The Couple in the Dream Suite Read online

  ‘I knew he was leaving,’ she conceded, ‘but I had no idea it was so soon. I’m sort of glad he didn’t tell me, mind you. I hate goodbyes as much as he does.’

  ‘What will you do without him, find another stool pigeon?’

  Vera made a show of adjusting the gold sash of the gold dress she had pulled on over her skimpy stage outfit. It was one of Fortuny’s famous Delphos gowns, a sleeveless shift of silk made of hundreds of tiny pleats which clung to the body thanks to the beads which weighted it. It shimmered when she moved, a sensual, smoothly-rippling feeling that made her think of water flowing over a cold stone. She could sense him watching her. She was used to men watching her. She had the kind of body that men liked. A fluke of nature that she exploited, but which, like pretty much everything else, left her cold. Usually.

  ‘What do you mean?’ she asked warily.

  ‘Precisely what you think I mean,’ Justin replied. ‘I’ve known Dexter Maxwell for a long time, Miss Milton-Kerr, he’s one of my best friends.’

  Which meant – which could not possibly mean – unless she’d got it horribly wrong, which shouldn’t matter, absolutely should not. ‘It’s Vera,’ she said, because she had to say something while she tried to decide what it was she really wanted to say. ‘Verity, actually, though no-one calls me that.’

  ‘Because it isn’t true? Or have you heard that before?’

  ‘How close are you and Dexter?’

  ‘About as close as you and he are, and not as close as you’re imagining.’

  ‘I wasn’t imagining anything.’

  ‘Yes, I see why you dropped Verity.’

  Despite herself, she smiled. ‘You tell me then, Mr Yorke, what was it I was imagining?’

  ‘It’s Justin.’ The room was all but empty now, for the dancing had started. He brushed a gold petal from the top of her arm. His touch made her shiver. He bent down towards her, tucking her hair back behind her ear. ‘You were wondering if Dexter and I were similarly inclined,’ he said. His voice was low, his breath a whisper on her ear.

  Her heart was thumping unevenly. ‘And are you?’ she asked, though she didn’t need to.

  She felt the rumble of his laughter. ‘No. Are you?’

  ‘I?’

  ‘Do you like girls, Vera?’

  ‘No more than Dexter does. Would you like it if I did, Mr Yorke?’

  ‘Justin. And no, I would not like it if you did. In fact I’m very pleased to hear that you don’t.’

  His smile was wicked. That thing he was doing to her neck, touching, stroking, fluttering, whatever it was, that was wicked too. It was making her feel wicked, and she hadn’t felt wicked in a very long time. Vera smiled back. She reached up to touch him, finger tips straying over his temple, behind his ear, to rest lightly on the back of his neck. She felt him tense. She heard the faint intake of his breath, and that made her feel even more wicked. ‘How pleased?’ she asked, choosing to ignore his implied question.

  ‘About this much,’ he said.

  He kissed her. It wasn’t really a kiss. His lips merely grazed hers. Not even enough to make her worry about her lip rouge, though it was enough to make her heart jump into her throat, and to make her inhale just a little too sharply. Not much of a kiss, but enough to make her want more, which was something she hadn’t wanted in a long time. All this she thought, as his lips touched hers, as his fingers ruffled the sleek cap of her razor-cut hair, and then it was over, and she was left wondering if she’d imagined it. Not the kiss, but the effect.

  ‘I wouldn’t count that as so very pleased,’ Vera said with something like her usual coolness.

  ‘Really? But what else could I have done, within the bounds of decency?’

  His fingers were doing that thing again, on her shoulder this time. ‘Oh, if you’re going to worry about decency,’ Vera said, ‘you should have confined yourself to kissing my hand.’

  He took her hand. He lifted it to his mouth. His lips on her palm. His eyes, watching her as he kissed her, his tongue flicking over her skin. She wished her gown didn’t cling quite so much, for it gave her breathing away.

  ‘Decent enough for you?’ Justin asked her.

  It was the way he was looking at her that made her do it. Teasing. Taunting. Daring. It had nothing to do with the way his mouth and his tongue on her skin were making her feel, and everything to do with a simple need to get even. ‘I don’t know,’ she said, dragging her hand from his mouth, pulling his hand to her mouth. ‘You tell me.’

