The Importance of Being Emma (31 page)

I knew, even before he rolled onto his back and greeted me with a sleepy smile. I knew it was Mark.

‘’
Morning, beautiful,’ he said, propping himself up on one elbow and reaching out to stroke my cheek with his other hand. Such a familiar hand, with its long tanned fingers and the signet ring that had belonged to his grandfather. But such an unfamiliar gesture, presuming intimacy. It stirred something within me, a vague memory of taking those fingers in my mouth, one by one, tasting sloe gin and …

I shrank away from him, grabbed the sheet and pulled it up to my chin. ‘What are you doing in my bed?’ I said, trying to keep my voice steady.

He grinned. ‘Technically it’s my bed, although you’ve spent just as much time in it.’ He leaned over and traced my lips with a confident forefinger; but I kept my mouth firmly closed, frowning as I absorbed what he’d just told me.

‘
Don’t you remember, you hussy?’ he said, his eyes dancing.

My heart started to pound as painfully as my head. ‘Are you telling me that we … ?’ I couldn’t bring myself to say it.

‘
We certainly did, although I don’t find it exactly flattering that you’ve forgotten so easily. Maybe you need an action replay.’ He pulled down the sheet, bent his head and started nuzzling my breast.

‘
For God’s sake!’ I shook him off with such force that the sheet ended up in a useless tangle. Still, he must have already seen all I was showing – and more. I moved to the far edge of the bed and looked at him warily.

‘
Let me get this right. I came to your room and we … Oh, shit! I just can’t understand how we could do such a thing.’

His eyes narrowed. ‘Well, Emma, it’s like this. I get hard and you get wet and we – ’

I put my hands over my ears. ‘No, no! I mean I can’t understand
why
we would do it. With each other.’

Silence. Then he said, in a cold, clipped voice, ‘Can’t you?’

‘
Well, sort of, at a basic level. We both have needs, after all. But we’re just friends, we’re not into each other in that way.’

‘
Believe me, we were into each other in that way last night,’ he said flatly. ‘Correction, this morning. More than once, in fact.’

I looked at him in horror. ‘You mean we – more than once?’

‘
Look, we’d both been drinking, but I’d have thought it was a bloody sight more memorable than you’re making out!’

My mind went off at a tangent. ‘Did you wear anything?’

‘
No.’ He gave a scornful laugh. ‘I seem to recall that you quite enjoyed watching me take everything off.’

I suppressed a shudder. ‘I meant, did you wear a condom?’

He flushed. ‘I didn’t. I wasn’t expecting – ’

‘
Oh shit! What if – ?’ I made to get out of bed, but his hand closed round my arm like a vice.

‘
Where are you going? You can’t tell if you’re pregnant yet. And if you are, then you can’t just run away and pretend it’s nothing to do with me.’

Maybe that was true, but it wasn’t what I wanted to hear. I lashed out at him, punching and kicking for all I was worth. It was futile, of course. With humiliating ease, he seized my wrists, pushed me back onto the bed and knelt astride me, completely in control. As we were both stark naked, it could have been, should have been, a sexually charged play fight. But that was the last thing on either of our minds.

His eyes bored into mine. ‘We need to talk about what’s happened.’

‘
Do I have any choice?’

‘
Not really,’ he said grimly. ‘So tell me – why did you come to my room?’

I focused on the picture hanging on the wall behind him, a run-of-the-mill still life – two oranges, a bunch of black grapes and a carafe of red wine. My head throbbed as I tried to recollect my actions. But a disturbing image intruded: my fingers raking his hair as his tongue teased my nipple in the most incredibly arousing way …

I took a deep breath and stared doggedly at the grapes. ‘I needed Harriet to undo my dress, but I couldn’t remember which room she was in. When I heard her in here, I assumed that this was her room and came in. She went before I could ask her for help, so I asked you instead.’

‘
That’s it? Nothing else?’

I looked him straight in the eye. ‘No.’

‘
Then you certainly got more than you bargained for,’ he said quietly.

