Tug Of Love

She stared at the skyline. Three months ago, while Charlie was away on a school trip—finding time to be alone together with a sharp-eyed thirteen-year-old about was, she had discovered, virtually impossible—she and Tom had made love.

For her it had been the first time since James. Perhaps it was because she was older, wiser, less inclined to see things through rose-coloured glasses that the experience had somehow not really lived up to her expectations.

Tom had been considerate and caring enough. He had taken time and care, and he was certainly far from inexperienced. She had not expected, as she had with James, that there would be immediate fireworks, but she had certainly expected to feel rather more than she had—a lot more, given her knowledge of how easily James had aroused her.

Neither of them had said anything about it, of course, but she had sensed that Tom was disappointed, and if she was honest with herself it was almost a relief that Charlie’s antipathy towards him and constant presence meant that they had not had any opportunity to repeat the exercise.

But then, as she had remarked quite recently to Heather, there were far more important things in a relationship than sex—or at least there were in the kind of relationship she wanted—and Tom, fortunately, had not pushed her.

Perhaps things would get better with practice and custom. But then when did they get the opportunity? Win was well past the age when she welcomed the idea of making love impetuously in a car on the way home from a date.

She winced a little, suddenly remembering doing exactly that with James. They had been out to dinner, and on the way back she had touched his thigh, tensing as his muscles clenched, staring at him wide-eyed, her heart pounding when he abruptly stopped the car and turned towards her.

Perhaps she was just past the age of being capable of that kind of sexual intensity, she reflected as she restarted her car. And if she did agree to marry Tom, would that have the effect of driving Charlie closer to his father? If only Tom could learn to be a little less hard on Charlie, a little more understanding, and if only Charlie wouldn’t always be so belligerent, and if only he would not constantly bring James’s name into the conversation whenever Tom was there.

She winced as she remembered Tom’s angry comment that he was thankful James was living in Australia. ‘If he’s as wonderful as Charlie seems to think, I’m surprised you’re still not married to him,’ he had told her sourly.

‘He is Charlie’s father,’ Win had felt obliged to point out in defence of her son.

And when she had tried to suggest to Charlie that it might not be a good idea to mention James quite so often when Tom was there, Charlie had demanded, ‘Why shouldn’t I? He is my dad.’

The problem was that Charlie was starting to grow up and that he seemed to be getting as over-protective of her as her brothers had once been.

Well, she had learned her lesson, and no matter how much she loved her son he must accept that she had a right to her own private life and to her own friends, even if he himself could not always like them. That was a lesson he must learn for his own sake, and for the sake of the woman who would eventually share his life, as well as for hers.

However, it was one thing to get him to accept her right to have Tom as a friend. To get him to accept him as her husband and his own stepfather was quite a different matter.

As she drove through the town, she heard the church clock striking, and grimaced. She hadn’t realised how late it was. Charlie had been spending the afternoon with a friend. They had been planning to watch a football match on television together. The friend’s father was apparently bringing them home.

When she had queried this, he had been quite cross with her, reminding her of how old he now was.

The cottage James had bought when they were first married was still her home. Together with half a dozen others, it looked out on to open fields at the back and had a good-sized garden. Last year she and Charlie had painted the outside, a task neither of them had really enjoyed but which Win had felt had done them both good.

Tom had been horrified. He would have got one of his own handymen to do that for her, he had told her, but she had shaken her head. One thing she had learned was how important it was to her to be independent—a change from the days when she had helplessly leaned on others and docilely allowed them to make her decisions for her.

There was a car parked outside the cottage, an expensive Daimler saloon with new numberplates. Guiltily she parked behind it.

Charlie had his own key for the cottage. Obviously his friend’s father had brought him home and Charlie must have invited him inside. She would have to apologise for being late. She only hoped the father would not judge her as a bad mother for allowing her son to return to an empty house.

It had been difficult for her to assuage the guilt she had felt at first, going to work, but Heather had chided her for it.

