The Hidden Years (10 page)

'Oh, it is private,' Kit agreed, and suddenly he was
smiling at her again so that her heart and body were flooded with
warmth and love. She went eagerly towards him, feeling as though she
had stepped into heaven itself when he took hold of her arm and led her
inside the summer-house, and then turned her more fully into his arms.

Even with familiarity the sensation of his tongue moving
erotically within her mouth didn't lose its power to make her body ache
and melt, Lizzie recognised, thrilled by the way Kit was moving against
her, silently telling her how much he loved and wanted her.

'You know how much I want you, don't you?' he told her
thickly. She trembled, too full of emotion to speak, tremulously eager
to show him how much she loved him… how much she needed him.
She was still so bemused by it all, still caught up in the miracle of
it all, totally blinded to reality by her innocence and her love.

In the past, a lifetime ago, had she really been a girl
who had believed idiotically that the physical aspects of love were its
least important, that the physical consummation of love was something
unimportant and even faintly sordid, something to be endured rather
than enjoyed? If so, she was discovering how ignorant she had been, how
blind and unfit to be the recipient of the love of a man like Kit.

That he needed her and that he was so open and urgent in
that need touched her with tenderness that bordered on the maternal.
When they were apart he would have these memories of her to bring him
safely back to her, and as he kissed her and held her against his body
she recognised that what she was experiencing now was a world away from
her girlish dreams of what love might be.

How
could
it be wrong to experience
such pleasure…such joy…to feel her pulses leap as
Kit kissed her face and her throat, as his hands caressed her
sun-warmed body through her borrowed clothes?

'You don't need this on, do you?'

He was already unfastening the cardigan, exposing the
V-neckline of her dress and the softness of her skin. She tensed a
little suddenly, made nervous by the way he was looking at her and Kit,
who had thought himself long beyond ever allowing his reactions to
escape his own control, was almost angered by the sensation that coiled
through him as the sunlight slanted across her body and he saw quite
clearly through the thin cotton the shape and shadowing of her nipples.
He had already known that she was naked beneath her dress, but the
unexpected glimpse of her body through it was somehow more erotic, more
arousing than if he had been looking at her naked body, and, as he
removed the bulky cardigan from her stiff body, he was suddenly
possessed by a frenzy of need so sharply intense that almost before he
had finished his hands were gripping her waist, his head descending so
that his mouth could find the dark-fleshed peak and punish it for its
temerity in so arousing him.

Lizzie had never felt a man's hands on her body so
intimately, never mind his mouth, and the sensation of Kit's teeth
savaging her flesh froze her into immobility, and alarm. It was far too
much, far too soon.

As he felt her tension, her resistance, Kit cursed
silently. For a moment he had forgotten her lack of experience, but now
her body was forcibly reminding him of it, causing his own flesh to
ache with resentment. He was almost tempted to take hold of her and
make her body accept his, but she was so small, so delicately made that
he could hurt her easily if he did. There had been an innocent young
girl once before; a pretty little thing from the village. That had been
before he had learned not to play in his own backyard. Her father had
complained to his parents. His father had been furious with him. He had
been forced to buy her family off. It was a pity that this one happened
to know his cousin.

If she chose to go running to Edward… Not that
there was a damn thing that Edward could do about it… Except
tell Lillian…

His mouth had grown still on her body. Relief unlocked her
muscles into shaky weakness. She felt sick and tremulous. She had known
that men enjoyed touching a woman's breasts, but she had not
known… never dreamed…

Despite the sunshine, and the musty scented warmth of the
summer-house, she suddenly felt so cold that her teeth had started to
chatter.

He still wanted her, Kit recognised, and it wasn't too
late to retrieve the situation. 'I'm sorry, sweetheart,' he told her,
murmuring the words in her ear, so that she wouldn't see the lie for
what it was. 'But you know it really was your own fault.'

