‘If I said no, would you believe me?’
‘No.’
‘Then I have.’
‘Because of me? Because I was unkind to you? I’m sorry for those things I said.’
‘No, it’s not you. It’s-it’s everything.’
‘Dan, dragging your unhappy memories into the light?’
‘Mmm!’
‘He shouldn’t have done that. It was insensitive of him.’
‘Oh, Dan’s all right. He means well, but he just says the first thing that comes into his head.’
‘Even if it hurts people?’
‘Well, I suppose I’m making too much of it. It was a long time ago.’
‘But she was your mother.’
‘Yes, she was,’ Gina said huskily. ‘And I didn’t understand why she suddenly couldn’t bear to look at me. I was ill, and when I got better I was deaf, and it was like I’d changed into a different person. I kept thinking, one day I’d get it right, and she’d be pleased. Only, then she died-’
She’d been trying not to cry, but suddenly the grief of years overwhelmed her and she dropped her head and sobbed, an inconsolable child again. Carson slipped an arm around her shoulders, and felt them heave. Somewhere deep inside him he was cursing, though whether he was cursing Dan, Gina’s mother, Joey’s mother, or simply himself for being so useless to comfort her, he didn’t know. He only knew that she was unhappy, and somebody ought to be made to pay.
He drew her against him, putting his other arm around her, so that her head fitted against his shoulder, and he rested his cheek against it.
‘I’ll never get it right now,’ Gina choked. ‘My last memories of her are all of how angry she used to get because I couldn’t work out what she wanted. She used to shout at me-I couldn’t hear but I knew she was shouting by the way she tensed up-and there was a terrible hostile look in her eyes, as though I were being stupid on purpose. If people came, she told me to stay out of sight-’
‘Dear God!’ Carson said with soft violence.
‘One day, when I was ten, she got terribly impatient. And the more impatient she was, the more I got it wrong. In the end she stormed out of the house. I felt so wicked, but I didn’t know what I’d done. I sat on the stairs, making plans about how it would be when she came back-how we’d try again, and I’d get it right this time.
‘But she never came back. She collided with a lorry and was killed outright. I thought it was my fault.’
Carson tightened his arms about her, beyond speech.
‘I haven’t remembered all this for years,’ she said at last. ‘It was there, but I wouldn’t look at it. And when my father didn’t cope very well either I suppose I balanced that by building her up in my mind. You can tell yourself all sorts of comforting lies about people who aren’t there.’
He rested his cheek against her hair. ‘Yes,’ he murmured, half to himself. ‘That’s true enough.’
Gina sighed. ‘It wasn’t really her fault. I think she was a light-hearted person who enjoyed a good time. When things didn’t turn out that way, it threw her.’
‘Thousands of mothers cope,’ Carson said, angry for her again. ‘Why must you let her off the hook?’
‘Maybe because it hurts less that way.’ She made a valiant effort to pull herself together. ‘I’m all right,’ she said huskily, dabbing her eyes. ‘I don’t know what came over me to act like that.’
‘Some wounds don’t heal,’ Carson said. ‘And if we try to pretend they have that only makes it worse, somehow.’
‘Yes,’ she whispered, thinking of the woman who had left him wounded and unable to heal.
‘You’ve been strong for Joey, and for me,’ Carson went on. ‘But who’s strong for you?’
‘There have been people who’ve helped. Mrs Braith, Dan’s mother, who taught me signing. She was kind, and he used to look after me a lot when we were children.’
Carson’s eyes hardened at the thought of Dan, her chosen husband, who would let her down again and again. He enfolded her more closely in his arms, wishing he knew what to say. But did he show up any better than the people who’d failed her? Wasn’t that failure exactly what she had recognised in him?
Then he felt her arms creeping around him, as though she found a kind of comfort in the warmth of his body. He stroked her hair, feeling how slight she was against his powerful frame. It was her spirit that was strong.
Tough, she’d said, only a short time ago. But it was the wrong word. She had the strength of finely spun tensile steel, but she could be hurt and broken with a word.
‘I guess you’ve got a good deal to cry about,’ he said.
‘Oh, I don’t cry any more-well, not really. I got all that over years ago.’
He lifted her chin and brushed a tear from her cheek. ‘Is that so? Now you just dry other people’s tears.’
She managed a tremulous smile, and Carson drew a sharp breath at the sight.
‘It’s all right,’ he said softly. ‘Everything’s going to be all right.’ He didn’t know what the words meant, only that he had to say something.
Gina heard him, not just in her ears but in her bones. Every part of her seemed to respond to that assurance of comfort and safety. She wanted to remain enfolded in his arms like this for ever, enjoying the sweet warmth creeping through her, until there was nothing else.
Carson stayed looking down into her face, feeling as though he was held in a dream. It was the night of her engagement to another man, and he had no right to kiss her. But while his conscience was arguing his lips were pressing themselves against hers.
Her mouth was wide and curved, generous to match her heart, and somehow just the right shape for his own mouth. It had been winter in his life for so long that the coming of spring was a shock, making his blood sing and his rational mind take a holiday.
For Gina, with only Dan for comparison, Carson’s kiss came as a revelation. She hadn’t known that a man’s lips could be so subtle, so skilful, or that it was possible to be so completely lost in sensation. His mouth was gentle, teasing her from one caress to another, so that she responded without thinking.
She’d yearned for this since the night he fell asleep on the sofa and she’d looked longingly at his mouth. It was forbidden fruit, and all the sweeter for it. This was why she couldn’t let Dan kiss her again.
She no longer had any power of thought, or even any desire to think. She wanted this, and every passing moment, every movement of his lips, made her want it more. She wanted other things, too, things to do with the feeling of danger at the thinness of her nightdress and her nakedness beneath.
She was trembling with the awakening of new life. His lips were thrilling but they weren’t enough. She desired his hands too, and his whole body pressed against hers, uniting with hers.
She slipped her arm about his neck and drew him closer, inviting him to explore her more intimately. Somehow his tongue was in her mouth, setting off sensations that were intense and glorious. She gave herself up to them joyfully, aching for the intimacy of his touch, her heart beating wildly. She felt his arms tighten about her and the power flowing from his body to hers.
Wherever his tongue flicked against the inside of her mouth, it set off new flares of feeling. She hadn’t known that a man’s touch could make a woman feel like that, as though she would do anything-break any rule-to make him hers.
She melted against him, letting his arms support her while her hands discovered the strong column of his neck, the breadth of his chest. She felt giddy, lying there in the darkness, barely able to see him, but feeling him with every part of her.
It was like the time she’d knelt beside him on the sofa, and his breath had brushed her mouth. She was so alive to Carson that he had only to touch her in one place to touch her everywhere. The electric sensation of his mouth against hers was reflected over her skin, her breasts, her loins.
Carson was too experienced a lover not to sense that Gina was on the verge of total surrender. His pulses leapt and his kisses grew deeper, more urgent and intense. In a moment he would carry her to bed, and she would let him because his skilled caresses had overcome her will.
To hell with Dan! A man had no right to a woman if he couldn’t keep her.
But the thought of Dan was fatal. To Carson he might seem an oaf, but to Gina he was the man she’d chosen- heaven alone knew why!
The struggle with himself was terrible, but he won. Gina had brought him priceless gifts, and he couldn’t repay
