Don't Hurt Me (22 page)
Authors: Elizabeth Moss
The question took her by surprise
and she stared, not sure how to respond. Was he jealous? That was impossible.
Perhaps he was hoping for a simple divorce on the grounds that she was having
an affair. A sudden fierceness came over her as she considered that possibility
and she straightened in her seat, aggression in her face, her courage bolstered
by the champagne still circulating in her veins.
‘How dare you ask me that?’ Julia
threw at him. ‘What about Sasha? Or are you still pretending she isn’t your
mistress?’
His hand flashed out and caught her
chin, turning her inexorably towards him. There was a strange look on his face.
‘Stop evading the question. Are you in love with him?’
‘Of course not,’ she snapped. ‘How
could I fall in love with a man who disappears at the first sign of trouble?
Richard took one look at your face and made for the nearest exit.’
His hand dropped away, a hint of
amusement in his voice. ‘He did look rather terrified, it’s true.’
‘Because you’re a bully,’ she
accused him. ‘You’re always throwing your weight around, trying to force people
into doing things they don’t want to. You don’t seem to realise people can get
hurt that way.’
‘Did you get hurt, Julia?’ he asked
quietly.
She shivered without answering,
hugging herself. With the engine switched off, it was beginning to get cold in
the dark interior of the car.
She did not
feel drunk anymore, she just felt awful. Her head ached from too much champagne
and she wished Marshall would simply drive her home, let her sleep it off
without asking any more of these difficult questions.
He shrugged out of his immaculate
black tuxedo and laid it across her shoulders. ‘I certainly never intended to hurt
you,’ he said levelly. ‘I apologise if I did.’
Julia swallowed, pulling the jacket
closer. ‘How’s Victoria?’ she asked, trying to change the subject.
‘Doing well enough at school. She
always was an intelligent child. But she’s so withdrawn at home, always holed
up in that damned room of hers, playing computer games. It drives me crazy.’ He
drew a slow breath, looking at her. ‘She misses you.’
‘I miss her too.’
Marshall looked at her urgently.
‘Then come back home with me. I’m not sleeping with Sasha, I swear it.
Sometimes I wish to god I’d never laid eyes on the bloody woman,’ he said, his
mouth twisting as she met his eyes with a cynical expression. ‘Oh yes, we were
lovers before I met you. But it was never serious.’
‘And this is?’
His eyebrows shot up. ‘I married
you, for god’s sake. How much more serious do you want to get?’
The pulse in her neck beat
fiercely. She licked her lips, glancing at him through lowered lashes.
‘Babies,’ she murmured. ‘Or is that
too serious for you?’
Marshall stared at her in blank
silence for a moment, then his eyes began to widen slowly as he took in her
meaning. His throat seemed to convulse, a faint hard flush creeping into his
face. ‘Is that just the champagne talking or do you really mean it?’ he asked
huskily. ‘Because that sounds like one hell of an invitation to me.’
Suddenly realising how he had
interpreted that, her cheeks flared with heat. ‘I don’t know why I said that.
Forget it.’
‘Oh no,’ he said, pinning her
against the seat. ‘You don’t say something that provocative and get away with
it.’
Marshall bent and kissed her, his
mouth so hard she felt bruised and shaken when he eventually raised his head.
He was breathing hard, colour in his face, the strange tawny eyes glittering.
She stared up at him, too dazed and confused to protest as his hands moved over
her breasts in the clinging black dress.
He spoke rapidly in the darkness,
his voice close to her ear. ‘You want me, Julia. Your body betrays you whenever
we’re together. Stop fighting it and come home with me.’
‘I’m not sharing you with Sasha!’
‘Forget Sasha,’ he said harshly,
then leant forward and opened the glove box with an angry jerk of his wrist. He
produced a slim black case which he threw carelessly into her lap. ‘Here, this
is why I was round at Sasha’s that night, why she kept ringing me on my mobile.
Go on, open it up and take a look inside.’
Her fingers trembling, Julia opened
the lid and stared down at the bracelet inside. It was slim and beautiful, of
Celtic design, made of fine gold and inlaid with diamonds.
‘What is this?’ she whispered,
stunned.
‘Your birthday present. But after
we argued, I was too angry to give it to you. Once I’d calmed down, of course,
I started to see things from your perspective. I was just on my way back to
your room to give you the bracelet, when I heard your car outside.’ Marshall
stared down at his hands as if he had never seen them before, a crooked smile
on his face. ‘For weeks after you left Moor’s Peak, I wanted to murder you. Or
sleep with you and then murder you. At the time, I wasn’t sure which I wanted
to do more.’
She bit her lip, running a finger
along the cool slim gold. ‘So you bought this bracelet from Sasha?’
He nodded, his voice deep and curt.
