Trophy Husband

by Lynne Graham

  'I think I'd like to meet that old doll before I commit myself,' Sara admitted as she slowly got to her feet. Although she was still pale, her mouth was firmly set.

  'What do you want to meet her for?' Marco regarded her in open dismay.

  'Are you scared of what I might find? So am I... but it would be much more scary to sit at home wondering,' she confided.

  It was already the middle of the afternoon. It was over two hundred miles to the small village where Elissa lived but Sara climbed into the Jag with unassailable determination. Alex might well have gone by the time she arrived... well, so be it. It was Elissa whom Sara needed to meet. She did not want to see Alex with the wretched woman. Such an encounter required a certain discretion, didn't it?

  The further north Sara got, the more tense she became. Suddenly she doubted her own sanity, the need to know which had blanked out every other prompting. Alex had kept his continuing acquaintance with Elissa a secret even from his family... for how many years? And how did she know that he only saw Elissa twice a year? Pete would only be aware of those visits when Alex went directly from the office. And Elissa was discreet, wasn't she? Pete had only once spoken to her on the phone. The perfect mistress...?

  She stopped for a meal at a motorway service station. She was exhausted and she forced herself to eat and drink simply to keep going. It was much later than she had hoped when she finally came upon the old stone farmhouse which lay about a mile outside the village on a steep, narrow road. There wasn't a single glimmer of life or light about Elissa's home. Sara stopped the car and rested her aching head back. So what now?

  Was he in there with her? The idea totally wiped Sara out. Two long-time lovers entangled in the comfort of an adulterous bed... In silent agony she shut her eyes. Elissa had betrayed her first husband—why should she think twice about betraying a woman she had never even met? Why hadn't Alex married her? Why had she left him in the first place? Why hadn't he told Sara the truth?

  But no, he hadn't lied except by omission. So what was the secret of Elissa's enduring appeal? If he still loved her, wouldn't he have married her?

  And then finally Sara grasped wearily at an explanation for behaviour which struck her as incomprehensible. Only last night Alex had told her that he could understand a sexual obsession. Was that Elissa's continuing attraction after all these years? Was it possible that Alex had married her to try and break free of that affair? And was it possible that she had driven him straight back into Elissa's waiting arms again?

  Sara hit her lowest ebb then. Alex had been happy with her. She wouldn't have had the courage to put her pride on the line today had she not been clinging to that awareness. Only Alex had not responded... Alex had been implacably cold and unimpressed.

  Why had she come up here? What had she hoped to achieve by confronting a woman who probably knew Alex so much better than she did? Forcing herself on Elissa would be demeaning and pointless. It sunk in on Sara then that Alex really was gone, that it would be pathetic to pursue him one more step, that he had left her with nothing to do but retire in defeat. Her whole world fell in pieces around her the minute she reached that conclusion. She covered her convulsing face with her hands, a choked sob of despair ripped from her working throat.

  Suddenly someone tapped on the windscreen and she was in such a state that she didn't even jump. She looked up and saw a woman in an incongruous pink dressing gown hovering. Gulping, she buzzed down the window a few inches.

  'Sara?' the woman said uncertainly. 'You are Sara, aren't you? I looked out when I heard a car stop. Alex described this car to me. Would you like to come in?'

  'In?' Sara echoed, blinking at the lights now illuminating the previously dark house.

  'I'm going to look really daft if a car comes along,' the woman pointed out gently. 'And it's beginning to rain..'

  'You're.. .Elissa?' The soft Scottish accent was equally disconcerting. Sara had simply assumed that Elissa was Italian.

  'Everyone but Alex calls me Liz now.'

  Sara snatched in a steadying breath and climbed out of the Jag, trying not to stare.

  'I'm afraid you've missed him. I assume that's why you're here.. .but he hardly ever stays over. Still, I'm glad you came,' Elissa asserted, as if Sara's unannounced arrival were perfectly normal. 'I hate being on my own at night. John took the kids up to his mother's this evening and he won't be back until morning.'

  'John?'

