She set it down silently, then curled up in the chair by the side of the fire with her tea and watched him sleep. He looked exhausted, she realised. Exhausted and thinner, run to a frazzle. He was doing too much. He’d been doing too much for more than a year, but he wouldn’t even discuss it.
He did what was necessary, that was all, he said. Nothing more, nothing less. End of discussion.
It was funny, they used to discuss things a lot, but just recently she felt he’d been stonewalling her. Maybe it was just her imagination. Maybe he was just too busy to talk, and too tired to bother.
Too tired to do anything—except a hasty flurry of activity every few weeks, in a vain attempt to get her pregnant.
She felt the hot sting of tears behind her eyes, and blinked them away. They’d lost so much. They’d been so happy at first, happy and full of life and enthusiasm. Nothing had been too much trouble, too much effort, too much of a challenge.
They’d talked and argued and made up, laughed and cried together, shared everything.
And now—now they had nothing except the spectre of failure in their most personal lives, and jet lag. She rested her head on the back of the chair and gave a quiet sigh. She’d needed this time out so much. She hadn’t realised how much until she’d agreed to take the cottage, and she’d felt a huge weight off her shoulders.
Freedom, she’d thought. Freedom from unspoken criticism, from failure, from Rob’s expectations of her as a hostess, from her friends’ expectations of her as a shopping companion and marriage counsellor—that was the funny one, she thought.
Andy asking her for advice on her marriage, when her own marriage was in such disarray.
Something splashed on her hand—a tear, she realised in surprise. She blinked and sniffed, but another one fell to join the first, and another, so she just lay there with her head against the back of the chair and let them fall.
She cried silently. She’d grown used to doing it while Rob slept, it was nothing new to her, but she didn’t usually do it with the lights on so he could see her if he woke.
Still, there was no danger he’d wake now. He was exhausted, and even he didn’t catch up with his sleep that quickly. She closed her eyes, rested her hand on the dog’s shaggy head at her knee and waited for the tears to stop. They would in the end. They always did.
She’d been crying.
He lay there, sprawled out on the sofa, and watched her without moving. There were tears drying on her cheeks, long salty tracks down the pale, smooth skin, and he felt his heart contract.
Oh, Laurie. He wanted to hold her, to comfort her, but he didn’t know how, or even if he could. What could he say that would make any difference?
Nothing. It was probably him she was crying about—or them, at least. He felt sick. How long had she felt like this, so sad inside that she could sit and cry silently while he slept?
Had she done it before, maybe in their big, high bed in the lovely house he’d thought was their home? Had he slept beside her, oblivious to her misery?
And yet he still didn’t know what he’d done, or what was wrong. Until today he would have said she was crying because she couldn’t conceive, but now he wasn’t so sure.
Was she having an affair? It was possible. Maybe her failure to conceive was deliberate. Perhaps she was on the Pill, or maybe her reluctance to have any tests was because she was happy as things were and didn’t want a child.
She’d said something about that in the kitchen. He hadn’t really taken it in at the time. He’d thought she was just trying to console herself, but maybe she really meant it. Maybe she didn’t want a child—or at least, not his.
It was a sobering thought. He lay there and let it sink in, slowly absorbing the implications. It seemed there was far more to her unscheduled disappearance than a simple flounce or a cry for attention. She really seemed to have deep, fundamental doubts about their relationship, and he realised he was going to have to listen to her, to talk it through rather than simply cajole her into returning home. For the first time he felt a seed of doubt that he would win her back, and something deep inside him clenched with fear.
He watched her sleep, the tears slowly drying on her cheeks, her hand hanging over the edge of the chair above the dog’s head. He was lying against the front of the chair, his nose on his paws, as if he’d just sunk down there from sitting under her hand. His eyes were closed, but Rob knew he was alert. One move from her and he’d be up.
He was her devoted slave, and Rob felt an irrational pang of jealousy. Not that he’d want to be her devoted slave, far from it, but he wouldn’t mind going back to the lively and productive partnership they’d had before.
