Season of Shadows (8 page)

Anton stepped forward, his eyes narrowed and shuttered,
and, as she placed her hand in his, she felt an inexplicable little
shiver race through her. His mouth tightened, as if her hesitation
angered him, then he drew her further into the living-room and the
ceremony began.

Mr
Fuller, a portly gentleman with a red face, conducted the
marriage ceremony in a voice that communicated its brittleness to
Laura's nerves. A wedding ring, a cold, hard seal of possession, was
slipped on to her finger, giving the man who placed it there the
unquestionable right to her body, and at this thought she only barely
succeeded in suppressing a shudder when Anton lowered his proud head to
touch her lips briefly with his own when Mr Fuller made the customary
suggestion that the groom should kiss the bride.

Champagne corks popped loudly, and glasses were filled in
order to toast their happiness, but Laura felt a numbness shifting over
her as if she had transgressed beyond the point of fear to a neutral
plane where nothing, and no one, could touch her. The time to depart
came all too soon. Graham and Gina kissed her as if they had known her
for years, but it was Sally's clinging arms about her neck that
registered most, and Laura caught her close in a rush of sudden warmth
until Anton announced impatiently that it was time they left.

The white Jaguar purred down the long avenue of cypress
trees, but, when Anton slowed down at the gate, a young man, camera in
hand, leapt from the shrubbery. A light flashed blindingly, and Anton's
muttered 'Damn!' seemed to explode in her ears. The next instant she
was thrown back against the seat as he put his foot down on the
accelerator and swung the car into the road with a violence that made
the tyres squeal. The Jaguar seemed to thrive on this unexpected burst
of speed, but Laura, who had never been able to see the sense in
risking one's life in this manner, was pale and shaken when Anton
finally slowed down at the intersection several kilometres from
Bellavista.

'Sorry about that,' he said abruptly, affording her just
the briefest glance before they continued their journey at a more
acceptable speed.

They arrived early enough at The Strand to pick up a few
supplies, and then the final six-kilometre stretch to Gordon's Bay was
accomplished within a matter of minutes.

The cottage was not exactly what Laura had expected, but
it was nevertheless pleasing. An ivy creeper trailed along the
whitewashed walls, and a small verandah offered an excellent view of
the beach. The interior was sparsely, yet comfortably furnished, and
while Anton carried in their supplies and suitcases, Laura opened the
windows to alleviate the musty smell which had resulted from the
cottage being shut up for a length of time.

It was an ideal retreat, she realised, for someone like
Anton who obviously felt the need occasionally to escape from the
pressure of his work.

Laura wandered into the first of the two bedrooms for a
second time since her arrival, and her eyes inevitably strayed once
more towards the old-fashioned four-poster bed. She swallowed
convulsively, and fear returned with an intensity that forged a
paralysing numbness into her limbs. With no chair available, she
lowered herself gingerly on to the bed, and absently prodded the
mattress.

'The springs don't creak,' a mocking voice informed her
and, mortified, she leapt to her feet to see Anton placing their
suitcases at the foot of the bed. 'You'll have to make up the bed
yourself,' he added as he straightened. 'You'll find whatever you
require in the passage cupboard.'

The sounds of the sea filtered pleasantly into the room
through the open window, but Laura was aware of nothing else except her
growing fear of this man who was now her husband. She must have been
mad to contemplate a marriage such as this, she thought frantically as
she met the direct gaze of those steel-grey eyes. There was no
tender-ness in his glance for the woman he had married that afternoon,
only the cold, calculating hardness of a man summing up a newly
acquired possession, and assessing its worth.

'Anton, would you—'

'Would I what?' he demanded when she faltered helplessly.

'Give me a little time,' she pleaded in a choked voice.
'Please?'

'How much time do you need?' he asked, his eyebrows rising
sharply above those cold, heavy-lidded eyes. 'A month? A year, perhaps?
Or do you need the rest of our lives?'

