Pagan Lover by Anne Hampson

to you that I fall in love with you?’
    He shrugged his shoulders.
    ‘Not really. Life would be more pleasant if you did, for then you wouldn’t be such a termagant.’
    She gritted her teeth.
    ‘I was never like this till I met you!’
    ‘Obviously not, because no one would ever have fallen in love with you.’ A pause and then, ‘This David’s had a narrow escape, if he only knew it.’
    Tara drew a breath, and managed to control the fury within her. She had several times made the resolve to be calm—icily calm—hoping that such an attitude would successfully attack his calm. But she kept losing control and showing him her temper. He had shaken her on two occasions, and on several more had threatened her with a beating. But he had never lost control to that extent; she felt that he was always conscious of preserving his dignity, and he did preserve it for most of the time. She glanced at the two gardeners, a brooding expression on her face. Would there ever be an opportunity of escape? She thought of her husband’s need to attend to his various businesses and wondered when he would be going to
Athens. He would not take her with him, he had said, and of course the reason was his inability to keep her a prisoner there, as he could so easily do on this small island where she was watched every minute of every day.
    He glanced at her, his eyes following the direction of her gaze.
    ‘How transparent you are,’ he mocked. ‘Don’t you ever stop thinking of getting away from me?’
    ‘No, never,’ she flashed back at him. ‘I could almost wish those two would drop dead!
    ‘If you did leave me,’ commented her husband mildly, ‘just look what you would miss.’ He was taunting her as usual, reminding her of her weakness.
    ‘You pompous ass!’ It was out before she realised it, and she knew for sure that it was only the presence of the gardeners that saved her from punishment. As it was,
Leon’s black eyes glittered with fury and his mouth went tight.
    ‘By God, girl, you’re asking for it! If I don’t take a stick to you before long it will be a miracle!’ The eyes smouldered now, and
Tara saw his hands clench as if their owner would like to have her throat within their grip. She shivered and resolved to be more careful in future.
    ‘I hate your repeated references to your prowess as a—as a—lover,’ she muttered, amazed at her own words but aware that they were spoken in order to break the awful silence that had dropped between them.
    ‘Because they remind you that I never fail to make you surrender?’ He was his cool suave self again, his expression one of sardonic amusement. ‘Deep down, you wanted to be married to me—’
    ‘You forced me into marriage! Oh, how can you say that I wanted to marry you? I’m in love with someone else!’
    ‘No, you are not,’ he stated firmly. ‘If you were then how could you enjoy lying in another man’s arms?’
      She bent her head, embarrassment staining her cheeks a vivid crimson.
    ‘It’s only—only in that way—’ She stopped, her head still bent, and, with a thread of laughter in his tone he finished for her,
    ‘—that you are attracted to me.’
    She lifted her face, to see him regarding her with a faintly sardonic smile in his eyes.
    ‘One day,’ she whispered, ‘I shall be free of this—this attraction you speak of.’
    ‘You will never be free ... will you?’ he challenged, watching her through narrowed eyes. ‘I knew when I saw you in that hospital ward that fate had given you into my keeping—for ever.’ He took her hand, staring down at the ring she wore. ‘Will you ever be free?’ he asked again, and it was as if some force beyond her control compelled her to answer as he desired she should answer.
    ‘No,’ she quivered with a long-drawn-out sigh that was very like a sob, for it came from the very core of her heart. ‘I will never be free,
Leon.’
    ‘Sensible girl to admit it. Perhaps you will now settle down and