Jack Riordan's Baby

by Anne Mather

  It had all seemed so simple—and so sordid. She hadn’t been able to believe that a man like Jack could exist without some woman in his bed. The fact that it had taken her almost eighteen months before she found out about his involvement with Karen Johnson didn’t reassure her. Karen wasn’t the first, she was sure. But she was the only one who’d got pregnant with his child.

  At lunchtime, Rachel abandoned any attempt to continue with her painting of Benjie Beaver and went back to the house. She had still to explain to Mrs Grady why her bedroom had been littered with burnt-out candles that morning, and why Jack’s bed hadn’t been slept in.

  However, Mrs Grady was out. She usually went shopping on Thursday mornings, Rachel remembered, finding even normal events as difficult to concentrate on as anything else. Karen Johnson’s visit the day before—and her own shameless behaviour—had left her in a state of confusion. She knew that she’d seduced her husband. She just didn’t know why.

  Oh, there was the obvious reason: she wanted to get pregnant. But where was the sense in that? Why should she believe that this pregnancy—if indeed there was to be one—would be different from any of the others? Wasn’t she just building up a whole lot of heartache for herself?

  She shook her head. She only knew she’d had to do something to stop that woman from stealing her husband. Despite everything, she still loved him—although she had no intention of telling him that. But if she was expecting his child it would prove to Karen that they were sleeping together. And it gave her an added advantage. After all, she was still his wife.

  To her surprise, Mrs Grady had left a cold lunch for two in the morning room. Chilled asparagus soup, a Caesar salad—Rachel’s favourite—and strawberry shortcake for dessert. Rachel wondered if the housekeeper expected her to ask Lucy to join her. Her best friend, Lucy Robards, only lived half a mile away.

  Rachel hadn’t mentioned having a guest, so that seemed unlikely. But Jack never came home for lunch these days. It was a stretch if she had his company for dinner. Which was just as well, because they rarely had anything to say to one another.

  An uncorked bottle of wine was standing in a cooler, and Rachel picked it out and poured some into a long-stemmed crystal glass. It was Chablis, she noticed as she tasted it. A wine that Jack had chosen. Was that relevant? Had he told Mrs Grady he’d be back for lunch?

  It seemed unlikely. After the way he’d left the house earlier she was fairly sure she wouldn’t see him again that day. But that wasn’t entirely Jack’s fault. She was going to bed earlier and earlier these days, escaping into oblivion to avoid the inevitable questions Jack’s absence always created.

  The roar of a car’s engine in the drive caused a sudden quiver in her stomach. It could be Mrs Grady, of course, but she didn’t think it was. Mrs Grady drove a Ford, not an Aston Martin. And this definitely sounded like a powerful car.

  Rachel’s nerves tightened instinctively, and she took a gulp of wine to calm her racing pulse. There was no reason to get all chewed up, she told herself. Jack had probably forgotten something. He’d probably come in and go out again without her even seeing him.

  A car door slammed, and in spite of her assurances Rachel’s mouth felt dry. She took another sip of wine, just to irrigate her throat, and then almost choked when Jack appeared in the open doorway.

  She should have shut the door, she chided herself, still convinced he wasn’t staying. But Jack had other ideas.

  ‘Hi,’ he said civilly, much to her surprise after the way he’d left the house. ‘Good. I’m just in time.’

  Rachel swallowed. ‘This—’ She gestured towards the round table, with its green and yellow place mats, its Villeroy and Boch china, its silver cutlery. ‘This is for you?’

  ‘For both of us,’ amended Jack, taking off his charcoal suit jacket and dropping it over the back of one of the ladder-backed dining chairs. He loosened the top button of his shirt and pulled the knot of his silver-grey tie away from his collar. Then he approached the wine cooler where Rachel was standing, her wine glass forgotten in her hand. ‘Is that Chablis?’

  ‘Don’t you know?’ She couldn’t keep the resentment out of her voice. ‘I imagine you must have arranged this with Mrs Grady before you left.’

  ‘I phoned,’ he corrected her again, a flicker of his eyes registering the way she moved around the table to put some space between them. He helped himself to a little of the wine. But only a little, she noticed. Whatever else he’d come home for, it wasn’t to drown his sorrows. He took a mouthful. ‘Mmm, that’s pretty good.’