She shook her head and swallowed nervously. 'Only until we
know each other a little better. Surely that's not asking too much?'

'I mean our marriage to start as I intend it to continue.'

'But, Anton—'

'No!' he interrupted harshly, closing the gap between them
with one long, lithe stride. His hands were heavy on her shoulders, and
her breathing felt oddly restricted when she felt his thumbs probing
the sensitive hollows above her collarbone. 'It's a hurdle that must be
crossed, Laura, and you won't find me an insensitive lover.'

'Don't!' she begged, suppressing a shudder at the
intolerable thought of being possessed by him, but, at the same time,
those caressing thumbs were sending a scintillating warmth flowing
along her veins which was not entirely unpleasant.

'I'm your husband, Laura,' he was saying, 'and before this
day has passed I'm going to be your lover.'

'No!'

'Accept it,' he stated harshly and emphatically, 'because
that's how it will be.'

'You're inhuman!' she accused in a choked voice.

'Not inhuman,' he corrected, releasing her abruptly. 'Just
practical.'

He strode from the room, leaving her alone and more afraid
than she had ever been before. There was no escape from this nightmare
she had plunged herself into, and she would just have to see it through
to the bitter end.

She collected the necessary linen from the cupboard in the
passage, but hysterical laughter threatened to engulf her while she was
making the bed. She felt like a condemned prisoner erecting her own
scaffold before the hanging was to take place, and there was abject
terror in her eyes when she eventually straightened from her task. She
stared down at the wide bed, saw it as the battleground where she would
suffer her most humiliating defeat, and wished suddenly that she were
dead.

She prepared a meal for them that evening in the small
kitchen, but found herself incapable of eating more than a mouthful,
and when Anton finally suggested a walk on the beach, she jumped at the
opportunity to delay the inevitable moment when she would be alone with
him in the bedroom they were to share.

She had changed into a cotton frock and low-heeled sandals
before dinner, but as they crossed the uneven sand Anton's hand was
beneath her elbow, his touch warm, firm, and disturbing.

Stars clustered like diamonds in the night sky, and the ocean lay like a
shimmering sheet of silver in the moonlight, but the beauty of it all
escaped her as she walked stiffly at Anton's side, listening distractedly
while he related to her a little of the history of Gordon's Bay. She heard
nothing, however, beyond the fact that a Colonel Gordon of the Dutch East
India Company had given his name to the bay when he had explored the
southern coastline of Africa in 1778.

Anton's mocking, 'I don't seem to be making much
impression as a tourist guide,' finally penetrated her panic-filled
thoughts, and she blessed the darkness for hiding her discomfiture.

'I'm sorry,' she murmured apologetically.

'Shall we return to the cottage?'

'No! Not yet!' she wanted to cry out, but, with a
submissiveness born of fear, she murmured, 'If you like.'

They strolled back to the cottage in silence, but it felt
to Laura as if every step brought her closer to her doom, and she
shivered uncontrollably when they finally entered the cottage and
closed the door behind them.

Anton snapped on the light, but when her wide, frightened
eyes looked up into his, he said harshly, 'I'll take another turn about
the place before locking up.'

The outer door closed behind him with a decisive 'click'
that made her flinch, but she felt a certain measure of relief as she
hurriedly collected her things from the bedroom before going along to
the bathroom at the end of the passage. She took her time bathing, but
her heart lurched uncomfortably when she returned to the room and found
Anton standing at the window with his back towards her. Her trembling
hand automatically sought the wide neck-opening of her gown when he
turned, but he merely stalked past her, removed his towelling robe off
the hook behind the door where she had placed it, and continued on down
the passage towards the bathroom.

She heard him in the shower while she removed the pins
from her hair to let it cascade down on to her shoulders and, picking
up her brush, she brushed her hair with long, firm strokes. The blessed
normality of this nightly ritual seemed to steady her nerves
temporarily, but, at the sound of the bathroom door opening, she
realised that she was still as tightly strung as a bow, and ready to
snap at the merest touch.

