The Faithful Wife by Diana Hamilton Page B

kitchen door closed firmly behind her, Bella released a long, shuddery sigh. She wanted to kill Evie for putting her in this situation! Kitty, too, for her part in it! The only thing that gave her any consolation whatsoever was knowing that this place, fully and lavishly provisioned, would have cost them at least an arm and a couple of legs apiece!
    Their intentions had been good, though; she had to give them that. But they were living in cloud-cuckooland if they thought that this enforced and probably prolonged contact would have the desired results.
    Jake didn’t even like her any more. He didn’t trust her. He would sooner handcuff himself to a baboon for the rest of his life than take her back!
    Tears rushed to her eyes. She blinked them away and sniffed ferociously, took the tray to the sink and did the dishes, then collected the clothes they’d worn earlier in the blizzard and pushed them into the washer-drier. Anything to keep busy, keep out of the way of the man she had loved and lost.
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    From behind the closed door Jake could hear the clink of china. At odds with his chaotic emotions, Bella was prosaically washing the dishes. The sheer unexpectedness of what she’d said had robbed him of speech.
    Of course he’d listened when she’d dreamily told him of what she envisaged for their future. Late-night lover-talk, he’d thought it, with her hair splayed against the pillows like a black silk shawl.
    He could remember it now, too vividly for comfort—cocooned together in the secret love-cave of the four-poster bed in that quaint old Cotswolds inn where they’d spent the first Christmas of their honeymoon. Her eyes dreamy, romantic, her voice soft and sweet with talk of country cottages, roses round the door, children—their children—fantasy children she’d created for him.
    His fingers stroking her hair, her face, the trembling starting up inside him again, his hand sliding down to the sensual swell of her breasts, his mouth covering hers, silencing her. His love for her, his need to drown himself yet again in the perfection of her overwhelming him...
    The groan that was torn from him was driven. Oh, God, if only he could wipe his mind clean of all memories! He gritted his teeth, making himself backtrack to what she had actually said, recalling the defiance, the tension in the way she’d said it.
    True, in the first couple of years of their marriage she had sometimes mentioned the possibility of moving to the country and starting a family. But she hadn’t made a song and dance about it, and had quietly accepted it when he had decided they should stay where they were.
    He’d assumed she meant some place tamed and tidy, chocolate-box rural. And he’d had damn good reasons for not wanting to alter his modus operandi at that time. He’d explained that a move, putting down roots and starting a family, was out of the question. For the time being anyway. He hadn’t known how much—and why—she’d wanted what she called a proper home.
    Why hadn’t she told him? In view of her deprived childhood—and that was something else she hadn’t told him about—he would have understood. And, understanding, he would have set about doing something about it.
    He had loved her more than life, and would have done anything to make her happy.
    Were there other things he didn’t know about her? Things she’d kept back, kept bidden? His jaw tightened. Damn it, he’d been her husband; he’d had a right to know!
    And yet he hadn’t made his motives clear, had he? At least, not the underlying motives. The sudden thought washed his mind with icy clarity. Had he been too arrogant, too driven by his own needs, too intent on doing things his way to share the essence of himself with her?
    He didn’t feel comfortable with himself about that. His face darkened, tightened, and self-disgust turned into a hard, sharp lump inside him.