She opened her mouth to protest at being called a coward, only to find Adam’s mouth possessing hers, his kiss hard, nothing at all like their lovemaking had been such a short time ago.
As he continued to kiss her in that way she knew the difference between tender lovemaking and a need to punish. Adam had made love to her earlier! It hadn’t been sex, as she had told him it was, but love.
Did that mean that Adam loved her…?
CHAPTER TEN
MAGGI was dazed, totally dazed, when at last Adam lifted his head, and she stared up at him wordlessly.
‘Don’t look so shocked, Magdalena,’ he derided. ‘And cheer up.’ His knuckles touched her lightly under the chin and then he released her. ‘You’ve got what you wanted. What you always wanted,’ he added bitterly. ‘I’m out of here. Out of your life. Out of your career. Out of our marriage.’ He ran a weary hand through the dark thickness of his hair. ‘I’ll sign your divorce papers, Magdalena. Free both of us.’
She didn’t understand. Something was wrong here. Oh, so very wrong!
‘Just don’t send me an invitation to your wedding when the time comes; I may be family, but in the circumstances it would be in pretty poor taste. I’ll send the two of you one of the many sets of salad servers you’ll receive and never use. But don’t ask me to dance—or sing!—at your wedding.’
He was talking about when she married Mark. He was Mark’s cousin, and therefore family. But there would never be a wedding to Mark. Not with her as the bride anyway.
Adam was leaving her life. It was what she wanted, as he’d said it was… The torment of having him back in her life was over.
Then why wasn’t she jumping for joy? Because she should be, should be glad her life would be free of him once and for all. Hell had frozen over!
He gave a laugh edged with bitterness at her continued silence. ‘I had better be on my way. Having rendered you speechless, it seems as good a time as any to go.’ He turned to leave.
As jokes went, it was pretty feeble. It made Maggi feel like crying instead of laughing. And, amazingly, so did his leaving.
‘What did you say?’ He turned at the doorway.
Once again she had spoken out loud without realising it. Although barely audibly, it seemed.
What had she mumbled…? ‘I’m not marrying Mark,’ she said more clearly, the words sounding as if they came through sandpaper.
‘Aren’t you? Oh, well, I can’t say I exactly blame you.’ He gave an understanding nod. ‘Marriages aren’t so easy to get out of, are they? Even nowadays. Your parents seem pretty resigned to your relationship on its present basis, so why bother to change it?’
‘You don’t understand.’ But neither did she, not exactly. What would she achieve by telling Adam that Mark had only ever been a friend to her, that he was marrying her physiotherapist? Because her thoughts earlier had been a mere madness of the moment; of course Adam didn’t love her. If he loved her, he wouldn’t be agreeing to the divorce.
He gave a grimace. ‘I don’t think I want to, Magdalena. Not any more. For a while I thought—Stupid.’ He shook his head. ‘Be happy, love. Enjoy your life. You deserve it.’
And he was gone. Just like that. And the vacuum he left behind him was one that Maggi knew would never be filled. Never in her lifetime…
* * *
Her parents were both still asleep when she got back to the hospital, and the nurse assured her all was well before Maggi went in search of Mark in the waiting-room.
* * *
His gaze instinctively moved past and behind her as she quietly entered the room.
‘Adam isn’t here.’ She flatly answered the question he hadn’t yet asked.
Dark brows rose. ‘Is he having trouble parking the car?’
‘I drove myself.’ She sat down heavily, still not absolutely sure how she had got here. She didn’t remember the drive at all, supposed she must have come in her BMW. But she didn’t remember parking it outside the hospital either…
Mark looked at her closely, missing nothing of the shadows beneath her eyes, the paleness of her cheeks, the slight tremble to her hands as she pushed the dark thickness of her hair back over her shoulders.
He placed one of his hands over both of hers as they lay limply in her lap. ‘What happened, Maggi?’ he prompted softly.
She squeezed her eyes tightly shut, willing the tears not to fall, but her lashes were nonetheless spiked with the wetness of them as she looked up at Mark.
