Sinful Nights

‘Six months or so Sapphire,’ he said quietly at last. ‘Not a lot to ask you to give up surely? And you have my word that afterwards … that we can part quickly and amicably. This time our marriage will be dissolved.’

‘And the farm … my father’s land?’

‘I’d like to buy it from you—at the going rate of course, unless your London lover wants to try his hand at farming?’

Just for a moment Sapphire taxed her imagination trying to picture Alan leading Blake’s life. Alan would hate it, and she couldn’t keep on the farm and work it herself. Even so, all her instincts warned her against agreeing to Blake’s suggestion.

‘It’s a ridiculous idea, Blake,’ she told him at last, taking a deep breath.

‘You mean you’re too selfish to acknowledge its merits,’ he countered. ‘I thought you might have grown up Sapphire; might have come to realise that there are other things in life apart from the gratification of your own wants, but obviously I was wrong. Come on,’ he finished curtly, ‘I’ll take you to Flaws.’

He strode across the kitchen, thrusting open the door without waiting to see if she was following him. Wincing as she got up from the ache in her ankle, Sapphire hobbled to the door. Cold air rushed in to embrace her in its frosty grip. Across the cobbled yard she could make out the bulky shape of the Land-Rover. Blake opened the door and started up the engine. He must be able to see that she was having difficulty walking, Sapphire fumed as she was caught in the beam of the headlights, but he made no effort to help her.

It was only when she reached the Land Rover that he finally got out, walking round to the passenger side to open the door for her. When his hands suddenly gripped her waist she froze, her whole body tensing in rejection, her stiff, ‘don’t touch me,’ making him tense in return. She could feel it in the grip of his fingers, digging through the wool of her jumper to burn into her skin. ‘What the hell …’ For a moment he seemed about to withdraw and then he spun her round, the proximity of his body forcing her back against the cold metal of the Land Rover. ‘What is it you’re so afraid of Sapphire,’ he mocked, his gold eyes searching her too pale face. ‘Not me, surely.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘As I remember it I barely touched you. So it must be yourself.’

‘I’m not frightened of anything Blake,’ she managed to reply coolly, still holding herself rigid within the grip of his hands. The warmth of his breath lifted her hair, and she was so acutely aware of him that it was a physical agony. Why, oh why had she come back? She had thought herself strong enough to cope, but she wasn’t. Blake still had the power to upset and disturb her. He made her feel just as awkward and insecure as he had done when she was seventeen. ‘I just don’t want you touching me.’

‘Frightened I might make you forget all about your London lover?’ The soft goading tone of his voice was too much for her. Drawing in her breath on a sharp gasp she said coldly. ‘That would be impossible.’ She turned away as she spoke, leaning into the Land Rover. Blake’s fingers continued to dig into her waist and then he was lifting her, almost throwing her into the seat with a force that jolted the breath from her body and made her aware of her aching bruises.

He didn’t speak until he was in the Land-Rover beside her, his eyes fixed on the fog-shrouded lane as he said softly, ‘Don’t challenge me Sapphire—not unless you want me to accept your challenge. You’ve come back from London with some fine haughty airs, no doubt meant to keep country bumpkins like myself in their place but it wouldn’t take much for me to forget mine Sapphire. There’s one hell of a lot of anger inside me towards you, and believe me it would give me great pleasure to give it release.’

Why should Blake be angry? Resentment burned through Sapphire as they drove towards Flaws Farm. She was the one who should be that; and not just angry but bitter too. Blake had never wanted her; he had callously used her adolescent adoration of him, had ruthlessly exploited her feelings, and now he was saying he was angry. He could say what he liked, but there was no way she was going to agree to his outrageous suggestion that they re-marry. Did he think she was totally without intelligence? She knew what he wanted well enough—the same thing he had always wanted. Her father’s land. The Seftons and the Bells hadn’t always been friendly to one another, and the border reiver had spawned a race of men who all possessed his reckless touch of acquisitiveness. There had been several Seftons who had cast covetous eyes on Flaws farm and thought to make it theirs, but so far none had ever succeeded.

Now she was being foolish, Sapphire chided herself. Blake was no border reiver, for all that he had inherited his wild ancestors’ darkly Celtic looks, and it was true that her father admired and respected him, but surely not to the extent of wanting her, his daughter, to put herself within his power once more?

