The Older Man (5 page)

She snuggled closer, her head against his shoulder. His lips brushed her temple, and his hands were on her back, smoothing the velvet of her jacket.

Then those hands moved down to her skirt, and up again, under the jacket, and Rennie was electrified. Now his fingers were on her bare skin beneath the lace blouse, running up the groove of her spine, and his other hand gently tugged at her hair, raising her mouth to his.

The kiss had nothing to do with comforting a child. His mouth was warm and insistent and very sure, his technique extremely adult, and after her first startled reaction, which he totally ignored, she enjoyed it very much. When his hand shifted, lightly skimming her ribs, and came to rest with a thumb just under her bra, moving lazily over the hammering of her heart, she felt as though flames had just erupted about her. Then, with his thumb still in the same place, he hooked one of those long fingers into the side of her bra and began caressing the soft skin.

Excitement spiralled within her. She felt her mouth open further under his, her breathing quicken. More. She wanted more. She wanted…

That wonderful warm hand moved again, the finger sliding along the taut curve of fabric to the fastening at the back. And then a car passed by with flaring headlights, and she wrenched herself away from him, gasping, “What are you doing?”

“Don’t you like it?” he asked. “I thought you did.”

“Well, I … I didn’t expect it, from you!” she said, totally confused. If she was honest, she had wanted him to admit in some way that she attracted him, but the kiss had been much more devastating than she had foreseen. “I’ve just been telling you that I’m in love with another man!” That it wasn’t true was surely neither here nor there.

“Ah, yes,” he said. “Well, I thought it would be … interesting to see if you could respond to someone else, in spite of your deep feelings for Ethan.”

Interesting! She struggled to keep her voice under control. “Oh,” she said. “Why?”

“Well,” he drawled, capturing her hand and holding it in a deceptively casual although, she discovered, inescapable grasp, “as you seem to be attracted to older men, I thought it might be enjoyable — for both of us — and help you get Ethan out of your system, if I offered myself in his place.”

Regrettably, Rennie found her voice rise to something resembling a squeak. “Offered yourself? Are you p-proposing?”

He looked at her thoughtfully. “Well, no, actually. Not proposing marriage, if that’s what you mean. Something less permanent. After all,” he added coaxingly, “I’m not much older than Ethan. And I think we’ve just proved that you don’t find me exactly repulsive. So … what about it? We could have a lot of fun. And cure you of your puppy love at the same time.”

An affair. He wanted to have an affair with her.

“Shall we try again?” he asked, and swept her back into his arms, his mouth claiming hers once more, parting her lips, his hands sliding down to hold her against him.

She wasn’t prepared for the explosion of pure rage that shook her. She shoved him away with all the force at her command, and swung a hand at his face, catching him a glancing blow on the chin as he whipped his head aside. “You bastard!” she panted.

She clenched her fists and lifted them, but he grabbed her wrists and held them away. And laughed. Laughed at her, infuriating her more than ever. She tried kicking out at him, and he twisted her wrists aside so that she couldn’t reach him. He was still laughing.

“All right, Rennie,” he said. “Tit for tat, and that makes us even. I didn’t mean it, any more than you meant any of that romantic fairytale you’ve just been spinning me about your great, wonderful, undying love for Ethan.”

Rennie stood still. “You knew! You — you sod! How could you — ?”

“Rather easily, once I realised I was being taken for a ride,” Grant rejoined coolly. He cautiously let go her wrists, waited for a moment and then added, “You laid it on a bit too much at the end. Carried away by your own imagination.” His lips twitched.

Rubbing at one of her wrists, Rennie said, “I’d decided you weren’t going to notice.”

“Really.” He put his hands in his pockets and looked at her consideringly. “Have I been that thick?”

“Yes. And you wouldn’t listen.”

He cocked his head enquiringly.

“I told you I wasn’t pining for Ethan. You didn’t believe me. And if you hadn’t been so busy manhandling me yesterday on the bridge and tearing strips off me afterwards, you’d have heard me telling you I had no intention of jumping. All I wanted was to get my scarf.”

“Your scarf?”

“I was just trying to retrieve it, that’s all. It blew off in the wind. You got it back for me,” she reminded him.

“You mean it blew over there before you started climbing the parapet? Is that true?” he asked blankly.

“How did you think it got over there?”