  She saw the surprise in his eyes. It was gratifying. Then she saw them change as she kissed his hand, exactly as he had kissed hers. Her mouth on his skin. Her tongue, on the pad of his thumb. Her eyes, watching his widen, darken, surprise giving way to desire. There was a callus at the base of his index finger. She softened her lips over it, then ran the tip of her tongue up his finger, taking the tip of it into her mouth. Sucking. Tasting. And all the time, watching, aware of the almost-forgotten twist of desire inside her, knowing she should stop, not wanting to, until he pulled his finger free, and pulled her towards him, and his lips closed on hers, and she opened to him with a sigh, because it turned out that was what she had wanted all along.

  A kiss. Lips and tongues and teeth. Not a gentle kiss, harsh, yet not harsh enough. She wanted to dig her nails into his shoulders. She wanted to hurt him for making her feel like this. She yanked herself away, making no attempt to disguise her breathing, looking over her shoulder, relieved to find that they were still, astonishingly, alone.

  ‘It’s a bit late to worry about the proprieties,’ Justin said, his own breathing satisfyingly ragged.

  ‘Dexter. The press. I would not want…’

  ‘A picture that compromised your little fairy story.’

  He was wiping his mouth, which was streaked with her lip rouge. Vera grabbed the handkerchief from him, and finished the task with unnecessary vigour. ‘It’s not like that.’

  He grabbed his handkerchief back and rammed it into his jacket pocket. ‘How is it then?’

  She was suddenly quite cold. ‘Oh, obviously it’s exactly what you’re thinking. I use Dexter to cover up the fact that I’m a complete femme fatale. So don’t flatter yourself, Mr Yorke, I’m not particularly discriminating. Any man will do.’

  She turned to go, but he caught her arm, just under the Egyptian-style gold bangle which she wore. ‘Where the hell did that come from?’

  ‘Don’t tell me I was wrong, I could see it written on your face.’

  ‘Then you misread me, I assure you.’

  ‘You’re hurting me.’

  Swearing, Justin let her go. There were finger-marks on her skin. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t realise – God, I’m sorry.’

  She could have walked way then, but she didn’t. He looked genuinely horrified. Vera told herself it would be cruel to leave him then. ‘I bruise very easily,’ she said.

  ‘So do I, it seems,’ Justin said.

  He ran his hand through his hair. It fell over his forehead. It looked endearing. She refused to be endeared, and said nothing.

  He was frowning. ‘I really wasn’t thinking what you thought.’

  Vera shrugged. ‘What most men think, when they look at me.’

  ‘Ah.’

  ‘Ah, what?’

  He smiled. ‘Ah, hence Dex. Because it’s not that you do far too much, it’s that you don’t at all. Is that it?’

  ‘It might be.’ He was making her uneasy. She was having to work quite hard not to return his smile. She was having to work very hard not to want to kiss him again. She wasn’t used to having either problem. ‘You shouldn’t have kissed me,’ Vera said.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did you do it because it’s what Dexter wanted?’

  ‘No!’ He looked aghast. ‘No, I bloody well did not.’

  Vera allowed herself just a fraction of a smile. ‘Did you do it because I provoked you?’

  ‘So you admit you did?’’

  Vera managed a shrug. ‘I migh
t have.’

  ‘I’m glad you did, but even if you hadn’t, I think I’d have found an excuse. I kissed you because I wanted to kiss you.’

  She surrendered, laughing. ‘Then I am glad to have given you a reason, Mr Yorke. It’s as well Dexter isn’t around, or he’d be congratulating himself on his little ploy working, and much as I love him, he is quite insufferable when he is right. Not that I think he was,’ she added hastily, ‘and even if he was, I’m not in the least bit interested.’

  ‘No,’ Justin said. ‘Obviously not. Nor am I.’

  ‘Good,’ Vera said, telling herself that it was.

  ‘Though I suppose it wouldn’t do any harm for us to indulge him, just to ease his mind. It’s not as if either of us are under any illusions.’

