That Tender Feeling (13 page)

Perhaps it was this step back into straitlaced virtue that made up Cliff's mind to tease. The gleam in his eyes was in close pursuit of the smile tugging up his mouth as he said, ‘I always give breakfast in bed to females who come into my room at dead of night to have their way with me.'

She pulled a face at him. ‘But I didn't.'

‘No,' he said sorrowfully.

‘Don't tell me you're regretting running out on me?'

‘What do you think? I regret it like hell, but I would have regretted it more if I'd stayed.'

With her breath suspended in her lungs, Ros said, ‘That's stupid. I came to you last night with my eyes open and my qualms squashed. In other words, I'm admitting that you are right and I've been sadly wrong. One should grab happiness as and when one can.'

He frowned. ‘That's a dangerous viewpoint to take.' He plonked the tray down on her knee.

Catching hold of it with a steadying hand, she noticed that the egg and two rashers of bacon were beautifully cooked, the toast done to a golden turn. ‘It's your viewpoint,' she defended.

‘I'm a man.'

Her eyes slid mischievously up to his face. ‘I had noticed.'

That furrowed his frown deeper. ‘Men aren't as vulnerable to hurt as women are.'

‘Could it be that you're changing your tune?'

‘No. So don't go building up your hopes. I'd be bored with the same woman. Variety has always been the spice of affection for me.'

‘Don't you think your affections are capable of being constant to one woman?' she asked, just as if there were a point in pursuing the issue.

‘No, for the simple reason that people aren't constant. They change. It isn't in the course of nature to stay the same, or we'd all be trapped forever in childhood. And that's a horrifying thought to dwell on. Take you, for example, you're not the same girl you were yesterday. You're not thinking the same. As the years progress, you'll change even more. In, say, five years' time, you'll have altered so much as to be hardly recognizable as the girl you are now. The chances are that the changes may not be to my fancy. It's unfair to ask any man to pledge his life to someone he may not even like before the first decade is out.'

‘I couldn't agree more about the horror of remaining static in childhood. That's one change for the better, so why can't the others be, as well? People mature physically and mentally, but feelings remain the same. Only a cynic or a very shallow person would think otherwise.'

‘Take your pick. Which am I, a cynic or shallow?'

‘A cynic. You believe deeply in what you believe, even though your beliefs are misguided.'

She shook her head on the futility of going on, taking an extremely long time over cutting a piece of bacon and piercing it with her fork but delaying transferring it to her mouth, needing the pretext to keep her eyes lowered. Of course, Cliff was cynical. He'd every right to be considering the blow he'd been delivered, and she was close to tears, frustrated that she could do nothing to rescind his fate and angry with herself for wasting one precious moment fighting with him.

‘In every way, Ros,' his voice boomed out over her bowed head, ‘I'm glad you're not with my beliefs. They're fine for me, but I don't want you to absorb them. It's all right for a man to play the field, but a woman needs constancy. There's a name for a woman who indulges in casual affairs.'

There was a name for a man who took that chauvinistic viewpoint—and a question burning in her brain. If all women remained constant, where were all the free-loving men going to find their excess of loose women? She could have pointed out the unrealism attached to his way of thinking except that she'd made up her mind not to argue with him, so she said sweetly, ‘If you say so, Cliff.'

That didn't suit him, either. Sending her a dark and suspicious look, he inquired: ‘You wouldn't be taking the micky out of me, would you?'

‘That wasn't my intention. I merely sought an end to the discussion so that I could eat my breakfast in peace.'

‘Are you saying that I'm so unreasonable that the only way to shut me up is to agree with me?'

‘No-o,' she said on a long, quivering sigh of exasperation. ‘I have a million and one things to do. Top priority is getting the turkey into the oven.'

He leaned forward and fiddled with the top button of her borrowed pajama jacket. ‘That's not my top priority. Can't we open a couple of cans?'

Slapping his fingers away, imperiling the tray on her knee, she said, ‘On Christmas day? Certainly not. Watch it! You'll have coffee all over your bed.'

‘Then we'd have to transfer to your bed, wouldn't we?'

