Torn (36 page)

‘Perhaps you can just drop me off at my house and I'll get a taxi over in the morning to collect Rory, or even walk if I'm feeling energetic,' Jessica said, after they'd been travelling for a while.

There was a brief silence as James digested this. ‘I thought … I'm sure Gilda's expecting you to stop over. It's not like you haven't done it before. We already know we don't recoil in horror at the sight of each other first thing in the morning? Or … perhaps I should amend that. I don't actually know whether you were secretly revolted by the sight of me, sans combed hair, sans application of razor to cheek … but I certainly didn't recoil at the sight of you
sans maquillage
.'

‘Well thank you kindly, sir, how gallantly put.'

‘I don't do gallantry. You'll have a long wait if you're expecting it from me. Feminism has lost women that privilege.'

‘What would you say if I told you I'm not a feminist?'

He laughed. ‘Rubbish! You might not be hardcore, but you're still a feminist.'

‘And is there anything wrong with that?'

‘Absolutely not. Only right and proper this day and age.'

‘You weren't quite so broadminded over the Wendy house?'

‘Ah! The Wendy house. That sounded like a typical bit of Sheila Jordan social engineering and indoctrination, and I'm afraid I lost my temper. I've a tendency to be … very forthright when I'm cross.'

‘Like when you found me and Rory walking on Spine Hill.'

‘You were bloody trespassing!'

‘Hardly the crime of the century?'

‘Look, I've told you already there's sometimes shooting on the hill. Apart from which I was already in a bad mood that day. As far as I knew you were a hippy slapper and her bastard sprog, looking for a likely place to set up your tepee!'

A silence fell while the dark hedgerows and trees of Warwickshire became the hedgerows and trees of Gloucestershire. Throughout the day her feelings towards him had softened considerably. But his response suddenly recalled for her why she'd questioned coming on this outing. The man was a bigot. Funny really. He didn't know he'd shared his day with, and spent money on, a woman he would label ‘slapper', not to mention ‘the mother of a bastard sprog'.

‘Have I said something to offend you?' He sighed. ‘Yes. Of course I have. I've been slagging off your chums, haven't I? The first two people you had to make friends with when you arrived in town were Sheila Jordan and a member of the hippy community!'

‘They're not hippies. They're new-agers if you have to lump them all together as if they're homogeneous.'

‘OK. OK. OK.' he muttered, as if weary of the subject. In the warm afterglow of their day together she had wanted to keep him company. Now she realised there was absolutely no point in talking to a man so mired in prejudice. Jessica rested her head back and closed her eyes. Sleep would be a welcome escape.

The car rattled over the cattle grid at the farm gate. ‘Jessica. Jess,' he whispered. ‘We're at the farm. Do you want to come in for a night-cap?'

Their conversation just before she fell asleep had faded to a blur but, drowsy though she was, she'd no trouble recalling the small sitting room with the big squashy armchairs, the log fire, and his liberal way with cognac.

Chapter Twenty-two

A large log smouldered gently. Jessica moved the fire-guard aside and knelt by the hearth. She rolled the log back with the poker and threw in a handful of kindling.

‘Hey? What are you up to, Cinders?'

‘Just giving the fire a bit of encouragement.' Jess tipped her head towards the bottle and two balloon glasses on the small table next to the arm chair. ‘Seems Gilda was expecting me.'

‘And she's made a room up ready for you,' he said, as he selected a CD. ‘Good old Ma. What would I do without her?'

‘You two get along well?'

‘Hmm. She drives me demented. Behaves like the lady of the manor, tries to run my life, treats me like another four year old. But she literally saved my life after Serena. Don't know what I'd have done if she hadn't thrown her lot in with me here. And I'm profoundly grateful.' He poured two generous measures of the Rémy Martin. ‘Before I drink this we'd better establish whether I'm driving you home.'

It would be so much easier to stay. And even though she'd slept badly the last time she'd spent the night in it, there was no competition between the spare bed here and her own at home.

‘OK. I'll stay. It'll be easier all round.'

