Part 3 (2/2)

”Stay right there,” he told her as he reached for his towel and secured it around his body.

The phone was in his bedroom and, as he walked out of the room to answer it, Nicola could hardly believe her luck. Another few seconds. She shuddered from head to foot, reliving the shocking moment when his towel had slipped and she had seen--She swallowed sickly. And if that had not been bad enough, when he had taken her hand and actually placed it on his body . on that part of him. She could hear the muted sound of his voice in another room. Her clothes were on a chair by the window, and she realised suddenly that here was her chance to escape.

She got out of the bed, frantically pulling on her clothes, her heart racing, her body tensing every time she beard him stop speaking. But then he would start again, and eventually she was dressed and on her way to the door.

It took her several precious seconds to find the main door to what she realised was a flat and, when she did find it, it took her several more to negotiate the complicated locking system; but at last she was safely on the other side and in a small foyer off which several other doors opened. Ahead of her lay a lift and a flight of stairs. She opted for the stairs, hurrying down them, relieved to discover she was only one floor above ground level.

The commissionaire in the foyer gave her a startled glance when she almost ran past his desk and through the main doors.

Outside it was a clear bright morning. She was, she recognised, in a suburb of the city which she vaguely remembered having travelled through on several occasions with her father.

Fortunately she had money in her handbag, and she could see a bus stop not far away. She could also see a bus approaching it, and, ignoring the angry protest of the motorist she ran in front of, she raced across the road, jumping on to the bus just as it was about to pull away.

”Dangerous thing to do that, miss,” the conductor told her disapprovingly as she paid her fare.

She started to laugh then, a high-pitched, almost hysterical laugh that caused the conductor to frown and then shrug his shoulders. These teenagers . all of them on drugs and what have you. Who could make any sense of what any of them did?

It took Nicola three days to decide that she had had enough. She endured Jonathon's taunts and goads about what had happened after she had disappeared with MH--as he referred to the man she only knew as Matt, and about whom she wished to know absolutely nothing more whatsoever--for as long as she could, and then finally, when he had accosted her in the corridor just once too often, demanding to know what had happened, and sneeringly asking her if she thought she was going to be able to keep a man like MH interested in her, she finally snapped.

The oddest thing about the whole affair was that, from the moment she had seen Jonathon on the morning after the party, she had experienced such a sense of revulsion towards him that she couldn't understand how she had ever even thought him mildly attractive, never mind wanted him enough to have behaved in such an appallingly stupid fas.h.i.+on.

Just how appallingly and stupidly she had behaved was something she could not bear to think about at all. Every time she recalled waking up in his bed . every time she remembered how he had touched her. kissed her . how he had made her touch him . how he had intimated that during the night they had been lovers not once but several times, she felt physically sick . was physically sick--at least, on the first day.

That had been another cause of guilt and anxiety. The rhythms of her body--normally so regular and orderly--quite obviously disrupted by the stress she was under, had even caused her to think for a few dreadful, agonising days that she might actually be pregnant.

Once she knew she was not, she vowed that never, ever again would she behave in such a way . that never, ever again would she try to change herself, to pretend she she was something she wasn't. And then sickeningly she realised that that was exactly what she was going to have to do, because she could not now go back to being the girl she had once been. She could not now have the same self-respect, the same belief and faith in herself. She was, she decided hollowly, a fallen woman and, as such, thoroughly deserving of any decent man's contempt and disdain. After what she had done it was no wonder that Jonathon and his ilk should a.s.sume that she was ready and willing to indulge in casual, meaningless s.e.x.

If men treated her with disrespect and saw her as s.e.xually available, then she had no one to blame but herself. She saw clearly now just what her impulsive behaviour had led her to. How long would it be before Jonathon would hear from Matt's own lips confirmation of all that he had said to her? She gave a deep shudder. She felt so . so filled with self-loathing and disgust, so deeply ashamed of herself.

City life wasn't for her, she decided miserably. All she wanted to do now was to go home where she could feel safe, where there would be no Jonathon, no Matt. where she could put what had happened behind her where she could start rebuilding her life in such a way as would ensure that never again would any man ever be able to claim as Matt had--and could--that she had had casual s.e.x with him . where no man could insult her with the insinuations that Jonathon had been making these past few days.

By the end of the week she had given in her notice, and long, long before Matt was back from New York she had left the city and was back at home.

He made enquiries, of course. Despite the complexity of the business negotiations, he had been involved in in New York, he had still found time to worry about her and to wish she had not rushed out of the flat before he had had a chance to explain what had really happened.

He pictured her worrying herself sick about the entire episode, trying frantically to remember what had actually happened. He remembered the look on her face when he had taken her hand and placed it on his body, and cursed himself for having done so.

When he did get back one of the first things he did was get in touch with Mathieson and Hendry.

In response to his carefully casual enquiry he was told that the girl in question was no longer with the company and had returned to her parents in the country, without leaving any forwarding address.

He told himself that there was really no reason for him to make any further enquiries; she had obviously learned the lesson he had wanted to teach her. He had been gone for over a month, long enough for her to have realised that there were going to be no permanent consequences from their supposed night together.