She’d been so vital and alive, so funny, so sharp and quick-witted. He supposed she still was, but the vital spark seemed to have gone, extinguished by something he didn’t really understand.
He remembered the first time he’d met her, at Julia and Charlie’s wedding. He’d been Charlie’s best man, and she’d been the chief bridesmaid. He’d felt his heart kick then, seeing her behind Julia, and then during the reception he’d talked to her and got to know her a little, and discovered that not only was she very beautiful, she was also clever.
She had a mind, a sharp and incisive mind and the verbal ability to go with it, and they’d wrangled about everything from fashion to the state of the stock market.
‘So what do you do for a living?’ he’d asked, and she’d laughed wryly.
‘At the moment I’m temping in an office, but my secretarial skills are slight and that’s a bit of problem in the job I’m covering, so it won’t last long, but I have to eat and run my car and pay off my uni debts, so I can’t afford to be picky. I’m looking around, though, waiting for the right thing to come up. I’d like a job with a bit of responsibility—something to get my teeth into. I’m just bored to death at the moment.’
Without pausing to analyse his motives, he slipped his hand into his pocket and pulled out his wallet, then handed her one of his cards. ‘Here. Ring me. There might be something—I don’t know what, but we’ve always got room for good people. I’ll have a chat with my Human Resources team. Come in and see us.’
She looked at the card, plucked at the sides of her pretty, floaty bridesmaid’s dress with a smile and then tucked the card down the low front of her bodice, into her bra. He caught sight of a peep of pale ivory lace against pale ivory breast, and hot blood surged in his veins.
‘I knew having boobs would come in useful one day,’ she said with a throaty chuckle, and he had to shut his eyes and count to ten. He could think of all sorts of uses for her soft, full, ripe breasts, and tucking business cards into them was way down the list.
Unless he was doing the tucking…
The next time he saw her was a week later, and she was dressed in a demure business suit with a high-necked blouse, but he could still see the firm, ripe swell of her breasts in his mind and he had to force himself to concentrate on interviewing her.
Within moments he’d forgotten about her body and was fascinated by her mind, instead. They talked about the business, about investment analysis and the stock market and maintaining the right sort of client base, and he was amazed. Most of the women he knew of her age would have been totally out of their depth, or bored to death.
Not Laurie Taylor. She had views and opinions, and she wasn’t frightened to express them. They argued, they tore holes in each other’s arguments, and in the end they agreed to differ.
For a moment, then, her confidence had seemed to falter, as if by disagreeing with him she thought she’d blown the interview, but then he’d smiled and held out his hand.
‘Welcome to the team—if you’ll come?’
‘You mean you want me, after all that?’ she’d said, surprise in her voice and her eyes, and he’d smiled back.
Oh, yes, he thought, I want you. Do I want you!
‘You’re too good to pass up,’ he said. ‘I like the way you think.’
‘But
you don’t agree with me.’
He smiled again. ‘But I can argue with you, and you don’t take offence. That’s very useful—helps me maintain a wider perspective. I think we need a new post. I’ll have an assistant—it’s probably about time. How much do you want?’
She laughed softly. ‘How much do you think I’m worth?’
He thought of a figure and doubled it, and she blinked.
‘Is that a yes?’
‘Absolutely.’ She gulped and nodded, and he just hoped she was worth it.
She was. By the end of the first week he wondered how he’d coped without her. By the end of the first month, their relationship had become more personal. Their wrangling over business issues had taken on the quality of a challenge—almost a game—and the stakes were rising.
One day, after a particularly long-running argument proved her right and him wrong, she crowed with delight and danced round the office, and he was suddenly, shockingly aroused.
‘OK,’ he said, retreating behind his desk for the sake of modesty. ‘I’ll concede—’
‘Concede? You’re mad! I’ve won—’
‘I’ll concede,’ he repeated with a slow smile, ‘on condition you have dinner with me. A sort of forfeit.’
