A Wife Worth Investing In

by Marguerite Kaye

  ‘One last time, Owen. So we can remember it this way.’

  It was impossible to resist. He pulled her on to his lap and their lips met in the sweetest, most delicious of bittersweet kisses. She murmured his name over and over as they kissed, as they stroked each other in that familiar way, and he said her name too, over and over, because he couldn’t tell her that he loved her, but he could demonstrate that he did. When he entered her, tears leaked from her eyes and he licked them away, and then the sheer delight of being inside her, of having her arms wrapped around him, their partially clad bodies entwined, took over, and the knowledge that it would be the last time, which should have made their lovemaking slow, instead made it frantic. It was over far too soon.

  ‘Phoebe.’

  She shook her head, putting her finger over his mouth. ‘Don’t say it. Don’t look for me in the morning.’ She kissed him lingeringly one last time. She quickly gathered up her clothes. Then she was gone.

  * * *

  He sat up all night, wide awake in his work room, counting down the hours until she left. She had taken a suite at a hotel in the short term. Now that he had decided to go abroad, there was no reason for her to leave the town house, save that he didn’t want her to wait for him. And she had promised him not to.

  Was he truly without hope? It was after six and the servants were stirring when Owen finally accepted that he was not. Hopelessness would keep him here, retiring back into solitude, giving up on the world, making a recluse of him again. It was hope that was taking him out into the world, though he dreaded all that entailed, for he would be exposed, raw, and able to rely on no one but himself. He hoped that somewhere in his travels he would find a way to live with himself. Because then, and only then, could he hope that he’d be able to find a way also to live with Phoebe.

  Chapter Twelve

  One year later, April 1832

  Owen stood at the foot of the steps outside Fearnoch House, the London residence of Phoebe’s sister, Eloise. Phoebe had moved there shortly after he had left England, according to his lawyer, who also acted for her in matters of business. The man had been astounded when Owen arrived at his office an hour ago demanding to know the whereabouts of his own wife. He’d have been even more astounded if he’d known that the only thing that prevented Owen tracking him down as soon as he arrived back in London last night, was the fact that he had no idea where his lawyer lived.

  He had not slept in the hotel where he’d been forced to stay, his own house being locked up, but he had bathed and changed. Now here he stood on the steps outside a London town house he’d never been in before, his stomach churning with nerves. Almost exactly a year and a half ago, Phoebe had stood outside his town house, uncertain of her own reception. Only now did he realise just how brave she had been, simply to knock on the door and beg an audience. How close he’d come to refusing her. Please to all the gods in heaven, she did not refuse him now.

  She would be perfectly with her rights to do so. He had asked her not to wait. He had refused to give her any hope. His lawyer had told him enough to assure him that she had made a resounding success of Le Pas à Pas, enough to fill Owen’s heart with pride. And now with doubt. Would she want to make room in her life for him? He thought she’d understood his reasons for leaving, but a year was a very long time. What if Phoebe had found someone else to fill the hole he’d torn in her heart?

  The very notion of it made him feel dizzy. He told himself staunchly that he would endure such a blow with dignity, that he would understand, that he would be happy that she was happy. That’s what he told himself. He didn’t believe a word of it as he rang the bell, for the one solid truth he had known all along was that he loved her, and that he wanted to spend the rest of his life loving her. ‘Let her see me. Let her listen. Let her give me a chance,’ is what he said to himself. ‘Let her still love me.’

  * * *

  Phoebe picked up the copy of the Town Crier, which had been sent to her courtesy of the publication’s editor.

  The first anniversary of Le Pas à Pas, our favourite London eatery, was celebrated last night with the usual muted panache we have come to associate with Mrs Harrington, the chef patroness.

  Regular diners will be relieved to know that the renowned venison ragout still features on the new menu, though it is now served with an Italian concoction called macaroni served with cheese, rather than the potato gratin that is a particular favourite of Yours Truly.

