Chapter Nine
somehow life went on, although to Christy, in a daze of misery and
pain, it seemed to have become something to be endured rather than
enjoyed.
Her mother was now spending several hours a day out of bed, and Christy
was at great pains to be unavailable whenever Dominic called at the
house.
The shock of his arrival the day after the Valentine Ball still
lingered with her. She had expected that he would be as eager to avoid
her as she was him. She had told him then, without giving him the
chance to speak to her, that she didn't want to see him again. She
couldn't have borne him guessing how she felt about him and pitying her
for it.
Luckily the hire company had been able to get the dress repaired, and
now, if she was sensible, she would put the entire events of that night
right out of her mind.
The only trouble was that no matter how firm she was with herself
during the daytime, at night in her dreams she lost complete control,
and dreamed of Dominic again and again, often waking up with tears
still damp on her skin. Only this morning her mother had remarked on
her wan expression and loss of weight, commenting that anyone would
think that she was the one who had been ill.
Soon her mother would be able to manage without her. Originally
Christy had contemplated staying in Setondale and finding a job in
either Newcastle or Ainwick, but that had been before she had realised
that Dominic had come home.
She knew that her parents were perturbed and concerned by the abrupt
change in her, but although once or twice her mother had tried to bring
the conversation round to Dominic, Christy had fobbed her off.
The way she felt about him was far too painful to discuss with anyone
else.
Perhaps if Meryl had not been away in Los Angeles, she might have been
able to talk to her. Only this morning Christy had received a letter
from her confirming the date of the baby's expected birth, and telling
Christy that David had still had no success in replacing her. It was
too late now to acknowledge that she would have been wiser to have gone
with them. She had made her decision with the best intentions.
The end of the month brought fresh snowfalls, and the knowledge that
their lovemaking was not going to result in a child. While logically
she knew she ought to be relieved, and that she had been a fool to take
such a risk, deep down inside Christy was aware of an atavistic sense
of loss and failure, as though somehow in not conceiving the child of
the man she loved she had shown herself to be less of a woman.
She reasoned with herself that an illegitimate child was the very last
thing she wanted, but even while she knew it to be true, there was
still a feeling of emptiness inside her.
"Dominic was asking after you yesterday," her mother commented,
watching her as she stood motionless before the sitting-room window
staring out at the white landscape. Blizzard conditions had been
forecast for later in the day, but as yet there was no sign of it in
the clear deep blue arc of the sky and the brilliant glitter of the
sun. Despite the sunshine, it was bitterly cold, well below freezing,
and only that morning had the snow-plough cleared the way up the
lane.
"Christy, can't you tell me what's wrong? Can't I help at all?" her
mother asked sadly when Christy made no response to her earlier
remark.
"You can't go on like this. You're losing weight.. you've become so
withdrawn that your father and I hardly recognise our daughter any
more, and Dominic doesn't look much better. If you've quarrelled,
surely you could make it up?"
"It wasn't that sort of quarrel," Christy told her heavily, refusing to
turn round. The very sound of Dominic's name on someone else's lips
was enough to start the silly weak tears she cried at night in the
privacy of her room flowing again.
"Your father tells me that Amanda has gone back to London."
The sensation that jolted through her, hope mingled with despair,
warned her how very vulnerable she was. She told herself that Amanda's
departure meant nothing, and that in any case, even if Dominic's
relationship with the other woman had petered out, there was still
absolutely no hope of him every feeling about her the way she did about
him.
By his very words to her about Amanda's desire for a second marriage,
he had shown how far any sort of permanent commitment was from his own
mind, and she loved him far too much to be his partner in a meaningless
sexual affair.
"Talking of Amanda, I've heard another fascinating piece of gossip
about the Andrews family. You'll never guess what. The Major and Lady
Anthony are going to get married! Apparently he's been in love with
her for years, and they had planned to get married but her father
refused his permission. He insisted that Lady Anthony marry her
cousin, and she and the Major quarrelled bitterly about it. The
Vicar's wife told me the whole story. The ceremony is to take place in
the Manor's private chapel, and there's to be a wedding breakfast there
afterwards. I think it's one of the most romantic things I've ever
heard of, don't you? I suppose he's never stopped loving her for all
this time."
It was romantic, and Christy was pleased for them both, but somehow
hearing about the happiness of others only served to emphasise her own
misery.
"I hope the snow holds off," she heard her mother sigh.
"Your father and I are due to visit the Hopkinses tomorrow. We haven't
seen them since before Christmas."
Helen and Bill Hopkins were very close friends of Christy's parents and
lived in Ainwick. They had spent Christmas and New Year with their
daughter and her family in Leeds, but had recently returned, and
apparently Dominic had agreed that her mother was now well enough to go
and visit them.
"I know Helen would be delighted to see you if you want to come with
us."
Christy shook her head.
"No, thanks, Mum, I'm not feeling very sociable at the moment. In
fact, now that you're properly on the road to recovery, I shall have to
do something about finding myself another job. I'll have to start
getting the London papers."
"Oh, but Christy, your father and I had hoped... Oh well, it's your
life, my dear."