She lowered the brush on to the dresser as Anton entered
the room, and her throat felt choked and dry when she turned to face
him. His hair was damp from his shower, and as her stricken glance
swept down to his bare feet, she felt terrifyingly certain that his
muscular body was clad in nothing except that dark-blue towelling robe
which left a large section of his deeply-tanned chest bare. She stared
fixedly at the short dark hair curling against his skin, but when he
came towards her she backed away instinctively, her heart leaping into
her throat.

He paused abruptly, and his autocratic features contorted
with something close to rage. 'For God's sake, don't look at me like
that!'

'How do you expect me to look at you?' she demanded,
forcing the words past the paralysing grip which fear had on her throat.

'I'm not a monster, Laura.'

'What you're expecting of me is monstrous,' she countered
swiftly, her nervous fingers automatically tightening the belt of her
gown.

'What are you afraid of, Laura?' His compelling eyes held
hers captive as he lessened the space between them, and she stared back
hypnotically. 'Are you afraid of the possibility that you might enjoy
being made love to?'

'I shall hate every minute of it,' she hissed at him, but
a hateful smile curved his mouth when he observed her heightened
colour. 'We shall see about that.'

She stood immobile, caught between a weird kind of
fascination and horror as he brushed aside her hands to undo the belt
of her gown before sliding it from her shoulders to lie at her feet.
The transparency of her nightdress offered her very little protection
from the intrusion of his smouldering glance and, heated with
embarrassment, she cried out hoarsely, 'You can't do this to me!'

His reply was to pull her roughly against him, and with
his hand in her trailing hair, he jerked her head back to expose her
throat. His face became a twisted blur when her eyes filled with tears,
then he lowered his head, and his lips trailed fire across her skin
before that hard mouth fastened on to hers.

Laura fought against him with every ounce of strength she
possessed, but the all-consuming passion of his kiss drained her of her
resistance, and left her humiliatingly supine in his arms as he carried
her across the room and lowered her on to the bed. His mouth never left
hers as he snapped off the light to plunge the room into merciful
darkness, then she felt him shrug himself out of his robe, but when he
lay down beside her, her alarming suspicions were confirmed. There was
nothing between them save the fragile thinness of her nightdress, and
this, too, he was removing with a dexterity born of experience.

Her dulled mind came alive once more to what was
happening, and her fear returned with every thundering beat of her
heart until, submerged in a well of panic, she fought him off like
someone demented, but there was no escape from the brute strength of a
man intent upon satisfying his desire.

'Stop fighting me, Laura,' he ordered harshly, placing a
muscled leg across her thighs to pin her thrashing body to the bed.

She flung every insult at him that she could think of, but
he held her firmly until, exhausted, she had no strength left to fight
off the sensuality of his lips and hands invading her body with an
intimacy which had, till that moment, been forbidden to other men, and
her humiliation increased rapidly when she found that he was drawing an
unwilling response from her.

She felt his weight above her, and her nails bit into the
hard flesh of his shoulders as her body grew taut with resentment and
fear. 'Please! I can't! Please, Anton!'

'Relax, dammit, or you're going to get hurt!' he warned
thickly, but her tension merely increased with the realisation of what
was about to happen, and the despairing knowledge that there was
nothing she could do to ward it off.

Her cry of pain was stifled moments later beneath his lips
when he took possession of her. Her body arched convulsively, giving
encouragement where none was intended, and then she was conscious of
nothing except the hardness of his thrusting body, and a numbness that
left her devoid of all feeling.

When Anton finally rolled away from her, she lay for a
long time staring into the darkness, dry-eyed and disillusioned. If
this was what making love was all about, then she could do very nicely
without it in future, she decided unhappily.

Anton stirred beside her. 'It wasn't my intention to hurt
you, Laura, but you have only yourself to blame for what happened.'

'I hate you!' she hissed at him, and all the anger and
humiliation she had suffered at his hands was locked up in those three
words.