  'My husband.' Elissa thrust wide the door of her home and Sara saw her properly for the first time.

  She wasn't exactly seduction personified, in a pink towelling robe and fluffy mules. Not my double either, Sara registered, still staring. She had wide blue eyes, very curly, short dark brown hair and a figure that verged more on the plump than the petite. But she had a beautiful face and the sort of vivacious warmth that just leapt out and grabbed you.

  Elissa was looking Sara over with equal fascination. 'I've been dying to meet you but Alex didn't think it was a good idea.'

  'Didn't he?'

  'He didn't say so.' Elissa grimaced, pushing open the door of a cosy, cluttered kitchen. 'Alex can be very tactful when he wants to be but I could see him bristling the way he does when you put your feet in it... which I always do around Alex. He's not at all like John. John is wonderfully easy to live with... Sorry!'' Like a dismayed child who had dropped a brick, Elissa clapped a hand to her mouth.

  'You don't need to apologise,' Sara assured her with a glimmer of slowly awakening amusement. 'Actually, I came up here thinking you were having an affair with Alex.'

  Elissa frowned in astonishment. 'But why?'

  'Alex had neglected to mention the fact that he was still in touch with you.'

  'I did ask him not to tell anyone. I left my old life behind and I don't want it to catch up with me again. John knows all about it, of course, but I would hate Alex's family to know we're still in touch. They really hate me,' she sighed. 'But Alex has done so much for us since our first business went bankrupt. We couldn't have gotten through that without him. He helped us get back on our feet and then start up again. Good grief...an affair,' she repeated, as if Sara's words were only now sinking in.

  She swept a pile of laundry off a chair while Sara studied a montage of photos on a pinboard. 'Your children?'

  'Well, technically John's. He was a widower with three children under five when we met up ten years ago. A match made in heaven,' Elissa joked. 'This was my fresh start.' She hesitated. 'I got in touch with Alex a couple of years after we broke up because I still felt guilty. I mean, I just ran out on him, which was pretty hateful after the way he'd stood by me.'

  'Why did you leave?' Sara murmured.

  Elissa gave her a wry look. 'I was making a mess of his life, Sara. He wasn't happy with me. He wouldn't admit it but I could feel it. I owed him so much. Without Alex's support, I would never have had the courage to leave Sal... My first husband was a very violent man,' she said tautly. 'Alex felt sorry for me. I started depending on him and the rest you can probably guess.'

  'Yes,' Sara said with sympathy. 'I'm sorry I landed on your doorstep like this—'

  'But how brave when you thought what you did.' Elissa surveyed her with amused but frank admiration. 'My lack of guts always got on Alex's nerves.'

  'Can I ask you why Alex came up here today?'

  'He owns the majority of our business, Sara. We import terracotta from Italy,' Elissa explained cheerfully. 'He refinanced us when we. couldn't get a loan after going bust the first time. John isn't terribly good with money and Alex keeps an eye on things. Well, to be honest, he watches us like a hawk so that we don't overextend ourselves again. He doesn't make much of a profit out of us either. He's been a very generous friend.'

  Sara smothered an embarrassing yawn.

  Elissa laughed. 'You can't possibly get back behind that wheel again. Will you stay the night?'

  Alex hadn't even confided in Elissa, Sara thought as she drove back home by easy stages the next day. Elissa ha
d thought that he was a little quiet, but had noticed nothing else apart from the fact that he'd appeared to be in a distinct hurry to leave again. 'A very generous friend', she had said. But was there something more on Alex's side? Was that why he had chosen not to tell her that he still saw the other woman? And what did it matter now anyway? she asked herself despondently as she turned up the drive to Ladymead. Nothing she had found out made the slightest difference really. Alex had left her. Yesterday his attitude to her had hardened even more. He had told her that he wanted a divorce.

  In the frame of mind that she was in, it was a heck of a shock when the first thing she saw as she got out of her car was Alex striding towards her.

  'Dio, where the hell have you been?' he demanded explosively. 'I've been up all night worrying myself sick. I was going to ring the police again!'

