St Matthew's Passion

chapter Six



‘Melissa!’

For someone with so slight a build, Emma had a surprisingly strident voice when she needed to. Melissa spotted her colleague at the far end of the pub, sitting with a couple of junior doctors and nurses.

She picked her way across the crowded room, nodding her greetings as she went. The department was a large one and they’d hired this floor of the Black Lion pub for the evening. Everybody was there, from clinical staff to cleaners and porters, from secretaries to chaplains.

Everybody except, so far, Fin.

Melissa unwound her scarf and shrugged off her coat, glad to be in the boozy warmth after the harshness of the night outside. Melissa stood.

‘What can I get you?’

Melissa accepted a red wine, fumbling for her purse. Emma shook her head.

‘Prof’s paying for the first hour.’

Professor Penney, the head of the department, was over at another table, regaling a group of staff with some anecdote or other. Melissa raised her glass to him in thanks, and he raised his in turn and winked.

Melissa had barely seen Fin all day, though she hadn’t been avoiding him; nor did she feel he was avoiding her either. They’d simply had their own work to do that day, and their paths hadn’t happened to cross. She remembered, however, that he’d proposed the venue for the office party himself some weeks earlier, and had enthusiastically been reminding people about it ever since. So she assumed he was going to be there.

She had woken from her post-night duty sleep that morning refreshed and with renewed resolve. She was going to speak directly to Fin about what had been going on between them. It would be painful, agonising even, to hear him admit that he had someone else, but the hurt it would cause her would in the long run be more bearable than the slow torture she was enduring at the moment. And she wouldn’t have to humiliate herself entirely. She would only need to acknowledge that she was attracted to him, even strongly attracted.

She wouldn’t need to tell him that she loved him. That was knowledge she’d lock away in a box inside her and bury deep. Eventually it would crust over like a treasure chest at the bottom of the ocean, forgotten and unseen.

Nine o’clock came and went. Around her the merriment was growing and the drink was flowing thick and fast. Melissa nursed her single glass of wine, wanting to keep a clear head for the coming encounter with Fin. She kept up her end of the various conversations she found herself drawn into, trying her best to appear as if she was enjoying herself, was full of seasonal cheer. But her thoughts were elsewhere. Every time the door opened to a blast of freezing air she looked across, but it was always someone else, coming in off a late shift or after popping home first. There was no Fin.

By ten o’clock the party was taking a turn for the raucous. Professor Penney had closed the tab by then and so Melissa went to the bar to buy a round of drinks for the group of people she was sitting with. While the barman prepared the order Melissa leaned on the bar, and became aware of Emma sliding on to the stool next to her.

‘Fin not here yet, then.’

Emma was a little tipsy, her speech a fraction slower than normal. Melissa shrugged, as if she hadn’t thought about it.

‘He’s probably finishing up at the office.’

Emma slung an arm across Melissa’s shoulders. Leaning close, she half-whispered: ‘It’s okay to show that you’re disappointed, you know.’

‘Disappointed?’ Melissa’s laugh sounded forced to her own ears. ‘Why would I be? The company here’s pretty good as it is.’

Emma laid a forefinger alongside her own nose. ‘You can be open with me, girl.’

Melissa sighed, turned on the stool to face Emma. ‘What are you on about?’

‘You and Fin.’

As with Deborah, Melissa felt a stab of indignation. ‘There’s nothing going on –’

Emma held up both palms in a placatory gesture. ‘Whoah, whoah. I’m not saying there is.’ She winked. ‘But it’s obvious you fancy each other like mad.’

‘Come on –’ But Melissa suddenly, desperately wanted Emma to continue. She’d said not you fancy him but you fancy each other…

‘Listen. All the girls look at Fin. I look at Fin. Can’t help it. He’s rather easy on the eye. Ah, forget that; he’s drop-dead gorgeous. A heart throb. And all the blokes look at you. No, let me say my piece before I lose the power of speech,’ Emma said, holding up a finger. ‘But the two of you, you and Fin… it’s not just looking at each other. Sparks fly when you’re in the same room. There’s a chemistry there, a connection. Neither of you can help it, though why would you want to?’ She leaned in again. ‘And for the record, I know you haven’t… done anything. That’s exactly why the electricity’s there. The tension.’ She sat back again, stifling a hiccup. ‘Think I’d better switch to water.’

Melissa stared at Emma, her friend’s words playing over and over in her mind. Emma beamed.

‘The question is, what are you going to do about it?’

Emma helped Melissa carry the glasses back to the table, then wandered off to the ladies’ room. Melissa sat, letting the conversation swirl and eddy around her once more.

