Age of Consent Read online

  ‘So maybe it’s time you learned that teasing isn’t the good sport you thought,’ he continued, not bothering for some reason to follow that sentence with a smack. But he was far from finished.

  ‘Bottomless can be worse than topless,’ he growled. And added another smack to emphasise his point. ‘But there are even worse things than either one.’

  And now his lips took over the torture, capturing her mouth without warning, claiming her like some savage warrior, drinking in her breathlessness, savouring her helplessness.

  Against the onslaught, her mouth trembled, then surrendered with hardly a fight. Her arms stole round his neck, holding herself tight to him; her breasts were crushed against his chest, but her nipples throbbed, growing with the heat of him, expanding, seeking.

  The warmth of his naked torso was like a torch, alighting her passions, drawing from within her a fire that scorched at her body. Her fingers, now straying across the muscular width of his shoulders, radiated that heat. As did his own fingers, moving like quicksilver along the nubbles of her spine, touching first at the narrowness of her waist, then at the swelling curves of her hips.

  Then his fingers were up beneath the softness of her jumper, their warmth vivid against her naked flesh. And she was holding him with her lips, meeting his kisses with mounting urgency as his right hand slid along her ribs, then up to cup her breast in a touch so exquisitely gentle and yet so arousing that she gasped.

  Somehow, the jumper lifted, and their bodies were touching, burning, merging in a spreading warmth that flowed through her in breathless haste. Her knees weakened; only the strength of her arms now held her upright against him.

  She could feel the masculine strength of him against her thighs, the warmth, the urgency. And her body couldn’t help but respond to the pull of his arm around her waist, the light touch of his free hand at the waistband of her jeans.

  ‘Oh ... God!’ she sighed, feeling the light tracery of fingers towards the very centre of her being, feeling her body shift ever so slightly to accommodate his searching hand.

  She wanted him. Desperately. Immediately. Now! Here! She wanted nothing more than for him to lower her to the pungent bed of sawdust and woodchips, to take her with a rising passion that matched her own. Beneath her fingers, the curling hair at the nape of his neck, then the mat across his chest, his stomach. Her own fingers encountered a belt, soft denim, the core of the flame that surged between them.

  She heard his voice, soft in her ear, murmuring, whispering words she couldn’t hear, couldn’t understand, and yet fully understood. And then another voice, this one distant, strident, intruding. And his voice again, this time fully audible.

  ‘Damn!’

  And her feet hit the ground with a thud as he virtually dropped her, turning away as he did so to meet the urgency of that other voice, Mrs Bowen’s voice calling him to the ‘phone.

  But it was Dane’s voice that stayed with her as he stalked away, his every movement taut with anger, but also with ... rejection?

  ‘Just as bloody well, dear Helen. That was one lesson that very nearly came unstuck.’

  A lesson! Her heart dropped like a stone from the previous dizzying heights to a rocky landing in reality. He might have wanted her. Had wanted her! But only as a lesson, only in a manner tinged with revenge for her teasing.

  Helen snatched up the wood-splitting axe, fighting against the tears and anger and fury that merged with her despair. Twirling it before her, she brought the axe down with a sickening thud in the nearest chunk of wood, feeling that her heart must have landed with just such a sound, that her dreams were rent as was the round of log now evenly divided at her feet.

  ‘Bastard!’ She repeated the word over and over, punctuating it with perfectly timed, viciously effective blows of the axe. An hour later, she was still saying it, the words gasping out now, and the pile of split firewood beside her almost head high. But she didn’t feel one damn bit better. And Dane, perhaps wisely, hadn’t returned.

  Nor was he in evidence when she finally abandoned his therapy as useless and returned to the house, ignoring the mildly curious glance from Mrs Bowen as she slammed through to her room and eventually to the shower,

  Mrs Bowen, thankfully, had left for the day when Helen answered the door to a floral delivery youth and wonderingly accepted the dozen roses he extended with a warm smile. Helen’s language when she read the note that accompanied the flowers would surely have given the elderly housekeeper a seizure.

