by Betty Neels
‘Mark, I’m so sorry.’
He acknowledged her sympathy, but his smile never reached his eyes. ‘It was the last act of a perfectionist. Leaving a note would have been far too messy. It would have meant everyone knowing that she’d failed the ultimate test for a woman. Motherhood. The letter was not for public consumption, just to say sorry…’
‘Mark, she didn’t fail. She needed help—’
‘Not a holiday?’ He stood up. ‘Yes. I’m making no excuses, the failure was mine. As a husband.’ He reached out, grasped her hand. ‘I promise I’ll try harder this time, Jane.’
For a moment she believed he was going to reach out for her, hold on to her, seeking some kind of reassurance, forgiveness. If he did that, anything was possible. But he turned away—almost, she thought, with relief—as Shuli called out from her room. ‘She’s excited about tomorrow. Meeting all her new cousins. Would you mind going up to her? I’ll take Bob for a walk.’
She wanted to scream with frustration, but she could see that he needed to be alone for a while with his thoughts. So she just said, ‘Try and keep him out of the pond.’
CHAPTER TEN
JANE sat at the window seat by the open window. The night was soft and warm, and beneath her the honeysuckle and night-scented stocks filled her mother’s moon-silvered garden with sweetness.
Mark had stayed tactfully downstairs, using the excuse of taking Bob out for a walk before joining her. Giving her an opportunity to get into bed, close her eyes and pretend to be asleep. He couldn’t believe she’d manage the real thing.
She’d scarcely had a moment to talk with him all day. She’d waited last night for him to come back, but he must have walked for a long time with his memories for company. Bob had been worn out, totally ignoring the jangling of his lead when she’d taken Shuli to playgroup that morning.
And the child had claimed all her attention in the car on their way to her parents’. Stories, games—the journey had passed in a flash. And once they’d arrived—well, there had been dinner and family news to catch up on. Elizabeth’s news to wonder over. A dozen people for Mark to meet.
Finally, though, they were to be alone. She had it all planned. All he had to do was kiss her. She’d do the rest. She started slightly as she heard the lightest warning tap on the door before he opened it. Her heart was pounding like a road drill, her skin heating up…
‘Are you asleep?’ And then, as he saw her, ‘Oh…’
‘Don’t turn the light on,’ she murmured. She didn’t turn around. ‘There’s a fox in the garden.’ She reached back, holding out her hand to him. ‘Come and see.’
For a long moment she thought he wouldn’t come, but then his hand grasped hers and he put a knee on the seat beside her to look out of the small casement window and search the shadows. ‘Where?’
‘Just there.’ He leaned closer, his chest pressed against her back, his soft twill shirt against her skin. He smelled so good, felt so strong…‘She’s got her cubs with her.’ She retrieved her hand to point to the dark patch on the grass where they were playing and he put his hand on her shoulder. Palm against naked skin. Surely he could hear the sizzle? She turned to look up at him. ‘Do you see, Mark?’ she said.
His face was unreadable in the moonlight, just black and white shadows like the negative of an old picture that might be anybody…‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I see.’ Then he bent and kissed her, so gently, so tenderly, so briefly that before she could respond it was over. ‘Go to bed, Jane.’
‘Mark…’
‘Tomorrow, Jane. Go. I won’t disturb you.’
Too late for that. She was disturbed beyond endurance. But she didn’t need telling twice. Grateful for the darkness to hide her hot shame, she scrambled from the window seat and into bed, lying on the farthest edge, her back turned towards him. But she needn’t have bothered; he kept his word, sitting at the window, staring out into the night.
As for tomorrow—what difference would a day make? He’d made his position clear right from the beginning while she, in her vanity, had believed she could win his heart.
‘Mum, can I talk to you?’
‘Goodness, Jane, aren’t you ready? We’re meeting the girls in less than an hour.’
‘It’s Saturday lunchtime down the pub. It hardly calls for designer dressing.’ She realised belatedly that mother was, in fact, dressed to kill. ‘Isn’t it?’
‘We haven’t gone to all the trouble of getting the men and the children out of our hair just for an hour at the pub, sweetheart. Elizabeth has found an absolutely wonderful new restaurant for our own little hen party treat and it’s definitely not a jeans kind of place. Why don’t you wear that lovely outfit you wore for your wedding?’
‘No…’
‘Please, make an effort, Jane. Your sisters always do.’
‘For heaven’s sake, Mum! I’ve probably made the biggest mistake in my life and all you’re interested in is whether I can hold my own in the fashion stakes with my sisters. We both know it’s a waste of time even trying.’
‘Mistake?’
‘Mark doesn’t love me. I thought I could make him…’ As her mother reached for her the whole truth spilled out in a torrent of anguished self-pity. ‘What on earth am I going to do?’
