Too Scared to Love

by Cathy Williams

  ‘Is he?’ Roberta tried to look startled and failed.

  ‘He is. He never talks about his wife, but he once said that she was the reason that he would never make the mistake of loving anyone again.’

  ‘Did he?’ Roberta asked with interest now, and Vanessa nodded.

  ‘I don’t envy you your lot,’ she said, magnanimous in her loss, now that she had reasoned it all out for herself and decided that she could re-write the episode in slightly different hues. ‘Good luck.’

  Luck, she thought acidly. That’s something Grant Adams is going to need when he walks through that front door. Luck to be alive when I’m through with him. If things had seemed black the night before, they seemed even blacker now.

  She had a light supper with Emily, her resentment growing with every minute, and she was positively vibrating with it as she sat watching television later that night, counting the minutes until she heard the front door.

  When she finally heard it click open her body tensed and she clenched her fists on her lap. She knew that he would come in here for a nightcap; she had become accustomed to his habits. And he did.

  ‘You’re still up,’ he said, shrugging himself out of his jacket and rolling up the sleeves of his shirt to expose his brown wrists, flecked with fine dark hair. She sat and watched him, simmering with anger as he poured himself a drink, wondering how he could look so damned composed when she felt so totally out of control.

  ‘You told Vanessa that we were going to be married, didn’t you?’ she bit out accusingly. He had sat down next to her on the sofa, one arm stretched along the back so that it was very nearly touching her, and she wondered if he had done that on purpose. Did he know how much it was disconcerting her?

  ‘Not in so many words,’ he said lazily.

  ‘But enough so that she got the general idea?’

  He didn’t say anything and Roberta bristled angrily. ‘I had a little visit from her this evening,’ she snapped, ‘and she’s asked me to tell you that you did her a favour, that she feels she’s well rid of you!’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘Good?’ Roberta repeated, thrown off course by his response. ‘Good?’

  He gave her a sidelong look. ‘She’s angry, but that’s far more healthy than being hurt. Now she can forget that I ever existed, put me down to a bad experience and carry on her life without being burdened by regrets and resentment. Those are emotions that fester.’

  ‘Are you trying to tell me something?’ Roberta asked tersely, knowing that she was being distracted from what she really wanted to say, but unable to respond in any other manner. Just being so close to him muddled her. She found that she was too busy trying to avoid touching him to think clearly, and all the things that she had planned to say, which she had rehearsed so carefully earlier on, became shadowy and intangible and infinitely difficult to put into words.

  ‘He was a bastard, but you’ve let it jaundice you.’

  ‘Oh, that’s rich, coming from you,’ Roberta broke out. ‘Are you trying to tell me that your wife didn’t have a similar effect on you? You can make love, all right, you can have your affairs and pretend that that’s all you want out of life, but you can’t go beyond that, can you?’

  His mouth hardened. ‘It’s a whole lot further than you can go,’ he muttered.

  Roberta didn’t want to talk about this. ‘And what about Emily?’ she asked, changing the subject away from her. She looked at him and had an insane desire to put her hands against his chest, to feel the hard, lean plateau of his torso. She licked her lips nervously, alarmed at the strength of the sensation.

  ‘Did you explain it to her?’

  ‘No! That’s up to you to do!’

  ‘Then why are you so worked up about it? It’s not your problem, is it?’

  That was precisely what she had thought, but the mere fact that he could be so cool about it just added to her anger.

  ‘I don’t like deceit,’ she muttered. ‘I happen to be very fond of your daughter,’ she carried on unsteadily. ‘How is she going to feel when she discovers the truth?’

  He looked at her for a long time, until the silence in the room became deafening, then he said mildly, ‘We could always remedy that situation, you know.’

  Roberta stared blankly at him. ‘How?’

  ‘We could always get married.’

  She felt the room begin to spin. Had she heard correctly? ‘I beg your pardon?’ she said in a high whisper.

  ‘I said,’ he repeated patiently, taking another mouthful from his drink, ‘we could always get married.’

