in the event, Alex had proved himself more than equal to her expectations. Which was one of the reasons why she was suffering these pangs of—what? Conscience? Remorse? Guilt? She shivered. In all her calculations, she had never expected to enjoy it, and the fact that he had made her do so had left her with a distinct feeling of regret.
It hadn’t been meant to be that way. Her intention had simply been to entice him into bed, and encourage him to violate her body. She hadn’t expected him to be so—so patient. Or that he would realise she had never been with a man before. She gave a mirthless laugh. She had proved to be some femme fatale, she thought ruefully. She hadn’t even known what to expect.
She blamed her inexperience, of course. All her life, she had kept men at arm’s length, never letting any of them breach the protective shell she had built around herself. Friends she had made had all learned to respect her privacy, and if some of them thought she was weird it was not something that troubled her overmuch.
It was only now she was having to come to terms with the fact that knowledge gleaned from books could only ever be superficial. Her lack of experience had left her hopelessly ignorant of the workings of a man’s body. Men weren’t like animals. They didn’t just mate, and walk away. More than that, they apparently had the capacity to prolong their enjoyment, and, totally without her volition, she had found herself sharing his need.
God!
She tossed the remainder of the sandwich out of the window, watching the antics of the ducklings with rather less enthusiasm now. How had it happened? How had a man she had met less than two hours before been able to cause such a fever in her body? Nothing remotely like it had ever happened to her before. Yet from the minute he’d entered the apartment, she’d had the uneasy feeling she was in over her head.
She should have called it a day there and then. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t given her the opportunity. On the contrary, without the liberal dose of alcohol, she doubted he’d have succumbed to her less than erotic charms. But, having gone so far, she had been unwilling to back off. She’d known she might never get up the courage to do such a thing again.
And, to all intents and purposes, she had been totally successful. Whatever the rights or wrongs of it might be, she had achieved her objective. She had had sex with a man she never intended to see again, a man who couldn’t trace her. She was free and clear and pregnant, just as she’d wanted. And the sooner she stopped thinking about Alex Thorpe the better.
But it was easier said than done. Once again, as it had done numerous times over the last eight weeks, her mind shifted to wondering what had happened after she ran out on him. It was natural that she should be curious, she told herself. He was not the kind of man to take it lightly.
At first, she had gone over her own efforts to erase all trace of her identity, constantly worrying over every small detail she remembered, afraid that she might not have thought of everything. But her plan then, and now, seemed foolproof. The apartment she had used in London had been rented in an assumed name. The same name had been used to rent the small Peugeot, and her appearance at the party had been brief and anonymous. She had only learned of the party by chance. She had heard Tony, one of the students, bewailing the fact that he wouldn’t be able to attend. Christina Lennox just happened to be his cousin’s girlfriend, but there was no reason to connect Tony Thiarchos with the uninvited guest. To connect him with Elizabeth Ryan, she amended pedantically, wondering if she had been a little rash in using her own first name. But no. There must be several thousand Elizabeths in London alone, and ever since she left home she had always referred to herself as Beth—Beth Haley.
But, even after she had assured herself no one could trace her, she still hadn’t been able to get Alex Thorpe out of her mind. She found he had left an indelible impression, and she hoped, now that she had achieved her ambitions, that what had happened would lose its importance.
She ought to be relieved that she had covered her tracks so completely. There seemed no way anyone could link a university lecturer from a small northern town with the kind of woman who’d pick up a man at a party in London. She doubted even her students would have recognised her behaviour—even if her appearance had been impossible to disguise.
So, all that remained was for her to complete the present term. She had already prepared the way for her absence. A year’s sabbatical, ostensibly to write the book about eighteenth-century literature she had been planning, and then back to work the following year, when the baby was old enough to be left with a minder. She expected his—or her—appearance would cause some speculation. At twenty-nine, Miss—she never fudged the issue by calling herself Ms—Haley was regarded as something of an eccentric. She had never had a regular boyfriend, even though certain of her fellow lecturers had endeavoured to share her confidence. But, although she was known to be efficient at work, and popular with the students, she was essentially a private person. There would be questions, but she could handle them. One of the advantages of being reserved was that it discouraged a lot of prying.
Remembering she hadn’t yet had a drink, she peeled off the plastic lid and brought the cup of coffee to her lips. The smell almost overpowered her, and, wishing she had just bought a fruit juice instead, she poured the lukewarm liquid out of the window. The ducks came to see what she was doing, but retired in disgust when they found the coffee had already seeped into the ground. ‘Well, you did have most of the sandwich,’ she informed them drily, smiling at her own foolishness, and, turning the key, she started the car.
She was leaving the English building later that afternoon, when one of her fellow professors hailed her. ‘Beth!’ called Nigel Dorner, hurrying across the quadrangle to intercept her. ‘I’m so glad I’ve caught you. I’m having a little reception tomorrow night, in the Students’ Union, and I wondered if you’d care to come. It’s an informal gathering, pre-finals and all that. A chance for the staff and students to get together before exams and degrees take precedence. What do you think?’
Beth folded her arms around the pile of papers she was carrying, and waited until he had reached her. Nigel was in his forties, and although he made a big thing about his sporting activities he was decidedly overweight. He was panting by the time he came up beside her, and she allowed him to get his breath back before saying, ‘I don’t think so, Nigel. I’ve got these papers to read, and I promised David I’d take his Thursday evening seminar. I’ll have to do some preparation—–’
‘Oh, Beth!’ Nigel expelled his breath on a disappointed sigh, and ran a hand over his thinning hair. ‘I was sure you’d come. It is almost the end of term. Surely you can take one evening off to have a little fun?’
Beth caught her lower lip between her teeth, wondering why Nigel persisted in thinking she needed to have some fun. Ever since she had made it known she wasn’t interested in having a relationship with any of the younger members of the faculty, Nigel Dorner, who was a divorcee, and Andrew Holroyd, who was slightly older than Nigel and a bachelor, had been vying for her company. It was as if they didn’t believe she could live without a man’s attentions, and they had evidently decided she’d prefer an older man.
‘Look, Nigel,’ she said, not wanting to hurt his feelings, ‘college get-togethers aren’t really my thing. I only attend when it’s absolutely necessary, and I do have a lot of work I want to finish before the holidays.’
Nigel hunched his shoulders. They were broad shoulders, she noticed, unwillingly finding herself comparing them to Alex Thorpe’s. It was because he had been so much on her mind today, she thought irritably, but she couldn’t help conceding that that was where the likeness ended. As well as having broad shoulders, Alex had also been tall, whereas Nigel was little more than her own height of five feet eight. And tubby, into the bargain, she added, his bulging belly always reminding her of Mr Pickwick.
She
