He shook his head. ‘You write, don’t you? I thought that as you were going to be living in a remote place you might as well have the most modern stuff on the market to keep you in touch with the big world outside.’
‘I’ve brought my own computer,’ said Catherine stubbornly.
‘I imagined you would have done—but I doubt it has anything like the speed or the power of this one.’
She turned on him furiously. ‘You don’t have to buy me, you know, Finn!’
‘For God’s sake—do you have to be so damned defensive? You wouldn’t be here if I had been thinking with my head instead—’
‘You don’t have to spell it out for me,’ she said in a hollow voice, feeling quite sick. ‘And there’s no need for you to play the martyr, either.’
‘I am not playing the martyr,’ he retorted. ‘I am just taking responsibility for your predicament—’
‘Stop it! Just stop it!’ she interrupted, even angrier now. ‘I will not, not have this baby described as a “predicament”. It wasn’t planned, no—but it’s happened and I intend to make the best of it. This baby is going to be a happy baby, whatever happens. And you shan’t take the lion’s share of the responsibility, either. We’re both to blame, if you like.’
‘Blame?’ He gave an odd smile. ‘Now who’s using loaded words, Catherine?’ But he forced himself to draw back, to blot out lips which when furiously parted like that made him want to crush them beneath his own. And to try to put out of his mind the fact that to spend the rest of the afternoon in bed might just rid them both of some of their pent-up anger.
And frustration, he thought achingly.
‘Would you like to get changed?’ he asked, eyeing the purple dress which clung so provocatively to her blossoming body and wondering how he was going to get through the weekend with any degree of sanity.
Catherine nodded. ‘Please.’
‘Come on, I’ll show you upstairs.’
There were four bedrooms, though one was almost too tiny to qualify.
Finn put her suitcase on the bed of the largest room, which suddenly seemed like the smallest to her, when he was close enough to touch and she was beguiled by a faint, evocative trace of his aftershave.
‘The bathroom’s along the corridor,’ he said quickly. ‘You’ll find everything you need.’
She had a quick bath and then struggled into her jeans, throwing a baggy jumper over the top. When she came downstairs she found that Finn had changed as well.
He saw her frowning. ‘What’s up?’
‘My jeans won’t do up!’ she exclaimed, pointing at the waistband.
He hid a smile. ‘That’s generally what happens, Catherine. We’ll have to buy you some pregnancy clothes—though God knows where around here!’
‘Big tent-like dresses with Peter Pan collars!’ she groaned.
‘No, not any more,’ he said knowledgeably.
Her eyes narrowed. ‘How do you know that?’
‘I remember Aisling telling me, the last time she was pregnant. Come on and I’ll make you tea,’ he said. ‘And then I’ll light a fire.’
She followed him into a kitchen which had most definitely not been modernised, and Catherine raised her eyebrows in surprise at the old-fashioned units and the brown lino on the floor. Even the ugly windows hadn’t been replaced!
‘How long have you owned this place, Finn?’
He turned the tap on and filled up the kettle, his back to her. ‘It came on the market about five years ago.’
She heard the evasion in his voice and wondered what he wasn’t telling her. She raised her eyebrows. ‘It’s not the kind of place I imagined you buying. It’s…well, it’s nothing like your place in Dublin.’
‘No.’ He had forgotten for a moment that she was a journalist, with a journalist’s instinct for a story. His instinct would be not to tell it. But they were married now, even if it was in name only. And if she was going to give birth to his baby then what was the point in keeping everything locked in? ‘It’s where I was born. Where I lived until the age of seven.’
Catherine studied him. There was something else here, too—something which made his voice deepen with a bleak, remembered pain. She wondered what had happened to him at the age of seven.
He saw the question in her eyes and sighed, knowing that he had to tell her. She carried his baby, and that gave her the right to know about a past he had grown used to locking away. ‘My mother died,’ he said, in stark explanation, bending down to light the gas with a match.
