Marriage Bargain With His Innocent

He looked at her and she wondered whether he realised just how offensive he could be.

‘Or have you relaxed sufficiently to tell me why you’re here? You may have had sandwiches on the train, but I’m hungry. I’ll get some food delivered. Let me know if you want to see the rest of the house and I’ll order when the tour is done.’

‘No—no need to go upstairs.’

She thought bedrooms and backed away from the thought fast. Despite loathing the man, it had always been way too easy to associate him with bedrooms—partly because he was so sexy, and partly because, even though time had moved on from that girlish infatuation, age had failed to completely extinguish the remnants of her crush. She still occasionally caught herself daydreaming about him. Fortunately she’d learnt how to avoid getting too embroiled in that kind of pointless fantasy.

‘Good.’ He headed back towards the kitchen, phoning for food on the way. ‘Where were you planning on spending the night?’

He looked at the battered khaki backpack which she had dumped on the ground in the kitchen.

‘B&B.’

Matias frowned. ‘That’s ridiculous,’ he said shortly. ‘Didn’t you consider staying here? Don’t you think I’m not appreciative for everything you do for my mother and have done over the years? A night in my house is the least I could offer in return.’

Georgina flushed. ‘I shouldn’t be the one doing stuff for your mother, though, should I?’ she muttered, fidgeting.

‘When it comes to that old chestnut—been there, done that. I’ve heard every variation of criticism from you over the years, so let’s drop the topic and move on.’

Matias felt a flash of guilt dart through him like quicksilver. He had no reason to feel guilty. None at all. He supported his mother financially, made sure she wanted for nothing. It took hard work to make the sort of money that he did, and without his money life would not be nearly so rosy for his mother. When things went wrong in her house he made sure to replace them with top-of-the-range equivalents. Over time, her kitchen had been so expensively kitted out that any professional chef would have been happy to ply his trade there. And as for the farm...

The organic farm she’d insisted on hanging on to brought in peanuts and she couldn’t have begun to handle it without his help. He made sure that everyone who worked there reported to him—just as he made sure that any headaches were sorted before they became full-blown.

And organic farming—as he had discovered years ago—was nothing but one long, grinding headache. Crops had a nasty habit of falling victim to the wrong type of insect. The chickens, which had made a brief and optimistic appearance for a year and a half, had fallen prey to foxes or else wandered off hither and thither to lay eggs that couldn’t be located and therefore never made it to the shelves at the local greengrocer.

Although, in fairness, it was better than the Reiki treatment, the donkey sanctuary, the creative workshops and the gem-selling crackpot ideas that had preceded the farm when he’d been a kid.

So guilt? No, he had nothing to feel guilty about. He and his mother might not be close, but how many relationships between children and their parents were trouble-free? He was a responsible and dutiful son, and if his mother thought that he came up short in the personal stakes then he could live with that.

He shook his head free of inconvenient introspection and surfaced to find Georgie apologising.

‘Sorry?’ His eyebrows shot up. ‘You’re sorry about criticising?’ He grinned. ‘Now I’m really getting worried. Since when have you ever made apologies for getting under my skin?’

He watched as she noticeably didn’t answer but instead devoted her attention to inspecting the rooms they had previously walked past.

Just when he was about to break the ever-lengthening silence the doorbell went. When Matias returned, it was with a spread of food from a top London restaurant.

‘I’ve ordered enough for two,’ he said, dumping the lot on the table and hunting down two plates and some cutlery. He poured them both wine and sat facing her.

‘Most people have Indian or Chinese take-out,’ Georgina remarked.

She shouldn’t eat. She had had those sandwiches and she could do with shedding a few pounds. But her mouth watered at the sight of fluffy white rice, beef in wine, vegetables...

‘Dig in,’ Matias encouraged drily. ‘But save room for the chocolate fondant.’

‘My favourite.’

‘I know. I recall going to that restaurant by the sea years ago, with my parents and your family, and you made them bring you three. Eat—and tell me exactly what you’re doing here. I’m bored with going round the houses.’

‘It’s about your mother, but not about her health as such. Like I said, she’s doing as well as can be expected, and I know you’ve paid for the best consultants, the best hospital, the best of everything... But health isn’t just a physical thing. It’s also a frame of mind, and your mum’s been depressed for quite a while.’

‘Depressed?’ Matias frowned. ‘Why would she be depressed when she’s on the mend? She didn’t sound depressed when I spoke to her last.’