Sapphire darted a glance at Blake. He was concentrating on his driving, his profile faintly hawkish, his hands assured and knowing as he turned the wheel. There was nothing indecisive or unsure about Blake, she acknowledged. That was what she had admired so much in him as a teenager, and even now, watching him she was conscious of a faint frisson of awareness, a purely feminine acknowledgement of his masculinity. Stop it, she warned herself as they turned into Flaws Farm Lane. Stop thinking about him.

When the Land Rover stopped, she glanced uncomfortably at him. ‘Are you coming in with me?’

‘Do you really want me to?’ he asked mockingly, before shaking his head. ‘No, unlike you Sapphire, I’m not hard enough to raise hopes in your father’s heart that I can’t fulfil. Your father means a lot to me,’ he added, startling her with his admission. ‘I’ve always admired him, even patterned myself on him as a youngster I suppose—my own grandfather was too cold and distant—he never ceased mourning my father. I’d give a lot to see your father happy.’

‘And even more to make sure that you get Flaws land,’ Sapphire threw at him bitterly, ‘even to the extent of marrying me. I fell for it once Blake, I’m not going to fall for it again.’

It was only as she struggled across the yard that she remembered about her luggage, still in Alan’s car. It was too late to turn around and call Blake back now, he was already reversing out of the yard. Sighing, Sapphire found the familiar back door and unlatched it. The kitchen was much as she remembered it. Her father used to employ a housekeeper to look after the house, but she had retired just after Sapphire’s marriage. For a while he had managed with daily help from the village, but now it seemed he was employing someone else.

The door to the hall opened as Sapphire stepped into the kitchen and a woman entered the room. For a second they stared at one another and then the woman smiled tentatively, offering her hand. ‘Mary,’ she introduced herself, ‘and you must be Sapphire. Your father’s been worrying about you.’

There was just enough reproof in the calm, softly burred voice for Sapphire to flush and feel at a disadvantage. Mary was somewhere in her late thirties, plumpish with smooth brown hair and warm eyes. The sort of calm, serene, capable woman she had always envied.

‘I’m sorry about that.’ Quickly she explained how she had been delayed, warmed by the quick sympathy in the hazel eyes.

‘May I see my father?’ Sapphire asked tentatively. She had been nerving herself for this moment ever since Blake had told her the seriousness of her father’s condition, and her palms were damp and sticky as she followed Mary up the familiar stairs. Her father’s bedroom had windows that looked out over the hills, but tonight the curtains were drawn to obscure the view.

‘It’s all right Mary, you can switch the lamp on,’ her father’s familiar voice growled as Sapphire stood awkwardly by the door in the half light. ‘I am awake.’

‘Sapphire’s here,’ Mary told him, snapping on the bedside light. Perhaps it was the warm glow from the lamp but her father didn’t look as ill as she had anticipated. Her legs felt shaky as she approached his bed, regret, guilt, and a dozen other emotions clamouring for expression. In the end all she could manage was a choked ‘Dad,’ and then she was in her father’s arms, hugging him tightly, trying not to give way to tears.

‘Well now, and how’s my lass? Let me have a look at you.’ As he held her slightly away from him, studying her features, Sapphire studied his. Her father had always had a tall, spare frame, but now he was gaunt, almost painfully thin, the weathered tanned face she remembered frighteningly pale—a sick-room pallor Sapphire acknowledged.

‘Dad, if only I’d known …’

‘Stop tormenting yourself, I wouldn’t let Blake tell you. You’re far too thin,’ he scolded. ‘Mary will have to feed you up while you’re here. Borders’ men don’t like their women skinny.’

‘But London men do,’ Sapphire responded, withdrawing from him a little, sensing danger.

‘You’re later than we expected.’

‘Umm, I had a slight accident.’ Quickly she explained.

‘You should have stayed overnight with Blake.’

‘I’m sure neither Blake nor I would have felt comfortable if I had Dad,’ she said quietly. ‘We’re divorced now.’

‘More’s the pity.’ He frowned, the happiness fading from his eyes. ‘You should never have left him lass, but then you were so young, and young things take things so seriously.’