Early the next morning Christy's parents set out for Alrrwick. They
had been gone less than an hour when the sky clouded over ominously,
the wind picking up in velocity. Watching the first furious flurries
of snow drifting in the high 1
speed winds, Christy shivered, and prayed that her parents made it to
their friends safely.
Half an hour later when the phone rang and she heard her father's voice
she was not surprised when he told her that they had decided to stay
over in Ainwick and spend the night with their friends.
"I think you're very wise. Dad. It's snowing so heavily I can barely
see the drive from the window, and it's drifting like mad."
"Yes, it's the same here, although it's only just started. You must
have got it before us. The local forecast isn't at all good, and the
last thing your mother needs right now is to be stranded in a
snowdrift. She's worried about you, though, Christy. Will you be all
right on your own?"
"I'm a big girl now. Dad. I've been living on my own for several
years--remember?"
She heard her father chuckle and was glad that she had managed to
reassure him. She felt guilty because she knew that her parents had
been worried about her. She knew that she ought to make an effort to
seem more cheerful. After another five minutes on the phone she
managed to reassure her mother that she wasn't either going to starve
or freeze to death in the brief space of twenty-four hours, and then
she him|g up.
The day stretched endlessly in front of her. It was only just
lunchtime, although outside it was almost dusk, and it was snowing so
heavily it was impossible to see where earth ended and sky began. She
hadn't exaggerated when she told her father that it was impossible to
see the lane from the window, and when she went to open the back door
to bring in a supply of logs from the outhouse, just in case the
central heating should happen to go off, the force of the wind whipped
it from her fingers, smashing it back against the wall with a harsh
thud.
Already snow had drifted over a foot deep against the door, and she had
to go back inside and don her anorak and wellies before she could go
and get the logs.
It took her several journeys to bring in enough. Her father, with
almost a lifetime's experience of winter blizzards, had advised her to
keep the sitting-room fire going at all times, and even to sleep down
there if necessary should the central heating fail.
She was just stamping the snow off her Wellingtons when she heard the
sound of a car engine. Disbelievingly she stared towards the lane,
watching the blue-grey shape of a Land Rover emerging through the
blizzard. It stopped opposite the gate, the engine left running as its
driver got out.
Even clad in wellies and a thick padded jacket, Christy recognised
Dominic. His dark head was bare, his hair whipped by the wind and
whitened by flakes of snow.
What was he doing here?
He didn't speak until he drew level with her his curt, "Christy, I need
your help," making fcer stare silently at him.
"Look, I haven't got much time. One of ny patients has gone into
premature labour. SShe lives in one of the hill farms, and there's no
}way we're going to be able to get her into hospital in time. Luckily
they'd got this Land Rover in for a service in the garage in Setondale,
and- as it was an emergency they lent it to me."
"But I can't help," Christy protested. '/ don't have any medical
training. "
"I don't want you for that." Dominic frowned as though in an
indictment of her stupidity, 'i want you to take charge of her
children. 1-S. er husband's out on the hills with his sheep, and
she's got twins and a toddler, all under five. I'd ask your mother.
"
"Mum and Dad aren't here. They've gone into Ainwick to see some
friends."
She wanted to protest that Dominic had no right to dragoon her into
helping him like tr is, but her heart went out to the pregnant woman
isolated from all the protection of modem medicine in her remote home,
and somehow she found herself clambering into the Land Rover and
holding her breath as Dominic put it into gear and the heavy
four-wheel-drive vehicle inched slowly through the deepening snow.
It was a hair-raising journey to the farm-only four miles away from her
parents' house,
was impossible to see where earth ended and sky began. She hadn't
exaggerated when she told her father that it was impossible to see the
lane from the window, and when she went to open the back door to bring
in a supply of logs from the outhouse, just in case the central heating
should happen to go off, the force of the wind whipped it from her
fingers, smashing it back against the wall with a harsh thud.
Already snow had drifted over a foot deep against the door, and she had
to go back inside and don her anorak and wellies before she could go
and get the logs.
It took her several journeys to bring in enough. Her father, with
almost a lifetime's experience of winter blizzards, had advised her to
keep the sitting-room fire going at all times, and even to sleep down
there if necessary should the central heating fail.
She was just stamping the snow off her Wellingtons when she heard the
sound of a car engine. Disbelievingly she stared towards the lane,
watching the blue-grey shape of a Land Rover emerging through the
blizzard. It stopped opposite the gate, the engine left running as its
driver got out.
Even clad in wellies and a thick padded jacket, Christy recognised
Dominic. His dark head was bare, his hair whipped by the wind and
whitened by flakes of snow.
What was he doing here?
He didn't speak until he drew level with her, his curt, "Christy, I
need your help," making her stare silently at him.
"Look, I haven't got much time. One of my patients has gone into
premature labour. She lives in one of the hill farms, and there's no
way we're going to be able to get her into hospital in time. Luckily
they'd got this Land Rover in for a service in the garage in Setondale,
and as it was an emergency they lent it to me."
