He grimaced. 'My darling, it was obvious.'

  'Am I very obvious to you, Phil?'

  'On the contrary,' he said. 'I often wish I understood you better. But one thing I was sure of ... I was mad to get you into bed, and you were still holding me at arm's length.'

  She gave him a cool smile. 'And now?'

  His face darkened. 'I wish I could say the situation had changed, but I suspect not.'

  'And you still want to marry me?'

  'For my sanity's sake I've got to,' he said, half laughing at his own passion.

  'Oh, well, if your sanity is at stake,' she said lightly. 'I would hate to see you go out of your mind, Phil.'

  He looked at her with a wry smile. 'There's a time when the laughter has to stop, Leigh. I passed that long ago with you, but you still play lighthearted games with me.'

  'I thought we both agreed marriage should be fun,' she commented with a lift of an eyebrow.

  'Fun!' he groaned. 'Darling, I'm at the end of my tether, and you still haven't got a clue, have you?'

  Leigh's pink mouth curved in amusement. 'Oh, I think I've got a very good idea what's wrong with you,' she said, looking at him through her lashes. 'I'd say an earlier marriage would be my diagnosis rather than a later one.'

  Phil stiffened. He watched her intently. 'Why?' he asked huskily.

  She leant forward and kissed him, her cool hands framing his face. 'Y
ou ask the silliest questions, Phil,' she said, and got out of the car.

  CHAPTER TWO

  LEIGH worked as a secretary in a large firm of solicitors whose offices were in the centre of Leicester. She enjoyed her job, which was demanding, and had risen rapidly there to become secretary to the head of the practice. On the Friday following, he eyed her leather suitcase curiously as he paused to leave the office at the end of the day.

  'Going away, Leigh?'

  She looked round, covering her typewriter swiftly. 'Yes,' she said. 'To London.'

  'Alone?'

  Something in his tone made a faint flush come into her cheeks. 'With Philip,' she said, almost defiantly.

  'I see,' he murmured. 'Enjoy yourself!' With a slight smile he walked out, and she made a face at the door, knowing perfectly well what he was thinking, and finding it irritating.

  When Philip opened the car door for her he glanced at her face with a frown. 'Something wrong?'

  'Just my boss making cracks,' she said shortly.

  Philip's mouth twitched. 'About the weekend? What did your parents say?'

  She looked at him coldly. 'Just what he said ... enjoy yourself.'

  Philip laughed, his brown eyes dancing.

  She leaned back in her seat as they headed south, her face shadowed. Ever since the day of the family wedding she had been in a peculiar frame of mind. The placid routine of her life had seemed perfectly satisfactory to her until she listened to Ann's heartbreaking confidences and then was brought sharply face to face with Phil's dissatisfaction with their relationship. She had been aware from the beginning that Phil was more desperately in love with her than she was capable of being with him, but her affection for him had seemed enough until that night. Now she felt she was faced with a problem she was not sure how to solve.

  They arrived at the hotel just before nine. Dinner was almost over, and the head waiter had a sour look on his face as he showed them to a table. She sat down, her blonde head high, a cool expression on her face as she accepted a menu. Phil glanced at her across the table, his brown eyes alert to her mood.

  'You've been looking grim ever since we left Leicester. We're here to enjoy ourselves, remember.' His glance pleaded with her. 'Are you still cross about your boss making cracks? He was only being funny.'

  She lifted her white lids, her face carved in cold hauteur. 'I prefer to forget it.' she said.

  Phil sat back as if she had slapped him. They ordered their meal and leaned back in silence. Her cool blue glance wandered around the lamplit room. It halted briefly, meeting the stare of narrowed grey eyes behind a wreath of blue cigar smoke, then, with a scornful flick of long lashes, moved on.

  Phil leaned forward suddenly, capturing her hand. She looked at him, meeting his smile. 'Darling, something extraordinary happened today. I was going to tell you on our way here, but you were in such an offhand mood that I thought it could wait until later.'

  The waiter appeared at their side and Phil released her hand to lean back. They began to eat their first course.

  She looked at Phil curiously. 'Well? What was this interesting event you want to tell me about?'

  'I was asked to go out to Saudi Arabia for six months,' Phil grinned. 'The firm are supplying electrical equipment to some company out there and they need a man on the spot to watch it all being installed. They asked me.'

  'Why you?' she asked, pausing with a frown.

  'I'm the computer expert,' he pointed out.

  She continued with her food. 'What did you say?' she asked him quietly.

  He reached across to seize her hand again, lifting it to his mouth, his lips tender against her skin. 'I told them to take a running jump,' he said. 'I couldn't ask you to postpone our wedding until I got back.' His eyes darkened on her cool face. 'And I was afraid that while my back was turned someone else might come along and steal you away from me.'

  'Can I have my hand back?' she asked plaintively. 'I need it to eat my dinner.'

  He grimaced, releasing her. 'Aren't you flattered that I should turn down a chance to see a fascinating country just because of you?'

  I think it would be an excellent idea,' she said, continuing to eat.

  Phil tensed, staring at her. 'Why?'

  "You said the other night that you wanted to be sure of ne before we married,' she pointed out. 'This is your chance. If when you come back you haven't changed your mind, we'll get married.'

