Rage

'What do I do?" he asked.

'You see those gangsters standing up there?" She pointed at the line of bookmakers. 'You pick any one of them, give him your money and say, "Rhapsody to win." She handed Gerry a ten-rand note. 'Let's dib ten each." Garry was appalled. Ten rand was a great deal of money. It was one thing to borrow two million on a legitimate business scheme, but quite another thing to hand ten to a stranger in a loud suit with a cigar. Reluctantly he produced his wallet.

Rhapsody was in the ruck at the turn, but as they came clear of the bend, Tiger Wright steered him wide and then asked him to run.

The colt jumped away and caught the leaders in front of the stand where Holly was hopping up and down and holding her hat on with one hand. He was two lengths clear at the post and Holly threw both arms around Garry's neck and kissed him in front of ten thousand beady eyes.

As Garry handed over her share of their wi

'Garry?" she mumbled. 'It's Sunday. You can't do this to me - not at six o'clock." 'This time I've got something to show you,' he said, and his enthusiasm was so infectious that she agreed weakly. 'Give me an hour to wake up properly." He drove her down to the curving beach of False Bay beyond Muizenberg and parked at the top of the dunes. Forty horses with their apprentice jockeys and grooms were cantering along the edge of soft white sand or wading bareback in the curling green surfi Garry led her down to the group of four men who were supervising the training and introduced her.

'This is Mr Miller." The trainer and his assistants looked at Holly approvingly. She wore a pink scarf around her forehead but her thick blond hair fell freely down the back of her neck and the short marine peajacket emphasized the length and shape of her legs in the ski pants and calf boots.

The trainer whistled to one of his apprentices and only when he turned the colt out of the circle of horses did Holly recognize it.

'Rhapsody,' she cried.

'Congratulations, Mrs Carmichael,' the trainer said. 'He's going to do us all proud." 'I don't understand." She was bewildered.

'Well,' Garry explained, 'you said it would be fun to own your own horse, and it is your birthday on the twelfth of next month.

Happy birthday." She stared at him in confusion, wondering how he knew that date and how she was going to tell him that she couldn't possibly accept such an extravagant gift. But Garry was so rosy with self-satisfaction, waiting to be thanked and applauded, that she thought, 'And why not -just this once! The hell with conventions!" She kissed him for the second time, while the others stood around and gri

In the MG on the way home she told him. 'Garry, I ca

Like her office, the apartment was an expression of her artistry and sense of form and colour. The balcony was high above the rocks, and the surf crashed and sucked back and forth below them so that it seemed they stood on the prow of an ocean liner.

Holly brought a bottle of champagne and two tulip glasses from the kitchen. 'Open it!" she ordered and held the glasses while he spilled the creaming wine into them.

'Here's to Rhapsody,' she gave him the toast.

While she made a huge bowl of salad for their brunch, she instructed him in the art of mixing a dressing for it.

They drank the rest of the champagne with the salad and then sprawled on the thick carpet of her living-room floor, surrounded by books of silk samples as they discussed their racing colours, and finally decided on a vivid fuchsia pink.

'It will look beautiful against Rhapsody's glossy black skin." She looked up at him. He was kneeling beside her, and her instinct told her that this was the precise moment.

She rolled slowly on to her back and hooded those hi-coloured eyes invitingly, but still he hesitated and she had to reach up with one hand and draw his head down to hers, and then his strength shocked her.

She felt helpless as an infant in his embrace, but after a while when she was certain that he would not hurt her, she began to enjoy the sensation of physical helplessness in the storm of his kisses and let him take control for a while until she sensed that he needed guidance once again.

She bit him on the cheek and when he released her and started back in surprise and consternation, she broke from his grip and darted to the bedroom door. As she looked back he was still kneeling in the centre of the floor, staring after her in confusion, and she laughed and left the door open.

He came in like a bull at the cape, but she stopped him dead with another kiss and, holding his mouth with hers, unbuttoned his shirt and slipped her hand into the opening. She was unprepared for the thick pelt of springing dark hair that covered his chest, and her own reaction to it. All her other men had been smooth and soft. She believed that was her preference, but now her sexual arousal was instantaneous and her loins swam with excitement.

She dominated him with her lips and fingertips, not allowing him to move while she undressed him and then, as the last of his clothing fell around his ankles, she exclaimed aloud, 'Oh dear God!" and then caught his wrist to prevent him covering himself with his hands.

None of her other men had been like this, and for a moment she felt uncertain of her ability to cope with him. Then her wanting overwhelmed any doubts and she led him to the bed. She made him lie there while she undressed in front of him, and every time he tried to cover himself she ordered him. 'No! I like to look at you." He was so different, all muscle and hair: his concave belly was rippled with muscle like the sand on a wind-swept beach and his limbs were clad in muscle. She wanted to begin, but she wanted even more to ensure that this would be something that he would never forget, that would make him hers for all his life.

'Don't move,' she whispered, and naked she stooped over him.

She let her breasts swing forward and her nipples just brush the curls on his chest, and she touched the tip of her tongue to the corner of his eye and then ran it down slowly to his mouth.

'I have never done this before,' he whispered hoarsely. 'I don't know how." 'Shh, my darling, don't talk,' she whispered into his mouth, but the idea of his virginity elated her.

'He's mine,' she told herself triumphantly. 'After today he will be mine for ever!" And she ran her tongue down across his chin, down over his throat, until she felt him thrust up hard and thick between her dangling breasts and then she reached down and took him in both hands.

It was darkening in the room when at last they lay exhausted.

Outside the sun had sunk into the Atlantic and left the evening sky infuriated by its going. Garry lay with his cheek cushioned on her breasts. Like an unweaned child he could not get enough of them.

Holly was proud of her bosom and his fascination with it amused and flattered her. She smiled contentedly as he nuzzled against her.

His spectacles lay on the bedside table and she studied his face in the half light. She liked the big virile nose and the determined line of his jaw, but the steel-framed spectacles had to go, she decided, those and the Prince of Wales checks which emphasized the squatness of his body. On Monday her first concern would be to find out from Ian Gantry, her partner, the name of his personal tailor. She had already chosen the pattern - crisp grey or distinguished blue, with a vertical chalk stripe that would make him taller and slimmer. His reconstruction would be one of her most challenging and rewarding projects and she looked forward to it.