‘I’m sorry—’
‘She’d been widowed when I was a baby—there was no one left to look after me and so I went to live with my aunt.’
‘Oh, Finn.’ Her heart went out to him, and she wanted to put her arms tightly round him and hug away his pain, but the emotional shutters had been banged tightly shut. She could read that in the abrupt way he had turned away, putting cups and saucers upon a tray with an air of finality. Catherine understood the need for defence against probing into pain. The time was not right—indeed, it might never be right. But that was Finn’s decision, not hers.
‘Have you such a thing as a biscuit?’ she asked, with a smile. ‘I’m starving!’
He let out a barely perceptible sigh. ‘There’s enough food to sink a battleship. I asked Aisling to come in and stock up on groceries. We don’t have to go out all weekend, if we don’t want to.’
Catherine’s smile faded and she couldn’t quite work out whether she felt excitement or terror. What did that mean? she wondered, with a slight tinge of hysteria. That play-acting as honeymooners was going to extend as far as the bedroom?
‘Go and sit down, Catherine,’ he commanded softly. ‘And I’ll bring this through.’
His face was unreadable in the dying light of the day, and rather dazedly Catherine obeyed him, sinking down onto one of the squashy sofas while she struggled not to project too much. There was no point in working out what she would do if he suggested bed when the circumstance might never arise!
He brought the tea in and poured her a cup.
‘Is today a sugar day, or not?’ he asked gravely.
She bit back a smile, stupidly pleased that he had remembered. ‘Not. My cravings seem to have settled down into something approaching a normal appetite.’ She waited until she had drunk some of the tea, then put the cup down. ‘Finn?’
‘Catherine?’
‘How often do you come to stay here?’
‘Not often enough,’ he admitted. ‘I keep meaning to spend weekends here, to get a breath of sea-air and a bit of simple living to blow the cobwebs away, but…’ His words tailed off.
‘But?’
‘Oh, you know what it’s like. Life seems to get in the way of plans.’
Yes, she knew what it was like—or rather what it had been like. But she was beginning a whole new life now, and a whole new future. And not just in terms of the baby. She was going to be living in Finn’s cottage as his quasi-wife and she didn’t have a clue about what role she was supposed—or wanted—to fulfil! Make up the rules as we go along, he had said, but surely that was easier than he suggested?
But for the baby’s sake she cleared her thoughts of concern and settled down to drink her tea.
He saw the softening of her face, and the look of serenity which made a Madonna of her, and found himself wondering how many different masks she wore. Or was her pregnancy just making him project his own idealised version of her as the future mother of his child? That she was soft and caring and vulnerable…rather than the cynical and go-getting journalist.
Life is evidence-based, Finn, he reminded himself grimly. Just think of the evidence. She wears different masks, that’s all. Just as all women do.
He stood up. ‘I’ll light the fire,’ he said shortly.
Catherine felt unreal and disconnected as he created a roaring blaze from the logs in the basket, and warmth and light transformed the room just as dusk crept upon the early evening air. The flames cast
shadows which flickered over the long, denim-clad thighs and she remembered their powerful strength in different guises. Running through a Greek sea. Naked and entwined with hers.
He looked up to find her watching him, her slim body sprawled comfortably on the sofa, and the temptation to join her and to kiss her almost overwhelmed him. He knew that in her arms he could forget all his doubts and misgivings about the bizarre situation they had created for themselves.
But wouldn’t being intimate with her tonight make a bizarre situation even more so? Confuse and muddy the waters?
He caught her eye but she quickly looked away, as if uncomfortable, and Finn was forced to acknowledge that things had changed, that there was no guarantee that Catherine wanted him in that way any more. Not after everything that had happened.
Later she unpacked, and Finn cooked them supper, and afterwards they listened to Irish radio until she began to yawn and escaped to her bedroom. Her senses and thoughts were full of him. All she could think about was how much she wanted him.
And how much easier everything would be if she didn’t.
