A Sudden Engagement and The Sicilian’s Surprise Wife(14)

It stunned and completely deflated her. She had expected furious disbelief; argument, anything but that quiet contempt. For a moment she was almost tempted to withdraw the words; to admit that.… That what? she asked herself in dawning shock. That he was the only man who could make her feel like that? But that would mean… that would mean.… She struggled heroically and then at the last minute lost her courage and told herself that all it meant was that she was extraordinarily susceptible to him, that was all. The other—that awful and tenuous suspicion that she might actually have fallen in love with him, was not to be borne, so she dismissed it, clinging hard to reason and logic, both of which assured her that it was completely impossible to fall in love with a man one disliked as much as she disliked Drew.

‘What are you waiting for?’ The cruel voice goaded her into awareness. ‘Me to dress you?’

Kirsty’s face coloured, her fingers clumsy as she reached for her clothes. He made no attempt to look away as she struggled, and to her consternation Kirsty felt her breasts flower into awareness of his gaze, the nipples firm and hard, her breasts swelling slightly.

‘Allow me.’ Drew’s touch was completely impersonal. It was all different for men, Kirsty thought, choking back weak tears. They could easily make love to one woman while really loving another. Physical desire for them had nothing to do with any nobler emotion. What would Drew do if she threatened to tell Beverley Travers about this? Nothing, probably, she admitted. In fact he would probably feel that it would only advance his cause and increase Beverley Travers’ jealousy. For the other woman had been jealous, Kirsty acknowledged that, and no doubt Drew hoped that by flaunting his mock engagement to her, he would get her back.

Why on earth should that thought cause her so much pain? Once he had succeeded she would be free to leave; she would never have to see him again, which was surely what she wanted.

‘I’ll drive you home,’ Drew announced abruptly, adding huskily, ‘I take it what happened just now hasn’t changed your mind?’

Kirsty went red and white with the cruelty of it. He must be completely insensitive if he could make love to her with one breath and ask her to help him get Beverley back in the next. And yet she had thought him a man of acute perception. Perhaps it was true that love blinded people to the feelings of others.

‘Nothing you could either say or do could make me do that,’ she threw at him through gritted teeth. ‘Nothing!’

For a moment his face seemed to be carved out of granite, masklike and taut, and she had the strangest feeling that it was concealing almost unbearable pain, containing it only with the greatest effort of will, but the moment was gone before she could question it. Drew was on his feet, pulling on his coat and handing her hers, opening the door so that she could precede him through it, and she told herself the regret and loneliness she felt as he closed it after them, shutting out its warmth and intimacy, was merely an illusion and had nothing to be with the fact that the closing of the door was symbolic of the fact that he was shutting her out of his life.





CHAPTER FIVE


A PRE-REHEARSAL meeting had been called by Drew for Sunday afternoon, and Kirsty had been up early, too nervous to settle down and read through the play again as she had planned. Instead she rang her parents, answering her mother’s anxious queries absently, wondering what Mrs Stannard would say if she were to tell her the truth. How could she have let Drew force her into a fictitious engagement? At the very first opportunity she fully intended to break it. But how? An idea took shape in her mind, causing her to abandon her chair by the window and the thumbed copy of Much Ado she had been studying.

Drew was a fiercely proud man; his attitude towards Beverley Travers had proved that. He had forced Kirsty into their ‘engagement’ solely to punish the other girl, she was sure of this, but what if she, Kirsty, turned the tables on him and made it impossible for him to continue their ‘engagement’ and still retain his pride? But how? One simple solution presented itself to her, and although she quailed a little from it, the memory of the emotions she had experienced in Drew’s arms, compared with his very evident lack of them, compelled her. What she had in mind was a flirtation with someone else, and to make it obvious enough to force Drew into bringing their ‘engagement’ to an end. But would it work? She didn’t know, but felt that it was a chance she must take; anything to free herself from playing the false and unacceptable role of Drew’s loving fiancée.

Firmly ignoring the small inner voice that whispered that she found the role all the more onerous for being false, she concentrated on laying her plans.

