Dark Summer Dawn (24 page)

It was his turn to flinch, she saw with astonishment.

'Yes, I did, God forgive me. I don't expect you to. Everything was wrong about the way I treated you. It's haunted me ever since—the way you were with me—your apparent innocence. I told myself it wasn't possible because I couldn't face the other implication—that you'd been a virgin, and that I'd ruined everything for you—for both of us. But I have to face it now, Lisa. Is it true? Was I the first with you?'

She closed her eyes. 'Yes.'

'Oh God,' he muttered softly, and there was a long silence. Then he said huskily, 'I should have known. I should have realised, but I was too angry, too jealous to think of anything except that I wanted you. It was only later when I allowed myself to think about what had happened that I realised that no one with the kind of experience I'd credited you with could have been so frightened and bewildered by passion—even the brutal kind I'd shown you.' He paused. 'I came back to see you, to try to talk the thing out, to see if I could mend things between us—but you'd gone.'

Lisa said between stiff lips, 'And of course you couldn't have come after me.'

'I could have,' he said grimly, 'if it hadn't been for that European sales tour I was committed to. I'd always made a rule that I never let my personal life get in the way of work. Things weren't too healthy at Riderwoods just then, and Chas was working like a dog too in the States. But I promised myself when the tour was over, I'd find you.'

'But you didn't.'

He looked at her levelly. 'By the time I came back, you'd become the Amber Girl. Those bloody photographs were everywhere. Every time I opened a newspaper, there seemed to be an item in a gossip column about you, linking you with some man or another. I had to concede that my instincts about you had probably been wrong after all.' He added flatly, 'And I was angry because your departure had hurt Chas and Julie. I felt that you'd betrayed them. Chas had treated you as if you were his own child, and Julie depended on you in so many ways, and you'd left them.'

'But I had to go,' she whispered.

'Because I forced you to?' He gave a slight groan. 'I was halfway to Leeds when it suddenly occurred to me that you might run away again. There was no logic in it, but I suddenly knew I couldn't allow it to happen again, so I came back, and there you were in Julie's car. It was like a repeat of a nightmare, and when she turned the thing over in that ditch, I was nearly demented.' He shook his head, remembering. 'I pulled you out, and there was blood on your face. It wasn't until the ambulance arrived that I realised it was Julie who was in urgent need of medical attention. And then I was angry again, because I thought you'd made her take a chance and drive too fast.'

Lisa felt as if she was dreaming. It was all so totally unreal. She gripped the canework on the chair, letting it leave its imprint on her flesh. What was she doing in this plant-filled, slightly steamy room, with its exotic jungle wallpaper and cavernous bath with Myra's carefully applied stencils along the sides? How was it possible that she was here with Dane, and that he could be talking about anger, and yet not angry? It was ridiculous, ludicrous, and a wild bubble of laughter welled up inside her.

There was a sharp stinging pain across her cheek, and she sank back in the chair gasping.

'That's enough,' Dane said crisply. 'I've had enough hysteria from Julie over the past few days to last me a lifetime.'

'You slapped me,' she protested half tearfully.

'And presently I'll kiss you.' His hand cupped her chin, and he looked at her mouth as if it was some rare and precious flower.

She said breathlessly, 'How—how is Julie? Is she still in hospital?'

'No, she took a leaf out of your book and discharged herself. She and James Dalton are now occupying a bed-sitting room in Leeds and behaving like the leads in a Shakespearean tragedy,' he said sardonically.

Lisa's lips parted in astonishment. 'Don't you care?'

'Of course I care. Julie's my sister. I hadn't figured her as a home-wrecker—not that James and Celia ever had much of a home to wreck. And what Julie and he have going for them apart from a conviction that they're the original star-crossed lovers seems strictly limited.' Dane sounded weary. 'It seems they plan to go and live in Africa, and as far as I'm concerned it can't be too soon.'

'How has Chas taken the news?' Lisa asked quickly.

'Better than any of us could have hoped. He has an unexpected streak of resilience.' He paused. 'And he needed it, because Julie told us everything.'

'Everything?'

He nodded slowly. 'From the way you'd always shielded her at school, right through to her involvement with the Hammonds and the way she tried to disguise her affair with Dalton. Every last detail, including how you'd begged her to slow down before the crash. A lot of it wasn't very easy to stomach, especially for my father. But neither he nor Julie know the real damage that was done—the damage to us.'

There was a silence, then Lisa said, 'So now you know. Is that what you've come all this way to tell me?'

'Not just that. I came to ask why? Why in the hell did you take the blame for Julie's stupidity? When I first accused you, why didn't you tell me the truth?'

She lifted a shoulder helplessly. 'Would you have believed me?'

'Perhaps not immediately, but I would have been bound to check on what you'd said. God knows Julie needed to be stopped in her tracks. We've all given way to her too often in the past, partly because of her temperament. She's been worrying Chas for years, apparently. I'm not making excuses for her, but perhaps if we'd all got together years ago and put our cards on the table, then at least we could have saved ourselves this scandal over her cold-blooded plan to marry Tony Bainbridge.'

'How could I have said anything?' she sighed. 'Chas treated me as a daughter, yes, but to you I was always the outsider, the intruder. You and Chas and Julie were the Riderwoods, a closed circle I couldn't break into. I couldn't do anything that might damage that circle—repay Chas's kindness to me by destroying his faith in his own child.'