"But I can't help," Christy protested. '/ don't have any medical
training. "
"I don't want you for that." Dominic frowned as though in an
indictment of her stupidity.
"I want you to take charge of her children. Her husband's out on the
hills with his sheep, and she's got twins and a toddler, all under
five. I'd ask your mother..."
"Mum and Dad aren't here. They've gone into Ainwick to see some
friends."
She wanted to protest that Dominic had no right to dragoon her into
helping him like this, but her heart went out to the pregnant woman
isolated from all the protection of modem medicine in her remote home,
and somehow she found herself clambering into the Land Rover and
holding her breath as Dominic put it into gear and the heavy
four-wheel-drive vehicle inched slowly through the deepening snow.
It was a hair-raising journey to the farm-only four miles away from her
parents' house,
but much, much higher in the hills and consequently even more exposed
to the ferocity of the blizzard.
Three times the Land Rover got stuck and both she and Dominic had to
get out and use the spades and grit he had packed in the back to get it
moving again. Each time, as she wiped the freezing snow from her
stinging face, Christy wondered what on earth she had let herself in
for.
It seemed to take hours to reach the farm, and on the third occasion
they became stuck she couldn't help asking Dominic uncertainly, "Will
she be all right...1 mean..."
"She's a very sensible woman, and telephoned the surgery the moment she
went into labour, knowing that it was going to be impossible for us to
bring her down. Her baby wasn't due for another three weeks, and both
the twins and her first child were late, so she wasn't prepared for
this one's early arrival."
Although he sounded calm, Christy could sense that Dominic was
concerned and she shivered on a surge of sympathy and apprehension for
the pregnant woman.
"Couldn't a helicopter...?" she suggested timidly, but Dominic shook
his head before she could finish her sentence.
"Nowhere for it to land; the house is on a fairly steep hillside.
Look, I think you can see the lights from it up ahead. "
By straining her eyes Christy could just about make out the faint
yellow gleam ahead of them. Staring into the snow made her eyes ache,
and she marvelled at Dominic's skill and stamina in managing to drive
them this far.
She could hardly believe it when they finally rolled to a halt in the
farmyard.
Two small tow-coloured heads poked round the back door as Christy
jumped down from the Land Rover. The twins, no doubt, she decided,
following Dominic inside. The kitchen was warmed by an immense Aga,
the strain in the face of the woman sitting in front of it telling its
own story.
"Sorry about the delay," Dominic apologised.
"How are you feeling?"
Christy could almost feel for herself the spasm of pain that contorted
the woman's body as she bent over.
It was several seconds before she could speak.
"I don't think it will be very much longer. I can't tell you how glad
I am that you're here." She saw Christy for the first time as she
stepped out from behind Dominic and smiled wanly at her.
"I brought Christy to keep an eye on the children." As Dominic spoke
he was looking at his watch--timing the contractions, no doubt, Christy
thought nervously. She had never had an awful lot to do with babies,
and had certainly never been there on the spot, so to speak, when one
was born.
"I've got everything ready upstairs, doctor."
"All right, Mrs. Thomson, I'll be with you in a minute. Can you cope
down here?" Dominic asked Christy briskly, smiling reassuringly at the
three small faces turned up to his with varying degrees of
apprehension.
"Mummy's having our baby," the largest member of the trio lisped.
"Yes ... yes, I think so. Shouldn't I be boiling water or
something?"
Christy suggested distractedly.
Dominic laughed.
"No..."
It seemed a long, long time since she had heard him laughing naturally,
and she could feel her own heart lifting slightly in response as she
remembered earlier, more innocent days when she had been ******* with
nothing more than his friendship.
Keeping the children occupied wasn't too hard a task. They were all
obviously wellbehaved, and the fact that she was a stranger further
inhibited them, so that it wasn't until Christy had the brain wave of
suggesting that they play Snakes and Ladders when she saw the game on
the dresser that they started to relax a little.
Every now and again she glanced upwards, inwardly praying for the
safety of Mrs. Thomson and her baby.
When she cried out, the twins' faces puckered, and one of the little
boys cuddled on to Christy's lap. Too young to really understand what
was happening, they could still feel their mother's pain and react to
it.
"Mummy cry..."
Christy watched despairingly as the small chin wobbled, but Lyn, the
eldest of the three, came to her rescue, saying stalwartly, "It's all
right, Christopher.. it's only like when Betsy had her puppies..."
That was one way of looking at it, Christy thought wryly, and of course
as farm children they would be used to the actuality of birth.
Time seemed to drag as Christy waited in apprehensive silence. How
long did it take for a baby to be born? She might as well have asked
herself how long was a piece of string, she acknowledged ruefully. The
problem was that she felt so woefully inadequate. She got up and
checked on the Aga, going out for more fuel.
When she came back the twins asked for drinks, and with Lyn's help she
found their orange juice. She had just got them settled when above
them their mother cried out, the sound splintering the silence of the
kitchen.
Christy held her breath, gathering the twins closer, and even the more
stoical Lyn leaned tensely against her.
From the top of the stairs she heard Dominic calling her, and numbly
she got up and hurried across the room.