Was Emma right? If so, Melissa herself had been right all along too. Fin did have feelings for her, and powerful ones. And perhaps he was conflicted; perhaps he did have someone else and he was torn between her and Melissa. Was that why he hadn’t come tonight? Couldn’t he face a whole evening of being with someone in a social situation whom he desired yet couldn’t acknowledge his feelings for?

A sudden thought hit Melissa almost audibly, like a coin dropping into an empty vending machine. She nearly slapped her forehead.

Had Fin bought the necklace for her?

She stood up abruptly, one word repeating itself over and over in her head.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

‘I’m going to head off,’ Melissa announced to the table.

‘Home so early?’ someone asked. Emma had just arrived back from the bathroom and gazed at Melissa.

Melissa said, ‘No, I think I’ll pop back to the office for a bit.’

‘The office, eh?’ Emma gave her an amused, knowing look. ‘Don’t work too hard, darling.’

Melissa said her goodbyes throughout the pub, trying not to seem too hasty. Emma had asked what she was going to do about the situation, and it was a fair question. Well, if Fin wasn’t going to come to Melissa, she was going to go to him.

She hoped only that he hadn’t gone home yet.



***



Melissa’s fears were unfounded. She saw a light from under the door of Fin’s office as she approached down the dark corridor.

The pub was a ten-minute walk from St Matthew’s and she was glad of this. Any longer and she might have got cold feet, found any number of excuses for herself to put this moment off.

At his door she paused, her fist poised. She took a few deep breaths to steady herself, then tapped four times.

There was no response, and for a few seconds Melissa felt a sweep of relief. He’d gone home after all, and had left the light on by mistake. But then she heard footsteps and the door opened. Fin peered out.

‘Melissa?’

‘Fin. Hi.’ She was momentarily lost for words. ‘I’ve come from the party. We wondered where you’d got to.’ This wasn’t at all the way she’d planned to start her speech, as if she’d been despatched merely to jolly him along into attending the Christmas do.

‘I am coming. Just finishing -’ He broke off, looked at his watch. ‘Is that the time? Ten thirty?’

‘Afraid so.’

Fin sighed deeply, wiped a hand across his face. Then he opened the door wide. ‘Forgive me. You’re standing out there like a delivery boy. Come in.’

Melissa stepped inside. The lamp was on at Fin’s desk and a pile of papers was spread across the surface.

‘Just finishing this review article,’ he said, apologetically.

He gestured at the armchair, just as he’d done on her first day, but she didn’t sit. Instead she stood watching him as he moved back round his desk and started to gather up the papers into some semblance of order. His sleeves were rolled halfway up his forearms, his collar button was unfastened with the tie knot pulled to one side and his shirt tails were partly untucked. He’d have looked like a schoolboy if it hadn’t been for the overwhelming aura of adult masculinity he gave off, the blue shadow on his jaw, the flop of disorderly black hair across his brow that added a raffishness to his appearance.

He caught her looking and said, sounding genuinely puzzled, ‘Something the matter?’

‘Fin.’ She took a step forward. ‘We need to talk.’

‘Uh oh. The words every man learns to dread.’ He half-smiled, but still sounded perplexed if not downright concerned. Melissa approached the desk, her heart trying to force its way up into her throat. She was terribly afraid that her voice would seize up, and for a moment she didn’t say anything.

Fin came out from behind the desk. He must have seen something in her face that alarmed him because he moved close to her and put a tentative hand on her shoulder. ‘Melissa, what is it? What’s happened?’

She forced herself to lift her head and meet his gaze. Up close, she could smell the faint residue of the morning’s aftershave on him, the scent familiar to her from his car that night. His eyes probed hers, flicking from one to the other in turn.

‘Nothing’s happened,’ she murmured. ‘That’s the problem.’

Somehow his face was closer, though she hadn’t noticed him move. His pupils were large and dilated within their circling grey irises. Normally they’d be smaller to accommodate the closeness of her own face. Their size meant he was stimulated.

Through the glazed window came the muffled nighttime sounds of the city. In the room Melissa could hear the low intake and expulsion of his breath, the higher rhythm of her own respiration.

He said, ‘What do you mean?’

Was there a huskiness to his voice which hadn’t been there before? Her own voice barely more than a whisper, she said: ‘You know very well what I mean, Mr Finmore-Gage.’

She became aware that his hand was still on her shoulder, a gentle, firm weight. Slowly Melissa brought her opposite hand up and laid it on his. The knuckles and bones were solid under the skin of her palm. She’d watched those hands countless times, usually sheathed in latex gloves and so deft, so delicate despite their power. But this was the first time she’d actually felt one.

His other hand came up and touched her upper arm, lingering there. His pupils were so wide and black they dominated his eyes. Lightly, his breath touched her face. She closed her eyes, savouring it.

