Devil and the Deep Sea (13 page)

course, be imagined.'

'Of course,' Samma echoed dazedly, then straightened, as she heard

the sound of voices approaching. The coffee, it seemed, was

arriving.

'Elvire,' Solange pounced at the table, 'Madame has drawn this

picture of me. It is good,
hein?'

'Excellent.' Elvire arranged the coffee things with minute care,

having greeted Liliane Duvalle with politeness rather than warmth.

'Madame has many talents, that is clear.' She gave Samma a bland

look. 'Will Roche be returning for lunch?'

'I'm not quite sure.' Samma's hands gripped together in her lap, out

of sight under the table. She thought savagely—Why didn't you ask

him yourself, when he climbed out of your bed this morning?

'And that is not all.' Solange snatched up her doll. 'See, Tante

Liliane?'

'But how charming.' Liliane Duvalle studied the doll with interest.

'And how clever of your
belle-mere
to find you a doll that looks

like herself. You see the hair—and the colour of the eyes?'

With a sinking heart, Samma saw the animation fade from Solange's

expression, as if a new and unpleasant thought had come to her.

'I—suppose,' the little girl said at last, colourlessly, and made no

attempt to reclaim her toy. It was obvious that a chance

resemblance, which had escaped Samma completely, had spoiled

the gift for her.

And put me back at square one, Samma thought, sighing inwardly

as she poured the coffee.

Liliane, aware she'd been tactless, hurried into speech. 'So you are

also an artist. Do you accept commissions?'

'Not exactly,' Samma said warily.

'You should paint Elvire. She is like the portraits of the ladies in the

house, only more beautiful,' Solange put in unexpectedly.

Samma felt a dismayed flush rise in her face, and saw it echoed, to

her surprise, in Elvire's own heightened colour.

Elvire said sharply, 'That is nonsense, Solange,' and walked away,

back to the house.

So she can actually be embarrassed, Samma thought. Amazing!

But at least she knew now how Roche and his mistress had met.

She'd come to Belmanoir to act as watchdog for his alcoholic wife.

Samma wondered with a pang if the
affaire
had begun while

Marie-Christine was still alive, and whether the knowledge of it had

driven her towards the final tragedy. The thought made her shiver.

Conversation over coffee proved desultory, and Samma wasn't

sorry when Liliane Duvalle excused herself afterwards, on the

grounds that she had work to do.

'My little book, which Roche hates so much,' she said with a little

laugh. 'Perhaps you would care to read some time what I have

completed so far—learn a little about the past of this family that has

become your own.'

'Thank you,' Samma said politely. But she knew she wouldn't be

taking Madame Duvalle up on her offer. I'm not a Delacroix, and I

never will be, she thought. I'm just an imposter here. Another

unwanted wife.

And definitely an unwanted stepmother. Samma was aware of

Solange watching her, with a kind of quietly hostile speculation.

And she made no attempt to touch her doll, lying half dressed and

face-down beside the lounger.

She sighed inwardly. She couldn't blame Solange for being so

prickly. She'd had a raw deal out of life, so far. A father who

virtually ignored her, and a mother who drank. No wonder she'd

lashed out at all well-meaning attempts to provide her with

companionship. And, each time she'd succeeded in driving one of

her companions away, it must have reinforced her doubts about her

own lovableness, Samma thought with a swift ache of her heart.

Whatever pranks she'd played must have been some kind of test,

which no one had ever passed. Or not until now.

She longed to put her arms round Solange, and reassure her in some

way, but she knew it was too soon, that they might never, in the

year she'd been allowed, achieve such terms of intimacy. The

person best able to help Solange was her father, she thought

restlessly, but was he prepared to do it? Or was Solange, perhaps,

an all too potent reminder of the wife he'd hated?

Samma shivered. Because suddenly, frighteningly, she understood

only too well the desperation which must have driven

Marie-Christine when she finally realised Roche would never be

hers. Perhaps, to her fuddled mind, life without him would have

seemed just another form of eternal darkness.

Oh, God—that's how I could feel—only too easily, she thought.

And knew with a pain too deep for words that it was already too

late.

SAMMA hauled herself out of the pool, and reached for a towel,

blotting the water from her shoulders and arms, and wringing the

excess moisture from her hair.

Her swim had refreshed her physically, but not mentally. She was

still reeling from the implications of that unheralded, unwanted

self-revelation.

She couldn't have fallen in love with Roche Delacroix! Common

sense, logic and even decency all legislated against it. She knew so

terrifyingly little about him, she thought. The only certainty was that

he was quite cynically prepared to exploit her for his own purposes,

and made no bones about doing so.

But as a man, and certainly as her husband, he remained an enigma.

She sighed as she walked back to the table. It was proving to be a

long and disturbing day, and, as an exercise in togetherness for

Solange and herself, it had to be marked down as a dismal failure.

The child had barely addressed a remark to her over the delicious

fruit-filled salad they had shared for lunch, or afterwards.

Now she was sitting, staring down at her portrait-sketch, her brows

drawn together.

'Do you like drawing?' Samma prepared herself for another

monosyllabic answer.

'I do not make very good pictures.' Solange hesitated, then pushed

the sketching-block towards Samma. 'Draw Papa.'

'I already did,' Samma said wryly. 'And it wasn't a great success.'

'Well, draw Tante Liliane.'

Well, it was something, Samma thought, as she tried to comply, but

even after several attempts Madame Duvalle's likeness failed to

transpire. As she scrunched up yet another page, a shadow fell

across her.