"Can you come up here for a moment, Christy?"
He sounded calm enough, if a bit terse.
Gently reassuring the children and checking that the door was locked
and there was nothing of any danger to them within their reach, she
hurried upstairs.
Lorna Thomson's dark hair was clinging stickily to her face, and
Christy felt a spasm of fear clutch at her stomach as she heard the
other woman's moans.
"What is it?" she asked Dominic nervously, licking dry lips.
"Dominic,
I. "
"It's all right. All I want you to do is to let Loma hold on to you.
Can you do that? "
The woman on the bed writhed and cried out, and Christy 'forgot her
fear.
"Soak a cloth in cold water, so that you can sponge her face," Dominic
instructed her.
As she sat at the side of the bed following Dominic's instructions and
feeling the sharp bite ofLoma's fingernails into her skin, even Christy
in her ignorance could see that the birth was imminent.
A huge wave of love and awe washed over her as she listened to Dominic
exhorting and cajoling Lorna. She looked at him, watching the total
concentration on his face, before she turned back to soothe Loma's damp
face.
"Just one more push, Loma. You can do it. And another..."
Awed beyond belief, totally unable to look away, Christy witnessed the
almost magical moment of birth. That the baby was scarlet and daubed
with mucus and blood could not in any way detract from the wonder of
what she had experienced, and if anyone had asked her what the baby
looked like she knew she would have said, and meant it, "Beautiful."
Almost from a distance, she heard Dominic saying tiredly,
"Congratulations, Lorna, you have another daughter."
From the side of the bed, Christy watched in wonderment as Dominic
placed the tiny redfaced creature flat on her mother's stomach.
There were tears in Loma Thomson's eyes as she reached out to touch her
new daughter's damp, dark head.
"Christy, why don't you go down and make us all a cup of tea?" Dominic
suggested quietly, drawing her to one side, and pushing her gently in
the direction of the door. For a moment she stood and watched him,
knowing that she was completely forgotten as he went to attend to his
patient.
Downstairs the children stared at her, round- eyed, and it was Lyn who
asked, "Has our new baby come yet?"
;' "Yes, she has," Christy told them.
"Your mummy needs to have a sleep now, but as soon as she's rested, I
expect you'll be able to go up and see her."
"You're crying," one of the twins accused, and as she touched trembling
fingers to her damp face, Christy realised that she was. She felt
privileged and elated in a way she couldn't explain to have witnessed
the birth. It was something she would remember all her life.
Unwittingly she touched her own flat stomach and felt again that wave
of desolation and failure that had encompassed her when she knew she
wasn't going to have Dominic's child.
They stayed at the farmhouse until Lorna Thomson's husband returned
home. The blizzard had stopped, and the wind was dying down. Jack
Thomson thanked them with tears in his eyes for what they had done, and
Christy felt guilty that he should have thanked her when she had done
so very little. The children had seen their mother and new sister now,
and already Lyn was telling the twins importantly that babies weren't
to be poked with inquisitive little fingers.
It was dark by the time they left, the snow freezing already. Christy
shuddered, dreading the hazardous return journey.
It took them almost an hour, crawling over the hard-packed frozen snow,
and when eventually the turning to the lane came in sight, she tensed
as she looked in vain for a spiral of smoke from the sitting-room
fire's chimney.
Sensing her tension, Dominic looked across at her.
"What's wrong?"
"I think the sitting-room fire's gone out."
His frown deepened.
"If it has the house will be like an icebox; these stone houses always
are."
"We do have central heating, you know," Christy pointed out as he
stopped the Land Rover in front of the house. She was sliding out of
her seat as she spoke, but somehow he seemed to have anticipated her,
and he was there to take the back door key from her frozen fingers and
unlock the door for her.
As she followed him inside, Christy's heart sank. She didn't need
anyone to tell her that the heating had gone off. The air was icy
enough to make her shiver.
She saw that Dominic was squatting down in front of the boiler, and
realised that he was looking for the pilot light.
"You'd better come back with me," he told her brusquely as he stood
up.
"If I leave you here you'll freeze."
If he'd put into words how little he wanted her company, he couldn't
have made it plainer, and before she could stop herself Christy heard
herself saying nastily, "Won't Amanda have something to say about
that?"
His eyes went cold. She'd forgotten how disapproving and quelling he
could be when he 'looked down his nose like that.
"What could she have to say?" he asked coldly.
"You're the daughter of some old friends, whom I can hardly leave to
spend the night in a freezing cold house when the temperature's already
way down below freezing and still dropping, when my home is less than
half a mile away."
"Maybe your central heating isn't working either," Christy suggested
childishly. What had she been hoping? That he would deny that Amanda
had any right to question his actions?
"Very likely," he agreed coolly. Too coolly for Christy's liking.
"However, unlike you, I took the precaution of making sure that all my
fires were well banked down before I came out."
"So would I have done as well," Christy fired up immediately, 'if you
hadn't practically dragged me off before I could do so. "
Suddenly his face split in a grin she remembered from earlier and far,
far happier times. Crossly she glared at him while he teased, "You
always were a cussed little brat, Christy. It must be something to do
with this red hair." He pushed back the hood of her anorak as he spoke
and gently tugged one of her curls.