I twisted my head to the side and studied another picture, a Constable print, all serenity and sunshine. ‘Don’t worry, I’m not about to accuse you of rape. I must have been willing, I suppose.’

‘
You
suppose
?’ His voice was raw with some sort of emotion – injured pride, no doubt. ‘God help me, Emma! You asked me to kiss you, even though I warned you what the consequences would be. You told me you wanted me, “so, so much”. When I was inside you, you begged me not to stop!’

He was almost shouting now, and I flinched as each word hit home. I couldn’t free my hands to put them over my ears, so I screwed my eyes shut. Tight shut. But still the accusations came, loud and clear.

‘
Oh yes,’ he bit out, ‘whatever state you were in, you knew exactly what you were doing. And who you were doing it with. You called my name over and over again. Screamed it, in fact, when I – ’

I felt my face flame. ‘That drink, Batty’s sloe gin, it put me in the mood. And Flynn wasn’t – ’ I broke off, opened my eyes and glared at him. ‘Don’t you understand? There was no one else around.’

‘
Give me strength,’ he muttered, releasing my wrists and getting up from the bed. Then, in a bored tone, ‘Forgive me if I can’t get too ecstatic about being a stand-in for Flynn Fucking Churchill.’

At that, something inside me snapped. ‘You’ve got one hell of a nerve, Mark Knightley! Wasn’t I just a substitute for Tamara?’

My breath caught in my throat as he looked down at me, his mouth twisted into a mocking smile. ‘Yes, you were.’ A pause. ‘Only not as good.’ And he went into the bathroom without another word.

A few seconds later, I heard the hiss of the shower. I scrambled to my feet, pulled on my crumpled dress and held it up at the front to cover my breasts. Then I found my briefs and my room key, dashed to the door, opened it and peered round to make sure there was no one about.

Head held high, I walked along the corridor, willing the tears not to fall until I reached my room.

~~MARK~~

The shower acted like a balm, restoring most of my sanity and bringing with it intense remorse.

‘
Oh Emma,’ I whispered, ‘you must know I lied when I said you weren’t as good as Tamara. Why did you make me want to hurt you like that? Why did you have to mention his name?’

I had to speak to her. Pausing only to turn off the shower, I hurtled into the bedroom. But she’d gone. She’d taken her clothes, and her key, and gone.

I hardly noticed the water I was dripping onto the carpet; my eyes were drawn to the bed. For a few hours, it had been a cocoon from the real world, warm with passion and possibility. It was empty now, and cold.

Yet, when I’d reached for her during the night and we’d made love again, it was just like the first time, no holding back. Then, this morning, she was the first thing I saw – the woman I’d always loved. Briefly, foolishly, I’d allowed myself to imagine waking every morning to this, believing that she felt the same for me.

But she didn’t. She was in some sort of denial, because of her infatuation with that bastard Churchill. And I knew her too well to try and make her change her mind right now; it was more likely to drive her into his arms. Ironic, wasn’t it? Her maddening pig-headedness was one of the many things I loved about her.

So I’d play it cool. For a little while, at least. However hard that might be.

~~EMMA~~

I was fumbling to unlock the door of my room with one hand, when I heard someone approaching. A few yards down the corridor, the fire door swung open and Flynn breezed through.

When he saw me he did a double take, then recovered himself almost immediately and winked at me.

I held my dress up more firmly and forced a smile. ‘I could ask you the same question.’

‘
Me? Oh, just been out for an early morning walk,’ he said airily. ‘Clear the cobwebs away, that sort of thing.’

He was almost as underdressed as I was, his shirt unbuttoned, with no jacket. And weren’t they the clothes he’d been wearing last night?

He grinned. ‘Yeah, had to make it an early morning jog, actually. And now it’s your turn to spill the beans. I’m intrigued – where did you spend the night?’

I blushed and blurted out the first thing that came into my head. ‘In Harriet’s room. We had quite a lot to drink and I just passed out on her bed.’