  For a minute, she glimpsed a vision of bliss, then the shutters of reality snapped down.

  ‘A business proposition,’ she said in a dull voice and, when he didn’t reply, she carried on in the same flat tone. ‘I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I’m not in the market for that nature of business proposition.’

  ‘Why not?’ he asked coolly. ‘I can think of a lot worse. You’ll have money, Emily will be happy and, face it, it’s hardly as though there isn’t a strong mutual attraction between us.’

  ‘That’s not the point!’ Roberta protested fiercely, but she could see the way his mind was working all too clearly. She might have told him that she believed in love, but everything else she had said, everything she did, indicated just the opposite.

  Why should she be so surprised at his cold, calculated proposal? A wife suited him at this present moment in time. Emily needed the stability, apart from anything else. That much he had come to realise. And she fitted the bill; it was as simple as that.

  He could not give love, and he assumed the same of her. It would be a marriage unhampered by any such emotion.

  Her reaction hardly surprised her. She could never accept a marriage in which she would always be the vulnerable one.

  He had no love to give, and she foolishly could not consider any sort of life with him without it.

  If I wasn’t in love with him, she thought sickly, I would be able to see the logic of everything he was saying, might even be persuaded by it.

  He was looking at her, trying to get inside her head with those brilliant eyes of his, and she muttered icily, ‘You can find another suitable companion, Mr Adams. Marriage to you is definitely not in my job description.’

  A shutter snapped down over his eyes and he shrugged. ‘In that case, you can explain to Mr Ishikomo that his invitation for Thursday night is out of the question.’

  ‘That’s not fair!’ Roberta cried out.

  ‘And you can also explain to Emily that you have decided that you can’t marry me,’ he continued ruthlessly.

  Tears stung the back of her eyes. ‘You can’t mean that! You’ve got to tell her yourself. She’s your daughter, and that’s your responsibility!’

  He gave a dry, humourless laugh. ‘What you mean is you want to avoid an unpleasant scene. Well, I’ll explain it to her all right, but,’ and he rummaged in his pockets for a business card which he tossed at her, ‘Mr Ishikomo is your baby. They’ve already ordered the chef in for the weekend. Mrs Ishikomo is at the house getting it ready herself. So you can handle that.’

  Roberta picked up the card and stared down at it miserably. ‘All right, we’ll go,’ she whispered. ‘I’ll continue this farce until I leave for London. You can get your deal signed, and what you choose to do after that is your business.’

  Her voice was barely audible. She didn’t know how it had happened, but she had been made to feel the guilty party in this terrible affair. He had cleverly turned the tables around so the sour taste was in her mouth.

  She stood up and he remained where he was, his face expressionless.

  ‘You’re a bastard,’ she said shakily, and he bared his teeth in the mimicry of a smile.

  ‘And you’re a fool. I hope you spend the night thinking about the lonely little life waiting for you back in England. It might be a salutary experience.’

  She turned away, almost tripping in her haste to leave the room.

&
nbsp; She had meant what she had said to him. He was a bastard, but it made her sick to think that that was not how Emily would see it. She, Roberta, would be the focus for all that childish disillusionment and hurt and, even though she would not be around to witness it, it still hurt badly.

  How was it with that man that whatever hand he had been dealt, he still managed to win?

  It was ages before she finally fell asleep, and then it was only because her body could no longer remain awake.

  The next few days proved even harder than she had imagined. Grant had not spoken to Emily, for which she was deeply grateful, admitting with a rueful cowardice that she could not have handled the resultant reaction with aplomb. On the other hand, it became progressively more wearing coping with the lie, and by the time Thursday finally rolled around she was almost relieved to be getting out of the house for three days.

  Mrs Thornson had reappeared on Monday after her week off doing the decorating, confiding in Roberta that it had been a complete waste of time anyway, since her husband had lethargically begun the wallpapering, only to lose interest halfway through, leaving a trail of unfinished rooms behind him.

