Don't Hurt Me (7 page)

  
‘Oh shit.’ Her hands uncoiled from
around his neck and she sat up, pushing him away. ‘What the hell was I
thinking? That was a
really
bad idea.’

  
He was still watching her, waiting
for a response, a slight frown in his eyes. The scar running down his throat
stood out white against his tan but she tried not to look at it. There was
grass in her hair and on her white sweater. Julia pulled it down to cover her
breasts and picked the grass off with trembling hands, her mind racing. She was
insanely embarrassed by her behaviour, but she did not want to seem like some
inexperienced kid now that it was over.

  
‘I know how it looks. But you’ve
got me wrong,’ she muttered, not meeting his eyes. ‘That was … amazing. No
question about that. But I don’t think we should pursue it. I’m not into casual
sex.’

  
There was an odd silence in which
she felt her skin prickle. Then he gave an abrupt laugh, reaching out to flick
the damp hair away from her face. His voice was dry.

  
‘Neither am I. There was nothing
casual about what we just did. Look at your hands. They’re still shaking.’

  
‘Okay, you turn me on,’ she
snapped. ‘But that doesn’t mean anything.’

  
His mouth twisted and he sat back
against the wall. ‘Some women are such hypocrites. You wanted what I just gave
you. You were begging for it towards the end. But sexual attraction isn’t
enough, is it? You want candles and soft music as well, maybe even a ring on
your finger.’
 

  
‘Christ, don’t be so patronising.’
She hated the way he was speaking to her, but tried to rein in her temper. She
could not simply blow this job away on a whim; her agent would dump her if she
did, and then how would she pay her bills? ‘Listen, I don’t normally have sex
with a man before dating him. Call me old-fashioned if you like, but this is
unusual behaviour for me. I prefer to be cautious about sex.’

  
‘My God, I was right about you
first time,’ he laughed, his mouth twisting harshly. ‘You are a control freak.’

  
‘That’s unfair!’
 

  
‘So how do you usually pick your
lovers then?’ he demanded sarcastically. ‘Do you check them out with a credit
reference agency before dating them, or simply ask for their medical records?’

  
Julia felt her cheeks burn with
fury and humiliation. It took all her self-control not to slap his face. But
what good would that do, except lose her the opportunity to continue working with
him and possibly set her career back several years in the process? It would be
far better for her to remove herself at once, distance herself from this
situation in the hope that time would cool them both down. That was the
professional thing to do, she told herself.

  
The rain had stopped some minutes
ago and the lean-to was silent apart from their ragged breathing.

  
‘I think we’d better get back to
the house,’ she said stiffly.

  
‘Suits me fine.’ His eyes were
flashing with anger too. ‘I shouldn’t have done that anyway. I got carried away
by how responsive you were. But I promised myself I wouldn’t get involved with
a woman again. It never seems to end well and my life is complicated enough
right now.’

  
My
life is complicated enough right now.

  
She wondered what he meant by that.
His daughter, perhaps.

  
Her clothing tidy again, she
climbed out of the lean-to, pushing aside the wet tarpaulin to find a world
sparkling with fresh light. Marshall emerged beside her a few moments later,
stretching his cramped limbs as he surveyed the change in the weather. The mist
and heavy clouds seemed to have cleared and the sun was shining at last. Above
the trees, she could even see the dark slate roof of Moor’s Peak glittering
peacefully. It looked like a completely different house in the sunlight.

  
Julia followed him back along the
path towards the house, shocked to find her legs still shaking beneath her but
determined not to let him see that reaction. His ego was huge enough already,
she thought grimly. There was no need to give him the satisfaction of realising
how strongly his touch had affected her.

  
But Julia squirmed inwardly,
remembering her helpless response to his sexual drive. She had caved in so
easily, given the man exactly what he wanted.
I got carried away by how responsive you were.
What must he think
of her?

As they
reached the drive to the house, Marshall paused in mid-stride, his expression
blank as he shielded his eyes against the sun and stared straight ahead.

  
Outside the front door, parked
diagonally across the gravel, stood a low slung white sports car.

  
Julia looked at the car curiously,
then back at his face. There was a small frown in his eyes now and she guessed
that he knew who the car belonged to, even though he had not said anything.

  
The front door flew open as they
approached and a tall redhead in her thirties appeared in the doorway, her slim
figure emphasised by tight black trousers and a cherry-red sweater which zipped
up the front. The zip itself had been left daringly undone at the top, showing
a pale throat and most of her cleavage. Swaying there on high black heels, the
woman stared at Julia for a long penetrating moment, then transferred her gaze
to Marshall as he came up the front steps towards her.

  
‘You said you’d call me, darling,’
she pouted. ‘It’s been almost a week since I got back from America. What’s been
going on?’

