Constantinou's Mistress (3 page)

‘I can't believe…my God, Nick…how could this have happened?' The full horror of the situation began to dawn on her and reality was like a bucket of freezing water. She pushed herself up and stared down at him, but not for long. She couldn't bring herself to look at his face. And she was glad that he was not looking at her either, his eyes lightly closed. Probably, she thought with another wave of bitter self-recrimination, working out in his head how he could sack her the following Monday without flaunting any obvious company guidelines.

She turned her back on him to dress, her movements jerky, and carried on talking, trying to find some justification for her behaviour.

‘I realise this makes our situation very difficult,' she finished, finally getting up the courage to turn around now that she was fully dressed, although under the severe clothing she was all too mortifyingly aware of her body, which was still burning from his caresses. His prone body was swathed in shadow and she was just glad that he was giving her the opportunity to speak. ‘I can't begin to tell you how sorry I am…' There was a sob in her voice and she blinked very quickly to clear her head. ‘Please don't think I blame you in any way…I don't…I…I blame myself, and I'll understand perfectly if you want me to hand in my resignation on Monday…'

She took a couple of tentative steps closer towards him.

‘Nick…?' When he didn't answer she moved towards the sofa and stared down at his relaxed body, one arm
slung carelessly over the side of the sofa, the other resting lightly on his chest.

Asleep. Fast asleep.

She remained where she was for a few seconds, wondering whether her need to talk was greater than his need to sleep. After a few more seconds of indecision she sighed softly and put on her coat and scarf, closing the door quietly behind her.

They had both acted on crazy impulse, she thought shakily, except he had an excuse and she had none. It had been an agonising reversal of roles. Wasn't it usually the man who took advantage of the inebriated woman? When he woke up, would he see her as someone who had taken advantage of his temporary defencelessness? It was a sickening, horrifying thought.

If she remained working for him, she at least had learnt her lesson. She would prove to him that her moment of weakness had been a passing madness. She had seen for herself the depth of his raging grief that had allowed him to use her as therapy and she had allowed herself to be used as therapy. She could only now regain her self-respect by ensuring that it never happened again. Ever.

N
ICK
stood at the floor-to-ceiling window of his office, hands thrust aggressively into his pockets, and stared, scowling, at the grimy London buildings outside.

His entire weekend had been spent reassuring departing relatives that he was fine, that, yes, getting back to work immediately was the right thing for him to do, that, no, he didn't need to get away. On top of that he had had to cope with what had happened on the Friday night.

He muttered an oath to himself and dragged himself away from the unappealing view outside to sit at his desk.

Of course he would have to face Lucy but what he was going to say was another matter. He could scarcely believe what had happened. The recollection had a dream-like quality about it, but, inebriated though he had been, he unfortunately had not been inebriated enough to consign to blissful oblivion the glaring fact that he had lost control. With his secretary. And, worse, the thought nagged away at the back of his mind that somehow she had been forced into doing something she would have found abhorrent.

He gazed abstractedly at his computer terminal and waited.

What, he wondered grimly, had he said to her? Anything? Had he jumped on her? The thought made him slam his fist on his desk in a gesture of frustrated rage that was directed entirely at himself. He almost sus
pected that she would not turn up at all, and if she failed to do so then he could hardly blame her.

 

But she did.

Even the prospect of facing him on the Monday morning, terrifying though it was, did not deter her from getting up at the usual time, getting dressed in her usual manner, having what passed for her breakfast, a snatched cup of coffee and a slice of toast.

Lucy only faltered when she was finally standing in front of the glasshouse office building, then she took a deep breath and propelled herself through the revolving door.

She was aware of several of her colleagues greeting her, and she heard herself greeting them in return, wondering feverishly if they could spot anything different about her.

The second floor of the building was designated to the directors of the company. Lucy strode along and when she reached the door to her own office she glanced desperately towards the lift and wondered what it would feel like to just run away.

Maybe he wouldn't be there, she thought to herself, as her nervous apprehension reached stomach-churning levels. Maybe he would have no memory of what had taken place. Temporary amnesia through excessive alcohol. That sort of thing happened quite frequently; she was sure of it.

She pushed open her door, walked in and saw him, sitting in his leather chair, every inch the forbidding, ruthlessly self-assured boss she was accustomed to. He had been staring at his computer but his eyes met hers the minute she walked through the door and Lucy smiled a tentative greeting.

‘Would you like a coffee?' she asked, removing her coat and hanging it on the coat stand by the door. When he didn't answer she went to stand by the interconnecting door to his office, hovering indecisively and trying very hard to maintain an air of efficient normality.