  Rachel shook her head, putting her glass down on the table with a slightly unsteady hand. She mustn’t let him do this to her, she told herself. She wasn’t going to let him behave as if nothing had happened. They both knew it had. Karen Johnson was part of their lives, for better or for worse.

  All the same, as Jack stood there regarding her from beneath lashes any woman would have died for, Rachel was unwillingly reminded of the concern she’d had about him earlier. There was something different about him today. She didn’t know what it was, but it troubled her.

  ‘Shall we sit down?’

  Jack spoke, and in spite of her thoughts Rachel gave a careless shrug. ‘If you like.’

  Jack waited until she’d taken the chair opposite before joining her. He wondered if she thought he hadn’t noticed her edging her place setting around the table so that there was no way their elbows would touch, but he didn’t comment on it. It was enough that she wasn’t sniping at him—yet, anyway. No doubt that would come when he told her about Karen’s call.

  Rachel reached for the wine and refilled her glass. She felt as if she needed some false courage, and one glass just wasn’t doing it. Despite her determination not to do so, she couldn’t help wondering why there were those lines of strain beside his mouth. However strenuous last night had been—and she coloured at the memory—he had been as eager to satisfy his needs as she had been.

  Realising he was waiting for her to have some soup before helping himself, Rachel lifted the lid of the tureen and ladled a spoonful into her bowl. Then she pushed the handle of the ladle in Jack’s direction.

  Judging by the little he took for himself, his appetite was as non-existent as her own, and once again she fretted over the reasons why. Last night he’d seemed exactly the same as usual; but then, last night she’d been intent on achieving her own ends, not his, she assured herself grimly.

  Of course, his haggard appearance might have something to do with his guilty conscience, she thought, dipping her spoon into the soup with more force than enthusiasm. He was thirty-seven, for God’s sake. What else could it be?

  ‘Did you sleep well?’

  His words took her completely by surprise—as they’d been meant to do, she guessed, annoyed that she’d been caught out. ‘Not very,’ she said, not altogether truthfully. After she’d left him sleeping soundly in her bed, she’d crashed in one of the other guest rooms. She must have been exhausted, because she hadn’t been aware of anything until the morning sun had poured in through the uncurtained windows and she’d realised what she’d done. After that, sleep had definitely been out of the question.

  Jack arched a disbelieving brow. ‘Shame,’ he said, putting his spoon aside. ‘I slept like the dead.’

  It was an unfortunate choice of words, particularly in the circumstances, and Jack hoped they weren’t prophetic. But Rachel was immune to their relevance.

  ‘Now, why am I not surprised?’ she asked scornfully. ‘It comes of not having a conscience, I suppose.’

  ‘I have a conscience.’ Jack was stung into a retort. ‘Do you?’

  ‘Me?’ Rachel was taken aback. ‘Why should I have a conscience?’

  ‘Well, let me see…’ Jack lay back in his chair and toyed with his wine glass, but his eyes never left her flushed face. ‘You don’t think last night’s play was just the tiniest bit unethical?’

  Rachel moistened her dry lips. ‘You’re my husband. What was unethical a
bout it?’

  Jack let out a short laugh. ‘Oh, baby, you don’t really expect me to answer that?’

  ‘Don’t call me baby.’

  ‘Why not?’ Jack gave her an innocent look. ‘Like you just said, I am your husband.’

  Rachel pushed back her chair and got up from the table. ‘If you’ll excuse me—’

  Jack got up, too, and blocked her exit. ‘I won’t,’ he said, aware that he was probably blowing any chance of appealing to her better nature by acting this way, but he couldn’t let her go like this. ‘We’re not finished yet.’

  ‘I don’t want anything more to eat.’

  ‘I wasn’t talking about the food.’

  Rachel looked up at him with angry eyes. He guessed it was annoying her that in spite of her height he still had several inches on her. ‘You can’t keep me here.’