  Is this innovation, which Mrs Harrington credits to Signora Sarti, her Italian sous-chef, an improvement? It is certainly different!

  In other words, he hated it, Phoebe thought, setting the rag aside. Which was a pity, because Gina was an excellent chef who deserved a reward for her loyalty. Having her name in print and her first dish on the menu was only the start. Phoebe intended to introduce several more in the coming months, and to delegate more too, with her plans to open a sister café to Le Pas à Pas well in train. There was another pasta dish Gina made, with asparagus and fresh peas, that would eat beautifully paired with pork.

  It was Sunday, her day off from the stoves, and a lovely spring day, perfect for a walk in the park. She checked her little enamel watch. Work first. She’d had no idea there was so much paperwork involved in renting and fitting out a new premises. Owen had taken care of that side of the business the first time around. The familiar pain made her heart clench, but she was used to it now. She had promised him not to hope. She had promised him not to wait for him, to make the most of her life. She had been true to both vows, but she loved him every bit as much now as she had done the day she had forced herself to walk away from him.

  The distant clang of the doorbell a few moments later made her frown. It was only just after eight in the morning. ‘You know I don’t like to be disturbed on a Sunday,’ she said, frowning at Wiggins, Eloise’s butler.

  ‘Indeed, Mrs Harrington, but I think you may wish to make an exception for this caller.’

  ‘I hope you will,’ came a voice from behind the butler’s back.

  ‘Owen?’ The room began to spin. Phoebe clutched the edge of the dining table.

  ‘May I come in?’

  ‘Owen? What are you doing here? You’re supposed to be abroad.’

  ‘I came back.’

  Wiggins had tactfully disappeared, but Owen was still hovering at the door. He was tanned. His hair had been bleached gold. He looked older, but younger. Different, but the same. And just looking at him, she felt the same too—the tug of attraction, the ache of unspoken love in her heart. Which must remain unspoken, she cautioned herself. It had been a year. She would embarrass the pair of them by throwing herself at a husband who had come seeking a formal separation.

  ‘Come in. Would you like some coffee?’

  ‘No, thank you.’ He stepped warily into the room, as if unsure of his welcome. ‘I’m sorry to surprise you like this. I only got back last night. I’d have called then, if I’d known where you were.’

  ‘You look very well, Owen.’

  ‘Do I? I feel—I wasn’t sure you’d see me. You look lovely, as ever.’

  ‘I’ve been working hard. The café...’

  ‘Phoebe, I don’t care about the café. No, that’s not true, of course I care, but not right at this moment.’ Owen finally crossed the room to her side. ‘I’ve had nearly a month to rehearse this, the whole journey home, and now I can’t think of a thing to say, except that I love you with all my heart and I’ve missed you with all my heart, and I’m not cured and I may never be, but I don’t want to spend another minute of my life without you.’

  She stared at him, open mouthed, her heart leaping ahead of her brain, fluttering wildly with joy while she tried to assimilate what he had said.

  Owen made to take her hand then changed his mind. ‘I know this is a shock. When I left England, I had no idea how long I would be gone. I was lost, I was scared, I didn’t k
now who I was. I thought the worst thing that could happen to me had happened that night, when I remembered my accident, but I knew even then that the worst thing that could happen was losing you. I know I told you not to hope, but I hoped, I never stopped hoping, that I’d find a way to come back to you.’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘Because I’ve lived a life in limbo, Phoebe. Before you came into my life, that’s what I was doing. Yes, I was working away on my investments, but that was never anything other than a way to kill time. You gave me a purpose, but I’ve never forgotten what it was like not to have one—or rather, what it was like when my only purpose was waiting for something to happen—waiting to remember, is what I was doing. Instead, you happened. And you changed everything for me.’

  She wanted so much to have his arms around her, but she wanted even more to hear him out, because the hope that she hadn’t ever fully repressed either, was blooming so quickly inside her. ‘Go on,’ Phoebe said, indicating a chair.

