Greg heard the alarms ringing, and looked out of his shop window, to see smoke spiralling upwards across the street, from inside the Nathan gallery’s yard. He rang for the fire brigade and then took off across the alley as fast as he could, flung open the gates and burst into the yard as the fire erupted skyward, like a bomb, through the workshop roof. He could hear terrible screaming from inside, and ran to try to wrench open the workshop door, but was at first forced back by the billowing smoke. The horrific, high-pitched shrieks went on and on.
At last he got the door open, but smoke and flames obscured his vision as he shouted Kendall’s name.
Suddenly she seemed to launch herself towards him, her mouth wide in terror: she was burning alive, her clothes, hair, her entire body alight.
Greg dragged her into the yard, wrapping his coat over her head in an effort to suffocate the flames, then to the gate to get them both out of the reach of the fire. The flames were now shooting out of the workshop, spreading, as she had intended, towards the gallery itself.
She was curled up beneath his jacket, which covered her face and the top part of her body, but he could see the terrible burns to her legs. As he lifted away the coat from her, he felt a rush of hysteria — his coat was smouldering, on fire from her body, but the sight of her face made him catch his breath. Her hair was burned to the scalp, and her face was a gruesome mass of burned flesh and blisters. But she was alive, and her eyes pleaded with him. She was trying to say something, her fingers plucking at his arm. Greg didn’t know what to do: his panic made him scream for her, and once he had started screaming he couldn’t stop, his cries drowning her awful, low moans of agony. Behind them, the fire reached the main gallery and even though the sprinklers had come on automatically, nothing could hold it back.
Within minutes the fire engines and the ambulance had arrived. Greg watched, shaken and distraught, as the paramedics gently lifted Kendall onto the stretcher. He asked if she was alive and one of the men looked down at her and nodded. She was alive, but she had already inhaled so much smoke that he knew there was little hope of survival.
The gallery alarms were ringing, police and fire sirens wailing, and the sound of the plate-glass windows cracking and shattering made it impossible to hear what her last words were. Kendall died, painfully moving her burned lips and using the last breath in her smoke-filled lungs to whisper the word, ‘Bastard.’
Chapter 10
They had ordered too much food by far, choosing every dish they had wanted to try but never ordered before, so that half-empty cartons of Chinese takeaway littered the kitchen counter and the coffee table. An exhausted Tiger lay flat out, his head almost resting on Burton’s foot. Jake stroked his head just behind his right ear, and the dog growled contentedly, wanting more.
‘You’ve won him over,’ Lorraine said, leaning back. There was about a foot between them on the sofa, but she wanted to be closer, wanted to feel his arms around her again.
‘Good, that makes life easier,’ Jake said, then gestured towards the cartons. ‘Will he eat the rest?’
‘Will he?’ she laughed, but fell silent as he reached for her hand.
‘So?’ he said softly, his fingers laced with hers.
‘So,’ she repeated. The gap was still between them.
‘So,’ he said again, then loosened his hold on her hand to turn towards her. ‘Can I stay?’
Lorraine said nothing, and he began to stroke her arm, circling her slender wrist with his fingers. Then he drew her towards him until she rested against him. ‘Yes, I want you to stay,’ she whispered, nestling against his shoulder. She could smell Chinese takeaway, and sand, and sea, and him, and his chin rested against the top of her head as she slipped one arm around him. He reached down and drew her leg across his lap, gently stroking her calf as he eased off her shoe. It fell onto Tiger, still at their feet, who grunted and got up sleepily to walk a few feet away before he sighed loudly and slumped down, head on his paws, watching them intently with his pale blue eyes.
Lorraine sighed as Burton massaged her leg, his hand slowly moving higher, inching up her thigh. He continued to caress her, running his hand under the high-cut leg of her silk panties to find her with his fingers and feel she was wet for him, her legs parting. He slid from the sofa and began to ease her panties down. She made no effort to stop him, wanting him to do what he was doing and more. She rested her head back against the sofa as he knelt in front of her, opening her wider, and then began to kiss first the inside of one thigh then the other, kissing closer and closer to her until he bent his head and she felt his tongue inside her. Lorraine moaned and lifted her pelvis a fraction, wanting him deeper, and he continued to lick and suck her, pulling her shirt out from the waistband of her skirt so that he could slip his hand over her ribs and under her bra to feel her breasts and her hard, aroused nipples. She came quickly, her body shuddering and her thighs tightening around his head until at last he moved upwards, dragging her underwear off her body, and taking her breasts in his mouth as she moaned with pleasure.
They kissed with passion, he lifted her from the sofa, carried her to the bedroom, kicked open the door, stumbling slightly in the darkness, and laid her on her bed. He stripped off his clothes in front of her, unself-conscious about his nakedness, and he noticed the rows of slender candles at her bedside. He asked where she kept the matches. She watched his lean, muscular body bend forward as he lit each candle in turn. She was about to undress when he turned and knelt on the bed. ‘No. Let me do that.’
He allowed her to do nothing to help him as he took her clothes off, kissing her as he removed each garment, until she lay naked, smiling up at him. He held up his hand and disappeared, returned with her cigarettes and put them on the bedside table before he lay down beside her. He continued to caress her, tracing the scars on her arms with his fingers, and turning her over to see the uneven white tissue of the other scars on her back. He didn’t ask about them, but kissed each one, becoming more and more aroused as he touched her until he eased himself on top and into her with a long, low moan of pleasure.
He made love to her first, a sweetness to his fucking, waiting for her to climax with him, and then they had sex, roughly, but he was an experienced lover, never losing her. There was no fear between them, and no questions asked as they whispered endearments to one another, enjoying the heated sex, their mutual lust. When Jake moved Lorraine to sit astride him, she moaned, arching her body back to bring him deeper inside her, and when she lay beside him he was able to arouse her again, until they lay curled side by side against one another, her back pressing into his chest, their legs entwined. Lorraine was tired, not wanting to speak, and eventually she felt the rhythm of Jake’s breathing change. He was asleep, one arm round her, and she felt cocooned by his presence, lulled by his steady breathing, until her own matched it and she drifted into the perfect sleep of physical exhaustion.
‘Jesus Christ,’ Jake murmured, fully awake as Lorraine stirred, his arm tightening around her.
Tiger had inched his way onto the bed, and Jake turned round as the massive dog pushed him slightly out of the way and rested his head on the pillow.
‘I told you he liked you,’ Lorraine said drowsily, falling back to sleep almost instantly. Jake wasn’t so sure about Tiger’s presence, as the dog’s hot breath on his neck meant that his fangs, too, were close, but he was too tired to argue, and just moved closer to Lorraine. He listened to her soft rhythmic breathing as she had listened to his, and noticed that Tiger’s was now audible too. He had already taken more than his share of the bed, and yet Jake somehow liked the warmth of the big dog beside him, and in fact, he was liking everything about this night — especially the woman cradled in his arms.