One More Night Page 6

  The comments and compliments came thick and fast, and it was only when the band finally packed up and exhausted but happy couples began to drift away to bed that she came back to earth with a crash.

  Rick was still there, at the bar, but as Evonne watched he put his arm around the pretty girl he was talking to and kissed her on the forehead, and they laughed together and went on talking.

  Evonne closed her eyes and swayed where she stood as thought after frightening thought pounded at her brain, and she was conscious of never feeling more alone in her life. Alone and…jealous. Alone yet frighteningly alive, in a way she’d sworn would never happen to her again. Alive to the desire, the need to be loved.

  She whirled on her heel and ran out of the lounge and down the path, uncaring of emus and kangaroos, ran all the way and up the stairs to her room, where she shut herself in and leant back against the door, breathing distractedly and saying over and over to herself, ‘No, oh, no…’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  IT was a knock on the door that jerked her away from it as if burnt, and Rick saying her name, unmistakably Rick, although the sound was muffled.

  ‘No,’ she whispered yet again, and tiptoed into the main body of the room. She had left one bedside lamp on and she crossed over to it swiftly and switched it off. Then she sat down on the bed in the darkness wringing her hands, staring towards the door and praying he would go away.

  He did after a time—at least, he stopped knocking, and she heard his own door close in the quiet of the night, and felt her chest muscles relax slightly.

  Her relief was short-lived, however, because there was an unnaturally loud clatter on her moonlit veranda and she swung around, wide-eyed, to see Rick picking himself up from a welter of overturned chair and table.

  Evonne sprang up, but he limped in through the glass doors before she could reach them, caught her wrists in one hand, while he slid the door closed with the other, swung the curtain closed too, then dragged her with him to switch on the bedside light.

  ‘How dare you?’ she panted, struggling desperately to free herself, not believing he was so strong. ‘How dare you climb into my room like this?’

  ‘I didn’t do it from choice, believe me,’ he said ironically. ‘It was the only way to get to you— to break into your ivory tower,’ he added almost contemptuously, and released her abruptly.

  Evonne lost her balance and sat down awkwardly on the bed.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said immediately, ‘but you might as well stay there.’ He loomed over her so that she couldn’t get up.

  She glared at him and rubbed her wrists resentfully, prey to so many conflicting emotions that although she tried to speak, nothing came out.

  He observed this for a moment, then said, ‘What happened back there?’ He gestured towards the main complex.

  ‘Nothing!’

  ‘Don’t lie, Evonne,’ he said curtly. ‘One minute you were having the time of your life, the next you were literally running for cover. Did you suddenly realise how much you’ve broken your vows lately? Did it hit you that you were living and laughing—and loving it?’

  Her eyes widened and her lips parted and her breath caught in her throat. ‘H-how…’ she stammered, then a look of horror clouded her eyes, and she twisted away and laid her head on the pillows. ‘Go away,’ she said hoarsely.

  ‘No.’

  She sat up convulsively. ‘Then I will! I don’t have to be… interrogated by you, of all people.’

  ‘Of all people? What’s that supposed to mean?’ queried Rick.

  ‘It means,’ she didn’t realise her teeth were chattering, she didn’t, somehow couldn’t stop the words from tumbling out, ‘don’t let me keep you from the girl you were with, and planning to spend the night with, no d-doubt!’

  ‘Jealous, Evonne?’ he shot at her.

  ‘No…oh!’ she cried. ‘Stop standing over me as if…as if…’

  Rick moved away, but for some reason her legs felt as if they wouldn’t be capable of supporting her, so she stayed where she was, breathing unsteadily, staring at the wall until she put her hands to her face and encountered her brave pink hibiscus blooms which were coming adrift and closing up anyway. She plucked them out impatiently and stared at them instead, then started to shred them, petal by petal.

  ‘Evonne?’

  ‘I wish you’d just go away,’ she whispered.

  He didn’t answer, and for a few minutes, in her misery, she didn’t care whether he went or stayed, whether she was dead or alive.

