Free To Love and to Cherish by Patricia Gaffney Page B

across the line of books she’d put there. She recognized his mood from his movements. He was restless and bored. When he was bored, he could be dangerous.
    “I want you to invite Christy Morrell for supper,” he said abruptly, coming to a halt in front of her.
    “When? You mean tonight?”
    “Yes, why not? Send him a note, ask him to come.”
    She regarded him in silence for a few seconds. “Very well,” she said slowly. “It’s short notice; he may not come.”
    “I know that,” he snapped. “Invite him anyway. I feel like seeing him.”
    His voice had a cranky, childish tone that was relatively new; he’d begun using it about the time they’d left London, she recalled. She wondered if he could hear it himself. He’d put on more weight in the last week or so; in fact, he ate like a starving man at the few meals they shared together, stuffing food into his mouth until he almost choked. Making sure her voice stayed flat and neutral, she asked, “Geoffrey, are you still taking your medicine?”
    Instead of answering, he started humming. Something soft and tuneless; it sounded like a nursery rhyme. He walked around until he was behind the chair. She didn’t move. “The little blue pills and the little gray pills,” he said in a soft, singsong voice. The chair shifted a fraction as he leaned his weight against it. “What are you writing?”
    She looked down and saw that she’d nearly covered the blank page with X’s, black and militant-looking, hostile as an iron fence. “Nothing. I’m not writing anything.” At the moment she felt his hand on her hair, she stood up. Papers fluttered; her little writing desk clattered to the floor. She flushed with embarrassment, but her heart wouldn’t stop pounding. Geoffrey’s dark eyes searched her face. He tried to smile. When she saw his lips tremble, she had to turn away.
    Beyond the west window, a fiery orange sun was sliding toward the dark treetops. The lonely colors of the sky, opal and shell-pink over shadow-black oak leaves, made her chest ache. She closed her eyes and gripped the hard edge of the casement as the old misery welled up inside, familiar as a favorite nightmare. When she opened her eyes, she saw that Geoffrey was beside her. Controlling an involuntary start, she turned to him and stared straight ahead, just over his left shoulder.
    His dark eyes were either gentle or hopeless, she couldn’t tell which. “Anne,” he said on a tired sigh. “Do you know what you look like, here with the sun on your hair?” She made no answer. “I thought you were pretty when we first met. Thank God, I thought, at least she’s not a hedgehog.”
    She tried to laugh, but couldn’t manage it.
    “You’ve changed since then. Bloody unfair of you, darling. You’re not pretty anymore. You’re beautiful.” She heard him swallow, and kept her eyes off his face. “Your hair . . . you know, I always loved your hair. It’s the color of poppies, red and gold, and the sun’s made a halo around it.”
    She whispered, “Don’t.”
    “I can remember how your skin feels. Even softer than it looks. When I touched you—” He lifted his hand.
    She flinched as if he’d struck her.
    The wistfulness in his eyes vanished. Both hands came up and clamped down hard on her shoulders. “Damn you,” he whispered, and pushed her back against the wall. Her head struck the sharp window frame; she cried out. He covered her breasts with his hands and kneaded them hurtfully, cursing her, mashing her with his body against the wall. “You’re my wife, my wife,” he kept saying, while she pulled at his wrists and struggled against him. He moved one hand to the back of her neck and yanked her head back by the hair. His breath was foul—when he kissed her, she gagged.
    He let go of her at once. She saw the hurt and horror in his face before she could mask her revulsion.
    “I’m sorry,” they said at the same instant.
    She reached for him, but he jerked back, and she