The Virgin Bride

‘Come in?’ she repeated, as though she could not make sense of his request. He hadn’t been to visit since her aunt’s death. He’d attended the funeral, but not the wake, an emergency having called him back to the surgery. She probably thought that their friendship—such as it was—had died with her aunt’s death.

‘There’s something I want to ask you,’ he added.

‘Oh…oh, all right.’ She stepped back and turned into the light.

Jason followed, frowning. She looked more composed than she had the day of the funeral, but still very pale, and far too thin. Her cheeks were sunken in, making her green eyes seem huge. Her dress hung on her, and her hair looked dull, not at all like the shining cap of golden curls which usually framed her delicately pretty face.

It came to him as he glanced around the spotless but bare kitchen that she probably hadn’t been eating properly since her aunt’s death. The fruit bowl in the centre of the kitchen table was empty, and so was the biscuit jar. Maybe she didn’t have much money to spend on food. Funerals and wakes did not come cheap. Had it taken all her spare cash to bury Ivy?

Damn, but he wished he’d thought of that before. He should not have stayed away. He should have offered some assistance, seen to it she was looking after herself. What kind of doctor was he? What kind of friend? What kind of man?

The kind who thought he could bowl up here out of the blue and ask this grief-stricken young woman to marry him, simply because it suited his needs. He hadn’t stopped to really consider her needs, had he? He’d arrogantly thought he could fill them, whatever they were.

God, he hadn’t changed at all, he realised disgustedly. He was still as greedy and selfish as ever. When would he learn? Would he ever really change? Hell, he hoped so. He really did.

But knowing what he was didn’t change his mind about his mission here tonight. He decided he was still a good catch for a girl whose circumstances weren’t exactly top drawer.

‘I’ll get us some coffee, shall I?’ she said dully, and without waiting for an answer moved off to fill the electric kettle and plug it in.

It wasn’t the first time she’d made him coffee. She’d done the honours every time he’d come to visit Ivy. She already knew he liked his coffee in a mug, white with one sugar, so she didn’t have to ask.

Jason closed the back door behind him and sat down at the old Formica-topped table, silently watching her move about the kitchen, seeing again what he’d seen that first time. The unconscious grace of her movements. The elegance of her long neck. The daintiness of her figure.

Once again, he felt the urge to touch her, to stroke that tempting neck, to somehow seduce her to his suddenly quite strong desire, a desire as strong and almost as compelling as he’d once felt for Adele.

Yet she was nothing like Adele, whose dark and very striking beauty had a sophisticated and hard-edged glamour. Adele’s long legs and gym-honed body had looked incredibly sexy in those wicked little black suits she wore to work. And what she did for a red lace teddy had to be seen to be believed.

Somehow Jason couldn’t see Emma dressed in either red or black, or having the body to carry off the kind of sexy lingerie Adele had been addicted to.

But, for all that, he found the delicacy of her shape incredibly sensual, as he did the feminine free flowing dresses she favoured. He imagined she probably donned long frilly-necked nighties for bed. But he wouldn’t mind that. There was something perversely alluring in a woman covering up her body. It gave her a sense of mystery, a touch-me-not quality that was challenging and arousing.

Jason realised he had no idea what Emma might look like naked, other than slender. Her breasts looked adequate in clothing, but who could say what was bra and what was not? Not that he found small breasts a turn-off. He liked tiny, exquisitely formed things.

She was petite in height as well, head and shoulders shorter than his own six feet two, unlike Adele, who in heels matched him inch for inch. To be honest, he rather liked Emma having to tip back her head to look up at him. He liked everything about her. And, whilst he had no doubt now that he was still a selfish man, Jason vowed never to do anything to deliberately hurt her, anything at all.

‘Sorry I haven’t got any biscuits or cake to offer you,’ she apologised as she carried the two mugs over to the table and sat down opposite him. ‘I haven’t felt like shopping. Or cooking. Or eating, for that matter.’

‘But you should eat, Emma,’ he couldn’t help advising. ‘You don’t want to get sick, do you?’

A wan smile flitted across her face, as though she didn’t think her getting sick was a matter which would overly trouble her at that moment. Jason frowned at the awful thought she might do something silly. She had to be very down and depressed after her aunt’s death.

Yet he could not think of the right thing to say. It seemed his newly acquired bedside manner had suddenly deserted him.

