MARC had told her the time would pass quickly, but to Helen the days that followed seemed more like an eternity. Yet under other circumstances she knew they could have been wonderful.
From that first afternoon in St Benoit Plage she seemed to have stepped through the looking glass into a different and totally unreal world, peopled only by the beautiful and the seriously affluent.
To her astonishment, Marc had been right about the photographers, and Helen had been chagrined to find herself described in the local news sheet as ‘charming but shy’, under a picture of her with her mouth open, clinging to her husband’s hand as if he was her last hope of salvation.
Not shy, she’d thought wryly. Just shocked witless at all this unwonted attention.
‘Relax, ma mie,’ Marc had advised, clearly amused. ‘They will soon focus on someone else.’
In the days that followed he took her to Cannes, Nice and Monte Carlo, until her mind was a blur of smart restaurants and glamorous shops. She had learned early on not to linger outside the windows of boutiques, or admire anything too openly, otherwise the next moment Marc would have bought it for her. It was heady stuff for someone who’d existed up to now on a skeleton wardrobe, but she found his casual generosity disturbing.
No doubt he treated his mistresses equally lavishly, she thought unhappily, but at least they deserved it. Whereas she, patently, did not.
Not that he cared, she told herself defensively. After all, when this pathetic honeymoon had stumbled to its close he had Angeline Vallon waiting for him. And life would return to normal for them both.
She had to admit that Marc had kept his word about their own relationship. He’d made sure from the first that they were rarely alone together. In the car, with Louis as unwitting chaperone, they exchanged polite but stilted conversation, and at the villa, as he’d suggested, they pursued a policy of positive avoidance, under the frankly disapproving gaze of Gaston and Elise, who were clearly baffled by these strange newlyweds.
She had no idea where or how Marc spent his evenings, although she was always courteously invited to accompany him and had to struggle to invent excuses. She only knew that she lay sleepless, listening for his return, however late it happened to be. And how sad was that?
There were times when she longed to confront him—tell him to his face that she knew he had a mistress. But that would only betray to him how much it mattered to her, and she couldn’t risk that. Couldn’t admit that he had the power to hurt her.
Also, he might ask how she knew. And she could hardly confess that she’d been eavesdropping.
It was far less humiliating to simply keep quiet and count her blessings that she still had Monteagle, if nothing else.
She halted, startled, aware that she’d never regarded the situation in that light before. Always her home had been paramount in her thoughts. She’d said openly that she would do anything to save it, yet now, for the first time, she was counting the cost and finding it oddly bitter.
It will be easier when I go home, she promised herself. When I get back to the real world again.
And yet, as she at last began packing for the return journey, she found herself feeling oddly wistful—even empty. And for once she had a genuine headache. The sky had become overcast towards the end of the afternoon, and she wasn’t surprised to hear a faint rumble of thunder from the hills.
When she arrived downstairs for dinner, she found that Gaston had prudently laid the table in the salle à manger instead of the terrace. ‘It makes to rain, madame,’ he told her lugubriously.
Elise came bustling in with a dish of home-made duck pâté.
‘Monsieur begs you will commence,’ she announced. ‘‘E is engaged with the telephone.’
It was over ten minutes later when Marc eventually made his unsmiling appearance. ‘I regret that I have kept you waiting.’ The apology sounded cursory, and he ate his meal almost in silence, his thoughts quite evidently elsewhere.
Eventually, when coffee was served and they were alone, he said abruptly, ‘We will be leaving for the airport in the morning, à dix heures. Can you be ready?’
Helen put down her cup. ‘Has the flight been changed?’
‘We are not catching the London plane,’ he said. ‘We shall be spending a short time in Paris instead.’
‘Paris?’ she echoed. ‘But where will we stay?’
‘I once told you that I have an appartement there,’ he said.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘And a hotel suite in London.’
His faint smile was twisted. ‘The appartement is larger, je t’assure. To begin with, there is more than one bedroom,’ he added pointedly.
She flushed dully, annoyed that he should read her so accurately. ‘All the same,’ she said stiffly, ‘I’d prefer to go straight home.’
He glanced at her meditatively. ‘You are my wife, Hélène,’ he said quietly. ‘It might be thought that wherever I am your home is with me.’
‘We don’t have that kind of marriage.’ She didn’t look at him. ‘And, anyway, I need to be at Monteagle. I want to see what progress has been made there. Besides, what would I do in Paris—apart from cramp your style?’ she added recklessly.