  ‘Are you sure? I have no right to expect you even to listen to me.’

  ‘Owen, almost exactly eighteen months ago, I called on you. You saw no one, but you saw me, and you listened to me. At the very least, don’t you think I owe you this?’

  ‘Is that the only reason? If you would rather not hear what I have to say, if you’ve made a new life for yourself...’

  ‘Would you leave?’

  He laughed shortly. ‘I asked myself the same question while I was on the doorstep a few moments ago. I told myself I would, but I know I wouldn’t. I love you with all my heart, Phoebe. That’s the one constant that’s been with me for the last year, and I’m going to do my damnedest to persuade you to give me another chance.’ He swallowed, took a visible breath. ‘But you found the strength to let me go when I needed you to. Hear me out, that’s all I ask. If you decide, after that, that I won’t make you happy then I promise I’ll find the strength to leave you.’

  Once again, the urge to throw herself into his arms and tell him that nothing mattered save that he was here was overpowering. She loved him, she didn’t doubt that he loved her, but the last year had proved to her that he’d been right to go, that if he’d stayed, they would have torn each other apart. So Phoebe didn’t throw herself into Owen’s arms, instead she ordered him a pot of coffee and herself a fresh pot of tea. And when she had poured their drinks, she nodded to him, permitting herself a very small smile. ‘I’m listening.’

  * * *

  Owen took a sip of coffee, trying to collect his thoughts. Phoebe had changed. She was still his beautiful, desirable wife, but there was an inner strength about her that hadn’t been there before. The old Phoebe would have either thrown herself into his arms or shown him the door. This Phoebe was determined to make a more rational decision, and by the sun and moon and stars, he admired her for it. He loved her so much, but he had a lot to prove. He finished his coffee in one gulp. He was determined to do just that.

  ‘You know why I left,’ he said. ‘First of all, I thought if I got away from England, it might help my condition, but it didn’t. I still had episodes, and I had the additional misery of missing you. Which I came to realise very quickly, was making me much more miserable than the episodes.’

  ‘But you didn’t come back, because you were determined not to make me miserable too?’

  ‘That was a big part of it, you know that, but the other part of it was...’

  ‘You needed to be alone.’

  ‘Yes,’ Owen said gratefully. ‘I knew you understood that.’

  ‘I did, eventually. It hurt, Owen, because at first I thought you didn’t want my help. Then I realised that I simply couldn’t help.’ Phoebe smiled sadly. ‘And that hurt too, but in a different way.’

  ‘I didn’t know who I was any more, but I knew I wasn’t the person I thought I was. When you’re alone and no one knows you and no one knows where you are, it does clear your mind. Remembering what happened the day of the fire—’ Owen broke off, shuddering. ‘The horror and the tragedy of that won’t change. But I did start to question how I viewed my part in it.’

  ‘You saw that it wasn’t your fault that the poor little baby died?’

  He sighed heavily. ‘I truly don’t think anyone could have saved him.’

  ‘Him?’

  ‘It was a little boy. I know, because I went to Marseille and I tracked down his mother.’

  ‘You did!’ Phoebe caught his hand, lifting it to her cheek, pressing a kiss to his palm, a familiar, tender little gesture that was one of the things he’d missed the most about her. ‘That was very brave.’

  ‘I almost didn’t go through with it,’ he admitted. ‘But I’m glad I did. I wasn’t even sure Madame LeBrun would want to meet with me. It was her husband, in fact, who came to the café where I was waiting. I thought he was going to attack me, but he took my hand and he...’ Tears sprang unbidden. But he was used to tears now, and no longer ashamed of them, so he didn’t apologise. ‘He embraced me and said he had waited a long time to thank me for saving his wife.’

  Phoebe smudged the tear which tracked down his cheek with her thumb. ‘I always knew you were a hero.’

