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It had been quite easy to discover an evening when Dominic would be at home alone. Every fortnight her own parents and his met up to play bridge, and she only had to wait until the venue for this fortnightly get-together was her own home.
‘Wear something sexy,’ had been Helen’s first instruction. Easy enough to say, but there was nothing in her wardrobe that remotely deserved such a description.
In the end, feeling more uncomfortable and embarrassed than sexy, she had taken off her bra, and unfastened her cotton shirt to show the taut upper swell of her breasts, before tugging it into her habitual jeans.
A cardigan hid the evidence of her bra-less state from her parents as she said her goodbyes, guilt and desire mingling in almost equal quantities as she got on her bike and sped down the drive.
It had been a hot summer, and the French windows of the Savages’ house stood open as she cycled down the drive and round to the back door.
Since their parents were close friends, it was not unusual for her to visit the house, but as she got off her bike she was filled with an awareness that she was trespassing, not just against the Savages’ friendship but also against her parents’ trust.
She would have turned back then if it hadn’t been for the fact that she would have to face Helen in the morning, and so, quelling her feelings, she went round to the French windows and knocked briefly before walking in.
The sitting-room was empty; her heart thudding, she walked through into the hall, and then stood there transfixed as she saw Dominic coming towards her down the stairs, pulling on a white shirt.
His hair was damp, his skin tanned and firm against the powerful male muscles. Something seemed to expand and flower inside her, a deep pulsating excitement that brought a delicate flush of colour to her skin and deepened her eyes to dark jade.
‘Christy, is everything all right?’
The sharpness in his voice brought her back to reality. ‘Yes.’
‘Then what are you doing here?’ He was frowning at her as he buttoned his shirt, and because he had never before spoken to her in anything other than a teasingly indulgent voice, Christy could only stare at him. ‘I asked you what you came here for.’
He was at the bottom of the stairs now, frowning at her, and even though she was tall she had to tilt back her head to look at him. She had taken off her cardigan as she stepped back from him, the dying rays of the evening sun falling across the thin cotton of her blouse, revealing the uncovered peaks of her breasts.
She heard Dominic catch his breath on what sounded like an impatient sigh, and said hurriedly, ‘I…I came to see you…’
‘Me?’ He was frowning even more now. ‘What about?’
Panic flared inside her. This wasn’t going the way it should. By now he shouldn’t be questioning her; he should be looking at her…wanting her. It wasn’t going to be as easy as Helen had said. Confusion flooded through her, and she turned puzzled, worried eyes up to him, betraying more than she knew.
‘I…I just wanted to talk to you,’ she said lamely, flushing a brilliant shade of red as he suddenly said harshly, ‘Christy, what’s this all about? You aren’t in some…some kind of trouble, are you?’
Her eyes widened, and went brilliant with shock as she absorbed his meaning. There was only one kind of trouble he could mean, and she jerked back from him indignantly.
‘No…no, of course not! How could you think anything like that…?’ She was shocked and hurt that he could think that she would give herself to anyone other than him, barely taking in his curt, ‘All too easily, especially when you parade yourself around dressed like that.’ A flick of his hand indicated that he was aware of her near-nudity, and she flushed again. This wasn’t the way he was supposed to react. Helen had said…
She bit her lip and moved closer to him, her voice shaking as she implored huskily, ‘Dominic, please don’t be angry with me…’ Tears weren’t very far away; she could feel them clogging up the back of her throat.
She heard him sigh, and then rapturously felt his arms go round her; she was being cradled against him, her head resting on his shoulder, the bare heat of his chest against her thinly covered breasts.
She quivered with nerves and excitement, aching to reach out and touch him, but scarcely able to even draw breath, never mind do anything else.
Helen was right, and it had worked! Her legs shook and threatened to give way beneath her. Her heart seemed to have lodged somewhere in her throat and was threatening to suffocate her. Could Dominic feel it beating? She could feel the steady, even thud of his. Instinctively she moved her hand to touch the place where she could feel that strong beat.
Her fingertips trembled against his skin and then, shockingly, almost frighteningly, her wrist was seized in an iron grip and she was forcefully pushed away from him.
Angry grey eyes glared down into the bemused jade of hers. ‘Just what the hell do you think you’re doing?’