Heat rushed through her body and she stepped back from him instantly.
His smile faded, his face shuttered and cold.
"You've got ten minutes to collect together anything that you might
need. What time do you expect your parents back?"
T^e no idea. Originally they would have come home tonight, but Dad
rang and said that they would stay over in view of the weather. "
"Umm, well, if you give me the number, I'll give them a ring and tell
them where you are while you collect your stuff."
This was the old big brother Dominic she remembered from her pre-teens.
She wanted to protest that she was perfectly capable of looking after
herself, but as she looked up her parents' friends' telephone number,
she was already starting to shiver in the chill air.
It didn't take her long to collect what she wanted, and while she was
upstairs she would have liked to have changed out of her damp jeans and
anorak--they had had to get out of the Land Rover twice on the way back
to dig it out, and on both occasions the snow had come over the top of
her Wellington boots--but she didn't want to give Dominic any more
excuse than necessary to criticise her, and criticise her he would if
she kept him waiting, she thought bitterly.
If she was Amanda, he wouldn't be treating her so cavalierly. If she
was Amanda. She punched the old velour dressing-gown she was shoving
into her roll bag with unnecessary vigour and then grimaced to
herself.
If she was Amanda, no doubt she wouldn't be packing serviceable
woollies and dressing-gown, but sheer silk undies and the sort of
nightwear that no woman in her right mind ever wore to keep warm.
He was just replacing the receiver when she went back downstairs.
"Your parents were worried about you. Apparently they tried to ring
this afternoon to check that you were all right. I've explained the
situation to them and your mother said you weren't to worry, and that
they would be back tomorrow after lunch."
So she wasn't to worry, Christy thought grimly as she allowed Dominic
to take her bag and then waited impatiently while he locked the back
door. How was she supposed to feel, forced to spend the night with the
man she loved, knowing how little he desired her? She only hoped that
he gave her a bedroom with a lock on the door, so that she wasn't
tempted to sleepwalk into his bedroom and betray herself completely.
"Oh, I'm not worried at all," she assured him nastily, refusing to
allow him to help her into the Land Rover, 'but Amanda might be if she
knew that the two of us were spending the night together. "
He was right, she was behaving like an absolute brat, she thought
guiltily, watching the angry flush of colour seep up under his skin.
She only hoped that he wouldn't realise that it was sheer jealousy that
was making her so objectionable.
"Spending the night together is hardly the way I would describe our
situation." He practically gritted the words through his teeth,
throwing them over his shoulder at her as he started the engine.
"And even if we were, what possible reason could Amanda or anyone else
have for objecting? We are both, after all, consenting adults, even if
one of us isn't behaving like one."
She had the grace to squirm a little uncomfortably on her seat.
"It's hardly my fault if everyone round here thinks of you and Amanda
as an established couple," she muttered.
One darkly raised eyebrow informed her that he suspected the truth had
been subjected to some imaginative expansion.
"Don't talk rubbish, Christy. It might suit you to believe that I
sublimated my need for Amanda in making love to you in the same way you
sublimated yours for David Galvin, but you won't get me to swallow such
an unappetising lump of fiction simply to sdothe your conscience."
"But you were dating her." Why on earth was she being so stubbornly
persistent? Dominic had turned out into the lane now and she could see
his house up ahead of them in the glare of the headlights.
"Was I? You seem to know more about our relationship than I do," he
said drily.
"I thought we were simply thrown together by force of circumstances."
"But you..."
On the point of reminding him that he had gone to London with the other
girl, she suddenly realised what a dangerous path she was treading and
closed her mouth firmly before she could endanger herself any
further.
"Stop looking for excuses, Christy." His voice was harsh, and edged
with temper.
"What happened between us happened, and I for one don't regret it."
He stopped the Land Rover with a jerk that made it slide forward a few
feet, jolting Christy slightly against her seat belt. As she
straightened her body she could feel her heart pounding like a steam
engine.
"I'm tired of getting the cold-shoulder treatment. I'm sorry if I
wasn't the man you wanted to take your virginity, more sorry than I can
say." He sounded tired now, and guiltily she realised what a strain
the whole afternoon must have been for him.
"If you want me to apologise for making love to you, or to say that I
regret it, I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed."
For the first time since she had known him, he turned his back on her
and got out of the Land Rover without either waiting to help her or
checking that she was following him.
He had reached the door before she realised how cold she was and
managed to stumble after him.
He had switched on the hall light, and its harsh glare illuminated the
tension in his face. He seemed to be waiting for her to say something,
but what could she say? That she didn't regret it either; that . but
no, she couldn't say that, otherwise he might think. What? That she
might welcome his love 7
making again? That she might be agreeable to just that sort of brief
affair she knew would tear her apart?
"Dominic, can't we declare a truce--just for tonight?"
