An Interrupted Marriage (Silhouette Special Edition) (10 page)

“So what did you do?”

“I boarded with a friend’s family for a while, finished my schooling, and used some insurance money for secretarial training.”

“Are you in touch with your grandparents?”

“I write to them, let them know how I’m getting on.”

“And...are you living with anyone at the moment?”

“Yes,” Jade said briefly.

“Female?”

“Lida Farrell, from the office.” She was so anxious not to read any personal meaning into that question that he obviously misunderstood the crisp brevity of her reply.

He said, “It’s none of my business, of course.”

“It’s all right—”

But before she could think of anything more to add, to soften what he’d obviously regarded as a snub, he’d steered the conversation back to some innocuous subject, and it remained on that plane for the remainder of the evening. Then he’d got her a taxi and given the driver some money to get her home.

The next day she’d made a point of thanking him again for the dinner, but he’d just given her a searching look and she wondered if she’d overdone it, made him think that she was hinting at a repeat performance that he had no intention of providing. She reverted smartly to her office manner, and Magnus remained aloof and businesslike.

“You terrified me,” Magnus had teased her, after they were married. “For a minute or two I thought I’d got through the efficient-secretary armour to the warm, real woman underneath. And then, when I tried to find out if there was a man in your life, you froze me out.”

“I didn’t want you to think I was a designing female, angling to hook the boss,” Jade had confessed. They were in bed, and she was leaning on his shoulder, smiling down at him with her fingers idly playing over his bare torso, while his toyed with the strap of her nightgown.

“Well, you did, didn’t you?” Magnus raised his brows and grinned at her. “You had me panting after your body from day one—”

“I
what?
“ Outraged, Jade pulled away.

Magnus hooked a lazy arm about her and hauled her against him. “Are you offended? The first time you walked into my office I thought how attractive you were—” He stopped with a small laugh. “No, it wasn’t ever that lukewarm. I lusted for you, but I told myself it was only a perverted—”

“Perverted?” Jade raised her head.

“Perverted—” Magnus repeated “—attraction to a mind like a steel filing cabinet, combined with the body of a houri—not to mention a face that was all my adolescent dreams come true.”

“You dreamed about a
face
when you were an adolescent?”

He laughed. “I was very innocent.”

“Hmm.” Her expression was sceptical, and he laughed again.

“I’d never have known,” Jade told him. “If you felt like that, you hid it awfully well.”

“I didn’t want to frighten you off. I forced myself to give it three months, to convince you that I wasn’t the sort of man who habitually made a play for his employees—”

“Lull me into a false sense of security, you mean?”

Magnus grinned. “Something like that. Then I took the plunge and asked you out to dinner and you accepted as though I’d asked you to take a letter—”

“You said it was only because you’d kept me working past dinner time.”

“Part of the plan,” he explained. “The next time, I was going to suggest we did it properly.”

Jade widened her eyes. “Wouldn’t that have been a bit premature?”

He tugged at her hair, his chest shaking with laughter. “You know what I mean—do
dinner
properly. A date. And then...”

“Your father died,” she said soberly.

“Yes.” His hold on her tightened, his hand stroking her hair as she laid her cheek against his shoulder. “All my plans went overboard. I just knew that I needed you—your quiet strength, your sympathy, your love.”

“You already had that.”

“You’d never let me see it until then. And I was selfish enough to take advantage of it when you did.”

“It wasn’t selfish. I was longing to help you, to comfort you.”

“You were so utterly generous,” he said. “When I asked you to have dinner with me again, on my first day back at the office, I didn’t dare hope that—well, that what happened would happen.”

It had been a subdued dinner, but he’d talked a little, haltingly, about his father. “I don’t think he ever felt really at ease with children. We got on much better after I grew up. Andrew looked to me rather than Dad, even though I’m living in Auckland now. And I don’t think Dad has—
had
any understanding of Danella at all. Laurence was the closest to him. He’s the one who’s interested in farming. Dad can—could relate to that.”

At the end of the dinner he’d paid the bill and walked her out to his car, and when they got in he turned to her and blurted out as though he couldn’t help it, “Jade—I don’t want to be alone tonight.”

She’d let hardly a second elapse before she said, lifting a hand to his cheek, “You don’t need to be, Magnus. I’ll come home with you.”