‘Melissa,’ he said, his voice catching, ‘We can’t -’

‘Can’t what?’ This time she moved in, so close that her forehead was nearly touching his chin. She ran her hand up over his wrist, feeling the hair on the back of his forearm beneath her palm. Now she could see the base of his throat under the unbuttoned collar and the hint of dark hair on his chest.

‘Can’t do this,’ he whispered, and, slipping a finger under her chin, he gently tilted her head back and lowered his mouth to hers.

As if time had slowed, Melissa was conscious of every individual component of the kiss: the dry softness of his lips, which yielded to the firm pressure of his teeth; as she parted her own lips she felt the wet probing of his tongue. Her arms wound up and around his neck, her hands sliding through his hair, pressing his head down on to her. At the same time his hands slipped from her arms and around her waist, pulling her body against his, then sliding up to splay across her back.

They locked together more tightly, Melissa arching her back so that her breasts pushed against his chest through the material of their clothes. The kiss continued, a force she felt was utterly beyond her control, a living phenomenon in its own right, his tongue exploring her mouth as hers did his. As his hands clasped her more insistently against him she pressed her hips forwards so that she made full contact with his groin. She felt the hardness of his arousal and it excited her further, driving a gasp from her in a brief instant when their mouths broke contact.

Fin swung them round so that Melissa’s back was to the desk, then slid his hands down her back as her bottom touched the edge of the wooden surface. Her legs parted and he moved in so that his hips were between them. Melissa was wearing a dress that ended just above the knee - informal for the party, but not vampish - and the hemline rucked up as her bottom shifted back on to the desk.

He pulled his head back, breaking the kiss, and stared at her eyes, his mouth open, his breathing guttural, its rapidness keeping pace with her own. Melissa gripped his hair in both fists and drew his face down again. Fin buried his mouth in her throat, the side of her arched neck, his tongue flicking and his teeth lightly nipping.

His hands slipped down to her bottom and, more urgent now, he shifted her further back on the desk, the movement sending a pile of papers toppling to crash on the floor. Melissa clamped her thighs closed about his hips and slid both palms down his back, revelling in the smooth, broad expanse of the muscles there beneath his shirt, taut and sinuous. Crooking her fingers, she pressed her nails in, anchoring her hands.

She felt his hands leave her bottom and fumble between their bodies, heard the jangle of his belt buckle as he unfastened it and the rustle of material. She released her grip on his back with one hand and groped blindly at her own hip, finding the elastic of her panties under her rucked-up dress and pulling them down, shifting and wriggling her bottom to free them. Melissa was distantly thankful that she was wearing stockings, not tights. Fin moved his hips away as he lowered his trousers and pants and she kicked her panties off her foot, still clad in its kitten heel.

Melissa pulled Fin to her, the blood burning rhythmically through her entire body. She let him push her back on to the desk and drew him with her, feeling his hardness nudging between her legs. She was ready for him and closed her thighs around his hips once more as slowly, exquisitely, he entered her.

Fin sank down on to her, his weight pinning her to the desk. Melissa pressed her mouth and nose against his hair to stifle a cry, each thrust driving her to what she believed was the highest peak of pleasure she could bear before the next pushed her even higher. She caught his earlobe between her teeth, breathed into his ear, ‘Fin, Fin,’ and she heard his own breaths turn into gasps.

As she felt herself reaching the ultimate peak, Fin raised himself off her, supporting his weight on his braced arms, and stared into her face, his forehead sheened with sweat, his eyes on fire. Melissa let go, abandoning herself to the orgy of sensation that she’d been keeping at bay, and this time she did cry out, long and low, as helpless as if death had claimed her, tightening her legs around his waist as she watched his mouth stretch wide and felt him reach his own climax inside her.



***



They lay like that, in each other’s arms, for what seemed like an hour but must have been only minutes. Melissa was aware of a continuing flood of sensations, as though what had just happened had somehow opened the gates to a world of experience which had always been there, but which had been hidden from her by a film of ignorance. She was conscious of the slow deceleration and deepening of her breathing and Fin’s; of the hard, work-roughened wood of the desk surface beneath her back and bare bottom; of Fin’s weight, warm and solid and muscular, bearing down on her.

Just when his breathing had slowed to the point where she thought he might have fallen asleep, Fin raised his head to look at her. His eyes smiled at her. She watched them move over her features like those of an artist appreciating a painting. Then Fin lowered his mouth to hers and they kissed again, long and slow.

A thought struck her. ‘When does the cleaner come round?’

‘Eleven,’ he said innocently. She craned her neck to peer at the wall clock. It was five to eleven. Then she saw he was laughing silently.

‘She’s been already,’ he said. ‘Nobody’s going to walk in.’