  ‘Oh, I think I can.’ Jack sidestepped—first one way, then the other, successfully preventing her from getting past him. ‘Now, why don’t you go and sit down again, and we’ll talk?’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  ‘I DON’T WANT to talk to you.’ Rachel was scowling now, and he could feel her frustration. The perfumed heat of her body was rising off her in waves, and after last night it was all he could do to keep a sense of perspective. ‘And I don’t want to sit down,’ she added tersely. ‘I want to go to my room.’

  ‘Works for me.’ Jack was willing. ‘I’ll come with you.’

  ‘You won’t!’

  ‘No?’ Jack adopted a puzzled look. ‘It was okay for me to go there last night.’

  ‘Last night was a mistake.’

  ‘Right.’ Jack pretended to consider it. ‘So the whole scene: the absence of any electric lights, the incense-scented candles, you virtually naked, I’m to believe it was all a mistake?’

  Rachel’s chin dipped. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why don’t I believe you?’

  She sniffed. ‘Because you’re too arrogant to think anything else?’ she suggested, and he sighed.

  ‘What are you saying? That it was for someone else?’

  That thought had just occurred to him, and he didn’t like it. But to his relief Rachel was too desperate to defend herself to lie.

  ‘No,’ she said fiercely. ‘I don’t sleep around.’

  ‘Meaning I do?’

  ‘If it fits.’

  ‘It doesn’t,’ he snapped, momentarily angered by the unjust accusation. Then, calming himself, he went on, ‘So it was all for my benefit?’

  Rachel shifted uneasily. ‘If you want to think that,’ she muttered.

  ‘What else am I supposed to think?’ Jack lifted his hand, and in spite of her instinctive withdrawal he caught a strand of her silky hair and tucked it gently behind her ear. ‘I didn’t realise you were so needy.’

  Rachel caught her breath. ‘I’m not needy!’

  Jack’s fingers trailed from her ear down the smooth column of her throat to the low vee of her vest. ‘You can’t deny you wanted me last night.’

  Rachel lifted her head. ‘I—wanted a man, yes.’

  Jack shook his head. He badly wanted to untie the shirt that hugged her midriff and slip his hands into the low waist of her trousers. But in spite of what she’d said he didn’t think she’d let him do that, and he didn’t want to destroy this tenuous relationship by rushing things. Instead, he contented himself with watching the way her nipples hardened against the fabric of her vest, remembering how delicious they’d felt rolling against his tongue.

  ‘Look,’ he said, after a moment, ‘we have to talk about this. You can’t expect me to ignore what happened and go on as before.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Why not?’ He stared at her frustratedly, his eyes darkening to the deepest shade of jade. ‘Because it was good between us,’ he said thickly. ‘And I want to do it again.’

  ‘No.’

  Jack lifted his hand then, but although Rachel took an involuntary step back all he did was rake back his hair with an angry hand. ‘So what now?’ he demanded. ‘Do I wait until the next time you feel like screwing me? Or do I get a say in the matter?’

  Rachel’s face burned. ‘Don’t use that word.’

  ‘What word? Screwing? Well, that’s what it was, wasn’t it? I made love to you, but you screwed me!’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Yes.’ Jack closed his eyes for a moment, striving for control. ‘I should have known better than to think it was anything else.’

  Rachel quivered. ‘Well, what did you expect?’

  Jack scowled. ‘And that means what, exactly?’

  Rachel took a deep breath. ‘Haven’t you forgotten Miss Johnson? What is she now, by the way? Your secretary? Your personal assistant? Oh, yes. Personal assistant just about covers it. She—’

  ‘Karen doesn’t work for the company any more,’ he interrupted her.

  Rachel stared at him disbelievingly. ‘Since when?’

  ‘Since George Thomas fired her.’ Jack hadn’t wanted to get into this right now, but he knew it was inevitable in the circumstances. ‘What can I say? She was no good at her job. We had to let her go.’

  ‘So how did she—’

  Rachel had started to ask how Karen had known where Jack was and what he was doing, but then stopped herself. How silly was that? Just because the woman didn’t work for Fox Construction any longer it didn’t mean that Jack had stopped seeing her. He must think she was stupid if he thought that by telling her Karen had been dismissed she’d believe he’d ended their affair.

  ‘How did she what?’

