LYNNE GRAHAM: The Heat Of Passion

Sometimes, Jessica had even told herself that she ought to be grateful for that sordid incident with Carlo. She had been afraid then that if she didn’t remain constantly on her guard, virtually policing even her thoughts, she too might easily turn into a slut. If it hadn’t been for that noise next door, Carlo wouldn’t have stopped, she knew that. Sex was a terrifyingly powerful force if you knew yourself to be as vulnerable as Jessica felt herself to be. One weak moment in the vicinity of a male like Carlo and that would be that. She had been incredibly lucky to escape unscathed.

Only somehow, she thought now on a tide of bitter pain, it had never occurred to her that she might be just as unscathed six years on, after five years of marriage. Untouched by human hand. A virgin, no less. And wouldn’t Carlo just love to know that, she reflected painfully, shuddering at the very idea. He would find it hilarious.

Jessica drifted out of her thoughts to find herself sitting shivering inside a very cold car with all the windows fogged up. She drove off but somewhere down deep in her mind was an image of Carlo as she had last seen him in the hotel suite. Angry, contemptuous... bitter? What the heck did he have to be bitter about? Had he really imagined she would accept that grossly insulting offer? Three months in Carlo’s bed, working out her penance for daring to marry another man. What a monumental ego he must have! And the utterly peculiar way he had gone about making that offer ... Her head was thumping again, tension twisting through her like a steel wire.

It was too late to go barging in on her father. Tomorrow morning first thing, she would be on his doorstep, and if he hadn’t seen a lawyer yet she would see that he did. It was a crisis and she was good in a crisis. For years it seemed her life had lurched from one crisis to another.

She was about to phone her father when the doorbell went. She peered through the peephole and recognised the broad, weathered features of the heavily built man on the other side of the door.

‘Dr Guthrie ... ?’ Her brow furrowed. Henry Guthrie was one of her father’s oldest friends. He and his wife ran a private nursing home.

‘I tried to ring you earlier but you were out,’ he proffered.

‘What’s wrong?’ she demanded, anxiously scanning his troubled face.

‘Your father’s going to stay with us for a day or two until- I can get him sorted out—’

‘But why... mean, I gather you know what’s happened... but what’s the matter with him?’ Jessica prompted sickly.

Henry Guthrie sighed. ‘Gerald’s been receiving treatment for depression for some months, now—’

She paled. ‘He didn’t tell me...’

‘He’s been quietly going off the rails ever since your mother died.’

She shut her eyes and groaned. Four months ago, they had received news of her mother’s death in a car crash. From the day she walked out until the day she died, neither Jessica nor her father had had any contact with Carole. Her mother hadn’t wanted any contact. She had wiped them both out of her life and had embarked on a new life abroad.

‘But he seemed to take it so well,’ she protested shakily.

‘Didn’t it ever occur to you that he took it too well?’ the older man murmured. ‘I think that he still hoped that she would come back. But when she died, he had to finally face that she was gone. That’s when the depression came and the gambling started. Now I understand he’s got himself in one hell of a mess—’

‘Yes,’ she whispered, tears stinging her eyes.

‘He just can’t cope with it, Jess,’ Dr Guthrie sighed. ‘He took some sleeping tablets this afternoon—’

Jessica gasped at him in horror. ‘He did what?’

‘Not enough to kill him but then, he didn’t have enough. His housekeeper found him lying in the hall and thought he’d had a heart attack...’

Jessica collapsed down on the sofa behind her, sick to her stomach, and bowed her head.

‘She rang me. I saw the tablets and contacted his own doctor, worked out how many he must have taken and between us ... well, we decided the nursing home would be a better choice than the local hospital.’

Tracks of moisture ran unchecked down her cheeks. She wanted to thank the older man for exercising that discretion but she couldn’t find her voice.

‘Now when he came to, he swore he hadn’t been trying to harm himself. He said he was just desperate to stop his mind going round and round and get some sleep and when the first pills didn’t do the trick, he took a few more...’

‘Do you b-believe him?’

‘I’ll know better what to think in a few days when we’ve talked some more,’ he confessed wryly. ‘Well...now I’m here to ask you how to get in touch with this character, Saracini—-’

‘Carlo?’ she gasped.

‘Do you think he’d see me? I want to tell him that Gerald needs criminal charges right now like he needs a hole in the head!’ he delivered grimly.

Jessica was barely thinking straight. But one awareness dominated the morass of emotions tearing her apart. Tonight she might have lost her father. And even if it hadn’t been a suicide attempt, in his current condition, who was to say he mightn’t make such an attempt this week or next week or the week after? If he wasn’t coping now, how could she expect him to cope when the police were involved and the news of his disgrace leaked out? How could he handle all the horrors still to come?

She cleared her throat. ‘There’ aren’t going to be any criminal charges. I... saw Carlo tonight and he was very understanding—’

‘He wasn’t very understanding when he had Gerald tossed out of the building!’

‘I explained how much strain Dad had been under. There won’t be any court case,’ she repeated unsteadily, her slender hands twisting together as she made her decision.

‘But what about the money? I gather that Gerald has no hope of paying all of it back...’

‘Carlo is prepared to write it off—’

‘He must be a very decent sort of man: Dr Guthrie shook his head. ’I honestly thought he would want to nail your father’s hide to the wall as an example to the rest of his employees...’

An inward quaking at that particular image assailed Jessica. She tasted cold fear but this time it was not only for her father, it was for herself as well.

The older man smothered a yawn and stood up. ‘I’ll pass on the good news to Gerald:

‘I’ll come and see him tomorrow.’

Dr Guthrie grimaced. ‘Would you be terribly hurt if I advised you to give him a couple of days to get himself together again?’

‘No,’ she lied.

‘He feels he’s let you down and I don’t think he wants you to see him until he has himself under control again.’

‘No problem,’ she said stiffly.

‘He still has a lot to handle, Jess. He’s lost his job and his self-respect.’

As soon as the older man had gone, Jessica dialled the Deangate Hotel with clumsy fingers. She asked for Carlo’s suite. He answered the call with a growl of impatience in his voice.

‘It’s me...‘ she said tightly. ’I’ve changed my mind:

Silence buzzed on the line for long seconds. It went on and on and on while she trembled at her end of the phone with a heady mix of fear and despair. Maybe Carlo had never expected her to accept... maybe Carlo had been playing some sort of game with her.

‘I’ll send a car over to collect you.’ There was no emotion whatsoever in his response. She couldn’t believe her ears.

‘When?’

‘Now.’

‘Now?’ she echoed incredulously.

‘Now,’ he repeated, his accent more pronounced than she had ever heard it. ‘I waited six years. I won’t wait one hour or one day longer.’