  ‘He lacks stamina, that man,’ she had said with her usual plaintive tone and economy of language. ‘Needs prodding.’

  Roberta had nodded sympathetically, her mind conjuring up images of rooms half-papered while the furniture stood forlornly in odd places, covered with protective sheets.

  ‘And you’d better be good,’ she told Emily, as she packed her bag. ‘No wild parties.’

  ‘With Mrs Thornson around?’ Emily scoffed. ‘Not likely. Anyway, I don’t think I could face another scene like the last one. Although,’ she added with wicked satisfaction, ‘Dad would probably be in a more mellow mood with you around.’

  Don’t bank on it, Roberta wanted to say. She had seen very little of him recently, and what she had seen had definitely been lacking in charm.

  She carried her bag downstairs to where he was waiting in the hall, tapping his keys on the stair banister, and mentally steeled herself for the drive ahead.

  She had had time to think about the shocking realisation that she was in love with him, time to work out that her best method of dealing with the threat he posed was to be as polite and as distant with him as was humanly possible.

  Even so, as she looked at him standing there, casually dressed in deep green trousers and a thick off-white jumper, she had to fight the alarming prickle of awareness that shot through her.

  Emily was delighted that they were going away together. She had got it into her head that it was something along the lines of a naughty weekend, even though Roberta had tried to explain to her, very firmly, that it was nothing of the sort.

  When Roberta turned to say goodbye, Emily threw her thin arms around her and then said playfully, ‘See you in a couple of days’ time, Mum!’

  Grant was standing a few feet away, idly looking at his car, impatient to get going. In fact, Roberta would have said that his mind was miles away, probably on his next conquest if his past history was anything to go by, but it wasn’t.

  At Emily’s teasing expression of fondness, he turned around swiftly, and said with hard anger, ‘She’s not your mother, Emily. Don’t ever forget that.’

  There was an uncomfortable silence, then Emily’s face took on that sullen expression that Roberta had not seen for quite a while.

  ‘It was a joke, Dad,’ she said, her fists clenched. ‘Where’s your sense of humour? Did you decide to leave it at work today?’

  ‘And don’t you use that tone of voice on me, my girl,’ he snapped, frowning.

  Roberta rested her hand affectionately on the girl’s shoulder and said gently, ‘You run along inside. It’s freezing here. I’ll call you as soon as we get to Mr Ishikomo’s place, all right?’

  Emily nodded, but Roberta could see that Grant’s abruptness with her had upset her. She was still too insecure in her relationship with her father to accept his bad moods as things that would eventually blow over. She couldn’t fall back on the certainty that he loved her, whatever he might say, because, even though he did, he had in the past lacked a means of expressing it.

  Roberta had thought about this, and had come to the conclusion that his wife’s death had something to do with that. Maybe Emily reminded him too forcibly of lost love. Whatever, it wasn’t fair of him to expect the child to obediently tune in to his mood swings without reacting.

  As soon as she was in the car, Roberta said as much. ‘That was a bit unnecessary, wasn’t it? Telling her off like that for no apparent reason.’

  ‘No apparent reason to you, you mean,’ he responded coolly, and she stared at his hard profile, willing herself to be as aloof as he was.

  ‘Fair enough,’ Roberta said shrugging, and she let the conversation slide, looking through the car window at the striking city skyline, then at the more sweeping landscape around her as they left the city behind.

  Neither was speaking very much, but it was not a comfortable silence, and as the miles slipped past she began to wish that she had got up the courage after all to decline Mr Ishikomo’s invitation. The embarrassment would at least have been short-lived, instead of which she now faced days of discomfort with Grant.

  In the end, just to combat the silence stretched taut between them, she began asking him about his deal with Mr Ishikomo, about the countryside, about anything that would lessen the atmosphere of tension. He replied tonelessly in monosyllables, until she finally burst out, ‘You’re determined to make me suffer, aren’t you? You want to make my last few days here as unpleasant as possible, don’t you? Just because I turned down your business arrangement!’ She could not bring herself to refer to it as anything else. ‘Did I damage that huge ego of yours?’ she mocked. ‘Are you piqued because, for once, you didn’t get your own way?’