She knew that he didn't mean it, that he was only teasing her, calling her bluff. Just the same, she snapped: ‘The only place I'm transferring to is the kitchen.'

‘That doesn't sound like the bold female who came to my room last night.'

‘You kicked her back into line.'

‘Seems to me she can't have been all that determined, to be so easily deterred. I've never seen such a quick change of mind.'

‘Who's had a change of mind? It wasn't a romantic impulse. I meant it. It's different, somehow, in the cold light of day. The atmosphere isn't the same, and it doesn't have the right mood.'

But wasn't she lying to herself? The mood wasn't dependent on the time or place but the people. Paradise wouldn't be paradise without the right companion, and Cliff's presence anyplace she happened to be would charge the air with electricity and give life's breath its extra sparkle. She was exhilarated by his closeness, and incalculably, insanely, in love with him, and in turn this made her feel—more than a little foolish. She was too vulnerable. She felt shy and self-conscious. A palpitating thrill ran through her as his eyes made a slow examination of her face, adding to her nervous tension and making her feel more at a disadvantage and more confused than ever.

It had taken a great deal of courage to do what she'd done the previous night. It might be cowardly of her, but she'd only been able to do it under cover of darkness. It wasn't in her nature to be blatant about it, and neither could she tell him why she'd done what she did. It was bad enough that Cliff knew how limited his future was; he would hate it if he thought she knew. He would be hurt and humiliated if he suspected that she'd offered herself to him out of compassion. Pity, however charitably extended, is invariably unwelcome, and to Cliff it would be especially abhorrent because he had more pride than most men. The only way to go to him was to let him think she found him irresistible, as she did, and that he'd swept her off her feet—as he had just by looking at her.

Thinking about the bleakness of his future had undermined her. She felt perilously close to tears again. She mustn't let him see her distress. She couldn't explain it to him. She'd already made up her mind to follow his example and enjoy, yes,
enjoy
, the time they had, filling each day to full capacity with fun as if—as if it were the last . . .

Hiding the lost look of sadness and resignation in her eyes by lowering her lids and pretending absorption in the food before her, she said testily, ‘What are you still hanging about for? I would have thought you'd better things to do.'

He grinned, helping himself to a piece of toast before doing as she asked by vacating the room and letting her finish her breakfast and get dressed. She was halfway through that when she remembered the two presents with her name on them under the tree. Her impatience to open them hurried her along, and so instead of pinning her hair back, she contained its looseness in a broad hair band that was in keeping with her wide-eyed childish eagerness. The turkey would have to wait a while longer before being popped into the oven.

One of the presents was in the shape of a flat, hard oblong, like a book. The other was bulkier and squashy to the touch, decorated with a lavish red and silver bow. She knelt on the floor, examining them, with Cliff indulgently looking on.

Tearing at the Christmas paper of the first one, saving the more intriguingly shaped package till last, she said: ‘Getting presents is such fun. Especially when they're so excitingly wrapped.'

A wicked smile came to his lips. ‘I thought it was fun, too, but for a different reason. I liked my present because it was excitingly unwrapped.'

Her fingers stilled on the paper. She looked up at him, a shy blush creeping to her cheeks. ‘You rejected it.'

‘Fool me.'

‘I don't suppose I would have lived up to your other women, anyway,' she said ingenuously.

One black eyebrow arched at her. ‘I could answer that in two ways. I could say, if you're that interested to know, there is a way of finding out. Then again, I could say, you might be inexperienced, but you showed fantastic potential.'

‘Oh, yeah!' she mocked to cover her embarrassment.

‘Don't draw comparisons, Ros. It could have been wonderful, and I'll tell you why. Because you were, are, uniquely you. I'm sorry you weren't luckier.'

‘Luckier?'

‘In the fairy-tale, the princess kissed the frog, and he turned into a prince. I'm not likely to turn into your prince. I'm a frog through and through. Keep that in mind, and you won't be hurt.'