‘Oh, Maggi, love,’ he groaned, before gently enfolding her in his arms, letting her cry as the sobs racked her body. ‘The bastard,’ he muttered as the tears continued to flow. ‘The lousy, rotten—’
‘You don’t understand, Mark. Adam and I—We—I—’
‘I understand completely, Maggi,’ he cut in angrily. ‘My dear cousin acted in his usual selfish way and took advantage of the situation. Nothing more and nothing less!’
‘He’s gone, Mark.’ She raised her head to look at him. ‘Gone for good,’ she added shakily. ‘He’s agreed to the divorce, the solo recording career. Everything.’
‘Then I don’t—Maggi?’ Mark grasped her arms as his eyes remorselessly searched the anguish of her expression. ‘You still love him,’ he muttered incredulously.
He had a right to be incredulous. She was herself. However, she knew it to be the truth. She loved Adam. Would always love him. But he was finally, and irrevocably, gone from her life.
She should be feeling ecstatic at that knowledge—and instead she was devastated.
‘Maggi, sometimes the mind plays tricks on us,’ Mark reasoned gently. ‘You and Adam always were physically—volatile together. Don’t be deceived into thinking what happened between the two of you last night was anything other than that.’
She wasn’t deceived, not by anything she had felt yesterday evening. Or by how she still felt. ‘Don’t worry, Mark.’ She gave him a watery smile. ‘I’m not going to fall apart or anything remotely like that.’ She gave a shaky laugh when he didn’t look convinced. ‘Have you ever known me to fall apart, Mark?’ she chided teasingly.
He grimaced. ‘It was a very close thing last time.’
‘And look how far I’ve come since then,’ she dismissed firmly. ‘My career can finally move forward, Mark,’ she said encouragingly. ‘It’s what we’ve both worked so hard for.’
He nodded. ‘I just wish you looked happier about it.’
‘Once my father is on his feet again and back home, then I’ll look happier. You’ll see,’ she added with certainty.
She knew from experience that the only way to deal with the part of her heart that belonged to Adam was to firmly close the door on it. It might not be the healthiest thing to do, but it was the route that caused her the least pain.
Unfortunately, the first thing her father did, when he woke from his healing sleep, was to ask for Adam!
Maggi and Mark had kept a silent vigil for the rest of the night as her parents slept. Her mother had been the first to wake, just after six o’clock, and Maggi had persuaded her to go off with Mark to the hospital canteen to get some breakfast; the last thing she wanted herself was food. She had a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach that refused to go away.
Consequently she was with just the attendant nurse when her father woke up a short time later. His colour was much better, that grey having faded from his cheeks, although he still looked small and defenceless against the white of the hospital sheets.
‘Cheer up,’ he told her lightly, alerting her to his wakefulness. ‘It may never happen!’
It already had—she had fallen in love with her own husband all over again! Adam had told her to cheer up, too. No! She couldn’t think about Adam. It would only cause her more pain.
‘Where’s Adam?’ her father asked astutely as he realised she was alone.
She swallowed hard. ‘He—he had to be somewhere else,’ she replied awkwardly.
Her father frowned. ‘But he promised he would co
me back.’
‘Daddy, promise or no promise, he has no place in our lives!’ She stood up agitatedly. ‘He hasn’t for a long time.’
‘But—’
‘Daddy, Adam and I have talked,’ she said evenly. ‘And we both think it best if Adam gets on with his life and leaves all of us to get on with ours. He’s agreed to the divorce, Daddy,’ she added conclusively.
He slumped back against the pillows. ‘I can’t believe that,’ he said, obviously puzzled.
‘Believe it,’ she told him lightly, going back to the side of the bed to take one of his hands into hers. ‘It’s over, Daddy. Can we just leave it at that?’
He still looked unconvinced. ‘Is that the way Adam feels too?’
‘I told you, he’s agreed to the divorce,’ she confirmed.
‘But did the two of you talk—really talk? About everything?’ His hand tightened on hers.
If the two of them carried on talking about Adam much longer she was going to break down and cry once more.