He looked down at her for a long time, his eyes glittering oddly
between the black fringe of his lashes. He was looking at her almost
as though he resented having to do so . almost as though . her
stomach lurched and she touched her tongue to her lips nervously.
"For God's sake, don't do that. Aren't things bad enough as they are,
without you behaving like a provocative..." He broke off and swore as
he saw her face, reaching for her, but it was too late, Christy was
already backing away from him and running out into the freezing
darkness, his words hammering relentlessly against her brain as past
and present met and merged, and she was once again that vulnerable
seventeen- year-old who had gone to him with the gift of her love and
her body, and had been rejected.
"Christy..." She heard him call her name, but it scarcely penetrated
the turmoil of her thoughts. The snow was too thick for her to run,
but she stumbled on, not knowing where she was going, only that she had
to escape.
^ When Dominic grabbed hold of her from behind, she cried out and
turned to push him off, but her feet slipped and she fell backwards
into the thick snow, taking Dominic with her.
His weight crushed the breath from her lungs, the cold sting of the
snow on her face and the shocking awareness of losing her balance
making her shiver convulsively beneath him.
"Christy my God, are you all right?"
She had started to cry, huge, gulping sobs that tore at her throat
until it was raw with pain from trying to drag in lungfuls of icy cold
air. She could feel the warmth of her own tears on her face as Dominic
levered himself up off her.
He picked her up, striding back to the house, carrying her into his
study.
Oh God, if he had brought her to any room but this! Snow clung to her
clothes, but he seemed unaware of it as he sat her in front of the fire
and started to tug off her Wellington boots.
"Christy, I'm sorry ... I'm sorry...1 didn't mean..." His words were a
husky, pleading sound that washed against her ears, without their
meaning really penetrating. She shivered, protesting between sobs as
he pulled off her socks and rubbed her freezing feet.
"Christy, listen to me... It was just my vile, abominable temper. I
never meant..."
She heard him curse and the sound penetrated, her blank eyes focusing
on his face.
"Come on. Let's get you out of these wet things." He spoke to her as
gently as though she was a child, and like a child she sat
lethargically and let him strip her down to her underwear and then wrap
her in a warm towel that he brought down from upstairs.
"You stay here. I'll go and make us both a hot drink."
By the time he came back she had herself under control. When he came
in with two mugs of coffee she said huskily, "I'm sorry, that was a
stupid thing to do."
"We all do stupid things at times." He looked so sombre and drawn that
she yearned to cradle his head against her breast and comfort him.
"It was wonderful.. this afternoon," she said half shyly, searching
for a safe subject for conversation.
"So beautiful ... that perfect baby."
Something in the yearning quality other voice must have reached him
because he said softly, "Would you like children, Christy?"
Only yours. She flushed as she thought she had spoken out loud,
gratefully realising that she hadn't after all.
"Yes ... yes, I would."
His face darkened suddenly. He got up and stared down at her.
"It's no good, I promised myself I wouldn't interfere, but I can't
stand by and see you ruin your life. Think of all that you're giving
up by holding on to your love for David Galvin. He doesn't love you to
the same extent. Surely you must see that. He'll never give you
children, Christy. He already has a wife and family."
She looked at him, curiously warmed by the fire and the coffee,
wondering at the intensity in his voice.
"Have you ever been in love, Dominic?"
He frowned and turned away from her so that his face was in the
shadows.
"Yes..." He sounded terse.
"And.. and did she love you too?" Why on earth was she tormenting
herself like this?
"Once I thought she did." The words seemed to be dragged out of his
throat under fierce pressure.
"But.. but I was wrong."
Some girl in the States, perhaps. Maybe that was even the reason why
he had come home, but she couldn't probe any further; she didn't have
the right, and neither did she have the strength to sit there and
listen to Dominic telling her about the woman he loved.
"I've got some reports to write up; do you mind if I do some work?"
Christy shook her head, watching as he walked over to his desk and sat
down. Within seconds he seemed totally absorbed in what he was doing,
leaving her free to look her fill at him.
He worked for about an hour, but she wasn't bored; The crackle of the
logs and the faint sounds from his desk as he wrote, the fact that she
was here with him--all these things filled her with a pleasure that was
tinged with melancholy. She fell asleep while he was still working,
unaware of the fact that he had put down his pen to come and look
broodingly down at her.
Her towel had slipped, revealing the gleaming curve of her shoulder.
As he bent to tuck the towel round her she woke up.
It was a shock to find him so close.
"Are you still working?"
"No, I've finished now." A faint smile tugged at his mouth.
"You're not my patient--remember? Do you feel hungry? Shall I make us
something to eat?"
She pulled a face and said drowsily, "I seem to have lost my appetite
recently." For a moment he stared at her, and then he tensed.
"My God, Christy, you're not..."
As his hands gripped her shoulders she stared back at him and then
suddenly realised what he thought.
"No... No, I'm not pregnant..."
It was ridiculous to think she had seen disappointment momentarily
darken his eyes, and she told herself that seeing things that weren't
there was a very dangerous symptom.
"When I said that about you being provocative, I didn't mean what you
thought, you know," Dominic said abruptly.