After a few seconds of thought, he said on a note of disbelief, “I’ve made a monumental fool of myself!”

“Well, yes — you have rather,” Rennie confirmed. She tried to look sorry for him, but her lips curved in spite of herself, and a bubble of laughter escaped.

He looked at her wrathfully, and grasped her shoulders. “Don’t you laugh at me!” But then his mouth began to curl upward, too, and she collapsed against him, still laughing.

“Well, you got your own back very nicely,” he admitted at last, holding her away from him as he grinned down at her.

She asked him, “When did you realise?”

“I was sure after the wedding that you’d been having me on. Then when I saw you apparently about to jump from the bridge, I was convinced I’d done you a gross injustice. That was enough of a fright for me, you know,” he reproached her.

“I meant to tell you then but you didn’t give me a chance.”

“Didn’t I? I suppose that’s fair comment. I was in shock.”

“And tonight? You didn’t know all along, did you?”

“I had my suspicions now and then. You didn’t act like someone who’d tried to kill herself the day before. I wasn’t sure though, until you began on that harrowing tale of teenage trauma. Hamming it up something awful, Rennie. You couldn’t have expected me to swallow that!”

“Considering what you’d already swallowed — ” she said heartlessly.

Grant stepped back from her and held up a hand. “Okay, okay. I admit it. I should have known you weren’t such a wet fish.”

“Well, thank you!” she said, slightly mollified. “I guess we can call it quits, now. You’ve had your revenge.” She held out her hand.

Grant took it in his. “Quits it is.” He looked down at her quizzically, still holding her hand. “I must say, I didn’t expect you to be quite so offended by my suggestion. I’ve never seen such a picture of outraged virtue. Most unusual in this day and age.”

“It was the way you did it,” she said. “Leering at me! You meant me to be offended, didn’t you?”

“Guilty, I’m afraid.” He smiled ruefully. “I hardly expected to be physically attacked, though.

“I’m not going to apologise,” Rennie told him roundly.

“No, I think we’re past that, don’t you? Now that we’ve cleared the air, we’d better be getting back to the car and I’ll drive you home.”

He took her hand as though it was the most natural thing in the world, and they walked side by side in companionable silence. As they left the waterside, Rennie said, “I’ll pay for my share of the dinner. It was mean of me to make you take me there.”

“You’re a good sport, Rennie.” He glanced down at her. “But that’s quite unnecessary. Believe me, it was worth it. I haven’t had such an enjoyable evening in years.”

It was nice of him to say so, even if it wasn’t strictly true. Stopping herself from naively asking if it was, she said truthfully, “Neither have I.” It was astonishing, but she couldn’t remember the last time she had felt so stimulated and alive.

“That’s very sweet of you, Rennie,” he said. Obviously he didn’t believe a word of it.

“I mean it!” she protested. And then, sure that he wouldn’t suggest it himself, she added, “Maybe we should do this again. Not so expensively of course, and without the — “

“Play-acting? Don’t you think the event would lack some of the flavour of tonight? In a metaphorical sense.”

“For you?” They had reached his car, and she turned to face him, preventing him from unlocking the door for her.

“For you, I meant,” he answered.

“I don’t know until we try it out, do I?” she suggested, and gave him her most winning smile.

He stood swinging the key in his hand, then gently moved her out of the way and unlocked the door. He turned to her and touched her arm. “Come on,” he said. “I’m taking you home.”

“Well?” she said as he drew the car up outside her door.

He didn’t pretend to misunderstand. With slow deliberation he switched the engine off and turned to face her. “Rennie,” he said. “It wouldn’t be a good idea to start — seeing each other.”

“Why not? I know you only kissed me to make me fall for that phoney line of yours, but I wasn’t the only one who enjoyed it.”

“Most men enjoy kissing. Especially someone as attractive and responsive as you are. As you say, I’m afraid I had an ulterior motive. It doesn’t mean I’m planning to repeat the experience.”

Rennie flushed at his bluntness. “Are you giving me the brush-off?”

“You’re a delightful young woman, and I like you a lot. I’m also divorced and about twice your age — “

“What does that have to do with it?”

“Some people might say, quite a lot. Your parents, for instance.”

“My parents have brought me up to make my own decisions, and they’re very broad-minded.”

“Lots of parents are broad-minded until it comes to their own offspring.”