  
Marshall bent his head and kissed
the woman, their bodies touching intimately as Julia stood back in
embarrassment.

  
‘I’m sorry, Sasha. It’s been
absolute hell here. I’ve been up to my neck in work, then Victoria ran away
from school ... and now I’ve got a new illustrator staying here for a few
weeks. My editor’s pushing me to get
The
Wounded Tiger
ready as soon as possible.’

  
The woman stared back at Julia in a
less than friendly manner as Marshall led her back inside the house. Her voice
dropped to a piercing stage whisper, deliberately designed to make sure Julia
could hear every word she was saying. ‘Is that her? But she’s so young.’

  
He opened his dark wood study door
and led her inside, his hands seeming to linger on her waist as she brushed
against him. His tone was reassuring, almost sympathetic.

  
‘Come along, Sasha. I’ll get you a
gin and tonic. Then we can sit down and talk in private.’ He glanced back at
Julia in the act of closing his door, oddly expressionless, his voice dropping
to what sounded like a threat. ‘I’ll see
you
later. Don’t go anywhere.’

  
 
Julia stood there in taut silence for a
few moments after the door had closed, hands clenched by her sides, then
realised how ridiculous she was being and forced herself to relax. It was none
of her business who came and went in his household. That quick orgasm in the
lean-to had meant nothing. It had been a pleasurable distraction from work,
that was all. She had to grow up and learn to shrug off casual sex, just as men
like Marshall did.

  
She hurried up to her room to
change out of her muddy clothes, trying not to imagine how she must have looked
to that woman’s eyes, stumbling up the drive with her jeans badly muddied and
her hair in disarray.

  
I
thought she must be one of your staff
. Presumably one of his gardeners, she
thought with a wry grimace at her appearance.

  
Examining herself in the
floor-length mirror, she saw a few light bruises springing up on her shoulders
and hips, her skin marked where he had gripped her. She had not even noticed
how tightly he was holding her. But then, maybe she had been too busy coming. God
though, he was a demanding lover. But she could not deny that she had enjoyed
his dominant way of kissing and touching, of practically forcing her to respond
to his love-making. There was something about a man taking charge in bed that
always got her excited, especially if he pushed her past her comfort zone.

  
Nonetheless, she was not sure she
would like it if Marshall tried to take control in any other areas of her life.
In bed was one thing. But she could not let him get into her head and start
controlling her there, however addictive his kisses.

  
Finally sinking into a deep luxurious
bath, Julia closed her eyes and made herself think of other, more pressing
professional matters: the illustrations for
The
Wounded Tiger
, for instance, which had still not taken on a satisfying
shape in her head.

  
Yet even with her eyes tightly closed,
she could not seem to escape the reality of their heated sex less than an hour
ago. Nor could she help remembering that glamorous redhead’s pout and how
Marshall’s hands had lingered on her waist as if they too were lovers. But were
they?

  
My
life is complicated enough right now.

  
If he was sleeping with the sexy redhead,
it would certainly explain a few things. And she was welcome to him, Julia
thought savagely. If Marshall was the kind of man who tried it on with every
woman he met, she wanted nothing more to do with him.

  
Except professionally, of course.

  
Like her agent had said on the
phone, she needed this job. Badly.

CHAPTER
FOUR

‘I’m so
bored. That film must have been on telly at least a dozen times,’ Victoria
said, switching off the television with a yawn and uncurling her legs from the
old leather Chesterfield.

  
Now that his girlfriend appeared to
have gone home, Marshall had asked Julia to keep his daughter company while he
made some phone calls. But it was over an hour since he had disappeared into
his study and Victoria was becoming restless.

  
The slim teenager stood up and
stretched lazily, gazing round the living room with an expression of extreme
boredom on her face. Then her eyes lit up with a mischievous grin. ‘Hey, Julia.
Did you know there was a secret passageway outside the kitchen door? You should
see it, it’s full of spiders and concealed spy holes.’

  
‘Ugh, I hate spiders,’ Julia
shuddered. She put down her magazine though, rather fascinated by the idea of a
secret passageway. ‘I didn’t think Moor’s Peak was old enough for something
like that.’

  
‘The man who built this place was a
complete eccentric, one of those nutty Victorians. He was obsessed with secret
rooms, so he asked the architect to add one to the design. I can show you if
you like. Unless you’re scared of the dark?’

  
‘No,’ she said firmly. ‘Only of
spiders.’

  
The secret passage was located a
few feet away from the kitchen door, its entrance hidden by the intricate dark
wood panelling. Victoria ran her hand expertly along the wall until she reached
a particularly ornate carving of a rose which she pressed inwards with a flat
palm. The whole wall seemed to move under her weight, swinging silently open to
reveal a low narrow corridor festooned with cobwebs and smelling of cold stale
air. The girl unhooked the torch which hung just inside the doorway and
gestured Julia to follow, bending her head as she moved carefully away along
the creaking wooden floorboards.

