Seeing that he wanted her increased her own desire, her own need, and as she leaned forward to caress him with her lips, to show him how greatly she desired him, she felt again the familiar sharp spasm of sensation within her own body, and shuddered with the force of it.
As she closed her eyes, she heard Lewis saying urgently, ‘Lacey…oh, God, Lacey.’
And then he was holding her, touching her, entering her and possessing her so immediately and so powerfully, as though he knew exactly how she had felt, how much she had suddenly needed him there within her, that she cried out, unable to bear the pleasure of it in silence, moving against him, whispering his name, telling him how much she wanted and needed him.
It was a fierce, short-lived coming together, a powerful explosion of sensation that left Lacey feeling weak and dizzy, clinging to Lewis while her body shook with its aftermath.
She could feel Lewis kissing her, holding her; his lips touched her ear, and he told her shakily, ‘In all these years there’s never been a day, an hour when I haven’t wanted you, ached for you…remembered…how it was between us; but I realise now that those memories were only pale shadows of reality. Mercifully so, because I could never have endured living with memories of that kind of reality…of knowing…’
Lacey opened her eyes and looked at him, her voice full of pain. ‘It didn’t work out, then, with her—the…the woman you left me for.’
‘What?’ He cupped her face, holding her so that she couldn’t avoid looking at him. ‘What other woman?’ he demanded huskily. ‘There never was any other woman. I just let you think that because…because it made it easier…easier to let you go, to tell myself that I was doing the right thing for you if not for myself…that you’d find someone else…someone who could give you children, and that when you did if you’d known the truth you’d have been grateful to me.’
‘There was no other woman?’ Lacey could scarcely take it in. ‘But you said. You…’
Lewis shook his head. ‘No, you said. I merely said our marriage had to end. I hadn’t got as far as thinking of anything so sophisticated as pretending there was someone else. I was still sick with the shock of discovering what I had inherited. All I could think of was that I must not allow you to find out…that your life must not be torn apart and destroyed the way mine had been.’
‘No other woman,’Lacey repeated slowly. ‘You mean you left me…divorced me because…?’
‘Because I’d found out from my father about the gene I was carrying.’
‘You divorced me because of that?You let me think you no longer wanted me…no longer loved me because of that?’
All her shock…her horror was betrayed by her voice, her eyes huge and accusing as she stared at him. ‘Did you really think I was so weak…so…so shallow that knowing the truth would have made any difference at all to me? Didn’t you realise how much I loved you?’
His face had gone white. ‘Yes, I knew,’ he said simply, not trying to evade her. ‘But I also knew how much you wanted children. How important a family was to you. Had I known about the hereditary disorder before we married…had I been in a position to grow up knowing about it…to discuss it with you…to be honest with you…but…well, when you married me it was in the belief that we would have children. You’d told me how important that was to you, remember? What right did I have to turn round and tell you that we couldn’t have those children?’
‘But I loved you…you, not some mythical father of children I hadn’t even conceived!’ Lacey protested vehemently.
‘You say that now, but think, Lacey. You were so young. I know you loved me. I know how loyal you are…were. I know you would have stayed with me…and continued to love me…for a while at least, but how long would that love have lasted? A year…two maybe…maybe even longer, but I couldn’t live with the fear that one day you would turn away from me…that one day your need for children would outweigh your pity for me. I had to set you free. Free to find someone else.’ He heard the sound she made and stopped and then asked her, ‘Why didn’t you find someone else?’
‘You hurt me too much.’
It was cruel and unfair, and she hated herself the moment she had said it, biting her bottom lip and shaking her head.
‘No. No, that isn’t entirely true, Lewis. You did hurt me…unbearably so. I couldn’t believe at first that all the time you had been telling me you loved me there had been someone else. I was afraid to trust another man, to believe that he might love me…and then I had Jessica. She filled my life…my heart, and besides…’
She lifted her head and looked directly at him.
‘It’s pointless lying about it now. I never stopped loving you. Oh, I tried. I even told myself I’d succeeded, but then I’d dream about you at night and wake up in tears, aching inside from wanting you…loving you. Perhaps if I’d allowed myself to forget you there might have been another man.’
‘Just as if I had allowed myself to forget about you there might have been another woman. I did contemplate it. A divorcee with a couple of children who didn’t want any more. It seemed an ideal solution, but there was also you…and certain memories of the way it had been for us that refused to allow me to want that kind of intimacy with someone who wasn’t you.
‘I can’t give you back all the lost years, Lacey. I can’t give you anything now that I couldn’t give you twenty years ago, but, if it helps at all, I’ve never stopped loving you. Never stopped wishing things had been different. Sometimes, God help me, almost wished I had never found my father…never known.’
He gave a deep shudder. Lacey reached out and touched him gently. ‘You must have come close to hating me for that. Because if I hadn’t suggested you look for him…’
He shook his head. ‘I could never hate you, no matter what happened. I hated myself, though…hated myself for still wanting you…for never truly setting you free.’
‘If only you had told me…shared it with me.’
‘And caused you eventually to turn from me…to hate me the way my father ended up hating my mother…rejecting me…the way he had rejected me?’
; Lacey hesitated and then asked him quietly, ‘If you had known…about Jessica…would that…?’
‘Don’t ask me,’ Lewis told her. ‘Because I don’t know the answer. The way I felt then, the panic…the fear…the self-hatred I was experiencing—God help me, but I think I would have wanted you to have a termination.’ He saw her face and closed his eyes. ‘I’m sorry, Lacey, but I can’t lie to you. Not again. I was still too raw from my own discoveries…from knowing that my father had rejected me…All I know is that I would have tried to justify my decision by saying it was to protect you…to protect our marriage…that the risk was too great. Even when I first realised that Jess might be mine, my strongest emotion was one of panic…of fear—fear of both her rejection and yours…of your condemnation of me…fear of the burden of my own guilt because she had been conceived…because I had been careless.’