Escape Me Never (14 page)

She was at the edge of the mystery which had eluded her for so long.

She felt him move. Was aware of him no longer at her side, but above her—over her.

Heard him whisper, 'Cassandra.'

She screamed, a high terrified sound, and jack-knifed away from him, her body curling protectively into the foetal position, her hands lifting to guard her face and head.

She said on a little wailing note, 'Don't hurt me—please, don't hurt me. I'll do what you want—anything you want, but don't hurt me.'

'Darling—what is it? What's wrong?'

Hands on her shoulders, turning her, forcing her… She shuddered in agony, trying to twist away. 'I know what you like—what you want me to do.' Her voice was high and breathless like a little girl's. 'And I'll do it, I promise I will, if you'll just be kind to me.'

She sat up, her eyes blind, unrecognising, as she pushed him back on the pillows, and bent over him, her shoulders hunched submissively as her trembling mouth sought him.

His fingers bit into her arms as he dragged her upright—shook her.

He said furiously, 'Will you tell me what the hell you're talking about—and what the hell you think you're doing, as well?' The hazel eyes blazed down into hers. 'I want to make love with you, Cassie, not have you—service me as if I was some client in a sleazy massage parlour.'

She looked at him with blank incredulity, then her whole body crumpled, and she began to cry, her body quivering under the force of the long, shattering sobs.

His arms en-folded her, drawing her tightly against him, pressing her wet face into the curve of his neck and shoulder, his hand stroking her tumbled hair, as he murmured soothingly to her.

As the fierce terrible weeping began to subside, he lifted her, putting her into the bed, and drawing the covers over her. She lay quietly, her hands covering her face, her body shaken by an occasional lingering spasm of frightened grief.

His hand touched her shoulder. He said quietly, 'Put this on, Cassie.'

She looked up. He was standing beside the bed, wearing a robe, and holding out what seemed to be a pyjama jacket in heavy black silk.

Cass sat up slowly, clutching the sheet to her. Mouth compressed he helped her put the concealing garment on, his fingers coolly impersonal as he fastened it.

He said, 'Now stay quietly where you are. I'm going to get some brandy.' She began to protest, and he put a silencing finger on her lips. 'I think you need some,' he said, adding wrily. 'And I know I do.'

He was only gone a very few minutes. He gave her the brandy, then lay down beside her outside the covers, putting his arm round her shoulders. She flinched, but his light clasp did not relax.

'You'll have to take my word for it, Cassie, that I've never felt less like sex in my life. You have nothing else to fear from me.' There was a silence, then he said. 'So—who was he?'

'I don't know what you mean.' She swallowed some brandy.

He sighed. 'Yes, you do, Cassie. I want the name of the man who turned the act of love into an act of terror for you.' He paused grimly. 'Was it your husband?'

She said bleakly, 'Yes, it was Brett.'

'Tell me about it.' He shifted slightly, drawing her closer, so that her head was pillowed on his shoulder. 'When did it start?'

She took another sip of brandy. She'd never cared for it, but she could feel it spreading warmingly through her chilled body. She said dully, 'Almost from the beginning. The first time he hit me was on our honeymoon. We were staying in a caravan on a camp site, and I'd forgotten to bring back the lager he wanted from the camp shop. He—slapped me.' She bit her lip. 'I was so surprised I fell over—and he practically grovelled. He—he thought he'd knocked me down. He seemed so horrified, so disgusted with himself that I—I thought it was just a momentary lapse—because he'd lost his temper.'

'But it wasn't?'

'No,' Cass admitted wretchedly. 'In fact, Brett—didn't lose his temper very much at all. That was made it so awful, because I could never see the—danger signs, and—pacify him.'

He said, 'Why in hell didn't you leave him? Go back to your parents and tell them what was going on?'

'My parents died when I was quite small,' she said. 'An aunt brought me up, but we were never close. I did try and tell her once, but all she said was that most men didn't know their own strength, and that I must have provoked him. I was expecting Jodie and she said it had probably made me difficult to live with.'

'Dear God,' he said softly. 'Did he actually hit you while you were carrying his child?'

She nodded. 'He hated me being pregnant. He said I looked obscene.'

'The only obscenity in all this is himself. Why did you stay with him?'

She said bitterly, 'Because like a lot of other women with young babies, I had nowhere else to go. I was eighteen when I was married. I hadn't trained for anything. Everything I've done with my life, I achieved—after Brett died.' She paused. 'I did try to save some money out of the housekeeping, but it wasn't easy.' She looked round the bedroom, at its discreetly understated luxury. 'You've never been poor, and you're not a woman, so you can't know what it was like. You'd never understand.' She stared down at her hands. 'But when Jodie came—it was bearable. He was better after she was born. But he didn't want any more children, he said, so he stopped sleeping with me. He said it was no hardship, because I was frigid and useless.'

'When did he come to that conclusion?'

'From the first, really.' She drank some more brandy. 'He complained because I wasn't experienced—because I didn't know enough. He used to bring books home, and want me to do the things that were in them, and when I didn't want to—he hit me.' She was silent for a long moment. 'Eventually, I think that he had to hit me. That it was the only stimulus that worked for him.'

His hand cupped her chin, turning her to face him. 'But it wasn't like that with us, Cassie. So what made you think…?'

'Because you called me—Cassandra.' She said it with difficulty. 'Brett always used to call me that—before—before he…'

He said with a great weariness, 'Dear Christ.' There was a brief silence, then he said, 'And Jodie. What started the nightmares for her? You told me once that she'd seen the accident which killed her father.'