  She considered this. She pretended to consider it a great deal more than she actually did. ‘But we are both under an – an obligation,’ she said. ‘I certainly owe Dexter something.’

  ‘A dance?’

  Justin smiled at her. He really did have a very tempting smile. Vera took his arm. ‘A dance to make Dexter happy,’ she said, ‘why not.’

  Reflections

  He led her through to the Mirror Ballroom. He ought to mingle with the crowd. He ought to be asking questions. Observing, not judging, that’s what he’d come here for. He told himself he had another duty to perform now, to Dex. He knew he was kidding himself, and decided, for once, not to care but simply to do what he wanted to do.

  The ballroom was long, the windows at the far end draped with thick velvet curtains. The walls were panelled, all the way from the white and gold ceiling to the polished floor, in pale oak. It would have been dark without the mirrors. There were six of them, three on each wall, huge things reflecting each other and the room to eternity. Light from another massive crystal chandelier bounced off them, giving the effect of sunlight through clouds.

  The band played on a dais at the opposite end from the windows. The floor was crowded. Dex had probably already left, and Justin couldn’t remember the last time he’d danced, but he took Vera into his arms and onto the floor. It was a crush, so he pulled her closer. The scent she wore was exotic, like Vera herself. Not flowers or citrus, but spice. She had renewed the crimson on her lips. Her eyes were huge, dark, the lashes thick. Her hair, so sharply-cut, was unbelievably soft. Like her body beneath the silk of her gown. She was artifice and nature combined, and if he was not careful, there would be no hiding how very arousing he found that combination.

  ‘Did you know,’ he said, ‘that this place has sixty-seven bathrooms, and every one of them is heated. Most houses in Britain don’t even have running water, never mind heating in any room but the kitchen.’

  ‘If the miners’ strike continues, none of us shall have any heating,’ Vera said.

  ‘So you think it’s wrong, the strike?’

  ‘I think it’s wrong that they have to strike,’ she replied, with a wry twist to her smile. ‘Do you think it’s wrong to have a heated bathroom? My aunt does. She thinks that it encourages loose morals. But then, Aunt Cicely thinks woollen underwear is character-building, and silk next to the skin is the first step on the road to perdition, which makes me pretty much there, before you ask.’

  ‘I wasn’t about to,’ Jason replied. ‘Though I can’t imagine that you’re wearing any underwear under that stage outfit, woollen or otherwise.’

  Vera laughed. ‘I’m not.’

  He closed his eyes briefly. ‘I wish you hadn’t told me that.’

  ‘You asked.’

  ‘I did.’ He adjusted his hold on her to put a few vital inches between them. ‘Would you mind very much if we turned the subject?’

  ‘Too much the gentleman to discuss a lady’s underwear, Mr Yorke?’

  ‘Too much a gentleman to let a lady know the effect the discussion of a lady’s underwear is having on me, Miss Milton-Kerr.’

  ‘I bet you say that to all the girls.’

  His smile faded. ‘Not lately.’

  ‘Oh.’ She shifted imperceptibly. ‘Are you married, is that it?’

  ‘No. Good grief no. You can’t think – I would never – no, I’m not married. I’m not engaged. I’m not anything. I’m not – not for a long time.’

  She raised her brows. ‘Why? I know you’re not frigid.’

  ‘Any more than you are.’

  She acknowledged this by inclining her head, but she was frowning now. ‘Miserable, that’s what Dexter called you.’

  Miserable as sin, and lonely as hell, is what Dex had said originally, though he remembered just in time that Vera had been on stage then. ‘Actually, he said that you were every bit as miserable as me,’ Justin corrected her. ‘Are you?’

  ‘Since I don’t know the extent of your misery, I can’t say.’

  She spoke flippantly, but he was not fooled. Her form of bravado was different to his, but something in her eyes struck a chord. ‘He’s a mite too perceptive for a playboy, is Dex,’ Justin said wryly.

  ‘Dexter is no more a playboy than I am a floozy. I shall miss him.’

  ‘Will you replace him?’

  She pursed her lips. ‘No, I think I shall cultivate a new persona. They will call me the Ice Queen.’

