A Solitary Heart (21 page)

and his hold tightened.

'I thought the first time was bad enough, but if you're now feeling

anything like I am, you've just been pole- axed.' He stared at her

grimly. 'This doesn't change you and me. If you think it does, to hell

with talking to Joshua, I'm going to stay right here and kiss you until

you come to your senses.'

'And what are we?' she asked him, with a wistful smile. 'Enemies,

lovers, or just good friends?'

He stared at her. 'Don't go back to South Bend tomorrow. Stay here

with me.'

Her eyes fell to the opening of his white shirt, and she muttered, 'Oh

Matthew, I—I don't know.'

'Why not?' he asked. His hard hands were branding marks on her.

'You're not going back to a summer job. Why couldn't you stay?'

'But for how long?'

He shrugged, a careless movement that belied the cool, deep shadow

of thought moving at the back of his hazel eyes. 'A few days, a week,

a month. Hell, who knows, you might end up staying the whole

summer and liking it.'

Her face twisted. 'My things are in South Bend—my friends, clothes,

school, plans.'

He was harsh. 'All I know is that if you leave now, you'll spend all

your spare time making up reasons not to come back, and erecting

your barriers, and Chicago is too far away for me to be popping back

every weekend just to try to change your mind.'

'But,' she argued, fiddling with the top fastened button, 'maybe we

need time to think.'

'See what I mean?' he replied drily. 'There goes another barrier, and

you're not even out of my arms yet. We don't need more time alone,

we need it together, to explore one another in depth, to find out what

we enjoy about each other, and what we disapprove of, to make love

in the long warm evenings, and the dark cool of early morning.'

Her fingernail jerked and the button slipped free, and at the exposure

of yet more of the hair-sprinkled skin of his chest, she recalled the

pressure and excitement of his hard body pinning her to the floor.

Why was she hesitating? It was what she wanted. She leaned her

forehead against him.

'Please,' she whispered. 'Ask me in the morning. Don't ask me now.'

He sighed into her hair and his arms loosened. 'All right. Tell me

tomorrow. In the mean time, I'd better go find Joshua and have a talk

with him. Do you want to come out with me?'

She shook her head and said, muffled, 'I'll be out in a few minutes.'

He dropped a kiss on to the top of her forehead and straightened from

the settee. Already he was absent- minded, thinking ahead to other

things. 'Fine. Just don't talk yourself out of something that would be

good for the both of us.'

But what about the long run, Matt? she asked, but silently, as he left

and shut the door behind him. Never mind about tomorrow, or the

day after, or the week after that. What about a year from now? Who's

to say what would be good for us then? What about the rest of our

lives?

BOTH Matthew and Joshua were conspicuously absent when Sian

finally mustered up the energy to leave the study. She had brushed

her hair and touched up her make-up, so that the only evidence of

what had happened lingered in the over-bright glitter of her eyes and

the hectic flush staining the high curves of her cheekbones.

At first glance the party still seemed to be in full swing, but, with

used plates stacked in the kitchen sink, glasses littering the counter

and most of the people sitting and talking in the living-room instead

of dancing, it looked as though it might wind to a close very soon.

She checked" her wrist-watch and found to her shock that it was

already well past midnight. Jane came up and whispered in her ear,

'Lordy, where have you been? You missed the fireworks. Joshua just

came storming into the room, looking like a thunder-cloud, and Matt

came in soon after, stern and hard and cold as you please, and he took

Josh into the bedroom. They're in there now and it's ominously quiet,

don't you think?'

She pressed one hand against her hot cheek and closed her eyes,

confessing shakily, 'I didn't entirely miss the drama. Matt and I were

in the study, and Joshua came in and found us together.'

Jane's eyes were very wide. 'What were you doing?'

'Well, we weren't exactly discussing the weather!' she snapped in an

explosive release of tension, though she immediately regretted it.

'Look, I'm sorry. I'm just strung out.'

'No wonder.' Her friend studied her closely and with a great deal of

sympathy. 'Don't blame yourself Sian. None of this is your fault. You

never encouraged Joshua. Whatever he built up out of your

relationship with him was entirely in his own head, so try not to

worry. Matt will sort him out, you'll see.'

'I hope so,' she said, but there was a wild, hunted look in her eyes.

Immediately Jane put one arm around her shoulders and led her into

the relative privacy of the kitchen, where she sank against the

counter.

'Tell me,' urged Jane in a gentle voice.

Sian stared blankly at her feet. 'Matt's asked me to stay tomorrow

instead of going back to South Bend with the rest of you.'

'Is that all?'

'Is that all?' she echoed incredulously, her green eyes flashing up to

her friend's compassionate, but calm expression. 'Jane, the very

thought terrifies me! I love him so much it hurts, and I have no idea

what his intentions are, or how long it might last.'

'Then you must stay,' Jane said simply, reaching out to grasp her

hands. 'And love him for as long as you can.'

Her head shook from side to side, and her eyes filled with pools of

salted wetness that streaked
diamante
paths down her marble cheeks.

How could she explain this crisis of uncertainty? In just a week she

had travelled too far from what had been a corner-stone of belief in

her life, and to reach out for what she wanted now would be to deny

every best judgement she had always believed in. She wasn't a

gambler like her father. She was just a young woman who was

frightened to find that the understanding she had built her hopes and

dreams on had turned to shifting sand underneath her feet.

