It was eerily quiet here with only the distant hum of the city traffic, as if they were in a secret world of their own. There was no movement of boat or barge, no shunting of trains on the tracks, no work of any kind taking place at this time of night. Alec turned off the engine, and the car headlights, and they both sat unmoving, staring out into the velvet darkness.
There wasn’t much room in the small two-seater and Carmina was acutely aware of his warm presence beside her. She could smell the musky scent of his aftershave, a welcome change from the stink of Brylcream that all the guys wore on their hair, mingling with the leather of the seats. It was an exhilarating combination and seemed to be having a strange effect upon her senses in the confines of the car. Still he made no move.
Carmina smiled to herself and thought, I’ll count to ten. If he hasn’t touched me by then, I’ll get out of the car and walk home.
His voice came out of the shadows, low and husky. ‘I think you’re hurting, Carmina. I think you’ve been rejected by someone, and that’s why you’re here with me now. You know, of course, that I’m far too old for you. I’m thirty-five, and what are you? Sixteen, seventeen?’
Carmina interrupted him, the sound of her own heartbeat loud in her ears. ‘Eighteen.’ Another lie, but what did she care? If he didn’t kiss her soon, she thought she might scream. ‘What has age got to do with anything?’
Her eyes were growing accustomed to the gloom but she sensed rather than saw him shift in his seat and turn towards her.
‘I know how it feels to be rejected, to be hurting inside. I’ve always thought myself to be a bit of a square peg in a round hole, trying to fit in. I suspect you feel the same. Parents, sisters, boy friends, how can they possibly appreciate how you suffer? Did everyone make too much fuss over Gina? Did that make you feel invisible?’
How come he knew so much about her, she thought, startled by his perspicacity.
‘You’re very good at putting on an act of defiance, Carmina, but I know that deep inside there’s a vulnerable young girl simply longing to be loved and needed. Nobody quite understands me either.’
She’d never heard him talk like this before, never imagined he could be so sensitive, so understanding.
A warm hand circled her knee, slid up to her thigh. Carmina caught her breath. She felt the softness of his mouth on her throat, his lips searching for the pulse in the little hollow of her shoulder. His fingers unpinned her suspenders, one by one, and slid each stocking down the smooth silk of bare skin. Then he was searching for her panties, pulling her down in the seat, his breath ragged, as was hers.
She couldn’t think beyond the touch of his exploring fingers, the sensations he was sending cascading through her. Her limbs felt flaccid, weak, and an overwhelming need was growing inside her, a hunger that only he could satisfy. The memory of that other time when he’d possessed her against her will, quite gone from her mind. Whatever it was he did to her, she wanted more.
She wanted to tear off his clothes, to scratch and snarl and force him to give her whatever was necessary to make this ache go away.
And when finally he did, she cried out loud with relief. Her last coherent thought was that this would show Luc Fabriani he wasn’t the only man to appreciate her.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Mavis never went near the little house next to the pawn shop. She seemed to have washed her hands of the entire enterprise, perhaps realising Chris and Amy’s minds were made up and it was fruitless to try and change them. Nevertheless, she deeply resented her husband’s long absences from home.
Thomas, of course, welcomed any excuse to escape the claustrophobia of life behind the baker’s shop, particularly of an evening when it was too dark and cold to sit in his little hut on the allotment.
‘You aren’t going round there again, are you?’ she would say as he reached for his jacket. ‘You’re never away.’
‘There’s a great deal still to be done and we’re running out of time, at least Amy is. That babby is busting to be born.’
‘I really don’t see the rush. Amy can have the baby here, I’ve already told her as much.’
‘She wants to have it in the nursing home, as you well know.’
‘I didn’t find it necessary to go to any
nursing home
when I had Chris.’
‘Things have changed for the better. They take more precautions these days, and a good thing too. Leave ‘em be, Mavis. They have their own lives to lead and must make their own decisions.’
‘That’s all very well in theory,’ Mavis retorted, shocked that he should dare to disagree with her. ‘But only if the decisions they make are the right ones, and so far I’ve seen little evidence of that.’