"You mean you weren't trying to remind me that there was a time when I
had been guilty of being extremely provocative? No, I know you
weren't, Dominic. I don't know why I ran off like that ... it all got
too much for me, I suppose." She shivered intensely at the memory of
her own folly.
"Cold?" Dominic's hands rubbed her arms through the towel. Td better
go upstairs and light a fire in one of the bedrooms for you, otherwise
you'll freeze tonight. "
"Only one? What about you?" She felt hot at the stupidity of her
unwary tongue.
To her relief Dominic seemed unaware of the ambiguity of her
question.
She had half expected him to make some taunting remark asking her if
she was inviting him to share a room with her, but instead all he said
was, "Oh, I won't need one. I don't often feel the cold. I seem to be
equipped with my own very efficient central heating. Your bag's in the
hall. Do you want me to bring it in?"
She nodded her head. While he was lighting the fire she could put on
some clothes. Although she hadn't said anything to Dominic, even her
bra was soaked through after her tumble in the snow, and she was
anxious to remove its cold clamminess from her skin.
She waited until she heard his feet on the stairs before slipping out
of the towel and stripping off her damp bra, shivering a little, her
skin still chilled.
She had only brought one change of underwear, so after a moment's
hesitation, she pulled on a thick sweater, hoping that its bulkiness
would disguise the fact that she wasn't wearing a bra underneath it.
The damp one she rolled up with her other discarded clothes and stuffed
in one half of the roll bag before putting on a pleated woollen skirt
of soft olive and yellow checks.
The skirt buttoned up the back, and the thick sweater she was wearing
was in the same olive as the check. It was an outfit she had had for
quite a long time and she was surprised to see Dominic stand just
inside the doorway for what seemed like a long time, simply looking at
her.
"It's snowing again," he told her.
"Will Loma and the baby be all right?" She shivered as she remembered
the cold drive to the remote farm.
"Yes, they'll be fine. Lorna's an experienced mother, don't forget,
and people who live as close to nature as they do know all about
protecting themselves from the elements. It's the city dwellers who
can't cope. If there's a power cut they're marooned without light and
heat in their multi-storey flats. The Thomsons have open fires and
paraffin lanterns."
Almost as though by some freak coincidence, as he spoke the light bulbs
flickered and from outside came the sound of the wind. It flickered
again twice, and then abruptly it was dark.
"That's all we need!"
"Have you got any lanterns?" Christy asked him wryly.
"There are probably some in the cellar, but I'm damned if I'm going to
go down there and risk breaking my neck. We'll have to make do with,
candles."
Candlelight and log fire, it was far, far too intimate, Christy
acknowledged. She could almost feel her mind disintegrating and her
senses taking over.
"Tell me about America?"
Dominic was sitting opposite her, and for a moment as he looked at her
she thought he had guessed how his closeness affected her.
"There isn't much to tell," he began, but nevertheless some of the
stories he told her about his patients were amusing, and as she
listened and laughed she forgot that shared laughter could be as
dangerous as shared silence--perhaps even more so.
They ate supper--a casserole that Dominic had heated and served,
refusing to let Christy do anything--and now as she sat with her
fingers curled round a mug of chocolate she could feel a sleepy
lethargy washing over her. She put down her mug and leaned back in her
chair. She would just close her eyes for a few minutes. Half an hour
later she was still asleep. Dominic bent down to look at her and then
picked her up. She stirred briefly in his arms, burying her head
against him with a *******ed sound of pleasure. His arms tightened and
he frowned.
Upstairs in the room he had prepared for her,
firelight danced on the walls, highlighting the floral trellis pattern
of the old-fashioned wallpaper.
He put her on the bed, and then threw more logs on the fire and walked
back to her. He could hardly let her sleep in her clothes.
Christy woke up as he started to tug off her jumper, clutching it
against herself protestingly.
"Christy, you can't go to bed in it. Come on. Look, I've got your
night things here."
Muzzy with sleep, she tried to remember why it was so important that
Dominic didn't take off her jumper, but it was too much of an effort,
and so she let him pull it off, only remembering why he shouldn't when
she felt the cool rush of air against her naked breasts.
She saw him looking at her and felt the responsive quiver deep down in
her stomach.
It wasn't a surprise when he moved to take her in his arms; part of her
had been waiting for him to touch her all evening . had been waiting
for it and wanting it.
Her lips clung softly to his, her skin delighting in the sensation of
his hands moving hungrily against it.
She could feel his heart thumping and knew that her own echoed its
frantic beat. There was need and hunger in the way that he kissed her,
and she couldn't deny her own response to him.
"Christy, let me stay with you tonight." The words were muffled
against her skin as he tasted the creamy vulnerability of her throat.
"I want you so much."
Ironically, if he hadn't spoken she would have gone with him to hell
and back, but the raw, almost agonised sound of his voice had broken
the delicate spell, and she moved away from him, shivering with too
much tension and emotion.
"I can't."
"Why not?" His voice was thick and tortured.
"Is it because of him?"
His face contorted and she shuddered as she recognised the sexual
jealousy glittering starkly in his eyes.