Marc’s brows lifted. ‘Cramp my style?’ he queried, as if he’d never heard the phrase before. ‘In what way, may I ask?’
Helen bit her lip. ‘Well—you have things to do—people to see,’ she offered nervously, backing away from his challenge. ‘And I’d be in the way.’ She poured herself some more coffee. ‘Anyway, I think we both need—breathing space—from each other.’
‘You think so?’ His tone was mocking. ‘Shall I calculate for you, cherie, exactly how many hours we have spent together this week? Not that it matters, of course. Monteagle calls, and you obey.’ He paused. ‘So, I will go to Paris alone, and arrange to have you met at the airport in England.’
He swallowed the rest of his coffee and rose. ‘And now you will excuse me. I intend to try my luck at the casino again tonight.’
‘Is that where you’ve been spending your evenings?’ Helen asked the question before she could stop herself. ‘I didn’t realise you were such a gambler.’
‘And nor did I, ma belle,’ Marc said softly, ‘until I met you. And I find the turn of a wheel or the fall of a card infinitely kinder, believe me.’ He kissed the tips of his fingers to her. ‘Au revoir.’
Helen hated thunderstorms. But she was almost grateful to this one for giving her something more to worry about than her immediate problems. After all, she’d won a victory over her return to Monteagle, she thought defensively. So why did it feel so much like a defeat? And Marc’s absence so soon after the honeymoon would excite the kind of local comment she most wished to avoid.
But anything was better than accompanying him to Paris, like a piece of extra luggage.
And he certainly hadn’t tried too hard to persuade her, either, Helen told herself defiantly.
She spent a restless evening trying to read, while lightning played around the hills, making the villa’s electricity flicker. Eventually she gave it up as a bad job and went to bed.
Perhaps it was the prospect of going home that made her feel more relaxed, but tonight she found herself drifting into a doze almost at once.
When she awoke, everything was pitch-black and completely silent. The storm, it seemed, had rolled away at last, leaving the room like an oven and the bedclothes twisted round her. Clearly she hadn’t been sleeping as peacefully as she’d thought. She struggled out of the shrouding covers and got out of bed, treading across to the window and opening it wide to step out on to the balcony, planning to cool off a little.
But the air outside was just as stifling. Helen leaned on the balustrade and inhaled, but the garden smelled raw and thirsty, and possessed by a strange stillness, as if it was waiting in anticipation of—what?
A moment later she found out. As if some cosmic tap had been turned, the rain began to fall in huge, soaking drops, and by the time Helen made it back into her room she was already wet through, her nightgown sticking in clammy dampness to her skin.
Grimacing, she peeled it off and dropped it to the floor. She discarded the coverlet from the bed, too, and slid back under the single sheet, listening to the heavy splash of rain on the balcony tiles, hoping it would have a soporific effect.
She had to train herself not to lie awake listening for Marc, she told herself wearily, because there would be so many nights when he would not be there. Starting with tomorrow.
She turned on to her side, facing the window, and stiffened as a tall shadow walked in from the balcony and moved soundlessly towards her. She wanted to scream, but her throat muscles didn’t seem to be working.
Then the heavily shaded lamp at the side of the bed clicked on, and she realised it was Marc, his hair hanging in damp tendrils, water glistening on his dinner jacket.
She said hoarsely, ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I came to tell you that I won tonight.’ He reached into his pocket and took out a packet of high denomination euros. ‘Every table I sat at yielded gold.’
‘I’m very pleased for you,’ Helen said tautly. ‘But the morning would have done for your news.’
He smiled down at her. His black tie was hanging loose, and several of the buttons on his dress shirt were unfastened. ‘But it is the morning, ma mie. And besides, I have something else I wish to share with you.’
‘Can’t it wait?’ She tried unobtrusively to raise the sheet to chin level. ‘I—I’m very tired.’
‘And I,’ he said, ‘have waited long enough. On our wedding night you accused me of buying you for sex. If so, Hélène, I made a poor bargain. And it occurred to me, as I came back tonight, that perhaps I had not yet paid enough for the privilege of enjoying your charming body. So—’
He scattered some of the banknotes across the bed. ‘How much will this buy me, mon coeur? A smile—a kiss, peut-être? Or even—this.’
He reached down and took the edge of the sheet from her, stripping it back to the foot of the bed, leaving her naked.
‘Oh, God,’ Helen said, with a little wail of shock. She tried to curl into the foetal position, covering what she could of herself with her shaking hands. ‘You said—’ she accused breathlessly. ‘You told me you wouldn’t ask again.’