When she tensed again, and turned towards him, her eyes
dark with confusion, he smiled ruefully at her. 'Coming out dressed
like that…tempting me like that…'

Subtly, cleverly, he shifted the responsibility, the
blame, so that Lizzie, who had felt uncomfortable enough about her
appearance to start with, now flushed dark red and bit nervously at her
bottom lip.

'I'm sorry if I frightened you,' Kit told her, smiling at
her as he saw her reaction. He could perhaps turn the situation to his
advantage.

'I didn't know… I didn't realise,' Lizzie was
apologising abjectly. 'I—'

'I know… I know…' Kit took her back
in his arms, stroking her hair. 'The trouble is I want you so very
much, and you don't have the experience…'

Immediately Lizzie tensed again, hearing the reproach in
his voice, wincing beneath the implied criticism.

'Let's try again, shall we?' Kit suggested, and her heart
bounded with the relief of knowing that despite her deficiencies he
still wanted her.

Shyly she nodded her head, blushing harder when he added,
'Let's take this off, then, shall we?'

His fingers were already deftly unfastening the buttons on
her dress, freeing her breasts to his eyes and his hands.

He wasn't going to make the same mistake this time, Kit
told himself, and besides, a little holding back now, a little coaxing
and persuading, would pay him handsome dividends later. What he had
already seen of her body was making him urgently eager to possess her.
She felt so small and soft beneath his hands, so vulnerable, her bones
so fragile that he could almost believe he could break them. Would she
be as small inside as her body seemed to suggest, would she…?

'Perfect… you're so perfect,' he told her
thickly as he caressed her bare breasts with his hands, silencing the
hesitant protest he sensed she was about to make by kissing her.

As he kissed her the memory of her earlier fear faded;
there was, Lizzie recognised tremulously, something sharply pleasurable
about the way he was touching her, something which, if she allowed it
to grow, she sensed would lead her into a whole new world of
experiences and feelings. But what she was doing was wrong, she
reminded herself… this kind of intimacy…

As Kit stopped kissing her mouth and started instead to
kiss the soft flesh of her throat, her thoughts became muddled and
confused, impossible to hold on to in the flood of sensation that swept
through her body. This time Kit held his desire in check, caressing her
slowly and lingeringly until at last his mouth was once again on her
breasts.

Immediately she froze, but he refused to let her push him
away, whispering against her skin, 'Did I hurt you, my sweet? I'm
sorry, I didn't mean to. Here, let me kiss it better.'

She was still too tense, too shocked really to enjoy what
he was doing to her, her mind too full of Aunt Vi's teachings and
warnings for them to be totally ignored. And yet… and yet,
dimly, distantly, she sensed that there
was
a
pleasure to be found in this shockingly intimate exploration of her
body, if only her darling Kit had the patience to lead her to it gently
and tenderly.

But tenderness and gentleness, never mind patience, were
virtues that were unknown to Kit Danvers—already he was
growing impatient, bored with such juvenile caresses. He pushed up her
skirt, and put his hand on her thigh, sliding it upwards until he
reached her knickers.

Immediately fresh tension gripped her—her
upbringing, Aunt Vi's strictures, warning against the instincts
struggling for life inside her.

Kit was kissing her again, and, untutored though it was,
somehow her body recognised the selfishness in his touch, the
determination and the greed, and her tension increased.

'If you loved me you'd let me,' Kit was telling her
angrily. 'I thought you and I had something special.'

If it weren't that the very innocence that was irritating
him so much now was also exciting him, arousing him in a way he had not
experienced in a very long time, he would already have lost interest in
her and abandoned her, but for all her reluctance, her fear, indeed
almost because of them, he felt his desire sharpen.

'I want you, Lizzie… let me show you how much.
Let me show you how good it can be,' he coaxed her, kissing her again,
ignoring her tension, ignoring the tremors that made her thigh muscles
quiver.

'I'm not going to hurt you,' he told her, 'I only want to
show you how good it's going to be between us… You do love
me, don't you…?'

What could she say? Of course she loved him.

'Yes,' she whispered helplessly.