  Sara blinked in bewilderment at this astonishing transformation. Her tongue cleaved to the roof of her dry mouth. Alex closed his arms round her with such force that he very nearly knocked her off her feet. 'It doesn't matter where you have been,' he groaned then, releasing his breath with unconcealed relief. 'You've come home.'

  Wide-eyed, she gazed up at him, taking in the tousled hair, the heavy blue shadow of stubble on his usually clean-shaven jawline, the shadows beneath his feverish dark eyes. 'Alex—'

  'Please don't ever do this to me again.' With an obvious effort he loosened a grip that was threatening to crack her ribs and grasped her hands tautly in his. 'I have now lived through the worst forty-eight hours of my life. I know I asked for it, but shout at me the next time, don't disappear! Not that there'll be a next time,' he hurried to assure her emphatically. 'I'll never take a risk like that with you again!'

  Alex had come home. Alex was practically on his knees with gratitude that she had come home. Her head swam. Obviously he hadn't been in touch with Marco... Either that or Marco had decided to keep quiet. In a daze she looked at the glossy black head bent over their linked hands. 'We're not on the brink of a divorce any more?' she asked, just to check.

  His head flew up, stark guilt and discomfiture clenching his vibrantly handsome features. 'I was sick with jealousy and bitterness, cara. I wanted to hit back and yet the whole time you were standing there I was cutting myself in two as well.'

  'You were like the iceman,' Sara whispered reflectively with a shiver.

  'I didn't want you to know how much you had hurt me,' he muttered gruffly.

  'When did you come back?' - .

  'Yesterday... as soon as I could. I assumed you'd be here... and then I called everywhere I could think of and panic set in. I was afraid you had had an accident. I checked with the police.'

  'I went up north to meet Elissa.'

  In the act of walking her into the house, Alex spun his dark head to her at speed. 'You... what?'

  'I spent the night there. I liked her—'

  'You spent the night?'

  Sara relished his stunned reaction. 'When I heard that name, I thought I had discovered a secret mistress. I decided to confront her—'

  'Dio...' Alex had paled. 'So that is where you have been all this time.'

  'But I soon realised I had nothing to worry about. I don't know where anyone got the idea that Elissa and I look alike...'

  'Sandra started that nonsense at the wedding,' Alex admitted grudgingly, his arm tightening round her as if he feared that she might pull away. 'Elissa once had long dark hair, but that was the only real similarity between you. Sandro has very poor eyesight but he's too vain to wear spectacles. I doubt if he even remembers Elissa that well.'

  'Yet Claudia told me I was Elissa's double.'

  Alex vented an angry imprecation in his own language.

  Sara smiled sweetly. 'And I don't recall you denying it when I mentioned the idea. Do you think you could explain that, Alex?'

  A slight darkening of colour had highlighted his hard cheekbones.

  'Stuck for a ready excuse?' she probed in mock disbelief. 'I don't believe it.'

  He released his breath in a hiss. 'I thought a little jealousy might give your thoughts a new direction—'

  'Back to you... and away from Brian,' Sara guessed. 'But then I wasn't thinking about Brian at the time.'

  'Every time I saw your face cloud, every time you went quiet, I assumed he was on your mind,' AJex confessed tautly. 'I couldn't stop doing it even though I realised I was being unreasonable. After all, I had married you knowing that you loved another man. I thought I could be patient but I found that a much tougher challenge than I had imagined.'

  'You should have told me you were still in contact with Elissa.'

  'My family have the very embarrassing habit of behaving as though Elissa was this great tragic love who wrecked my life and broke my heart and whom I never recovered from,' Alex said through decidedly gritted teeth. 'I didn't mind you wondering a little about that affair but I certainly didn't want you getting the same maudlin ideas fixed in your head.'

  'Didn't you put them there in the first place?'

  'The day I told you about her, I was attempting to empathise with you,' Alex admitted wryly. 'But I was very young when I met Elissa. It was first love and intense but I wasn't ready to make the kind of commitment she needed. She was right to leave before we ended up hating each other but at the time I felt she had just used me as an escape from a rotten marriage. Meeting up with her again a couple of years later put paid to that. We were both able to laugh about what a bad match we were once the romance wore off.'