‘But I am not asking,’ he said gently. ‘This time I am taking.’
‘But why?’ There was a sob in her voice. ‘Weren’t there any women at the casino you could have chosen—with all that money?’
‘Dozens,’ Marc told her pleasantly. ‘And all of them more eager and welcoming than you, ma chère. But I decided I preferred a little—domestic entertainment.’ He paused. ‘And you can always close your eyes—pretend that I am someone else.’
Quietly ruthless, he unpeeled her arms from her body, one hand closing on both her slender wrists and lifting them above her head. Holding them there. Helen cried out in startled protest as his other hand grasped her ankles, straightening her body and drawing it gently but inexorably down the bed, leaving her with nowhere to hide from the insolent hunger in his dark gaze.
‘Marc,’ she whispered imploringly. ‘I beg you—please don’t do this.’
Marc lifted himself on to the bed and knelt over her, trapping her legs between his knees while he studied her.
He said quietly, ‘Tu es vraiment exquise, Hélène. And this is what your body was made for.’ Then he bent his head and began to kiss her, his lips cool as the rain as they touched her.
Helen tried to resist, her mouth clamped shut, her head twisting frantically on the pillow. But he was not to be denied.
His tongue was like a flame against hers, teasing her slowly and sensuously, demanding that her lips yield him their innermost secrets. At the same time his hand found one small, pointed breast, his fingertips delicately stroking its soft curve, wringing a response that urged the nipple to bloom sweetly and helplessly into his caressing palm.
Helen found herself almost unable to breathe—to think. He was still clasping her wrists—but so loosely that she could have pulled free at any time, at least tried to fight him off. Instead, she realised she was sighing into his mouth, her body gradually slackening under the sensuous insistence of his lips and fingers.
When he had finished with her she would die of shame at her own weakness, she told herself dazedly. But for now …
His mouth moved down to her throat, making the pulse there leap and flutter. He explored the soft hollows at its base, then trailed kisses down to her breasts, his lips suckling each excited peak in turn, piercing them with sensations she’d never dreamed of.
When at last he raised his head she stared up at him, her eyes wide with bewilderment, her lips slightly parted.
He touched them lightly with his own, then released her wrists, turning her slightly so that the long, supple line of her back was at the mercy of his mouth instead, while his hands still stroked and pleasured her tumescent breasts.
He brushed the soft strands of hair away from the nape of her neck with his mouth, and she felt her whole body quiver in helpless response to the caress.
His lips and tongue travelled slowly, almost languidly, between her shoulderblades and down her spine, as if he was counting each delicate bone with kisses, while his fingers pursued their own erotic path across her ribcage to the flat plane of her stomach, coming to rest on the slender curves of her hipbones.
As he caressed the sensitive area at the base of her spine she gave a muffled moan and her body arched involuntarily, vulnerably. He drew her back against him, his arm across her breasts. At the same moment his other hand moved, cupping the soft mound at the parting of her slackened thighs with terrifying intimacy.
‘No—please.’ Helen’s voice splintered as his fingertips began their first silken journey of discovery into the moist, scalding heat of her most secret self.
Marc kissed the side of her throat and she felt him smile against her skin. ‘No?’
His hand moved, delicately, subtly, and she cried out, her body writhing helplessly against his enfolding arm.
Suddenly, unexpectedly, he turned her on to her back, and she caught a dazed glimpse of the heated glitter in his eyes. But she had no idea of his real purpose as he bent to her, his hands sliding under her flanks, lifting her towards him. The next instant, before she could move to prevent him, his mouth had taken possession of her, and the powerful glide of his tongue had sought and found the tiny hidden bud, continuing its exquisite arousal.
Helen’s entire being tensed in shock, followed immediately by an agony of guilty, terrified delight. She tried once more to say no. To find the strength, somehow, to push him away and stop this shameful, delicious pleasure before it carried her away beyond all the barriers she’d tried to build against him.
But the only sound that came from her throat was a small sob. She closed her eyes in a desperate attempt to distance herself—to hang on to some kind of self-control. But it was already too late.
Her awareness had shrunk to the distant splash of the rain, her own jagged, fevered breathing, and the hot, beautiful semi-darkness that surrounded her—invaded her. She knew nothing but the response that Marc was forcing from her trembling body, the alchemy of his experienced caresses, seducing her bewildered senses and sweeping away her innocence for ever.
