His Wedding-Night Heir

I need to look cool, calm and collected, she told herself, as she ran the cold tap over the pounding pulses in her wrists and applied a damp tissue to her temples. I have to keep the emotional temperature low, no matter how difficult it may get later, because I can’t afford any sign of weakness.

And if they could only agree to conduct the eventual divorce in a rational, equable spirit, that would be a bonus.

She supposed divorce was the solution. She couldn’t imagine Nick accepting the annulment that represented the true state of affairs between them. Not good for his all-powerful male image, she thought wryly.

Although it would be her lack of sex appeal that would probably be blamed. What else could it be? Because, where women were concerned, Nick Tempest didn’t have to prove a thing.

Whereas she—she had little to offer. She was still too thin, she admitted, and under normal circumstances too pale. Her features were generally nondescript, with that thick, glossy fall of hair her only real claim to beauty. Although even that was brown. The whole picture was dull and duller, underlined by a blouse, skirt and jacket that didn’t hold a scrap of allure between them.

No change there, she thought, her mouth twisting.

The witnesses at their wedding must have imagined they were watching a peacock mate with an ugly duckling.

But then Nick hadn’t married her for her attractions, or her charm. He’d had his own reasons…as she’d finally discovered, she thought, tension lancing her as those hidden memories stirred again.

Not that it mattered, she told herself vehemently. It was all past and done with, and soon that would be a matter of law.

I want nothing from him, she thought, but my freedom. And surely that isn’t too much to ask? He should be glad to be rid of me at so little cost.

In these past strange months in limbo, she’d learned that she could earn sufficient to keep herself without luxuries. Once she was no longer running away, she could actually seek some training, prepare herself for a career. Life would open up in front of her.

And, however long it took, and however painful the process, she would learn to forget that for a few hours she’d been Nick Tempest’s convenient bride.

‘So you’re still here.’ Tracy came into the cloakroom. ‘Kit sent me to find you. I think he was getting worried in case you’d disappeared.’

‘No.’ Cally had managed to tone down the worst of her flush with powder. She produced her comb and started to smooth her hair. ‘I’m still around.’

‘Put some lippy on,’ Tracy suggested.

‘I haven’t brought any.’ It was a fib, but she hadn’t used it earlier, and there was no way she wanted to look as if she’d made any kind of effort. It was the kind of feminine detail that Nick would notice, she thought, with a pang.

‘Kit thinks we should go and have a quiet drink at the White Hart.’ Tracy went on. ‘Plan our tactics, he says.’ She gave Cally a straight look. ‘You don’t think there’s much point, do you?’

Cally put her comb in her bag. She said quietly, ‘I honestly don’t know. He could simply have refused to talk to us.’

‘Well, he’s your husband, so you should know,’ said Tracy. She added, ‘And it’s not really “us”, at all. It’s you—isn’t it?’ And her eyes met Cally’s with a question she was unable to answer.

By the time they reached the restaurant Cally was on tenterhooks, totally gripped by tension. The preliminary discussion in the pub hadn’t got very far, because Kit was clearly still upset about her concealed marriage and was prepared to be resentful, which she regretted.

She realised, to her shame, that she was hoping against hope that Nick would yield to the Hartleys’ blandishments and not turn up.

You’re supposed to be fighting for Gunners Terrace, she reproached herself silently. Balance that against an awkward hour or so in your ex-husband’s company, and get a grip.

But Nick was there before them, occupying a corner table—the best in the house, naturally—and accompanied by a fair, stocky man whom he introduced as Matthew Hendrick, the project architect.

Cally was so determined not to sit next to Nick that she found herself placed opposite him instead, which was hardly an improvement, she thought, biting her lip with vexation.

While the menus were handed round, the bread brought and the wine poured, she could feel Nick’s eyes on her in a cool assessment which she could not avoid and he did not even try to conceal.

She could only hope he was thanking his stars for a lucky escape, but her intuition warned her that she might be wrong.

She ate sparingly of the antipasti that formed the first course, and only picked at the chicken in its rich wine sauce that followed. She tried to fix her mind on the earnest discussion going on, primarily between Kit and Matthew Hendrick, while Nick watched and listened. This was all that should matter to her, she reminded herself. The plight of the residents. The need to save the project and continue it. She should be joining in here, making her own reasoned contribution, as Tracy was doing.

But she was too aware of the dark man opposite, with the cool, contained face. Too conscious of the apprehensive thoughts circling in her mind, giving her no peace.

She refused dessert and coffee, praying inwardly that the party would start to break up and she’d finally be let off the hook.

But it was a vain hope.

‘Goodnight, Miss Andrews—Mr Matlock.’ Nick had risen to his feet and was shaking hands. ‘Matthew, I’ll meet you on site tomorrow at nine a.m. My wife and I are going to stay for a while, and enjoy our reunion.’ His smile didn’t reach his eyes. ‘We have a lot of catching up to do—don’t we, my sweet?’

Cally’s lips parted to utter a startled protest, but she bit back the words and sank back in her chair. That same intuition told her that any resistance on her part would only make her look foolish in the end. Far better not to fuss, she thought, but to let him think she regarded spending time alone in his company with complete indifference.

But how that was to be achieved she hadn’t the faintest idea.

The others left, and she saw Kit looking frowningly back at her. She was almost tempted to call out to him, ask him to stay, but she knew that wouldn’t be fair. She’d enjoyed working with Kit, but she would never have wanted more even if she’d been free, and she would have told him goodbye without regrets.

Besides, if Eastern Crest were interested enough in what he had to say to hold a site meeting, she couldn’t jeopardise that by allowing him to annoy the chairman.

And Nick had made his wishes coolly and brutally clear.

They were going to talk.

As he resumed his seat, she said in a small, brittle voice, ‘I feel as if someone should read me my rights.’

‘I already know mine,’ he said shortly. ‘I’ve had plenty of time to consider them.’ He signalled to the waiter to bring more coffee.

‘I don’t want anything else,’ she told him quickly.

‘Then you can sit and chat to me while I have some. Doesn’t that paint a nice domestic picture?’

‘Nick,’ she said, deciding to jump straight in, ‘do we really have to do this? Can’t we just accept that our marriage was a seriously bad idea and call it quits? I—I’d honestly like to go home.’

‘An excellent idea,’ he said affably. ‘Why don’t we do just that? Unfortunately, at the moment home for me happens to be the Majestic Hotel—a flagrant misnomer, if ever there was one.’ He gave her a small, cold smile. ‘I wonder if I could get them under the Trades Description Act? However,’ he went on, ‘with uncanny prescience, they’ve given me the bridal suite, so perhaps I should forgive their delusions of grandeur.’ He drank down his espresso. ‘Shall we go?’

She could suddenly feel the hectic drumming of her pulses. Hear the silent scream of No in her dry throat. She thought, He doesn’t mean that. He can’t…

Aloud, she said shakily, ‘I’m going nowhere with you. You seem to have overlooked the fact that I’ve left you.’

‘Oh, no, darling,’ he said with corrosive lightness. ‘I remember that incredibly well. Our wedding day, right? In fact, the ink was barely dry on the register when you scarpered.’

She said stiffly, ‘I suppose you deserve some kind of explanation.’

‘Yes,’ he said, and his voice seemed to remove a layer of her skin. ‘I bloody well do. And maybe an apology for making a fool of me quite so publicly. That would be a beginning.’

She bit her lip. ‘Yes, of course. I—I’m sorry about that.’

‘But nothing else?’ Nick divined grimly.