Thomas sighed, put on his flat cap, picked up the bucket of white distemper he’d prepared, and left. Arguing with Mavis was always a pointless exercise. He had a couple of hours to spare, time enough to give the back-yard walls a quick coat and make it all clean and ship-shape. Then when summer came there’d be somewhere clean and decent for Amy to put the baby out in the pram. His first grandchild, eeh, he couldn’t wait. He didn’t care what it was, girl or boy, he’d be made up either way.
Marc had decided that it would be for the best if Patsy sold the hat stall. ‘It was less of a problem when Annie had been available to keep an eye on the accounts, even if the poor lady had been confined to the house through sickness. But now she is dead, the responsibility would be too great. It would be too much for you on your own.’
‘I don’t see it as a responsibility, and I may not necessarily be on my own. There’s still Clara.’ Patsy felt vaguely irritated by his concern, even though he was only thinking of her. ‘Anyway, I shall leave any decisions till after the funeral?’
It rained all day with even the heavens weeping for this feisty old lady. And, despite Annie never having had a good word to say for anyone, half of Champion Street turned out to pay their respects.
Clara was humbled by their support. ‘Annie never believed that anyone liked her very much. But then she wasn’t the easiest person to get along with, far too brusque for most people’s sensibilities.’
Patsy smiled and said nothing, recalling only too well the tall, stiff-backed woman with the cropped, prematurely grey hair, her uncompromising standards and unbending manner. She remembered the many fiery exchanges they’d enjoyed over the years, and the gradual thaw that had set in when Annie had begun to see that this stroppy young orphan might have some good qualities after all. How at first she’d constantly complained about the noise Patsy made, and then bought her a record player. How she’d threatened to turn her out of the house and then offered her a home for life.
The vicar was commendably brief, perhaps aware that Annie would still be keeping a close watch as she had so often done in life, speaking quite sharply to him if she thought he’d overrun.
Friends returned with Clara and Patsy to Number 22 for the wake. Big Molly Poulson from next door was there, together with her daughter, Amy, who looked as if she might give birth and produce the next generation before the day was out. Marc was by Patsy’s side, of course, as were Papa and Momma Bertalone, who’d always admired Annie for the courage she’d shown during the war. Winnie Holmes had never missed a good funeral yet, although Barry, her husband, had for some reason elected not to attend.
Jimmy Ramsay brought a plate of sausages for the repast. Joe Southworth and his wife Irma contributed one of her famous cakes, although they weren’t speaking and addressed comments to each other via various friends. Even Belle Garside popped in briefly to pay her respects. All had known Annie Higginson and felt the sharp edge of her tongue on more than one occasion, yet all were present to see that she had a good send-off.
Clara looked proud or desolate by turn, depending on who she was speaking to. Then she would disappear for a few private moments before coming back all bright-eyed and bravely smiling. Patsy wept a few tears herself during the course of the afternoon, so was not in the mood for Marc to again harass her on the subject of her own future, the moment they were alone.
They’d escaped to a quiet corner of the Dog and Duck. With its grimy exterior, hardly discernable from the once glossy back paint of the doors and window-frames, and an interior that stank of smoke, strong beer and stale sweat, the pub was nonetheless a favourite meeting point for the residents of Champion Street. Marc bought Patsy a welcome shandy and a pint of bitter for himself, then set about laying down the law yet again.
‘Why would I want to sell?’ Patsy interrupted when she’d heard enough of this stuck record. ‘I love working on the hat stall. I even kid myself that I’m really rather good at what I do. Apart from anything else, it’s my livelihood.’
Marc quietly pointed out that earning a living would cease to be a problem for her, once they were married.
Patsy’s eyes flashed. ‘And why would that be? Because you expect me to turn into a frumpy little housewife who devotes all her time to wiping down her formica work surfaces and baking cakes? I don’t think that’s quite me, do you?’
Marc smiled. ‘Perhaps not, but I live in hope. I rather like the idea of you in an apron, breathlessly waiting for me to step over the threshold each evening.’