  ‘It was a dumb trick and I’m sorry, I think,’ said the note. Helen’s reply, shouted into emptiness through a veil of tears she could no longer contain, was far less gentle.

  But when Dane finally did return, hours later, she managed to restrain herself, greeting him as if nothing had happened, laying the table for dinner silently, but not sullenly and able, just barely, to meet his eyes as they ate. Neither of them mentioned the earlier incident, but it was there, looming like a wraith in the tension- laden air.

  And it was there, inside Helen’s still-sensitive body, each time he moved, each time that movement revealed a flow of muscle, a disturbing memory of touch, of voice. When he shifted into his office almost immediately after the meal, Helen was both relieved and vaguely disappointed.

  Next morning, it was easier ... slightly. Dane had risen before her, and when Helen woke after a surprisingly restful night, she found that most of the chores were already done and most of the previous night’s tensions had been stilled.

  ‘I’ll just finish up and then we’ll eat and be off,’ Dane said with a smile when she met him outside the barn. ‘I think we’ve both been cooped up out here too long, so we’ll trot into town and visit the Salamanca markets, if that’s okay with you?’

  ‘Why not?’ she replied noncommittally, deliberately hiding the excitement inside her. She had wanted to visit the open-air markets ever since hearing about them, but until now Dane had never so much as mentioned an interest.

  He made up for this lapse as they drove through early-morning mists along the Southern Outlet and into the city. Although the weekly open-air market was in itself a primary tourist attraction, he said, the historic Salamanca warehouses, built of native stone between 1835 and 1860, had their own claim to fame.

  Protected by cliffs created when a new wharf was constructed and later named Prince’s Wharf to commemorate the visit in 1868 by Prince Alfred, the warehouses were once the commercial centre of Hobart Town, and still provided a stepping stone to the exploration of historic Battery Point, one of Tasmania’s most unique tourist areas.

  When they arrived, and during the expected struggle to find a parking space near the markets, Helen was struck by the beauty of the elderly buildings, but more so by the frenzied activity of the market itself. Sprawling through blocks of cobbled pavement which Dane told her was normally just parking for the commercial area, the market teemed with life and activity.

  She could see, as they strolled towards it, a kaleidoscope of booths and caravans selling everything from books to vegetables. Second-hand furniture, clothing, food and drink, arts and crafts were displayed seemingly without rhyme or reason, with the booths rising like islands from the sea of thronging early- morning shoppers that teemed around them.

  There is no possible way of staying together in this mess,’ Dane muttered in her ear. ‘I’ll meet you in an hour outside the Ball and Chain,’ pointing to a restaurant across the way. ‘And then, if you’re game to face the masses once again, we’ll make new arrangements. Okay?’

  Helen nodded, then plunged into the throng, letting herself be carried by the tide of shoppers and tourists as it swarmed along the pavement.

  The next hour passed in a moment. She found that much of what was on offer could only be called junk, but there were other stalls that definitely interested her. Only once during that time did she even catch a glimpse of Dane, head bent over the wares of a second-hand book stall.

  Helen also found the book stalls interesting, but it was
so crowded in the market that she found it impossible to really investigate the books on offer. Not, at any rate, without more pushing and shoving for position that she could be bothered with.

  Still, when she met Dane at the appointed time and place, she was flushed with excitement, an excitement generated in part by the sheer aliveness of the place, the bustle and the crowding and the voices.

  Dane’s face registered a tolerant amusement, perhaps tinged with boredom, but he merely smiled when she pointed first at herself, then at the throng behind her, and lifted one finger in the air. One more hour. Agreed. Helen slid back into the flow, this time with a definite purpose in mind.

  Even so, it took her fifteen minutes to work her way back to the one second-hand clothing stall she’d especially noticed, and even longer to fully investigate the astonishing find she’d noticed in passing.