  Then some sounds pierced her consciousness and she turned to see that he had boiled the electric jug each room was equipped with, and was making coffee. Her shoulders sagged and she sighed soundlessly, then watched helplessly as he put two gently steaming cups on the low table and arranged the two armchairs around it.

  He straightened and stared at her for a moment, then said quietly, ‘Come on.’

  Evonne looked away, then stood up with a shrug.

  The coffee was too hot, and she burnt her lips with the first sip and put the cup down jerkily so that it rattled against the saucer.

  Rick said, into the silence that followed and with a wry glance around, ‘Your room puts mine to shame.’

  She looked around at the neatness. There were no clothes in sight, the dressing-table bore her cosmetics in beautiful, expensive jars and tubes and arranged like a display. There were no shoes on the floor, no towels lying about, not even a purse or a bag, and on her work-table no sign of his brown paper shopping bags but neat piles of foolscap, her typing paper, two pens; her typewriter was covered. The only evidence of any slight disorder was the scattering of torn pink petals on the bedspread—and a few still clinging to the front of her dress.

  She picked one fragment up between her fingers and said huskily, ‘Look, I’m sorry, I…got a bit carried away, but it’s really nothing for you to worry about. It’s not any of your…’ She stopped and bit her lip.

  ‘Business?’ he supplied.

  ‘Well,’ she said with an effort, ‘I don’t mean to sound ungracious, but no, it isn’t.’

  Rick lay back in his chair and studied her thoughtfully from beneath half-closed lids, and while she held her breath, waiting for his reply, she noticed with a curious little ache around her heart that he had scratched the side of his face when he had tripped over her veranda furniture.

  ‘I’m afraid I have to disagree,’ he said at last. ‘If you’re worried about your book, I’ll still finish it for you…’

  ‘Evonne,’ he said softly but compellingly and with an odd hint of menace, ‘let’s not beat about the bush any more. The way you are, the state you’re in, affects me, and you know very well why.’

  ‘Do I? I’m sorry to say I don’t…’

  ‘Yes, you do,’ he countered. ‘Oh, we’ve kept it under wraps—in fact you’ve done your best to bury it as deep as you can, and because of the curious way it appears to affect you, I’ve,’ he shrugged, ‘gone along with it. But none of that alters the fact that there’s a rather primitive attraction between us, my dear.’

  She made a protesting little sound, but he ignored it and went on, ‘I’d even go so far as to say one of those spontaneous ones—it was certainly like that for me.’

  Evonne stood up clumsily. ‘I don’t want to hear any more. I’m not interested..

  ‘Then why are you so bloody upset?’ he interrupted coldly. ‘And so uptight?’

  ‘I’m…’

  But he swore beneath his breath and got up in one long, lithe movement and before she could take evasive action, had her in his arms. ‘Surely you couldn’t be so beautiful,’ he said, his lips barely moving and his green eyes seemingly raking her soul, ‘and have no honesty in your heart. We want each other, Evonne. Whatever else is wrong for you, whatever is impossible about it, doesn’t change that one simple fact. Nothing can change the fact that you saw me with a girl and thought I was going to sleep with her tonight, and it hurt.’

  ‘All right, it hurt,�
� she said through her teeth. ‘But it wasn’t only you—don’t flatter yourself it was particularly you. It was… I was just suddenly desperately lonely. Everyone was going, everyone had a… partner, it… got to me, that’s all.’

  ‘Poor little Cinderella Evonne,’ he mocked. ‘What really interests me is why you’re such a determined Cinderella, not to mention deliberately blind and…’

  ‘Let me go, Rick,’ she warned, and tried to break free.

  ‘Not just yet, sweetheart,’ he drawled. ‘It seems I have a score to settle—my pride,’ he added with a dry little smile, ‘appears to be ruffled. Let’s see how you kiss just anyone, not particularly me— if you follow my drift.’

  Evonne gasped, but he only laughed quietly and drew her closer.

  ‘I’ll scream,’ she threatened.

  ‘Scream away,’ he murmured, ‘because I intend to kiss you, and while I concede that with words—well, you handle them with as much dexterity as a nasty sharp little dagger does its work— but in this I might just have the edge.’

