Forgotten Passion

‘Why, you…!’

She was yanked bodily into Rorke’s arms, her heart pounding in terror as they locked round her and she was forced backwards against his arm, his hand lifting to grasp her chin and lift her face so that he could look into her eyes.

‘What’s the matter?’ he asked insultingly, studying her hectically flushed cheeks and glittering eyes. ‘Isn’t Greg a satisfactory lover, or is it simply that you like a little bit of variety, because that’s what all that was about, wasn’t it, Lisa? You wanted to be here in my arms, didn’t you?’

‘No!’ she denied vehemently. How could he think such a thing? Her whole body was trembling helplessly and fear crawled down her spine as he looked at her. ‘I wouldn’t want you to touch me if… if you were the last man on earth!’ she snapped childishly. ‘Helen might go in for those sort of games, but I don’t. Now perhaps you’ll let me go.’ She tilted her chin proudly, defying him to refuse.

‘Helen’s all woman,’ he drawled, ignoring her demand. ‘She doesn’t have to play games to get across what she wants. It’s been five years, Lisa, and I reckon you owe me this.’

He bent his head and she could see the dark flecks in his eyes, the hard purpose of his mouth as it closed on hers, ruthlessly determined to shatter her defences and impose its superior male strength. It wasn’t a kiss of desire, Lisa recognised as she fought its dominance, it was a punishment, a brand, a pain that burned itself into her heart and left her crying silently inside, her lips bruised and swollen when Rorke released them.

‘I have to go now,’ he told her emotionlessly. ‘But I’ll be back, and when I come back I want your answer.’

‘And if it’s “no”?’ Lisa demanded huskily.

For a moment she thought he actually intended to strike her, and took an instinctive step backwards. Rorke’s mouth curled sardonically as he recognised her fear.

‘Like I said, a man’s entitled to the company of his only child—if you’ve any sense you’ll come, Lisa. You obviously love your son, even if you don’t give a damn for my father.’

He was gone before she could retort, leaving her bruised in body and spirit, wishing he had never come back into her life, wondering why on earth she had not punished him with the truth—because it would be a punishment to him to discover it. What a fool she was to allow the residue of old emotions to trap her into a desire to protect rather than to hurt. Hurt! Didn’t Rorke deserve to be hurt after what he had done to her? And yet she knew she could never be the one to retaliate. She just didn’t have it in her.

CHAPTER FIVE

‘MUMMY, Mummy, wake up!’

Drowsily, Lisa surfaced from sleep. Robbie was standing beside her bed, his small face determined, the blue-green eyes, all that he had inherited from her, looking accusingly at her.

‘Why are you still sleeping?’ he demanded, watching her. ‘I’ve been awake for ages!’

He had tried to dress himself, and a strong surge of love tugged at her body as Lisa propped herself up on one elbow to watch him. He was so sturdy and self-assured, this son of hers; so much his father’s child in everything he did. But Rorke would never acknowledge him. To Rorke he was Mike’s child. The thick dark hair, so like his father’s, tangled and unruly, curled round his still babyish little boy’s face, but despite the baby chubbiness, already in his bone structure Lisa could recognise Rorke’s.

A rattle in the hall heralded the arrival of the post, and suppressing a sigh Lisa swung her legs out of bed, as Robbie hurried downstairs to see what had arrived.

Lisa heard him coming back as she stepped into the shower. He was talking to himself; she could hear the high piping voice, and she smiled to herself, picturing him climbing the stairs. He still had to take them one at a time, and consequently it took him a couple of minutes to reach the top. She heard him pushing open the bathroom door, and called out to him to pass her a towel as she turned off the shower and opened the door. Her body stiffened as she realised that Robbie wasn’t alone. Rorke was with him, and it was Rorke who proffered the towel she had asked for, galvanising her tense muscles into action as she whipped the towel round her, securing it like a sarong, as she darted Rorke a look of bitter hatred.

‘What are you doing here?’ she hissed as she urged Robbie towards the door. ‘How did you get in?’

‘Robbie let me in,’ Rorke told her calmly, apparently completely undisturbed by the intimacy of their surroundings.

‘I want my breakfast,’ Robbie announced, looking from one adult face to the other.

‘Go down stairs, Robbie, I’ll be down in a minute,’ Lisa instructed, glancing coldly and pointedly at Rorke as he followed her on to the landing.

‘If you don’t mind,’ she told him icily, ‘I’d like to get dressed. ‘I realise that good manners are apparently completely alien to you—otherwise you’d never have come up here in the first place,’ she added when he refused to move, ‘but getting dressed is something I prefer to do without an audience.’

‘You surprise me,’ was Rorke’s cynical comment, as he stepped past her, and as she opened her bedroom door Lisa found she was shaking with a mixture of temper and reaction. Just for a moment as she stepped out of the shower and saw Rorke there time had telescoped, present and past mingling, and just briefly, for the merest heartbeat, she had experienced again all those emotions she had known at seventeen.

But she wasn’t seventeen any longer. She was twenty-two and the mother of a five-year-old son whose father refused to acknowledge him, and that was somthing she would be wise not to forget.

She dressed quickly in jeans and a checked shirt. The jeans were relatively new ones and emphasised the slender length of her legs. Her hair, tangled and slightly damp from the shower, curled riotously on to her shoulders, and with an impatient gesture she tied it back into one long plait, securing it with a rubber band.

As she reached the kitchen she could smell coffee and toast. She pushed open the door, and the domesticity of the scene that greeted her took her by the throat, reminding her of how very vulnerable she still was no matter how much she might want to deny it. Robbie was sitting in his chair, eating toast. Rorke was standing beside him talking to him. Both of them looked up as she walked in, identical expressions in their eyes. If Rorke could see what she could see he would never imagine that Robbie was anyone else’s child. But he didn’t want to know about Robbie’s parenthood, she reminded herself, hardening her heart. He had wanted to believe what Helen had told him. Perhaps he had even then been regretting marrying her; wanting a way out. He had certainly never made any attempt to find her before—and now that he had it was for Leigh’s sake, not his own.

‘We’re going to fly a long way in a huge plane,’ Robbie told her matter-of-factly as she sat down, adding innocently, ‘We’re going with my daddy.’

Lisa’s head shot up, her eyes widening in shock.

‘It’s all right,’ Rorke announced, anticipating her. ‘I’ve explained to Robbie that I’m his father.’