The Secret Wife

by Susan Mallery

“Don’t you need help?” he asked as she moved past him.

  “Not really.” Her shrug was nearly apologetic. “Elissa explained some things to me a few days ago and now it all makes sense. I want to do my homework in here in case I have any questions.” She cast a quick glance at the television. “Besides, I really like watching ‘The Sally McGuire Show.’ It’s a hoot.”

  “Great.” Cole’s smile was automatic. He didn’t want Mindy or anyone knowing that he resented Elissa’s presence and her easy way with the children.

  No, he thought grimly. Resented wasn’t the right word. If he believed in his heart that she really planned to make a place for herself here, he would welcome her with open arms. For the children at least, if not for himself. But she wasn’t here on a permanent basis. As soon as it suited her, regardless of the cost to anyone else, she would be gone.

  Mindy settled on the floor in front of the center sofa and spread her papers around. Tiffany joined her. Gina leaned close to Elissa.

  “I’m sorry you’re not a movie star,” the ten-year-old said.

  “Why?” Elissa asked.

  “If you were, you could marry a handsome prince. That’s what movie stars do.”

  “They do not,” Greg said, and frowned. “That’s stupid.”

  “Greg, don’t be a dork,” Mindy said absently as she chewed on her mechanical pencil and stared at the book. “If anyone gets dibs on handsome princes, it would sure be movie stars.”

  Elissa smoothed Gina’s straight bangs. “I knew a handsome prince once,” she said quietly.

  Gina’s eyes widened. “Did you marry him?”

  Elissa nodded.

  Cole stiffened. As far as he knew, he was the only man she’d married. Somehow the phrase handsome prince didn’t fit him. Was she mocking him?

  “What happened?”

  He forced himself to relax. What did he care about the answer?

  Elissa tilted her head, as if deep in thought. “He decided he didn’t want me anymore.”

  The hell he did, Cole thought furiously, refusing to acknowledge the sadness inherent in her words. She’d been the one to do the deciding in their relationship.

  Familiar anger made his hands curl into fists. He had to get out of here before he said or did something he would regret. But before he could leave, Gina glanced up and saw him.

  “Cole!” she called, her voice laced with delight. “We’re watching ‘Sally McGuire’ with Elissa. Come watch with us.”

  At the child’s words, Elissa turned. Her skin flushed as her mouth dropped open. Obviously she hadn’t known he was eavesdropping.

  Oblivious to the tension between the adults, Gina pointed to the space on the other side of Elissa. “There’s plenty of room.”

  If the request had come from anyone but Gina, he would have refused it. But shy Gina rarely asked for anything. He supposed he should be pleased that she and Elissa had connected. On some level he was; on another he was annoyed as hell.

  As there was no way to gracefully escape, he made his way into the room and settled on the sofa. He made sure that there was as much distance between him and Elissa as possible. He didn’t want to take a chance on touching her. Not when he hadn’t learned to control his reaction to her.

  “That’s Kayla,” Elissa said, pointing to the screen. Several children paraded around in pirate costumes, with a blond, green-eyed minx as their leader.

  “She’s the youngest?” Gina asked.

  “Right. By several minutes. We never let her forget it, either. She always hated being the baby.”

  “Elissa, if I have an equation and I take the square root of one side, do I have to take the square root of the other?” Mindy asked.

  “I don’t know why you’d want to, but yes, you have to do the same thing on the other side. Don’t forget to plug your solutions in to the original equation to make sure it balances.”

  Mindy wrinkled her nose. “I know. Sheesh, I hate algebra. Who thought it up?”

  “I have no idea.”

  Cole noticed Elissa seemed to be avoiding him nearly as much as he was avoiding her. Was it for the same reason? Did she recall that moment of almost-passion between them?

  He’d read the desire in her eyes. At least, he told himself he had. Maybe all he’d seen was what he’d wanted to see. Nothing had changed. She hadn’t wanted him in her bed five years ago, and she still didn’t.