But, after a surprisingly sleep-filled night alone on the big, soft feather mattress, the morning dawned bright and sunny. After breakfast Finn took her down to the beach to look at the boats and to walk along the sand, then afterwards to meet his aunt.
Her heart was beating nervously as they approached the house. ‘What’s her name?’
‘Finola.’
‘I bet she’ll take an instant dislike to me.’
‘Don’t be silly, Catherine—she’s hardly going to hate a woman I bring home and introduce as my wife, now, is she? She loves me; she wants me to be happy.’
Happy? What an ironic choice of word.
‘So what’s your definition of happiness, Finn?’
He stooped down for a pebble and hurled it out at the blue sea before turning to look at her with eyes which rivalled the ocean’s hue.
‘It’s a way of travelling, Catherine,’ he said slowly. ‘Not a destination.’
So, was she happy at this precise moment? She thought about it. Actually, yes, she was. Though contented was probably a better description. She was healthy and pregnant and walking along a beautiful beach with a beautiful man. And if she defined happiness in a futile wish that their relationship went deeper than that, then she was heading for a big dis appointment. You couldn’t look for happiness in another person. First you had to find it within yourself.
She thought that to the outside world they probably made a very striking couple—both tall and slim, with matching heads of jet-black, and her gleaming and brand-new gold band proclaiming very definitely that she was a newly-wed.
But there were several giveaway signs that all was not as it appeared. Finn did not smile down into her face with the conspiratorial air of a lover, nor hold her hand as if he couldn’t bear to let it go.
Not, that was, until they arrived at his aunt’s house. Then he caught her fingers in his and squeezed them reassuringly. ‘It’ll be okay,’ he whispered.
The door was opened by a grey-haired woman in her late sixties, whose faded eyes were a blue a few shades less intense than those of her nephew. She only came up to the middle of his chest, but she flung her arms around him all the same and Catherine’s heart clenched as he hugged her back. She’d never seen him so openly affectionate and demonstrative.
‘Why, it’s the divil himself!’ she exclaimed. ‘Finn! Finn Delaney!’ She fixed him with a look of admonishment, but anyone could see her heart wasn’t in it. ‘And why haven’t you been round to see me sooner?’ Without waiting for an answer, she moved the blue eyes curiously from Finn to Catherine. ‘And who might this be?’
Catherine was feeling as nervous as a child on the first day of school, recognising how much this woman meant to Finn and desperately not wanting to start off on the wrong foot.
‘I’m Catherine,’ she said simply. ‘I’m Finn’s wife.’
Chapter Eleven
CHAPTER ELEVEN
FINN’S wife.
The first and only time she had said it had been to Finn’s aunt, but she thought it often enough, running the words sweetly through her mind like chocolate melting over ice-cream.
She had thought it the first morning he had driven back to Dublin, standing in the doorway just like a proper wife, watching his car disappear over the horizon, leaving her alone with her thoughts and her writing and her growing baby. And the big bed in which she slept alone.
The car had become a distant dot and she’d slowly closed the door on it, telling herself that she was glad he had made no move to consummate the marriage.
It would have only complicated things. Made the inevitable split more difficult—for her, certainly. Because women grew much closer to a man when they had sex with him. Even more so when that man’s child grew bigger with every day that passed.
But being off limits had forced them together in a way which had its own kind of intimacy. For what did you do when you were closeted together every weekend and unable to do the one thing you most wanted to do?
Well, they seemed to go for an awful lot of walks. Brisk, bracing walks along the unimaginably beautiful coastline. He would feed her cream and scones, and afterwards take her back to the cottage and insist that she put her feet up for the inevitable sleep which would follow. Sometimes she would wake up to find him watching her, the blue eyes so blazing and intent. And for one brief and blissful moment she would almost forget herself, want to hold her arms out towards him, to draw him close against the fullness of her breasts.
But the moment would be lost when he turned away, as if something he saw in her disturbed him, and she wondered if he felt uncomfortable with this masquerade of marriage. Did he find himself wanting to tell the aunt who was more like a mother to him that it was not all it seemed? That he had made her pregnant and was simply doing the right thing by her? Was he now perhaps regretting that decision?