They both sat for a few moments, silently sipping their coffee, till Emma put hers down and looked over at him.

‘What did you want to ask me?’ she said in that same flat, bleak voice. ‘Was it something about Aunt Ivy?’

She wasn’t really looking at him, he noted. He might have been wearing anything, for all she cared. Her lack of interest in his swanky suit and spruced-up appearance didn’t do much for his already waning confidence.

‘No,’ he replied. ‘No, it wasn’t about Ivy. It was about you, Emma.’

‘Me?’

The soft surprise in her voice and eyes showed she was taken aback by his displaying any personal interest in her at all. But he’d gone too far in his mind to back down now. ‘What are you going to do, Emma,’ he asked gently, ‘now that Ivy’s gone?’

She sighed heavily. ‘I have no idea.’

‘Do you have any other relatives?’

‘Some cousins in Queensland. But I don’t know them very well. In fact, I haven’t seen them for years.’

‘You wouldn’t want to move away from Tindley, anyway,’ he argued. ‘All your friends are here.’

And me.

‘Yes,’ she said, and sighed another deep and very weary sigh. ‘I suppose I’ll open the shop next week, and just…go on as before.’

Go on as before…

Did that mean waste her life waiting for Dean bloody Ratchitt to return? Didn’t she know any relationship with him was a dead loss, even if he did come back?

‘I see,’ Jason said. ‘And what about the future, Emma? A pretty girl like you must be planning on marrying one day.’

‘Marrying?’

He saw the pain in her face and wanted to kill that bastard. ‘You would make some man a wonderful wife, Emma,’ he said sincerely.

She flushed and looked down into her coffee. ‘I doubt that,’ she muttered.

‘Then don’t. I think any man you agreed to marry would have to be very lucky indeed.’

His words sent her head jerking up, and Jason saw the dawning of understanding over his visit. Shock filled her eyes.

‘Yes,’ he said before his courage failed him. ‘Yes, Emma, I’m asking you to marry me.’

Gradually, her shock gave way to confusion and curiosity. Her eyes searched his face, looking for God knew what.

‘But why?’ she said at last.

He should have expected such a question, but it threw him for a moment. Don’t lie, his conscience insisted.

‘Why?’ he stalled.

‘Yes, why?’ she insisted. ‘And please don’t say you’re in love with me, because we both know you’re not.’

Jason was tempted to lie. He knew he could be very convincing if he tried. He could say he’d hidden his feelings because Ivy had warned him off. He could say a whole load of conning garbage. But that was not what he wanted. If and when he married Emma, he wanted no lies. No pretence. From either of them.

‘No,’ Jason replied with a degree of regret in his voice. ‘No, I’m not in love with you, Emma. But believe me when I say I find you very pretty and very desirable. I have right from the first time I saw you.’

He took some comfort from the colour which zoomed into her cheeks. Had she been aware of his admiration all along? If she had, she’d never given him any indication, although, to be fair, she’d always been prepared to spend time with him after he’d visited her aunt, always offered him coffee and conversation.

‘A man like you could have any girl he wanted,’ she countered. ‘Ones far prettier and more desirable than me. There’s not a single girl in the district who wouldn’t throw herself at your feet, if you turned your eye her way.’

But not you, it seems, Jason thought. Damn, but this was not going to be one of his greatest moments. Failure was always a bitter taste in his mouth. In the past, there hadn’t been a girl he’d fancied whom he hadn’t been successful with.

Keeping his voice steady and calm, and his eyes firmly on hers, he went on. ‘I don’t want any other girl in the district, Emma. I want you.’

Now she flushed fiercely, and his confidence began to return.

‘As I’ve already said, Emma, I think you’d make a wonderful wife. And a wonderful mother. I watched you with your aunt. You’re so kind and caring. So patient and gentle. In the weeks I’ve known you, I’ve come to like you very very much. I thought you liked me in return. Was I mistaken?’

‘No,’ she returned, although warily. ‘I do like you. But just liking someone is not enough for marriage. Neither is finding them attractive.’

So she found him attractive, did she? That was good. That was very good.

‘You think you have to be in love?’ he probed softly.

‘Well, yes, I do.’

‘Six months ago I might have agreed with you,’ he said ruefully, and her eyes narrowed on him.

