Lovers in the Afternoon Read online

  It was time they sorted out this mess, to tell each other of their true feelings, for the past and for each other. If an affair were really all he wanted then she would accept that, but she had a feeling they were both living a lie. God, she could hardly wait to see him again!

  CHAPTER NINE

  THE telephone was ringing as she entered the flat, and after falling over an awkwardly reclining Harvey as he lay in front of the doorway, she ran to pick up the receiver, sure it was Adam.

  ‘Leonie?’

  Her hand instantly tensed about the green-coloured receiver. ‘Yes?’ she sounded breathless. ‘You sound as if you’ve just got out of bed.’

  ‘I—’

  ‘Is he still there, Leonie?’ that taunting voice interrupted. ‘Is your lover still in your bed?’

  This couldn’t be happening. This was Saturday, he never called on a Saturday!

  ‘Leonie?’ The man’s voice had sharpened angrily as she remained silent.

  ‘Yes! Yes, I’m still here,’ she gasped, realising that something else was different about this call too. He was using her name! He had never done that before either

  ‘Did your lover stay the night, Leonie?’ he rasped.

  ‘Look—’

  ‘Is Faulkner still there with you?’ he cut in furiously.

  Leonie felt numb with shock. Not only did this man know her name, he also knew about Adam! She felt an uncomfortable tingling sensation down her neck, as if someone were watching her. How else could this man know so much about her and Adam? God, it made her feel sick—and frightened. It was a long time since she had felt physically threatened by this man’s calls, but today was different, he was different, not talking about the sick things he would like to do to her as he usually did, sounding menacing as he questioned her.

  ‘I said is he there, Leonie?’ he grated again.

  ‘I—er—Yes, he’s here,’ she invented desperately, suddenly feeling trapped, out of control of her own life.

  ‘Liar!’ the man gave an unpleasant laugh. ‘He isn’t there, is he, Leonie?’

  ‘Of course he is,’ she insisted. ‘He—He’s in the shower.’

  ‘I saw him leave, Leonie.’

  ‘You saw—!’ She swallowed hard. ‘Where are you?’ Her voice rose shrilly.

  ‘Wouldn’t you like to know,’ he taunted. ‘Get rid of him from your life, Leonie. You’re mine, do you understand? he growled. ‘I stood by while that wimp Stevenson tried his luck with you, but Faulkner is a different matter. Get rid of him, Leonie, you won’t like what will happen to him if you don’t.’

  ‘Wh-what?’

  ‘I could love you much better than he ever could,’ he told her softly.

  ‘What will you do to Adam?’ she repeated shrilly.

  There was silence on the other end of the telephone, but she knew he was there, knew he hadn’t rung off, could sense him there even though he didn’t say a word.

  ‘You’re in love with him!’ The man suddenly exploded.

  ‘No!’ she denied desperately. ‘I just—’

  ‘Yes, you are, damn you,’ he rasped harshly. ‘And I can’t allow that, Leonie. I would have given you everything, everything,’ his voice rose. ‘But you weren’t interested, were you? Oh no, you chose Stevenson over me, and now you’re in love with Faulkner. You shouldn’t have done that, Leonie. I’ll never allow another man to have you. Never!’ He slammed the receiver down with such force it hurt her eardrums.

  She couldn’t move, daren’t move, felt frozen, her breathing constricted, her hunted gaze darting about the room like a cornered animal.

  She had told Adam the man never threatened, but he had threatened just now. She had told Adam she didn’t know the man, and yet she obviously did for him to know so much about her. But who, who could it be? Every man she had ever met came crowding into her mind, a jumble of male faces that suddenly all looked menacing.

  And then she dismissed the majority of them as being too ridiculous; she hadn’t seen most of them for years. But that still left so many friends, acquaintances. Two men she knew she could exclude from that list, Adam and David. It couldn’t be Adam, she knew that without a doubt, and the man had been so scathing about David he couldn’t possibly have been talking about himself.

  But there was Tony, the boy she had been seeing casually before she met and married Adam so quickly, several friends of Adam’s she had come to know, the man in the upper flat, and the man in the lower one, the men she worked with, the men she had worked for. God, the list was endless, and she couldn’t begin to guess which one of them could be this sick.