He sat down with a relieved sigh. After a while she relaxed back against his chair, resting her elbow over his knees.

‘What's the music?'

‘Miles Davis … 
Kind of Blue
.'

The classic jazz wrapped around them intimately. The fire crackled and spat; the log settled. The resiny smell of wood-smoke mixed with the deceptively smooth cognac fumes in her mouth and nose. Soon her head had dipped against her arm as she watched the licking, flaring flames. The only time she lifted her head was to sip the drink. Time passed and she emptied the balloon. He took it from her unresisting hand and poured another from the bottle next to him. The record finished but he didn't move.

‘Jessica?'

‘Mmm?'

She felt his finger trace the curve of her neck. He stroked his hand over her short cropped hair, down to the nape and on to her shoulder. ‘Jessica, are you happy?'

‘Funny question? If you mean this moment, the answer is yes. But happy in general? I don't know.'

‘Why not?'

‘When I moved down here I thought it was all I needed to be happy. I had escaped my relationship. I felt safe and secure in my little house. I was independent and living in a beautiful stretch of countryside. But life is never so straightforward, is it? The required elements are in position so why do I still feel dissatisfied, guilty, unsettled?'

‘You'll eventually buy a place, won't you?'

‘That's the idea, though I've not really been looking.'

‘Then that's why you feel unsettled. You know you'll be moving again.'

‘Perhaps. But I'm afraid it's just me, never satisfied with what I have. Always looking for something … other.'

‘Part of being human … not a swan.'

She smiled, turning her head back to look up at him. ‘You're not happy, are you?'

He shook his head slowly. ‘Like you said, life is never straightforward.'

‘After what happened to you, unalloyed happiness would be a lot to expect.'

‘I don't expect it. Of course there's a generalised sadness about Serena's death which is with me most of the time … the manner and suddenness of it still hurts … but I'm not grieving now. It's anger more than grief which has consumed me, anger, guilt, resentment, a sense of powerlessness.'

‘Why do you feel guilty?'

‘Why do you?'

If the only way to elicit an answer to her question was to answer his first then Jessica was stumped. She felt guilty about Danny. But even if James suspected it, there was no way she was going to confess it to him.

She turned her head back and stared into the flames. A log creaked and settled. Tiny fiery lights flared then died, then reappeared, as if moving over the sooty fireback. These were the fire-fairies of childhood first described to Jess by her godmother – the only person she then knew who had an open fire, or who lived in a real cottage. Those visits to the countryside had been magical to her, like an evocation of the stories she loved where elves lived in toadstools and fairies danced in rings.

Further silent minutes passed. At length the hand, which still rested on her shoulder, began to move again, this time sliding down her arm as he leant forward. His fingers threaded into her hand, and she felt the slight ruffle of his breath just ahead of the pressure of his lips against the side of her neck. From the point of imprint a warm syrupy languor spread outwards slowly, heavily, oozing through her blood. She curled her fingers around his and deliberately stretched her neck, allowing greater access. She felt the brush of his lips back and forward over her skin, and the gentle, almost experimental touch of his tongue, before he straightened.

Jess turned her head to look up at him again.

‘I'm sorry,' he said. ‘It's been a long time since I've been exposed to that kind of temptation.'

‘No need to apologise. If I hadn't liked it, believe me, I'd have told you so.'

‘I'm sure you would.'

‘As for temptation, what about all those nights in London?'

‘Not the same thing at all. That was mechanical.' He was looking down into her upturned face, his mouth compressed, dark brows drawn together.

To lighten the moment, she said, ‘You look very serious.'

‘I feel serious.'

She felt vulnerable and exposed in this position, unnerved by the intensity of his gaze as it travelled the short distances from her mouth to her eyes to her hair then back again. Jess made as if to turn her head away but his hand against the side of her face prevented her. There was a short sigh, and in the whispered breath of it, she thought she heard, ‘Oh, shit,' as his face moved down towards hers. Consideration of whether or not this was a good idea became instantly redundant.

