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It was
worth more than she could ever tell him; with those few words he had wiped out a raw wound so old and so deep that she had forgotten it was there. It was only the sudden cessation of its ache that reminded her. Ever since the folly of her attempted suicide, part of her had despised herself for her weakness, for using such cruel emotional blackmail on those who had loved her. She had lost her own self-respect, and for Kyle to say that she had his was like being given back a part of herself. She felt a tremendous inner softening toward him, an urge to go up to him and touch him, a need to almost physically embrace him, as though they were indeed brother and sister. But as she reached for him he side-stepped, widening the gap between them, his face suddenly taut and harsh.
‘Let’s just leave it there, shall we? You’d better start making tracks, that sky doesn’t look too promising.’
He had rejected her, had rejected her physical overture of…of regret and affection, and she felt so cold inside that her muscles ached and hurt the way her flesh did when she was physically cold.
It was on her mind all the way home. Why had he done that to her? Why had he almost pushed her off, as though he loathed the very idea of her touch?
Why not? part of herself argued hardily. Up until that particular moment in time, if asked, she would have said that she loathed the thought of being touched by him.
They could have shared so much, if only she hadn’t been so determined to shut him out of her life. They could have…but it was pointless mourning now the brother he could have been. It was too late to turn back the clock. She could only go on, and hope that one day she would break through the barrier he had thrown up between them and convince him that…
That what? Heather didn’t know. She only knew that she was conscious of a tremendous loss; of a great sadness and heaviness of heart; of a sensation of having stupidly deprived herself of something she would mourn for the rest of her life.
CHAPTER FIVE
THAT sensation of almost being at one with Kyle didn’t last very long.
The snow was still holding off, although the late afternoon sky was ominously heavy with its winter burden. On impulse, instead of spending the day working as she had intended to do, Heather turned the van round and drove into Bristol. Once there, she was lucky enough to be able to park it relatively close to the shops.
Seeing families battling through the busy streets, their arms piled high with brightly coloured packages, made her realise how close Christmas was—something she had forgotten in the aftermath of her father’s collapse, when all her energies had been concentrated on willing him to get better.
This would be the first Christmas she had not spent with her parents. She could see the wisdom of Kyle’s insistence that they go away to Portugal just as soon as her father was fit enough to travel. Several weeks spent snowed up in a cold, draughty house worrying about heating bills was hardly likely to aid his recuperation, while a month or two spent in what she was sure would be luxurious surroundings, in Kyle’s Portuguese villa…
She was being selfish to wish that Kyle had suggested that she should go with them. He had made it clear to her that the job he was offering her was no manufactured sinecure and, that being the case, she had no right to expect to be allowed to take time off in order to spend the best part of the winter with her parents. And yet it hurt that Kyle had not even suggested that she might fly over to Portugal just to spend Christmas with them.
What on earth would the pair of them find to say to one another, cooped up in that beautiful house of his? Would they manage to last out the Christmas season without quarreling? Kyle obviously wanted her there as little as she wanted to be there. No doubt normally he spent his Christmas somewhere exotic, like the Caribbean, or perhaps somewhere more traditional, but just as expensive, such as Gstaad. And of course, whichever location he chose, no doubt there would be a beautiful woman to accompany him, to…
Abruptly, she stopped still in the street. What was it about Kyle that sparked off this almost uncontrollable surge of physical awareness? Even his conversation had been sprinkled with acidly barbed sexual innuendo. She shivered tensely, digging her hands deep into the pockets of her old coat. What was it that had changed so much between them and that made her so intensely aware of Kyle as a man?
The resentment, the dislike, the antagonism; these were all emotions she remembered and understood; but this new sexual undercurrent, this alien and dangerously strong power that moved through her whenever she was with him, this was new. Completely new, she admitted, oblivious to the curious stares of passers by at her motionless figure. This was something she had never experienced before in her life. And she didn’t want to experience it now.
Slowly, almost painfully, she started to move, all her concentration turned inwards as she forced herself to confront the warring anomalies within her own personality.
Why was it she should react so strongly to Kyle, when all the other men she knew left her completely cold?
It wasn’t a question she could answer and, because it made her feel so uncomfortable and almost alienated from herself, she pushed it to the back of her mind, and concentrated instead on looking for the small Christmas presents she had come to Bristol to buy.
Christmas was normally one of her favourite times of the year. On Christmas Eve she loved to walk into the shabby sitting-room and see the presents piled up under the tree.
At eleven they always left for Midnight Mass, and then afterwards had friends back for some of her mother’s home-made wine and mince pies. Despite the fact that they went to bed late, they were always up early in the morning to unwrap their presents and get ready for the almost constant onslaught of visitors who called throughout the day.
This year there would be none of that to look forward to. Her hand tensed on the small box of scented soaps she had been examining. What was she going to do with herself, cooped up with Kyle for the whole of the Christmas holidays?
Her eye was caught by a display of books, and she grimaced faintly. She would have to stock up with plenty of good reading; that would help to pass the time.
If she was Kyle, she wouldn’t welcome her stay at all, she recognised, wondering uncomfortably what plans he might have made that her presence would spoil.
It was ridiculous of her parents to expect him to take her in! Good heavens, she wasn’t a child; she was perfectly capable of looking after herself.
Disconsolately she put the box down, unaware of the frowning irritation of the girl behind the counter.
She couldn’t get out of going, and it would be childish to try. Surely she was capable of enduring less than a week of Kyle’s company, for the sake of her parents’ peace of mind? It was no use telling herself that she was an adult; in their eyes, she was still vulnerable, and she admitted that she would hate her father’s recovery to be held up by any action of hers.
Moving more briskly, she headed for another shop. It was silly to waste time worrying about how she would cope with Kyle when she had so much to do. She looked down at the list in her hand, and frowned slightly over her own handwriting.
Normally they all did this together, taking more pleasure in buying their small gifts than most other people seemed to do in spending much greater sums.