  Her rejection of the physical side of their marriage had hurt almost as much as her leaving.

  When would he learn? Why did she have to be the one? There were probably a couple dozen women who would find him reasonably appealing. They might not fall head over heels, but they could come to care about him. They might even find him sexually attractive.

  Over the past few years a few women had indicated their interest. He’d wanted to respond. He’d wanted to take one of them into his arms and feel her tremble with desire for him. Just once.

  But he never had. Not because they hadn’t desired him, but because he’d never taken things that far. He couldn’t; he was married. Even years of separation hadn’t been enough to make him break his vows.

  Tiffany stood and stretched. “I’m going to bed. Night,” she said, and walked toward the sofa. She bent over and kissed Cole’s cheek. “Thanks for everything,” she said, her dark eyes bright with emotion.

  “No problem, kid.” He squeezed her upper arm.

  She gave him a quick smile, then leaned toward Elissa and offered her a hug. From Elissa’s surprised expression and awkward embrace, he figured it was the first time Tiffany had included her in the evening ritual.

  He probed his emotions, expecting to feel anger or resentment but could find neither. Whether he liked it or not, Elissa was making friends and fitting in.

  Friends. Isn’t that what she’d wanted them to be? Friends. He was never her friend. Maybe that’s what had gone wrong between them.

  As surely as the sun would rise in the morning, Elissa would leave. He knew that down to his soul. Yet he wasn’t sure he could resist. If he couldn’t have her in his life as his lover and his wife, would he want her as his friend?

  A month ago he would have said no. Now, despite the pain, the resentment and the past, he wasn’t so sure.

  * * *

  Mindy was the last of the kids to head off to bed. She closed her algebra book and grinned. “I’m done for the week. There isn’t even a test until the end of the month. Now I can concentrate on important things.”

  “Like your acting?” Cole asked.

  Her grin widened. “I was thinking more of figuring out a way to get Steve to ask me to the homecoming dance.”

  “Steve?”

  Mindy rosé to her feet, crossed the floor and patted his shoulder. “I love it when you go all protective on me. It’s very sweet. Unnecessary, but sweet. Night.”

  With that, she left.

  Elissa breathed a sigh of relief. She’d been terrified that Cole would leave before the children did, forcing her to hunt him down to explain. As it was, she could feel the heat of embarrassment staining her cheeks. What must he think of her?

  She reached for the remote control and clicked off the TV. After briefly sorting out her thoughts, she cleared her throat and began speaking.

  “It’s not what you think,” she said quietly, not quite able to meet his gaze. She angled toward him, staring at the center of his chest, at the faded sports logo on a field of dark blue. “I didn’t tell the children about ‘The Sally McGuire Show.’ Millie brought it up a few days ago in front of Tiffany and Shanna. They’re the ones who told everyone. Then tonight they insisted we watch a couple of episodes.”

  She braced herself for his anger. He was so quick to find fault with her. But she hadn’t done anything wrong. Scratch that, she thought, remembering the playground equipment and science camp application. She hadn’t done anything bad.

  Silence filled the room. If she hadn’t been staring right at him, she would have sworn he’d left.

 
; As he shifted in his seat, she realized the disadvantage of staring at the center of his chest—when he moved, the soft T-shirt clung to him, outlining the hard muscles of his midsection. Away from him, she could easily forget the raw power of his masculinity, telling herself it was just her overactive imagination. But in his presence she could be nothing but aware. His strength, his heat, his scent surrounded her until the world ceased to exist, except through him.

  “I’m not mad,” he said, his voice low.

  “Really?”

  She risked raising her gaze to his face. His dark eyes were unreadable tonight. No obvious emotion lurked there, or in the firm but pleasant set of his mouth.

  “I know how Shanna found out. She ran to tell me the news as soon as she learned it. Shanna’s a good kid, but she doesn’t keep many secrets.”

