Just One Last Night

CHAPTER THREE

THE sun was well and truly up when Melanie’s eyes eased open after the first solid night’s sleep she’d had since leaving Forde. She had slept so deeply that for a moment she was only semiconscious, and then memories of the previous night slammed into her mind at the same time as she became aware that she was curled into the source of her contentment.

Forde.

Frozen with horror, she stiffened, petrified Forde would open his eyes, but the steady measured vibration beneath her cheek didn’t pause, and after a moment she cautiously raised her head. He was fast asleep.

She disentangled herself slowly, pausing to look into his face. Her gaze took in the familiar planes and hollows, made much more boyish in slumber; the straight nose, high cheekbones, crooked mouth with its hint of sensuality even in repose, and the dark stubble on his chin. A very determined chin. Like the man himself.

How could she have been so unbelievably stupid as to sleep with him again? Her breath caught in her throat as her stomach twisted. And it was no good blaming the wine. She had wanted him last night; she had ached and yearned for him since the time they’d parted, more to the point.

But she didn’t need him, she told herself stonily. She had proved that; she had lived without him for seven months, hadn’t she? And she was getting by.

She had barely survived losing Matthew. She had wanted nothing more than to die, the grief and guilt crucifying. She didn’t ever want to be in a place where something like that could happen again. She wouldn’t be in such a place.

She slid carefully out of bed, the trembling that had started in the pit of her stomach spreading to her limbs. She had to get out of the house before Forde woke up. It was cowardly and mean and selfish, but she had to. She loved him too much to let him hope they could make a go of their marriage. It was over, dead, burnt into ashes with no chance of being resurrected. It had died the moment she’d begun to fall down those stairs.

But he would be hoping, a little voice in the back of her mind reminded her relentlessly as she gathered her clothes together as silently as a mouse. Of course he would. As mixed messages went, this one was the pièce de résistance.

Once in the kitchen she dressed swiftly, scared any moment there would be movement from upstairs. Then she wrote him a note, hating herself for the cruelty but knowing if she faced him this morning she would dissolve in floods of tears and the whole sorry mess would just escalate.

Forde, I don’t know how to put this except that I’m more sorry than I can say for behaving the way I did last night. It was all me, I know that, and it was inexcusable.

Melanie paused, her stomach in a giant knot as she considered her next words. But there was no kind way to say it.

I can’t do the together thing any more and that’s nothing to do with you as a person. Again, it’s all me, but it’s only fair to tell you my mind is made up about the divorce. I’ll still do the work for Isabelle if you want me to. Ring me about it tonight. But no more visits. That’s the first condition.

Again she hesitated. How did you finish a note like this? Especially after what they’d shared the night before.

Tears were burning at the backs of her eyes but she blinked them away determinedly. Then she wrote simply:

I hope at some time in the future you can forgive me. Nell

She owed him the intimacy of the nickname at least, she thought wretchedly, feeling lower than anything that might crawl out from under a stone. He had been attempting to comfort her last night when they’d first come into the house, and she had practically begged him to make love to her. She had instigated it all; she knew that.

Creeping upstairs, she placed the note on top of the clothes he’d discarded so frantically the night before but without looking at him again. She couldn’t bear to.

It was only when she was driving away from the house that the avalanche of tears she’d been holding at bay burst forth. She managed to find a lay-by that was hidden from the road by a row of trees once she’d entered it, and cut the engine.

Steeped in misery made all the worse by the remorse and self-condemnation she was feeling, she cried until there were no more tears left. Then she wiped her eyes and blew her nose and got out of the car to compose herself in the warm, fresh air. The chirping of the birds in their busy morning activities in the trees bordering the lay-by registered after a minute or two, and she raised her eyes, searching out a flock of sparrows who were making all the noise.

Life was so simple for them, for all the animal kingdom. It was only Homo sapiens, allegedly the superior species, who made things complex.

The fragrance of Forde still lingered on her skin, the taste of him on her lips. Hugging her arms about her, she recalled how it had felt to have him inside her again, taking her to heaven and back. Falling asleep with her head on his chest, close to the steady beat of his heart, had felt like coming home and had been as pleasurable as their lovemaking.