The pleasure began slowly, at first little more than a breeze rippling across still water, then building with irresistible, quivering urgency into a great wave, gathering force and speed as it lifted her, all control gone, to some unimagined peak of rapture and held her there.
Then the wave broke, and she crashed with it, helpless, whimpering, torn apart by the spasms of ecstasy that possessed her.
She lay dazed and trembling, unable to speak or move, or even to comprehend what had just happened to her. She was no longer certain where she was, or even who she was.
A strange euphoria was spreading throughout her body. Every bone, muscle and skin cell was utterly relaxed, tingling with this new delight, as if she was floating in some beatific dream, drained and weightless.
She was dimly aware that Marc had moved away from her, and found herself reaching out a bereft hand, searching for him blindly across the empty bed.
‘Sois tranquille, mon amour. I am here.’ His voice was a whisper. He’d used his brief absence to strip, she realised, as he drew her to him, and she gasped silently as she felt the warmth of his aroused and powerful nakedness against her body.
Instinctively, she arched towards him, thrilling again at his touch, her arms circling his neck, the tips of her breasts grazing his hair-roughened chest, and heard him groan softly. His hands took her gently, positioning her, then he entered her with one strong, fluid thrust.
Her yielding was total, immediate. Almost languidly she lifted her legs, locking them round his hips, her own movements mirroring the smooth, almost voluptuous drive of his loins, drawing him deeper still into her body.
‘Tell me.’ His voice was a hoarse whisper. ‘Tell me if I hurt you.’
‘I want you.’ Her reply was hardly more than a breath. ‘I want—everything …’
She’d thought after that previous implosion of ecstasy that still lingered, suffusing her with its joy, she would find herself exhausted, emptied of sensation, incapable of anything but compliance. But she was wrong.
The controlled force of his possession was evoking a response that went far beyond mere surrender. Suddenly her body was coming unexpectedly, ardently to life again, and as his rhythm increased, became fiercer, she found she was being carried away with him, striving with him on some long, sweet spiral of such intensity that it frightened her.
Pleasure hovered on the verge of pain, and she heard herself crying out, crushing her mouth against his shoulder as the long, shuddering convulsions of her climax pulled her over the edge into Paradise. Seconds later he followed her, wildly groaning her name as he reached the white heat of fulfilment in his turn.
Afterwards they lay quietly in a tangle of sweat-soaked limbs, his arms holding her as she pillowed her head on his chest, both waiting for the storm of their breathing to subside.
But for Helen the descent to earth was swift, and soon unhappy.
Because now she knew there was no more room for pretence. She had taken as completely as she had given. And by so doing she’d sacrificed her self-respect, and any forlorn hope of feigning her indifference.
However it might have begun, Marc had given her a night she would remember always. But soon he would be lying with his lips against someone else’s hair, his long fingers drowsily caressing another woman’s breast. And she’d allowed herself to forget that for the sake of a few hours of total ravishment.
A little domestic entertainment. The coolly jeering words came back to haunt her. Because that was all he wanted—to ensure that when he came to Monteagle she’d be waiting for him with passionate eagerness, ready to give him anything he wanted. A perpetual honeymoon, Helen thought, biting her lower lip, still swollen from his kisses. Until, of course, her sexual education was complete, by which time her novelty for him would probably have worn off.
And all this pain—this heartbreak—she had brought upon herself.
I shall have to learn not to think, she told herself, as Marc’s soft, regular breathing informed her that he’d fallen asleep. Not to wonder what he’s doing when he’s away, or who he might be with. No scenes and no accusations.
If I can manage to turn a perpetually blind eye, and he is reasonably discreet, then maybe our separate lives can be made to work.
She leaned across and switched off the lamp.
And now, she thought, she would try to sleep.
She opened her eyes to sunshine and birdsong, and Marc bending over her, clearly about to kiss her—and not for the first time, she thought, blushing, assailed by a vivid memory of him kissing her awake in the early dawn, and making love to her with such tenderness and grace that afterwards she’d found herself weeping in his arms.
‘Bonjour.’ He propped himself on an elbow and smiled at her. ‘You awaken very beautifully.’
Her blush deepened. At some point during the night he must have retrieved the sheet, she realised, and covered her with it, because she now had a shield against the over-bright light of day. And, more importantly, against his eyes.
‘Good morning,’ she said, a touch awkwardly. ‘Has—has the rain stopped?’