He’d taken her to meet his friends who lived at the far end of the small town. Apparently he had known Patrick ‘for ever’, and Patrick’s wife, Aisling, was an energetic redhead who squealed with delight when they told her the news.
‘At last!’ she exclaimed. ‘You’ve done it at last! Oh, Finn—there’ll be legions of women weeping all over Ireland!’
‘And legions of men sighing with relief,’ commented Patrick wryly as he reached into the fridge for a bottle of champagne.
‘Shut up.’ Finn smiled.
‘So you went and got married without telling anyone?’ Patrick demanded as he eased the cork out of the bottle. ‘Even us?’
‘Especially you,’ murmured Finn. ‘We didn’t want the whole of Wicklow knowing!’ He paused. ‘Catherine’s pregnant, you see.’
‘Oh, Patrick,’ said Aisling softly. ‘Will you listen to the man? “Catherine’s pregnant,” he says. As if we didn’t have eyes in our heads, Finn Delaney! Congratulations! To both of you!’
She hugged them both in turn and Catherine felt a great lump rise in her throat, glad to have her face enveloped in Aisling’s thick-knit sweater. I don’t deserve this, she thought. I can’t go through with it. Pretending to these nice people that all is what it seems.
But she looked up, her eyes bright, and met a sudden warm understanding in Finn’s, and she drew an odd sort of comfort from that.
‘Will you look after Catherine for me while I’m away in Dublin, Aisling?’ he said, his voice suddenly urgent.
‘But I don’t need looking after!’ protested Catherine, slightly terrified that this attractive woman with the warm smile might ask questions which would be impossible not to answer truthfully.
‘You can see me as much or as little as you wish to, Catherine—I won’t mind in the least,’ said Aisling firmly. ‘But won’t you be terribly lonesome with Finn away?’
‘Catherine wanted peace and quiet,’ put in Finn. ‘So Dublin’s out. And she wants to write.’
‘Yes.’ Catherine swallowed. ‘I’m a journalis
t.’
‘So I believe,’ said Aisling lightly, leaving Catherine wondering whether she had read the article. But even if she had she didn’t seem to hold it against her, not judging by the genuine warmth of her welcome, anyway.
A small boy came running in, closely followed by an older sister, his face covered in sand and the sticky remains of a crab. ‘Jack Casey! Just what have you been doing to yourself?’
‘He tried to eat the crab, Mammy!’ crowed the little girl. ‘Even though I told him not to!’
‘And you just let him, did you?’ asked her mother, deftly picking up a cloth and beginning to scrub at her protesting son. ‘Does this not put you off what you’re about to go through, Catherine?’
‘Well, I’ll have a few years to prepare myself,’ said Catherine, as Jack deposited a chubby handful of shells into her lap.
‘Jack! Please don’t put sand all over Catherine’s dress!’ scolded Aisling.
‘I don’t mind—honestly, I don’t.’
Finn sat and watched the interaction of everyday family life and felt a great clench of his heart. How easy and uncomplicated it all seemed on the surface. With Catherine sitting there laughing as a sticky hand was shoved towards her hair, which today she had woven into two thick plaits which fell over her breasts.
Pregnancy suited her, he thought unwillingly, and her growing body seemed just as sexy as the pre-pregnancy one had done.
Thank God he was going back to Dublin in the morning!
The weeks slid by and Catherine settled into her new life, taking to the slow, easy pace like a duck to water.
She rose early and walked along the seashore, tracing her route back via the shops, where she bought freshly baked bread and milk which tasted better than any milk she had ever drunk before.
Then she settled down to write, but found that her writing had changed. She no longer had the desire nor the contacts to produce the punchy, easy-read features which had defined her career up until this point.
The flat in Clerkenwell was being rented out at an exorbitant fee, and so for the first time in her life there were no pressing money worries. She could enjoy her pregnancy and give in to what she most wanted to do.
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