  She didn’t scream, but she fought him with all her strength—and Rick resisted with as little of his as was necessary to keep her in his arms and pressed to the lean, hard length of him. She wrenched her mouth free and one arm and tried to hit him, but he caught her wrist and imprisoned her arm behind her back. He slid the fingers of his other hand through her hair and tugged her head back and claimed her mouth again, but once again she got it free. Then she started to swear at him, unprintable words she hated and always tried to forget she ever knew, words she had heard her drunken father say to her mother over and over again until he walked out on them all…

  It was the quizzical spark of amusement in Rick’s eyes that stopped the flow but, what was worse, her contempt for herself seemed to drain all the fight out of her, and that was when she fell into a terrible trap…

  ‘Quite finished?’ he said softly, and started to kiss her again.

  Later, for ever afterwards, Evonne was to wonder if it was being drained not only spiritually by the unforgivable lapse in the smooth veneer of her sophistication, but also being physically close to exhaustion, that accounted for it. Accounted for the way she gradually found herself clinging to him rather than being held and restrained; found her heart beating erratically as he increased the pressure on her mouth and her lips parted and she was suddenly drowning in the taste of him, aware through every pore of the feel of his body against hers, conscious of her body as if the blood was singing through her veins and as if her breasts, her thighs, her throat craved for more than even this contact, needed his hands upon them, exploring, releasing the incredible tension beneath the surface of her skin, cupping, caressing…

  She moaned beneath his mouth, a husky, unmistakable little sound of desire, and when he lifted his head, she could only lean her brow on his shoulder, shaken to the core, bereft.

  She heard him say something dimly, but once heard, it was as if his quietly mocking words were engraved on her heart. ‘So you like it rough, Patterson. I don’t know if I should be surprised, but somehow I’m not.’

  She moved convulsively and his arms fell away, but as their eyes met she trembled, knowing there was more to come.

  There was. Rick took her hand and turned her so that they were facing the wide mirror above the dressing table. Evonne could only close her eyes after a moment at what she saw. Her hair was tumbling down, her cheeks were flushed, her strapless dress had slipped down a little at one side and her mouth was ripe. To complete her dishevelment, she was standing awkwardly at an angle because she had lost one shoe in her futile fight.

  ‘Get out,’ she whispered raggedly, kicking off the other one.

  ‘Just going,’ he said, and added meditatively, ‘Yes, I think I always knew you were a case of still waters running deep. Goodnight, my dear.’ And he left the way he had come, climbing over her veranda on to his because, he informed her casually, he had neglected to bring his key. He didn’t trip over anything this time.

  Evonne lay huddled on her bed, on top of the cover, still in her chalk-blue dress, for about an hour, staring with terrible eyes at the wall, hugging herself. Then she got up and had a shower, locked herself in and, secure in the knowledge that she had often typed very early and quite late without disturbing Rick or anyone else, set to work.

  When the sun rose, she fortified herself with a cup of coffee and the thought that she had eaten enough last night to last her for a good few hours. By nine o’clock, seven hours of virtually straight, swift typing without any breaks to chuckle at or enjoy the manuscript, she was dizzy and seeing double, stiff and cramped, but it was finished. Wearily she clipped the last chapter together and slid the pile into an envelope folder. Then she got up, stretched and, with every step an effort, began to pack. Finally she took another shower and stood in it for an age, contemplating her options, There were several flights a day off the island, but if they were booked she could take the afternoon boat. All that remained was how to spend the intervening hours—and how to blank her mind to that dreadful question she kept asking herself. Had she been right… or was Rick right? Not that it mattered, she kept telling herself, not that it mattered.

  She stepped out of the shower at last and dressed as if she was leaving there and then, in an almond safari dress with a woven straw belt and matching shoes, and she tied her hair back with a silk jade green scarf. The finished effect was perfectly groomed, but nothing could hide the shadows under her eyes, and her bag and sunglasses lay ready on the bed. Still, it was curiously hard to leave the security of her room to make the necessary arrangements—one disadvantage of Brampton was no phones in the rooms—and she was hesitating briefly when Rick knocked on the door.

