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‘I’ll see you late Wednesday or early Thursday.’ She closed the taxi door and waited until it had turned out of the drive.
Back in the kitchen she munched absently at Jon’s toast and drank her coffee. She and Jon were to be married. It was incredible, ridiculous…only strangely it didn’t seem that way. Already she felt an oddly comfortable pleasure in the thought, as though some burden of pressure had been released. She wanted to marry him, she realised with a start of surprise…or at least…she wanted what marriage to him would give her. She frowned. Didn’t that mean that in her way she was just as selfishly grasping as Louise? But, unlike Louise, she did care about Jon. As a person she liked him very much indeed. As a man he was so totally unthreatening to her that she found his company relaxing. Marriage to Jon would be like slipping into a pair of comfortable slippers…But on Saturday? She comforted herself with the thought that it was hardly likely that Jon would be able to organise a special licence so quickly. In fact she doubted he would even remember about it once he got on the plane. No doubt the task of sorting out all the arrangements would fall to her once he came back but she would still prefer not to tell her parents until after the ceremony.
Coward, she mocked herself, hearing sounds from upstairs that meant David and Alex were up and about.
She told them about Jon’s proposal after breakfast. All three of them were outside, sitting on the lawn. Their open delight and excitement made tears sting her eyes. David flung his arms round her embracing her exuberantly, Alex hanging on to her arm.
‘I’m glad he’s marrying you and not that nasty old Louise,’ she told Sophy. ‘We didn’t like her, did we, David?’
‘No, and neither did Uncle Jon…otherwise he would have let her sleep in his bed.’ A thought seemed to strike him. ‘Does that mean you’ll be sleeping in his bed, Sophy?’
A strange paralysis seemed to have gripped her. She wasn’t sure how much the children knew about adult behaviour. They must have learned something from school but their parents had been dead for three years and she could hardly see Jon satisfactorily explaining the so-called facts of life to them. On the other hand, it was pointless telling them a lie.
‘No, I won’t, David,’ she said at last.
She watched him frown and saw that for some reason her answer had not pleased him.
‘That’s because both of you are so big, I expect,’ intervened Alex, ever practical. ‘You wouldn’t both get in one bed.’
‘They would in Uncle Jon’s,’ David told her gruffly. ‘It’s huge.’
It was…king size and Jon normally slept diagonally across it. She knew because she occasionally had to wake him up in the morning when he had an early business appointment and he had been up late the previous night working. She had never needed to do much more than lightly touch his duvet mummy-wrapped body though.
‘If you’re going to get married, why won’t you be sleeping in his bed?’ he persisted doggedly.
‘Married people don’t always share the same bed, David,’ she told him, giving him what she hoped was a reassuring smile. ‘You know what your uncle’s like. He often works very late and I like to go to bed early. He would wake me up and then I wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep.’
He looked far from convinced, muttering, ‘Ladies always sleep with their husbands,’ and betraying a innate chauvinism that made Sophy smile. Already at ten he was very, very sure in his masculinity and of its supremacy which was surely something he didn’t get from Jon. He was also, as she had often observed, very protective of his sister…and too, of her. She bent forward and ruffled his dark hair.
‘Perhaps Uncle Jon doesn’t want her to sleep with him, David,’ Alex offered, smiling at him. ‘He didn’t want Louise to.’
The little girl was more right than she knew, Sophy thought grimly, glad of the distraction of the telephone ringing.
As she had half suspected it was her mother, eager to tell her all about the previous evening’s dinner party.
‘Chris came too,’ she told Sophy, oblivious to her daughter’s lack of enthusiasm, ‘and he brought his wife. Such a lovely girl…tiny with masses of blonde curls and so obviously in love with him. She’s expecting their first baby. He asked after you, and didn’t seem at all surprised to hear you weren’t married.’ There was a hint of reproof in her mother’s voice. ‘He even laughed about it.’
Sophy realised as she replaced the receiver that she was actually grinding her teeth. So he had laughed, had he? Well, he would soon stop laughing when he heard that she was married! She stood motionless by the telephone staring blindly out of the study window for a few seconds picturing the ordeal the dinner party would have been for her had she been there…that future dinner parties would have been if it hadn’t been for Jon’s extraordinary proposal. Without being aware of it had he had saved her from the most galling humiliation and pain. Now she needn’t even see Chris, never mind endure his mocking taunts on her unmarried state.
OVER THE NEXT couple of days, cautiously at first and then with growing confidence, like someone blessedly discovering the cessation of toothache and then cautiously exploring the previously tormented area and finding it blissfully whole again, Sophy allowed herself to acknowledge the totally unexpected happiness unfurling inside her.
