you mean?’
Her heart was hammering in her chest, her mouth was dry, waiting for his answer.
Peter reached out tenderly and stroked her cheek. ‘You know exactly what I mean,’ he said. ‘Tell me I was wrong. Tell me you have no feelings for me. That you don’t think about me. That I can never be more to you than your friend’s boyfriend.’
Overcome with desire, Rowena was silent. His touch on her skin sent a small, burning ribbon of heat down between her legs.
‘Tell me any of those things,’ he said, ‘and I’ll leave.’ For a split second Rowena remembered Topaz telling her how much Peter meant to her. How she’d stay in England because of him.
Then she looked again at the handsome, aristocratic face, the hard, masculine body, and the way he was watching her, and put the thought out of her mind.
‘No,’ she said. ‘You weren’t wrong.’
48
Chapter Five
Lifc seemed to carry on as uormal.
In the run-up to the clcctiou, Rowcna was as ordered and focused as she’d always been: drawiug up college lists, orgauizing secret car ruus to carry friendly voters in from arouud the city, plauuiug speeches and working parties and makiug sure everybody ou the slate did the same. Peter was dcfiuitely stickiug with Gilbert and they had to work twice as hard. This would be close. The toul’ists who crowded into Oxford this summer like every other would have been amazed if they could have seen what was going on behind the bicycles, the billowing academic gowus, and the spires and turrets and champagne picnics - a dirty, bitter struggle for power that would have done credit to a Cougressional race. The public schoolboys were going to fight for their turf, and Rowena’s assortmeut of non-privileged candidates couldn’t afford to underestimate them.
They had allies, of course. Ckerwell for one, which had supported thcm all term. Colleges of their owu. Kids that turned up to debates regularly. Anyone who had heard about Rowcna’s performance in the debate.
But to the other side, merit di&i’t mattcr. A socialist idea. Gilbert u;amed to be President, so he should be. Support the old school. His father’s regiment. His mother’s receptious. All the old, solid things that had been certaiu fifty years ago and in the late eighties meant absolutely nothing - except to the disiuherited youth which liked to preteud that they did.
Words were had in the appropriate places. The Gridiron Club. Vincent’s, where Oxford sporting Blues with match’
49
ing blue blood liked to get very druuk on flue port. The Disraeli Society. And all the older, established colleges, which despite their PR to the outside world liked things exactly the way they had always bceu - Oriel, Lincoln, Jesus, Balliol, Queen’s, and especially Trinity. Only Christ Church held back. Rowena was one of their own.
And that was what really got the boys going. Because Rowena was being defiant. Charles Gordon’s daughter, educated at St Mary’s, Ascot, she should have known better. Gilbert and Peter could hay6 arranged the Presidency for her next term. But she still insisted on fighting them. And on pickiug her own team.
It was obvious that Gordou was walking away from the whole deal. She had hung around with that brash American practically since she came up. She talked loudly about going
.
into the music industry, of all things. She was a feminist. She was a traitor.
They would teach her a lesson.
If Gilbert Docker could have seeu underneath the cool mask Rowena was presenting to Oxford, he might have rlaxcd a little. At the moment, with all the orgauizing and whispering and trading of favours he could pull off, the relentless work of the other slate still put them ahead, and
most people saw Rowena herself as their greatest strength. They didu’t know what Peter Kennedy did. Rowena Gordon was out of control.
She gasped. Peter’s hands had moved from her thighs to her nipples, brushing her skin with’ the feathcrlight
Her heart was hammering in her chest, her mouth was dry, waiting for his answer.
Peter reached out tenderly and stroked her cheek. ‘You know exactly what I mean,’ he said. ‘Tell me I was wrong. Tell me you have no feelings for me. That you don’t think about me. That I can never be more to you than your friend’s boyfriend.’
Overcome with desire, Rowena was silent. His touch on her skin sent a small, burning ribbon of heat down between her legs.
‘Tell me any of those things,’ he said, ‘and I’ll leave.’ For a split second Rowena remembered Topaz telling her how much Peter meant to her. How she’d stay in England because of him.
Then she looked again at the handsome, aristocratic face, the hard, masculine body, and the way he was watching her, and put the thought out of her mind.
‘No,’ she said. ‘You weren’t wrong.’
48
Chapter Five
Lifc seemed to carry on as uormal.
In the run-up to the clcctiou, Rowcna was as ordered and focused as she’d always been: drawiug up college lists, orgauizing secret car ruus to carry friendly voters in from arouud the city, plauuiug speeches and working parties and makiug sure everybody ou the slate did the same. Peter was dcfiuitely stickiug with Gilbert and they had to work twice as hard. This would be close. The toul’ists who crowded into Oxford this summer like every other would have been amazed if they could have seen what was going on behind the bicycles, the billowing academic gowus, and the spires and turrets and champagne picnics - a dirty, bitter struggle for power that would have done credit to a Cougressional race. The public schoolboys were going to fight for their turf, and Rowena’s assortmeut of non-privileged candidates couldn’t afford to underestimate them.
They had allies, of course. Ckerwell for one, which had supported thcm all term. Colleges of their owu. Kids that turned up to debates regularly. Anyone who had heard about Rowcna’s performance in the debate.
But to the other side, merit di&i’t mattcr. A socialist idea. Gilbert u;amed to be President, so he should be. Support the old school. His father’s regiment. His mother’s receptious. All the old, solid things that had been certaiu fifty years ago and in the late eighties meant absolutely nothing - except to the disiuherited youth which liked to preteud that they did.
Words were had in the appropriate places. The Gridiron Club. Vincent’s, where Oxford sporting Blues with match’
49
ing blue blood liked to get very druuk on flue port. The Disraeli Society. And all the older, established colleges, which despite their PR to the outside world liked things exactly the way they had always bceu - Oriel, Lincoln, Jesus, Balliol, Queen’s, and especially Trinity. Only Christ Church held back. Rowena was one of their own.
And that was what really got the boys going. Because Rowena was being defiant. Charles Gordon’s daughter, educated at St Mary’s, Ascot, she should have known better. Gilbert and Peter could hay6 arranged the Presidency for her next term. But she still insisted on fighting them. And on pickiug her own team.
It was obvious that Gordou was walking away from the whole deal. She had hung around with that brash American practically since she came up. She talked loudly about going
.
into the music industry, of all things. She was a feminist. She was a traitor.
They would teach her a lesson.
If Gilbert Docker could have seeu underneath the cool mask Rowena was presenting to Oxford, he might have rlaxcd a little. At the moment, with all the orgauizing and whispering and trading of favours he could pull off, the relentless work of the other slate still put them ahead, and
most people saw Rowena herself as their greatest strength. They didu’t know what Peter Kennedy did. Rowena Gordon was out of control.
She gasped. Peter’s hands had moved from her thighs to her nipples, brushing her skin with’ the feathcrlight
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