He raised one eyebrow. ‘Harriet? Interesting. Didn’t think you had leanings in that direction.’

‘
What on earth do you mean?’ I said, with a nervous laugh.

‘
I can always tell when a woman’s had a good time. And I’d say you certainly have.’ His eyes flicked to the briefs I was holding. ‘Never mind, your secret’s safe with me. Strewth, and there’s me thinking I’m a good judge of sexual orientation – hey, what’s wrong?’

Tears were streaming down my cheeks. It was all such a horrible mess. I’d slept with a man I’d known all my life and destroyed our relationship for ever. And now the man I’d really wanted to sleep with thought I was a raving lesbian.

Flynn put his hands on my shoulders and gave them a comforting squeeze. ‘Things are never as bad as they seem, Em. Why don’t you get properly dressed and I’ll make us a cup of tea and you can tell me all about it?’

I nodded and handed him my key. He made short work of the lock I’d been fiddling with for ages and pushed me gently into the room.

‘
You’re cold, you’ll feel better after a nice warm shower,’ he said, busying himself with the kettle. ‘Don’t be too long, or I’ll come and hurry you up!’

I thanked him with a wan smile, then stumbled through to the bathroom. And there, in the soundproofed privacy of the shower, I washed away any traces of Mark Knightley – and sobbed my heart out.

But Flynn was right; I did feel better afterwards. In fact, I felt almost back to normal as I put on my jeans and a jumper and sat drinking tea with him. Except that ‘normal’ had changed. ‘Normal’ meant recalling random moments from the previous night when I was least prepared for them. ‘Normal’ meant my stomach churning at the very thought of seeing Mark again.

And as for Flynn … When he suggested that I told him everything, I couldn’t. And at first I didn’t understand why.

‘
So you went along to ask Harriet to undo your dress,’ he prompted. ‘Shame I wasn’t around, I’d have undone it like a shot, then who knows how your night might have turned out?’

I glanced at him sitting on my bed with that naughty-boy look on his face and I realised that it was a charade, that he was all talk and no action, at least where I was concerned. It made me wonder how I’d ever thought of him as relationship material. Oh, he was good company and he made me laugh, but something about him didn’t ring true. And this morning, for the first time, I didn’t even fancy him. Those once-gorgeous green eyes had lost their magic.

‘
But you weren’t around, were you?’ I said coolly. ‘You could have been, but you disappeared quite early on. What did you get up to for all that time?’

He smirked. ‘I wish I could say it was something exciting, but I just went to my room and fell asleep. Anyway, we were talking about you, not me. What happened next?’

What happened next was that I crossed a boundary that should have been sacrosanct, had the best sex ever – and couldn’t forgive myself for it.

Aloud I said, ‘That’s none of your business.’ I softened my words with a smile and added, ‘You’ve done me good, Flynn, and I’m grateful to you, but I think I’ll go home now.’

‘
Well, you know where I am if you ever want to talk.’ He got to his feet, came over to me and planted a kiss on my forehead. ‘Just remember, you can’t help your natural instincts. Don’t fight them, go with the flow. These are enlightened times, even in a place like Highbury.’ And he sauntered out, as if he hadn’t a care in the world.

I took a deep breath. Time to move on.

~~MARK~~

As I walked through the car park, I looked for Emma’s car. It was still there, which meant that I could call at Hartfield on my way home without any further confrontations.

Anxious not to disturb Henry, I left the car on the road and walked as quietly as I could up the drive. I was just about to slip an envelope through the letter box, when the door opened and there he stood in his dressing gown, beaming at me.

‘
Lovely morning, isn’t it?’ he said.

I glanced up at the overcast sky. ‘If you say so.’

‘
Oh, I know the weather’s nothing special, but I’ve had my best sleep in years. And it was all thanks to this.’ He produced a little bottle and waved it in my face. ‘I’m sure there’s a business opportunity here, must look into it. Mary says her mother swears by this stuff for all sorts of things.’