LITMIR.BIZ

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      She sighed. ‘Frankly, yes.’

      Mark shook his head. ‘You worry too much. I know exactly what I’m doing.’

      Miranda wished she could be sure. Staring out of the frosted window, she wondered where Lady Sanders thought they had gone. Perhaps she would send Jaime to look for them. Jaime! Miranda’s lips tightened. How she would like to see him humiliated just once in his life!

      Mark had stopped at the traffic lights and was looking at her in the light cast by the street lamps. ‘You’re beautiful,’ he said, as if he had just realised the fact, and she forced a faint smile although her lips felt stiff and unresponsive.

      Then the lights changed and they were moving again, faster now as the outskirts of the town were left behind them, and the open road invited greater speed. Miranda fastened the safety belt and gripped the seat tightly with her fingers. She would not ask him to slow down, she told herself fiercely. If he killed them both now, she would at least have the satisfaction of knowing that Lady Sanders had not won. She felt curiously fatalistic, and it was almost a shock to see the lights of the village ahead of them and to know that they had arrived safely.

      ‘Wh-where are we going?’ she ventured, speaking for the first time when he drove past the turning to the Hall, and he heaved a half regretful sigh.

      ‘You’ll see,’ he said, and slowed to a standstill before the cottage he had bought for her mother.

      Miranda caught her breath. ‘Here?’

      ‘Why not? It’s mine, isn’t it?’

      ‘Well, yes, but—’

      ‘The decorators have been here all day. The place is bound to be warm. It’s as good a place as any to talk, isn’t it?’

      Miranda made no reply, and he thrust open his door and climbed out. As she joined him, she wondered how many pairs of curtains twitched as their owners espied the visitors to the cottage, and she cringed at the thought of her mother being regaled with the information.

      Inside, as he had said, it was warm, and there was the pungent odour of new paint. Central heating had been installed, and the radiators still retained an atom of heat. But it was the gas fire in the living room which really dispelled the draughts, and illuminated the shadowy corners of the room. Mark had not put on the light as there were no curtains as yet at the windows, but the firelight was enough.

      Two planks were fixed horizontally between two pairs of steps and the painters had spread the planks with an old piece of carpeting they had found to make a seat. Mark sat down on the planks and beckoned to Miranda to join him. She looked doubtfully at her cream gown and then at the grubby carpeting. Obviously it would stain, but if Mark was prepared to risk it, so must she.

      ‘So,’ he said, turning sideways to look at her. ‘Here we are.’

      ‘Yes.’ She sought about desperately for some way to begin this. ‘Mark, I want you to know—’

      She broke off suddenly when he leaned towards her and pressed his lips to the side of her neck. It was a totally unexpected caress, and her tension melted.

      ‘You—believe me?’ she breathed.

      ‘Let’s say I’m prepared to be persuaded,’ he responded, his voice thickening somewhat. ‘You can tell me first what you were doing with that half-breed cousin of mine!’

      Miranda caught her breath. ‘Mark! Don’t say things like that.’

      ‘Why not? It’s true.’ His lower lip jutted aggressively. ‘Is that why you found him so attractive? They say women like that sort of thing!’

      Miranda sighed. ‘Mark! I’ve told you what happened. I felt faint and—and Mr Knevett suggested I stepped outside for a few minutes, that’s all.’

      ‘All?’ Mark’s lips curled even as his fingers probed the nape of her neck before sliding down to linger suggestively on the swelling mounds of her breasts. ‘And what did you do while you were—outside?’

      ‘Nothing!’ Miranda’s unease returned in full measure. ‘What do you think we did? What could we do?’

      ‘I could think of a lot of things,’ replied Mark with a sneer. ‘This, for instance,’ and he slid his hand inside the neckline of her gown to cup the rounded softness of her breast.

      Miranda froze. His hand inside her gown aroused nothing but a feeling of distaste inside her, and the derisive twisting of his mouth revealed that he was aware of her revulsion.

      ‘What’s the matter?’ he demanded, leaning towards her. ‘Don’t you like me to touch you? Don’t you want me to see how desirable you are?’

      ‘Mark, this has gone far enough—’

      ‘No, damn you, it hasn’t,’ he snapped violently. ‘Not half far enough!’

      With a muffled exclamation his arms were around her, forcing her back on the planks until her shoulder blades were digging painfully into the wood. Then he threw himself upon her, his lips wet and slippery against the shrinking coldness of her flesh.

      Miranda was so shocked that for minutes she could do nothing but lie there. Then, as his intentions became clear to her, she began to struggle desperately, digging her nails into his arms, fighting in any way she could to escape his revolting caresses. He was no longer the gentle man she had imagined him to be, but a drink-crazed beast who cared for nothing but his own sexual appeasement.

      And she was no match for him. Slender though he was, he had no difficulty in overcoming her frantic efforts to evade him, and tears were streaming down her face when she heard his groan of defeat. Not understanding, she was too shocked and shaking to move when he rolled off her, buttoning his clothes and muttering to himself in tones of distress.

      Blinking, hardly capable of coherent thought, she propped herself up on one elbow, staring at him through the wild disorder of her hair. Holding the bodice of her gown together with trembling fingers, she thought at first he had come to his senses, but the ravaged face he turned to her disabused her of that fact.

      ‘M-Mark!’ she got out unsteadily, but his face just contorted more savagely.

      ‘Don’t speak to me!’ He spat the words at her. ‘Don’t speak to me!’

      Miranda pushed back her hair with an unsteady hand and got to her feet. ‘Mark, you’re drunk—’

      ‘Drunk, am I?’ He lurched a step towards her, and then shaking his head, he stared broodingly down at the floor.

      ‘Drunk! Huh, that’s a laugh! God, I wish I was!’

      Miranda was trying to understand what he was saying, but her mind wouldn’t work very well. Yet common sense told her that something had happened to bring Mark to his senses, and she desperately wanted to find some good in this awful mess.

      ‘Mark, you’ll feel better in the morning—’

      ‘Will I? Will I?’ He glared at her. ‘What do you know about it? What do you know about anything?’ His breathing had quickened again, and as she watched him she saw to her astonishment that there were tears in his eyes.

      It was a revealing moment, and compassion swept over her, dispelling the revulsion she had felt for him. ‘Mark, let me help you—’

      ‘You! Help me?’ His laugh was bitter. ‘I don’t need your help. I don’t want you. I don’t need you. I never did. Don’t you understand, I don’t need anyone!’ And with a muttered oath he flung himself across the room and out the door.

      Miranda stared after him blankly, not immediately comprehending the import of what he was saying. But suddenly she knew, suddenly she guessed why he had not finished what he had started. He couldn’t! That was what was eating him up. He couldn’t love anyone.

      She turned back to the fire, her hands pressed to her mouth, and as she

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