Summer's Edge Read Online Free Page B

of his breath as he nearly suffocated her with his kiss.
    His mouth left hers and moved to her neck, half embracing, half biting it. She tasted blood on her lip where he had crushed it with his own. He was gripping her hard and she clung to him. She didn’t even care that he was hurting her.
    He could have ripped all her clothes off right there and forced himself upon her. She had never wanted anyone so much.
    Then just as suddenly he thrust her away from him. He swore under his breath as he tried to recover himself.
    "Is that what you wanted?"
    "No… yes… I mean…" Alice had no idea what to say. She was shaken and half in misery, half in ecstasy.
    His face was like granite, its angles unyielding.
    "Get out and don’t come back here again. Stay out of my way," he said.
    Too stunned to respond Alice went out. She thought she heard him mutter something about "jailbait" as she left.
    Outside, still sitting on the grass, Jules and Becky were agog to know what had gone on.
    "What the hell happened in there?" Jules saw Alice’s bleeding lip. "Oh god, did he hit you?"  
    "No, of course not." Alice involuntarily put a hand on her neck, which drew Jules’ attention to it. She grabbed Alice’s hand away.
    "You have a love bite on your neck? What the hell?"
    "Let’s just get out of here," Alice said. She wanted to get away. She couldn’t face his anger or contempt any longer.
    "Okay, but you’d better tell us exactly what’s going on."
    "Nothing’s going on," Alice said as they got up and walked back to the main school. She couldn’t even bring herself to look behind her and see where he was.
    "He summons you into the pavilion and you come out moments later with a bleeding lip and an enormous love bite and that’s nothing?" Jules was incredulous.
    "How are you going to cover that?" Becky asked. "You can hardly wear a scarf in May. And your collar won’t go anywhere near it."
    "I don’t know, a Band-Aid." It was the last thing on Alice’s mind.
    "You can’t wear a Band-Aid on your neck, everyone will know exactly what it’s concealing."
    "Forget about concealing the bloody love bite, Becky. How it happened is more to the point," Jules said.
    "He was angry, and then he kissed me, and then he was angry again."
    "Jesus!"
    "Are you ok, Alice?" Becky asked.
    "Yeah, I’m fine. Well no I’m not fine, I don’t really know what I am, but I’m ok," Alice said. She was absolutely confused. How she felt about him, how he felt about her, what any of this meant, what she was going to do. It was like he hated her but wanted her at the same time.
    Again and again she re-ran it in her mind, every second, every sensation. She wanted his hunger and even the pain again, his anger. She imagined it dissolving into something more sensuous as their embrace continued. He couldn’t maintain that level of rage for long. Or could he?

    * * *

    Becky was thrilled when Brett rang her on Monday night. She'd been suffering silently as well, hoping and hoping that he'd call her and that he hadn't lost her number.
    She told the others the next morning as they filed into Assembly. "There's a barbecue at some guy's house on Sunday. Loads of the players are going. We're all invited."
    "I can't go," Jules said. "Kate's invited me to this thing in Lechlade over the weekend, some sort of festival at a quarry."
    "Doesn't sound like your sort of thing," Alice said. Jules' stepsister's friends were much more crusty than they were. They went to folk festivals and eco protests.
    "I said I'd give it a go." Now Jules and Kate would soon be going their separate ways at university it had defused some of the tensions between them.
    "What about the cinema on Sunday night, can you still make it?" They were planning to see Basic Instinct which had finally been released in the UK.
    "Sure, I’ll meet you there."
    "What about you Alice? I can't go by myself to the barbecue. They're expecting a group of us," Becky said.
    Alice was in two minds. On one hand she wanted