‘Oh, I see,’ she jeered, ‘the great James Allingham doesn’t want anyone to know that at least one woman doesn’t find him irresistible.’
Imperceptibly his expression changed, hardened, anger and a certain degree of icy contempt killing the amusement that had been in his eyes.
‘What makes you so sure it will be my sexual appeal that will be held in doubt,’ he taunted softly. ‘Remember, you’re the one with the hang-ups about sex. It isn’t exactly a secret, how you feel about the male sex, Jenna. You’re going to have to be careful. If it becomes common knowledge that physically you can’t bear me anywhere near you, people are going to start to talk.’ He shrugged, watching her like a cat at a mousehole. ‘No one’s ever been in doubt about my sexual proclivities, but yours…No doubt there are quite a few unattractive motives the less charitable among the gutter-press writers could attribute to your agreement to marry me—they won’t hurt me, Jenna, but they could hurt you.’
It was no less than the truth, but, God, how she hated him for bringing it home to her. She wanted to lash out at him physically, to destroy, to cause him the same anguish he had just caused her. And then the full meaning of what he had just intimated burst upon her and she cringed, physically and mentally. She had never been attracted to any member of her own sex, and his blunt suggestion that there might be those who would say publicly any different made her feel ill with inner anger. Why should anyone’s private life become a matter for public speculation? She knew reporters…once they thought there might be the slightest suggestion of any scandal in her life, they would start digging and they would not stop until…until they disinterred her sister.
‘Jenna!’
James’s voice cut sharply through her tumultuous thoughts. ‘Dear God, that’s not——You aren’t——’
Oddly enough he looked as pale and shaken as she felt.
‘No.’ She forced the denial from an aching throat, tense with pain and fear.
She reached behind her chair for the jacket to the suit she was wearing, her back to him as she reaffirmed it. ‘No. There’s nothing like that.’
He took her jacket from her and she suffered his helping her into it. ‘Where are we going for lunch?’
‘Wait and see.’
With an ease that she resented privately he managed to find a cruising taxi the moment they stepped outside. Since Jenna got in first she didn’t catch what he said to the driver, but frowned in bewilderment when the cab stopped, not outside a restaurant, but instead outside Garrard’s, the Crown jewellers.
‘Come on.’ James helped her out, guiding her towards the main door. The commissionaire opened it for them and James murmured something to him.
The commissionaire disappeared, and Jenna gazed at her surroundings, awestruck by such opulent magnificence. Before she had time to speak the commissionaire was back, another man behind him.
‘Mr Allingham,’ he greeted James with a courteous smile, ‘and this, of course, must be your fiancée?’
Jenna forced a rather stilted smile.
‘If you’ll both come this way.’
A private room had been put at their disposal. Jenna sat down in a deep, buttoned velvet chair still trying to get her breath as
a velvet tray bearing a selection of rings was presented for her consideration. Nearly all of them comprised diamonds and emeralds, and the reason for this was explained when James told her, ‘I specified emeralds this morning when I made the appointment, because of your eyes, but if you have some other preference…’
Jenna had not, mainly because she had never given any thought to her choice of an engagement ring—not even since James had put his proposition to her. For some reason it had never struck her that he would give her an engagement ring. Her throat closed tightly in a mixture of pain and anguish as she stared at the exquisite rings presented for her consideration. She wanted to tell James that she had no need of an engagement ring, but she sensed that he would overrule her. To judge from the size and quality of the stones just one of those rings would cost far more than she needed to overcome her present cashflow problems, and a shaft of bitterness pierced her. Perhaps she should choose the most expensive-looking of them all, and then pawn it. Just for a moment she dwelt on James’s reaction to discovering she had managed to evade his trap by pawning the engagement ring he had bought her. It was frightening enough to make her shiver slightly.
The gems in front of her shimmered and danced, cold green and white lights sparkling from them. They were all beautiful, but cold and empty—like her marriage would be. Suddenly, she knew she could not wear any of them. She turned impulsively to James shaking her head. ‘They’re all lovely…but…’
James was frowning. The man on the other side of the small antique desk staring as though unable to believe his ears. If she refused a ring James would feel humiliated, Jenna realised suddenly. She had within her grasp the perfect weapon for hurting and humiliating him as he had done her on far too many occasions already. The words hovered in her mind, but instead she heard herself saying huskily, ‘James, I’ve always wanted to have an antique engagement ring. I…’
It was almost funny how both male faces cleared as if by magic. ‘Of course,’ James was actually smiling at her. ‘I should have thought of that. My fiancée is an interior designer, with a special love of the Georgian period,’ he informed the other man.
While Jenna was wondering how on earth James knew of her love of that particular period the sales assistant was beaming. ‘We have a beautiful Georgian ring in at the moment, sir. A client has asked us to dispose of it on his behalf. If you would give me a moment.’
He wasn’t gone very long, returning with a shabby leather box which he opened and then put down on the table. Jenna caught her breath and then held it. Tears smarted weakly in her eyes, burning the back of her throat as she stared at the smooth circle of gold. An intricate and delicate setting had been woven in gold to display the ring’s one beautiful emerald. Although it was nothing like the modern stones she had seen with their sparkling diamond surrounds, Jenna sensed none the less that the stone she was looking at surpassed those others in its perfection. It had a depth and purity of colour that fascinated her, drew her, until she felt almost as though she could drown in its green depths. Its effect was almost mesmeric and she had to blink before she could tear her glance away.
‘It’s beautiful.’ She was whispering without knowing why she should do so.
‘And extremely rare,’ the salesman told her with a smile. ‘It’s been handed down through the same family since the days of Elizabeth I—at least the stone has: it was placed in its present setting during George Ill’s reign as a betrothal gift from the then owner to his fiancée. The present owner has no immediate family to hand it on to—by tradition it has been the betrothal ring of his family since Georgian times. He lost his fiancée during the last war and has remained alone since then.’
Jenna looked at the ring again and shook her head regretfully. ‘It must be terribly expensive…’ She was using the words as an excuse and a defence. What really prevented her from sliding the ring on to her finger was the feeling that up until now it had always been given and worn with love, and somehow she could not tarnish all that the ring represented by allowing James to give it to her to seal what was only a business arrangement. Out of the corner of her eye she saw James shake his head at the other man.
‘I think we’ll leave it for now,’ she heard James saying easily as he stood up.
As Jenna turned towards the door, James paused to say something to the sales assistant but Jenna wasn’t listening. She felt a curious numbness envelop her and she knew that if she had to wear an engagement ring, that was the one she wanted. Already she was half regretting her emotional decision, but as James took her arm and escorted her out into the main foyer of the jewellers’, she knew it was too late to tell him she had changed her mind.