The Faithful Wife

‘You want it, you eat it. I ate mine while I was making yours,’ he fabricated. He would willingly starve rather than see her want for a single thing. Watching her eat with such unselfconscious enjoyment filled him with tenderness.

‘So I gave up and decided I might as well stay home,’ she completed. ‘Not that it matters. Not now. Not at all.’

But it did. Jake knew it did. He knew now that he had his own burden of blame to carry. What had happened hadn’t been all down to her. If they got this right—and he prayed to God that against all the odds they would—things would have to change. He was willing, if she was.

‘And because you were bored you took up your modelling career again.’ He could understand that now, though it had made him possessively jealous at the time. It had been her career, and one she had handled well.

He hadn’t put any pressure on her, but had been deeply thankful when she’d abandoned it on their marriage. He had never been able to quell the unreasonable jealousy, the desire to make her his exclusive property, the overweening distaste at the thought of millions of nameless males lusting after her much-photographed face and body.

That, too, would have to change. If she wanted to pursue her career then that was what he wanted, too.

She twisted round in the cosy bed, and Jake moved imperceptibly away. He was aroused enough already. If she touched him there would be no more talk...

‘You got it wrong,’ she assured him, her lovely eyes shadowed. ‘I’ve finished with modelling. You know that. When we married I told you I’d never stand in front of the cameras again. I meant it. Guy offered me the job of assistant manager in his agency’s New Accounts department. So I took it. And I know we didn’t need the money. My modelling career called on reserves of physical stamina, not the intellect, but I’m not a fool, Jake. I knew the healthy state of your bank balance, your investment portfolio.

‘I knew all that.’ She smiled into his eyes, not wanting to denigrate everything he’d given her, but knowing it was important to explain the way she’d felt. ‘And, honestly, I knew our apartment was the last word in luxury—but you couldn’t grow roses round the door or walk out barefooted onto dewy grass on a June morning. And there was a limit to the number of times I could change the decor, buy cushions and rugs and flowers.

‘I guess—’ her eyes mirrored her regret ‘—that by the time I decided to take that job as a way of occupying my time, we weren’t heavily into communication. I told you I’d decided to accept Guy’s job offer. You assumed I’d be prancing in front of the cameras again.’

Not heavily into communication was an understatement, Jake accepted ruefully. During that last year of their marriage there’d been a total lack of anything remotely like togetherness.

He’d been increasingly aware of it at the time, putting it down to the large amounts of time he spent away from home. He had made up his mind to do something about it, had been on the point of telling her he’d delegate more, stay home, work from the London office. But it had been too late. He’d learned she’d been seeing Maclaine, had taken up her former career—or so he’d apparently wrongly assumed. He hadn’t been able to handle that.

He removed the tray from where it lay on the bed between them and told himself it wasn’t too late. He wouldn’t let it be.

Already he had accepted the lion’s share of the blame for what had happened. Bella had wanted, with more reason than most, the ordinary everyday things other people took for granted. A home that was a real home—not a sterile apartment that could have earned an award for being avant-garde—a husband who was around, babies. All the things he’d refused to give her.

The worst part would be coming to terms with her affair with Maclaine. The sudden insight hit him hard.

He didn’t know whether he could handle it, learn to trust her again.

Bella watched as a shadow crossed his impressive features and took the light from his eyes. Her heart jerked. Had she complained too much when putting her point of view? But the air needed to be cleared if they were to go on. Were they to go on? And where to?

Had Jake made love to her simply because she was there? The sexual chemistry between them was as strong as ever; that was a fact of life and it wouldn’t go away. Had her viewpoint of their marriage reinforced his conviction that they were poles apart in what they wanted, that all they had going for them was sex? Had he simply used her?

No, she thought decisivel

y. Jake had far more integrity than that. And she was going to have to find a way to convince him that her dreams didn’t matter. She’d woken up at last. The reality of loving him was the most important thing in her life.

‘I’m going to take a shower.’ She slid her long legs out of the bed, needing to lighten the atmosphere that had for some reason suddenly become brittle.

Perhaps her assumptions had been wrong, because the slow smile he gave her was warm enough to be reassuring. But he didn’t follow her to share the shower, as she had more than half expected him to. When she emerged at last, clean and scented and unwrapping herself from a bath sheet, she thought he was asleep.

Eyes half-closed, she watched him. His male perfection made her breath stop in her throat For all his muscular strength; his body was lean and elegant. He had fallen asleep on his back, his arms crossed behind his head, and Bella, suddenly, had never felt less like sleep in her life.

But she wouldn’t wake him. She’d creep beneath the duvet, cuddle up and stay awake all night, savouring every moment of this reconciliation.

Because it was a reconciliation, wasn’t it?

Refusing to entertain negative thoughts, she selected a slinky, bias-cut satin nightie and wriggled into it. For the first time she thanked Evie for her meddling. Brushed cotton pyjamas wouldn’t have had the same allure.

When he woke, Bella knew from delicious experience, Jake would make a slow, erotic game out of removing it. And it wouldn’t be easy. A soft smile curved her mouth as she glanced down at herself. The oyster-coloured fabric clung to her breasts and tummy, then flared softly from just below her hips. Not a comfy garment to sleep in, but it made her feel good, supremely conscious of her femininity, her sensuality. She hadn’t felt like that since she and Jake had broken up.

Her movements unconsciously sinuous, she walked towards the bed, her hand going out to snick off the bedside lamp, and Jake said, ‘If you’ve finished, I’ll use the bathroom.’

He sounded much too alert to have just this second woken. Why hadn’t he spoken to her? Why had he kept his eyes so firmly closed? In the past, he had loved to watch her getting ready for bed, lazily teasing her, suggesting which of her huge selection of night-wear she should choose, then wickedly speculating on how long it would take him to remove it.

She almost switched the light back on so she could read his expression when she asked him. But she didn’t do either. At this early stage of their reconciliation it might be too soon.