‘Charlie can always come to us for a couple of hours if necessary,’ she had told her. ‘You know that. You need this job, Win—not just for the money. You need it for yourself. You’ve devoted yourself exclusively to Charlie when he’s needed you most. Just remember, another handful of years and he’ll be gone.’

Even though she had acknowledged the truth of Heather’s comments and even though she felt that both Charlie and herself had benefited from the independence her job gave them both, Win still had these sharp attacks of guilt.

She could hear the television as she walked into the hall. The sitting-room door was open, and through it she could hear Charlie yelling excitedly.

‘That’s it! Did you see it, Dad? Did you see the way he kicked that goal?

Dad!

Win froze, her nerve-endings screaming a rejection of all that that one simple word conveyed.

‘He certainly has some real power there.’

She hadn’t heard him speak in over ten years, but she would have recognised his voice in a hundred…in a thousand. Deep, reflective, the words measured and firm, no trace of any Australian accent, the same voice which had once slurred like honey with desire when he had told her how much he wanted her, how much he loved her. The same voice which had been raw with need when he’d leaned over her in the dark, entering her body.

The same voice which had been hard and cold when he’d condemned her for conceiving their child.

Forcing down the feeling of icy shock threatening her, Win took a deep breath and then, straightening her shoulders, she pushed open the sitting-room door and walked in.

CHAPTER THREE

WIN had learned her lessons and knew now how vitally important it was to seize control and hold on to it.

Without looking at Charlie, she demanded icily, ‘What are you doing here, James?’

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the way Charlie had flushed, how anxious and distressed he looked, but she forced herself to ignore him, instead focusing all her attention on the man who was uncurling himself from the settee and standing up in front of her.

She would have preferred him to remain seated, she acknowledged, just about managing not to give in to the instinctive desire to step back a little from him. That betraying piece of body language would mean her giving far more away to him than a couple of feet of floor space. So instead she stood her ground, angling her head so that she could look directly at him, her eyes flashing, her mouth indenting with the hostility she made no attempt to conceal.

She could see the way James looked briefly at Charlie, and her hostility increased. How dared he try to use their son as a pawn between them? How dared he be here in her home in the first place? Why had he come here? He could not have known she wouldn’t be here. Unless…

Win stiffened immediately and only just resisted the desire to turn round and look fully at Charlie. What she had interpreted as confusion could just as easily have been guilt.

Had Charlie lied to her about his arrangements for the afternoon? Had he known—arranged with James that he would come round? she wondered in disbelief.

Before James could say anything, Charlie had come to stand beside her.

‘I said he could come here,’ he told her. ‘After all, it’s my home too, and he is my father.’ His chin jutted out as he spoke, and helplessly Win recognised that, for all his bravado, he was very close to tears. She forced back her own shock, habit enabling her to control and dismiss her own emotions.

Later, she would have to point out to him that, his home or not, it was still wrong for him to have done what he had, but she couldn’t humiliate him by doing so in front of James, so she simply said quietly, ‘Yes, it is your home as well, Charlie.’

As she looked away from him, she realised that James was studying her with a frown. Probably wondering what on earth he had ever seen in her, she reflected acidly. She certainly wasn’t in the same class as the Taras of this world. She wondered what had happened to the other woman. James had never remarried, and if there was a woman in his life he hadn’t introduced her to Charlie while their son had been staying with him.

‘I’m sorry,’ James apologised briefly. ‘I had no idea you weren’t aware that I was coming.’

‘I knew you were returning to the area,’ she countered coolly, ‘but no, I did not expect to come home and find you sitting in my living-room.’

She stressed the ‘my’, and was pleased to see the faint darkening of colour touching his cheekbones. So he wasn’t totally impervious to his own guilt in taking advantage of an offer he must have known she would never have countenanced. Good.

‘Well, we won’t delay you,’ she continued smoothly. ‘I’m sure you’ve got things to do.’

She tensed as she saw the look that passed between father and son, and felt the tiny hairs standing up on the back of her neck.

‘Dad’s moving in here with us,’ Charlie informed her, then added rebelliously, ‘I told him it was all right.’

For a moment Win thought she might actually faint. This time Charlie had quite definitely gone too far.