She slumped against him, her tears fiercer and more scalding as she wept out her disappointment and hurt, her terrifying uncertainty about her immediate future, and her humiliated rage against the man whose arm encircled her like a ring of iron.
But, gradually, the tearing sobs began to diminish and the burning in her throat to subside, leaving a strange emptiness in place of the grief and anger. A vacuum that, slowly but surely, was being occupied by other, more insidious emotions. Feelings that she could not understand, let alone explain or justify.
She was suddenly, potently aware of the physical reality of the hard male warmth supporting her. Conscious that the comforting rhythm of his heartbeat under her cheek, the strength of his embrace and the clean, beguiling scent of his skin were all permeating her shaking senses in a manner as unfamiliar as it was disturbing. And that his other hand was stroking her hair back from her aching forehead with unexpected gentleness.
Like soothing a puppy abandoned on the motorway …
Tallie sat up abruptly and he released her at once, waiting in silence as she used his handkerchief to wipe her face and blow her nose. Mortified to notice, as she did so, that she’d left a damp patch on his shirt.
Eventually she said in a small brittle voice that still trembled a little, ‘Please … excuse me. I don’t usually embarrass myself like this—or anyone else, for that matter.’
‘You didn’t embarrass me,’ he said. ‘If anything, I feel guilty because it seems to be my comment on your obvious sexual innocence that acted as the trigger in all this.’ He added quietly, ‘However, what I don’t understand is why that should be. Why you should feel insulted or troubled by my assumption that you’re still a virgin, even if it could have been expressed more tactfully.
‘After all, taking your time before you dash into some ultra-heavy relationship makes a lot of sense, especially these days.’
She kept her gaze fixed on the pale cord carpet. ‘But not everyone sees it in quite the same way.’ And what on earth had prompted her into an admission like that?
‘Oh, dear,’ he said, not unkindly. ‘Has some callow youth been hassling you because you said no?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘Not at all. It turned out that he … he preferred … girls with more experience.’
Oh, God, she thought, I can’t be doing this. I can’t be sitting on a bed telling Mark Benedict about my failed love life. And if he bursts out laughing, I shall only have myself to blame.
‘Then he certainly won’t have far to look,’ he said caustically, the firm mouth surprisingly unsmiling. ‘And you, sweetheart, have probably been saved a world of grief. Congratulations.’
‘But I love him.’ She hadn’t intended to say that either, and her words fell with utter desolation into a silence that seemed to stretch into eternity.
She found herself stealing a glance at him, wondering, and saw that he was very still, gazing in front of him, the dark brows drawn together in a faint frown.
But, when he spoke, his tone was almost casual. ‘Well, don’t worry about it,’ he said, getting to his feet. ‘They say first love is like measles—lousy at the time, but conferring immunity afterwards. And one of these days you’ll wake up and wonder what you ever saw in this crass Casanova.’
Tallie lifted her chin. ‘Please don’t call him that,’ she said defensively. ‘You know nothing at all about him—or me.’
‘Agreed.’ Mark Benedict nodded. ‘And, where he’s concerned, I’d find it hard to take an interest. But I’d bet there are a lot of girls out there who’ll be waking up tomorrow in strange beds, feeling used up and disappointed, who’d like nothing better than to turn the clock back and find themselves in your shoes with life still waiting to happen.
‘Besides,’ he added softly, ‘think how much more you’d have to regret if he’d taken everything you had to give and still walked away.’
‘I’m sure your logic is impeccable,’ Tallie said coldly. ‘But it doesn’t actually make me feel any better about the situation.’
Nor did it justify this extraordinary conversation either, she thought, or explain how she was going to live with herself after this unforgivable piece of self-revelation.
She was bitterly aware that she’d allowed him to get too close—physically as well as mentally, as if the room had shrunk in some strange way—and knew that she needed to distance herself—and fast.
Swallowing, she rose too, folding her arms across her body in a defensive gesture she immediately regretted. She kept her voice level. ‘I—I’m sorry to have involved you in all this. It certainly won’t happen again. And I know you’re … going out tonight,’ she added primly. ‘So please don’t let me keep you.’
The grin he sent her had ‘wicked’ stamped right through it and she felt her stomach curl nervously in a response as involuntary as it was unexpected.
‘Don’t worry, sweetheart,’ he said softly, ‘you won’t.’ He paused, his glance flicking past her to the bed and the pile of white towelling draped across the coverlet. ‘But, before I go, I’ll have my robe back.’
Tallie bit her lip. ‘Shouldn’t I launder it first?’
‘No need for that.’ He held out a compelling hand, leaving her no choice but to fetch it. ‘It’s hardly contaminated after its brief acquaintance with you. Besides,’ he added softly, ‘it holds memories that I shall fully enjoy savouring each time I wear it myself.’
And he walked off, leaving Tallie staring after him, her heart beating like a kettle drum, furiously aware that she was blushing again.
This coming week is going to seem an eternity, Tallie thought as she picked her way without noticeable enthusiasm through her cheese salad that evening.
And I have no one to blame but myself, she acknowledged sombrely. Why couldn’t I simply apologise for annoying his girlfriend and leave it at that? Why have a go, however justified I may have felt it was at the time? Especially when all I’ve achieved by it is to make a spectacular fool of myself?
Well, I’ll know better next time—except that I’m going to make quite sure there is no next time. A policy of strict neutrality plus a swift and unobtrusive departure is what I must aim for now.
She’d already checked to make sure there was a bolt on the inside of the door in the bathroom she’d be using from now on, and she’d take care that it was securely fastened on every visit—and that she’d be wearing her own elderly dressing gown too, she thought, her skin burning again.
And, eventually, she’d be able to put the whole sorry interlude behind her, and send Mr Benedict to the dump bin in her memory. With luck, she might even stop feeling as if her skin had been scrubbed all over with steel wool.
However, she told herself as she washed up her supper things and put them away, the positive side to all this was having the flat to herself again, at least for the evening, if not all night. So she could get back to her writing undisturbed.
If ‘undisturbed’ was really the word she was looking for.
Because, try as she might, Tallie found concentration difficult. Long after she’d heard the front door slam, signalling his departure, she discovered disagreeably, as she stared at her laptop screen, that her encounters with Mark Benedict were still occupying the forefront of her mind and lingering there to the detriment of the unfortunate Mariana, whose mule had somehow got free in the night and run off, forcing her to spend the day walking miles over rough terrain, until at last she came upon a stream that she could follow downhill.
Luxury—compared with the day I’ve had, Tallie muttered under her breath.
But eventually she became caught up in her story again, and when the sudden steep gradient