If anyone had asked her only days ago if her father had accepted her divorce Sapphire would have had no hesitation in saying ‘yes’ but now, suddenly, she knew he had not. She looked away from the bed, blinking back tears she wasn’t sure were for her father or herself. As she did so she saw Mary glance sympathetically at her.

‘I’ll run you a bath,’ she offered, ‘You must be exhausted.’

‘Yes, you go along to bed,’ her father agreed. ‘We’ll talk in the morning.’ He closed his eyes, his face almost waxen with exhaustion and fear pierced her. Her father was going to die. Until now she hadn’t truly accepted it, but suddenly seeing him, seeing his frailty she did. ‘Dad, who’s looking after the farm?’ she asked him trying to force back the painful knowledge.

‘Why Blake of course.’ He looked surprised that she needed to ask. ‘And a fine job he’s doing of it too.’

Mary’s hand on her arm drew her away from the bed. On the landing Sapphire turned to the older woman, unable to hold back her tears any longer. ‘Why?” she asked bitterly. ‘Why did no-one tell me? Get in touch with me, I’d no idea …’

Shaking her head Mary gestured downstairs, not speaking until Sapphire had followed her down and they were back in the kitchen. ‘Blake said not to,’ she said quietly, ‘he thought it best. At least at first.’

Blake had thought … Blake had said … Bitterness welled up inside her coupled with a fierce jealousy as she acknowledged something she had always kept hidden even from herself. Her father would have preferred a son … a male to continue the family line and although he loved her, it was to Blake that he had always confided his innermost thoughts, Blake who he thought of as a son … Blake who he turned to when he needed someone to lean on and not her.

‘There, sit down and cry it all out,’ Mary said gently. ‘It must have come as a shock to you.’

‘Is it true that … that my father …’ Sapphire couldn’t go on. Tears were streaming down her face and she dug in her jeans pocket for a handkerchief. ‘He’s been a very sick man,’ Mary said compassionately, her eyes sliding away from Sapphire’s. ‘His heart isn’t too strong and this bout of pneumonia, but having you home has given him a real fillip.’

‘I never knew how he felt about the divorce until tonight.’ Sapphire almost whispered the words, saying them more to herself than Mary, but the other woman caught them and smiled sympathetically. ‘Blake means a lot to him,’ she agreed, ‘he thought that your marriage protected both you and Flaws land.’

‘He worries a lot about the land doesn’t he?’ Sapphire’s voice was unconsciously bitter.

‘And about you,’ Mary told her. ‘The land is like a sacred trust to him and he has a strong sense of duty and responsibility towards it.’

‘Strong enough to want to see Blake and me back together again?’ Sapphire asked bleakly.

Mary said nothing, but the way her eyes refused to meet Sapphire’s told her what she wanted to know.

‘You obviously know my father very well,’ she said quietly at last. ‘He confides in you far more than he ever confided in me.’

‘I’m a trained nurse,’ Mary told her, ‘and that is how I first came to know your father. When he was first ill he needed a full-time nurse. Dr Forrest recommended me, and your father asked me to stay on as his housekeeper-cum-nurse. The relationship between patient and nurse is one of trust. It has to be. I can’t deny that your father, like many people of his generation, doesn’t wholly approve of divorce, and he does feel that the land would be properly cared for by Blake, and …’

‘And that if Blake and I had a son that son would inherit Flaws Farm and would also be half Bell.’

Sapphire sighed, suddenly feeling intensely tired. Too much had happened too soon, and she couldn’t take it all in.

‘There was a phone call for you,’ Mary added, ‘an Alan. I said you’d ring back in the morning.’

Alan! Sapphire started guiltily. She had almost forgotten about him, and even more unforgivably she had forgotten about his car. The BMW was Alan’s pride and joy and he wouldn’t be too pleased to hear about her accident.

Tomorrow, she thought wearily as she climbed into bed. Tomorrow she would think about what had happened. Somehow she would have to convince her father that there was no chance of her and Blake getting together again. Selfish, Blake had called her. Was she? Her father had very little time left to live … six months or so … if she re-married Blake she would be giving her father a gift of happiness and peace of mind which surely meant more than her own pride and freedom? She wasn’t seventeen any more, held in thrall by her adoration of Blake. She could handle him now as she hadn’t been able to do then. A six-month marriage which would be quickly annulled—six months out of her life as payment for her father’s peace of mind. What ought she to do?