‘The past is—exactly that,’ she told her father. ‘Three years is just too long, Daddy. There’s nothing left.’ Except her love for Adam—and the desire he still felt for her. But, as Mark had said, that part of their relationship had always been volatile; there had to be more than that. Unfortunately, on Adam’s part, there wasn’t.
Her father looked at her searchingly. ‘You don’t love him?’
‘No stress, no strain, no worries…’ Maggi recalled the doctor’s words. If her father knew how she still felt about Adam he would be sure to worry.
She swallowed hard, her smile forced. ‘I don’t love him,’ she said tightly. ‘Maybe I never did. I was very young when I met him.’
‘But, Maggi—’
‘Daddy, I made a mistake five years ago when I married Adam, but I don’t have to go on paying for it for the rest of my life.’ She squeezed his hand encouragingly. ‘With the divorce imminent, that chapter of my life can finally be closed.’
He gave a resigned sigh in the face of her indomitable certainty. ‘If you’re sure that’s what you want…?’
‘I’m absolutely sure,’ she told him emphatically.
The best thing for her to do, where Adam was concerned, was not to talk about him, and not to think about him either if she could help it. As she had just told her father, that chapter of her life was well and truly closed.
* * *
Over the next few weeks it really seemed as if it was. Her father’s health improved by leaps and bounds, so much so that after a week he was allowed out of hospital. It was a happy day for all of them when he came home.
The record company contacted her too, and the recording of her solo album was scheduled to begin the following week. Evidence indeed that Adam meant to keep his word. The signed piece of paper he had thrust at her in the kitchen that night was consigned to the back of one of her drawers in her bedroom. One day she might be able to look at it again, although not, she was sure, without vividly recalling all that had taken place before it…
Because Adam had also signed and returned the divorce papers to her lawyer…
It was the only jarring note in a time filled with positives, and in its own way it too was a positive. Although it would be some time before Maggi could look on it as such. Most of her adult life had been spent as Adam’s wife, and it would be strange, once their divorce was final, for that no longer to be the case.
The first time she appeared as a guest singer on a television show, and a single red rose didn’t appear, she felt a sickening jolt in the pit of her stomach. Adam really had gone from her life.
It was what she had wanted for so long, but now that it had happened she felt strangely bereft.
Then she became caught up in all the hard work of recording her album, moving temporarily into a hotel in London and working so hard that she returned every evening with only enough energy to eat a meal in her room before collapsing into bed. December had seemed a long way off when it was first decided that would be the rush-release date of her album, but it now seemed to be approaching all too rapidly.
Mark, as her manager, had also lined up a number of television appearances in advance of the album’s release, giving her added publicity—although any chat shows involved were accepted only with the proviso that her relationship with Adam would not be discussed.
‘You’re starting to look really tired,’ Andrea told her concernedly one evening as she and Mark drove her to a television studio for yet another of those interviews. ‘I’ve told Mark he’s pushing you too hard.’ She frowned at her fiancé. She was a tall, leggy redhead, with a sprinkling of freckles across her nose that added a touch of mischief to her classically beautiful face.
In truth, Maggi was finding it all a bit much, had found it difficult to get out of bed at all this morning! The mornings were dark now, and her bed had been cosy and warm; she had just wanted to curl up and go back to sleep. But she hadn’t, had forced herself to get up. Now she only had this couple of hours at the television studio before she could do what she had wanted to do all day—and that was go back to bed!
‘It isn’t for long.’ Maggi smoothly defended Mark, knowing how protective of her patients—even expatients—Andrea could be. ‘Another couple of weeks and the album will be finished.’
‘And then you’ll have even more public appearances to do.’ Andrea frowned. ‘I don’t—’
‘Will you just concentrate on your approaching wedding, and not worry so much about me?’ Maggi put in laughingly, knowing the other couple were busy organising their big day. In fact, they were taking a break from that pressure this evening and treating themselves to an evening out, going on to have a quiet dinner together once they had delivered Maggi to the studio. ‘I’m going to get this show over with, take a taxi back to the hotel, have a long soak in the bath and then go to bed. By tomorrow I’ll be fine again.’ She would make sure she was!