Nothing he could say would make her despise him or alleviate the bitter hurt that she knew would be hers. She hadn't known that her feelings would be this involved, that she would give so much of herself. Her lashes descended hastily, hiding her eyes. She must do better than this, and she could make a start by concentrating on his feelings and disregarding her own. Instead of going tearful on him every time she thought about the terrible thing that faced him and acting as if her virginity were sacrosanct and not to be infringed upon, she could make light of it so that he wouldn't feel guilty if . . .
when
, she amended hastily in her mind, it happened. She knew with staunch conviction that it would happen between them—they would make love. He might resist or she might resist in the confusing pendulum swing of emotions, but the outcome was inevitable.

Lifting her face, she said, ‘Princes don't come wearing badges stating, “I'm a prince.” And ordinary girls seem to lack the discernment of a fairy-tale princess, so I'll have to take my luck along with the rest.'

She pulled at the last bit of wrapping paper, and then her laughter was real. It was a book. ‘Just what I've always wanted,' she said, gulping on hilarity. ‘A cookery book.' At least it wasn't one that she had written.

His smile was slow in coming. Something had not amused him. Perhaps because he didn't know she was herself a cookery expert and writer of cookbooks, he thought she was laughing at him. Unless his mind was still lingering on the serious undertones of the frivolous conversation they'd just had about frogs and princes.

Eventually, the corners of his mouth struggled out of whatever grimness of thought had been clamping them in such black gloom, and she turned to the other gift. Both useful and adorable, it was a housecoat in midnight blue velvet with a tiny quilted collar and a quilted pocket motif.

She reached up to kiss his cheek. ‘Thank you for my presents. I love them.' Her eyes said, ‘I love you.' She never meant to send him that melting look. It had just happened. She regretted it instantly. Perhaps he hadn't read the message. But she knew that he had and had found it not to his liking.

He took her face in his hands, and his lips swooped in angry assault, as if endeavoring to bully the loving thoughts from her head, to stamp the moment with passion and punish her for daring to add a sweeter dimension.

He didn't so much release her as push her away, and the corners of her mouth turned down at the brutality. She occupied herself by scooping up the velvet housecoat. ‘Just the thing to slip on at the tail end of an evening,' she said huskily. But the evening was a long way away; first there was a lovely day to
enjoy
, just as she'd determined, and damn his gloom!

His bad mood didn't last. They both took a share of the chores; busily, harmoniously, they worked side by side. A perfect twosome, Ros thought, now that good humor was restored between them. A robin perched on the windowsill, looking for crumbs, which were quickly taken out to him. At last, everything was ready. Ros changed into the red dress she had bought, and then they sat down to the special meal. They pulled crackers and wore the fancy hats that came out of them and laughed at the corny cracker jokes that they read out loud to each other. One joke slip was howlingly appropriate to a recently explored theme. Beneath a particularly revolting drawing of a frog gloating over a pretty girl, the caption read, ‘It's a girl's lot to kiss a lot of frogs in her search for her prince.' It wasn't that much of a coincidence, because the cracker selection was called
One Day My Prince Will Come.
The box had been under the tree, and doubtless Cliff's eyes had lit upon it as they'd talked, and it had prompted his observation in the first place, but it was so screamingly funny that Ros fell about laughing, and she put the slip of paper on one side to save.

Day slid into evening. They drew the curtains, shutting out the cold, frosty, fairy-tale world. They didn't have a sophisticated stereo deck, just a small transistor radio, but it provided music to dance to. Ros had been sitting on the sofa, her slippers kicked off and her feet tucked under her, when Cliff proffered the invitation. Because she danced barefoot, her head didn't ascend to the curve of his neck as it had before, and he had to bend his head a long way to kiss her. He seemed to take a long time in deciding whether he wanted to kiss her or not—and then it was as if the decision were taken out of his hands. The compulsion to do so wouldn't be fended off a moment longer.

The night before, she'd been positive that her lips had known every delight there was, but this deeply explorative kiss swept open new doors and took her down into endless depths of pleasure. She felt as though she were drowning in sensualism, and she never wanted to surface. When she did, it wasn't long before he reclaimed her lips, and the dizzy delight dragged her back down into the bliss again. Her arms went up round his neck. Her head was driven back as the kiss deepened; her concave spine brought her body closer still to his. His hand on the small of her back burned through her dress and fused them together for a brief, deciding moment, and then he reached up and untangled her fingers.