Page 43 of A Night with Damien Spur

Her mind was somewhere else.

He waited and then she turned to him.

‘I’m ready now,’ she said.

Damien swept her up in his arms and carried her into the bedroom.

He slid the straps of her oyster satin dress down her shoulders and kissed her neck. Brushing aside the gossamer curtain that veiled the baroque four-poster bed, he lay her on the silky sheets.

Here he was with the love of his life – his virgin bride. He was about to bless their marriage with a sacred consummation.

He tried so hard to please her but as soon as he became aroused, she pushed him away as if he were a stranger.

‘No, Damien – stop! I need more time,’ she said.

But time didn’t change her.

Yes, in the months that followed, she placated him. Gave him as little as she could to appease him. Allowed him a swift thrustthat she accepted and endured which left him lonely and confused.

‘Laura,’ he said one night as she lay beside him, her face implacable, eyes glazed, far away. ‘Where are you?’

And she looked at him and sighed. ‘Damien, why do you love me? I don’t deserve you.’

Until one day she gave him a platonic hug and said, ‘You love me too much. I’m sorry I can’t give you what you need.’

Damien looked at her pale, tortured face and wondered why she’d married him.

‘This is crazy, Laura. I thought that we were soulmates. But you’re ice cold in bed.’

‘I can’t help it,’ she said. ‘I’m locked in my head. I do love you. But my body just shuts off. I feel physically numb.’

She looked up at him and for a moment he saw something else. An arrogance. As if to say, ‘You don’t know how to please me.’

There were no more conversations. Damien stopped trying. It hurt less.

Frustrated that his manly needs were unrequited, he sought other willing beauties who were simply delighted to oblige.

The sensational response to his debut novel,The Empress, had prompted his publishers to send him on a book tour to the States: LA, Miami and New York.

‘I was in full throttle, Claudia,’ he said. ‘I just couldn’t stop. Laura made me so angry. Every time I had sex with another woman, I wanted her to know. I was glad the paparazzi took pics of me with gorgeous actresses and models. I wanted to hurt her – to humiliate her, like she did me. And why not? She didn’t want my body, she just wanted my soul. What kind of marriage is that! So I was happy to go on tour and have my ego stroked by my adoring fans. Laura cried when I said goodbye.’

‘Well then, she must have cared about you,’ Claudia said.

‘Don’t think so. More like crocodile tears.’

Claudia passed him a glass of water. He took a sip.

‘I had lost the sense of who I was with her,’ he continued. ‘She made me feel useless – a failure. But, luckily, on the plane to LA I met a gorgeous girl called Lilly, sitting in a first-class seat next to me. I was back in the game.’

‘And what was her story?’ Claudia asked.

‘Well, she was getting married to a wealthy Greek man, twice divorced and pushing sixty.’

‘How old was she?’ asked Claudia.

‘Twenty-three. It was a huge age gap. I asked her whether she was happy with that. Lilly said that at the time it didn’t cross her mind. He just swept her off her feet. She said that they’d met in Paris a year ago when he came to a fashion show. She was on the catwalk modelling Givenchy and afterwards he waited for her. And every day for a month he sent her flowers and took her to the finest restaurants. He treated her beautifully and didn’t ask to sleep with her. Until he took her for a weekend to St Tropez.’

Now he had pushed Laura out of his mind, Damien coasted along. He enjoyed talking about his exploits.

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