About the effect on her when she eventually discovered that she had not, as she supposed, had a lover, but was, in fact, still a virgin, he preferred not to think; pursuing her into the country to enlighten her on that point was something he didn't really think it would be wise to do, more for his own sake than for hers. He winced a little, remembering how his body had reacted to her. It had been a long time since he had last had a serious relations.h.i.+p. perhaps too long. And as for the girl--Nicki--well, with a bit of luck she would have realised by now the dangers of the way she had behaved.

He smiled a little grimly to himself, reflecting wryly that, although she herself might not believe it, he had acted in her best interests.

He remembered the look' on her face when he had kissed her . how she had felt--and then he stopped himself. There were, after all, some avenues in life which it was wiser not to go down . because they led nowhere . or because they led somewhere that was far, far too dangerous?

It was a question he preferred not to answer.

Somewhere in the distance a dog barked, startling Nicola back into the present. She gave a small s.h.i.+ver, rubbing her upper arms with stiff fingers.

Even now, all these years later, she still could not shake off the cold horror of the moment when she had realised that she and Matt--Matthew Hunt--had been lovers, and that she could remember not one single thing about it. The shame, the anguish, the self-disgust of that knowledge would be with her for as long as she lived.

The make-up she had never used again, the dress had been thrown away, and eventually even the perm had grown out of her hair; but nothing had been able to eradicate her feeling of guilt and self-disgust.

And that was why she lived her life the way she did, keeping to the shadows, sticking firmly within the boundaries of the kind of behaviour she had set for herself, enjoying the company of her women friends, even though there were occasions when the conversation turned to s.e.x, and they were making outspoken and sometimes rather outrageous if amusing comments about their partners, and she had to bite on her tongue and keep silent. That was why she dated someone like Gordon, who was thankfully uninterested in making s.e.xual overtures to her.

If sometimes she woke in the night, mentally grieving for all that she was denying herself in living her life this way--the lover, the children-she only had to recall the way she had behaved with Matthew Hunt . the sick disgust and horror that had followed the realisation that they had shared the most intimate act two human beings could share, and that she had absolutely no memory of it . to remind her of how unfit she was to encourage and accept a man's love.

It made no difference telling herself that she had only done what thousands of foolish girls did every year; others might be able to forgive her, but she could not forgive herself. Even though she knew also that her att.i.tude, her self- denigration, was self-destructive and dangerous, and that the wisest, the most sensible course would be for her to undergo some kind of professional counselling to help her put what had happened in its proper perspective, she stubbornly refused to even consider letting go of her selfimposed punishment.

While she alone knew what had happened, she had felt reasonably safe.

Now. She remembered the way Jonathon had taunted her when he had realised she had spent the night with Matthew Hunt . the insults he had thrown at her, the names he had called her. the way he had terrorised her once he'd realised that no amount of mental blackmail was going to make her allow him to have s.e.x with her.

How bitterly she had realised then how very much more preferable it was to be considered dull, s.e.xless and boring than to be subjected to the kind of pressure he was trying to exert. But by then it was too late. by then Jonathon had told just about everyone she worked with just what she had done.

She s.h.i.+vered again, and Honey, sensing her desolation, pushed a cold, wet nose into her hand, causing her to look down and give the dog a brief, painful smile.

”Oh, Honey, what am I going to do?” she whispered, kneeling down to fondle the dog's silky ears.

”If he suddenly recognises me--realises...”

She could feel the tension invading her body, the panic starting to claw at her stomach.

He wasn't going to recognise her, she a.s.sured herself. If he hadn't done so by now--and he hadn't, that was obvious--then why should he ever?

After all, he had probably forgotten she even existed. But if he did remember. She shuddered deeply. The only way she could ensure that that would not happen would be to give up her job and move out of the area, to run away as she had done once before; but, like all creatures who felt hunted, she had lea mt long ago that to move. to run was to attract attention, and that her best chance of safety and protection lay in the camouflage of not drawing attention to herself.

If she gave in her notice, her friends, her family would start speculating. wondering. Her parents would be anxious, and want to know what was wrong.

She could, of course, always say that there was a clash of personalities--that she could not get on with their new boss--but jobs as interesting as hers were hard to come by in this rural area, and she had no wish to start a new career in the city, no wish at all. No, she was safe enough for now. Just as long as she kept her head. just as long as she didn't betray herself by doing something foolish.

Today, for instance, during this morning's meeting, Matthew Hunt had glanced piercingly at her once or twice when Alan in his speech had praised her for her hard work, but it had been the hard, a.s.sessing look of an employer to an employee--not the look of a man to a woman.

But then, he was hardly likely to give her that kind of look, was he?

she derided herself. After all, the real her was so very different from the Nicola--the ”NickT--he had known so briefly.

At her feet Honey whined and pawed at her jeans-clad leg, indicating that she had had enough of sitting waiting for something to happen, and that it was time to mm around and go home.

”Have a nice walk?” her mother asked her cheerfully when she opened the kitchen door.

”Your father's just come in, so I'd better serve supper. Oh, and by the way, Christine rang. She asked me to remind you that you're having dinner with them next week...”

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