  But she did have to get out of the flat, couldn’t stay here and just wait for him to arrive on her doorstep. She had to call Adam, that was what she had to do. It was almost three now, he would be coming to see her soon, and she couldn’t possibly let him walk into a trap.

  She let his telephone ring and ring, but received no reply, becoming more and more agitated as she didn’t. Surely he couldn’t still be at his business meeting?

  She had to get out of here. She could wait for Adam at his apartment, didn’t care how long she had to stand outside; she wasn’t staying here.

  She moved about the flat picking up her bag and jacket, pushing an unsuspecting Harvey, as he lay asleep on her bed, into his travelling basket; she didn’t intend returning here, would have the rest of her things, and Moby Dick, moved to Adam’s apartment as soon as she could.

  She was just giving one last frantic look round to make sure she had switched everything off when the doorbell rang shrilly. Her breath stopped in her throat, and for a moment she couldn’t move. Dear God, what was she going to do? What could she do!

  She thought of pretending she wasn’t here, but the sudden trip she made over the coffee-table, dropping an indignantly screeching Harvey, put lie to that idea. She righted Harvey’s basket before moving cautiously to the door, pressing her ear against the white-painted wood. She couldn’t hear anything—but what had she expected, heavy breathing!

  The doorbell rang again. ‘Leonie, are you in there?’ called a familiar voice. ‘I heard a thump, have you hurt yourself?’

  Relief flooded through her as she ripped open the door. ‘Gary!’ she hugged him before quickly pulling him inside. ‘Thank God you’re here.’ She felt like crying at the sight of a friendly face after her imaginings.

  ‘I just thought I’d drop by for a coffee while Joan does her shopping,’ he dismissed in a preoccupied voice, frowning at how pale she was. ‘Did you hurt yourself?’

  She shook her head. ‘Only Harvey’s dignity when I dropped him.’

  Gary looked down at the cat in the travelling basket. ‘Are you going away?’

  ‘Just to Adam’s—Adam Faulkner,’ she explained with a blush, although Gary must be as aware as the rest of the staff were at Stevenson Interiors that she was seeing Adam. ‘You see, I’ve been having these calls, nasty calls,’ she grimaced. ‘I think I told you about them once…?’

  ‘Yes,’ he nodded.

  ‘Well, I was sure he was harmless. But then he called just now, and he never calls on a Saturday, and I—’

  ‘Hey, calm down,’ Gary chided, his smile gentle. ‘Why don’t you sit down, let me make you a cup of coffee, and then you can tell me all about it.’

  ‘No, we can’t stay here.’ She shook her head frantically. ‘You see, when he called just now he was—threatening. I’m sure he’s going to come here,’ she shivered.

  ‘With me here?’ Gary soothed. ‘I doubt it.’

  He was a dear, but with his five-foot-eight-inch frame she didn’t feel confident she could depend on him if it should come to violence with the obscene telephone caller. But she couldn’t say that to him without hurting his feelings.

  ‘I really don’t think we should stay here, Gary,’ she tried to sound calm. ‘Look, why don’t you come over to Adam’s with me, he’s sure to be back by the time we get there.’

  ‘He isn’t at home?’

  ‘He
had to go to a meeting, and he doesn’t seem to be back yet.’ She was speaking quickly in her agitation. Didn’t he realise how dangerous this situation was! ‘Please, Gary, we have to go,’ she urged desparately.

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘But he could be here any minute! He—’ her voice trailed off as she watched him walk over to the door, check that it was locked before putting the key into his pocket. ‘What are you doing?’ she asked—but she had a dreadful feeling she already knew!

  He looked at her calmly. ‘Stopping you from leaving.’

  She swallowed hard. ‘Gary, this isn’t a time to play games. He could be here soon, and—’

  ‘He’s already here.’

  She had guessed that as soon as he pocketed the key—and she had actually let him in here! Gary was the man who called her every Friday night, who whispered obscene things he wanted to do to her. She couldn’t believe this nightmare, had always believed the two of them were friends.