‘I think we need to have a little chat, don't you?'

So he
had
remembered. Had she really expected otherwise?

‘Do we?' Lucy asked in a voice that bordered on the pleading. ‘There's so much to do on a Monday morning. Shouldn't I be getting on with work?' Her mouth dried up as his black eyes swept over her.

‘Come in and shut the door behind you. I've told Christina to make sure that no calls come through until advised.' He could see the reluctance on her face, could sense her desperate longing for him to say nothing of what had taken place, and another spasm of self-disgust twisted in his gut.

Of all the people in the world, he'd had to get drunk and fall on the one who was least able to handle it. Lucy had never once shown any inclination that she was attracted to him. She was the most private woman he had ever known. Even when he had been married, and very faithfully married despite the provocation, he had been a magnet for other women, including those with husbands tucked safely at their sides. Distasteful though the thought was, he would have preferred to direct his unsteady feet towards the nearest bar and pick up a woman. Anyone other than the girl standing in front of him with her huge, dismayed eyes which she was trying so hard to conceal.

Not only would he have spared her from his despicable behaviour, he would not now be in a position of
wondering just how uncontrolled he had been emotionally in front of her.

‘Sit down,' he ordered, trying to modulate the tenor of his voice. ‘We have to talk about what took place on Friday night.'

‘Must we? Wouldn't it be better for us to both forget about it? We're adults. These things happen…' Her voice trailed off into anguished silence, which only made his expression harden as he contemplated the idiotic madness of his behaviour.

‘Would you feel more comfortable if we discussed this out of the office?' he asked. ‘There's a coffee bar ten minutes' walk away from—'

‘No!' Lucy edged towards the chair facing him, the one she used for more mundane reasons such as jotting notes down in her pad. ‘This is fine.'

‘Right.' Nick sat back in the chair and broodingly surveyed the nervous fair-haired woman in front of him. Where to begin? ‘First of all I want to…apologise for what happened between us. My behaviour was inexcusable.' He was visited by a split-second of instant recall, the memory of small breasts spilling from a bra, rosy-peaked nipples against pale, soft skin, and he drew in his breath sharply, dispelling the disturbing image. ‘My only excuse is that the situation was…somewhat extraordinary.'

‘I realise that,' Lucy said, steeling herself not to wilt. She had seen the expression of disgust cross his face earlier on and it had been all she could do to remain where she was and not run sobbing from the room. He talked about his behaviour and made all the right noises of regret and apology but she could tell that he had found her behaviour as repellent as his own. Her behaviour, she thought with mortification, and her body.

‘I had just come from the most traumatic experience of my life…' What the hell had they talked about? He remembered he'd spoken quite honestly with her—just what had he said? They must have talked about
something
. Had he made an even bigger fool of himself by discussing the private details of his married life? Had he, God forbid, broken down? Cried?

No. He rejected the thought completely. He wouldn't have. He simply was not built that way.

‘Perhaps I spoke to you about that…?' he prompted in an attempt to fill in the missing pieces.

‘No, of course not!' Lucy's denial was spontaneous. ‘I… Look, I understand. I understand why you felt that you had to get away. I told you so at the time. You were grief-stricken and you were dealing with it by…by losing yourself in drink.'

So he hadn't confessed anything. Nick breathed an inward sigh of relief.

This was just the tip of the iceberg, however. He had to find out how exactly they had ended up making love.

‘Not very appropriate behaviour,' he commented, allowing her to relax, knowing that the minute he broached the whole subject of sex she would revert to her stammering state of utter confusion. He looked down and idly picked up the fountain pen lying on his desk. Despite the advance of technology, he still used a fountain pen for writing letters and signing his name on documents. He twirled it slowly between his fingers now, making sure that he didn't look at her. She seemed to go to pieces whenever he looked at her, something she had never done before. Then again, she had probably never been repelled by him before.

‘Have you ever drowned your sorrows, Lucy? Drunk
too much for your own good? Behaved like a complete fool with no regard for the consequences?'

Of course, in retrospect, he would consider himself a fool to have made love with her, she thought with a burning sense of shame and hurt. This conversation would have been totally different if she had been beautiful and sophisticated. In fact, it probably wouldn't have been taking place at all. ‘I did get drunk once when I was eighteen but I had such a bad hangover that I never did it again. And, no, I have never had to drown my sorrows in drink. But of course, as I said…'

‘What a blameless life you must lead,' Nick mused, half to himself. Of course, it was written on her face, a fresh innocence that he had blasted his way into like a maniac. For the first time he wondered what her outside life was like. It had never occurred to him before, but then he had been so wrapped up in his own personal domestic nightmare that he had spent very little time actually noticing the people around them. He moved through them, did deals, went to meetings and functioned in a way that had been utterly detached from any curiosity.