‘What do you mean? What happened six months ago?’

Jason hesitated, then gambled on telling her the complete truth. There was a bond in revealing one’s soul to another. And one’s secrets. He wanted no secrets between them, not if they were to be man and wife. And, by God, they would be, if he had anything to do about it.

‘Six months ago I was working with and living with a woman in Sydney. A doctor. I was madly in love with her and we were planning to be married this year. One day, one of her patients died. A little boy. Of bacterial meningitis.’

‘Oh, how sad! She must have been very upset.’

‘One might reasonably have thought so,’ he said bitterly. ‘I have no doubt you would have been devastated in her position. But not Adele. Oh, no. The child’s death meant nothing to her, other than a slight blow to her ego. She was briefly annoyed she hadn’t matched the child’s symptoms with the cause, but then how could she, in a mere five minutes’ consultation?’

‘Five minutes?’ She was shocked, he could see.

‘That was the average length of a consultation in our surgery. Get ’em in and get ’em out as quickly as possible. Turn-over meant money, you see, and money was the name of the game. Not people. Or lives. Just money.’

She was staring at him, perhaps seeing the truth behind that vitriol, that it wasn’t just Adele who’d been greedy and heartless in those days. He’d been just as bad.

He sighed. ‘Yes, it’s true. There, but for the grace of God, go I.’

‘Oh, no, Jason,’ she said softly. ‘Not you. You’re not like that at all. I watched you with Aunt Ivy. You’re a very caring man, and a very good doctor.’

His heart squeezed tight. ‘You flatter me, Emma. But I would like to think I finally saw the error of my ways and made changes for the better. That’s why I left the city and came here, to find my self-respect again, and to find a better way of life.’

‘What about your relationship with this Adele?’ she asked, her expression thoughtful.

‘I could hardly continue to love a woman I despised,’ he said.

Her laugh startled him. ‘Do you think love is finished as easily as that? Do you think finding out something unpleasant—or even wicked—about the person you love, smashes that love to smithereens? Believe me, Jason, it doesn’t.’

Her words were like a kick to his stomach. She still loved Dean Ratchitt, regardless of his faithless character. And she believed he still loved Adele.

Jason tried to give that concept some honest thought. Perhaps he did still love her. He certainly thought about her a lot. And he missed her, especially in bed.

But neither of these factors would deter his resolve for a future between himself and Emma. Nor would he let her think he wasn’t aware of her unrequited passion for another man.

‘I’ve heard all about Dean Ratchitt,’ he said abruptly, and her green eyes flared wide with shock.

‘Who from? Aunt Ivy?’

‘Amongst others.’

‘And what…what did they say?’

‘The truth. That you were engaged to be married and he betrayed you with another girl. That you argued and told him you would marry the next man who asked you.’ He set steady eyes upon her own stunned gaze. ‘So I’m the next man, Emma, and I’m asking you. Marry me.’

Jason was taken aback when her shock swiftly became anger. ‘They had no right to tell you that,’ she shot back at him. ‘I didn’t mean it. I never meant it. I can’t marry you, Jason. I’m sorry.’ And she tore her eyes away from his to smoulder down into her coffee.

Her passionate outburst stripped away the cool, calm façade Jason had been hiding behind. He was never at his best when his will was thwarted, especially when he believed what he wanted was for the best for everyone all round.

‘Why not?’ he demanded to know. ‘Because you’re waiting for Ratchitt to return?’

‘Dean,’ she snapped, glittering green eyes flying back to his. ‘His name is Dean.’

‘Ratchitt matches his character better.’

Her gaze grew distressed and dropped back down. ‘He…he might come back,’ she mumbled. ‘Now that I’m alone, and…and…’

‘An heiress?’ he supplied for her cuttingly. ‘I don’t think this place will bring him running, Emma.’ And he waved around the ancient and shabbily furnished room. ‘Men like Ratchitt want more out of life than some old house in a country backwater, even if the front rooms have been turned into a sweet shop.’

She was shaking her head at him. ‘You don’t understand.’

‘I think I understand the situation very well. He stole your heart, then broke it, without a second thought. I’ve met men like him before. They can’t keep their pants zipped for more than a day, and they love no one but themselves. He’s not worth loving, any more than Adele was. I’ve consigned her to my past. The best thing you can do is consign Ratchitt to your past, and go forward.