  ‘Why, Gary?’ she asked faintly, feeling weak with nausea that it was him that said such disgusting things to her every week, that he had done so for the last six months, while still continuing to be so friendly at work. God, she had even told him about those calls!

  ‘Why do you think?’ he scorned, his eyes narrowed unpleasantly.

  ‘I—I don’t know.’ She watched him warily, but he seemed to be making no move to cross the room to where she stood poised for flight.

  ‘Because I want you, you little fool,’ he derided mockingly. ‘I always did, from the moment you came in to my office with David that first morning and promptly fell over the waste-paper basket. You made me feel protective, very much the man as I helped you to your feet. You looked so delicate and defenceless, and I wanted to take care of you.’ There was a smile to his lips as he recalled the morning they had met. ‘That month I worked so closely with you was the most enjoyable four weeks of my life,’ he added flatly.

  ‘I enjoyed it too,’ she infused enthusiasm into her voice.

  His eyes hardened angrily. ‘You barely noticed me!’ he rasped.

  ‘You were married—’

  ‘Yes,’ he acknowledged harshly. ‘But so were you.’

  ‘I was separated from my husband.’

  ‘I remember. I was jealous of any man who had had you and not had the sense to hold on to you. I hated your husband,’ he stated coldly. ‘I wanted you, no other man could have you.’

  ‘No other man did,’ she assured him quickly.

  ‘David—’

  ‘We’ve only ever been friends, nothing more.’

  ‘Faulkner?’

  She swallowed hard, paling even more, knowing after what he had just said about her husband that she daren’t tell him Adam was the man she was married to. ‘Adam and I are friends too,’ she dismissed lightly.

  ‘Very good ones from the amount of nights he’s spent here with you,’ Gary scorned.

  ‘How did you—Have you been watching me?’ she asked dully.

  ‘I didn’t need to,’ he derided. ‘Your face when you came into work every morning this week has been enough to tell me just how friendly you and Faulkner have become.’

  ‘Gary, you don’t understand—’

  ‘Oh, I understand,’ he sneered. ‘Like all women you need a man, any man, to make love to you and tell you how beautiful you are one hundred per cent of the time!’

  ‘It isn’t like that—’

  ‘That’s what Joan said when I found out about the little affair she had been having with a doctor at the hospital,’ he cut in hardly. ‘I’d been working hard, just wanted to sleep when I finally fell into bed at night, but the bitch couldn’t understand that. Oh no, she had to go and find herself a lover to give her what I wasn’t!’

  She had met Gary’s wife at the Christmas dinner, had found the other woman to be shallow and flirtatious, had been surprised to learn she was a nurse, the wine she had consumed with the meal making her silly and giggly, demanding kisses from all the men in the party, her willowy beauty making them all willing to comply.

  ‘You could have left her,’ she said softly.

  ‘She would take Timmy with her.’ He looked bleak as he spoke of his young son.

  ‘Gary, can’t you see that what you—what you’re doing now is wrong?’ she pleaded with his common sense—if he still had any!

  ‘I haven’t done anything—yet.’

  She shivered in apprehension at the threat behind that last word. ‘You made those calls,’ she reminded.

  ‘Not at first,’ he shook his head.

  She frowned. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I didn’t make the first couple,’ he sneered. ‘And I wouldn’t have made any of them if you hadn’t started seeing David. You were really upset when you got the first call, remember, told me all about it. But it was David you let comfort you,’ he added harshly. ‘David who took you in his arms and told you everything would be all right. And for a couple of weeks the calls stopped, didn’t they, Leonie?’ he derided.

  ‘And then you began making them,’ she realised dully. She hadn’t noticed a change in the voice, had been too disturbed by the first few calls to notice what it even sounded like!

  ‘Yes,’ he admitted with satisfaction. ‘It felt strange at first, I didn’t quite know what to say. But after a while it just came naturally,’ he smiled his relish.

  As he became more and more emotionally disturbed! It was his mentally disturbed state that made him so unpredictable now. She didn’t quite know what to do next, or what he was going to do either!

  ‘You always made such a joke about asking me out, Gary,’ she tried to smile, although her face felt stiff. ‘I didn’t realise you were serious.’

