[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
'Laurie you'll let me make love to you?' he whispered wonderingly.
'Because somehow, right now, that seems more important than
anything else in the world.'
'Yes.' Her reply was a whisper, too. She met his eyes, her own
unafraid, unashamed, her desire as strong as his.
She wanted to give him these moments of tenderness, impose them
upon the black scenes he had described that she knew haunted him
still. She wanted to do this because she loved him. She knew it
with a singing certainty. And because she loved him this was right,
good.
She pulled his head down to her breast and softly ran her lips along
the scar that marred the springy hairline at his brow, moving down to
his temple, his ear, her teeth gently exploring its lobe. His response
was instantaneous, electrified. He covered her face and neck with
kisses that seemed to sear her flesh.
From that moment there was no going back for either of them; in her
consciousness nothing but the agony of need, the passion riding them
both unendurable. And at last, heady with sensation, warm sun their
only cover, birdsong their lullaby, locked in each other's arms they
slept in satisfied oblivion.
CHAPTER SIX
IT was a cloud passing across the face of the sun, the sudden
springing up of a chill little breeze, that woke Laurie, and for a
drowsy moment she could not think what she was doing here. Then
she remembered, and the warmth of joyful recollection curled
ecstatically through her. Curtis had made love to her. She loved him.
It didn't occur to her to wonder how he felt towards her. Their
coming together, she thought, had expressed their emotions beyond
all the capability of words.
Languorously, she turned her head to look at him where he lay beside
her, still in a deep sleep sleep that had erased the lines of strain
brought to his face by the retelling of his close brush with death. He
lay on his side facing her, one outflung arm still beneath her neck, his
free hand limply relaxed on the ground between them.
Laurie had often wondered how a woman felt after the first physical
intimacy with the man she loved, and now she knew. To her there
was no shame in what they had done, because she loved, because out
of that love she had wanted to give. And looking at Curtis, her eyes
drinking in his powerful, muscular beauty, she exulted in the
knowledge of how good it had been between them. It was good too,
to know that Curtis had desired her, but best of all to know that for a
short while at least, their loving had released him from his inner
nightmares.
Such reflections served to rekindle sensations her body had newly
discovered, and with a little incoherent murmur she crept closer to
him, her hand running over the roughness of his broad chest, her lips
following their path. As she pressed herself against him, she felt a
response stir in his body even before he jerked fully awake.
Then his dark eyes were on hers, questioning, as hers had done in the
first moment of awakening, the reality of their situation.
'Oh God!' he groaned. 'What have we... what have I done?' As though
shocked into full wakefulness he sat bolt upright, running distracted
hands through his dishevelled hair.
'We've done nothing to be ashamed of.' Her husky voice, deepened
by feeling, recalled his gaze to her radiant face, the unmistakable
light of tenderness in her green eyes.
'Oh God!' he groaned again. The women he'd known in the past had
always been aware of the rules of the game, no strings, no pain. But
this girl, with her shining innocence, her mother-earth bounty ...
'Laurie, I'm sorry. This should never have happened. I never intended
that it should believe me.'
The lovelight faded from her eyes, her shapely mouth trembled into
uncertain speech.
'Wh-why not?'
'Because ...' he stood up and turned his back '... because you're what
you are and I'm what I am.' Then, with more coherence, 'Why didn't
you tell me, dammit, that you hadn't that you were a virgin?'
'I thought you knew,' she said simply.
'No! It never occurred to me that at your age ... You've had
menfriends, you were engaged to be married, even though it didn't
last long.' A sudden thought seemed to strike him. 'Why did you
break it off, Laurie?'
'I thought perhaps you knew that, too,' she told him tremulously.
'Oh, my God!' He stared at her, seeking the truth behind the words,
and finding it. 'Get dressed!' he told her savagely.
Silently Laurie obeyed him, sick with a pain that seemed to constrict
her heart, drying her mouth so that, her tongue cleaved to its roof.
She was hurt. She couldn't understand his sudden brusque coldness,
such a total reversal of his earlier manner towards her before... But
perhaps now he despised her ready giving of herself, not realising
that it had been only because she loved him. She'd thought that today,
at last, she had begun to know him, to understand him, but it seemed
there were many more undiscovered facets to his nature.
'Why are you so angry with me?' she managed to croak. 'I thought
you wanted ...?'
'I did. I'm not angry just with you, dammit! Though I ought to be.
You shouldn't have let me, should have told me ...' He swung round
to face her. 'I'm angry with myself because I suppose I should have
guessed, should have known better. Because I told you before
you're not the type I ...'
'Not the type of woman you usually make love to,' she said drearily.
'All right, I know.' She was on her feet now, buttoning her dress with
fingers that trembled, fingers that felt cold despite the lingering
warmth of a setting sun. 'But I thought perhaps you'd changed your
mind, that I ... What's wrong with me?' It was a desperate, piteous,
heartfelt cry that she would have snatched back if she could.
'Laurie! Laurie!' As though in spite of himself, he moved towards
her, hands outstretched. 'Believe me. There's nothing wrong with
you you're ...'
'Don't touch me!' She shrank from him. She couldn't trust herself. If
he touched her now she knew she would throw herself into his arms,
beg him to hold her again, to say that he loved her, when it was
obvious he didn't, or he wouldn't be standing there, wearing that
scowling disguise that hid the passionate lover he had been moments
since.
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]