‘Marry me, Emma,’ he urged, when her eyes became confused. ‘I promise to be a good husband to you and a good father to our children. You do want children, don’t you? You don’t want to wake up one day and find that you’re a dried-up old spinster with nothing to look forward to but loneliness and rheumatism.’

She buried her face in her hands then, and began to cry. Not noisily, but deeply, her shoulders shaking. Jason was moved as he’d never been moved before. He raced round the table to squat down beside her chair. He reached out to take her small, slender hands in his and turned her tear-stained face towards him.

‘I won’t hurt you like he did, Emma,’ he promised her with a fierce tenderness. ‘I give you my word.’

‘But it’s too soon,’ she choked out.

Jason wasn’t sure what she meant. ‘Too soon?’ he probed. ‘You mean since Ivy’s death?’

‘Yes.’

‘Are you saying you might marry me later on?’

Her eyes lifted, betraying a haunted, hunted look. She was tempted to say yes, he could see. But something was stopping her.

‘A month,’ she blurted out. ‘Give me a month. Then ask me again.’

Jason sat back on his heels and exhaled slowly, his surge of elation dampened by a prickle of apprehension. It wasn’t a long time, a month. But it worried him. He didn’t believe the wait had anything to do with Ivy’s death. It was all to do with Ratchitt. She still hoped he’d come back for her.

The possibility of that scum showing up again was slight, Jason believed. But even that slight possibility sickened him. The thought of Emma falling back into his filthy arms sickened him even further.

And it did something else. It sparked a jealousy which startled him.

He’d never been a jealous man before. Not even with Adele. Emma was evoking emotions in him that were alien to all his previous experiences with women. Along with the jealousy, he also felt fiercely protective.

Still, he would imagine most men would feel protective of a girl like Emma. She was so fragile-looking. And so sweet. Someone had to stand between her and the Ratchitts of this world. She wasn’t experienced enough to see just how bad his type were. How depraved and conscienceless.

‘All right, Emma,’ Jason agreed. ‘A month. But that doesn’t mean I can’t see you during that month, does it? I’d like to take you out on a regular basis. We could get to know each other better.’

‘But…but everyone with think that…that…’

‘That you’re dating Dr Steel,’ he finished firmly. ‘What’s wrong with that? You’re single. I’m single. Single people date each other, Emma. That’s hardly grounds for gossip.’

Her eyes almost smiled through their wet lashes. ‘You don’t know the good ladies of Tindley.’

‘Believe me, I’m beginning to. So what about dinner tomorrow night? It’s Friday, and I always eat out on a Friday. We could drive over to the coast if you don’t want to be seen with me here in Tindley for a while.’

She blinked the last of her tears away and looked at him with that searching gaze he found quite discomfiting. ‘Are you going to try to get me into bed afterwards?’

Jason had trouble stopping the guilt from jumping into his eyes. Not that he’d had seduction on the menu for tomorrow night. He’d actually been going to leave that course of action for a week or two.

‘No,’ he said, with what he hoped was honest-sounding conviction. ‘No. I wouldn’t do that.’

She looked at him with frowning eyes. ‘Why not?’ she posed in a puzzled tone. ‘You said you found me pretty and desirable. You also asked me to marry you. I imagined you fancied me, at least a little.’

‘I do fancy you. And more than a little. Hell, Emma.’ He stood up and raked his hands back through his hair. She’d thrown him for a loop by being so sexually direct. He hadn’t expected it from her. Did she want him to try to seduce her or not?

‘It’s perfectly all right, Jason,’ she said calmly. ‘I’ve been brought up in a country town, not a convent. I’m well acquainted with the way men think and feel when it comes to sex. I know you haven’t had a girlfriend since coming here to Tindley, and I’m sure you’re fairly frustrated by now. I just didn’t want to give you false hopes if I agreed to go out to dinner with you. You’re a very attractive, experienced man, and I’m sure you know how to get to a girl. But I have no intention of sleeping with you. Not this side of a wedding ring, anyway.’

He stared at her, and her chin tipped up, revealing a side to Emma he hadn’t seen before. A very stubborn side. A decidedly steely light gleamed in her green eyes and her attitude was definitely defiant.

