‘My mother made them for me,’ he said, seeing her raised brows. ‘I don’t think she’s very good at that sort of thing.’
Sylvie folded them carefully. ‘Then she must love you very much, to have made such an effort.’ His feet were narrow, the arches high. She stood up and began to unbuckle his polished crossover belt. Then she unbuttoned the brass buttons on his tunic, flattening her palms over the broad sweep of his chest as she eased it from him.
Robbie kissed her, lifting her almost off her feet. ‘I think you should take something off now. Let me return the favour.’
She stood motionless as he unfastened her dress, pressing little kisses onto her spine as he undid each button, his fingers warm on her skin as he slid it over her arms.
Another kiss, deeper than the last, and she removed his trousers carefully over his erection. She was breathing erratically, her skin flushing hot then cold. Another kiss. He cupped her breasts, teasing her nipples into aching hardness with his thumbs. His tongue touched hers, retreated, touched hers. She tugged his undershirt over his head. He kicked off his underwear. She caught her breath, staring unashamedly at his body in the sunlight filtering through the thin curtains. Pale Highland skin, muscles that were so close to the surface she could see them move when he breathed. He was sleekly lithe, his chest smattered with dark auburn hair arrowing down to his belly. Long legs. Strong thighs, like a runner. And...
Sylvie wrapped her hand around him, relishing the shudder that her touch caused. Silken skin. So hard. She stroked him. He shuddered again, then he kissed her again, and his kiss took her desire and ratcheted it up a notch, so that she was no longer just hot but burning.
He picked her up and set her down on the bed. He unbuttoned her chemise. It was new, cream coloured to match her knickers. He barely seemed to notice, so intent was he on tasting the skin beneath. He kissed her neck. He kissed her shoulders. He kissed the valley between her breasts, the soft undersides, and then he sucked her nipples. She was moaning, breathing erratically, her fingers plucking at his hair, at his skin, but he would not be hurried.
He eased her onto her back and pulled off her knickers. Kissing her belly. Kneeling between her legs. Easing them apart. Kissing her thighs, her knees, her ankles as he removed her stockings. Nuzzling the pulse at her ankle. Who would have thought there was so much sensation scattered about her body? Then back up again to the crease at the top of her thighs. Then between her legs, his tongue delicately parting her, delicately delving into her, making her arch up, cry out.
He pulled her towards him, easing her back down on the bed, and continued his delicious torment. She was climbing, tensing, coiling. His tongue. His fingers. His mouth. She was hot, so hot. And still he licked, stroked, sucked, teased, taking her almost there, letting her fall back again, until she let out a guttural cry and began to climb again, and he sensed there was no stopping her. Her entire body tensed, then seemed to split apart as she climaxed, yet he held her still, bringing it back when it began to ebb again, and then again, until she thought she could not bear any more, and put a restraining hand on the top of his head.
He was smiling up at her. She wrapped her arms and legs around him and kissed him greedily. His smile faded, desire making his face tense as he slipped on protection. On her back again, her arms still around his waist, finally he entered her. Slowly. Then deeper. She found that there was more she could bear after all, as he began to thrust, each stroke rousing her again in a new way, a different way, reaching deeper, until he, too, got to that unstoppable moment, when he thrust harder, faster, and it took him, too, and Sylvie with him, over, up, over, flying and soaring, to a place where there was only them, and nothing, absolutely nothing else.
* * *
They spent the afternoon in bed, making all sorts of love, taking their time, as if there was all the time in the world for their bodies to learn all there was to know about each other. In between, they dozed, talked, kissed. Kisses with no purpose but kissing, Robbie said, and then almost immediately proved himself wrong. They ate the cheese and bread in bed. ‘A naked picnic,’ Robbie said. ‘I’ve never been on one of those before.’
‘Have you ever swum naked—maybe in one of your Scottish locks?’
‘Lochs.’ Robbie shivered as he corrected her. ‘Trust me Sylvie, the water’s cold enough to ensure that even the sight of you naked on the shore would have no effect whatsoever.’
‘What about the sight of me naked in bed?’ she teased, looking at him over the rim of her glass.
Robbie took it from her, setting it down on the bedside table. ‘Now, that’s a different matter entirely. See for yourself.’
