Marriage Under Suspicion. Sara Craven

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СКАЧАТЬ I’m sure. One way or the other.

      She stopped abruptly, with a small gasp, aware of how far and how fast she had come from her original total disbelief.

      She found herself remembering an article she’d read in a magazine at the hairdressers. Titled ‘His Cheating Heart’, it had detailed some of the ways to check if a man was being unfaithful. And one of the chief danger signs, she recalled, her heart lurching sickly, had been long, unexplained absences.

      She said aloud, huskily, almost desperately, ‘Ryan—where the hell are you?’

      No, she thought, setting her jaw. She would not let herself think like this. Five years of love and trust could not be destroyed by a single act of malice. She wouldn’t allow it.

      So she wouldn’t mention the letter at all, she told herself, drawing a deep breath. In fact, she would make believe she had never seen it. That it didn’t exist. She would make no wild accusations. Drop no veiled hints. She would act completely naturally, she thought fiercely. But—she would also be on her guard.

      She tore the letter in half, then into quarters, before reducing it to strips, and thence into a mound of minute fragments which she piled onto a saucer and burned.

      She flushed the ashes down the sink, and wished the words could be erased from her mind with equal ease.

      She chose a bottle of Ryan’s favourite Bordeaux from the rack, and opened it. A nice, wifely gesture to welcome him home, she thought, biting her lip. Except there was no positive guarantee that he would be home . . .

      If he didn’t return, of course, that would be a whole new ball game. But she would deal with that only when she had to.

      She sat curled up on the sofa, sipping her wine, and watching television, aware of the light fading from the sky above the river. But the words and images on the screen passed her by, as if she were blind and deaf. Her mind was occupied only by her own heavy thoughts.

      It was with a sense of shock that she discovered that it was now completely dark, and realised how long she must have been sitting there. She uncoiled herself stiffly, forcing herself to move around the big room, switching on lamps, and drawing the voluminous drapes across the windows. Closing out the night, and the thousands of lights which twinkled at her like small prying eyes. Reinforcing the fact that she was still, unaccountably, alone.

      She thought, with anguish, He’s not coming back. And how am I going to bear it . . . ?

      The sudden sharp rattle of a key in the door made her wheel round, her heart pounding.

      She said with a gasp ‘Ryan? Oh, Ryan, it’s you.’

      ‘You were expecting someone else?’ He spoke lightly, but the glance he directed at her across the intervening space was searching. He shut the door behind him, and put down his briefcase.

      ‘Of course not, but I was getting worried. I didn’t know where you were.’

      ‘I’m sorry, but I didn’t know you’d be around to worry.’ His brows lifted questioningly. ‘To what do I owe this unexpected pleasure?’

      He was wearing, she noticed, his favourite pale grey trousers, topped by a white shirt, a silk tie in sombre jewel colours, and his black cashmere jacket. Not his usual casual weekend gear at all.

      She swallowed. ‘Oh, the bride got cold feet and cancelled. A Special Occasions first. All that lovely food, and the prettiest marquee in England, and no takers.’ She realised she was beginning to babble, and bit her lip.

      ‘Ah, well,’ Ryan said lightly. ‘It’s probably a blessing in disguise. One less mistake to chalk up to experience. One less digit to add to the divorce statistics.’

      She stared at him, suddenly and totally arrested. ‘That’s a very cynical viewpoint.’

      ‘I thought I was just being realistic.’ He paused. ‘Did it cause you a lot of problems?’

      ‘Enough.’ Kate shrugged. ‘But it also gave me the weekend back.’ She hesitated in her turn. ‘I did phone and leave a message. You must have been out all day.’

      ‘Pretty well,’ he nodded, discarding his jacket and tie and tossing them on to one of the sofas.

      Kate watched him release the top buttons of his shirt with a swift, primitive yearning. How long was it since they’d last made love? It must be all of three weeks, she realised with an inward grimace. Just before she’d been taken ill with that twenty-four-hour tummy bug, when she thought back.

      But I’ve been out a lot on business, she reminded herself defensively, and Ryan often works late into the evening, so that I’m asleep when he comes to bed.

      But not tonight, she promised herself. Tonight, she would take infinite care to stay awake.

      She smiled at him. ‘Would you like a glass of wine? I—I didn’t know what to do about food. . . ?’ She turned it into a question.

      Ryan shook his head. ‘I’ve eaten, thanks. But some wine would be good.’

      She poured carefully, and handed him a glass. ‘You look very smart.’ She kept her tone casual. ‘Have you been with Quentin?’

      He shook his head. ‘No, I had some research to do.’

      ‘Oh.’ Kate refilled her own glass and sat down. ‘I thought you did that on the Internet.’

      ‘Not all of it.’ He didn’t come to sit beside her, but prowled restlessly round the room. He paused by the phone. ‘Have there been any other messages?’

      ‘Apparently not.’ Kate sipped her wine. ‘Were you expecting anything in particular?’

      ‘Not really,’ he returned. ‘There was some mail for you, by the way. Did you find it?’

      ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Oh, yes, thank you.’

      He continued his pacing, then halted abruptly, his brows flicking together in a frown. ‘What happened to the floor? And the rug?’

      ‘That was me being clumsy.’ She managed to laugh. ‘I had a fight with a cup of coffee and lost. Does it look too obvious and awful? I’ll get the rug cleaned, and there’s some special stuff for the woodwork.’

      ‘No, leave it,’ Ryan said, his mouth twisting. ‘I rather like the fact that we’ve actually put our mark on the place at last. I’d begun to think we were going to pass through without one blemish.’

      ‘Pass through?’ Kate echoed. ‘That’s an odd thing to say.’

      He shrugged. ‘Just a figure of speech.’

      ‘And it’s not “the place”,’ she went on, with a touch of fierceness, feeling uneasy, wanting, obscurely, to challenge him. ‘It’s a home. Our home.’

      He laughed. ‘Is it, my darling? I thought it was some kind of statement.’

      ‘Can’t it be both? Is it wrong for our environment to express who we are—our aspirations and achievements? ’ She could hear her voice rising.

      ‘That,’ СКАЧАТЬ