Permission To Love. PENNY JORDAN

that without her father’s money Jeremy would not want to marry her, but that was not something she did not already know. What did Lucas want her to do? she wondered wrathfully. Fall in love with someone totally unsuitable just so that he could have the pleasure of pointing out her folly to her and reminding her of her father’s wishes?

      Of course it was only natural that Lucas should be bitter and angry at Gwendolin’s desertion, but why take it out on her? She would have plenty of opportunity to talk to him over dinner, she reminded herself, wishing again that Jeremy had been able to accompany her. If Lucas could see and talk to Jeremy himself he would realise the rightness of her decision. Perhaps there was no excitement or deeply intense emotion in her relationship with Jeremy, but there was liking and mutual respect that would build a good life together. Sexual chemistry was all very well in its way, but Lindsay wasn’t sure if she would trust such volatile emotions. Startlingly, for the first time it struck her that the reason she might never have experienced intense physical desire was because she had deliberately programmed herself against doing so. She could remember quite vividly the feeling of self disgust and shame she had experienced when Gwendolin had accused her of wanting Lucas as a man and not as a brother. Her seventeen year old self had been shocked by the older woman’s vitriolic claim and had instantly denied it, but she could not deny that Lucas was an extremely attractive man. Even just now, despite his bitter anger, she had sensed the magnetic pull of his personality; the heady, breathless sensation of no longer being quite in control of herself or her reactions.

      She was here to inform Lucas of her impending engagement, not to daydream about the past, she reminded herself severely, opening her wardrobe and surveying the clothes she had brought with her. She had come prepared for all contingencies, knowing Gwendolin’s love of entertaining, but it seemed hardly appropriate to wear an evening dress simply to dine with Lucas. She frowned over a tweed skirt and toning silk shirt, dismissing them as not dressy enough and eventually decided on the soft lilac Jean Muir dress she had owned for several seasons and which remained a firm favourite, the excellence of the fabric and its cut ensuring that it was suitable for a whole host of occasions.

      The colour suited her, emphasising the delicacy of her pale English complexion, the long lean line of the dress with its swing of pleats from the hip, comfortable and yet at the same time subtly feminine. Brushing her hair thoroughly she secured it in a loose chignon, on impulse putting in her ears the pearl and diamond studs which had been Lucas’ eighteenth birthday present to her. She wasn’t wearing Jeremy’s ring. He wanted to present it to her formally next weekend when they went to visit his parents but for some reason tonight she would have welcomed its presence on her finger. Why? Because she felt that wearing it might convince Lucas of the rightness of their engagement. She didn’t need his permission to marry she reminded herself … Jeremy was everything her father had wanted for her in a husband. Sighing faintly she sprayed her wrists lightly with perfume and then remembering the housekeeper’s absence, decided that if they were to eat dinner, she’d better go downstairs and see about preparing it.

      In the event there wasn’t a good deal of preparation necessary. The housekeeper had left everything ready in the fridge, and all Lindsay was required to do was to heat it up in the oven. She was a good cook who enjoyed exercising her skill. When she was married to Jeremy she felt sure she would have plenty of opportunity to do so. He would not want her to work; he had already told her that much and when, as was eventually planned, he took over the running of the estate from his father, she would have plenty to occupy her time. Until then she would be expected to occupy herself preparing clever little dinner parties for Jeremy’s friends and clients, shopping … gossiping … having children. It was the accepted mode of wifely behaviour amongst Jeremy’s set.

      It seemed silly when there was just the two of them for them to dine formally in the vastness of the dining room, so instead Lindsay placed cutlery and glasses on the much smaller table of the little breakfast room just off the kitchen. She had always liked this room which caught the early morning sun and although Gwen had completely altered the decor and furnishings, standing by the window observing the view she had observed so often as a child, brought back a stream of half-submerged memories.

      ‘Wondering how you can get your own way?’

      She hadn’t heard Lucas come in, and she turned tensely at the sound of his voice, instantly aware of the clean male scent of him … of the fact that his hair was still faintly damp from his shower, and that his body, beneath its civilized sheath of sophisticated clothes, moved with all the predatory grace of the hunter.

      ‘No … as a matter of fact, I was remembering how I fell in the lake the year I was twelve, and how you fished me out.’

      It was no less than the truth, and just for a moment his mouth softened slightly and she was almost able to persuade herself that he was once again the old Lucas whom she had loved so much … and who, she had once thought, loved her in return.

      ‘Yes … You don’t know how close you came to being walloped. You’d been expressly forbidden to ride your bike along the lake path.’

      The bike in question—a brand new two wheeler had been a birthday present and she had desperately wanted to try it out. It had been raining heavily for several days though and the lakeside path had been dangerously muddy. She had known all this, but still she had defied Lucas’ suggestion that she wait to try the bike until he could go with her. She had paid for her defiance with a thorough soaking and a bad fright … Lucas had been furious … she remembered grimacing faintly, and she could well remember sensing how angry he was with her. But he had taught her to ride … and then she had known instinctively that beneath the anger there was a deep vein of caring. Where had it all gone?

      ‘Dinner’s ready,’ she told him, forcing herself back to the present. ‘If you sit down I’ll go and get it for you.’

      ‘Buttering me up, Lindsay?’ he asked unpleasantly, and then as though sensing her lack of comprehension he added drily. ‘I’m not used to being waited on these days. Dinner is normally a meal I manage to grab somewhere between ‘phone calls. No doubt in the ordered household you intend to run after your marriage, things will be very different. Why are you marrying him, Lindsay?’

      He sounded so derisive that she almost lost her own temper. ‘Because I want to.’ She held his gaze levelly, and then asked softly, ‘What do you expect me to say Lucas? Because we’re madly in love with one another? I can’t pretend to emotions I don’t feel, but I can honestly say that I don’t trust that sort of sexual fascination … it dies … and I don’t believe it to be a good foundation for an enduring marriage …’

      ‘And you of course, have a vast wealth of experience,’ he mocked her suddenly savage in the way he looked and sounded. His fingers closed painfully around her wrist as he yanked her round so that the light from the window fell sharply across her pale face. ‘Just how often have you experienced sexual desire to be able to talk so knowledgeably about it Lindsay? How often have you been savaged by the sharp teeth of frustration … How often have you lain alone in bed at night, burning up with the need for another human being.’