Then, into the pulsing silence, Guy spoke. His voice was rough, distanced, speaking out into the darkness around them.
‘This has changed everything.’ The words fell into the pounding silence between them. ‘Everything,’ he repeated, and his voice was harsher than ever. ‘I will not do without you.’ A heavy breath escaped him, his chest rising and falling. ‘It will be…difficult. I cannot be with you often. Even less than I was able before. You must understand that. Accept that. It will be when I can. As I can.’
His hand around her fastened on her hip, tightened.
‘It cannot be as it was. You must understand that too. But what I can do, I will.’ She heard a scissoring breath. Then the voice speaking out into the dark
ness continued. ‘I will come to you—there can be no other way. Discretion is essential—I am sorry, but it must be so. No one must know that I have taken up with you again. There can be no breath of suspicion.’ She felt his chest beneath her brow rise and fall again. Then he spoke again. Still into the darkness. Staccato, disjointed. ‘Then later…later…afterwards… it will be easier. It will be understood. Accepted. By everyone.’ He paused again. ‘Including Louisa. My intended bride.’
His voice hardened.
At his side, in his arms, Alexa felt her blood thicken and congeal.
He was still speaking. ‘Until then—’ He fell silent. ‘Until then only this is possible,’ he finished. His voice was flat.
For a while, as the blood began to sluggishly force its way through her, bringing no heat but only a chill, draining cold, she just went on lying there, her head resting on him, her hand across the flat, taut plane of his abdomen as his arms encircled her.
Imprisoned her.
He said nothing more, only gazing upwards into the darkness above them. After a while he moved, lifted one arm to glance at the circle of gold around his wrist. Then with another scissoring breath he removed himself from her, reaching for his scattered clothes, pulling them on wordlessly. She watched him—watched him with nerveless limbs, numb. When he was dressed again he looked down at her.
‘I am sorry—I have to go right now. Immediately. I should not be here—not with Louisa in London. There is too much danger of discovery—too great a risk that she might find out, be informed of where I went after the gala.’ He took another heavy, distracted breath. ‘I will need to talk to you, evidemment, to explain all the arrangements, the necessities… But right now I must go. It’s unavoidable. And tomorrow I’m returning to Paris. Then everything will be impossible for at least one—two weeks. Then perhaps a possibility—that is all.’ His voice was still flat. ‘I will phone you when I can.’ His expression changed minutely. ‘You can no longer phone me. You must understand that.’ He broke off, then with a rasp said, ‘It is the very devil, but it is the only way. The only way! For now there can be no other, and I will take what I can. I am sorry—but it is all that is possible now.’
For one long moment he went on looking down at her. Then with a swift, fluid movement, one hand splaying on the wall behind the bed, he sealed her mouth.
Brief, dispassionate. Marking her as his.
‘Until I can get here again,’ he said.
Then, straightening, he walked out.
She heard the door shut behind him. Then nothing more.
Out on the street, damp from the rain, Guy walked—his pace rapid, his mind occupied. Racing ahead. Far, far ahead. He could see it. See what he had thought he would not see again. The tunnel, opening once more to space and air. Beyond, the freedom of the eagles beckoned.
‘Alexa?’ Imogen’s voice was sleepy. Then a moment later anxious, despite the early hour of this morning visit. It was only eight o’clock, and as it was the weekend Imogen was still in her dressing gown. She had donned it when her bell had rung, the buzzer depressed unwaveringly until Imogen had groped her way to the door and opened it. She had seen, outside, Alexa—fully dressed, a small suitcase in her hand.
And a fistful of ten-pound notes.
Alexa walked in, holding out the notes to Imogen.
‘One hundred pounds,’ she said. Her voice was clipped. Unemotional.
But Imogen could hear an ocean of emotion in it.
She did not take the out-held notes, only pushed Alexa into the kitchen, sat her down at the breakfast bar, plonked herself opposite. She looked at the notes, looked at Alexa, at her drawn, immobile face. ‘Oh, hell,’ said Imogen. Then, as Alexa dropped the ten ten pound notes on the bar, she added another expletive. ‘Bastard.’
A strange noise sounded in Alexa’s throat.
‘I didn’t believe you,’ she said. ‘I didn’t believe anything you said about him. I wouldn’t believe it. Well, now—’ she took a breath that razored the cords in her throat ‘—now I do.’ She let her eyes rest on her friend. They were expressionless. ‘You said one hundred pounds. That was the bet. One hundred pounds that he’d be back, ready to carry on, despite the minor inconvenience of his forthcoming nuptials.’ She swallowed as if a stone were lodged in her throat, large and immovable. Unbearable. ‘He came back. Last night. He was at the charity gala. He let himself into my flat. We—’ She halted. Swallowed again. ‘Then he made his proposition to me. Informed me of his plans for me. For that wretched girl he’s going to marry!’
Her face worked. ‘I met her last night. I didn’t know it was her—and thank God she didn’t know who I was! But it was clear—clear as a bell—that she knew what she was in for in marrying him. Knew just how Guy was going to treat her. I didn’t know it was him she was talking about—just heard about her cold-blooded brute of a fiancé, who thinks her clumsy and gauche, and who’s going to set up a mistress and pay no attention to his bride and doesn’t even damn well care! Doesn’t care that he’s going to humiliate her and neglect her. And I felt so damn sorry for her. But I didn’t…didn’t…’ Her features twisted. ‘I didn’t realise that it was going to be me who was going to be set up to be the convenient mistress. To give her husband someone “beautiful and elegant—”’ she mocked the description with bitter savagery ‘—to have sex with, because he’d be uninterested in his ingénue young teenage bride!’
She raked more air into her lungs. ‘Immie, I thought you were cynical and mistrusting, but you were right—right all along! I thought that however…odd…you thought my relationship with Guy was, you were wrong about his treating me badly. I wasn’t just convenient sex-on-demand as you said I was.’ Her voice hardened, scraping along her skin. ‘But you were right all along. That’s exactly what I was. Exactly what he still wants me to be. The only difference is that this time—’ she gave a harsh, humourless laugh ‘—I’m to be even more invisible! This time around I mustn’t even phone him, mustn’t contact him, must be totally unseen, unsuspected.’ Her voice twisted. ‘At least until he’s got this convenient extra-marital sexual arrangement accepted by his bride. Which she will, poor kid, because it’s what she’s expecting anyway.’
Her face worked again, hands clenching.
‘Oh, Immie—how could I have been such a damn fool?’