She straightened, her soft mouth setting. She wasn’t going to think about this. She was too early to arrive at the farmhouse where she and James would be working for the next week or so, but there was a café on the way that would be open. She’d go and buy herself breakfast.

The café only had one other occupant when she pushed open the door, a lorry driver who was reading his paper while he shovelled food into his mouth. After ordering a round of bacon sandwiches and a pot of tea, Melanie made her way to the ladies’ cloakroom, locking the door behind her. The small room held a somewhat ancient washbasin besides the lavatory, and she peered into the speckled mirror above it. She’d looped her hair into a ponytail before leaving the house but it was in dire need of attention. And she hadn’t showered or brushed her teeth.

Stripping off her clothes, she had a wash with the hard green soap, which was as ancient as the washbasin, before drying herself with several of the paper towels in the rusty dispenser. Dressing quickly, she brushed her hair and redid her ponytail before applying plenty of the sunscreen she always carried in her handbag. Brushing her teeth would have to wait.

She was about to leave the cloakroom when she glanced at herself in the mirror again and then drew closer, arrested by the look in her eyes. She blinked, unnerved by the haunting sadness. Was that what Forde had seen? Worse, was that why he had stayed and made love to her? He’d stated quite clearly that the only reason he had come to see her was to discuss the work he wanted her to undertake for Isabelle. Had he felt sorry for her? He had left her severely alone since the time she’d threatened to take out a restraining order; maybe he was seeing other women now?

Feeling emotionally sick, she left the cloakroom and went into the main part of the café. The lorry driver had left but a group of motorbike enthusiasts were clustered around three tables, talking and laughing. She saw them glance her way but, after one swift glance, kept her head down. Dressed in leathers and with tattoos covering most of their visible flesh, they were a little intimidating, as were the huge machines parked outside next to her beaten-up old truck.

The waitress brought her sandwich and tea immediately as she sat down. Aware her eyes were still puffy from the storm of weeping, Melanie forced down the food as quickly as she could and drank one cup of tea before standing up to leave. She had just reached the door when someone tapped her on the shoulder and she turned sharply to find a huge, bearded biker behind her.

‘Your bag, love,’ he said, holding out her handbag, which she realised she’d left on a chair, the keys to the car being in her pocket. And then, his eyes narrowing, he added, ‘You all right?’

‘Yes, yes, th-thank you,’ she stammered, feeling ridiculous.

‘You sure?’

His blue eyes were kind under great winged eyebrows, and, pulling herself together, Melanie managed a smile. ‘I’m fine, and thank you for noticing the bag,’ she said, silently acknowledging this was an apt lesson in not going by appearances.

He grinned. ‘I’m well trained, love. My girlfriend’s the same. Forget her head, she would, if it wasn’t screwed on.’

Once on the road again, Melanie gave herself a stern talking-to. The biker had asked if she was all right and the honest answer would have been no, she doubted if she would ever be what he termed ‘all right’ again, but that was nobody’s fault but her own. She should have known better than to marry Forde and try to be like everyone else. She wasn’t like everyone else.

She passed a young mother pushing a baby in a pushchair and bit hard on her lip. It still hurt her, seeing mothers with babies. Like a knife driven straight through her heart.

Throughout her life, every person she had loved had been taken from her in the worst possible way. First her parents, then her grandmother, even her best friend at school—her only friend, come to it, because she hadn’t been a particularly sociable child—had drowned while on holiday abroad with her parents. She could still remember the numbing shock she had felt when the headmaster had announced Pam’s death in assembly, and the feeling that somehow the tragedy was connected with Pam’s friendship with her.

If she hadn’t married Forde and wanted his baby, Matthew wouldn’t have died. She had tempted fate, thought she could escape the inevitable and because of that Forde’s heart had been broken as well as hers. She would never forget the look on his face when he’d held that tiny body in the palms of his hands. That was the moment she had known she had to let him go, make him free to find happiness somewhere else. Forde had said last night that she would have given her life for Matthew’s if she could and he was right, but she hadn’t been able to. But she could protect Forde from more hurt by exiting his life. Once the divorce was through she would move again, far away, perhaps even abroad, and in time he would meet someone else he could commit to. Women fell over themselves to get his attention and he was a passionate and very physical man. Whatever the cost in the present, this was the right thing to do for the future. And there could be no more incidents like last night.

