‘B-but the airline ticket, the divorce settlement she offered me—’ Emma stammered.
Richard scowled.
‘Amanda’s always had a shrewd sense of bluff,’ he said curtly. ‘She was only trying to frighten you off and leave the way clear for herself. She admitted as much when I went to her home and tackled her about it the day after you left Sydney. But she was wasting her time, Emma. I’ve never been interested in another woman from the first moment I laid eyes on you.’
There was so much harsh sincerity in his voice that a lump rose in her throat. She had to force herself to remember the incident which had caused their marriage to break up years before.
‘The Blue Mountains—’ she began.
‘I’ve never been to the Blue Mountains in my life!’ growled Richard. ‘But I’ve been doing some detective work in the last few days and I’ve found out now what did happen. It was all a put-up job by your father to drive us apart. And he succeeded too, damn him! If I’d had the slightest suspicion what he was up to, I would have flattened him. But I never guessed and neither did you.’
‘Guessed what?’ asked Emma in bewilderment.
Richard broke away from her and prowled angrily across the room before turning back to face her.
‘Frank never liked me and he had cooked things up to make it look as though I was being unfaithful to you. But it was a total fabrication, Emma. Look at this.’
Snatching open one of the bags on the floor, he rummaged inside and produced a handful of documents. Unclipping a photocopy from the top, he handed it to her.
‘It’s a Visa Card statement,’ she said in a baffled voice.
‘Yes. I got it from Miss Matty. She had every record of Prero’s going back to the year dot. Just look at the date. December the twenty-second, over eight years ago. The Visa Card is in your father’s name, so can you tell me why he was paying for one night’s accommodation in the Norfolk Pines Motor Inn in the Blue Mountains for Mr and Mrs Richard Fielding when neither you nor I was anywhere near the area at that time? Suspicious, isn’t it? And didn’t good old Frank have access to the bracelet I’m supposed to have given to this woman? Couldn’t he have planted it at the motel and arranged for the manager to phone you about it?’
Emma went chalky white as the pieces of the puzzle began to drop into place.
‘Dad wouldn’t—’ she began hotly. And then stopped. Wouldn’t he? Would a man who had snatched his two-year-old daughter away from her mother really hesitate to come between husband and wife? Suddenly Miss Matty’s words rang in her head. ‘Mr Prero could be very unpleasant if you crossed him, very vindictive.’ She stared in horror as the uncomfortable suspicion grew.
‘He would,’ insisted Richard grimly.
Emma felt as if her legs had given way beneath her. Gripping the arm of the couch for support, she sat down, shaking her head. Quite suddenly she found Richard on the couch beside her, with his massive arms protectively around her. He gazed down at her with a compassionate expression.
‘There’s worse,’ he warned. ‘But you ought to know the truth. Your father destroyed the letter you wrote to me asking me to come back. He got Miss Matty to put it through the shredder in her office.’
Emma gasped.
‘Miss Matty wouldn’t do something so cruel to me!’ she protested.
‘She didn’t know she was being cruel. Frank told her you’d changed your mind about sending the letter because you’d discovered that I was still being unfaithful to you. She thought she was destroying it at your wish.’
There was no mistaking the bitterness in his tone. Emma stared at him with slowly dawning comprehension, suddenly realising that he was innocent of the offences she had blamed him for all these years. There had been no reason to hate him and distrust him, no reason at all!
‘O-oh, heavens! I’m so sorry, Richard,’ she stammered. ‘You mean you never did sleep with somebody else, you never did ignore my letter?’
He shook his head.
‘No. All I did was lose my temper, tell you your father was an unscrupulous old bastard and storm out of the house. And the only things I did while I was away were to raise a loan to save my business and uncover further rumours that Frank had tried to ruin it in the first place.’
‘You really believe he did that to you?’
‘Oh, yes. He was as mean as they come. I never had hard evidence before, but I’ve got documents now to prove it. He deliberately tried to make me go broke, and all because I had dared to fall in love with you and marry you.’
Emma closed her eyes briefly and shuddered.
‘And I…nearly had an affair with Nigel,’ she breathed. ‘Oh, Richard, can you ever forgive me?’
A stormy light flickered in his blue eyes and he grimaced.
‘I won’t pretend it thrills me, even now. But how could I not forgive you, Emma? You believed I’d been unfaithful to you, that I had ignored your generous attempt to patch things up and that I had made no effort to contact you… I don’t suppose you ever received the dozen red roses I sent you on our first wedding anniversary?’
She shook her head in anguish. No, by then she had been living back in her father’s house. No doubt he had made sure she never received them!
‘Frank again,’ breathed Richard. ‘Of course. So there you were, twenty years old, hurt, bewildered and ripe for seduction by the man your father favoured…’
Emma gave a muffled groan.
‘Oh, Richard, I’ve never regretted anything so much in my life!’ she exclaimed. ‘But I was so unhappy. I tried to convince myself that I loved Nigel, but deep down I knew it wasn’t true. You didn’t seem to love me any more and I wanted to hit back… But when he asked me to sleep with him—I just couldn’t.’