Cherry had already pointed Clive out to her as being the company’s recognised flirt. Kirsty had seen the way he had looked at her, and recognised in him a certain devil-may-care attitude which would probably incline him towards a flirtation with a girl supposedly attached to another man; especially a man such as Drew, she thought intuitively. Clive was slightly jealous of Drew. She had seen it in his eyes, and had noticed the slight pique with which he had heard the announcement of their engagement.

And there would be no need to be particularly subtle. Clive wouldn’t need much encouragement, and she could not see Drew accepting his supposed fiancée’s flirtation with another man with any great degree of complacency whether that fiancée was real or not. The best thing, she mused, would be if she could provoke Drew into a public quarrel, one where she could trap him into giving her the sort of ultimatum she could react to with tears and a very definite breaking off of their supposed relationship.

It gave her a few uncomfortable moments to know that her plans would shock and distress her parents, but Drew scarcely merited any tender consideration of his finer feelings after the way he had treated her. He was using her, and would have no grounds for objection if she turned the tables on him! She would do anything to be free of the odium of their engagement—anything! She couldn’t endure another scene like the one she had undergone last night. Her skin still felt scorched by his touch, her body almost frighteningly alien to her. It had alarmed her how easily he had aroused her, and how callously. It must be his greater experience—she refused to allow herself to even contemplate any other explanation for her response.

Rather than drive down to the theatre, she decided to walk. It was a cold, crisp afternoon, with the leaves crunchy underfoot, and walking along the river bank was a pleasure rather than a hardship. She had dressed casually for the rehearsal—jeans, a baggy jumper over her thin tee-shirt and a pair of suede boots she had bought the previous winter and which were now beginning to look rather scuffed.

And yet several of the people she passed, walking in the opposite direction, turned to glance admiringly at her slender figure in the faded jeans and maroon sweater, her dark hair curling wildly round a face more piquant than beautiful, her skin healthily flushed and a vivaciousness about the way she moved that made them envy her her lack of years.

Kirsty was oblivious to their regard, intent only on getting to the theatre and putting her plan into action. Inactivity didn’t suit her, and her eyes glowed with resolution, determination firming her chin.

So Mr Drew Chalmers thought he could push her around and force her to fall in with his schemes, did he? Well, it was high time he realised that he was wrong. Very wrong!

Most of the others were already gathered in the theatre when Kirsty arrived. Cherry was busy making coffee, and produced a mug for her, warning her that everyone was expected to provide their own. ‘You’ll be able to pick one up at the weekly market,’ she told Kirsty. ‘Unless, of course, you intend to share your beloved’s.’

Kirsty swallowed the bitter retort hovering on the tip of her unruly tongue and produced a rather forced smile. Cherry meant well, and after all, she didn’t realise the true situation.

‘Kirsty, you’re five minutes late!’

Nothing could have been less lover-like than the snapped sentence.

One or two of the others looked surprised as well, and Kirsty bent her head over her steaming mug, not wanting Drew to see the flash of rebellious resentment in her eyes. Of course, he had a position to maintain. He was going to direct them and no doubt would not want the others suggesting that she was favoured because of their supposed personal relationship.

‘Whew, what’s got into him?’ Cherry whispered as she came to collect the mugs. Drew was talking to the actress who was to play Beatrice, and Kirsty shrugged carelessly, indicating that she neither knew nor cared.

‘Not had a lovers’ quarrel, have we?’ murmured Clive dulcetly, coming over to join them. ‘Ah, Kirsty my love, if I were engaged to you, I’d be so busy making love to you there wouldn’t be time to quarrel!’

Here was her chance! Kirsty took a deep breath and smiled at him provocatively. ‘Drew’s a very busy man,’ she told him, giving a small, pained sigh. ‘I’d no idea when I came up here that I’d see so little of him. It isn’t a bit like I’d imagined.’

She was aware that Cherry, at her side, was looking rather surprised, but Clive’s smile was edged with satisfaction, the pressure of his fingers, gently squeezing her arm, slightly more than merely comforting.