She cocked her head on one side, hands on hips, sassy and luscious. ‘I thought you paid the forfeit if you lost.’
‘You do,’ he said, thinking quickly. ‘I lost. I have to pay.’
Her head tilted the other way. ‘I’ll want a good dinner—not just any old place.’
He gave a rueful laugh. ‘I never doubted it for a moment,’ he murmured. ‘So—are we on?’
She pretended to think for a moment, one luminous pink fingertip pressed against her pursed lips, then she sparkled and laughed. ‘We’re on,’ she said, and perched on the edge of the desk unconsciously revealing a great length of thigh. ‘So—where are we going?’
‘Don’t know yet. Dress up.’
‘Long? Short?’
‘Long,’ he said, knowing he wouldn’t get through the evening if he had to look at her legs, but his clever ruse didn’t work, because her gown was slit to the thigh and her sparkly, slinky tights were nearly the death of him.
‘Just do me one favour,’ he said as the waiter left them contemplating the menu. ‘Let’s not talk about work. I really, really don’t want to fight.’
She grinned. ‘OK. We’ll talk about you. How did you get to know Charlie?’ she asked, and so he told her about his childhood at boarding school, and then asked her about her childhood and was rewarded by tales of scrapes and close shaves, all the naughty little things that children did, but recounted with such mischief in her eyes at the memory that he just knew it was all still bubbling up inside her.
He took her home after the meal, and she turned at the door and flashed him that wonderful megawatt smile of hers. ‘It’s a tip inside,’ she confessed, ‘but you’re welcome to come in.’
It was a tip. It was more of a tip than she’d realised, because her flatmate had decided to have a party and it was littered with people hell-bent on enjoying themselves.
‘Ah,’ she said, having found that even her room had been taken over and there was no escape.
‘Come back to mine,’ he suggested, wondering how he could be noble and not make love to her once he’d got her alone in his apartment. They walked through the door, and he deliberately didn’t reach for the switch so that she could see London stretched out below them, a million sparkling lights reaching out to the horizon.
‘Oh, wow,’ she said, and laughed a little breathlessly. ‘That’s so pretty. London at its best—you can’t see it.’
He chuckled and moved to stand behind her, aching to take her in his arms. He could smell her perfume, feel the warmth radiating off her. He dragged his eyes from the delicate, creamy nape of her neck and back to the view reluctantly. Not so reluctantly. He loved it. It put everything else in perspective. Even his longing for her.
‘It’s beautiful,’ he said quietly. ‘Sometimes I sit here for hours in the dark and just stare out over it—recharge the batteries.’
She turned, looking up at him with eyes that were serious for once. ‘You have trouble with that, don’t you? Recharging your batteries? You ought to do more fun things—go to the zoo, go to the park—anything, really. You need to learn how to relax.’
He smiled a little sadly. ‘With you?’ he murmured. ‘You’re the least relaxing person I know.’
‘I don’t have to be. I can be quiet—I often am. It’s only with you I’m like this—so alive.’
Odd, how she’d echoed his thoughts, as if it was only when they were together that they became whole.
‘You’re beautiful,’ he said without stopping to think. ‘I want to make love to you, Laurie.’
Her smile was gentle and full of promise. ‘Good,’ she whispered.
He closed his eyes and counted to ten. He was going to die. His heart was going to stop, or rupture or something. Either that or it was a dream. He opened his eyes and she was still there, her smile tentative, and his heart was still beating.
‘You’re so lovely,’ he whispered, his thumb coming up to trace her cheekbone, the angle of her jaw, the soft, rosy fullness of her lips. The skin dragged a little and the tip of her tongue flicked out to touch his thumb, moistening its path. It was unbearably erotic, and a groan erupted from deep in his throat.
Her hands slid up his chest, over his shoulders, tunnelling through his hair and drawing him down. Their lips met, coaxing, sipping, teasing, and then something seemed to shift, some elemental force within them that rose up and took over, and they were both consumed in a primitive fire that swept everything in its path.