'Then let me touch you… let me love you. You're
not one of those women who can't please a man, are you?' Kit asked her,
abruptly changing tack and making a fresh shiver of fear ice along her
spine. Of course she wasn't what he was suggesting… was she?
Confused thoughts jumbled in her brain. She did love him, she knew
that; so why did she feel this hesitation… this fear? Why,
when she had enjoyed his kisses so much, did she feel this apprehension
at his more intimate touch?

She heard the hospital village clock tolling the hour.
Four o'clock already, and she was due back on the ward at five.

Mingling with her panic was a sense of
relief…of escape almost, as she pushed desperately against
Kit's imprisoning arms and told him huskily, 'I must go… I'm
due back at work at five.'

Cursing
beneath his breath, Kit released her. She was proving more of a
challenge than he had expected and like green unripe fruit she was
beginning to leave a sour taste in his mouth, but he still wanted her;
not just because he desired her. Now anger and male pride were also
spurring him on. There was something about her. Something about her
vulnerability, her naiveté, that made him almost want to reach out and
punish her for them.

Not a man given to introspection of any kind, he withdrew
from her abruptly, uncomfortable with his own thoughts. It wasn't in
his nature to give in, to back down from a challenge of any kind.

'I'd better drive you back, then,' he told her curtly,
watching the effect his coldness was having on her, and smiling
inwardly as he recognised her pain. Well, it wouldn't hurt her to
suffer a little… It might even teach her a much-needed
lesson, and it would certainly make her all the more eager to give him
what he wanted the next time he saw her.

He walked her back to the car in a coldly remote silence
that made Lizzie ache with misery and regret. Why on earth had she
behaved so stupidly? Of course she loved him, and of course he had
expected her to allow him to make love to her. He wasn't a boy; he was
a man… a man who was fighting for his country, a man who
could walk out of her life today…

She felt the tears clogging her throat and pain and the
panic churning inside her stomach. Why had she panicked like
that…? Why had she felt that tension, that apprehension?
Was
there something wrong with her… was she perhaps incapable of
pleasing a man as he had suggested, of sharing physical desire?

It was a devastating thought and one that made her face go
white with anguish as they finally reached Kit's car.

When he turned to look at her Kit was pleased to see the
effect his silence had had on her. It made him relent a little towards
her and cup her face with one careless hand while he demanded softly,
'When can I see you again, sweetheart?'

Lizzie's heart leaped with gratitude and relief. He still
wanted her, after all. He was actually giving her a second
chance—he did love her.

'I—'

'Tonight,' Kit pressed. 'What time do you finish work? I
could pick you up…'

Lizzie shook her head.

'Not until late.'

'Then when?' Kit pressed her. 'Tomorrow…'

Tomorrow was her day off. Her heart started to pound, as,
almost incapable of speech, she nodded her head.

'Good,' Kit told her, and then added carelessly, 'Look,
I'll tell you what. Instead of picking you up, why don't I meet you at
the summer-house? That way… that way we'll keep it our
secret… something special just for the two of us…'

Silently Lizzie nodded her head. She had no idea how she
was going to get through the interminably long hours before she could
see him again, but one thing she had already promised herself, and that
was that when she did see him, when he held her and kissed her, when he
touched her and told her how much he wanted her, she was going to
behave like a woman and not a child, she was going to remind herself of
how lucky she was to have met him, and how precious this time together
with him was… how vulnerable their future together when the
war could sweep them apart again at any time, maybe only for a short
space of time, or maybe for eternity.

She shuddered from head to foot, suddenly so cold that her
teeth were chattering.

'Tomorrow, then… eleven o'clock,' Kit reminded
her before they parted.

'Tomorrow,' Lizzie echoed in a whisper, her sight suddenly
blinded by weak tears.

She loved him so much. She wanted to reach out to him and
to say the words, to be held in his arms. To be kissed by
him… to be loved by him, she recognised shakily. So why was
it that when he touched her the way he had she had acted like that,
tensing against him, rejecting him?