  ‘I’m not. I was a fool. I don’t think anyone could have saved that child. I may have saved Madame LeBrun, but I risked my own life doing so. It was mine to risk, but the two men who saved me—their lives were not mine to risk. I was lucky, very lucky, that they were so brave.’

  ‘Did you meet them too, in Marseille?’

  ‘I did. And invested a little money in their fishing boats—I now know a great deal more than I will ever need to about the fish of the Mediterranean. Perhaps even more than you.’

  ‘You’re a good man, Owen Harrington. You knew they wouldn’t accept money.’

  ‘It’s a good investment. More importantly, meeting them, all of them, returning to Marseille as I did, it made me finally see things differently.’

  Owen poured himself another cup of coffee, forcing himself not to rush. Phoebe, his lovely, patient, strong Phoebe, was such a distracting presence, but he had to get this right. ‘I saw that I’d been looking at my accident the wrong way round, you see. I thought it had deprived me of my second chance. Before you came along, I was wallowing in self-pity, I was miserable.’

  ‘In limbo.’

  ‘Exactly. You dragged me out of the pit of despair. No, don’t tell me that I did it myself. I did, in the practical sense, but if it hadn’t been for you, for wanting to be better for you, then I wouldn’t have done anything. Then I fell in love with you. I was happy, I thought I couldn’t be happier, but I was wrong about that. It was still there, the guilt and the grief, waiting until I was well enough to deal with it. You made me well enough.’

  ‘And have you dealt with it?’

  ‘I’m not better,’ Owen said. ‘I won’t lie to you, Phoebe. I may never completely recover. I still have episodes. But I understand them. There’s less of them, much less. And because I understand what happened, I can bear them.’ He took a last sip of coffee. ‘I hope that they are symptoms of progress. Like lancing a boil, the poison has to come out, do you see?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘But I could be wrong, Phoebe. I know—don’t ask me how, I simply do—that they won’t get worse, but I may never be clear of them. I’m asking a lot of you. I’m asking you to take what I say on trust until you have the evidence that I’m right. If that means you want me to wait until you are reassured, then I’ll wait for however long it takes. But I can promise you two things, hand on heart. The first is that I won’t be going away again. And the second is that I love you. Always.’

  He dropped to his knees beside her, finally allowing himself to take her hand. ‘That fire didn’t deprive me of a second chance, it gave me one. I could have died. I didn’t. I have a life to live, and I want to live it with you. Every single second of it. I have made my pea
ce with the tragedy that I was part of, but I want more than that. I want happiness. And the only true happiness for me is with you. But if you don’t feel the same...’

  ‘I do.’ Phoebe fell on to the floor beside him and threw her arms around him. ‘I love you so much, Owen, so very much.’

  ‘It won’t be plain sailing.’

  She laughed. ‘No, it certainly won’t. For a start I’m about to open a second café.’

  ‘Why stop at a second! Why stop at London! You are magnificent. I love you so much.’

  ‘And I love you. I haven’t stopped loving you but, Owen—are you absolutely sure?’

  ‘Completely and utterly sure. The whole time I was away, I carried you here.’ He touched his heart. ‘This is yours, if you want it, my darling. Will you take it?’

  He drew the ring from the inner pocket of his waistcoat and held it out to her.

  ‘I left that behind,’ Phoebe said.

  ‘And I took it with me. Will you take it?’

  ‘For ever.’

  He put the ring on her wedding finger above the wedding band. He kissed the ring. Then he turned her hand over to kiss her palm. Then finally, he pulled her into his arms. Their lips met. Their kiss was awkward, tentative at first, but it deepened quickly and they clung together, kissing until they had to stop for breath.

  ‘Are you really here?’ Phoebe asked, touching his tanned face, the rough stubble on his chin.

  ‘For ever.’ He kissed her again, and knew without a shadow of a doubt that he had finally found the place where he belonged. ‘For ever,’ he repeated, then he kissed her again. ‘I promise.’

  * * *