“I’m a woman now.”
There must have been something unusual in my expression, or perhaps it was the inflection in my voice. But whatever it was, he stared back at me in the oddest way and for the longest moment, that puzzled look more pronounced. Unexpectedly, he took a step toward me, then he stopped abruptly.
We exchanged a long look, one so deep, so knowing, so full of longing, I felt my breath catch in my throat. Before I could stop myself, and almost against my own volition, I began to move forward, drawing closer to him.
It seemed to me that he watched every step I took, and then without uttering a word, Sebastian reached out for me. He pulled me into his arms with such fierceness, I was startled. And he held me so tightly I could scarcely breathe.
And everything changed. I changed. Sebastian changed. Our lives changed irrevocably. The past was demolished. Only the present remained. The present and the future. Our future together. We were meant to be, he and I. At least, so I believed. It had always been so. Our course had long been set. Somehow I knew this. Moving his head slightly, Sebastian bent down and kissed me. When he moved his tongue lightly against my lips, I parted them quite naturally. Our tongues touched. My legs felt weak and I held onto him tighter than ever for support, as he continued to kiss me in this most intimate manner. Without warning, he stopped, held me away from him almost roughly and looked down into my face.
Again our eyes locked. I knew he wanted me as much as I wanted him. He had already told me so without uttering a word. And yet I detected hesitation in him.
I took hold of his hand and led him upstairs. Once inside the room, he let go of my hand and moved away from me, hovered in the center of the floor. I felt, rather than observed, his uncertainty. After a moment, he said in a strangled voice, “I came to take you back to your birthday party…” His voice trailed off.
“No! I don’t want to go back. I want to be here. To be with you. That’s all I’ve ever wanted, Sebastian.”
“Vivienne…”
We moved at the same time.
We were in each other’s arms, holding onto each other. Eventually we drew apart. He struggled out of his dinner jacket, threw it on a chair, undid his bow tie as he walked to the bedroom door. With one hand he locked it; with the other he began to remove the sapphire studs from his evening shirt, and his eyes never left my face as he walked back to me.
I opened my arms to him. He came into them swiftly, held me close to him. He undid my zipper and suddenly my evening dress was a pile of white lace at my feet. Drawing me toward the bed without a word, he pushed me down on it, lay next to me, took me in his arms once more. His mouth found mine. He caressed every part of me, his hands moving over me with such expertise I was soon fully aroused, spiralling into ecstasy. When he entered me a moment later, I gasped, cried out and he stopped, staring down at me. I assured him I was all right, urged him on, wrapping my arms around him. My hands were firm and strong on his broad back and I found his rhythm, moved with him, inflamed by his passion and my own urgent desire. And so we soared upward together, and as we reached the peak I cried out again, as did he.
We lay together silently. Sebastian’s breathing was labored and his body was damp. I went to the bathroom, found a towel, came back and rubbed him dry. He half smiled at me, pulled me to him, wrapped his long legs around my body, and rested against me, still without speaking. But there was no awkwardness in our silence, only eloquence, ease.
I let my fingers slide into his thick black hair; I ran my hands over his shoulders and his back. I kissed him as I wanted to kiss him. It was not long before we made love again and we did so without constraint.
Satiated and a little sore, we eventually lay still. After a while, Sebastian raised himself on one elbow, looked down at me. Moving a strand of hair, he said quietly, “If I’d known you were a virgin, I wouldn’t—”
I pressed my fingers against his lips. “Don’t say it.”
He shook his head. “It never occurred to me, Vivi, not in this day and age…” His sentence trickled away and he shook his head, a little helplessly, I thought.
I said, “I was saving myself.”
A dark brow lifted above those piercing blue eyes.
“For you,” I explained with a smug smile. “I saved myself for you, Sebastian. I’ve wanted you to make love to me for as long as I can remember.”
“Oh Vivi, and I never even guessed.”
I reached out, touched his face. “I love you, Sebastian Locke. I’ve always loved you. And I always will…all the days of my life.”
He bent down and kissed me softly on the lips, and then he put his arms around me, holding me close to him, keeping me safe.
The phone was screaming in my ear.
I roused myself from my half-dozing state and my memories instantly retreated. Reaching out, I lifted the receiver and mumbled, “Hello?”
“It’s me,” Jack said. “I’m coming over. With the newspapers.”
“Oh God, don’t tell me,” I groaned. “Lousy headlines, I’ve no doubt. And obituaries.”
“You got it, kid.”
“You’re going to be besieged by the press,” I muttered. “Perhaps you are better off coming here. Maybe you should bring Luciana with you, Jack.”
“She ain’t here, Viv. She’s skipped it, gone back to Manhattan.”
“I see,” I said and sat bolt upright. “Well, that’s not surprising.” Sliding my legs out of bed, I continued, “I’ll put coffee on. See you in about half an hour.”
“Make that twenty minutes,” he answered brusquely and hung up.
It was quite obvious that Jack was in one of his peculiar moods. His face proclaimed it to me before he had walked even halfway across the kitchen.
“Good morning,” I said, carrying the coffeepot over to the table and putting it down. When I received merely a curious, gruntlike mumble from him, I added sharply, “So, we’re maungy this morning, are we?”
The use of this word caught his attention at once, and he glanced at me rapidly. “Maungy. What does that mean?”
“You’ve heard it before so don’t pretend you haven’t. It was a favorite of Gran’s. She often used to call you maungy when you were a snot-nosed little boy in short pants.”
Ignoring my acerbity, he said evenly, “I don’t remember,” and flopped into the nearest chair. “And I don’t know its meaning.”
“Then I’ll tell you,” I answered, leaning over the table, peering into his face. “It means peevish, bad tempered, or sulky, and it’s a Yorkshire word from the West Riding where my great-grandfather came from.” I paused, said in a lighter voice, “Surely you haven’t forgotten Gran’s marvelous stories about her father? She never failed to make us laugh.”
“George Spence. That was his name,” Jack said, and then grimaced. “I need a life-saving transfusion. Strong coffee. Immediately, sugar.” He reached for the pot, poured cups of coffee for both of us, and took a gulp of his.
“Jack, don’t start the day by calling me sugar. Please. And so that’s it, is it? You have a hangover.”
“A beaut. Hung one on. Last night. When I got back to the farm.”
His occasional bouts of drinking were nothing new and had worried me off and on, but I had stopped trying to reform him, nor did I chastise him anymore, since