She’d gone home with him that night and other nights, shared his bed and brought him, she hoped, a measure of comfort, of forgetfulness, of happiness. “It wasn’t selfish,” she insisted. “I wanted it as much as you did.”

“I should have waited—at least before asking you to marry me. I rushed you into it, without even a proper wedding. Took advantage of your...compassion.”

“It wasn’t just compassion, Magnus. I’ve never been so happy in my life as I am now.”

“Is that true?”

“It’s true.” She turned a little and kissed his cheek.

“Well,” he said, sliding down the strap he’d been playing with, “let’s see if I can make you still happier.”

He turned her in the bed, his fingers stroking down her arm, his eyes on the curve of her breast where he’d bared it. Then he bent his head and kissed her there, his lips lingering. Jade gave a sigh of content, and he lifted his head, replacing his lips with his hand, his mouth capturing hers.

* * *

“Jade?”

She found herself staring into space, her fingers idle on the keyboard, her body tingling and her cheeks flushed with remembered desire. Magnus was standing in front of her.

“Yes, Magnus.” She raised her eyes languorously, and saw his pupils darken in response before his gaze narrowed.

“You’ve finished?” he asked, his voice grating.

“Oh—yes. Just this last envelope.” Flustered, she rapidly typed the address, found that she’d made two mistakes, and said, “Sorry, I’ll do it again.”

He waited until she’d done it, then said, “Are you tired?”

Jade shook her head. “A bit out of practice.” She wished he’d stop standing there. Her body was still warm, and her fingers not quite steady as she straightened the stack of letters and envelopes. “You can sign them now.” She picked them up to hand them to him, but he’d come around the desk to stand beside her chair, taking a pen from the container by the typewriter. His shoulder brushed hers as he bent to skim the work and put his signature at the bottom of each sheet.

He was very close. His cheek showed a faint shadow where he’d shaved, and his neck was tanned. She fought the urge to put out her hand and brush away the hair from his eyes as it fell forward, to make him turn his head and look at her again.

He did it anyway as he straightened. His hand, replacing the pen, missed the container, and the pen rolled.

Jade automatically made a grab for it, and so did Magnus. As her fingers came down on the pen, his hand closed over hers.

He didn’t lift it, and she felt its weight, and the tensile strength of his fingers. She could hear him breathing, and her chair moved very slightly as he put his other hand on the back of it, steadying himself. She was looking at their hands, at his fingers curving about hers.

She thought he said, “Hell!” And then he lifted her hand within his, and closed his other hand about her upper arm, drawing her from the chair.

Jade’s eyes met his, half-afraid, because his touch was not quite gentle. And he swore again, and said, “Don’t look like that.” His face was taut and angry, and for a moment before he lowered his head she thought that what she read in his eyes was some kind of contempt. But then his mouth touched hers with fierce control, moving lightly, almost teasingly at first, gradually becoming more demanding, an expert, carefully constrained seduction of the senses. She hardly knew when he’d persuaded her lips apart for him, and even then he didn’t take advantage of it straight away, although his arm about her waist tightened, and he leaned back on the desk, parting his legs and urging her forward to stand between his warm, hard thighs.

He still held her hand, and as she instinctively clutched at his shoulder with the other, he moved their linked hands so that her arm was bent behind her, his free hand sliding down over the rounded curves, touching her thighs, intruding under her skirt.

She felt her mouth open as he urged her closer to him, her back arched and her pelvis snug against his.

And then he was kissing her deeply, freely, completely overwhelming her senses, so that the blood raced along her veins and beat in her ears, and her limbs felt fluid with pleasure.

He dragged his mouth away, and she opened her eyes and saw that his were brilliant with passion, his cheekbones darkly flushed. He turned, so that it was she who was pressed up against the edge of the desk, and his voice rasped when he said, “Do you know when you first came to work for me, I used to fantasise about making love to you on your desk—or mine?”

“No.” Her voice felt raw. He’d never told her that, even after they were married.

The hand that had been caressing her beneath her skirt was on her breast now, moving over the fabric of her blouse while he watched, apparently fascinated. She knew he could see her arousal even through the blouse and the thin, seamless stretch satin of her bra, could feel it under his palm. He raised his eyes to hers and gave her a tight, glittering smile. “No, you didn’t? Or no, you don’t want to?”