Melissa slapped him lightly on the bottom, then felt strangely embarrassed. It was a curiously intimate thing to do, and despite what had just happened between them – one of the most intimate acts two people could share – she felt a certain shyness towards him still.

Slowly, unhurriedly, they disentangled themselves from each other, tidied up. Melissa stole glances at Fin’s face from time to time, caught him looking at her. There was a reserve between them that she could understand. She wasn’t used to reaching this stage with a man so suddenly, though she had to admit it wasn’t as if she’d just met Fin. And she suspected that Fin wasn’t the kind of man who took a casual approach to anything, whether it was his work or his relations with women.

When they’d collected the spilled papers and returned some semblance of order to his desk, Melissa stood a few feet away from Fin, facing him, her hands clasped demurely in front of her.

‘So,’ she said. ‘What happens now?’

He gazed at her, the hint of a dimple at the side of his mouth again. There was silence for three seconds. Four.

A couple of seconds too long, she thought.

Fin ran a hand through his hair, glanced away.

‘Melissa,’ he said.

She felt a cold stab. Oh no. No, it’s not going to be like this.

He looked at her again, as if he realised it would be cowardly to avoid eye contact. ‘Melissa, we can’t.’

Her legs weakened. She was grateful that the edge of the desk was nearby so she could steady herself against it without appearing to stumble.

‘Why –’ Her mouth was parched. She swallowed, tried again. ‘Why not?’

‘It just… can’t be.’ His voice was slow, careful, as though he was having difficulty keeping it steady.

‘Don’t you want to?’ she whispered.

‘Yes. Of course I want to.’ There was no hesitation there, no faltering. She noticed that.

‘Then why? Is there someone else?’

‘No.’ Again he passed a hand through his hair. ‘Not really.’

‘Not really.’ Anger was strengthening her voice. ‘That means yes, there is.’

‘Melissa, I’m sorry.’

‘Is she the one you were buying jewellery for? The other day, in John Lewis?’

He stared at her. Despite her hurt, her anger, her disbelief at what seemed to be happening, Melissa couldn’t help a rush of desire as she studied his face.

‘You were there?’

‘Yes. I was going to come up and say hello.’ Suddenly she wondered if he thought – ‘I wasn’t following you, if that’s what you think.’

Fin shook his head. His features, so strong, so fascinating, were twisted in agony. ‘I was buying the necklace for you.’

It was Melissa’s turn to stare.

‘Believe it or not,’ he went on. ‘I was going to give it to you some time before Christmas.’

Thoughts tumbled through Melissa’s head, leaving her utterly disorientated. ‘Then why didn’t you?’ she managed.

‘Because…’ He was either groping for the right words, or trying to find the actual reason. ‘Because I came to my senses. I realised it would be a mistake. To give you jewellery, to continue leading you on. That’s why I didn’t come to the party tonight. I didn’t want to give you a false impression any longer.’

‘False impression? What was that all about just now? On the desk? Just a roll in the hay for you?’

‘No.’ Again, his answer was quick, certain. ‘It meant far more to me than that. That’s the problem. It’s the first step down a path we can’t take.’

‘But why can’t we? If it’s what you want...’ Her voice was taking on an edge of hysteria, she knew, and she fought to bring it under control. But the tears were behind her eyes and in her throat.

For the first time since the start of the conversation Fin dropped his eyes. ‘I - can’t explain.’

‘You owe me an explanation.’

‘I know. But I can’t.’ He lifted his gaze once more, and in his eyes she saw despair, and torment. ‘And it makes me a weak man. A despicable one.’

Melissa closed her own eyes, drew a deep breath, held it. When she was feeling a degree more centred, she said, quietly: ‘Are you sure about this? Sure you won’t have a change of heart in five minutes, or a day, or a week? Because I can’t cope with this uncertainty, Fin. I really can’t. It’s tearing me apart.’

He stepped forward, reaching a hand out but too far away to touch her. In his face she saw anguish of a kind she’d only ever seen before in the bereaved relatives of patients she’d lost.

‘Melissa, I’m so, so sorry. But it can’t go any further. We have to stop it here.’

She kept her features impassive, she thought; but a slow, warm tear betrayed her, sliding down her cheek. Angrily, she brushed it away.

‘See you tomorrow.’

He took several more steps forward. ‘Melissa -’

She headed for the door. Over her shoulder she said, ‘There’s an afternoon theatre list. I’ll make sure the patients are prepped in time.’

‘Melissa!’

If she’d slowed, he might have reached her, but that would have prolonged the encounter and made things worse. Melissa stumbled down the corridor, not caring if he was staring after her, not caring about anything, unaware of anything but the choking in her chest and throat and the stinging in her eyes and the sense of being sucked into a vortex and spiralling down, down.