The children were a constant, sometimes funny, sometimes exasperating joy and one she had never thought to know. For some women the physical act of giving birth was acutely necessary to motherhood but she, it seemed, was not one of them. She could not take the place of the children’s dead mother and did not seek to but it gave her a special delight to know that she would have the joy of mothering them. It was this, probably more than anything else, that convinced her that her decision to marry Jon was the right one. She still didn’t know how he could even have thought of relinquishing his responsibility for them but then his mind was so wrapped up in his work, that everything else was obviously secondary to it.
On Tuesday evening it rained and they spent the evening going through some old photograph albums David had found in a bureau drawer.
Once she and Jon were married she would ask him if she was to be allowed a free hand with the house, Sophy mused, glancing round the shabby sitting room, and mentally transforming it with new furnishings. At the present moment in time it wasn’t even particularly comfortable. Both the sofa and the chairs had loose springs which dug into vulnerable flesh if sat upon.
‘Look, Sophy, there’s Daddy and Uncle Jon when they were little.’
Sophy glanced down at the open page of the album, her eyes widening fractionally as she studied the photograph Alex was pointing out.
Two lanky adolescent boys stood side by side, one topping the other by a couple of inches. Both of them had identical shocks of near black hair—both of them had the same regular features, hinting at formidably good looks in adulthood.
‘Uncle Jon looks really like Daddy there, doesn’t he?’ Alex commented, wrinkling her nose. ‘He doesn’t look anything like Daddy did now though, does he, David?’
Thus applied to, her brother studied the photograph briefly and then said gruffly. ‘Yes he does…underneath.’
It was an odd remark for the little boy to make and one, Sophy sensed, made in defence of his uncle against his sister’s comment.
‘Uncle Jon would look much better without his glasses,’ Alex continued cheerfully. ‘He should wear contact lenses like our teacher at school.’
‘He can’t,’ David told her loftily. ‘They don’t suit his eyes, and besides, he doesn’t need to wear his glasses all the time anyway.’
This was news to Sophy. She had never seen him without them, apart from one occasion she recalled, remembering watching him remove them here in this very room. Then she had been struck by the very male attractiveness of his profile, she remembered and then shrugged mentally. What did it matter what Jon looked like? It was the kind of man he was that was important. She already knew all about the pitfalls encountered in getting involved with handsome men. Chris was good looking.
On the Wednesday morning after she had dropped the children off at school she got back just in time to hear the phone ringing noisily.
Thinking it might be Jon, she rushed inside and picked up the receiver, speaking slightly breathlessly into it, barely registering her sudden spearing disappointment at discovering it wasn’t him as she listened to the crisp American tones of the man on the other end of the line.
She explained to him that Jon was due back that day, and slowly read back to him the message he had given her, frowning slightly as she did so.
She knew, of course, that Jon often did work for various governments, but that call had been from the Space Center in Nassau, where apparently they were urgently in need of Jon’s expertise.
Would that mean he had to fly straight out to Nassau, before they could get married? She shrugged slightly. It didn’t really matter when the ceremony took place, surely?
The next time the phone rang it was Jon, ringing her from the airport in Brussels, to tell her the time of his flight.
‘I managed to get through a little earlier than planned,’ he told her, adding, ‘any messages?’
Quickly Sophy told him about the call from Nassau, giving him the number and asking hesitantly, ‘Will that mean that you’ll have to fly straight out there?’
There was a pause so long that she thought at one point their connection had been cut and then Jon said slowly, ‘I’m not sure.’ Having rechecked with him the number of his flight, Sophy said goodbye and replaced the receiver.
She would have to ring Heathrow now and check what time it was due to arrive…her mind ran on, mentally ticking off all that would have to be done. The children would have to be collected from school, fed…Yet all the time at the back of her mind was that same ridiculous sense of apprehension.
Suppose Jon had changed his mind about wanting to marry her? How long would he need to be in Nassau? What if he…?
Stop it! she urged herself firmly, reminding herself that less than a week ago there had been no thought in her mind of marriage to anyone, let alone her boss and now here she was in a mild flurry of panic in case they did not marry.
Since the time needed to get to Heathrow and back to meet Jon’s flight interfered with the children’s school leaving time, and because she knew of no one she could ask to meet them in her place, Sophy rang the school and asked to speak with the headmistress, quickly explaining the situation and getting permission to collect David and Alex on her way to Heathrow just after lunch.