'Don't you see?' she said, almost begging. 'It's too soon. It happened

too quickly. I don't even know what he feels for me, beyond the

physical attraction. Maybe someone else might have the strength of

mind to take such a risk, but I don't know if I can.'

'Then come home,' said Jane and squeezed her cold hands. Then she

added with quiet, relentless wisdom, 'But if you do, you must be

prepared to let Matt go. Because some day, some time, he will find a

woman who can, for she will recognise how much courage it took for

him to risk opening up his heart and his life to her.'

Every strong emotion inside her rose up in nauseous rebellion at the

thought of Matthew living with, and loving, another woman, and she

flinched back as if she'd been slapped in the face. Through a roaring

in her ears, she heard her friend ask, 'Does the consideration of that,

if nothing else, give you an answer?'

She whispered through bloodless lips, 'Yes, I rather think it does. I'll

stay, if he'll still have me.'

'Oh, Sian.' Jane stepped close and hugged her tight. 'I couldn't wish

for you to find a better man, but I am going to miss you!' .

She put her arms around the other girl and laid her head on Jane's

shoulder, exclaiming, 'What's this? I might only be gone a few days.'

'Then again, you might not,' said Jane, who stepped back and wiped

her eyes. 'Which is only how it should be.'

Just imagining how it would be to wave goodbye to the others, then

find herself alone with Matt at last with all the private future

stretched before them, was enough to send her blood-pressure

soaring. She was beside herself with excitement, consumed with

dread. Would they be able to fill the empty space with light and

laughter? Or would all her new emotions collapse under the weight

of it? Would she discover after the first heated rush that she was

merely caught in the illusory spell of infatuation? And he—how

would he feel? Would he regret his invitation after a few brief days,

or might he also fall in love with her?

She knew then that she was doing the right thing, for all the questions

had assumed an imperative place in her mind, and there would be no

rest, no peace, no hope for her until they were answered.

When the two men emerged from Matt's bedroom at last, there was

no chance to find out how things stood between them, for Matt's

attention was claimed by the departure of his guests, and Joshua was

remarkably silent and subdued, and refused to meet her questioning

gaze.

She schooled herself to patience as best she could, but her concern

was growing into a deep, unsettled unease, for the shape of Matt's

mouth was a straight white line, and his eyes when they met hers

briefly were cold with a kind of bitten-back fury that was all the more

disturbing for the severe control he exerted over it.

The spectre of the scathing stranger she had confronted just a week

ago rose in her mind. With an inward shudder, she banished the

terrible ghost to the past where it belonged, for neither of them were

really the people who had enacted that scene. She had worn, albeit

unknowingly, the misshapen cloak of someone else's caricature of

her personality, and Matt had fleshed out since that time to become a

real, full-blooded person with strengths and vulnerabilities, and a

deep-bedded core of compassionate wisdom that made him so

extraordinary.

She marked time, going into the master bathroom to wash her face

and brush her teeth, denying for as long as possible the need to go to

Matt and discover what had caused that taut set of his mouth, or

scored the deep lines on either side of it. She wanted to hug him, and

stroke his tawny hair, and tell him that she was willing to stay for as

long as they both wished it.

She drew on her light wrap of summer cotton that came to mid-thigh,

and belted it at her slim waist as she walked back through the

bedroom, wished Jane goodnight, and went to the study.

The light was on. Matt sat on the high stool facing the drawing-table,

his back to the doorway. His hair looked ruffled, as if he had run his

hands repeatedly through it, and she ached to smooth it back from his

forehead.

She smiled involuntarily and stepped inside the room. 'Hello there,'

she said. 'I was just going to look for you.'

His head turned to one side. 'Funny,' he said flatly. 'I came in here

looking for you, but I half expected you to have made other sleeping

arrangements.'

The short, clipped voice, and the glimpse of the hard line of his jaw

made her hesitate. Why wouldn't he turn around? If he only smiled at

her, she would run to him with open arms, but this—she didn't know

how to react to.

'I don't understand,' she said quietly.

'You're always running away,' said Matthew, with a thin slicing edge

of sarcasm. 'You did it from the start. Even the first time we met,

when I gave you hell, you ran away.'

A frown creased her brow. 'But I'm not running now— you've got it

all wrong. I told Jane that I wasn't going back to South Bend with

them.'

'You're going to try to convince me that you want to stay?' he asked

harshly. 'That's taking it a bit far, even for you, isn't it?'

She didn't know what was going on, but her heart thudded hard in

apprehension, and she licked suddenly dry lips. 'Matt, look at me.'

He swivelled around and thrust off the stool, in a stunning upsurge of

movement, and the deep rage in his face was so far beyond what she

had feared that she fell back a step and stared, one hand creeping up

to cover the frantic beating at the base of her throat.

He asked fiercely, his lips drawn back, 'And just when was it you

were planning on telling me that you'd become engaged to Joshua—

early in the morning, just before you left? Were you saving it for

pillow talk? Damn you for a lying bitch!'

The bottom of her world seemed to drop away at the severity of his

accusation, and she swayed on her feet. God, oh God, how could she

have forgotten that little piece of mischief she and Joshua had cooked

up between them? She whispered on a shuddering breath, 'He told

you?'