  She flinched and wondered foolishly if she would ever come to know anyone else’s knock so well, then she squared her shoulders and went to answer it.

  Nothing, she knew, could stop her blushing at the mere sight of him, leaning on her doorframe with his hand raised to knock again, looking tall and still sleepy about the eyes but as formally dressed as she had ever seen him. Formal for Rick, that was, she suspected, in a round-necked slate blue T-shirt beneath a check blue and grey seersucker sports jacket and grey pants.

  They said nothing for a moment, as he watched the hot colour rise to her cheeks and Evonne steeled herself to say what she had to.

  ‘Come in.’

  He straightened and followed her in, and his eyes went immediately to her luggage standing neatly in the middle of the floor. ‘I suspected as much,’ he murmured.

  ‘It was probably the suspectable thing,’ Evonne returned drily.

  ‘No, I mean I felt in my bones. Look at this.’ He turned towards the door and gestured for her to go outside to the landing.

  ‘What…?’

  ‘Just have a look.’

  She compressed her lips, then with a shrug went out to have a look. Rick followed her and indicated a pile of luggage outside his door.

  Evonne blinked. ‘You’re…leaving too?’ she said uncertainly.

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Can’t you guess?’

  ‘No… I mean,’ she turned and went back into her room, and he followed her, ‘you don’t have to. I’ve finished your book. It’s all typed up.’ She pointed to the bed. ‘There’s no need for you to leave yet.’

  He stared at the pile on the bed and then at her with an incredulous frown growing in his eyes. ‘You… But when?’

  ‘Last night,’ she said briefly, then added more accurately, ‘This morning.’

  ‘Did you go to bed at all?’

  She shrugged. ‘No. So you see…’

  ‘I don’t see anything—why?’ he interrupted roughly.

  Evonne took a breath. ‘I also,’ she said steadily, ‘like to complete any projects I undertake. And if you want me to be really honest,’ she closed her eyes briefly at the sudden flash of anger in her voice but went on truthfully, ‘I thought it might obviate the need for you to re
sort to any kind of blackmail…’

  ‘Blackmail,’ Rick said softly.

  ‘Yes, blackmail…’ She stopped and bit her lip. ‘Authors are notorious for it,’ she added coolly.

  ‘Oh, that kind of blackmail,’ he drawled. ‘It so happens you’re right.’

  ‘Well, now there’s no need…’

  ‘Evonne,’ he cut in, ‘sit down, will you? There’s something I have to tell you.’

  ‘There’s nothing I want to hear!’

  ‘Don’t make me have to force you, my dear,’ he said quietly but with that sudden tiger-like glint in his green eyes.

  Evonne hesitated, remembered and coloured faintly, then sat with as much dignity as she could muster. But I won’t be manipulated into anything! she told herself grimly.

  Rick stared at her for a moment, then sat down on the end of the bed and rubbed the side of his face gingerly, and she noticed for the first time that there was a faint bruise around one eye as well as the slight scratch.

  Her lips parted. ‘You’ve got a black eye,’ she said involuntarily, then cursed herself.

  ‘I know, from your veranda furniture.’

  ‘It’s not mine…’ She broke off and gritted her teeth against any more inane comments. ‘Go on,’ she ordered, ‘I haven’t got all day.’

  Rick smiled faintly and she found herself feeling hot again, hot and foolish, which always made her defensive and impossible—oh, why doesn’t he just let me go? she wondered miserably.

  ‘It’s about my pride—and me,’ he said slowly. ‘We’re in even more… disharmony than we were last night, so I have to tell you that I’m sorry for what happened.’ His green eyes searched her face.

  ‘Thanks,’ she said stiffly. ‘I appreciate…’

  ‘On the other hand, I’m not going to let the matter go. And that’s why, when I woke up this morning with this certainty in my mind that you were packing and determined to leave, I decided to come with you.’

  ‘Come…?’ Evonne stared at him, wide-eyed. ‘I don’t think I know what you mean. Where?’