  
‘Better keep close behind me,’
Victoria said over her shoulder, voice echoing in the draughty space. ‘This
passage runs the whole length of the ground floor, right from the kitchen to
the dovecot wing, and the floorboards are a bit dodgy in places.’
 

  
‘You mean it’s not safe?’

  
‘Just a bit damp in winter, that’s
all. Rain gets in through the outside walls sometimes and rots the boards.’

  
‘Your father won’t mind us doing
this, will he?’

  
Victoria stopped and Julia almost
bumped into her in the semi- darkness. There was a suspicious note to the
girl’s voice.

  
‘Are you sure my dad didn’t bring
you here to spy on me? I’m not a kid. I don’t need permission to walk around my
own home.’

  
‘I told you before, I only came
here to discuss the illustrations for his book,’ Julia reminded her. ‘Besides,
if your father really wanted someone to spy on you, he’d be more likely to ask
his girlfriend than a complete stranger.’

  
‘His girlfriend?’ Victoria sounded
puzzled for a moment. ‘Do you mean Sasha?’

  
‘Yes, I think that was her name.’

  
‘She might be his latest
girlfriend, I don’t know. She’s certainly always turning up at odd moments, it
drives him crazy.’ The girl glanced at her over her shoulder. ‘That’s something
you’d better
 
not forget while
you’re here, unless you enjoy being yelled at. Dad hates anyone interrupting
him when he’s in writing.’

  
‘I’ll bear it in mind,’ she said
drily.

  
‘Sasha’s a jewellery designer, you
know. She’s pretty talented, made me some cool silver earrings last Christmas.
She wants Dad to pack me off to some finishing school in Switzerland. So she can
get her claws into him while I’m stuck out there learning how to arrange
flowers.’

  
Julia smiled, amused by the girl’s
scathing tone. ‘I believe most finishing schools are business-oriented these
days. You’re more likely to be learning accountancy or Japanese there, to be
honest.’

  
‘Whatever. I can run away from a
school in Switzerland just as easily as I can run away here. So he might as
well save himself all that money and effort -’

  
Victoria halted abruptly, shining
the torch beam along the wall ahead. They had come to a sudden bend in the
passageway. Her voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper.

  
‘See that little flap on the wall?
It’s a spyhole. Looks straight into my dad’s study.’

  
Now that they had stopped shuffling
along the dusty floorboards, Julia could hear a deep masculine voice on the
other side of the wall. The voice was unmistakeable. Just hearing it made her
body begin to tense and the hairs rise on the back of her neck. From the long
pauses between sentences, it was soon apparent that Marshall was speaking to
somebody on the telephone.

  
Julia shivered, folding her arms
for warmth in the chilly air. It had not been a good idea to explore the house
without asking for permission. The old passageway was clearly dangerous and she
could not imagine Owen Marshall approving of his daughter being down here. She
felt deeply uncomfortable about eavesdropping on the novelist in his private
study, even if he was unaware of her presence behind the wall.

  
‘We should go back now,’ she
insisted, turning to retrace her steps in the darkness. ‘I’m sure he wouldn’t
approve of us being here. Can you pass me the torch?’

  
But the girl paid no attention. She
was too busy trying to follow her father’s conversation, her voice a little
breathless. ‘Listen, I think he’s on the phone to my headmaster, Mr Ewart.’

  
‘Vicky - ’

  
‘In a minute. I want to hear what
he’s saying first.’

  
Before Julia could try to prevent
her, the girl had lifted the little flap on the wall and put her eye against
the spyhole. Seconds later, they both heard Marshall’s voice raised in crisp
agreement as if the telephone conversation was drawing to a close.

  
‘Absolutely, Mr Ewart,’ he was
saying. ‘That seems like the most sensible option to me, given these difficult
circumstances. I’ll drive Victoria back to school first thing in the morning
and we can finalise the details when I arrive.’

  
Victoria dropped the flap abruptly
over the spyhole and turned back to Julia, her eyes glittering with unshed
tears.

  
‘God, I don’t believe it,’ she
choked furiously, the torch beam wavering in front of her. ‘Did you hear what
he said? He’s going to send me back to school tomorrow, in spite of everything.
How many times do I have to run away before he gets the message?’

  
Frowning, Julia shook her head.
‘Slow down, Vicky. You can’t be certain what you heard.’

  
‘Oh, don’t bother defending him. Paul
was right. My dad’s nothing but an arrogant bastard and he can go to hell for
all I care!’ Victoria pushed past her with a sharp cry, stumbling back along
the passageway, torch beam bouncing erratically off the walls and floor. ‘’

  
‘Vicky, come back!’ Julia called
after her, concerned that she was going to hurt herself but the girl paid no
attention.

