Bryan was on her little kitchen cooking soup in a saucepan. Her nostrils quivered, she realised she was mildly hungry, but she was much too angry to stop and think of that. There was something much more important on her mind.
'You took my clothes off while I was asleep, you bastard, didn't you?' she accused him hoarsely.
Bryan turned, his eyes lazily mocking. 'You mean you only just remembered?'
'I thought' I was dreaming', she began and saw his eyes narrow, gleam.
'You have interesting dreams, I must say'. She felt the provoking drift of his eyes down over her body and pulled the lapels of her velvet dressing gown closer together, but that only made him laugh.
' Look, I found you in a terrible state- your temperature had broken and you were bathed in sweat. You:d kicked your bedclothes off, your nightdress was saturated, the material was so thin it clung from your neck to your knees like a second skin', he paused, lowered his lashes, looked at her through them teasingly, 'A transparent skin of course'.
'Oh shut up! You are delibrately trying to wind me up!' she muttered.
Blandly, he said, 'Well, I couldn't leave you like that, could I? So I found a clean nightie for you, a towel and a sponge and took care of you'.
'You should have woken me'.
'I spoke to you and when I started taking your nightie off, you opened your eyes and looked at me', his lashes lifted again. She saw his eyes brilliant, black and hot like the heart of a slow burning fire and trembled. 'Don't pretend you didn't know what I was doing, Sharon, because you did', he said huskily. 'You gave me a very tempting invitation....'
Scalding colour poured up her face as she remembered trapping her hand between her thighs, saying his name in a pleading voice. She had wanted him to make love to her and he knew it. She couldn't bear to look at him.
'You were too ill or I would have had to get into bed with you', he murmured. 'So I was the perfect gentleman, I let you go back to sleep and then I sat here, going crazy with frustration'.
'I was hallucinating! Out of my head. I didn't know what I was doing!' she whispered, biting her lip.
'Oh, I think you did', he whispered and took a step towards her. She shot back, agonized by the conflict in her between a wild temptation and a reluctance to get hurt again, throwing up her hands as a frail barrier.
'Don't! I couldn't bear it!'
He stopped dead at the anguish and fear in her voice, staring at her fixedly, his face hardening, darkening.
'That wasn't the impression I got a few hours ago!'
'I told you... I was out of my head, but now, I'm not, and I don't want you to touch me'.
'Wrong wordings, Sharon', he bit out, his face grimly contemptuous. 'You want me to touch you but it's David you have decided to marry, isn't it? Your body wants one thing and your head wants another', his voice thickened, roughened. 'Of course, I could force you to admit how you feel about me....'
She tensed, shaking, going white.
He laughed harshly, watching her with inexorable eyes. 'Oh, don't worry. I am not going to! I realise it wouldn't make any difference, because I'm not telling you what you do not know already and haven't decided to cold- bloodedly to ignore. We both knew in Rome, in the streets when we saw those two kids making out in the doorway, didn't we?
I envied them like hell and so did you. It must have seemed so simple to them at their age. They saw each other, wanted each other, took each other, they didn't let anything get in the way of what they desired, not even their own minds. They certainly won't put a barrier up to shut out desire simply because of ambition or some craving for security!'
'Maybe they wouldn't, but we are not teenagers', she said quietly. 'We are both adults who know the score where life is concerned. Life isn't simple and taking what you want without thinking about it can have disastrous consequences'. She took a deep breath, her chin lifted. 'As we're being so frank, I'll admit... you can turn me on'.
His eyes narrowed, brilliant, demanding.
She shook her head at him. 'But you're right. I do prefer to follow the dictates of my head,not my body. The body can betray you t can lead you into a trap, I've been in love before and have been betrayed'.
His brows jerked together. 'When was that?'
'Never mind that. The point is that I learn from my mistakes'.
'Does he work at the bank?'
'Never mind about him...', she said irritably. 'Don't side track me. He isn't relevant'.
'He is to me', Bryan said tersely. 'If he is one of the reasons why you have decided to ruin your life, then he is relevant'.
'Well, he didn't work at the bank and you don't know him but he is rather like you in some ways'.
Bryan's face tightened.
She sighed. 'I seem to go for a type and it's the wrong type for me. You are wrong for me Bryan and I know how any affair I might have with you would end on tears. So, I'm not starting one. I have other plans for my future. So please leave me alone from now on. Find someone else to play your games with'.
'Your plans do involve David,though, I may take it?' he asked harshly.
She nodded, her face tense and bleak. It was not quite a lie since she certainly hoped that David would be around to run the bank and help her career and she knew that she dated not tell Bryan the truth. She had to send him away and she couldn't think of any other method of doing it.
He gave her a long, cold deadly stare, his mouth twisting, 'Well then, I won't waste any more of my time on you. I won't say that I hope you will be happy with David, because I know you won't be. He isn't the man for you. You are going to ruin his life as well as your own and I hope you are as miserable as sin be ause that's what you deserve'.
He turned on his heel and walked away, she heard the front door slam and the sound reverberated round her flat like the knell of doom.