CHAPTER THREE

‘GOOD MORNING.’ Mary smiled a warm welcome at Sapphire as she walked into the kitchen. ‘I was just about to bring you up a cup of tea.’

‘Yes, I’ve overslept disgracefully,’ Sapphire said wryly. Time was when she had thought nothing of getting up at half-past five with her father.

‘You were exhausted, what with the accident and all. Oh that reminds me, Blake rang. He said not to panic about your luggage. He’s bringing it over later when he comes to see your father. He calls in most days,’ she added, plugging in the kettle. ‘Your father looks forward to his visits, Blake keeps him up to date on how the farm’s running.’

‘May I go up and see my father?’ Sapphire didn’t want to think about Blake right now. He had occupied far too many of her thoughts already.

‘Of course.’ Again Mary smiled warmly. ‘Would you like to have your breakfast first?’

‘Just a cup of coffee will be fine,’ Sapphire assured her. ‘I’ll go up now.’ Before Blake arrives, she could have added, but didn’t. Somehow, quite how she didn’t know yet, but somehow she was going to have to find a way to explain to her father that she and Blake were parted for good. Even now she could still remember that agony of those first months in London, of having to come to terms with the truth about her marriage; about Blake’s feelings for her. He had tolerated her because he wanted the farm. He had never loved her, never desired her and knowing that she had not seen these truths had diminished her self-esteem to such an extent that she had felt somehow as though everyone who saw her or spoke to her, must share Blake’s opinion of her. The only way she could escape had been to shut herself off mentally from the rest of the world. There had been days when she felt like dying; days when she would have given anything simply not to wake up in the morning. But all that was past now, she reminded herself. She had overcome the trauma of Blake’s rejection; had put the past and all that it held, safely behind her. But she couldn’t forget it, she acknowledged. She still occasionally had those terrible dreams when she was forced to witness Blake making love to Miranda, when she had to endure the sound of their mocking laughter. How she had hated herself; everything about herself, from her height to the colour of her hair, torturing herself by imagining how many times Blake must have looked at her and put Miranda in her place. The only thing that surprised her was that Blake hadn’t married. Those love letters she had found had obviously been meant for Miranda.

No-one, not even Alan knew how totally Blake had rejected her; physically, mentally and emotionally. And facing up to that knowledge had driven her almost to the point where she lost her sanity. But she had emerged from it all a stronger person. Being forced to come face to face with the truth had made her re-evaluate herself completely. No man would ever hurt her now as Blake had done. She allowed no-one to come close enough to her to do so.

If Alan did propose to her she would probably accept him. She wanted a family; she and Alan got on well. She would never feel for him what she had once felt for Blake, but then he would never look at her body, imagining it was another woman’s, he would never lie to her, or look at her with contempt. Blake was an arrogant bastard, she thought bitterly as she stood at the top of the stairs, poised to enter her father’s room. After what he’d done to her, she didn’t know how he had the nerve to suggest what he had.

‘Sapphire.’ Her father greeted her happily, from his chair by the window. The cold March sunshine picked out with cruel clarity the signs of wasting on his face, and Sapphire was overwhelmed with a rush of emotion.

‘Dad.’ She went over to him, hugging him briefly and then turning away before he could see her tears.

‘What’s this?’ Her eye was caught by the heavy, leather bound book on his lap. ‘Don’t tell me you’re actually reading something, other than a farming magazine,’ she teased. Never once during her childhood could she remember seeing her father reading. He had always been an active, physical man more at home in his fields than in the house. It saddened her unbearably to see him like this. Why … why? she cried bitterly inside.

‘It’s the family Bible.’ His smile was as she had always remembered it. ‘I haven’t looked at it since your mother wrote your name inside.’

After her, her mother had not been able to have any more children. Had she too, like Sapphire, sensed how much her father felt the lack of a male heir? Had that in part contributed to the break-up of their marriage? Questions she would never know the answer to now, Sapphire thought dully, watching her father open the Bible.

His hand trembled slightly as he touched the old paper. ‘This Bible goes back as far as 1823, and it lists the birth of every Bell since.’ He gave a faint sigh and closed it. ‘I had hoped I might see the name of your’s and Blake’s child added to that list, but now …’ He turned away dejectedly.