One part of him admired her strong old-world standards, till he remembered Ratchitt. He’d bet London to a brick on that she hadn’t given him the same ultimatum.

Or had she? he suddenly revised. Was that what had happened between them? Had she refused to sleep with Ratchitt till he’d walked with her to the altar? Had he given her an engagement ring, then simply had other girls on the side till the prize would finally be his without any more arguing, for ever and ever?

‘Do you want to take back your proposal now?’ she asked challengingly. ‘And your dinner invitation?’

‘No,’ he said slowly. ‘But I would like an answer to one simple question.’

‘What question’s that?’

‘Are you a virgin, Emma?’

CHAPTER THREE

THE following day felt interminable to Jason. Several times his mind wandered to that moment the evening before when Emma had looked him straight in the eye and told him the truth. Yes, she was a virgin. So what? Did he have a problem with that?

Did he have a problem with that?

Yes, and no.

Virginity wasn’t something he’d encountered before in his personal life. Not once. Adele hadn’t been a virgin. Not by a long shot. None of his other girlfriends over the years had been virgins, either.

The thought of making love to a virgin was a little daunting. Unknown territory usually was.

At the same time, the thought of making love to an untouched Emma on their wedding night appealed to a part of him he’d never known existed. He’d never thought of himself as a romantic before. But with Emma he was a different man. He recognised that already. She brought out the best in him.

And perhaps the worst.

Possessiveness and jealousy in men weren’t traits he’d ever admired. He didn’t like the way such men treated their girlfriends and wives. The females in their lives were flattered for a while—seeing their partners’ passion as evidence of the extent of their love. Till reality set in and the flattery gave way to fear. He vowed to fight the temptation to be like that with Emma. He wanted her to be happy as his wife, never afraid.

And she would be his wife. He felt confident of that now. It was just a matter of time.

Time…

Jason glanced up at the clock on the wall. Five o’clock. And the small waiting room was still full of wheezing, sneezing patients. The beautiful spring weather had brought a rash of hay-fever sufferers, along with the blossoms.

Sighing, Jason rose from his desk and went to call in the next patient.

‘I hope to heaven that’s it, Nancy?’ Jason said at long last, popping his head around the consulting-room door and sighing with relief when he spied the empty waiting room. The clock on the wall now said five to seven. Surgery usually finished around five-thirty and, whilst it sometimes ran late, it was rarely this late.

‘Yes, all finished for the day, Dr Steel,’ Nancy returned, in a sighing tone which Jason knew didn’t denote tiredness, but a reluctance to leave the love of her life and go home to an empty house.

Not him. The practice!

Nancy had been Doc Brandewilde’s resident receptionist - cum - secretary - cum - book - keeper - cum-emergency nurse for the past twenty years. She worked six days a week—seven, if and when required—and overtime without ever asking for an extra cent. Rising sixty now, she was as healthy as a horse and would probably be presiding over the practice for another twenty years at least.

She’d been a bit pernickety with Jason when he’d first arrived, till he’d discovered through Muriel that Nancy was afraid he’d fire her, if and when Doc retired, and Jason took on a new partner. Once Jason had reassured Nancy the job was hers for as long as she wanted it, their relationship had improved in leaps and bounds, although there’d been a temporary hiccup when Jason had suggested they get a computer system for the files and the accounts. He’d made the mistake of saying a computer would be more efficient and cut down on her workload. He hadn’t realised, at that point in time, that Nancy didn’t want to cut down on her workload.

Nancy had gone into an instant panic, then flounced home in a right snip, saying if Jason thought a machine could do a better job than twenty years’ experience, then she didn’t want to work for such a fool. After one day’s mayhem in the surgery, Jason had gone crawling on his hands and knees, begging for her to return. He’d grovelled very well, calling himself an idiot from the city who didn’t understand the workings of a country practice, saying if she could be gracious enough to forgive his ignorance and help him wherever possible, he was sure to get the hang of things in due time.

After that, they got on like a house on fire, even though Nancy maintained an old-fashioned formality in addressing him as Dr Steel all the time, which sometimes irritated Jason. Still, that seemed to be the way with people in country towns. They held their doctors in high esteem. Put them on a pedestal, so to speak. And while that was rather nice, Jason sometimes felt a bit of a fraud. If they knew his original motives for choosing medicine as a profession, they might not be so respectful.