Cass swallowed convulsively. 'He began to hurt her too, after a while,' she said. 'I suspected it, but I could never prove it, or make him admit it. He used to laugh at me. But she'd begun to avoid him, and once I heard her cry, and went into the sitting room, and he was just moving away from her. There was a mark on her face.' She shuddered. 'I couldn't stand any more. I just— grabbed her and ran. I had nothing except her, not even my bag. I had nowhere to go, except that I'd read in the local paper that one of those women's refuges had opened in the neighbourhood, and I had some vague idea of finding it.' She took a deep breath. 'I—ran, straight across the road with Jodie in my arms, and Brett was right behind us. For once, he really was angry. I don't think he'd ever really believed I would leave. And he wasn't looking. There was a lorry. It couldn't stop. I heard the brakes. I turned round, and—we saw it happen.' She stopped abruptly, gagging slightly as the horror rushed over her once more.

'Everyone was very kind,' she said at last. 'The Coroner told me it would have been over at once. That—oh God—that Brett would have felt no pain.' She began to laugh. 'He—he thought I'd be glad to know that.'

His voice was compassionate. 'Hush, darling, hush,' and he held her, pressing her face into his shoulder, until she'd regained her self-contriol.

At last he said, 'And, of course, you said once I reminded you of him. I'm beginning to see now why you reacted as you did when you ran into me that day at Finiston Webber.' He gave a short laugh. 'I misread the signals completely. I was attracted, so you had to be as well, and I told myself the antagonism I sensed from you was simply liberated female contrariness. That I could be a living reminder of your personal nightmare never even occurred to me.'

Cassie shook her head. 'Why should it?' She sank her teeth into her bottom lip. 'I'm sorry,' she said stiltedly. 'I've—ruined everything. Will you take me home, please.'

To that empty flat?' he asked. 'I don't think that's a very good idea. There are plenty of guest rooms here.' He paused, then said flatly, 'And you have nothing to worry about from me, Cassie, I swear it. I won't come anywhere near you.'

'Thank you.' She didn't look at him. She was tensing against the sudden, unexpected pain which had lanced through her at his words. 'But I'd really rather go home.'

'Then you shall.' The sheltering arm was removed, and with it, to her dazed mind, went all the comfort the world had ever offered.

He picked up her clothes from the floor, and put them on the end of the bed, then bent to retrieve his own clothing.

He said courteously, 'Can you manage? I'll dress in the bathroom but I'll be within call if you need anything.'

Her voice shook slightly, 'I'll be all right.'

He nodded, and left her alone. Cass moved slowly and reluctantly forcing her trembling limbs to acquiescence, huddling into her garments.

As she retied the sash of the jade dress, she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror and shuddered. What right had she had to wear such a thing? It was a sexy provocative disguise, but totally fraudulent. Because, underneath, she was still as much an emotional cripple as ever.

The mental numbness which assailed her was beginning to wear off, and shame was taking its place. For the first time in this new life she'd made for herself with such single-minded determination, she'd lifted the curtain on the past for someone else.

No one, apart from the women at the refuge in those first exhausted days knew the truth about her relationship with Brett.

And now, she'd blurted out the sordid details to Rohan Grant, of all people in the world.

She'd made, in fact, an abject, humiliating fool of herself.

Because, as he'd made clear from the first, all Rohan wanted from her was sex. Well, she'd failed him there, and if that wasn't bad enough, had added a complete run-down on her hangups.

The blue-green eyes were wide and bitter, like bruises in the pallor of her face.

No wonder, he couldn't wait to get her out of his bed—out of his life. He'd been kind to her about it all, but behind the sympathy, he must have been embarrassed to death. He'd wanted a sexual partner, a willing woman—not to be burdened by her past emotional traumas.

And she'd led him on. Instead of keeping him at arm's length, as she should have done, as sanity had suggested she should do, she'd led him on by coming here tonight—by wearing this dress.

He must feel totally defrauded.

By the time Rohan returned, she had herself well in hand, even managing a cool smile in response to his look of enquiry.

In next to no time, it seemed, they were in the car, and driving back through the late night traffic. Rohan was concentrating rather too obviously on his driving. Cass stared rigidly through the windscreen. Neither spoke.

When they reached their destination, he said briefly, 'I'll come up with you,' and switched off the engine.

'There's really no need,' she said stiffly.

"There's every need.' His voice was brusque.

He fitted the key in the lock for her, opened the door, and went ahead of her to put on the lights, checking that all was well.

She followed him mutinously into the sitting room. Rohan dropped the key into her silently outstretched palm.

'Good night, Cassie,' he said quietly.

She took a breath. 'Not good night—goodbye,' she said flatly. 'I don't want to see you again, Rohan.' She swallowed. 'This evening was a terrible mistake—a disaster from every point of view. It was wrong of me to try and—use you, as I did, and I can only apologise.' She paused. 'All I can promise is to stay out of your life in future, and hope you'll have the goodness to stay out of mine.'

There was a silence. The hazel eyes looked coldly into hers. Then he shrugged. 'If that's what you want,' he said. 'Perhaps it might be best.'

The door closed behind him, and Cass was alone.

She sank down on the sofa, staring blankly ahead of her.

So—he'd gone, without a backward glance, or even a word of regret. Well, it was what she'd asked him to do—what she'd expected, but in some twisted way that made it worse, not better.

She'd feared he would not care enough. Now she knew that he hadn't cared at all, and the realisation was a bitter one which haunted her as she lay, looking into the night shadows, and waiting for the glimmer which would herald dawn.