The words Sapphire had intended to say died unspoken. A tight knot of pain closed her throat. She reached out her hand touching her father’s shoulder, ‘Dad …’ He turned to look at her, and as though the words were coming from another person, she heard herself saying shakily, ‘Blake and I are going to try again. I … we … we talked about it last night.’ She looked out of the window without seeing the view. Could her father honestly believe that what she was saying was true? Perhaps not, but he would accept it as the truth because he wanted to believe it so desperately; just as she had once desperately wanted to believe that Blake loved her.

‘You mean the two of you plan to re-marry?’

‘We may …’ What on earth had she got herself into? Panic clawed at her. She couldn’t marry Blake again. But she had just told her father that she might.

‘I suppose if we do it will make the local tongues wag.’

‘Not necessarily. I don’t think Blake’s ever told anyone that you’re divorced. Most people think you’re still just separated.’

Why hadn’t Blake told them? Could it be that he was using her father’s illness as a lever to force her to fall in with his plans? He would buy the land from her, he had told her, but as her husband he wouldn’t need to buy it, and being married to her need not stop him from finding love elsewhere. It hadn’t stopped him before.

She must tell her father that she had changed her mind, she thought frantically, she must tell him now, before this thing went any further. Even now she couldn’t believe that he was dying. He looked ill yes, but … But hadn’t she learned the futility of self-deception yet?

‘Dad …’

‘Isn’t that the Land Rover?’ he asked interrupting her. ‘Blake must have arrived.’

‘Dad, I …’

Both of them turned at the sound of firm footsteps on the stairs, Sapphire unconsciously blending into the shadows of the room as the door was thrust open and Blake strode in. Strangely his eyes met hers almost immediately, as though he had known by instinct where she was.

‘Blake, Sapphire’s just told me the good news.’ If she hadn’t known better she might almost have believed the look the two men exchanged was one of complicity, but even as the thought formed it was gone as her father turned his head and the harsh light through the window made her acutely conscious of his illness.

‘Has she now.’ For a man who spent so much of his life outdoors Blake moved exceptionally gracefully, and far too swiftly. She had no opportunity to avoid him as he walked towards her, lean brown fingers curling round her upper arm. ‘And do you approve?’

‘Need you ask?’

‘Not really.’

‘I’m sure you two have lots to discuss.’ Sapphire snapped out the words bitterly, resenting their male unanimity. ‘I must go and telephone Alan. He doesn’t know about his car yet.’

‘Or about us,’ Blake reminded her, and while the look in his eyes might have been mistaken for one of possessive hunger Sapphire knew it was for her father’s land rather than for her.

Outside the room she paused on the landing feeling acutely sick. Why had she said what she had to her father? Heaven only knew, she didn’t want to be married to Blake again, no matter how temporarily. And yet her father had been pleased; pleased and relieved and surely for six months … Gnawing on her bottom lip she walked down to the kitchen and picked up the ‘phone. Alan answered almost straight away.

‘Where’ve you been?’ he demanded. ‘I expected you to ring hours ago.’

‘I overslept I’m afraid. Alan, I had an accident last night and damaged your car.’ She waited for his anxious spate of questions to finish before explaining what had happened. ‘Don’t let them touch the car—these country garages, God alone knows what sort of damage they might do. I’ll come up and sort it out myself.’

‘Alan no …’ Sapphire started to say, but it was too late. ‘Look I’ve got to go,’ he told her before she could continue. ‘I’ve got an appointment. I’ll be up as soon as I can—possibly in three or four days.’

‘Everything okay?’ Mary nodded to the kettle. ‘Fancy a drink? I normally take one up to your dad about now.’

‘No … no thanks, I think I’ll go out for a walk.’

‘Well, don’t go too far,’ Mary cautioned her. ‘The temperature’s dropping and we might well have snow. Snow in March isn’t uncommon up here,’ she reminded Sapphire dryly when she raised her eyebrows. ‘Many a farmer’s lost a crop of newborn lambs to the weather. You should know that.’

She needed time to think, Sapphire acknowledged as she walked into the cobbled yard and through into the field beyond; time to come to terms with what she herself had set in motion. She couldn’t back out now; that much was plain. How could she have been so stupid as to allow Blake to manoeuvre her into this situation?