'So instead you chose to destroy our faith in you,' he said. 'Oh God, you little fool!' He hesitated. 'I had another reason for coming here. I'm asking you to forgive me, Lisa, for everything I've said and done to hurt you, for every unjustified thought I've ever harboured against you. I'm prepared to ask for your forgiveness on my knees if it's necessary, if that's what you want. And I want you to come back to Stoniscliffe. Chas needs you.'

Lisa shook her head. 'I can't go back there.'

He was silent for a moment, then he rose from the half-kneeling position he had adopted beside the chair and moved away.

He said quietly, 'So you can't forgive me. Would it influence your decision if I told you I was prepared to move out?'

The deep inner pain had returned, so sharp and fierce that it seemed to be tearing her apart.

She bent her head, allowing her dishevelled hair to fall across her face. That—wouldn't make any difference.'

She heard him sigh, then he said, 'I see. I'm sorry, Lisa. I can tell I've upset you, and that was the last thing I intended. I'll go.'

Lisa thought in anguish, 'He'll go, and I'll never see him again.'

She heard a voice she hardly recognised say, 'You said you were going to kiss me.'

Dane was at the door, his hand already on the knob, but as she spoke he turned sharply. Two long strides and he was lifting her up out of the chair, and his mouth was on hers, fiercely and achingly possessive. She clung to him, the tears which she had dammed back, spilling down her face as she responded with her whole heart to the demands of his kiss.

He tort his lips from hers at last with something like a groan and imprisoned her face between his hands, staring down at her fiercely.

He said, 'I don't care how many men there've been in your life, Lisa. I was the first and I'm going to be the last. You belong to me, and I'm never going to let you go again. We're going back to Yorkshire tomorrow.'

She tried to smile. 'Because Chas needs me?'

'Because I need you. Because we're going to be married, and give the local gossips something to chew on apart from James and Julie. We've wasted two years out of our lives, and I'm damned if we're going to waste any more.'

Lisa gave an unsteady laugh. 'What will Chas say? And— Tina?'

His mouth twisted slightly. 'Tina is unimportant—a charming diversion who totally failed to take my mind off you. No one ever succeeded in doing that. As for Chas—he already has the champagne on ice. He told me not to come back without you.'

'Oh!' Lisa gasped. 'So you were that sure of me?'

'I wasn't sure of you at all,' Dane said quietly, and looking into his eyes, she saw ah uncertainty, a new vulnerability which twisted her heart. 'I didn't even know if you'd give me a hearing, or if I could make you understand how I felt—that I was asking for much, much more than your forgiveness. And all the time you sat in that damned chair, like a little ghost, hardly saying a word.'

'I was waiting for one word that showed you cared,' she said. 'I knew you wanted me, but that wasn't enough. I always wanted you to love me, even when I was a child and thought I hated you. One word of praise from you made my heart sing. That's why I said I couldn't go back to Stoniscliffe. I'd have died rather than lived under the same roof as you again under the old footing.'

Dane said slowly, 'I know I've waited too long to say it, Lisa, but I love you. It's a cliché to say you always hurt the one you love, but in our case it's been true. But I'll make it up to you, darling, if it takes the rest of our lives.'

'I think I'll like that.' Smiling, she slid her arms up round his neck, glorying in her new-found power over him. 'This is the first time I've ever been proposed to in a bathroom!'

'Where did Simon propose?' His voice was still quiet.

'He didn't. I always tried never to let any of my— relationships get to that stage. It never seemed fair.' She hesitated. 'You heard what he said—that I was frigid. Well, in a way it's been true. I never wanted anyone to touch or kiss me—after you. I blamed you for that—blamed what had happened between us. I told myself you'd stopped me from fulfilling myself as a woman. So there was never anyone. You wanted to be the first and the last. Well, you are, my darling. The first, the last and the only man in my life.'

He looked at her for a long time, then he said huskily, 'I don't deserve that.'

He kissed her again, his lips caressing hers with all the sweetness and tenderness she had ever longed for, filling her with a soaring delight.

There had been darkness, and bitterness, but they would be forgotten, and soon, very soon, there would be another summer dawn.

Harlequin Plus

THE HAUNTING MUSIC OF RAVEL

Maurice Joseph Ravel, a French composer who is a favorite of Sara Craven's heroine, is best loved for his haunting and hypnotic musical compositions.

Born in 1875 in the Basque region of France, he made his debut as a composer in 1898 in Paris, and his early works were praised for "opening up a new world of haunting sounds."

In 1912 the celebrated Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo presented what is generally regarded as Ravel's greatest work—
Daphnis et Chloe
—praised for its exquisite beauty and magic. Yet despite this and several other fine compositions, Ravel was not taking the world by storm.

That changed with his composition
Bolero
which, when introduced in Paris in 1928, caused a sensation. A compelling theme that moves relentlessly to a tremendous crescendo,
Bolero
received acclaim wherever presented, and Ravel became the most sought-after composer in France. Recently the piece enjoyed renewed popularity, its rising rhythm featured prominently in the sound track of the movie
10
.

On a personal level, Ravel has been described as a man of meticulous manners. He never married, but lived with a family of Siamese cats, whom he talked to in a "cat language" he insisted they understood.

Maurice Ravel died in Paris in 1937 of a brain disorder. His legacy is a varied collection of rich and original works. As the composer himself once explained, "I belong to no school of music. I try to create beautiful ideas in music. Great music must always come from the heart; great music must always be beautiful."