  They were driving along a quite deserted stretch of country road now, and he suddenly swerved off on to the snow-encrusted verge, killing the engine and then turning to face her, his expression grim.

  Her eyes widened in alarm. She had gone too far, she could see that now, but it was too late to retract what she had said, and she stared at him silently.

  ‘Listen to me, lady,’ he bit out in a razor-sharp voice. ‘It would take more than you to have any effect on me whatsoever. The fact of the matter is that you make me sick. In a way, it would have been better if you were the gold-digger I first imagined you to be, because at least then you would be up front. No, you disgust me, because all I can see is a repressed, twisted woman, handy with sarcasm but not much else. Sure, I offered you a deal, and you turned me down. Fair enough, but what really sticks in my throat is that you turned me down because you’re nothing more than a coward who’s scared witless about taking control of her life.’

  ‘I’m in perfect control of my life!’ Roberta flared back.

  ‘Is that why we’re on our way up to see Mr Ishikomo and his wife? Face it: you didn’t have the guts to tell them the truth.’

  ‘That was up to you!’ Her face was flushed with miserable confusion and hurt anger.

  ‘I bet that’s how you spent your life,’ he threw at her scornfully, ‘letting other people make the decisions for you, happy to ride along just so long as you didn’t have to take responsibility for anything.’

  ‘That’s not true,’ Roberta whispered, but wasn’t it? It might not have been the absolute truth, but there was enough in what he said to fill her with a giddy sense of unreality.

  Hadn’t her mother always made the decisions? Even her job was one in which she ultimately never had to make any hard choices. She had been a caretaker of other people’s children, rather than a mother with the harsh responsibility of her own. She had been swept along by Brian until that tidal wave came crashing down around her ears.

  ‘But I’m close, aren’t I?’ he said grimly. ‘Well, you wear your smile when we reach that house, but when we’re together don’t try and pretend that you’re anything other than what you
are. You couldn’t even handle yourself after we had made love, could you? You found it safer to hide behind it as a mistake. I’m surprised you didn’t try to persuade yourself that I had seduced you. That would be your style.’

  She didn’t want to hear any more of this. He had said enough, and inside she was being torn in two, because he was right, but what he couldn’t see was that this time she had made a decision. She had decided not to marry him because she was in love with him, and it was a hopeless love. But how could she tell him that?

  ‘I’m sorry if you think that,’ she said on a whisper.

  ‘Are you really?’ His voice was laced with sarcasm. ‘How big of you.’

  He started up the engine and it purred into life, then he pulled out into the road and Roberta closed her eyes.

  Two hours later, when she next opened them, the car was pulling up outside a small house nestled amid a forest of conifer trees and overlooking the vast, flat black expanse of a lake.

  She must have fallen asleep, against all odds. Maybe her body had decided to shut down temporarily because it could not cope with any more.

  Whatever, she warily eyed Grant from under her lashes, wondering whether he would resume his attack on her, but he didn’t. His face was expressionless as he lifted their bags out of the boot, and he barely glanced in her direction when Mr Ishikomo and his wife emerged smiling from inside the house, fussing over them like two mother hens, ushering them inside where an open fire was burning.

  This place was bigger than Grant’s cabin had been, less of a hideaway and more of a second home. It was tastefully furnished in rich, deep colours which gave it a warm, intimate feel, and there were shelves of books on one of the walls, not just one inadequate Western stuffed into a drawer somewhere.

  She tried to feel pleased, but simply felt nostalgic, and then told herself that she was a fool to even let herself dwell on Grant Adams and his damned cabin at all.

  The Japanese couple proved the perfect hosts. Perfect as far as Roberta was concerned, anyway, because they were always around, chatting, involving her in what the chef, who was a personal friend of theirs, was doing. That left her very little time alone with Grant, and for that she was grateful.