  “I noticed.” Elissa leaned back in her seat. Thank goodness. The second he’d walked into the room, she’d been terrified he was going to blame her for the choice of television show. After what had happened—and not happened—the night of the school play, she wanted to avoid trouble.

  Which didn’t explain why she blurted out her next question. “If you’re not mad about the show, what are you mad about?”

  He stiffened slightly, then narrowed his gaze.

  Elissa bit her lower lip, but didn’t retract the words. Okay, maybe this wasn’t the best way to avoid trouble, but she was tired of his attitude. It had been nearly a month and he hadn’t loosened up at all.

  “You’re avoiding me,” she continued when it became obvious he wasn’t going to speak. “I hate that. I understand that we have a lot of things to deal with. There are unresolved issues from the past, our feelings, what we’re going to do about the future. You can be angry about that if you want. I can’t stop you. But at least have the grace to admit I’m doing a good job here. I know my way around the office paperwork and I connect with the kids.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “Angling for a raise?”

  “Nothing so dramatic. It’s just nice to be acknowledged.”

  “I’m sure Millie tells you you’re doing a fine job.”

  Elissa almost smiled. He was good. She would bet money he’d been hell on wheels as an attorney. Millie telling her she was doing a good job wasn’t the same as him saying it, nor did it mean she was doing a good job. After all, Millie might be biased.

  Common sense and her previous experience with Cole told her this might be a good time to back off. She risked a lethal blow if she continued to toy with the tiger. Five years ago she would have gone running for cover. But she’d grown up while she’d been apart from him. She wasn’t afraid of his temper or his intelligence. While his good opinion mattered, she’d learned she could get by without it. Maybe the tiger’s tail needed a good tweaking.

  “You’re still mad,” she said. “That’s why you hold me at arm’s length.”

  “I don’t trust you,” he admitted. “There’s a difference.”

  His good opinion might not be necessary for survival, but his words still had the power to wound. The blow fell squarely on her chest, slicing at her confidence, bruising her pride.

  A silence settled between them. Elissa refused to be the one to run away. She squared her shoulders and forced herself to take slow, deep breaths.

  His gaze settled on her face. She felt his attention drift from feature to feature, as if he were comparing her to something. To the girl she’d been, perhaps? The ideal wife he’d always wanted? She hadn’t compared favorably with the latter when they’d first been married. She would fall even further short of that elusive goal now.

  How odd that she’d failed so completely at being his wife when all she’d wanted to do was please him. Despite the love that had burned so brightly between them, they hadn’t made it work. If love wasn’t enough, what was?

  “Are you bored living here?” he asked.

  His question was so at odds with what she was thinking, it took her a couple of minutes to process it in her brain. “Bored? Why would I be? If I’m not busy in the office, I’m helping with the children. There are a thousand things that need doing.”

  “I don’t mean the work. I was referring to the life-style. You haven’t been out since you arrived. Didn’t Millie tell you which were your nights off?”

  She shifted on the sofa, smoothing the skirt of her cotton sundress. “I’m not the disco type,” she said. “Do they even still have disco?”

  “Not really.”

  His mouth turned up slightly at the corners. Her heart skipped a beat. The man was good-looking enough to melt metal; what hope did she have of resisting him?

  “I wasn’t the one who wanted to move to New York,” she reminded him. “Once we were there, I didn’t much care for the pace of life in the city. I was always a homebody. Give me good friends or a good book and I’m happy.”

  He leaned against the back of the sofa and crossed one ankle over the opposite knee. “What about when you were on the show? You must have had a more glamorous existence then.”

  “I was a kid. Besides, it’s not really glamorous. We had public appearances at local malls and stuff.” Elissa shrugged. “It wasn’t what you think, Cole. People imagine a star’s life as perfect, but it’s just like everyone else’s.”

  “Everyone else doesn’t have a poster that’s now a collector’s item.”