  She rested her head on his shoulder. She was tall enough for that. He liked that she was so tall. They were on a crowded dance floor, surrounded by noise and bodies and light, yet it felt like they were alone, and though he had barely drunk anything, he felt curiously light-headed. Justin tightened his arm around her waist and pulled her closer. ‘I can’t think of a more inaccurate epithet.’

  Vera reached up to push his hair back from his forehead. ‘That’s because you don’t know the real me.’

  He wondered who the real Vera was. He wondered who the real Justin was. It was a strange thing for him to wonder. He tried very hard not to think about such things. Was he lonely? He had not held a woman in a very long time, and this woman was a spectacularly lovely one. Was it that? He splayed his fingers across the voluptuous curve of her hips. ‘No,’ he said, ‘but I’d like to.’

  ***

  The music drifted from one tune to another. Around them, couples made extravagant moves, showing off the tango and the foxtrot. Vera and Justin remained on the edge of the floor. His fingers on her hip were not holding, but caressing. Hers on his shoulder, straying to his neck, to his hair, to his back, fluttering up and then down. Her cheek rested on his chest. His chin rested on her hair. And then there was the looking. Just looking at each other. His eyes were flecked with a colour that wasn’t quite gold, wasn’t quite brown. There was a tiny scar right at the edge of his left eyebrow. He smelt of shaving soap and fresh linen. He didn’t wear hair oil. There was the faintest trace of a smile on his lips, as if he couldn’t quite believe what was happening. Just what she was thinking. If that really was what he was thinking. She could see them, reflected in one of the huge mirrors, and reflected back in the other. She saw him notice it too, and smiled at him. She saw the effect of the smile in his eyes. And in the mirror. And in the mirror.

  ‘Why are you here?’ Vera asked, striving to break whatever spell they had wound around themselves, because she wasn’t used to spells. ‘You’re not one of the party crowd, I’ve never seen you before.’

  ‘Dex told me he had something important to say. Which, as you know, he did.’

  ‘Yes, but…’ She pursed her lips, trying to frame what it was that jarred. ‘But what you said, about the bathrooms. About the Chatsfield. Do you agree with my Aunt Cicely?’

  ‘That everyone here is on the road to perdition?’

  ‘That it’s wrong to – to enjoy life, while others can’t – the miners, for instance. That – oh, I don’t know, here are all these beautiful creatures spurning the caviar and smoked salmon because they’re watching their figures, while some people can barely scrape together enough to buy some bread and dripping. Is that what you’re thinking?’ He looked uncomfortable. Part of her wished she had not brought the subject
back up, though now she had, she couldn’t help pursuing it. ‘Well?’

  Justin shrugged. ‘No. Well, yes, but it’s not so simple, is it? I wish it was. I’m not looking down my nose and despising you, if that’s what you think.’

  He sounded very defensive. ‘I don’t know what to think of you,’ Vera said. ‘You’re an enigma.’

  ‘Says the floozy who doesn’t flooze,’ Justin retorted. ‘Yes, I did come here expecting to look down my nose a little bit, but I was also hoping to be proved wrong.’

  ‘And have you?’

  ‘I’ve decided not to think about it tonight. I’m sick of thinking.’ Justin sighed. ‘I’m not so stupid as to think that everyone will ever be equal, but I do wish the gap was not so huge, and I do wish that people wouldn’t pretend it wasn’t there.’

  ‘People have learnt how to pretend lots of things aren’t there,’ Vera said. ‘They’ve become so good at it, it’s a habit.’

  ‘It’s not right. Half of these men, they were too young even to fight in the War. They don’t know…’

  ‘God Justin, don’t you think that’s a good thing! I don’t know what it was like for you, where you were, on the front line, wherever you were, but…’

  ‘On the front line.’

  ‘Well then. Would you wish that on anyone?’

  He looked as if she had slapped him. She was suddenly on the verge of tears. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t – I shouldn’t have – because I never do, usually. Talk about it. Because I’d rather like to forget. Because I’m one of them.’ She stared over his shoulder, seeing herself wide-eyed and pale in the mirror. But not crying. Her reflection reassured her. ‘Some of them feel guilty, you know. The ones that were too young. Another reason for forgetting. We all do it, Justin, and who can blame us?’