Rennie thought that might be true of her father. “Anyway, I’m over eighteen, so they don’t really have any say in the matter.”

“And you’d be happy going against what they felt was in your best interests?”

Of course she wouldn’t. She would always value their advice, no matter how old she was. But she had to make her own decisions in the long run. She said crossly, “I wish you’d stop trying to be a Dutch uncle, and go with your feelings for once.”

“If I did that — “

“Yes?” she said hopefully.

“Never mind.” He sounded rather grim. “Believe me, you’d be shocked rigid.”

She gave a gurgle of laughter. “Do you really think so?”

“Yes, my provocative little virgin, I do.”

Looking into his eyes, Rennie caught her breath. “H-how do you know I’m a virgin?” she asked, refusing to move her gaze from his.

“You are,” he said, daring her to lie. “Aren’t you?”

Rennie shrugged. “It’s no disgrace.”

“No, it isn’t. And don’t believe anyone who tells you any different.”

Rennie folded her hands in her lap and looked resigned. “Are you about to give me another lecture?”

“No. I’m about to tip you out of this car and say goodnight.”

“Why?” she demanded as he reached across and opened the door for her. “You said you liked me. You can at least give me a good reason.”

“I just did.”

“Because you’re twice my age? What does that matter? No one thinks anything of it any more. Well, hardly…”

“All right,” Grant said, his face close to hers. “Because I’m not in the habit of seducing teenagers. Clear enough for you? Now, shoo!” He gave her a peck on the lips and a meaningful little shove.

Rennie sighed, climbed out onto the pavement and said, “I’m not a cat!” She heard him laughing before he closed the door and drove away.

For a few days she half-hoped he would relent and contact her. But it seemed he wasn’t going to change his mind. Regretfully, she tried to put the episode behind her. When she found herself daydreaming about his firm mouth searching hers and his hands touching her skin, when she recalled the delicious tingling of her body, the hot melting in her bones, she told herself that she had never felt like this before merely because she had never been kissed by a man of his experience. It had meant nothing to him but a brief, pleasant incident. He had probably shared equally intimate moments with dozens of other women.

Including his wife. She wondered what his ex-wife was like, and why the marriage had gone wrong.

Then her father said casually at the dinner table one night, “Oh, I ran into Grant Morrison today, Rennie. Celeste’s friend. He was asking after you.”

“Was he?” She looked up eagerly, her cheeks flushing, and Shane cast her a curious, interested glance.

“Mm.” Her father was poking at the casserole on his plate.

“What did he say?” Rennie asked.

“What’s this green stuff?” Frank asked his wife suspiciously. He turned a blank expression to Rennie. “Say?”

“It’s zucchini,” Marian told him.

Frank grunted. “He said, ‘How’s Rennie?’ Is that a fancy name for marrow?”

Rennie demanded, “Is that all?” as her mother answered, “Baby marrows.”

“Just as tasteless. All what?”

“They’re good for you,” Marian said. “Full of vitamins.”

“Is that all he said?”

“What else should he say?” Frank asked his daughter, pushing the zucchini aside. “He hardly knows you, after all. Does he?”

“No, no,” Rennie agreed hastily. “I’m just surprised he remembered me at all, really.”

She caught her brother’s eyes. Shane’s expression was frankly disbelieving, and mischievous. He opened his mouth, and closed it quickly when she gave him a murderous glare.

Marian said a few days later, “Ethan phoned. He and Celeste have returned from their honeymoon, and they’ve asked us all to come round to Celeste’s house for drinks on Saturday night, before they take off for Sheerwind.”

“Just us?” Rennie asked, looking up from the book she was reading.

“I’ve no idea,” her mother said. “He didn’t say.”

“Does it matter?” Shane asked.

Rennie shrugged. “I’d like to know if it’s a party or not. So I know what to wear,” she added.

“Something pretty,” her mother advised vaguely. “I don’t think it’s meant to be formal, though.”

She wore a floral print dress in autumn colours. It hugged her breasts and nipped her waist before falling to a full skirt, and left her shoulders bare although it had soft, full sleeves. She pinned her hair carefully up, used a bit more makeup than usual on her creamy skin, and put on a pair of high-heeled shoes that she seldom wore but which emphasised her narrow feet and slim ankles. When she came into the hall as they were preparing to leave, Shane whistled and asked, “Who are you trying to impress?”