Sweet Bondage (16 page)

She spent a happy hour, possibly longer, sketching. Despite the cold she was so absorbed in her task that she would have liked to have stayed even longer, but she had to get back to prepare the midday meal.

She was only halfway across when yesterday's mist came back. At first it was nothing to worry about, just scarf-like swirls twirling across the loch, eerie rather than frightening. Ghostly gray-white specters forming and dispersing and forming again until suddenly it wrapped all round her. She
couldn't
see the bank she was heading for, she looked back and discovered she couldn't see the bank she'd left, either. She told herself not to panic. If she walked in a straight line she would be all right Surely, even without landmarks to guide her, this wouldn't be impossible.

She seemed to be walking a straight course, but she realized that she couldn't be because she had now been walking longer than it took her to cross initially. The fog—by no stretch of the imagination could this be called mist—stole all the normal daytime sounds, birdcalls, the fleeting step of a deer, the chitterings of small woodland animals and the wind shuddering through the trees. The blanketing silence was unnerving.

She called out Maxwell's name, but all that came back to her was the ringing echo of her own voice. Had she said where she was going? No, she had looked round the door and merely informed him that she was going in search of something to sketch. Was this before or after she'd put on her coat and boots? It was difficult to remember, but she thought that it was before, so Maxwell might have assumed that she meant something in the house. Even if he did look out and see that the fog had rolled in he might not realize that she was out in it and wouldn't come looking for her, at least not right away.

She began to walk more quickly, hoping
against
forlorn hope to stumble upon the bank, but she seemed to go on forever with no awareness of direction. She shouted Maxwell's name at the top of her voice, then she listened, praying for an answer. What she heard intensified her fears instead of taking them away. It was a loud noise, like the report of a gun—or the cracking of ice. A jagged black line appeared round her and she couldn't find a safe footing. The loch was like a conveyor belt and she didn't know where to turn, which step would take her to her destruction.

A voice—Maxwell's—called out, ‘Glenda!'

Tears, frozen drops of fear in her eyes, melted on her cheeks. Never had she been so delighted to acknowledge that name as her own.

‘I'm here, Maxwell.'

‘Where? Keep calling out. Your voice will guide me to you. Don't stop calling until I get to you.'

‘Maxwell, no! Let's do it the other way round. You call out and let your voice guide me to you. I'm much lighter than you are. There's every chance that I shall make it. The ice is cracking all around me; it won't stand your weight. You could drown trying to rescue me.'

‘What are you saying? I can't hear you.'

‘I'm saying don't come on the ice. Please, Maxwell, don't. It won't stand your weight' She listened for his reply. It didn't come. ‘Maxwell,
why
don't you answer me? Answer me, damn you!' What was he playing at? ‘You must be able to hear me. Where are you?' she demanded, her voice lifting on hysteria.

‘I'm here. Right here,' he added. As his arms closed round her she knew that he had been able to hear her every word. He had made her keep talking by pretending not to hear until he reached her.

‘You crazy man,' she sobbed.

‘You crazy woman, and a lot more besides, which will have to wait for the time being,' he said thickly.

‘I've been walking and walking. It's been a nightmare. I must have been going round in circles.'

‘Later!' he commanded. His voice was harsh, but she knew it was that way for a reason, as his next words confirmed. ‘Shut up. I need my ears. Do everything I say and don't utter a word.'

If anything, now that Maxwell had joined her, one aspect of the situation was much worse. His added weight was a severe detriment, but she knew that she would never have made it without him. She thought it was probably a false sense of security, but now that he was here she felt safe.

Progress was agonizingly slow. When she wanted to go faster Maxwell made her walk even slower still, often halting altogether so he could listen. Suddenly she felt her feet whirling
clear
of the ice. She was being rushed through the air and she didn't know what was happening to her until Maxwell, his arms still firmly clamped round her waist, set her down and she was conscious of her feet touching the bank.

She clung to him, unable to speak or move, just grateful to be safely encased in the warmth of his arms. She didn't know how he was managing to hold himself aloof, why he wasn't taking her offered, upturned mouth in a passionate kiss and conveying the agony that had gone through his mind when he discovered she was missing. At her bleakest moment, just before she'd heard his voice, it had flashed through her mind like a revelation that she didn't want to leave this life which had suddenly become doubly precious to her—ever since, in fact, he had entered it

To recognize feelings of love could be—should be—the most wonderful experience in the world. It could lift you right up to the stars. Or it could be the worst moment and drag you down into the deepest despair you have ever known. It all depended on your loved one's reaction. Maxwell's reaction shattered her. He wasn't a fool. As her hands clasped tightly round his neck, clinging to his strength with an urgency born of the torment and suffering of her recent experience, he
knew
of her need, her caring. Her body shaped to his in a declaration of surrender. She loved him and
she
didn't care if he knew it How could he feel nothing in return? How could his face be so cruelly cold toward her, his voice withering her with condemnation instead of sighing in soft gratitude for her safety?

‘You little fool. I forbade you to go on the ice.'

‘You forbade me to skate,' she corrected.

Was he angry because he'd received a fright—because, despite all the signs to the contrary he cared? Or because she'd disobeyed him?

‘Don't split hairs,' he said, his voice as harsh as the hands that pulled her forward, commanding her to move. ‘Let's get you back to the house and dried out.'

The rain-like mist had soaked into her clothes and chilled her through to her bones, but it was his attitude that chilled her heart.

They didn't speak again as he bundled her roughly toward the house, his long stride showing no consideration for her. No sympathy for the ordeal she had been through, not the merest glimmer of human compassion, touched his dark countenance. Would it have hurt for him to unbend just this once?

‘I know you're angry with me, and perhaps you have just cause,' she admitted. ‘I made an error of judgment. Is that such a big crime?'