A first kiss which plunged too rapidly into the sloppy mash of tongue wrestling could be a complete turn-off. This experience was entirely different. At the instinctive level her response kicked in with a rush of pleasure. On the rational level her brain registered nothing but the taste of him, the feel of his mouth moving over hers, the slide of his tongue between her lips, between her teeth. This all-consuming sensation could go on and on …

But he pulled back abruptly. ‘I'm sorry,' he whispered breathlessly.

‘Stop bloody apologising.' Needing no more hint than his open-armed gesture she scrambled up from the floor and in the next moment was in his lap, her arms around his neck. From that moment every inch of the other's face was an open canvas to kisses, soft nibbles, and licks; his lips on her eyelids, her ear, her nose – hers on his cheek, on his brow, on his chin. But they returned, mouths coming together again and again, for that particular and exquisite exploration. And this time her mouth was as fervent as his.

Eventually they broke apart and simply stared at one another. Stunned surprise mixed with desire and doubt in his face. He blinked hard several times as if needing to clear his brain. She waited, head buzzing, for her heart to stop rattling in her chest.

‘What's happened?' he eventually managed. Jessica, still in his lap, still with her arms about his neck had begun to recover her composure.

‘Do you think it might mean we fancy each other?'

‘I'd just about managed to work that much out. What I meant was … I never planned … I didn't expect this?'

‘Good! I'm lousy at doing what's expected of m –'

But his face dipped towards hers again and her reply was effectively stopped.

When Jessica saw the state of his bedroom it was easy to believe that he'd made no assumptions about the way the evening might end. He'd surely not planned to bring a woman back to this? It was not a very large room, so the clothes flung about on the floor, on the rumpled duvet and across the bedside chair, plus the newspapers and books dropped randomly on the carpet beside the double bed were enough to make it look untidy. But, in addition to this disarray, every surface in the room was cluttered. There were pens, handfuls of change, opened letters and scraps of paper covered in notes and hand-drawn plans, plus bits of wire, an electric plug, a screwdriver, scissors, and other DIY bits and pieces scattered around the room. They'd stumbled up the stairs whispering, giggling, kissing; they'd almost fallen into the shadowed room, eyes closed, mouths and bodies glued together. When he roused himself sufficiently to switch on the light they stood in silence for a moment contemplating the ravages of his bedroom. She leant back against the wall and slid down it, laughing.

‘Ssssh!' he admonished her. ‘We don't want the kids waking up!'

‘Looks like the room's been ransacked!'

‘I couldn't decide what to wear this morning,' he said, quickly gathering up the shirts, jeans, chinos, and sweaters and flinging them into the corner. Socks and boxers he stuffed into a laundry basket. That his self-confidence was assailable, and that he was willing to admit as much, was touching. Jessica hadn't had him down as a man who cared much about the impression he made.

‘I'm not usually this untidy.'

She was still sitting on the floor beneath the light switch, smiling.

‘I believe you.'

He took hold of her hands and lifted her up, drawing her back into a close embrace.

‘Oh, Jess,' he mumbled against her neck. ‘What have you done to me? You must be a witch! You put some magic potion in my glass when I wasn't looking.' As he began to kiss and lick her throat, her head arched back against the light switch; it clicked off again. His hand covered her breast.

Soon she was lying flat on her back looking up dreamily at the dark ceiling. Her limbs were heavy, her brain fuddled with alcohol and lust. And James knelt above her on the bed, swearing softly as he fumbled to open the many fastenings down the front of her button through dress. It was easier, somehow, to leave it to him. That way none of this was her fault. She'd had nothing whatsoever to do with it. It was all his idea.

I am like a half unpeeled banana, lying on its skin, she thought, while recalling that this banana was in white lace underwear. He stooped down with a sigh and she closed her eyes, utterly confident that this was a man who would know what he was doing. He held each breast gently as the tip of his tongue delicately rolled and lapped the nipple through the lace. The sensation was entirely novel and intensely exciting. She could feel the warmth and the wetness, but also the slight abrasion of the lacy fabric as his tongue circled the nipple. The sensation intensified considerably when he began to suck.