India Grey - Champagne Summer

She was in the arms of Alejandro D’Arienzo, and his mouth was crushing hers, his hands holding her, sliding downwards, his thumbs caressing the underside of her breasts.

Alejandro lifted his head and looked at her. His eyes were as dark as vintage cognac, glinting dully in the low light, and his mouth was full and crimson where the ferocity of their kiss had opened up the cut in his lip.

He moved his thumbs upwards, brushing them over the hardened tips of her swollen, tingling breasts. She stiffened, her head falling backwards. Instinctively, helplessly, she felt her legs wrap around his body, tightening and drawing him into her, wriggling against him as the straining peak of his arousal pushed against the damp silk of her pants.

Her mouth opened in silent bliss, her eyes were wide, dazed, and her breathing shallow as, frozen on the brink of some terrifying, tempting abyss, she stared up into his bruised face.

His bruised, cold, totally emotionless face.

Before she could move or speak he had let her go, stepping sharply away from the table where she was sprawled backwards, turning so she could no longer see his face.

‘I think we’ve proved that your cheap shots were wide of the mark, sweetheart,’ he said mockingly. ‘It’s not that I’m not interested in women, per se . It’s just that spoiled little girls who use sex as a bargaining tool don’t really do it for me. Sorry.’

Points of light danced in front of Tamsin’s eyes and for a desperate, horror-struck moment she thought she might faint. Or be sick.

She closed her eyes, fighting the feeling, focusing all of her fading energy on holding onto that small scrap of tattered dignity which would enable her to hold up her head and look him in the eye as she told him exactly what she thought about men who treated women like laboratory rats to be experimented on.

But when she opened her eyes again he was gone.

TAMSIN gave a low moan of despair as she looked at her reflection in the big, cruelly lit mirror.

The lighting in the ladies’ loo at Twickenham might be designed for functionality rather than flattery, but there was no doubt that the face that looked back at her was a mess. Mortuary-pale, with matching white lips, the only hint of colour came from the bluish shadows beneath her bloodshot eyes. It wasn’t a good look.

Right at that moment she would rather face a firing squad—than photographers and journalists from the sports desk of every major national and special-interest publication in the country, but she didn’t have much choice. Her father, along with members of the England management, was waiting for her, and he would expect her presentation to be seamless.

With a shaking hand she dabbed some lipstick onto her pale, numb lips and pressed them together, remembering with a slice of sudden breathtaking pain how they’d swelled and burned beneath Alejandro’s kiss last night as the blood from his torn mouth had crimsoned them.

No .

She couldn’t go there now, not when she had to get out there and look like a poised professional instead of the creature from the crypt. It was absolutely not the time to revisit the ground she had worn bare throughout the long hours of the night as she had asked herself the same question over and over again.

Why had she been so stupid?

Letting him humiliate and reject her once was bad enough. Giving him the opportunity to do it a second time … Well, that was nothing short of insanity. And yet, at the time she had been powerless to stop it. It was as if, the moment he’d left her shivering in the freezing darkness of the orangery at Harcourt, she had shut down and had gone into a state of mental suspended-animation. She remembered reading somewhere that extreme shock could do that to people. For six years she had gone about her life, looking for all the world like a normal person, a perfectly healthy, successful young woman, so that even those closest to her—even Serena—had no idea that beneath the surface she was frozen. A stopped clock.

Until last night.

Putting the lid back on the lipstick, she threw it into her bag and pressed her palms to her cheeks as tears smarted in her eyes again. Big girls don’t cry : that was what her father always said. By the time Tamsin had been born Serena, two years older, had already cornered the market on ‘pretty and feminine’. Tamsin did ‘tough’ instead, and Henry had accepted her as the son he’d never had. Tears were for babies, he’d told her, and Tamsin had learned very early to hold them in.

Last night had been a minor blip—well, quite a major blip, actually—but she was back on track today. She stepped back, taking a deep breath and giving herself one last look in the mirror before heading back out there. As a designer, her clothes were about so much more than fashion, both mirroring her mood and influencing it. The way she dressed always made a statement, and today’s severe black trouser-suit said very loudly ‘don’t mess with me’. The four-inch heels she wore with it added, ‘or I’ll smash your face in’.

The noise from the press room spilled out along the corridor as she left the sanctuary of the ladies’, a loud babble of conversation, as rowdy and excited as the bar on match day. Tamsin shuddered. Right now it sounded good-natured enough, but she had a horrible feeling that in a few minutes it could turn into the sound of a pack of journalists baying for her blood.

‘Ah, there you are, Tamsin. We were waiting.’ Henry Calthorpe looked at his watch as he came towards her. ‘Is everything all right?’

Tamsin summoned a smile. It felt like strapping on armour plating. ‘Everything’s fine, Daddy,’ she said ruefully. ‘Why wouldn’t it be?’

‘No reason.’ Henry was already moving away. ‘You look pale, that’s all. But if you’re ready let’s get started.’

The noise level in the press room rocketed as they filed in. The cameras started whirring and journalists got to their feet, keen to get their questions answered.

Boards showing life-size images of the players lined up at the start of yesterday’s game had been placed behind the long table at the front of the room. Taking a seat right in front of Matt Fitzpatrick’s hulking figure in the picture, Tamsin found herself sitting between her father and Alan Moss, the team physio. He was there to comment on the effect the techno-fabric of the new strip was expected to have on the players’ physical performance, but he’d also come in very handy if she passed out, Tamsin thought shakily, picking up the pen that had been left on the table in front of her and starting to sketch.

Henry introduced them all, saying a few brief words about each person’s role in the new team. When he reached Tamsin, the reporters seemed to strain forwards, like greyhounds in the stalls the moment before the start of the race.

‘As you may be aware, Tamsin Calthorpe won the commission to design the new strip, as well as the off-field formal attire of the team.’

‘Surprise, surprise!’ shouted someone from the back. ‘I wonder how that happened?’

Outrage fizzed through Tamsin’s bloodstream. Instantly her spine was ramrod straight, her fingers tightening convulsively around the pen in her hand as her body’s primitive ‘fight or flight’ instinct homed in on the former option. Forcing a grim smile, she looked into the glittering dazzle of flashbulbs in front of her.

‘It happened thanks to my degree in textiles and my experience designing for my own label, Coronet.’ She didn’t quite manage to keep the edge of steel from her voice. ‘I believe there were three other designers competing for the commission, and the selection process was entirely based on ideas submitted for the brief.’