  It was old, very old. A Victorian gown, she thought, but in amazingly good condition. The high-necked, many-buttoned bodice nipped to a tiny waist before flowing out again into the full skirt fashionable at the time. No bustle, she thought idly, and chuckled to herself as she held the garment before her, mentally calculating the fit. The dark, forest green colour that had first attracted her was flattering, and she could see where a few miniscule repairs would bring the garment back to life with relative ease. If it would fit!

  ‘It’s very fetching, love,’ grinned the hawker, himself resplendent in a costume mingling eras from Victorian to modem and looking more like some strange court jester than a weekend merchant. ‘I reckon you’ll have to have it.’

  ‘Not at this price, I won’t,’ she retorted gaily, instinctively realising that this man’s prices were negotiable, provided one had the nerve to haggle. ‘Besides, how can you expect me to buy something when there’s nowhere to try it on?’

  His ribald reply drew raised eyebrows from two older ladies passing, but Helen could only laugh at the man’s impudence; it was so totally in keeping with his costume.

  They haggled back and forth, cheerfully and without malice, for ten minutes before Helen finally agreed to pull the garment on over her street clothing. It wouldn’t give her a perfect judgment of fit, especially not with her own shirt under it, but finally she decided that if he’d drop the price a bit more she would take the chance.

  When she finally rejoined Dane for the second time, she had a paper-wrapped parcel tucked under one arm and was convinced that given the afternoon to work on it, she might even have the dress ready for the party being given that night by Marina’s mother.

  If I decide to go, she thought, having already tossed that particular issue over several times without resolution. All of her common sense cried out for her to plead a headache or any other excuse to avoid the party. She would only be out of place and, she knew only too well, made to feel it. But there was a mischievous imp inside that demanded equal time, demanded that she attend the party and do it with a style that might somehow mollify the humiliation she’d endured since meeting the elegant brunette.

  This dress, if only it fit as well as she hoped, would go a long way in the right direction. It had ... style; style and a sense of history. A sense of rightness, somehow.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  From Helen’s viewpoint, the party was immensely successful even before she arrived, The effect of the dress accounted for that.

  She’d spent all afternoon in a frenzy of repairing, washing and pressing the garment, then rearranging hair and make-up to match the effect created. And it had all worked!

  It was, she decided after staring almost with disbelief into the mirror, as if the dress had been created especially for her. It fitted perfectly, hugging her figure where that effect was intended, flowing like a cape of rich, dark moss below the hips. With her hair piled high and a minimum of make-up, her only jewellery an old brooch of her mother’s, she left her room to find Dane standing in the lounge, a drink in his hand and another, presumably for her, on the table beside him.

  He glanced up at her approach, raised one eyebrow in appreciation, then gave her a courtly bow as he handed over the drink,

  ‘Now that,’ he said, without a trace of anything but honest compliment, ‘is absolutely astonishing. Fantastic!’

  ‘It isn’t bad, is it?’ Helen replied, twirling in a perky little pirouette but being careful not to spill the drink in her hand. ‘I’m actually rather proud of myself; it came out much better than I’d expected.’

  ‘Well so you should be,’ he replied. ‘I’ve never seen you looking so elegant,’

  ‘And the same to you,’ Helen replied. Honestly, because it was true. Dane was indeed elegant in his dinner jacket, his white dress shirt gleaming against the dark tan of his skin.

  As they drove northwards towards Hobart, Helen leaned back into the softness of the car seat, glowing with an inner warmth at Dane’s obvious approval of the job she’d done on the dress. But it was Marina Cole’s reaction — when they arrived at the swank home in the trendy suburb of Sandy Bay — that capped Helen’s evening.

  ‘What a ... marvellously original outfit,’ Marina said upon greeting them upon her arrival. And the look in her eye said even more than the brittle tones of her voice. She didn’t like Helen, and didn’t like the dress even more, Helen knew. Just as she knew that nothing this woman might say or do tonight would be allowed to spoil her evening.