  She felt herself flush again. The triplets had posed for a Sally McGuire poster the second year of the show. It had sold very well and was now difficult to find. Fallon had told her a poster in mint condition could fetch as much as three hundred dollars. Too bad she and her sisters hadn’t had a concession on that particular bit of merchandise.

  “Some of the circumstances are different,” she admitted. “But it’s not perfect. The reality is we would drive to the public appearances, spend several hours signing autographs and talking to strangers, then we’d drive home. We were ten-year-old kids and that wasn’t our favorite way to spend a weekend. Monday morning we were back on the set.”

  She shook her head, trying to banish the memories. “Kayla and Fallon get along now, but when we were younger, they were always fighting. It’s so weird that we’re only minutes apart in age, yet the three of us have very different personalities. Those two can really clash, while I’m the peacemaker. Sometimes it was a full-time job. I just wanted everyone to get along.”

  “But they didn’t,” he said.

  “No. They fought. My parents fought. Then they broke up. All I ever wanted was a relationship that worked. I never had that.”

  “Not even with me.”

  She wasn’t sure how he meant his comment. As an apology? A statement of fact? An admission of blame? Whatever his motivation, she didn’t want to ignore the opportunity to talk about their relationship. There were things they needed to resolve.

  “We both could have done better,” she said.

  “Yeah. Then this could have been ours.” He raised his arm and motioned to the room.

  She knew what he meant. Not the orphanage or the big-screen TV, but entwined lives, kids. A future.

  “We really messed up, huh?”

  He shrugged as if to say that sort of thing happened.

  She leaned toward him. No way she was going to let him skate by this time. She wanted to know what he was thinking. “Doesn’t that make you angry?” she asked. “We had so much and we blew it.”

  “Not angry.” His mouth twisted down. “Sad. I thought it was going to be perfect and it wasn’t. I thought you were going to stay.”

  And you didn’t.

  He didn’t have to finish the statement. She heard the silent words.

  “Don’t lay that on me,” she told him, irritated at the way he always brought the conversation back to her leaving. “You weren’t home enough to notice I’d left.”

  “Then why did it hurt so bad to find you gone?”

  The bitter words were his first admission of pain. They made her ache inside, for both their suffering. But she r
efused to be distracted from the point.

  “You left before dawn every morning and you got back around midnight. If you weren’t at work, you were attending parties put on by the law firm or by clients.”

  “They were business and I took you along.”

  “That’s not the point, Cole. Your time was always about you and your career. It was never about us, let alone me. I had no life outside of you.”

  He glanced away. “I’ll admit it was selfish to expect you to walk away from everything, then not consider that you could have continued your schooling in New York.”

  She brushed that off. “We’ve discussed that and we’re equally at fault. I’m just saying that you were a hundred percent focused on the law firm. You had nothing left over for us. I spent my days and my nights waiting for you, wondering what you were doing or if you were even working.”

  His expression darkened. “What the hell are you talking about? Of course I was working. What else would I have been doing?”

  Making love with another woman, she thought, amazed at how that image still had the power to haunt her. Even knowing that it was her fault if Cole had turned elsewhere didn’t take away the pain.

  “I don’t know what else you would have been doing,” she lied. “I just know you weren’t with me.”

  “Maybe because you didn’t want me there. After all, you slept best when you were alone.”

  Shame had a bitter flavor, almost as metallic as blood. If she could call back those words, she would. She still remembered that night. He’d stayed over at the office for three days, then had come home early the next afternoon, scruffy but elated that a case had gone well. The partner in charge had commended him, then given him a couple of hours off.

  Cole had shown up with flowers and a bottle of champagne. In her mind they hadn’t been enough to make up for the days of neglect. When he’d tried to kiss her, she’d turned away. When he’d suggested a nap together, she’d coldly informed him she slept better alone.

  The words of rejection had hung between them, a line drawn in the sand. She’d wanted to take them back, to erase what had been said, but it was too late. His shuttered expression had told her all she’d needed to know. He wouldn’t expose his pain to someone he couldn’t trust.