‘Whereas the truth is that I never stopped loving you.’
‘But those other women…,’ she said uneasily.
He scowled.
‘There were no other women until a long time after we split up. Perhaps three years later.’
‘But you admitted that you were involved with other women while you were still married to me…’
‘I’ve been married to you for the last nine years, Emma,’ Richard reminded her. ‘Married legally and in my heart. I kept hoping you’d come back to me. When you didn’t, I eventually tried to blot you out by turning to other people. But it didn’t work. I could never forget you.’
‘I could never forget you, either,’ admitted Emma huskily. ‘After I left Nigel, I just lived for my work. There was nothing else in my life.’
‘You left Nigel?’ asked Richard.
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’ he demanded.
‘Because he wasn’t you,’ she said simply.
‘And those other men—’
‘There were no other men. You know the journalists, Richard. Some of them don’t believe in messing up a good story with the facts.’
Richard winced.
‘I know. My exploits weren’t half as colourful as they were made out to be either. In the end I got thoroughly sick of that kind of life myself. All I wanted was for you to come back to me, but you never did. And then one day I heard the major tenant for your new office block had gone broke and Prero’s was likely to follow suit. I saw my chance to get you back, so I followed you here to Bali and put my proposal to you.’
Emma screwed up her face in bewilderment.
‘But if you still loved me, why didn’t you just ask me to come back to you genuinely?’ she demanded.
Richard ran his fingers through his wild blond curls and sighed.
‘Wounded pride,’ he admitted. ‘A masculine thirst for revenge. Don’t forget my view of what had happened, Emma. As far as I knew, you’d simply upped and left me because I’d insulted your precious father. And to add insult to injury you’d gone off with Nigel almost at once. Even after your father died and you and Nigel split up, my rage never really cooled. I wanted to drag you off by the hair
and force you to admit that I was the better man.’
A dimple began to appear in Emma’s cheek.
‘I see,’ she said evenly.
Richard glared at her.
‘Then I wanted you to crawl on your hands and knees and admit that you’d made a mistake in leaving me,’ he continued. ‘I wanted you to say that you still loved me.’
‘But I did!’ protested Emma. ‘At Air Panas. That first night we made love. And you flung my words right back in my face.’
Richard groaned.
‘I know. It was because you said it too soon. I couldn’t believe it was real. One night, and you were turning to melted butter in my arms? It seemed too suspicious to be true. I thought it was some kind of game you were playing or something you said to every man you were involved with. I was wild with jealousy and I felt my whole carefully laid plan was crumbling to dust right at the beginning.’
‘"Carefully laid plan”,’ echoed Emma thoughtfully. ‘Richard, what was your plan? Did you seriously intend just to stay with me for three months and take your revenge, then walk out on me?’
‘I don’t know any more!’ he admitted with a mirthless laugh. ‘I certainly told myself I did. But I soon realised I couldn’t go through with it. I’d been eight years away from you and then, after only one night of making love with you, I was right back where I started—needing you, loving you, hating you! Ready to worship the ground you trod on. I couldn’t handle it.’
‘Is that why you were so hateful to me?’ asked Emma.
‘Yes,’ he rasped.
‘And why you let me think you were involved with Amanda?’
‘Yes, again. It seemed like a heaven-sent camouflage for my true feelings, although I didn’t know she fancied me herself at that stage. As time went by, I realised that what I was doing was ridiculous. I couldn’t deny any longer that I loved you and I had to have you back. But for a long time my pride wouldn’t allow me to come right out and say it to you. Somehow the words always stuck in my throat.’
‘But that day I walked in on you and Amanda at home she was telling you that she loved you. Why didn’t you—’
‘I wanted to do the decent thing by both of you,’ he broke in irritably. ‘She seemed genuinely upset and I tried to calm her down and get rid of her so that I could talk to you. But you wouldn’t listen, even when I shouted through the bedroom door that I loved you.’
Emma flashed him a swift, guilty smile.
‘I couldn’t hear you. I had the Wagner turned up too loud.’
‘I’ll never listen to that vile CD again!’ vowed Richard.
‘No, you won’t,’ agreed Emma. ‘I threw it in the trash.’
‘You what?’ roared Richard, momentarily diverted. ‘You threw my Wagner CD in the trash?’
It sounded as if they were getting revved up for one of their shouting, stormy quarrels about nothing. Coming on top of the harrowing discoveries which had just shaken her to the core, it was too much for Emma. A joyful, bubbling sense of relief surged through her and she burst out laughing.
‘Oh, what does it matter?’ she cried, throwing herself into Richard’s arms and hugging him. ‘What does any of it matter now that we’re back together and it’s all sorted out?’
He looked momentarily startled. Then, taking advantage of the opportunity presented to him, he cupped her face in his hands and kissed her with a passion and intensity that enthralled her.
‘You have a point,’ he admitted at last, gazing down at her through smoky, half-closed eyes. ‘There’s only one thing that matters now.’