Neither of them stopped chattering during the drive. Oddly enough, this would be the first time either of them had been to the airport and since Sophy always believed in having a little time in hand once they had parked the car she was able to take them to the viewing gallery to watch the flights taking off and landing.
‘Will we see Uncle Jon’s plane from up here?’ David demanded at one point.
Sophy glanced at her watch. Jon’s flight was due in in five minutes.
‘Yes,’ she told him. ‘We’ll watch it land and then we’ll go down to the arrivals lounge to wait for him.
The flight was on time and the plane landed perfectly, so there was no reason for her to feel that odd choking sensation of fear clutch at her throat, Sophy chided herself, especially when she had already watched half a dozen or so planes come and go without the slightest trace of apprehension.
‘Look! Look, Sophy…they’re putting the stairs up,’ Alex told her excitedly, tugging on her hand. ‘Can we wait and see Uncle Jon get off?’
Sophy knew from past experience that Jon was likely to be the last to leave the plane but in the face of the little girl’s excitement she could hardly refuse. It would be a bit of a rush down to the arrivals lounge…and she always liked to be on hand just in case Jon ran into any problems. There had been that time he had left his passport on the plane and another when he had lost the keys for his briefcase, and the strange buzzing sound emanating from it had drawn frowns and stern looks from the security authorities. In the end it had simply been the alarm he had forgotten to switch off but…
‘All right,’ she agreed, ‘but then we’ll have to rush back down.’
‘Look…they’re getting off now,’ David called out, ‘but I can’t see Uncle Jon.’
As Sophy had guessed, Jon was the last off the plane, a clutch of dark suited business men in front of him, the whole party impeded by the slow progress of an old lady who was having difficulty walking.
One of them, obviously growing impatient, pushed past her. His companions followed suit, and Sophy felt an impotent cry of warning rise in her throat as she saw the old lady lose her balance.
What happened next was so out of character that for a moment or two she actually doubted the evidence of her own eyes.
Jon who never seemed to be aware of what was going on around him…Jon who could often be so clumsy and awkward, moved forward so quickly that Sophy blinked. He caught the old lady before she could fall, supporting her with one arm while he held on to his briefcase with the other. She had never seen anyone move so quickly, Sophy reflected, nor move with such controlled reflexes, unless it was on the sports field.
‘Gosh, did you see the way Uncle Jon saved that lady?’ Alex asked, round-eyed. ‘It was really fast, wasn’t it?’
‘That’s because of playing rugger,’ David informed her loftily. ‘He used to play when he was at Cambridge.’
‘And he did rowing as well,’ Alex chipped in, as Sophy drew them away from the viewing windows and towards the arrivals lounge.
She had known about the rugby but it had never occurred to her to think of Jon as an athletic man. Chris who prided himself on his physical fitness spent at least three evenings per week in the gym, jogged and played amateur football but, as far as she knew, Jon did none of these things. There were of course those totally unexpected muscles shaping his shoulders and chest though. Irritated with herself without knowing why, Sophy tried to redirect her thoughts.
For once, Jon managed to negotiate the hazards of passport control and baggage checks without any mishaps.
As he came through the gate Alex slipped her hand from Sophy’s and ran towards him. Watching him field her as easily as any rugby ball and transfer his baggage to his other hand, Sophy was forced to admit that there were obviously still some aspects of her future husband that she was not familiar with. The knowledge was a little unsettling. Up until now she had thought she knew Jon very well indeed and had been quite content with the slightly exasperated toleration which was the normal feeling he aroused within her. Indeed she liked feeling faintly motherly and superior to him, she realised. Thoroughly startled by this sudden discovery about herself, she was the last of the trio to step forward and greet him.
‘That was really good how you saved that old lady from falling, Uncle Jon,’ David was saying. ‘We watched you from the gallery, didn’t we, Sophy?’
Over David’s head the navy blue eyes fixed rather myopically and vaguely on her own.
Alex piped up, ‘Yes, Sophy was so surprised that her mouth was open—like this.’ She demonstrated Sophy’s stunned surprise far too well, the latter thought uncomfortably, feeling the slow crawl of embarrassed colour seeping up under her skin as Jon continued to look at her.
Her embarrassment heightened when David asked suddenly, ‘Aren’t you going to kiss Sophy, Uncle Jon? You can do now that you’re going to get married.’
