‘Ask him,’ he taunted. ‘Go on—ask him!’
But Constantine’s cruel words focussed Laura’s mind on what really mattered, and now she got up and faced him, staring mulishly up at him. It was true that he towered over her, and made her feel ridiculously small, but she didn’t care. She might be small but she certainly wasn’t insignificant. And he would hear her out!
‘No, I won’t ask him—because I wouldn’t marry you if you were the last man on earth!’ she hissed. ‘A man so cruel and so cold that he can’t bear to forgive his own father. Even though that father has asked him time and time again to forgive him for all the wrongs he admits he did!’
‘Have you been speaking with my father?’ he demanded furiously.
‘And what if I have? Is that such a heinous crime?’ she retorted. ‘Am I supposed to ask your permission if I want to speak to somebody?’
‘You dare to accuse me of going behind your back, and now I discover that you have done exactly the same!’ he thundered.
‘Oh, please don’t try and get out of it by using logic!’ she flared, showing a complete lack of it herself. ‘Your father made mistakes, yes—and so did your mother. Though it sounds to me as if she couldn’t help her own behaviour, and some people are like that. Weak. Unable to give love—even to their own children. And they can’t help it, Constantine—they were born that way!’
He clenched his fists in fury. How dared she? How dared she? ‘Have you quite finished?’
That intimidating tone would have silenced many people, but Laura was too passionate to stop. This meant far too much for her to be able to stop. ‘No, I have not finished! I can’t believe you even made the suggestion that I marry you. You’re still angry about the coldness of your own childhood and yet you want to subject Alex to more of the same!’
‘What the hell are you talking about, Laura?’
This was painful; maybe too painful—and Laura was not prepared to go as far as admitting that if they married then the balance of love would be as one-sided as in his parents’ own marriage. Because he didn’t realise she loved him, did he? And wouldn’t it give him power over her if he did?
‘I’m talking about bringing a child up within a loveless marriage—it’s just not fair. Things would only get worse between us—never better—and as Alex grew he would have to tiptoe around our feelings and our animosities. What kind of example is that to set him?’ she said, her voice beginning to tremble as she thought of her darling son. ‘What hope is there for him to be happy in his own life if he looks around and sees discord all around him? How can he believe in love and happiness for himself if he never sees an example of it at home, Constantine?’
Her breath had deserted her and her words died away. She had nothing left to say—but she did not think she needed to. For Constantine’s face had suddenly become shuttered. And his eyes—always enigmatic—now looked like strange, cold stones. As if a light had gone out behind them.
‘This is what you think?’ he demanded.
‘Yes,’ she whispered, although it broke her heart to admit it. ‘Because it’s the truth.’
For a moment there was silence—a heavy and uncomfortable kind of silence—and then Constantine’s mouth hardened.
‘Very well, Laura,’ he said, in a voice of pure steel. ‘I can see the sense behind your words, since they are—as you say—the truth. And at least if you go then I will no longer have to endure your intolerable interference in things which do not concern you.’
She prayed her lips would not crumple, nor her eyes give her pain away. ‘Constantine—’
But he silenced her with his next statement. ‘We will need to make plans. And we must do it so that everyone benefits as far as possible. You will require financial assistance. No!’ He held his hand up peremptorily, anticipating her objections. A harsh note of bitterness entered his voice. ‘This is not the time for pretty displays of unnecessary pride,’ he spat out. ‘You are the mother of my son and I insist that you have an adequate income to support him in a manner which I hope we can both agree on. I want him to go to a school where he isn’t bullied—’
‘Who told you that?’
‘He did, of course,’ he said impatiently. ‘Not in so many words—but it was clear to me that he is not as happy as he could be. He needs a school where there is plenty of sport, and you
need enough money to take that haunted look out of your eyes, never to have to supplement your income with damned waitressing jobs again. And I…’ He drew a deep breath as pain like he had never known rushed in to invade the heart he had tried to protect for so long. ‘I want to see as much of Alex as possible—we’ll need to come to some agreement on that.’
She wanted to reach out to him. To tell him that he could see as much of Alex as he wanted—to reassure him and to comfort him that they would do the best they possibly could. But there was something so icy and forbidding about his words and demeanour that she did not dare. Suddenly he had become a stranger to her. ‘Of course,’ she said stiffly.
‘I will arrange for you to return to England as soon as possible. I think that best, in the circumstances. My lawyers will be in touch on your return. But I want some time alone with Alex tomorrow morning.’ He drew a deep breath as reality hit him, seeming to turn his whole body into stone. He forced the next words out. ‘To say goodbye to my son.’
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
‘BUT Mum, why do we have to go home?’
Laura’s smile didn’t slip, even though her face felt as if it had been carved out of marble—but during the sleepless night which had followed her furious row with Constantine she had decided the best way to handle questions like this. And the best way was to present her and Alex leaving Livinos as something perfectly normal. Which it was.
‘Well, we only ever planned to come out for a few weeks,’ she reminded him. ‘Remember?’
‘It’s been less than that,’ said Alex sulkily. ‘And I like it here.’
She knew that—and it broke her heart to have to drag him away—but what choice did she have? He’d been happy in England before and he would be happy again—especially if there was no more bullying and if he changed schools, as Constantine himself had suggested. And didn’t all the books on child-rearing say that the worst thing you could do was to subject your children to a hostile atmosphere and infighting between parents? She could do worse than remind herself of the bitter words she and Constantine had exchanged last night if she needed any more convincing that the two of them were basically incompatible.