  ‘And if you had you would have accepted, hm?’ he scoffed at her attempt to placate him.

  ‘I may have done,’ she answered sharply.

  ‘You may have done,’ he repeated derisively, his gaze mocking. ‘Don’t lie to me, Leonie.’ His eyes hardened to blue pebbles. ‘Joan is always lying to me.’ His hands clenched into fists at his sides. ‘And I don’t like it!’

  She could see that, swallowing hard at the anger emanating from him. ‘I’m sure she loves you, Gary,’ she encouraged. ‘Every marriage has its problems, I’m sure Joan regrets her lapse with the doctor.’

  ‘She stills see him.’

  ‘Oh.’ Leonie chewed on her bottom lip.

  ‘Once a week,’ he spoke almost to himself, not seeming to see Leonie at all at that moment. ‘She tells me she’s working at the hospital that night, but I’ve checked; she’s seeing him.’

  ‘Fridays,’ Leonie realised weakly.

  ‘Yes,’ he bit out, focusing on her again.

  ‘She can’t really care for him, Gary, otherwise she would have left you to go to him,’ she pointed out desparately.

  ‘He’s married too,’ Gary scorned. ‘This way they both have the best of both worlds!’

  And Gary’s jealousy and pain had acted like a sickness, growing, spreading, until he latched his unwanted love on to another woman—who also turned out not to want him.

  ‘For a while I thought about killing both of them,’ he continued matter-of-factly. ‘But then I met you, and realised I could have the same arrangement Joan has. You should have gone out with me, Leonie, I would have been so good to you. Now all we’ll have is this one night together.’

  ‘Wh-what do you mean?’

  ‘Well you know who I am now,’ he shrugged.

  ‘You—you’re going to leave London?’

  He seemed amused by the idea. ‘No,’ he drawled.

  Leonie felt faint as his meaning became clear to her. She couldn’t believe this were really happening—it happened on television, in films, not in real life!

  ‘Gary, you’re making a mistake,’ she told him breathlessly. ‘I—I’ll forget all about this if you—if you’ll just leave,’ she urged desperately.

  He shook his head. ‘As soon as I got out the door you would call t
he police.’

  She would too, knew she would have to. Gary was a danger to other people as well as to himself. But by the sound of it she wasn’t going to get the chance to call anyone.

  ‘It would be your word against mine,’ she reasoned.

  ‘And Faulkner’s,’ he grated. ‘It was him who answered the last two calls, wasn’t it?’

  She flushed her guilt. ‘Gary—’

  ‘We’ve talked enough,’ he snarled. ‘I didn’t come here to talk!’

  She knew exactly what he had come here for, and the thought of it terrified her. ‘Gary, can’t you see this is wrong?’ she pleaded. ‘Do you really want to make love to a woman who doesn’t love you?’

  ‘Why not?’ he scorned. ‘That’s what I do at home!’

  ‘But that’s Joan, Gary,’ she said softly. ‘Things could be different between us. We—’

  ‘Don’t try the psychological approach, Leonie,’ he scoffed. ‘I’ve seen those bad films too!’

  ‘I’ve always liked you, Gary,’ she insisted.

  ‘Then you’re going to get the chance to prove it, aren’t you?’ he taunted. ‘And for God’s sake shut that cat up!’ he rasped as Harvey scratched frantically at the basket to be let out.

  Leonie weighed up the possibility of winning a fight against Gary, instantly knowing that she wouldn’t, not even with desperation on her side. Gary may be short and stocky, but muscles bulged in his arms and legs. He could overpower her in a few minutes, possibly sooner.

  She moistened dry lips. ‘If I let him outside he’ll stop,’ she suggested desperately. ‘He—He’s likely to keep scratching if I leave him in the basket.’

  Gary’s mouth twisted. ‘By all means throw the damned cat out. But don’t try and scream,’ he warned gratingly. ‘You wouldn’t like the way I silenced you,’ he promised.

  Leonie had a feeling he would enjoy it immensely, her hands shaking as she carried the wicker basket over to the window, all the time measuring the distance between herself and Gary, a plan formulating in her mind. He was too close, although as Harvey clambered thankfully out of the window the empty basket in her hand gave her an idea.