‘What’s that?’ asked Emma, nestling against him.
‘That you’re my wife and I love you now and forever. Will you come back to me, Emma? Properly this time? Permanently?’
‘Of course I will!’ she agreed fervently.
He dragged her against him with a growl of triumph. Suddenly all the tension between them was dissipated, transformed into a riotous, exuberant mood of rejoicing. Hauling her off the couch, he swung her bodily off the ground and into the air, then set her down and kissed her. And kissed her. And kissed her.
‘You’re never going to leave me again,’ he vowed. ‘In fact, you’re going to spend a large proportion of your time gorgeously naked while I make violent love to you. Starting right this minute.’
Rising to his feet, he swept her off the couch into his arms and made for the stairs at a run. He was not even breathing heavily when he reached the bedroom upstairs, dropped her in the middle of the bed and gazed down at her with a long, appreciative look.
‘Do I have any say in this?’ mocked Emma.
‘No,’ replied Richard coolly, leaping astride her and untying the halter-neck of her dress. ‘Kindly remember your place, woman. This marriage is not a democracy, it’s a tyranny.’
‘I see,’ murmured Emma as Richard peeled the dress right off her and cupped her soft breasts in his hands. ‘And the tyrant is about to have his evil way with me, is he?’
‘Mmm,’ agreed Richard, caressing her provocatively. ‘Want to scream for help?’
‘Help!’ squeaked Emma softly. Then she raised her mouth to his. ‘Oh, damn, no sign of rescue! Looks as though I’m out of luck. I guess I’ll just have to give in. Oh, Richard… Oh, Richard! Do that again!’
He rose to his feet and in a few frantic movements had stripped off his clothes, tearing his shirt in the process. Then suddenly he was warm and hard and naked beside her, letting his hand trail over her flanks in a tender, appreciative caress. Emma sighed rapturously.
‘Are you sure this won’t hurt the baby?’ he demanded between kisses.
She smiled mischievously.
‘The doctor said it was all right.’
His lips touched her ear.
‘I’m so proud, so thrilled to think that you’re carrying my child,’ he murmured. ‘It’s almost the best thing of all. But not quite. The best thing of all is being back together. Being man and wife.’
His hand continued to stroke her in a way that was provocative, intimate, wildly arousing. Soon she was gasping, twisting under his touch, reaching for him so that she could return the pleasure he was giving her. And when her whole body was a heated, throbbing ferment of love and need he entered her at last and brought her to a climax so thrilling that she turned her face into his shoulder and cried out. Through the warm, thundering waves of fulfilment that were breaking over her, she heard the distant sound of his voice.
‘I love you, Emma. I love you, I love you, I love you.’
‘I love you too, Richard,’ she whispered hoarsely.
Hours later, when they had slept and eaten and showered and loved again, he pulled her to her feet and announced that they were going out. Giggling weakly, she allowed him to manhandle her back into her clothes.
‘I can’t be bothered,’ she protested. ‘I want to stay here in a state of ecstasy forever. Where are we going anyway?’
‘Penelokan.’
That silenced her. Penelokan, where they had made their vows of undying love on their honeymoon. And, even if Richard couldn’t remember what he had said to her, at least he knew it was a magical, special place for both of them. Yes, it was fitting that they should return there.
A late tropical shower had fallen while they were in bed and every bush and tree along the road gleamed with the rainbow light of a thousand diamond droplets. On the muddy roadside verges huge, fresh puddles reflected a dazzling blue sky and, when Emma rolled down the window, a surge of moist, flower-scented air wafted into the car. Pagodas and village compounds glided by and thickets of rainforest and rice paddies and flocks of quacking white ducks. Then they began their ascent into the mountains and the air grew as cool and potent as chilled white wine. At last they came through the great moss-encrusted ceremonial stone gateway and found the mountain country laid out before them in a vivid panorama of emerald-green and blue. Stopping the car, Richard helped her out. They were at Penelokan.
The view from the look-out was as spectacular as ever with Mount Batur rearing up in the background and the lake lying like a jewel among the rolling green hills. As Emma stood gazing down at it, she could not help feeling a brief pang of nostalgia for the moment they had shared here on their honeymoon and the words Richard had spoken to her then. But what really counted was that his arm was warm and powerful around her, that she could hear the steady beating of his heart and that he loved her to the depths of his soul. What did words matter, after all?
Then suddenly Richard drew her to him and looked down into her eyes with an intent, brooding expression on his face. She gazed back at him with a questioning look.
‘Emma Fielding,’ he said quietly. ‘I swear I’ll love you until that mountain is levelled and that lake runs dry.’
An incredulous joy soared through her entire body, so that she felt she could take wings and fly.
‘R-Richard!’ she stammered. ‘You remembered?’
‘How could I ever forget?’ he murmured.
And his mouth came down on hers.
eISBN 978-14592-7615-4
YESTERDAY’S HUSBAND
First North American Publication 1996.
Copyright © 1994 by Angela Devine.
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