The only acknowledgment that she received was a swift sidelong look and a grunt

She sighed. ‘Everything was fine going
across.
The ice was as solid as a rock and there was no danger; at least, none was apparent. If the mist hadn't come down I would have got back all right and you wouldn't have been any the wiser. But it did, it rolled in on me without warning. I couldn't keep a straight course and somehow I found myself on the part of the loch you said was dangerous. I'm not stupid. I didn't walk there deliberately to thwart you. Why don't you say something?' she shouted, goaded by his silence. ‘I wasn't to know the mist would come down like that.'

‘God Almighty! You weren't to know! Where have you been all your life? Any fool knows how quickly these mists come down, and the islands off this coast are particularly prone to this sort of thing. Don't tell me you've never read anything to that effect?'

‘Well, I suppose I have, but—'

‘You had to find out for yourself. Your sort are a hazard to themselves and a menace to others. I've never before known so much trouble to come in such a small packet.'

With that he lifted her off her feet, opened the door with his free hand, banged it shut behind them with a vicious kick of his foot and carried her up the stairs and into her bedroom. She didn't know what he was going to do next; she half expected to be flung down onto the bed, but she wouldn't have been surprised at anything. As it was, the hand clamping her waist stayed there, the one supporting her legs
was
removed; she slid down along the length of him and felt her feet contact the floor. Even with the bulkiness of their clothes separating them her consciousness of his nearness caused her to shiver alarmingly. She was blue to her lips with cold and hoped he would put it down to that alone.

‘Get out of those damp things. I'll fetch some rough towels from the bathroom to get your circulation going.'

In a moment he was back, divested of his own coat, but because her fingers were so numb she was still wrestling with the buttons on hers.

‘Let me.'

She submitted to having her coat removed with childlike docility because there was nothing else she could do. He took her hands in his, chafing her fingers to bring the circulation back. Then he flattened them against his chest, trapping them there with his own hands. The warmth of his body forced life back into her dead fingers which knew an absurd longing to mold to the hard contours, bury themselves beneath the light covering of his shirt and curl into the masculine growth of hair on his chest.

As his flesh tautened she wondered if her shameless fingers had given her away. Did he feel their quivering urge to touch, know the frightening depth of emotion he was arousing in her? She looked up in anxiety and her hope
that
he might not have perceived anything different in her died when she saw the dawning cynicism in his eyes.

‘Wanting to find something else out?'

‘I don't know what you mean.'

Shuddering in shame and rebellion she used her hands as a lever to push herself away from him, at the same time shaking off his hands. She knew that he let her do this, that if he'd exerted himself to stop her she would have been powerless to escape. As her hands dropped loosely to her sides his crept round her waist, pushing upward under her sweater, following her spine. She felt the tingling in her breasts as he unfastened the clasp of her bra. She tried to swallow, but her throat wouldn't constrict, as if she'd lost command of the muscles. Her breathing was similarly defective and the blood seemed to be pumping through her body at twice its normal speed.

Her heart throbbed fiercely as his hands moved round to the front. The tingling lightness of his touch scalded and sensitized her flesh. His thumbs rubbed sensuous circles round her nipples, then withdrew. As before, his lips moved down to take their place, lightly and moistly taking her left nipple between them, biting gently, as if on some precious fruit, then pausing.

She waited, her breath held and his name hovering on her lips. She dared not speak, but she had no clear idea whether she was afraid
that
he wouldn't stop if he knew how he was affecting her—or that he would.

His breath was hot on her throbbing breast; surely he could feel her heart beating against the warm flesh of his mouth. Then his tongue slipped back onto the pebble-hard tip of her breast and she shuddered against him as he resumed the maddening caresses of a moment before. His fingers teased gently at her other nipple, which tautened further in response, flames darting along her skin.

His other hand slipped to her back and then down along her spine and beneath her jeans, moving with tormenting slowness over the firm, rounded curves of her buttocks. Teasingly, always teasingly, his mouth and hands sent her quivering along the path of mindless sensation, her breath coming in long gasps of agonized delight.

And then, suddenly, he stopped. His hands returned to his sides and he lifted his head. The cool air of the house chilled the overheated, moistened flesh of her breast, and the desire that had been coiling and uncoiling within her, leaving a hollow feeling beneath the pit of her stomach, subsided as shame coursed through her.

Only then did she realize he was playing that macabre teasing game again. Demonstrating, with even greater boldness, the power he could wield over her, the command he had over himself. Proving, in case
she
hadn't got the message the first time, that he was capable of driving her to dizzy heights of desire while remaining immune himself.

‘There. I'm sure you can manage the rest yourself—getting out of those damp things and into something dry.'

She slid her hand over the seat of her jeans in a gesture of restraint. How she would have loved to slap that smirk off his face.

‘Thank you,' she said stiffly. She could have been saying thank you for anything. Thank you, I can manage. Thank you for bringing the towels. Thank you for humiliating me as I have never been humiliated before. Or—and this one was somewhat belated—Thank you for braving the loch and coming to get me.

‘I wondered when you'd get round to that.'

‘Don't make it sound as though I'm ill-mannered. You haven't given me much time to say anything. I'm exceedingly grateful. I might have survived on my own, but I have no guarantee of that. It was a lucky chance that you missed me and came after me.'

He said very slowly, injecting his words with a specific importance, ‘You can thank Angus that I did.'

‘Angus? He's . . . here?'

‘At this moment he's thawing out in the kitchen. I came looking for you when he arrived. If Angus hadn't come I wouldn't have realized you weren't in the house.'

‘He brought the boat out in this? He
wouldn't
have attempted it in this unless . . . Oh, no! Ian . . . ?' He nodded.

‘Is he . . . ?' She didn't seem capable of finishing a sentence. Not that it mattered. Her meaning was clear.