Her mind irrevocably made up, Melanie felt slightly better. She had to be cruel to be kind. It was the only way.

Forde awoke suddenly with the presentiment that something was wrong. For a moment he couldn’t reconcile where he was and then he remembered, turning to see that the place next to him in the bed was empty. The house was quiet and still, no sound from the bathroom or downstairs, and he let out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding.

Glancing at his watch, he saw it was gone nine o’clock and he swore softly, cursing the fact he hadn’t woken before her as he swung his feet out of bed, running a hand through his sleep-tousled hair. Damn it, this was exactly what he’d wanted to prevent. But maybe she was having breakfast in the tiny courtyard garden they’d sat in the night before?

As naked as the day he was born, he took the stairs two at a time, but even before he opened the back door and looked into Melanie’s tiny garden snoozing in the sun he knew she wasn’t around. The small house was devoid of her presence, as if the heart of it was missing.

Cursing some more, he retraced his steps, and this time, as soon as he entered her bedroom, he saw the note on top of his clothes, which she had folded neatly for him. It was a single piece of cream-coloured paper and, sitting down on the side of the bed, he began to read it.

His stomach muscles contracted, as though a cold, hard fist was squeezing his gut. So nothing had changed. After all they’d shared last night, the fire, the passion, she was still intent on divorcing him.

Screwing the paper into a ball, he flung it across the room before getting to his feet and reaching for his clothes. He needed to get out of her house fast before he gave in to the crazy urge to break something.

Once downstairs again he relocked the back door and left by the front one, which had a Yale lock, slamming it hard behind him. His Aston Martin was waiting for him in the small car park and after sliding into the car he sat, the door wide open and his hands on the steering wheel.

Where did he go from here? This morning had been a repeat of so many mornings when he’d awakened from erotic dreams of their lovemaking and reached out for her across an empty expanse of bed, only for reality to slam in. But this morning had been different. Last night had been real. She’d been silk and honey in his arms, her body opening to him and accommodating him perfectly as he’d thrust them both to a climax of unbearable pleasure. But it wasn’t just his body that burnt for her, hot and fulfilling though their lovemaking had always been. He wanted her, his Nell.

He watched a black cat saunter across the car park, stopping for a moment when it noticed him, its green eyes narrowing before it dismissed him as unimportant and continued with its leisurely walk. The cat that walked alone, he thought fancifully. Like Nell. She’d come to the same conclusion about him as that damn animal, whereas he needed her in every part of his life. He wanted to share waking up together at the weekend and reading the Sunday papers in bed while they ate croissants and drank coffee, watching TV with a glass of wine after a hard day’s work while the dinner cooked, going to the theatre or to a film, or simply taking a long walk in the evening arm in arm. In the early days they’d done all those things and they had talked about anything and everything—or so he’d thought. Now he realised there was a huge part of her psyche she’d kept from him.

He started the car, frowning to himself.

He’d known she’d been damaged by her earlier life when he’d got to know her, of course. He’d just underestimated the extent of the damage and that had been fatal. Or maybe his ego had ridden roughshod over any concerns he might have had, telling him he would be able to deal with any difficulties in the future.

He nosed the powerful car out of the car park and onto the road beyond, deep in thought. But all that was relative now. One thing was for sure, she wouldn’t have responded to him as she’d done last night if she didn’t still care for him, deep down somewhere. And when he’d asked her if she loved him she hadn’t said no. Admittedly, she hadn’t said yes either …

He’d call her tonight, as she’d suggested. Everything in him wanted to come back here and bang on the door till she let him in so he could convince her how much he loved her, but something told him that would accomplish nothing. He’d played the waiting game for months, hadn’t he? He could play it a little longer. But this time on his terms. She wouldn’t go back on her word, she’d work at Hillview and he knew how fond she was of his mother. That was the reason he’d suggested this in the first place.

Well, he conceded in the next moment. Not the only reason. It was true his mother’s heart wasn’t good since the hip operation but she hadn’t been quite so…difficult about the garden as he’d led Melanie to believe. But Hillview’s grounds did

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