‘But—’
‘Hey, I’m not your patient any more,’ Maggi teased the other woman. ‘And if you don’t stop fussing I shall refuse to be your bridesmaid!’
‘No, you won’t,’ Andrea said with certainty; the two women were firm friends. ‘From the way you are now, you look as if you should be—still my patient, I mean.’ She looked concerned. ‘You look as if you’ve lost weight over the last few weeks, and you’re still very pale.’
‘The weight loss can only be a plus for television; for some reason the camera always makes you look fatter than you really are,’ Maggi told her as they came to a halt outside the television studio. ‘And make-up will take care of the paleness.’
‘An answer for everything!’ Mark grinned at her good-naturedly.
‘It’s a case of having to, with the two of you always fussing over me,’ Maggi told them lightly as she got out of the car. ‘Enjoy your meal. Forget all about weddings for the evening.’
Mark’s eyes went heavenwards. ‘The vicar is still in a tizzy because Maggi Fennell is to be one of the bridesmaids. He’ll probably make a complete mess of things on the day!’
Maggi was still smiling to herself as she went into the studio building, and perfectly relaxed as she was directed to Make-up. Twenty minutes’ rest and relaxation while her make-up was applied, and she would be ready to face the television cameras.
Except that the woman already seated in Make-up made that impossible. Celia Mayes!
Maggi had never met the woman, but she had seen several of her films and would have recognised her anywhere. She was even more beautiful in the flesh, her skin smooth and peachy, her figure voluptuous.
She was also the latest lover in Adam’s life…
Maggi felt as if time had suddenly stood still. Celia had to be a guest on the same show as herself…
‘Maggi Fennell, isn’t it?’ the other woman said pleasantly, looking at Maggi with candid blue eyes as she sat down.
Maggi was tongue-tied. Celia Mayes knew who she was! After the publicity concerning Adam and herself several wee
ks ago, maybe she knew that Maggi had found out about her own friendship with Adam. What did one say to one’s ex-husband’s mistress…?
She cleared her throat. ‘Er—yes,’ she confirmed huskily.
Celia Mayes nodded. ‘I’ve always enjoyed your singing.’
Polite conversation—any conversation!—was not something Maggi wished to engage in with Celia, now or at any other time!
‘Thank you,’ she accepted flatly, wishing herself anywhere but here. She might have dismissed the strain of the last few weeks to Andrea earlier, but she was actually feeling it quite strongly. And this had to be the worst of it!
‘I know Adam too, of course,’ Celia continued smoothly. ‘Thank you, Joanne.’ She gave the make-up girl one of her famously heart-stopping smiles as the young woman finished her make-up. ‘Very well, in fact,’ she added to Maggi, as if the conversation had never been interrupted.
Maggi stiffened. ‘So I believe,’ she acknowledged abruptly, wishing Celia would just go now that her make-up was complete.
But the actress seemed in no hurry to do that, turning in her seat as Joanne began Maggi’s make-up. ‘As does my husband, Geoffrey,’ she added.
Another cuckolded husband. Perhaps that was an improvement on deceiving your own wife? Although Maggi didn’t think so. Adam had no right to intrude on this couple’s marriage, especially when there were young children involved. Almost babies, only a year old…
Her gaze hardened as she looked at the other woman. ‘I’m aware of that too,’ she bit out.
Celia Mayes looked at her consideringly. ‘I wonder what else you think you know—?’
‘Five minutes, Miss Mayes,’ a young boy opened the door to announce importantly, his eyes widening with admiration as he gazed at the actress’s exceptional beauty.
‘Thank you.’ Celia Mayes smiled at him warmly before turning back to Maggi. ‘I’m afraid I have to go. But perhaps you would join me for a drink after the show?’ she invited smoothly. ‘Coffee,’ she added encouragingly as Maggi opened her mouth to refuse. ‘I rarely drink alcohol since I became a mother,’ she added indulgently. ‘It wouldn’t do to be less than a hundred per cent with my two little bundles of fun!’
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