‘I don’t think I will right now, old son, if you don’t mind.’ Watching Jon ruffle David’s hair and listening to the mild, even tone of his voice as he sidetracked his nephew away from such a potentially embarrassing subject, Sophy knew she should be grateful to Jon for what he had done but for some strange reason, what she was really feeling, if she was honest, was a sense of genuine pique. Jon couldn’t have made it more plain that the thought of kissing her held absolutely no appeal for him, she thought irrationally. Was she really so unattractive to him that…? She stopped abruptly, stunned by the train of her own thoughts. Of course Jon did not want to kiss her—her or anyone else…indeed that was the reason she had felt able to agree to marry him. So why…?
It must be something to do with all the reunited couples and families freely embracing around them that had aroused that momentary and totally unnecessary fit of pique inside her. Feeling much better now that she had found a logical explanation for her irrational feelings, Sophy hurried to catch up with the others and led the way to where she had parked the car.
CHAPTER THREE
IT WAS GONE ten o’clock, the silence in the study as they both worked a companionable one and then Jon got up and walked over to the window, his back to her as he stared out into the garden. His hair had grown slightly while he was away, Sophy noticed absently and it looked better, even curling faintly into his nape.
‘Will you have to fly out to Nassau immediately?’ she asked him suddenly, uneasy with the silence she had found so relaxing only seconds before.
He turned round and smiled mildly. ‘No, not straight away. Not until Sunday.’
‘So…’ All at once her throat was dry. ‘So you’ll still be here for the wedding, then?’ Fool, idiot, she derided herself mentally; without him there wouldn’t be a wedding and she had made him sound like one of the guests.
‘Oh, yes…I’ve made all the arrangements. Got the special licence organised through someone I know in Brussels.’
‘You’re not having second thoughts, then’
Good heavens, what was the matter with her? What was she asking him for? She was behaving like a total fool.
‘No. Are you?’
It was unusual for Jon to ask such a direct question and in such a crisp tone. She shook her head without looking at him, suddenly too restless to stay in her seat. She got up and paced a few steps.
‘There is one thing though.’ She tensed. ‘When we were discussing the…er…style of our marriage I neglected to mention one point.’
‘Yes?’ Her mouth felt frozen and stiff, so much so that it was difficult to shape the word.
‘We have discussed my reasons for our marriage, Sophy, but I don’t think we’ve fully discussed yours. I know you care deeply for the children,’ he went on before she could speak, ‘but—and please correct me if I am wrong—you could always have children of your own. No, please,’ he stopped her when she would have spoken. ‘You are, in addition, a very attractive woman.’ He saw her expression and his mouth twisted slightly. ‘I assure you, Sophy, that even my shortsightedness is not sufficient to blind me to that fact. A woman whom I am sure very many members of my sex would be only too pleased to marry. Men who would want to share with you a far more intimate relationship than the one I am offering.’
It was ridiculous to feel embarrassed but she was.
‘I don’t want that kind of relationship,’ she managed to say thickly, turning away from him.
‘I see. This is, I presume, because of the romantic involvement you once had with someone else. You did tell me some such thing the first time we met,’ he reminded her.
Her face flamed. She had had so much to drink that night she could not remember what she had told him, but it embarrassed her now to think that she had probably poured out to him all her maudlin misery over what had once been her love for Chris.
‘I take it there is no question of this, er…relationship—’
‘None at all,’ Sophy managed to interrupt huskily.
‘I see. Having suffered the pangs of love once and been hurt by it you have no wish to risk yourself with such an emotion again, is that it?’
It wasn’t because she was frightened of loving that she was marrying him, Sophy reflected, but it was much simpler and easier to let him believe that than to tell him the truth.
She lifted her head and looked at him, forcing a cool smile. ‘Yes, Jon, that is it. The relationship you are offering me, the chance to take over the role of mother to the children, is exactly what I want.’
‘Very well…but I must tell you, Sophy, that, er…that there can be no question of me tolerating a sexual relationship which you might form outside our marriage.’
‘You mean you wouldn’t want me to take a lover?’
‘Yes, that is exactly what I mean.’
It was getting dark and in the dusk she could barely see across the room.
The aura that Jon projected when she was not able to see him clearly was unnervingly at odds with the man she knew him to be. Even his voice seemed to have changed, become slightly silky and somehow subtly menacing.
‘You have my word that there will be no question of that, Jon,’ she told him quietly and truthfully. Not wanting him to ask any more questions she gave a small shrug and added lightly, ‘Perhaps, like yourself, I am one of those humans whose sex drive is so low as to be almost nonexistent.’
She thought for a moment he seemed to tense, as though about to say something and wondered uncertainly if she had perhaps hurt or offended him by being so frank. No man would enjoy hearing himself described as virtually sexless, she thought guiltily.
