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‘I’m sorry about last night, infant,’ he had said softly. ‘I forget sometimes that you’re not a little girl any more.’
She had burst into tears again, but this time there had been nowhere to run and she had sobbed out her misery and confusion against the hard warmth of his shoulder, even in her anguish conscious of the pleasure of his body close to her own and his arms wrapped round her.
He had kissed her briefly on the forehead as he released her, offering his handkerchief so that she could dry her eyes. That had been the day she knew she had fallen in love with him.
‘Come back, Christy…’
Her mother’s teasing voice jolted her back to the present and reality, and although she listened to her chatter as she smoothed her pillows and checked that she had everything she needed, Christy was wondering what her mother would say if she told her that now she could play chess. Meryl had taught her. Meryl, whose patience made her an admirable teacher; Meryl, whose patience allowed her to turn a blind eye to a husband to whom a continuous string of brief sexual affairs seemed to be as necessary as the air he breathed. And yet without Meryl, David would be very unhappy. She was his wife, and in his way he loved her. He also loved their children. Sighing faintly, Christy walked towards the door. Adult relationships were very complex things. As a teenager she had day-dreamed about the perfect life she would have with Dominic if he loved her; she had imagined that love alone was enough, that nothing else mattered, but different people had different needs.
She herself was too old-fashioned in her moral outlook to involve herself in an affair with a married man, especially a married man whose wife she knew and liked.
No matter how awkward and unsettling it was discovering that Dominic had come back to Setondale, she knew that she had made the right decision in refusing to accompany David to Hollywood. Already, the effect of his sexual magnetism was beginning to fade now that he was no longer there to generate it. Maybe even the desire she had felt clawing so sharply within her had really been the desire of an inexperienced woman for experience rather than a particular desire for David himself.
Ever since the humiliation of her rejection by Dominic, Christy had kept the sexual side of her nature firmly under control. She was not and never had been the sort of woman to whom sex could be sufficient in itself, but there were times, increasingly so these days, when she saw lovers embracing, couples together, when she was pierced by an intense need, coupled with sadness for all that she had lost in not having a lover of her own.
And that was Dominic’s fault; his strictures, his contempt had made it impossible for her to be open and honest in her dealings with his sex; she was quite frankly terrified of misinterpreting a man’s feelings and suffering once again the savage rejection which still haunted her.
She went downstairs and started to make a tray of coffee for her father and Dominic. It was gone ten o’clock and, as Dominic no doubt remembered, her parents preferred early nights.
When she took the tray in it was obvious that Dominic was winning the game.
‘He’s got me completely tied up,’ her father commented with a mock grimace as she handed him his coffee.
‘Mmm.’ She studied the chess board knowledgeably. ‘Another two moves and you won’t be able to avoid checkmate.’
Her father’s eyebrows rose, but he looked pleased. ‘Well, well, so you have managed to learn something while you’ve been in London!’ Turning to Dominic, he asked teasingly, ‘Do you remember how often you tried to teach her?’
‘There are teachers and teachers,’ Christy responded acidly, watching the way Dominic frowned as he looked up at her. The humour she had seen warming his eyes earlier was gone now, and they were a hard, flat grey.
‘And pupils and pupils,’ he taunted back, while her father looked from one set face to the other as though suddenly conscious of the fast-flowing undercurrents racing between them.
Christy was glad that the phone rang, cutting through the thick silence. Her father went to answer it, and she started to follow him until Dominic’s smooth voice stopped her.
‘You’ve changed, Christy. And I don’t suppose for one moment that chess is the only thing you’ve been taught!’
She swung round, her eyes glittering with the temper he had always been so easily able to arouse inside her, but before she could say anything, her father came back into the room, frowning slightly.
‘The call’s for you, Christy. It’s David.’
‘My ex-boss. I suppose he’s lost an all-important piece of filing.’ She knew she was flushing and that moreover, Dominic was aware of it, but David ringing her when she had thought she had made it quite clear to him that there was no point in him pursuing her had caught her off guard.
She hurried to the phone, curling the flex round her fingers in nervous agitation as she spoke into the receiver.
‘Christy, my love, you can’t know how much I’ve missed hearing your voice. I miss you, Christy. Come back.’
She gritted her teeth together. She had always known that David was persistent when there was something that he wanted, but she thought she had made it clear there could be nothing between them.
‘I can’t come back, David,’ she responded coolly. ‘My mother is ill and she needs me.’
‘I need you. God, how I need you! Come back, Christy…’
Her body had started to tremble. This was too much to cope with coming on top of her clash with Dominic.
‘I can’t, David.’ She took a deep breath. ‘And I wouldn’t even if I could. I’ve already told you that. You’re a married man. You know how much I like Meryl.’
‘Oh, for God’s sake!’ she heard him swear sharply. ‘Listen, Christy…’
Suddenly she panicked. ‘No…no…I don’t want to hear any more.’ She held the receiver away from her, but before she could slam
it down she heard him saying furiously, ‘I’m not letting you go as easily as that. I want you…and I can make you want me…’
Even with the receiver held away from her, the words were plainly audible. She slammed it down, literally shaking with reaction.
‘And that’s your boss, is it?’
The shock of Dominic’s hard voice coming from behind her made her whirl round to stare at him.
Correctly reading her expression, he added evenly, ‘I just came in to say goodnight, on your father’s instructions. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop. Do you love him, Christy…is that why you’ve come running home?’
‘He’s a married man.’ She cried out the words desperately, hating him for seeing her like this when she was so weak and vulnerable.
‘I see…’
Surely that wasn’t compassion she could see in his eyes. She shook her head disbelievingly and heard him say, ‘If there’s anything I can do to help…’
Eight years ago she had needed his help, but he had rejected her, and suddenly she wanted to throw that in his face, and to tell him that it was his fault she was the person she was now; that it was his fault that she was a twenty-four-year-old virgin with ridiculously unrealistic ideals of love and marriage, but common sense told her that the blame wasn’t all his, so instead she stormed past him, saying bitterly, ‘Stop trying to big-brother me, Dominic; I don’t need your help, either as a doctor or as a man.’
His face closed up immediately, and she was conscious of an unfamiliar hardness about it, an expression that warned her that he would be a dangerous man to push too hard.
‘I’ll say goodnight, then.’ He paused in the act of stepping past her to the front door and said quietly, ‘Just tell me one thing. Was he…’ he gestured to the phone, ‘the one who taught you to play chess?’