Patsy punched him, though not too hard. ‘Huh, every man’s fantasy. It won’t happen, not unless I have a rolling pin in me hand.’
‘A man can dream. Still, you might at least tell Clara that you’d have no objection to
her
selling it, should she wish to. She oughtn’t to feel obliged to hang on to it just for your benefit. I mean, maybe she too feels it would be too much for her now that Annie’s gone, and be glad of the chance to be rid of the responsibility.’
Patsy was thoughtful for a moment. ‘If Clara wants out of the business that’s her decision, and I wouldn’t dream of stopping her. Although I might offer to buy it off her, assuming I could borrow the money.’
‘What?’ Marc looked appalled. ‘You wouldn’t?’
‘I might, why not? Anyway, I doubt that will happen. I believe Clara will be glad of the distraction. She’ll need something to occupy her mind besides grieving for Annie in the weeks and months ahead. And she too still needs to earn a living. Life goes on, as they say.’
Marc instantly let the subject drop, as if he didn’t like the turn the conversation had taken. But he’d made it very clear that, in his opinion, she was working far too hard already and the situation could only get worse in the months to come.
Patsy was troubled by this. He didn’t seem to want a wife with anything else in her life but him. He wanted her waiting at home with his tea on the table, his son cooing sweetly in his cot, and for her to have the energy and time to devote herself exclusively to his needs. What man wouldn’t want that? But was it realistic? Was it even fair? Why couldn’t he accept her as she was, instead of wanting to change her?
One morning Mavis spotted Thomas coming out of Belle's Café. She instantly marched over, face like thunder. ‘I thought you were working on our Chris’s house? What were you doing in there talking to that hussy?’
‘I were a bit peckish like,’ Thomas said, his cheeks going quite pink with guilt, as if he were a naughty boy caught doing something he shouldn’t.
‘And you don’t have a perfectly good wife to come home to, I suppose?’ Mavis demanded, folding her arms across her heaving bosom.
‘I don’t like to bother you when I know you’ve just got the place all ship-shape and tidy. Anyroad, it were only a ten minute break, for a brew and a pie.’
‘Pie indeed, in the middle of the morning? I never heard the like. You’ve already had a decent breakfast which I cooked for you at seven.’
‘Aye, I know, but it’s hungry work, plastering.’ Recognising his mistake, Thomas attempted to back-peddle. ‘It weren’t so much a pie, more a toasted currant tea cake, just a snack like to keep me going.’ But it was too late. Her expression was grim.
‘Cutting down your working hours at the bakery is doing you no good at all. Being at a loose end is making you eat too much.’
‘I’m not at a loose end, Mavis, I’m working on our Chris’s place. It’s hard graft.’
‘Are you suggesting I don’t feed you properly?’
‘Nay, I’m saying nowt o’ t’sort.’ Thomas knew he was getting into deep water, but for the life in him couldn’t think how to extricate himself. Mavis’s breakfasts were never very reliable. It could be the whole works: bacon, sausage and fried egg, or a slice of thin toast and a dollop of runny scrambled egg, all depending on her mood. Belle, however, understood about a working man’s appetite and had never let him down yet.
But then she understood other appetites as well, which was the main problem so far as Mavis was concerned.
‘Since you’re so
peckish
of a morning, you’d better come home at eleven for coffee and a biscuit,’ Mavis snapped. ‘It will be ready and waiting for you. See that you’re not late.’
‘Yes, love.’
Watching this heated exchange from the window of her little café which looked out over Champion Street, Belle let out a sympathetic sigh. ‘Poor chap,’ she thought. ‘Mavis never gives him a minute’s peace.’
Thomas had rarely called in her café at one time, but he’d been popping in every morning for weeks now. Generally he’d ask for a large mug of strong tea and a pork pie or sausage roll, just to keep him going till lunch-time, he said. Sometimes he’d push the boat out and have the full English breakfast. That would be on the days when his wife wasn’t speaking to him. Mavis always took out her revenge on her husband’s stomach.