  
Alone in the darkness, Julia stood
motionless, confused and fairly surprised by what she had overheard from
Marshall’s study. The evidence against him seemed pretty damning, yet she could
not bring herself to condemn him without asking him to explain the
situation
 
first.

  
Sternly, she told herself not to
get involved. For one thing, Marshall might have a perfectly understandable
reason for taking his daughter back to the school. And for another, this was
absolutely none of her business. It was a private affair between father and
daughter and she had no right to interfere.

  
Returning to the faint glimmer of
light which marked the end of the secret passageway, this time she barely
noticed the delicate cobwebs brushing against her face and hands, too intent on
her own thoughts to realise what they were. She did not want to believe that
Owen Marshall could behave so cruelly towards his own daughter. Yet what other
explanation could there be for that telephone conversation?

  
It had been her immediate intention
to head upstairs to find Victoria and reassure the girl before she did anything
stupid, but she did not get the chance. Almost as soon as she had closed the
hidden door in the wood panelling, she heard the sound of his determined tread
and turned to see Marshall bearing down on her.

  
Even though she had no logical
reason to feel embarrassed, her face was ridiculously hot as she spun to face
him.

  
Had he seen her emerging from the
secret passageway? If he had, she was not prepared to lie about it just to
avoid embarrassment. But neither did she relish the thought of provoking his
anger by admitting that she had been eavesdropping on Owen Marshall’s private
conversations.

  
‘Ah, there you are,’ he said,
raising his eyebrows when he saw her flushed cheeks. ‘Something wrong?’

  
She shook her head, thrusting her
hands into the back pockets of her jeans to hide the dirty knuckles.

  
‘Good,’ Marshall nodded briskly,
gesturing to the leather portfolio beneath his arm. ‘Then I’d like to discuss
these preliminary sketches of yours. Shall we go into the library?’

  
He guided her into a sombre book-lined
room, closing the door behind them and snapping on the overhead lights. The
floor-length red velvet curtains had been drawn back, letting in a pallid
afternoon light, but it would be dusk soon and the chandelier which dominated
the room immediately dispelled its gloominess. The elaborately carved
mantelpiece writhed with strange figures: the leering smile of a centaur, a
beautiful woman’s face, her hair becoming an oak tree in full summer as it
curled along the dark wood.

  
‘Impressive, isn’t it?’

  
‘I’ve never seen anything like it,’
she agreed, and there was genuine astonishment in her voice as she gazed
admiringly at the mantelpiece, tracing a finger down the carved wood.

  
‘This house is full of surprising
little touches. That’s one reason I wanted to buy the place when it came up for
auction. I’d seen it through the trees when I was out walking, and the locals
were always gossiping about it. Tales of ghostly hauntings and all the usual
rubbish.’ He smiled drily. ‘Personally, I was just fascinated by its wonderful
eccentricity. It’s not often a house like this comes onto the open market.’

  
The centrepiece of the library was
an antique oval table in smooth mahogany. Marshall unzipped the portfolio and
carefully spread out her sketches across the polished surface.

  
Standing on opposite sides of the
table, they studied the drawings at length. ‘I think this one has potential,’
he commented after a long moment of silence, tapping a pen and ink sketch she
had made of a barren moorland scene. ‘But it lacks focus. You need a figure
from the story here. Perhaps coming out of the mist?’

  
‘The tiger himself?’

  
Marshall glanced across at her. ‘Or
his rescuer.’

  
She felt an odd sense of confusion
as their eyes met and looked down at once, reaching out to finger a different
sketch.

  
‘You didn’t like this one?’

  
He shrugged, dismissing it with a
brief sideways glance. ‘It’s okay but nothing special. I prefer your work when
it coincides more closely with my own obsessions.’

  
‘Which are?’

  
‘The moor, the wilderness ... ’

  
Marshall turned his head slightly
as he spoke, gazing out of the window towards the dark tracts of moorland
beyond the trees as though he were looking for something. Julia followed the
direction of his eyes, drawn by his rapt attention. She could understand why he
loved the Cornish landscape so much. In this eerie zone between day and night,
it did seem beautiful and thick with legends. Perhaps even a haunting or two,
as the more superstitious locals would have tourists believe. The perfect place
for a writer of ghost stories and other supernatural tales. Through the
leafless branches surrounding the lake, it was still possible to see a faint
glimmer of water reflecting the dusk as night fell, and immediately beyond
that, the brooding emptiness of the moor.

  
‘Bodmin Moor is an unpredictable
place and, as you discovered, dangerous too.’ He swung his head back to look at
her, his eyes searching her face, strangely intent. ‘Now that you’ve seen it,
Julia, what do you think of the moor?’