And poor Adam’s jaw was already beginning to show signs of discoloration.
She frowned at him worriedly. ‘I think you should go and get a cold compress for that to try and keep the swelling down.’
He glanced at the other man with narrowed eyes. ‘It can wait,’ he decided dismissively.
‘Don’t delay on our account,’ Paul taunted hardily.
‘I wouldn’t think of leaving just yet,’ Adam returned mockingly.
‘Will you two just stop this?’ Eve put up a hand to her throbbing temple, the strain of the day beginning to tell on her. The last thing she felt in the mood for was being emotionally dragged about by these two men like a rag doll!
Adam’s expression instantly became one of concern, and he moved protectively towards her.
Eve stepped back instinctively as she saw the anger snapping in Paul’s eyes.
The movement had been pure force of habit, but nevertheless she didn’t want a repeat of the violent outburst of a few minutes ago.
‘Adam, I really think it might be better if you went downstairs and got something for that bruising,’ she told him firmly.
His mouth tightened, and he looked from Paul’s triumphant face to her wearily resigned one before nodding reluctant acquiesence.
But, being Adam Gardener, he couldn’t just leave. Oh, no, that would have been too easy!
‘Don’t let him get to you,’ he murmured, before bending his head to lightly brush his lips against hers.
Eve glanced over his shoulder at Paul’s furious face, knowing that, however much Adam might have enjoyed the kiss, he hadn’t done it for that reason. ‘Swine,’ she muttered, for Adam’s ears alone.
He was grinning as he stepped back. ‘Just call if you need me,’ he said, provocatively loud enough for the other man to hear.
Paul was still scowling when the two of them had been left alone up in the studio. ‘What was that supposed to mean?’ he ground out.
She shook her head impatiently. ‘Adam was deliberately trying to goad you.’ And he had more than succeeded, she conceded wearily. Would today never come to an end?
Paul thrust his hands into his trouser pockets, a pair of the expensively tailored variety that he always wore, a navy blue pair this afternoon, with a sports jacket bearing a grey and navy blue check. Paul always looked perfectly tailored, no matter what the occasion.
‘I resent the fact,’ he bit out, ‘that a man like Adam Gardener believes he has the right to do that. How could you, Eve?’ He looked pained. ‘How could you come straight from shattering all my hopes and plans into Adam Gardener’s arms?’
Not literally, of course; a few hours had elapsed since she saw Paul at his flat, but it was close enough to make her feel heavy with guilt. How could she have done that? If she knew the answer to that, there would probably never have been the need to cancel her plans to marry Paul. It was not knowing how she felt about Adam that confused her so much.
But an answer like that wouldn’t satisfy Paul, as it hasn’t earlier. And why should it? The two of them had given almost a year of their lives in commitment to each other, and yet within a few days of her meeting Adam it had all been destroyed. She acknowledged that she owed Paul more than that, and yet she couldn’t think of any other answer than releasing him from his unspoken promises to her. And releasing herself from her unspoken promises to him. Because she could no longer keep them.
Paul looked haggard, a white line of tension about his mouth. ‘I came here to tell you I still love you, that this—madness, with Adam Gardener, changes nothing for me.’
And he had found her in the other man’s arms! ‘I’m so sorry,’ she choked.
‘I’m not giving up, Eve,’ he told her evenly. ‘Adam Gardener was wrong a few minutes ago; we’re the ones who were made for each other.’
Eve blushed at the thought of Paul overhearing that conversation, of the things Adam had said next. It must have seemed to Paul as if at any moment she and Adam were about to go to bed together. And, despite her attraction to Adam, she liked to believe they wouldn’t have done.
; ‘Just think, Eve,’ Paul persuaded lightly, ‘We come from the same background, have the same friends, the same interests, want the same things out of life.’
Except when it came to her career and anything connected to it.
Strange, how even since this morning she had realised the fundamental differences they had when it came to that. And, important as Paul was to her life, her painting was important to her too, not in competition with him as he almost seemed to regard it, but as a way of enriching their lives through her own sense of self-achievement.
‘You’re thinking of all this, aren’t you?’ Paul made a sweeping movement with his arm around the room as he seemed to read her thoughts. ‘Maybe I have been wrong in the way I’ve handled your career, but it’s true that we learn from our mistakes. Eve, if you want publicity, then you’ll have publicity. If you want to travel, then we’ll do that too. I’m not in that much of a hurry to enter politics, I can take a few months off——’