  'So you stayed friends?'

  'No, we went our separate ways until three years ago when she phoned and asked me for financial advice. John had just been declared bankrupt. They were in a real mess. I was happy to help.'

  'That was a kind thing to do.'

  Alex shrugged. "They're a pleasant couple, but hopeless in business.'

  'Were you really worried sick about me last night?'

  Sara pressed.

  'Panicking.' His deep voice fractured as his eyes collided with her searching gaze. 'So when did you decide to come home?' 'Five minutes after the helicopter took off.' Alex reached for her hands again. 'I know I was a real swine but I was hurting myself as much as I was hurting you. Dio, cara, I have loved you for so long...' 'How long?' she whispered shakily. 'The first month you started working for me,' Alex confided heavily.

  In shock, Sara stared back at him. 'But you told me you didn't believe in love—'

  'Sara, I would have told you the sky was pink if it would have impressed you. I would have done and said anything it took to persuade you that it was a good idea to marry me,' Alex admitted, scanning her shaken face with wry comprehension. 'If I had told you how I really felt, it might have frightened you off. You're so considerate about other people's feelings that you could have decided it wouldn't be fair to marry me.'

  'So you offered me a marriage of convenience.' 'Non-threatening.'

  'And didn't complain about anything until you had that ring on my finger,' Sara said, and she remembered him saying that he had expected too much from her and finally understood why. The knowledge that Alex had been in love with her for such a long time stunned her. 'I was terrified you would get cold feet.' 'But you smouldered in silence.' 'I thought I could be patient—' 'You're not the patient type,' she interposed absently. 'And when I heard that Brian and your cousin had split up and guessed where you had to be...' Alex paused, his dark eyes revealing lingering pain. 'And you'd lied to me. It was one hell of a shock. I went right off the rails—'

  'Alex, I—' Sara began strickenly, distressed by what she read in his expressive gaze.

  'But I still came back. I didn't believe your version of events for one moment, though. Then your aunt phoned this morning and asked me to tell you that she was grateful for a little favour you'd done for her and would I please pass on the message that Brian and Antonia were talking again. She had no idea that I knew what she was referring to...' Alex's troubled features clenched. 'Sara... I should have trusted you.'

>   'When people lie, trust can be very difficult,' she conceded softly.

  'If you hadn't lied, you wouldn't have done any little favour,' Alex gritted. 'I'd have torn him limb from limb!'

  'No, you might have felt sorry for him. Antonia faked being pregnant.'

  Alex absorbed that with a complete lack of interest, his burning gaze engaged in roving over her. 'Did you mean it when you said you loved me?'

  Sara lifted possessive hands to his broad shoulders and looked up at him with glowing eyes. 'What do you think?'

  'I think I want you to say it at least once every five minutes.'

  'I love you...'

  His lean hands were unsteady as he cupped her cheeks. 'I don't know how you didn't see that I was madly in love with you, greedy for your attention, possessive of your every thought...'

  His hungry mouth closed over hers and the aching emptiness was banished for ever as he hauled her up into his arms and carried her upstairs. 'Would you really have to be a mental case to want my baby?' he muttered between hot, drugging kisses that made her wildly responsive senses swim.

  'Do we get to do this a lot in pursuit of the objective?'

  'Do we need an excuse?'

  They decided that they didn't and concentrated on the difficulties of getting undressed when neither of them was prepared to stop long enough to accomplish that feat. A long time later they lay entwined, so mutually entranced that even the sound of a not too distant workman's hammer didn't penetrate the heady sense of wonder they were both experiencing.

  And then a stray thought occurred to Sara. 'Alex...do you think you could fix Brian up with a better job?'

  As his dark eyes shimmered and tensed Sara rested a teasing fingertip against the compressed line of his mouth. 'I don't object to you helping Elissa and her family, do I?'

  'No, but-'

  'Brian and Antonia's marriage would have a much better chance of succeeding if he was earning a bit more.'