The shock of his sudden withdrawal was too much for her to cope with. She was still lost in the rapturous dream of her own intense desire and love, and without comprehending his anger she burst out eagerly, ‘Dominic, make love to me. Please…I know you want to.’
For a moment it was as though they were frozen in time: she gazing pleadingly up at him, her mouth soft and trembling, her body, supple and eager for his touch; he, tense and angry, the grey eyes darkened almost to black, his mouth drawn in a tight hard line, his body tense as though he was too furious even to draw breath.
And then the spell was broken, and the reality of his anger crashed through her physical arousal as he breathed harshly, ‘My God, I don’t believe I’m hearing this. Is this why you came here dressed like…like…like a modern-day Lolita? To ask me to make love to you? And you’re so damned blatant about it, as well!’
He saw the shock and pain on her face, and although she wasn’t aware of it, his voice softened slightly. ‘Christy, I can’t make love to you…you know that.’
‘Because you don’t want me?’ She made herself face him, and saw his face grow cold and shuttered.
‘Among other things,’ he agreed evenly, adding, ‘it is customary for the woman to wait to be asked, you know. Who put you up to this? Come on, Christy, no lies. I know you; you’d never have thought of doing this for yourself.’
She had been too distraught and humiliated to keep back the truth, and he had kept on and on at her until she had told him everything. She had had to sit there answering his questions and seeing the look of contemptuous disgust darken his eyes, until he had moved away from her as though even to look at her had contaminated him.
‘Well, now it’s my turn to tell you something,’ he had said at last, when she was finished. ‘Contrary to what your friend informed you, it isn’t that easy to make a man desire you.’
She had flushed with shame and pain then, but he hadn’t let her look away, holding her chin with hard, hurting fingers as he said cruelly, ‘Look at me, Christy. Go on…take a good look…your friend has told you what to look for. Do I look as though I want you physically?’
She had wanted to get up and run away then, but shock and pain had held her rigidly where she stood, shivering like a rabbit before a hawk, totally unable to do anything other than stare blindly back into his savagely dark eyes.
When she couldn’t turn her eyes in the direction of his body, he taunted with soft menace, ‘If you won’t look at me, perhaps you’d like to touch me instead. Just so that you know I’m not lying to you…’
She had shuddered deeply then, knowing that he had just destroyed her childish illusions, exposing her as what she was, and how she had hated the image of herself that he had held up to her gaze! She had turned away from him then, struggling to subdue the sob of terror and anguish that rose up in her throat.
He hadn’t let her go, though; there had been more for her to endure. A lecture about the physical dangers she was courting: about the health risk of promiscuity, about the danger of rape and worse, and a reminder of h
ow much her parents loved and trusted her and how shocked they would be if they knew what she had done. Worse still, he hadn’t let her ride home on her bike, but had sent her upstairs to the bathroom to wash her face and brush her hair, and once she had done that he had waited until she had buttoned herself into her concealing cardigan and then had driven her home.
There was only eight years between them, but he had been as stern and forbidding as any Victorian parent, and when he had let her out of the car at the end of her parents’ drive she had known that she would hate and loathe him for the rest of her life.
But not as much as she would hate herself, she reflected bitterly as she emerged from the past and came back to the present.
She had avoided Helen after that and had asked her parents if, instead of going back to school, she could attend college instead. They had agreed and found her comfortable digs in Newcastle, where in addition to her secretarial skills she had learned how to begin living with herself again.
It was as though those hectic weeks when Helen had been her friend had been some sort of sickness from which she had emerged with a revulsion for all that she had been and done. The very thought of meeting Dominic in those early days had been enough to make her feel physically ill, and if her parents thought it was curious that she never mentioned him, they kept it to themselves.
She sighed faintly. The snow was coming down more heavily now. It was time for her to return home. She glanced at her watch. Ten past three. Good, by the time she got back Dominic should have left. She knew she couldn’t spend her entire life avoiding him, but discovering that he was back had been such a shock. She hadn’t been ready for it. Now, having endured the catharsis of making herself relive the past, she should be stronger, more able to judge her teenage actions with tolerance and compassion. But she couldn’t. That was the problem: she couldn’t get over the feelings of shame and self-disgust that Dominic had given her; they still haunted and tainted her life like a disease that, although dormant, still possessed the power to return.
