[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
Victoria? Is that why you won't say yes?'
'No. There's no one else.'
'Then what's the objection?'
Her eyes dropped. 'I assumed one got married because one was head over
heels in love, like my mother and father. Your version of marriage is so
businesslike; not very romantic for someone who got rave notices as
Romeo.'
Gavin stared down at her, frustrated. 'Romance? Is that what you want?'
Without warning he pulled her against him, his mouth in sudden demand
against her parted, surprised lips, nothing like the other kisses. He held her
fast and slid the dress from her shoulders and she gasped as the bright head
swooped and his lips closed over a tightly-furled nipple, his tongue licking
and coaxing it erect, making her cry out and try to push him away. Gavin
raised his head and looked into her dazed eyes triumphantly. 'Well?' he
demanded. 'Is that what you wanted? Did I supply the missing ingredient?'
Victoria pushed him away violently, her eyes smouldering with fury.
'That was sex, not romance. Don't you know the difference? You obviously
don't understand me, either. When I marry if I marry it will be because
the man who asks me loves me, and wants me because he can't contemplate
life without me, not because I'm an object of pity who would make a very
convenient wife, because she'd be grateful just to stay at home and keep your
bed warm. Or because I'd make a convenient buffer against the multitude of
women panting for your body, or your fame, or whatever particular aspect of
your charms turns them on most.'
'Is that how you think of my proposal?' Gavin sprang to his feet, agile as a
cat, and stood over her like Colossus, his eyes slitted in hostility in his angry
face.
Victoria refused to be intimidated and stared back defiantly. 'Since you ask
me, yes. I suppose you thought I'd fall on your neck in gratitude.'
'Not in the least. My imagination was never wild enough for that.' His
nostrils flared slightly as he raked a hand through his hair. 'God all I
wanted was to make it up to you, to try and compensate a little for the years
of misery after your parents died.' He flung away and leaned on the
mantelpiece, staring down into the empty grate. 'I couldn't think of any other
way to persuade you to take money from me unless we were married, so it
seemed the perfect solution to marry you. I knew very well you had some
kind of feeling for me once. I thought hoped there might be enough left
for a basis for marriage.' He turned his head to look at her, the expression in
his eyes hard to make out under the half-closed lids.
Victoria shook her head. 'When I was eighteen I'd have jumped at the chance
of marrying you said yes on any terms. But you asked Julia instead, and
after one look at her I was crushed, my poor immature affections mutilated
beyond repair. My life, I firmly believed, was in ruins. In one way it was.
Your visit to the Coach House with Julia occurred a day or two before my
Oxford entrance exam. I was in such a dense fog of misery over you it
seemed to numb my brain, and I failed. Ignominiously.'
Gavin's eyes widened in consternation. 'But Victoria!'
She shrugged sadly. 'Yes. I blamed you bitterly. If your visit had only been
after the exam, you see I couldn't get the thought out of my head. Mother
knew exactly how I felt, of course. She was a helpless witness to that awful
black misery of mine, and I know very well I cast a shadow over over the
last part of her life because I was so unhappy at the college I went to,
couldn't settle down. I was a pain in the neck, to be precise. And all because
of you, I firmly believed. I worried my parents sick, and was too wrapped up
in my stupid little self to take any notice of their concern. Then it was too
late. They weren't there any more.'
Gavin looked as though someone had punched him in the stomach. 'You
blame me for all that?' he asked.
Victoria met his eyes candidly. 'My intellect has always exonerated you
entirely. It's my emotional side that refuses to agree. Some silly part inside
me, the heart maybe, to be mawkish, still has a tendency to resent you quite
actively, and not merely because of Julia, but because you just went off and
forgot us, as if you had no further use for us. My mother never admitted it,
but I know she was hurt, while I, my poor little calf-love trampled in the
dust, was shattered. I became convinced, like Shakespeare, that "most
friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly". My outlook hasn't changed
all that much, so how could I marry you, feeling like that?'
CHAPTER SEVEN
GAVIN sat down abruptly, rubbing a weary hand over his face. 'That's one
hell of a load to lay at someone's door.'
Victoria shrugged. 'You asked.'
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]