future loomed ahead of her as a maze of misery, with no hope for the peace of mind she had always craved.
Thank the lord tomorrow is my rostered day off, she thought with a sigh. Perhaps I won’t go in to work to make up for today. I just want to pull these blankets over my head and never surface again.
But Salome was to surface from those blankets again, far sooner than she would ever have envisaged, and with a far greater threat to her happiness...
ONE second Salome was fast asleep, her mind in oblivion. The next, she was awake, her eyes dazzled by the overhead chandelier.
Her first muddled thought was that she must have left the light on. Pushing her tangle of curls back out of her eyes, she glanced at the time on the bedside clock-radio. One thirty-four. It was then that she saw Charles, standing in the bedroom doorway.
Salome sat bolt upright and simply stared at him. He looked drunk, his cheeks flushed, his greying hair untidy. He was also clearly contemptuous at finding her there.
Salome clutched the quilt up towards her throat, her green eyes wide with shock.
‘I thought you said you didn’t want this place,’ he muttered derisively.
His beady, bloodshot eyes raked over her bare shoulders, then dropped to where alarm was making her breasts rise and fall rapidly beneath the bedclothes. A glittering came into his gaze that made Salome feel sick to her stomach. If she hadn’t been so stunned by the situation she might have thought to get out of bed, to do something. But she stayed where she was, huddled under the sheet.
‘Funny,’ Charles slurred, ‘I never imagined you sleeping in the raw. I always pictured you in tantalising black lace, or virginal white silk.’ Chuckling obscenely, he drew out a packet of cigarettes and lit one, then stuffed the packet and lighter back into his suit pocket. The smoke curling around his head made him look even more menacing, his piggy eyes dark and dangerous as he leered at her through the haze.
Salome swallowed and tried to gather her wits. She was not stupid, and it didn’t take her long to gather that Charles held duplicate keys to this penthouse and had been using it as a sort of doss-house. And much as logic demanded that a high-profile lawyer wouldn’t risk his career and reputation by doing anything criminal—like raping her—no amount of common sense seemed to be able to stop fear and panic from clutching at her throat. So much so that she couldn’t even find her voice.
Finally, Charles levered himself away from the door-jamb, stubbing the cigarette out on the wall before he strolled across the beige shag carpet towards the bed. Salome felt her insides cringe, even though she didn’t move an inch. Don’t show any fear, she kept telling herself. He’s just trying to frighten you. He won’t really do anything.
He reached the bottom of the bed and idly picked up a corner of the quilt. Her fingers tightened on her end, uncomfortably aware of her nakedness beneath the bedclothes. Why, oh, why, she groaned, hadn’t she unpacked a nightie?
‘If you’re nice to me,’ he drawled, ‘I’ll tell you why Ralph kicked you out.’
Salome’s heart jumped, then tightened again. ‘I already know,’ she said brusquely. ‘And I have no intention of being nice to you, Charles Smeaton. Not now, not ever! I don’t like you sober and I especially don’t like you drunk!’
Charles dropped the quilt and set cold eyes upon her. ‘Is that so?’ Those beady grey eyes raked over her once more. ‘Well, that’s just too bad.’
Panic was threading its way through Salome’s system, but she kept a brave, bold face turned towards her intruder and slowly eased herself back to sit hard up against the headboard, dragging the quilt with her. ‘If you don’t leave immediately,’ she advised curtly, ‘I’m going to have to tell Ralph. I don’t think he’ll be too pleased with your having kept a set of keys to this place.’
The returning smile was so confident that Salome was rocked. ‘Quite frankly,’ Charles countered, ‘I don’t think Ralph would give a stuff at my using this place. And, since you know why he finished your marriage, you’ll know he has other things on his mind right now.’
Salome shuddered, and that ghastly smile widened. She was scared, and he knew it. In fact, he seemed excited by it, his face flushing all the more. Uncontrollable lust peered out at her, smouldering and strong and sadistic.
Now Salome felt true panic. Aroused and intoxicated, Charles looked incapable of realising the serious consequences if he forced himself upon her. There was no point in screaming, she decided with a rapidly escalating pulse-rate. Without any windows or doors open, no one would hear. Not even Mike next door. These penthouses were solidly built for privacy.
Her eyes slid towards the en-suite bathroom across the room. If she could make it in there, she could lock the door.
Charles’s laughter was low and ugly. ‘I don’t think so, Salome. I’m a lot closer than you.’
She pretended she didn’t know what he was talking about. ‘Closer to me than what?’ she said scoffingly.
Again he laughed. ‘OK, play that game if you want to. Play any game you want to. I like games. My favourite is hard to get. Nothing like a bit of challenge to whet the appetite.’
When he actually began loosening his tie, Salome’s face paled. ‘I want you to get out, Charles!’ she demanded, but her voice was trembling, her fear exposed.
His expression lost all humour as he slid the tie from his neck and curled it, as if it were a snake, on the bed. She almost died when his hands went to the buckle on his belt. ‘I don’t think you should adopt that superior tone with me,’ he warned, then whipped the belt out from his trousers, snapping it in front of her before it too joined the tie. ‘It doesn’t bring out the best in me.’ He shrugged out of his jacket and threw it away, then began on the buttons of his shirt.
‘You can’t seriously mean to do this,’ she rasped, terror a vice in her chest.
‘To do what?’ he smiled.
‘To...to assault me.’
‘Assault?’ He feigned mock-surprise, and pulled off his shirt. Salome was shocked to see that, although overweight, he looked amazingly strong, his chest and shoulders massive. ‘I have no intention of assaulting you, my dear. Once you’re suitably subdued and... restrained...I’ll make sure you enjoy it. In fact, I’ll guarantee it. After all, I know what you are. I know where you come from. You’ve learnt to put on airs and graces, but, underneath the designer clothes and ladylike veneer, you’re nothing but a slut, like your mother.’ He picked up the belt and began moving towards her, an evil, thin-lipped smile beneath his equally thin moustache. ‘God, I’m going to enjoy this!’ he breathed. ‘I’ve been wanting to do it for years!’
Salome moved with a strength and speed she didn’t realise she had. But her adrenalin was high, panic and desperation inspiring her to attempt anything in her own defence. Snatching the heavy brass bedside lamp into shaking hands, she reared up to crash it down on to her assailant’s head before he knew what was happening. Groaning, he collapsed over the bed then began sliding down on to the floor.
She didn’t wait to see what the damage was. Scrambling from the bed, she snatched up a towel from a chair and raced from the room, wrapping the towel around her naked body. Within seconds she was out in the corridor, where she fled along and began hammering on Mike’s door, pounding and screaming for him to help her.
He couldn’t have been asleep, for the door was flung open almost immediately, and he was standing there in a maroon dressing-gown. Startled black eyes swept over her. ‘Salome! What on earth’s going on? Hell, you haven’t got any damned clothes on! Here... put this on.’
He swept off his dressing-gown and helped her flustered