Sylvie laughed, made utterly brazen in the wild exhilaration of his presence and their lovemaking, sated and at the same time already aroused again. She leaned over him, trailing her breasts on his chest. ‘I think I will,’ she said, and began to kiss her way down his stomach.
* * *
That evening they ate in the splendour of Le Grande Véfour near the Palais Royal. The restaurant where Napoleon had taken Josephine to dine was sumptuous, a riot of gilded wood, gold leaf, delicately painted cornicing, plush crimson banquettes, gleaming mirrors and tiled columns depicting various semi-naked gods and goddesses.
Sylvie, horribly aware that her only evening gown was a very far cry from haute couture, eyed the menu nervously. ‘There are no prices,’ she said.
Robbie grinned. ‘I have them. Trust me, you don’t want to see them.’
‘We shouldn’t have come here. I would have been quite happy to eat at Le Chat Noir
.
’
Robbie put down his menu and leaned across the table to take her hand. ‘First of all, stop fidgeting with your dress. I told you before we left your apartment that you look divine, and I meant it. Second, stop worrying about the cost. Apart from the fact that I’ve been stuck in the trenches with nothing to spend my pay on for nearly two years, I’m actually quite well off.’
‘You would need to be rich to afford this place, I think,’ Sylvie said, sneaking a covert glance at the woman in the next booth, who was positively dripping diamonds.
‘Well, I am, rather, as it happens,’ Robbie replied, looking slightly abashed. ‘I inherited a fair bit of money from my grandfather, and my business—well, it’s actually quite a large concern.’
She wondered why it hadn’t registered before. The signs had all been there. The cut of his uniform. The references to his school. And the castle. How could she have forgotten the castle? ‘Why didn’t you say?’
‘It’s hardly the sort of thing one drops into the conversation. Besides, I can’t believe that it matters, except that I can easily afford to treat you to a posh meal.’
‘Which will probably cost as much as I earn in a year waitressing.’
Robbie pressed her hand. ‘I rather took my life for granted before. I had no idea how privileged I was. It doesn’t matter a hoot now, my money. All that matters is that we’re here, and the food is reputed to be excellent, and as far as I am concerned, the company—by which I mean you, Sylvie—could not be better. Let’s order, I’m starving.’
She was content to let him choose, impressed by his expertise when he did. ‘You certainly know your way around a menu.’
‘My sister would say I’m a show-off. I saw her briefly last week, I haven’t had a chance to tell you about it. Flora is one of the few people I know whom the war has changed for the better.’
‘How so?’
Robbie frowned. ‘She was always a wee bit timid. You know, happy to do what she was told, not too much to say for herself. Now, though she plays it down, she’s a bit of a force to be reckoned with. She’s achieved wonders with the work she’s doing behind the lines. I can understand why my mother’s a bit in awe of her these days.’
‘Her husband is serving here in France, isn’t he?’
‘Geraint. Fine chap. I’ve never seen anyone so happy as Flora was on her wedding day.’ Robbie took a sip of his martini. ‘This war has a lot to answer for. They’ve never lived together, never had any sort of married life. One night of a honeymoon, then nothing but days snatched here and there since. It’s not right.’
For the first time that day, the spectre of war had cast its shadow over them, Sylvie thought as she took a sip of her own aperitif. ‘You think their marriage was a mistake?’
‘Yes, I do.’
‘Have you never been in love?’ Sylvie asked.
Robbie shook his head. ‘I thought I might be once, with a girl called Annabel. She was pretty, fun to be around. My parents liked her, which was a bonus. You’ve no idea the fuss my mother made when Flora married the son of a Welsh miner.’
‘What happened—with Annabel, I mean?’
Robbie shrugged. ‘The war. I stopped writing. She found someone else. Though I think it would have come to a natural conclusion, anyway. The fact is, we didn’t care for each other half as much as we thought we did. We sort of fell into it, really. Everyone thought we were suited, and we liked each other, and there was nothing stopping us, and—you know the kind of thing.’
Sylvie smiled sadly. ‘Yes, I do. I thought I was in love once,’ she said. ‘A friend of Henri’s. We grew up together. We liked each other. We liked the idea of falling in love. For a while, I thought we might get married, then he met someone else, and instead of being jealous I realised I was glad.’