‘You are a true Englishwoman, cherie.’ He was laughing. ‘You wish to discuss the weather even when you are in bed with your lover.’
But you’re not my lover, she thought with sudden pain, even as her body clenched once more in unwilling yearning. Last night had nothing to do with love. It was simply a vindication of your own prowess in bed, because I rejected you. You needed to prove that you could make me want you against my own will and judgement. And against all reason—because I’m not the only woman in your life, and we both know it.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said stiffly.
‘No, you must not be. It is charming.’ He leaned down and kissed her mouth softly. ‘And I wish very much that we could stay here for ever, but we have a plane to catch. Besides,’ he added, stroking her cheek, ‘there will be tonight.’
‘Two planes,’ Helen corrected, remembering the resolution she’d made last night and how badly she needed to keep it. He only had to look at her, she thought. Or smile. Or touch her lightly with a fingertip, and she was dying to melt in his arms. But she could not allow him to do this to her. Could not—would not—live this lie with him. ‘We—we’re on different flights.’ She took a steadying breath. ‘And yours, if you remember, is the earliest.’
‘Different flights?’ Marc repeated slowly. ‘What are you talking about? We will be travelling together. You are coming with me to Paris, naturellement.’
‘No,’ she said. ‘I’m going back to England and Monteagle, as we agreed.’
Marc sat up abruptly, the sheet falling away from his body, and she looked away swiftly. Oh, God, she needed no reminders …
He said, ‘But that was yesterday—before …’
‘Before we had sex, you mean? You feel that should make some difference?’ She kept her voice light. ‘I don’t see why.’
‘I had hoped,’ he said very quietly, ‘that perhaps you would want to be with me. Now that we have found each other at last.’
But not in Paris, she wanted to scream at him. Never in Paris—at this famous apartment of yours, in the bed where you make love to your mistress. Don’t you see that I can’t go there? And that I won’t—ever?
‘But I shall be with you,’ she returned instead. ‘That is whenever you choose to come back to Monteagle.’
‘Which may not be for some time,’ he said. He looked at her steadily. ‘That does not concern you?’
‘You may come and go as you please. It’s not up to me to interfere in your life—your decisions.’ The rawness in her heart gave her voice an edge.
‘I believed,’ he said with sudden bleakness, ‘that I had given you that right. So why do you refuse me?’ He paused, and his voice hardened. ‘Is it because there is some other one involved in our relationship? Has that come between us? Answer me.’
‘You seem to know already.’ She felt her heart give a sudden jolt. She hadn’t intended this, she thought wretchedly. She hadn’t thought he’d want to discuss Angeline Vallon or any of his women with her. She’d assumed he’d prefer her to ignore the rumours which would no doubt reach her. That he’d expect gratitude for Monteagle to keep her silent.
Why, she asked herself desperately, wasn’t he playing according to the rules? But then, when had Marc ever done so?
‘Ah, Mon Dieu.’ He almost groaned the words, then was silent for a moment. At last, he said unevenly, ‘Hélène—you are being a fool. Yet in spite of all this we can make our marriage work—I know it. This—other thing—it will not last. It cannot. And you cannot allow it to matter. To damage what we might have together.
‘Cherie.’ His voice deepened. ‘You must not do this to yourself—to us.’
Us, Helen thought. There is no ‘us’ and never can be. Because even when Angeline Vallon is history, as you suggest, there’ll be someone else in her place. There’ll always be someone else—for a month or two …
‘But I can’t pretend it doesn’t exist either,’ she said raggedly. ‘That wasn’t part of the deal. So I shan’t be going with you to Paris.’ She took a deep breath. ‘But Monteagle is yours too, of course, and when you choose to be there I’m prepared to reach some—compromise with you.’
‘As you did last night?’ The words slammed at her.
‘Yes,’ she said defiantly. ‘Exactly like that.’
He said something under his breath—something harsh and ugly—then threw himself off the bed, grabbing for his discarded clothing. But he made no attempt to dress himself.
Instead, he reached into the pocket of his dinner jacket. ‘Then allow me to congratulate you on your performance, madame.’ His voice seared her like acid. ‘You learn quickly—and, as I explained, I would not wish you to go unrewarded for your efforts.’
He tossed the roll of money into the air, and watched the banknotes flutter down on to the bed around her.
‘Consider yourself paid in full, ma femme,’ he added. ‘Until the next time—wherever and whenever that may be.’
And he left her, white-faced and stricken, staring after him, as he strode to the door and vanished.