‘Designed it, commissioned it, paid for it. That’s why I was still in contact
with her after I’d married you, and why she rang on the morning of your
birthday.’
‘Why on earth didn’t you tell me?’
‘Because I was blind and arrogant,
I didn’t see the need to explain.’ His face was grim. ‘You were my wife. I
thought you should trust me without needing to be given all the answers.’
Julia fastened the bracelet around
her wrist, admiring the complex Celtic design with its delicate criss-cross
patterns. Then she unclasped the bracelet and laid it back on its velvet bed,
closing the lid gently. ‘It’s lovely,’ she said simply. ‘But I can’t accept
it.’
‘Why not?’
‘Okay, let’s say I believe you’re
not involved with Sasha anymore. But I still should never have married you. You
only asked me so that Vicky could have a mother again.’ She smiled wryly. ‘Oh,
I know it works between us sexually. But that’s not enough. I’ll be thirty in a
few years. I want a real husband in my life and children of my own.’
Marshall nodded tautly. ‘And you
don’t love me. I understand.’
‘I’m not sure that you ... ’
‘Look, just hear me out for a
moment,’ he interrupted, a harsh driven note behind the words. ‘You’re right. I
did propose initially for Vicky’s sake. But as soon as you accepted, everything
changed. I found it increasingly harder to look at you without wanting to touch
you, take you to bed. When you were so intimate with Richard on our wedding
day, it drove me crazy. I wanted to kill him, my temper shot straight through
the roof. That was when I realised ... ’
She stared at Marshall as he
suddenly broke off, a haggard look in his face, the tawny eyes shifting
restlessly under her gaze. For the first time, a wild hope began to stir in her
heart.
‘Realised what?’ she prompted
softly.
‘That
I’d fallen in love with you,’ he burst out at last, raw pain in his voice.
‘There, I’ve said it aloud. I love you, Julia. Are you satisfied now? You’ve
got me exactly where you want me.’
‘In my bed?’ she joked, lifting a
hand from her lap to stroke the scar on his flushed skin. Her eyes darkened
with desire as he turned his head and lingeringly kissed her fingertips.
She had raised her chin at the
gesture, as though deliberately inviting him to kiss her. But to her surprise Marshall
pulled back and looked at her soberly instead. For such a strong and confident
man, she had never seen so much hurt in his eyes.
‘If you still want a divorce,’ he
said, his voice grating, ‘I won’t fight you. But at least give me a chance
first to make up for the way I’ve treated you. I’ve never felt so rough, every
day without you has been a living hell.’
‘
Good
.’
‘Demon woman.’ Reluctantly,
Marshall managed a wry laugh at her satisfied tone. ‘Look, I know the odds are
stacked against me. With this damned scar on my face, I’m no Adonis. But I was
hoping that maybe over time, you might come to ... ’
‘Love you?’ she supplied ironically
as he hesitated. ‘I already do love you, you great idiot. Why on earth do you
think I agreed to marry you in the first place?’
He sat perfectly still, hardly
seeming to breathe, his eyes searching her face. ‘I did … wonder,’ he said
slowly.
‘I fell in love with you within
days of arriving at Moor’s Peak,’ she admitted, her voice unsteady. ‘The scar
only made you more fascinating, to be honest. But I wasn’t interested in a
casual affair and I knew you weren’t the sort of man who could commit to one
woman for life.’
‘I wasn’t,’ Marshall said drily,
with a lopsided smile that made her heart turn over.
‘And though I hated the way you
treated me at first, that master and submissive thing you’ve got going –
’
‘The
what
?’
She smiled at the shock in his
voice. ‘Come on, admit it. You treat women like sexual objects. And you certainly
dominated me from the start.’
‘That, I concede,’ he admitted. ‘You
are
not
my slave though, Julia.’
‘Well, the offer stands.’
He raised his eyebrows at her,
still not quite understanding.
‘But only in the bedroom,’ she
whispered. ‘Because I haven’t lost faith in your ability to step up, Marshall.
Just … mislaid it a little.’
His eyes widened, then he said,
‘Good God,’ and took her mouth hungrily. They kissed for a while, a smothering
silence in the car, his strong hands roving over her with the same restless
desire she felt for him, pulses springing up wherever they touched. And if his
hands were a little rough at times, she did not complain. It was precisely what
she wanted from him. To hurt her without hurting her.
‘Let’s do it again, Julia,’ he
muttered urgently against her throat. ‘Get married, I mean. Renew our vows.
Wipe the slate clean and start again.’
She stared at him. ‘Are you
serious?’
‘I’ve never been so serious in my
life,’ Marshall said, and cupped her face with warm, passionate hands, letting
his lips show her just how serious he intended to be from that moment on.