‘She wouldn’t have wanted to worry you, Matias,’ Georgina said impatiently. ‘She’s been making noises about her mortality. She’s waiting for some test results—perhaps that’s been preying on her mind—but she could be in a mental slump.’

‘Test results? What test results? At any rate, they can’t be important or the consultant would have mentioned them to me. And thoughts of her mortality? She’s not even in her mid-sixties!’

He relaxed. If this was a simple case of hypochondria then an informal chat with her consultant would soon make her see sense. She was on the road to recovery. Mortality thoughts were only appropriate for people in their eighties and nineties, anyway.

He had a couple of big deals on the go, but as soon as he was through with those he would go down to Cornwall. He might even consider staying longer than a weekend. It could work... He had had the fastest possible broadband installed in his mother’s house years previously, because he couldn’t function without the Internet. In short, he could spare a little time down there without it affecting his work schedule.

‘She’s got another thirty years in her,’ he said, noting that for someone who had refused the offer of a meal out Georgie had certainly done justice to the food on her plate. No one could ever accuse Georgina White of having a feeble appetite. It was a refreshing change, in actual fact.

‘She doesn’t see it that way.’

‘She doesn’t have a medical background. The consultant has no worries about her health or I would know about it. That’s what he’s paid to do—keep me in the loop. It’s just a question of convincing her of that. If she’s concerned that there’s a risk of this thing happening again, then I can get Chivers to show her the charts and scans.’

‘It’s not just a question of that, Matias. She feels...’ Georgina sighed and gazed at him, then wished she hadn’t because she couldn’t seem to tear her eyes away. He was so ridiculously good-looking. ‘She feels that she’s been a failure as a mother. She feels that there’s a chasm between you two and it’s one that will never be breached. All she wants, she tells me, is for you to settle down...have a wife and kids. She tells me that she’s always wanted to be a grandmother and that she feels there’s nothing to look forward to. When I say that she’s depressed, it isn’t because she thinks she might be pushing up the daisies in six months’ time. It’s because she’s been looking back on her past and questioning where she is right now—in the present. I’ve had a word with Mr Chivers... I hope you don’t mind.’

‘It wouldn’t make any difference if I said I did, would it? Considering you’ve already contacted him.’

Matias scowled. The guilt was back and with a vengeance. It seemed it had been buried in a very shallow grave. His mother had never been impressed with his lifestyle or his money. Nor had his father, when he had been alive. Neither had ever said anything, but their silence on the subject had spoken volumes.

‘What did he say?’

‘He says that under normal circumstances he wouldn’t be worried. Rose is young. But because of her anxieties, and the subsequent stress, there’s a chance that her health might be jeopardised. She’s lost interest in all the things that used to occupy her. She doesn’t seem to care about the farm any more. She’s not going to the gardening club. Like I said, she’s talking about having nothing to live for.’

‘You could have just called to fill me in on all this. Leave it with me. I’ll have a word with Chivers. I’m paying the man a small fortune. He should be able to do something. There might be a course of medication my mother could go on...there are tablets for that sort of thing.’

‘Forget it. It won’t work,’ Georgina told him bluntly.

Matias frowned, his brooding dark eyes betraying the puzzlement of someone trying to join dots that weren’t quite forming a pattern.

‘Then what will?’ he asked, with an elaborate show of patience that got on her nerves.

‘You’ll probably need something stiffer than a glass of expensive white wine before I tell you my solution.’

‘Spit it out. I can’t bear the suspense.’

‘I may have told her a couple of tiny white lies...’ Georgina stuck out her chin at a pugnacious angle—an angle that said that she was a woman about to dig her heels in and was ready for a fight if he wanted to have one.

Now that they were getting to the heart of the matter, her nerves were kicking in big time.

‘You may have told her a couple of tiny white lies...? Now, why does that admission send a shiver of apprehension racing down my spine?’

‘I love your mother. I’ve always been close to her, as you well know, and more especially now, since my parents decamped to Melbourne for my dad’s three-year secondment to the university there. I’ve been with her throughout this awful business, and you can trust me when I tell you that her spirits are sinking lower and lower by the day. Who knows what could happen?’

‘Yes, I’m getting the picture. You’ve known my mother since the dawn of time and you’re worried about her, despite hard evidence from the experts that everything’s ticking along nicely. So, Georgie, just say what you have to say—because my apprehension is still there. Why don’t we dump this meandering, getting-nowhere-fast route and stick to the main road? In fact, why don’t we just return to those little white lies of yours?’