As the fire died away and left just the ashes of their passion, they found they were in the bedroom, with no clear idea of how they’d got there. He imagined they must have walked, or maybe he’d carried her, or dragged her by her hair. Nothing would have surprised him.
He touched her face with fingers that trembled. ‘Wow,’ he said softly, his voice ragged. ‘That was—’
‘Amazing,’ she said huskily and, leaning towards him, she pressed her lips lightly to his. ‘It was the most beautiful thing.’
He laughed a little unsteadily. ‘You see, we can agree on something,’ he teased, and she smiled and kissed him again—and again—and again.
It was the start of a personal life as wild and tempestuous as their working life, and even more satisfying. Within weeks they were married, and the next three or four years had been bliss.
And now, he thought heavily, all that wonderful humour and sparkle seemed to have gone and, far from arguing with him, she didn’t even want to talk. She just wanted to run.
And cry. That was the awful bit, seeing her cry. He’d hardly ever seen her cry, and never without him.
A lump rose in his throat, and he swallowed it. Oh, Laurie, where did we go wrong? he asked himself. When did you stop answering back and fighting me? And why? You’ve never been afraid to tell me in the past if you didn’t like something. Why now?
He needed to move. His neck was at an awkward angle, but he didn’t want to get up without giving her time to compose herself and wash her face. He grunted and shifted his legs, watching her through eyes open just the merest fraction, and she came awake with a little start, sat up and scrubbed her cheeks, then with the dog at her heels, she tiptoed out of the room, closing the door behind her with a soft click.
Rob sighed and stood up and rolled his head, arching his back and stretching his arms above his head. They hit the low ceiling, and he looked around, studying the room for the first time.
It was comfortable—nothing special, but the atmosphere was cosy. He thought of their home in London, and wished they had a room as cosy as this to curl up in. But when? There was never time. He could hardly remember the colour of the walls, never mind the last time he’d sat down long enough to fall asleep.
He threw some more coal on the fire and prodded it i
nto life, and it crackled and spat, little flames licking up around the new coals. He held out his hands to it, rubbing them together. There was something primitively satisfying about a real fire. They should have one at home more often—if they still had a home together, that was.
He refused to admit defeat. And at least now, having seen her cry, he knew she wasn’t indifferent to him. That might have been impossible to overcome.
He could hear her moving around in the bathroom next door, then the kitchen, and a few minutes later she reappeared with another tray of tea.
‘Hi,’ she said, smiling brightly, but it didn’t reach her eyes. ‘I made tea earlier but you were sleeping. I’ve done some fresh.’
‘You should have woken me when you made the first lot,’ he said, and he thought her shoulders squared a fraction. Because she thought it was a criticism? Oh, hell.
‘You looked tired,’ she said, sounding defensive. ‘I thought I’d just leave you. I knew you’d wake up soon, you always do. Here—and there’s some cake, if you like. I don’t know what it’s like, I bought it at the local shop yesterday.’
‘I’m sure it’ll be fine. I hope you got plenty of food in while you were there—or should we save it?’
She shook her head. ‘I bought quite a bit. Enough for a few days, anyway. I don’t think we need to start rationing ourselves.’
‘Let’s hope it stops snowing, then. I don’t fancy starving to death if we’re stuck here for too long.’
For a moment her face reflected panic—at the thought of being shut up with him? Not so very long ago they would have revelled in it.
Not that he could afford to be out of circulation for long, whatever happened. He was expected back in New York on Monday, and it was Friday evening now.
She looked out of the window, shivering slightly as the gale squeezed round the frame and cooled the air several degrees. She pulled the curtain shut again and her chin went up a notch defiantly. ‘I’m sure we won’t be stranded long—this is Scotland, after all. They’re used to it. They’ll have snow ploughs out in the night—I expect it’ll be clear by the morning.’
The Baby Question Page 4