Roche said, 'Employing your dubious talents,
ma belle?

Samma looked up with a startled, indrawn breath, aware her skin

was tingling suddenly at his proximity. She said inanely, 'I—I

wasn't expecting to see you.'

'Evidemment,
' he agreed drily, his brows lifting slightly as he

regarded her. 'Yet, here I am.'

'Papa!' Solange ran to him. 'Look—Madame has done a picture of

me. I look very different,
hem?'

'Very different indeed,
petite.
' Roche's face softened as he looked

down at her. He tweaked one of her braid?. 'Perhaps it is time we

carried the difference into real life. Go up to the house, and Elvire

will take you to the hairdresser in St Laurent.'

'Oh!' Solange digested this. 'And may 1 have my hair cut to look

like this?' She held up the sketch.

He smiled. 'Take your portrait with you,
cherie,
so that you can

show the
coiffeuse
exactly what you want.'

Solange needed no further bidding, her thin legs galvanised into a

sprint as she made off, shouting excitedly for Elvire.

Samma pushed the sketching-block away, aware that her hands

were shaking. It was just shock, she told herself defensively. She'd

expected him to be away all day, and yet here he was in the early

afternoon, and, judging by the fact that he was wearing only brief

swimming trunks, and carrying a towel slung over one bronzed

shoulder, with every intention of remaining.

She hurried into speech. 'Thank you for remembering about her

hair. You—you didn't waste any time.'

He gave her a level look. 'You don't think so? Yet at times, I think I

have wasted a great deal.'

She wasn't sure what he meant, but she wasn't going to hang around

and find out, she thought confusedly. She said, 'Well, if Solange is

going to St Laurent, I may as well go, too.'

'No.' Roche was smiling, but his tone was definite. 'I prefer,
ma

jemme,
that you stay here with me. I did not complete my morning's

work in record time in order to spend the rest of the day alone.' His

mouth twisted. 'Everyone was most co-operative when I explained I

was on honeymoon.'

'But you aren't—we're not.' She took a deep breath. 'You seem to

have forgotten—last night.'

'Not at all,' he said calmly. 'As you see, this time I have ensured we

will not be interrupted.'

But that wasn't what she'd meant at all, she thought swallowing. She

said breathlessly, 'I—I think I'll go for a swim.'

'You have been for one.' He reached out, and coiled a tendril of

damp blonde hair round an exploring finger. His other hand slid

down over her shoulder. 'Now, you should sunbathe a little. With

me.'

As if she was in a dream, Samma watched him remove the long,

padded cushions from the loungers, and arrange them deftly on the

tiled floor.

Then he held out a hand to her.
'Alors, ma belle.'
He was still

smiling, but there was a purpose in his face which would not be

denied.

Still in that dream, Samma felt her hand taken, herself drawn down

beside him on to the softness of the cushions, while a voice in her

head whispered, this can't be happening—it can't . . .

Yet it was. She lay in the circle of his arms, her body taut, the long

sweep of her lashes veiling her eyes in what, it seemed, would soon

be the only defence left to her. And felt, with a shock that pierced

her inmost being, the first slow brush of his lips on her skin.

He was gentle, almost tender, his mouth making few demands as he

explored the planes and contours of her face and throat with a slow,

lingering pleasure he made no attempt to disguise.

Gradually, almost in spite of herself, Samma began to relax. The

heat of the sun pouring down on them was nothing compared with

the sweet, insidious warmth inside her which his caresses were

engendering, as his lean, supple fingers soothed her, stroking lazily

over her shoulders and back.

He drew her closer still, taking her hands and placing them on his

bare chest, letting her feel through her fingertips the hard, steady

beat of his heart.

He said softly, 'You think our marriage is not real,
mignonne.
Well,

I am real. And—so is this . . .'

His mouth took hers with breathtaking emphasis. Samma's lips

parted, half in surprise, half in involuntary response to the frank

sensuality of this new invasion. Her hands stole shyly round his

neck to tangle in his dark hair and hold him closer, while his own

arms tightened round her in fierce reply.

That first time on
Allegra,
she thought, she'd had a hint of what

passion could be. But she hadn't known even a fraction if it . . .

Roche kissed the line of her jaw, the soft pink recess of her ear,

gently nibbling its lobe. His mouth travelled downwards, tracing the

column of her throat, skimming lightly over the hollows and lines of

shoulder and collarbone to where the first soft curves of her breasts

had escaped the chaste restraint of the
maillot.

He lifted his head, a faint smile curving his mouth as he studied the

swimsuit's austere lines. His fingers slid under' the straps, propelling

them off her shoulders and down, and Samma gasped, snatching at

the slipping fabric.

'No—please.'

'Yes.' In spite of his amusement, he was inexorable. 'You are too

lovely,
ma belle
, to spend our private hours together hiding under

unnecessary covering.' He bent and touched his mouth to the

sunwarmed curve of her shoulder. 'You are like honey,' he

murmured. 'Does all of you taste as sweet, I wonder?'

'You—you mustn't . . .' She barely recognised her own voice.

He shook his head, slowly. 'You are wrong.' His tongue flickered

sensuously across the swollen contour of her lower lip. 'Because I

must . . .'

His mouth fastened on hers in deep, insistent demand as his hands

slid down her body, sweeping away the despised
maillot
with total

determination.

Samma cried out in protest, and tried to cover herself with her