Luc was watching her, his face unreadable.
She suddenly realised that she was in the thick flannel pyjama jacket which Dandy had lent her when her own nightclothes ran out during her sickness. The jacket was massive, far too big for her, and she felt ridiculous in it. She climbed back into the bunk, very flushed.
Luc gave a sudden grin. 'What's up now? After nursing you for the last few days it's a bit late for you to become prudish.'
'I feel like a clown in this jacket,' she said wryly. He laughed. 'You look very appealing in it.' She pleated the sheet with her fingers. 'Thank you for being so kind and understanding when I was ill. I'm sorry I was such a nuisance to you.'
'You weren't a nuisance,' Luc said flatly. 'Thank you, anyway.' She glanced up at him. 'When will we get to England?'
'Tomorrow.' He said the word shortly. 'You've got your passport?'
She nodded. 'My father made sure I kept a British passport and I've always renewed it when it ran out.'
'Good. That should make it easier.' Luc paused. 'What plans did you have for when we arrive? Have you any relatives in England?'
'None that I know of,' she said slowly. 'I shall go to London and try to get a. job.'
'You have some money with you?' She chewed her lower lip, flushing. 'A little.' 'How much?'
She shrugged. 'Enough to keep me until I find a job.' 'How much?' he insisted.
When she told him he stared at her and gave a short, angry bark of laughter. 'My God, girl, that won't keep you for more than two days in London!' 'I'll manage,' she muttered, her head bent. 'You've no idea what you're talking about,' Luc shot back at her tersely. ' London isn't a little village, you know. You're in for quite a cultural shock when you first arrive and being penniless into the bargain will make it worse.'
'I thought I could get work in a hotel,' said Lissa, still not looking at him. 'Alter all, that will give me somewhere to live, and I do know all about hotels.'
Luc moved to the porthole and stared out, his hands thrust into his pockets. 'I can't let you wander off alone.'
'I'm responsible for myself!'
He laughed harshly. 'I wish I could believe that. You'd walk straight into some sort of fix and I'd go crazy not knowing what was happening to you.’
Her heart missed a beat. She didn't answer, staring at her own fingers as they fidgeted with the sheet.
'I can't let you do it, Lissa,' he told her roughly.
'You can't stop me.'
He swung, his face fixed in a frowning mask. 'I know I've handled this all wrong, but you've got to trust me, Lissa, At least let me take you to my home for a few days while you find yourself work and a place to live.'
'No.' Her mouth was stiff and stubborn and he watched her with a barely controlled impatience, his body shifting restlessly.
'You're being stupid,' he bit out. His mouth twisted and the blue eyes held sardonic irritation. 'Do you want my word that I won't try to rape you?'
Her colour rushed up in a blinding heat and she glared at him. 'Maybe I do! I wouldn't put it past you.'
She saw that he did not like that. His face tightened. But he said coolly enough: 'Very well, you have my word. I shall not try to rape you. Is that sufficiently reassuring?' He turned and walked to the door. 'Dandy and his wife will be around, anyway. You won't be alone with me.'
When he had gone Lissa stared at the closed door.
Somehow that promise of his was not so very reassuring, after all. Rape was not what she really feared-it was the insidious, tempting seduction of his hands and mouth which might prove really alarming. In spite of what she had said to him about not wanting him, she knew that all her own sensual instincts fought on his side whenever he touched her.
Her common sense and her intelligence warned her not to give in to him, but her senses clamoured for the pleasure he had begun to teach her. Lissa was not certain that in a straight fight between her mind and her body, her mind would win.
She had meant what she said about disliking his attitude. If she gave in to Luc's seductive caresses she would be exchanging the frying pan for the fire. Luc could destroy her every bit as much as Chris would have done. She had no intention of becoming his mistress for a few months until he tired of her. Her whole nature disposed her to feel sick at the very idea.
For most of her life she had been floating in a romantic mist, not seeing very clearly, not understanding herself or anyone around her. She had been fooled by Chris because of her naive romantic blindness. Now she had grown up very rapidly and painfully and she was facing facts; not only about the world but about herself.
It had never occurred to her until recently that it was necessary to understand oneself. She had never known that she did not understand herself. The unthinking projection of her own personality which had gone on since she left the convent school had ended. The girl who had never noticed the sort of world she was living in had been a fool, and Lissa's own intelligence had sharpened at the realisation of it.
She had so much more to find out about herself, so much more to discover about the world, but of one thing she was absolutely certain; she was not the sort of girl who could blithely enter into a sexual relationship with a man she scarcely knew. She was strong enough to survive on her own-difficult though it might be-and she refused to trade her body for the sort of security Luc was presumably offering her.
The days when a woman had no choice but to do that were long gone. She was free and independent and she was her own mistress. She would not slide into becoming Luc's.
The following evening they drove to London through a windblown landscape whose bland, domestic contours seemed very strange to her eyes. Dusk was falling to shroud it as they drove, but she stared out at the countryside excitedly for as long as she could see it.
She kept comparing it with the fertile, vibrant colours and sounds of the island of her childhood. Everything she saw seemed to lack that drama-the empty great plains of Somerset, the neat little fields of Wiltshire, seemed colourless to her. But her fascination and surprise over the English countryside was as nothing compared to the traumatic cultural shock of London 's overcrowded grey streets and bumper-to-bumper traffic.
Her head ached and throbbed, her eyes were dazed, her ears hummed with noise. Luc glanced at her and smiled faintly. 'Something of a shock, isn't it?'
It was quite dark now, but London seemed to blaze with light. Shops and street lights flared orange in the night. The city lay in a smoky flaring light which could be seen from a long way off-for a moment Lissa had almost thought it was on fire. They drove in over an enormous flyover and she stared down from the car, wincing at the spread of the city.
'I feel like Alice in Wonderland,' she said to Luc.
'You'll get used to it,' he promised her with a reassuring glance. 'You can adapt to anything, believe me. In a few months you'll feel as if you've never lived anywhere else.'
Lissa wasn't sure she wanted to adapt to this crazy, surrealistic place. There were too many people, too much noise. Things rushed and pounded at her eyes and ears and she couldn't take any more of it in, her mind confused.
Luc obviously knew his way around the city. He turned into a stream of traffic going north and a few moments later they were purring down a" quiet street of eighteenth-century houses. 'Regent's Park,' he informed her as he drew up outside one.
She looked at the house and although she knew nothing much about London she did not need great imagination to work out th,at this was the home of a wealthy man. Luc watched her wary, pale face.
Lissa was too tired to make any comment. When he got out and walked round to help her out of the car she let him steer her towards the house while Dandy took Luc's place at the wheel and drove the car away.