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‘Oh, for God’s sake don’t look at me like that! Dream of Bob if you must, but I warn you, Genista, if I ever think you’re dreaming of him when you’re in my arms, I’ll take my pleasure from you as a man does with a woman he’s bought for the night!’
She flinched as he flung the paper down and walked towards the door. ‘I’m going out for a walk. I’ll be back for lunch. And remember, this marriage stands for just as long as I want it to.’
When he had gone Genista cried as she had not done even when they brought the news of her parents’ death. Not for Bob, but for herself, because when she dreamed of Luke she had dreamed that she had been begging him to make love to her, and he had turned his back on her, jeering that love was the last emotion he would feel for her. Alone she faced the truth. She loved him and must have done so, unknowingly right from the start. A deep shudder went right through her. She could only pray that he tired of her quickly, before she betrayed her feelings to him. His mockery of her love was something she could not endure. Sexually compatible, he had called them, but she knew that her body’s response was that of a woman deeply in love with the man who possesses her. She loved him! If only she had discovered this before they had married. Wild horses would not have dragged her to the altar had she done so, but it was too late now. They were married. She was Luke’s wife. The woman he had married purely because he wanted to possess her; the woman he had thought the property of another man. For the first time she bitterly regretted her lack of experience. With it she might have known how best to hold his interest, perhaps even fan it so that he never grew bored with her. She was being ridiculous, she told herself. Desire was no sound basis for marriage. It would wane eventually, it was bound to do so. And she would be left with nothing. No, not nothing—she would have a broken heart.
CHAPTER SIX
THE morning dragged by. Had she been on her own Genista might have entertained herself by taking a walk through the glorious Lakeland countryside, but she was not alone. Her eyes kept straying to the window which overlooked the wooded hillside, but there was no sign of Luke.
Where had he gone when he left their room? The thought of her response to his lovemaking brought a fresh stab of pain. How could she have been so blind to her own danger? How could she not have realised what was happening to her? In a less worldly age she might have described her feelings for him as ‘love at first sight’, but because such naïveté was the object of mockery amongst her contemporaries, she had wilfully deceived herself that the immediate awareness she had felt had been strong dislike. How could any woman who professed to dislike a man respond to his lovemaking the way she had responded to Luke?
He returned shortly before lunch; a meal which was eaten almost completely in silence.
‘I’ve decided that we might as well return to London,’ he announced abruptly when they had been served with their coffee. Something had happened during his walk to change him. The eyes which rested on her averted profile were completely impersonal, his attitude towards her that of a coolly polite stranger. No longer did the burning intensity of his gaze trigger off shivers of awareness, scorching her flesh where it alighted upon it. He smiled mirthlessly, lifting his cup to his mouth. ‘It wasn’t my original intention, but in the circumstances it seems the best course of action—for both of us.’
Genista went upstairs to pack, leaving Luke to settle their bill. She had closed her own case and was staring at his, wondering whether her newly married status meant that he would expect her to adopt the duties of a normal wife, when he walked in, calmly settling the matter for her by opening the wardrobe and withdrawing the clothes he had hung there. He packed methodically, with a precision that spoke of long practice. No doubt in the early days of building up his business he must have travelled widely, and probably not always alone.
Jealousy knifed agonisingly through her. How many other women had known the pleasure she had found in his arms? It was something she would be wiser not to think about, but it was impossible not to. How many of them had he loved? Or had there only been one—Verity? Verity who had gone off with his brother-in-law because she preferred being a rich man’s mistress to a poor man’s wife.
‘Ready?’
She nodded numbly, following him out of the room. On the threshold she was unable to resist one backward glance. In these impersonal surroundings she had come to full womanhood; had experienced ecstacy and pain; had learned the difference between mere infatuation—which was what she had felt for Richard—and love.
It was late afternoon when they reached the out-skirts of London. Luke had said not one word about their future together, and Genista felt as though her forehead was in the grip of an iron band, which tightened increasingly painfully as the silence between them stretched into a tension that plucked at her overwrought nerve ends.
‘I want to call at the office,’ Luke told her as he turned off the motorway. ‘There are some papers I want to pick up.’
Everything was the same—but different. It was hard to believe that the last time she had entered these offices she had entered them as a single woman, unaware of what lay ahead of her.
Bob looked up from his desk as they walked in. Most of the staff had already left, and he did a double-take as he saw them.
‘We weren’t expecting you back. How did it go?’
Jilly walked out of her office, and grinned at them. Luke asked her if she could get him a file, and while they talked, Genista managed to ask Bob about Elaine. His face was grave.
‘She has to have major surgery. The surgeon wants to be sure that they remove the growth completely.’ He looked close to tears, and Genista laid a sympathetic hand on his arm, feeling almost maternal.
‘They can do wonderful things these days,’ she comforted him.
He smiled bleakly. ‘I know. It isn’t the operation I’m worried about—it’s afterwards—when Elaine realises what it means. I had to give consent for the operation. Before she went in she begged me not to let them remove her…anything, but the surgeon told me that if they didn’t she could die. Oh God, Genista!’ He covered his face with his hands, his shoulders bowed and shaking, and Genista placed her arms round him instinctively, putting her cheek comfortingly against his hair.
‘You’ve done the right thing, I’m sure of it. The operation will be a shock to her, but once she realises that you still love her, that you still feel the same…’
‘Of course I do.’ Bob’s voice was rough. ‘Love isn’t something you turn on and off like a tap.?
?
‘Have you told Bob our good news?’
Neither of them had heard Luke approach the desk. Genista looked up, frightened by the black fury in his eyes. How he must hate her, now that he had discovered the truth. He had thought her a sophisticated woman of the world, well schooled in everything it took to please a man, instead of which he had discovered that she was an inexperienced virgin. No wonder he was looking at her as though he wanted to murder her!
‘What news?’ Jilly asked gaily, coming to join them. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve finally got Genista to declare a truce in this war she’s declared against the male sex.’
‘I hope so,’ Luke replied dryly, ‘otherwise it doesn’t say much for the success of our marriage.’
‘Marriage!’ Bob and Jilly uttered the word in disbelieving unison. ‘You’re married? Oh, Genista, how could you without telling me?’ Jilly wailed. ‘I want to know all about it. What did you wear? When was it all decided? You dark horse, you, spinning me that line about disliking Luke, and all the time…Do you know, she even had me convinced that she didn’t know how you felt about her,’ she complained to Luke. ‘But I could see that you’d fallen for her like a ton of bricks the moment you set eyes on her.’
‘Perceptive of you.’