  Jack had picked up on her unfinished question, and Rachel spent several unfruitful seconds trying to think of something else to ask.

  ‘Um—how did she manage without a reference?’ she asked at last. Then, seizing on his look of incredulity, ‘Oh, right. You wrote one for her. What did you say, Jack? Performs poorly in the office but makes up for it in bed?’

  ‘My God!’ Jack groaned. ‘You can’t let it alone, can you? You don’t want me, but you still think you have the right to control my life.’

  Rachel flushed. ‘No.’

  ‘Yes.’ Jack gave a harsh laugh. ‘Tell me how that makes sense.’

  ‘You don’t understand—’

  ‘Damn right.’ Jack glared at her. ‘Two years ago you let me know in no uncertain terms that you didn’t want me anywhere near you. For weeks, months after that last miscarriage, you hardly even spoke to me.’

  ‘I was traumatised!’

  ‘So was I,’ retorted Jack sharply. ‘But I knew there was nothing I could about it.’

  ‘You knew it wasn’t your fault,’ muttered Rachel, almost under her breath, but Jack heard.

  ‘It was nobody’s fault,’ he snarled. ‘For God’s sake, I never blamed you, did I?’

  ‘No…’

  ‘So why the hell did you blame me? Because that’s what it felt like. I was being punished because I couldn’t keep my hands off you.’

  ‘It wasn’t like that.’

  ‘So what was it like, Rachel?’ He could feel himself getting stressed and, swinging out a chair from the table, he straddled it and sat down before he fell down. ‘Tell me. Tell me why you’ve decided to stay married to me when you’re obviously unhappy with the situation? For months we’ve been like strangers to one another—only speaking when we have to, only being seen out together when it’s necessary to present a united front. If you want out, you should say so. Why the hell didn’t you ask me for a divorce?’

  ‘Why didn’t you?’

  ‘Me?’ Jack blew out a heavy breath. ‘I didn’t want a divorce.’

  ‘Why? Because you knew if you left me Daddy wouldn’t make you his successor?’

  ‘No!’ Jack was stunned. It was one thing to be accused of having an affair; it was something else entirely to be suspected of being corrupt. ‘For pity’s sake, Rachel, where the hell did that come from? If you think I only married you to get my hands on your father’s company—’

  ‘I don�
�t,’ muttered Rachel in a small voice. And she didn’t. Despite what she’d said, that particular aspect of Karen’s argument still sounded alien even after what she’d learned. ‘It was just something someone said.’

  ‘What someone?’

  Rachel hesitated, twisting the knot tying her shirt around her fingers. Then, with a rush of bravado, ‘Karen Johnson.’

  ‘What?’

  Jack was amazed. He couldn’t believe it. But, with the blood draining out of his brain, the dizziness he’d been having off and on for the past few weeks convinced him it was true. Somehow Rachel had been in touch with the other woman. But how, in God’s name, had it happened?

  ‘She—she came to see me, ‘ Rachel went on doggedly, inadvertently answering the question he felt too numb to ask. She looked at him a little curiously. ‘I gather you didn’t know anything about it?’

  ‘No.’

  The word was clipped, and Jack shoved back his chair and got to his feet. Pacing somewhat unsteadily across the room, he managed to retain his balance. But he couldn’t just sit there, blinking at her, knowing that sooner or later she was going to realise he was struggling for control.

  Beyond the long windows, the Atlantic looked bluer than he’d ever seen it. White-capped waves curled in towards the beach, breaking on the rocks with a great swirl of spray. The ocean was so constant, he thought. Unlike people, it never changed. But the ocean was free, impartial. It didn’t have a psycho like Karen making trouble in its life.

  He glanced over his shoulder. Rachel still stood where he’d left her, her eyes flickering away when he found her watching him. What was she thinking? he wondered. That he was upset because he’d been found out?

  ‘Are you saying she came here?’ he asked, when he was capable of formulating a sentence, and Rachel gave a jerky nod.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘When?’

  Rachel looked discomforted now, and the reason for it occurred to him only seconds before she gave her answer.

  ‘Yesterday,’ she mumbled, turning back to the table and making an effort to gather their dirty dishes together. She cleared her throat. ‘Are you going to have some salad?’