  The waiter appeared before Phil could answer and whipped their plates away. Phil sat seething while he served the second course, his dark figure moving around them, while Leigh gazed calmly at the other guests. She caught sight of the redheaded girl from Accounts, eating with bald, flushed Jefferson, on the other side of the room, and a smile of distaste crossed her calm face as she glanced away. Her blue eyes trailed indifferently over the tables and for the second time came in contact with grey eyes. This time her glance was held. She sensed the man deliberately willing her to look back at him, and, her face unconsciously cold, she did so, inspecting him at her leisure, her oval features without expression.

  He was a good three inches taller than Philip, his thick black hair threaded with silver at the sides, his face bearing the hallmark of power, a coldly cruel intelligence in the steely grey eyes. Beneath his dinner jacket his shoulders were wide and powerful, but his body was leanly fit as he lounged at his ease, eyeing her in his turn as curiously as she did him. Indifferently her mind played with the problem of his age. Late thirties, she decided. Under his dark brows his eyes narrowed in open speculation, and she gave him a last icy look before turning back to Philip.

  'Your little redheaded girl friend from Accounts is here,' she murmured.

  Phil turned, his eye sliding over the room.

  'In the corner,' she said.

  Phil lifted a hand in a wave and Leigh, turning her head to see the enthusiastic beam he got in return, smiled slightly herself, her face wry. There was no question but that Philip had made a conquest there, she thought. He turned back, his glance diving into her eyes to seek her reaction, and the eager appraisal brought a tolerant, humorous smile to her mouth. He looked like a little boy who had brought his mother something to admire.

  'You should have come alone,' she said in mockery. 'Think how ecstatic she would be now.'

  Phil's mouth turned down at the corners. He looked down at his plate with distaste.

  'I'm not very hungry,' he said.

  'Don't be silly, Phil. Eat it.' She was in a difficult mood tonight--she knew that.

  Somehow she had been feeling edgy ever since Phil had asked her if she was as madly in love as he was--she had resented the question, although she had parried it. The only time she had ever lost control of her emotions she had found herself in a wild, emotional muddle which could have proved disastrous. She had made up her mind then never to do so again, and she knew she had not altered her mind. She had never pretended to Phil to be as passionately in love as he was --he had admitted as much. She offered him herself as she was, not as he might like her to be, and she looked at him with unconscious irritation as she remembered his remarks.

  'About Saudi Arabia,' she murmured.

  'Yes?' He looked apprehensively at her.

  'Don't you think it might be the best thing for both of us if you went? You said the other night that you weren't certain about me, and it seems lunacy to marry feeling like that.' Her eyes were serious. 'Phil, I can't be a different person. If you fell in love with me as I am, how can you ask me to be different now? I haven't changed an inch. If anyone has, you have.'

  He looked miserably at her. 'I don't want you to change, Leigh. I just want ...' His voice broke off on a sigh.

  'What do you want?' she asked.

  'You,' he murmured passionately, leaning towards her, his hand searching for hers, his fingers trembling as they covered hers on the tablecloth. 'You as you ought to be, a woman so much in love she can lose her head.'

  The words sent a shiver down her spine. She withdrew her
hand, frowning. He stared at her face, watching her expressions, their irritation visible in her blue eyes.

  "As I said, you want me to be something other than myself,' she said flatly.

  He sighed deeply. 'Maybe I ought to go to Saudi Arabia. Maybe absence will make a difference.'

  The waiter brought their coffee and they drank it in silence, avoiding each other's eyes. Leigh rose after a few moments and looked at him calmly.

  'I want to go to my room to unpack. Shall we meet in the bar in half an hour? You could ask Jefferson and your redheaded friend to meet us.'

  He nodded. 'Just as you like.'

  The sombre expression on his face touched her. She bent and kissed him deliberately on the mouth, her soft lips brushing his, and whispered, 'You could always make me jealous by flirting with her, Phil.'

  His eyes began to smile as she withdrew and she smiled back. She walked out of the dining-room, unconscious of the glances which followed the slender sway of her body, the smooth blonde hair and cold face. Crossing the foyer, she went towards the lifts and pressed the button of one.

  Footsteps behind her made her half turn her head. Out of the corner of one eye she recognised the man from the dining-room. He was standing just behind her, one hand pushing back a thick wave of silver-streaked black hair from his hard face.

  The lift arrived and she walked into it. He followed. Glancing at her, he asked with a lift of his dark brows. 'Which floor?'

  'Third,' she said crisply.

  He pressed the button and the lift doors closed. She stood with a cool face ignoring him. He leaned back against the lift wall, his eyes travelling up and down her body in an insolent appraisal which annoyed her.

  The lift stopped and she walked out of it, evading the man's grey eyes. She was surprised when he followed her. Her room lay at the far end of the long corridor and she could feel his stare during every inch of the way. Jerking open her handbag, she found her key and opened the door. Before entering her room she turned her head, bristling, and found him at her elbow. Shock made her start.

  His eyes continued to sweep over her lazily, and hot colour began to rise in her face.

  Slowly he held out a small pearl ear stud. 'You dropped this,' he said, and his tone mocked her.