  ‘You look very elegant yourself,’ Helen responded, using honesty as her best defence and hoping she wouldn’t need any other. With her dark colouring, Marina’s choice of a flame-red gown gave the other woman a sultry, almost torrid look. Like a close-banked fire, Helen thought, not at all wanned by the analogy.

  When she met Marina’s mother, she could see where heredity had played a strong part in providing the raven-haired woman’s classic beauty. Only years differentiated between Marina and her mother when it came to the fine bone structure, the elegant carriage. But on first impressions, she thought it unlikely Marina had inherited her mother’s natural charm and graciousness. Her smile was warm and friendly, her attitude entirely one of welcome. Especially, Helen thought, for Dane.

  ‘You’ve become too much a stranger,’ Mrs Cole criticised in friendly tones as she led Dane and Helen round, introducing them to the various other guests. After a few moments, Helen found it no longer possible to keep track of the names or even the faces, but Dane seemed to know at least some of the other guests already.

  As they drifted casually from group to group, Mrs Cole having disappeared temporarily to greet new arrivals, Dane was welcomed warmly, especially by the ladies in the crowd. Several of the men, Helen was pleased to notice, seemed more inclined to pay attention to her. And just as well, she thought at one point, when all the guests had apparently arrived and Marina felt herself free to monopolise Dane entirely.

  She was rather surprised, some time later, when Marina, alone and seemingly quite deliberately so, approached and drew her to a quiet corner. The other woman’s attitude was too gracious, too friendly; Helen found herself immediately suspicious, and with good reason, she thought, once the supposedly subtle interrogation began.

  ‘I didn’t realise you’d known Dane for such a long time,’ Marina began. ‘And did you know his wife very well too?’

  ‘Fairly well,’ Helen replied, not really sure what reply was expected of her. Whatever, there was more to this line of questioning than met the eye, she thought, and determined to watch her replies carefully. What did Marina want? An entree into Dane’s taste in women? Surely not, Helen thought.

  ‘He must have cared for her a great deal,’ Marina continued, and all of Helen’s journalistic training was stirred by the ever-so careful shielding, the cautious choosing of words, inflection, nuance.

  ‘I think it would be fair to say she was the centre of his universe,’ Helen replied, choosing words carefully herself and totally alert to the reactions they might cause. ‘But, surely he’d have told you that himself?’

  Marina, the defender now, managed without
a flicker of muscle to appear nonchalant about her reply. ‘Of course,’ she said, ‘although to be honest he seldom mentions her. I thought it was ... because she and 1 are ... somewhat alike?’

  And she hadn’t meant for the statement to emerge as a question, Helen realised. Indeed, Marina probably didn’t realise it had. But Helen did! In her ears the question mark at the end was louder than the words ahead of it.

  She’s fishing, Helen thought, and wondered only briefly why. Obviously it was because Dane hadn’t, and from her own knowledge of him, wouldn’t have discussed his dead wife with Marina Cole or anyone else who hadn’t known Vivian personally.

  To Dane, such action would be almost unthinkable, unless of course things between he and Marina had progressed to the point where such confidences had a place. And if that were the case, Helen immediately realised, the brunette wouldn’t be asking her these questions at all.

  But how to answer? Anything she said now might be wrong, either by breaking confidence with Dane or by deliberately antagonising one of his friends. No matter what she said, it could so easily be taken wrongly.

  ‘I ... well, I really couldn’t say,’ she finally stammered, ‘She was very special to me, you see. Almost an older sister, in some respects, and I’m ... I’m afraid I couldn’t ... well, I couldn’t think in terms of such comparisons.’

  ‘Of course; I understand completely,’ Marina replied, but the unholy glow in her eyes seemed to Helen anything but understanding or compassionate. She found herself suppressing a shiver, knowing that somehow she’d slipped up, somehow she’d made the wrong reply, and that somehow she’d pay the price for not thinking more quickly, more clearly. Probably, she thought, the price would be paid before this night was over. And the party began to lose its glow even before Marina’s next question jangled warning bells Helen couldn’t possibly disregard.