Oddly, he found himself sidetracked by questions that had nothing to do with why he had called her into his office.

‘What do you do out of work?' he asked suddenly and Lucy looked at him in surprise.

‘What do I do out of work? What do you mean?'

‘Do you go out much? Do you share a house with other people? Is that why you decided to come to the office on Friday? Because you couldn't face your house-mates?' She hadn't been a virgin, he thought suddenly. He had another vivid image of her lying on him, her breasts swinging above his face as she moved, her slight
body grinding against his hard, pulsing masculinity. His body stirred in response and he clenched his jaw at the intrusive thoughts.

‘No, no, I don't share a house. In fact, I have my own flat. In a renovated Victorian house that's been converted into ten flats. It's not in the best part of London, but it does.'

‘And do you go out much?'

‘I have a normal social life,' Lucy informed him, tilting her chin up defensively. It would have been a hell of a lot more normal if she hadn't spent precious time hankering after the man facing her. She cringed at the thought that he might ever find out that little fact. She, at least, had not once uttered a word about how disastrously attracted she had always been by him. She had not allowed her short-sighted passion to guide her words. And he would never find out.

‘I go to the movies with friends, go to the theatre now and again, have meals out…'

‘With men?' he asked smoothly, picking up on her list of hobbies and tacking on what purported to be a natural follow-on question.

‘Sometimes.'

‘And do you have a lover?' It was an outrageously interfering question, he thought to himself, but curiosity had got the better of him. Sex with her had been good. Better than good. Or so it seemed to him in hazy retrospect. But her demure appearance belied any such suggestion.

Yes, you, once in reality but a thousand times in my head.
‘I don't think that's any of your business,' Lucy said, half-shocked by the directness of her statement.

‘You are quite right,' Nick said soothingly. ‘I am perfectly sure that if you had you would never have…' The
silence, fraught with the unspoken, stretched between them.

‘No,' Lucy blurted out.

‘Which brings me to something that I have been turning over and over in my mind all weekend.'

She knew exactly what he was going to say. He was going to ask her why she had ever allowed herself to have sex with him and she frantically sought in her head for the answer that would be furthest away from the humiliating truth, which was that she had simply been unable to resist, that all her pent-up yearning had broken down her usual powers of reason and common sense and left her mindlessly drifting in a sea of sensuality. He had touched her and she had been lost, totally and shamelessly lost.

‘What's that?' she asked faintly.

‘Why?'

For a few desperate seconds, Lucy pretended to be bewildered by his question.

‘Why…what?' she asked finally, buying time.

‘Why did you? You were working peacefully here, albeit at an extraordinarily peculiar time, and I lurched in… I confess I am surprised that you did not flee the building in terror.'

‘I…I'm not the fleeing-buildings type of girl,' she answered in a high-pitched voice. ‘Besides, I knew who you were and I could see that you had been drinking. I only thought to make sure that you didn't pass out, to be honest.' All the truth so far.

‘And…?' He couldn't find the words to phrase the question but it was vitally important that he knew the truth, that he had not coerced her into a situation against her will. He could not seriously believe that he was capable of any such thing, but the demon drink could work
in a thousand ways, and he was not accustomed to consuming large amounts of it.

‘Look,' he said impatiently, ‘I need to find out whether I…took advantage of you in any way…'

‘Took advantage?'

‘And stop repeating every phrase I utter. You know precisely what I mean. Did I force you to do something against your will?' His body went still as he waited for her to reply. If his memory served him right…but he couldn't rely on his memory.

‘No,' Lucy told him quietly.

‘Then did I somehow use my position to influence you in any way?' His razor-sharp memory was failing him just when he needed it most. ‘Did I hint that you might…I don't know…lose your job if…?'

‘No. Don't you think I have a mind of my own?' she flared, insulted by the insinuation that she would either do something against her will or else yield to something simply for the sake of a job.

‘Of course I do,' Nick grated harshly. ‘I am merely trying to establish what precisely happened.'

‘What for?' Lucy blurted out, her face reddening. She could feel tears pricking the backs of her eyelids and swallowed them down. ‘What's the point in performing a post-mortem on what happened? I was perfectly prepared to…to pretend…'