‘And wearing new clothes is going to stop them worrying, is it?’ Debra asked her sardonically.
‘No, but it might at least lift a little of the burden off them. Unless, of course, you don’t want it lifted.’
The accusation made Debra flush and demand reproachfully, ‘How can you say that?’
‘I can say it because I love you and because I care about you,’ Leigh told her quietly. ‘Debs, can’t you see, by behaving like this you’re letting Kevin Riley and all those like him win? Is that really what you want?’
Debra didn’t answer her, but later she forced herself to examine what Leigh had said and was forced to accept that she was right.
She hadn’t realised before the trauma that being a victim could cause, the devastating loss of self-worth and self-respect; the fear that wouldn’t let her sleep, and the pain and the guilt.
When she went to baby-sit for Leigh she refused her stepfather’s offer of a lift, saying that she would walk and that no doubt either Jeff or Leigh would give her a lift home.
She also wore one of the new outfits Leigh had bought for her, the bright multicoloured cotton suit that Leigh had admired the day they had gone shopping.
When she put it on the bright colours immediately highlighted her strained, colourless face. Grimacing at it, she reached for her make-up.
When she went downstairs and saw the surprise and relief in her mother’s eyes she was guiltily aware of the truth of Leigh’s comments to her.
‘I’ll be fine,’ she assured them firmly as they both fussed over her.
‘Ring us when you get there,’ her mother insisted.
It was broad daylight and only a fifteen-minute walk to Leigh’s house, but Debra was shakily aware of how vulnerable she felt and how glad she was to get there.
‘The girls are both in bed,’ Leigh told her, ‘and they’re to stay there,’ she added firmly.
It was only after Jeff had arrived to pick her up and they were on the point of leaving that Leigh turned to her and hugged her, telling her fiercely, ‘It’s only because I care, you know.’
Then she thought that Leigh was referring to the fact that she had bullied her into wearing her new clothes.
There was nothing of any particular interest to her on television, but Leigh had rented a video for her, and Debra had started watching it before she realised that its theme was a love-story of great tenderness and finesse.
The love-scenes in particular distressed her, but for some reason she couldn’t stop watching. Anguish and yearning burned through her as she saw the tender look in the male actor’s eyes as he touched his lover.
When she heard the doorbell ring she jumped up in relief, hurrying to answer it.
She opened the door without thinking, assuming the caller would be a friend of Leigh’s. The last person she expected to find standing outside was Marsh.
He was inside the house before she could do or say anything, and her body trembled in a mixture of trauma and outrage as she acknowledged edged how impossible it would have been for her to physically prevent him from coming in.
It was only after she had mastered her initial shock that she realised that he must have known that she would be here on her own and that only one person could have given him that information.
Leigh. Debra smarted as she remembered her stepsister’s Judas kiss as she’d left.
‘I suppose you and Leigh arranged this between you, did you?’ she challenged him bitterly.
‘Only because you made it necessary,’ Marsh retorted tautly.
Leigh had been reluctant at first to accede to his plea that she help him to see Debra, but when he explained to her that Debra had written, resigning from her job, she had been so shocked that she had given way.
Of his private feelings for Debra he had said nothing, nor of his growing burden of guilt and despair that he had not been with her when she’d needed him.
He hadn’t come here this evening looking for absolution, he reminded himself grimly. His guilt was his burden and he must not give in to the temptation to plead with Debra for understanding. Or to beg her for her love?
His mouth clamped in a hard line, and Debra, witnessing the hardness of his expression, felt a flutter of apprehension.
What had he come here for? He must have realised by now that she fully understood the nature of his desire for her.