Robbie grinned. ‘Not as glad as I am,’ he said, taking her hand again, ‘because otherwise you wouldn’t be my best girl.’
The teasing look was back in his eye. ‘Best girl,’ she said, repeating the unfamiliar English phrase with a smile.
‘Very best,’ Robbie said, kissing her fingertips again. ‘Very different, and very best. It’s not like how it was with Annabel, Sylvie. You and I, I mean. You do know that, don’t you?’
It was the way he was looking at her that did it, that mixture of teasing and tenderness, the hint of anxiety in his tone that told her how very much it mattered, and made her see, with a shock, just how very blind she had been. She loved him. She had actually fallen in love with him.
For a few precious moments the knowledge made her feel quite euphoric, but the implications were terrifying. She would not deal with them. Not tonight. Not yet. She wanted to bask for just a little while in the glow. She wanted to savour the joy of just being with him. She loved him so much. What harm was there in pretending, just for a few hours, that it meant she would be happy with him forever after.
‘Sylvie? You do believe me, don’t you?’
She smiled across the table at him, gazing into his beautiful eyes, the colour of the sea in winter. ‘I do. And you believe me, too, don’t you, when I tell you that nothing has ever been like this for me, too?
Nothing
, Robbie. Do you believe me?’
‘I do,’ he said, taking her hand. ‘I really do.’
Chapter Eight
R
obbie lay awake, watching the dawn light filter in through the thin curtains. Sylvie was sleeping on her side, her delightfully curved rear brushing his thighs. He had dozed, but had not dared sleep for fear of dreaming. They came to him in dreams, the men he had lost, and the friends, too, a long line of them, snaking on and on into the distance. He could never see their faces, had only a blurred sense of their presence as they solemnly filed past him, rather horribly like one of the parades they used to have at school in honour of some visiting dignitary. He didn’t know if he cried out during those dreams. So commonplace, disturbed nights were, that no one ever mentioned them until they got to the stage when the poor lad had to be carted off. Shell shock. Not that they were allowed to call it that these days.
Only another twelve hours or so and he’d be on the train back there. He didn’t want to think about it. He hadn’t thought about it once since he got here, but now he couldn’t stop. It was a habit with him, with all the officers, to be matter-of-fact about the prospect of death. He never thought about surviving the war. Never thought about the things he would never have. A wife. Children. And now, in a moment of horrible clarity, which struck him not like a blinding light but like a sharp blade, he knew that it was this woman sleeping beside him he wanted to be their mother. This was the woman he wanted to marry. This woman that he loved so deeply he couldn’t understand how he hadn’t realised it before now.
He allowed himself a few more brief moments of dreaming. Sylvie beside him at the altar. Sylvie at Glen Massan as it was before the war. Sylvie in his bed in his flat in London. Sylvie in five years’ time, in ten years’ time, twenty. Smiling at him lovingly. Holding his hand. Telling him that there was no one like him, nothing like this. Nothing.
He roused himself when it became unimaginably painful. Determined to make the most of the day and escape these melancholy thoughts, he suggested they take a trip to Versailles.
* * *
It was cold, but bright and sunny. The famous fountains were still, the gardens rather sad and bare with little sign of foliage, but they spent a pleasant few hours wandering hand in hand around the grounds before lunching at a café in the town, talking of anything but the fact that he had to go back to the trenches. Time played games, co-operatively dragging its heels for a while before leaping forwards, two hours in a single bound.
It was late afternoon when they returned to Paris. As the light began to fade, it became impossible to cling to the illusion that the clock was not ticking inexorably towards that last hour.
They arrived back at the Rue des Martyrs in a subdued mood. The two days that had once seemed to stretch before them endlessly were almost at an end, and the things they had not said hung over them like a leaden cloud. ‘When do you have to leave?’ Sylvie asked.
Robbie looked at his watch. ‘Soon.’ He drew her into his arms, breathing in the scent of her. It would be a mistake, to make love to her again. It meant too much now. How had it crept up on him, this sudden all-enveloping significance? It would be best if he left now. Yet his lips sought hers hungrily, and she pressed herself against him urgently, and his body responded, blood rushing to his groin, pulses quickening in anticipation as she ran her fingers through his hair. She tasted so sweet and he wanted her so much. Once more. Just once more.