"You might love him, Christy, but you can't have him. And besides, you
want me."
His hand touched her breast to underline his meaning, the brief
sensation of the pad of his thumb against the taut thrust of her nipple
almost agonising.
"Be with me tonight..."
"No..." The denial was torn from her throat, making it ache. It was
all too much; she couldn't go on pretending any longer.
"You don't understand, Dominic," she told him wretchedly.
"I don't love David, I never have... Oh, he wanted me for a while, just
as he's wanted a dozen or more women, and sexually he's very
attractive, but I've never loved him."
He looked at her hard, but she held his eyes until she saw that he
believed her. If anything he seemed even more tense, and then he said
rawly.
"If you don't love him, then why..."
She didn't let him go on. She was far too wrought up as it was.
"Can't you guess? I don't want to have sex with you, Dominic..."
She saw him flinch back from her feverish words. A dark tide of colour
burned up under his skin, and he looked almost as wretched as she
felt.
"I can't go to bed with you, Dominic; I can't involve myself in a brief
affair with you, because it would tear me apart. I love you too
much."
There, it was said. He would leave her alone now. She turned away
from him, waiting to hear the sound of the door closing behind him.
Dominic had his own code of honour; now that he knew the truth he would
understand, and so she waited, tense and frighteningly close to the
edge of her self-control.
When he touched her she flinched almost as much as he had done earlier,
but his grip compelled her to turn round and look at him.
"Let me get this straight." He was speaking slowly, breathing heavily
as though fighting to control a huge inner rage.
"You won't make love with me because you love meT For the first time in
her life she was frightened of him. He wasn't reacting the way she had
expected. He looked angry, violently, dangerously angry, and he was
looking at her in a way that made her skin crawl with fear.
"Is that what you're saying?"
He shook her and she tensed beneath his hand. It was too late to lie
now.
"Yes."
He released her so unexpectedly that she fell back against the bed,
watching him with nervous eyes. He was staring up at the ceiling,
swallowing hard.
"I don't believe this." His voice was flat and hard.
"Why do you think I made love with you in the first place?" Her voice
was nowhere near as self-controlled as his had been.
"It certainly wasn't because of anything to do with David."
"All these years I've fought against coming back.. told myself that
what you felt for me was just an adolescent's emotion. I kept in touch
with your parents, hoarding every little nugget of information I got
from them. I thought you were happy in London--the career woman who
put her job first and her lovers second. I tried every way I knew to
forget you, and to stop myself from going mad because I'd fallen in
love with a child of seventeen. Have you any idea what that does to a
man? It made me feel like some sort of pervert. It got so bad that I
couldn't trust myself alone with you. What in God's name made you
think that all I wanted was a cheap affair?"
She was almost too stunned to speak.
"I... You only said that you wanted me...1 thought it was just sex..
When I mentioned
Amanda you said she was looking for a husband, and implied that you
weren't interested. "
"Of course I damned well wasn't! There's only ever been one woman I've
wanted to marry, and that's you."
He reached for her, dragging her into his arms, his voice muffled
against her.
"Christy.. when I think how close we've just come to losing each
other... Tonight when you said you didn't want me..." He broke of,
gripping her tightly.
"I couldn't bear to make love with you. I was terrified of what I
might reveal. Did you really love me all those years ago?" She
couldn't believe it.
His smile was slightly crooked.
"Want me to show you how much?" He laughed softly at her expression.
"When you were seventeen I was twenty-five, plenty old enough to know
what I wanted from life, and old enough to be terrified of the way I
felt. One of the reasons I went to the States was that I felt I
couldn't trust myself not to manipulate you into a relationship you
weren't really ready for. It would have been all too easy to take
advantage of your adolescent feelings for me and to persuade you into
marriage, and I knew that wouldn't be right."
His thumb stroked the softness of her lower lip and she caught it in
her teeth, biting it gently, her eyes widening as she caught his
harshly indrawn breath.
"The first thing I'm going to do when this snow lets us out of here is
to get us a special licence," he told her huskily.
It was her turn to laugh, a confident, happy sound, knowing that he
loved her.
"And until then?" she teased.
"When I asked you this afternoon if you were pregnant, I was secretly
hoping that you might be. Then you would have had to marry me, or so I
told myself, and I'm afraid a rather base male instinct still makes me
feel that it would be a very good way of making sure that you can't run
away from me."
Dominic's child. Emotion quivered through her, and she held out her
arms to him.
"Stay with me tonight," she whispered against his ear.
"We've already spent far too many nights apart."
"Are you sure that this is really what you want?" She could see the
tension in his eyes as he waited for her response.
"I'm sure."
Christy moved her mouth to his, kissing him slowly, savouring the taste
and texture of him.
Against the provocatively lazy movement of her lips he muttered, "If
you keep on doing that, you're going to get yourself in an awful lot of
trouble."
Suppressing the bubble of laughter welling up inside her, Christy
reponded softly, "Mmm, do you know, that was exactly what I had in
mind."
22-11-07, 05:41 PM
Chapter Nine
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العرض العادي