“I never...knew,” she managed to say, her eyelids growing heavy with desire as his hand went on stroking, kneading, discovering.

“
Do
you want to?” he asked her. He released her briefly, only to drag both his hands into her hair, tipping back her head so that she had to look at him.

“N-now?” Her voice faltered.

“Have I shocked you?” His mouth came back to hers, in a kiss that was wild and hot and abandoned. She felt dizzy when he finally lifted his head and said, “We can’t, though, unfortunately. Mrs. Gaines is going to bring in afternoon tea any minute now.”

That
shocked her. She stiffened, coming upright, clutching at his sleeve to steady herself.

Magnus stepped back, laughing. “Don’t panic. We’ve got a few minutes. Anyway, she knows that we’re married, and that we’ve been apart for a long time. I don’t suppose she’d be surprised.”

“She’d be embarrassed,” Jade said, smoothing her hair, making sure her blouse was tucked in. “And so would we.”

“You might be. How do you know I’m not a secret exhibitionist?”

“You’re the one who mentioned we might be...interrupted,” Jade pointed out. “Anyway, after twelve months of marriage, I’d have known.”

A strange expression crossed his face. “Are you sure? There seems to have been quite a lot I didn’t know about
you,
after twelve months of marriage.”

“It...wasn’t very long,” she said, not quite sure what he meant. “Oh! The letters!” she remembered, and turned, wondering if in the heat of passion they’d crushed them. But the pages were away from the edge of the desk, and untouched.

A discreet tap came at the door before Mrs. Gaines opened it and carried in a tray bearing two cups. Magnus cast Jade an ironic look and casually moved back to his own desk.

When they had drunk the tea, Jade asked, “Is there anything more I can do for you?”

She flushed at the way he raised his brows, his eyes making an explicit unspoken comment as they ran over her, but he said only, “No, I don’t need your
secretarial
services any more. You could take the tray out of my way, if you don’t mind.”

She picked it up and walked away from him, but as she reached the door his voice stopped her. “The sooner we take that week away together, the better,” he said. “Have you given any thought to where you’d like to go?”

She half turned, but kept her eyes on the tray in her hands. “I don’t mind,” she said. “Somewhere quiet. I’m happy to leave it to you.”

“I’ll see what I can rustle up.”

* * *

She felt tense and restless, and decided a swim would help settle her body, if not her emotions. Arriving at the beach she found Glen and the baby sitting on the sand, Glen in swim shorts and Rose-Lee wearing a diminutive frilled yellow bikini with red polka dots, and a matching sun-hat.

Jade laughed, and Glen looked up at her with a grin. “Ridiculous, isn’t it?” he said cheerfully. “My sister gave it to her. At least the hat’s practical.” It shaded Rose-Lee’s face so that Jade could see only a fat baby cheek and tiny pointed chin.

“How do you like the beach, Rose-Lee?” Jade asked, making the baby look up with curiosity at the sound of her name, squinting in the sun.

“She’s not too impressed with the water, but she’s enjoying the fresh air.” Glen made a grab for the baby’s fist just before it reached her mouth, with the remains of a handful of sand in it. “Going in?”

“Yes,” Jade said. Seeing his shorts were dry, she said, “I can watch her for a while if you want a dip.”

“Thanks, but you go first.” He picked up a plastic rattle and handed it to Rose-Lee. “Here, if you must eat something, try that.”

When Jade came out and sank down on a towel, Glen ran into the water. Rose-Lee, bored with the rattle, was inspecting a piece of dried seaweed now, and Jade removed it twice from her mouth, finally sitting the baby in front of her on the towel and gently replacing the seaweed with a piece of smooth, whitened driftwood, saying, “I hope it hasn’t got too many germs on it.”

Danella’s voice said, “She tries to eat everything in sight at the moment, and she’s never been sick for a day.”

Dressed in a high-cut one-piece white suit, she dropped a towel on the sand and sat down beside Jade and the baby. Rose-Lee blew some bubbles and waved plump arms at her mother. Danella picked her up, made a face at her, and grinned. “Blub-blub to you, too.”