‘Do?’ Her mother touched her cheek. ‘You don’t need me to tell you what you have to do, darling. You’re going to go upstairs right now, put on your make-up and your pretty new clothes—’
‘I can’t—’
‘Yes, Jane. You can. You have no choice. They need you. Mark made an honest bargain with you, and you have taken on a little girl who loves you—’
‘And I love her.’
‘Of course you do. As I love you. And I know you won’t let either of them down.’
‘No.’
‘This might not be a great romance, Jane, but marriage takes a lot more than romance. It takes hard work and commitment. And sometimes a brave face.’
‘I hope I’m as good a mother to Shuli as you have always been to us.’
‘I used to worry about you so much, but I must have done something right. You’re strong, Jane. Inside—where it matters. You’ll be a wonderful mother to Shuli. And you’ll have babies of your own, too. Just give it time.’
‘How long?’
‘How long is a piece of string?’ Her mother looked at her watch and gave a little yelp of panic. ‘Let’s take this one step at a time. Right now, you’ve got twenty minutes.’
‘Why are we stopping?’ Jane looked around as her mother pulled into a space in front of the church. ‘Why are all these cars here?’
‘The Women’s Institute…’ she said vaguely, as if that were explanation enough. ‘I’ve just remembered that I promised to pass on a message. I won’t be a minute. Why don’t you go and have a little chat to your grandmother? You always used to tell her your troubles when you were little.’
‘You think she’ll have the answer?’
Her mother, about to climb out of the car, paused and put her hand over Jane’s. ‘It wouldn’t hurt to ask.’
‘No.’ Jane got out of the car and walked around the church to the quiet spot where her grandmother was buried.
Someone else was there before her.
‘Mark?’ He turned as she approached. ‘I thought you’d all gone down to the beach.’ But he wasn’t dressed for the beach. He was wearing a cream suit. A shirt the same colour as her shalwar kameez. A new tie she’d bought him. ‘What are you doing here? What’s going on?’
‘Last night—’
‘Don’t!’
‘Last night I wanted to make love with you, Jane. More than anything in the world. I ached with a depth of longing, desire, that I was certain I’d never feel for any woman ever again.’
That wasn’t an answer. But she’d lost interest in her original question. ‘Then why didn’t you? I couldn’t have made myself plainer—’
‘Because I’d done everything wrong.’
‘No!’
‘Oh, yes. I’d seized your selfless offer with both hands without a second thought. That should have told me something, don’t you think? What man would marry a girl he didn’t care for? I could have hired a housekeeper or a live-in nanny any time in the last two and a half years, but I didn’t want to share my house with anyone. Yet from the moment you said “Are you asking me if I’d marry you?” I never considered anything else. It seemed so…right.’
‘I pushed you into it. I knew you’d never advertise, but I thought if I put the idea into your head—’
‘I was so sure it was the right thing to do, and I told myself that you must have a good reason to settle for something less than perfect. I imagined that someone had broken your heart, too, and you couldn’t ever face the pain again.’ He took her hand. ‘That wasn’t the reason, was it?’
Jane was without defences. Only the truth would serve her now. ‘There has only ever been one love in my life, Mark. I’ve loved you from the first moment I saw you.’
‘And I think I must have loved you for a long time. Maybe from that first day when you walked into my life, picked up Shuli and cuddled her, stopped her fretting.’
He remembered? ‘A helpless, needy man and his baby,’ she said softly. ‘I knew you’d both break my heart even then. Well, last night I finally felt the pain.’
‘Last night was different.’
‘How, Mark? How was it different?’
‘Because I wanted to make a gesture. Show you how much you really mean to me. Make a new start. Not as some couple who married out of convenience and fell into bed because it was there…’ He took both her hands and clasped them in his. ‘Everyone we both know and care for is waiting in the church. To hear us say our vows before God. To bless our marriage not as an expedient but as a partnership, in every sense of the word.’
‘A blessing?’ She looked around at all the cars. ‘You’ve arranged all this?’
‘With the help of your parents, your sisters, and Laine. I’ve even managed to drag my mother and sister here for the occasion. I love you, Jane, and I want everyone to know it. You’re my wife in name. Now I’m asking you will you be my wife…’ he paused briefly, as if searching for the right words ‘…heart, body and soul?’
She reached up, touched his face. ‘I always was, my love. I’ve just been waiting for you to notice.’
‘Then let’s not keep the vicar waiting.’
Laine and Shuli were waiting for them in the porch. Laine hugged her and handed her a bouquet of flowers. Shuli had a velvet cushion waiting to carry their wedding rings.
And when, after they’d exchanged their vows, the vicar said, ‘You may kiss the bride,’ Mark’s tender, lingering kiss held a promise that this was the real beginning of their marriage.
Jane turned and picked up Shuli. Mark took her, and with his hand in hers walked her down the aisle. At the church door he stopped to kiss her again. ‘You know,’ he murmured, ‘I really like your family, but I don’t think I want to spend my honeymoon with them.’
‘We could go home.’
‘We could,’ he agreed. ‘Or we could leave Shuli and Bob with your parents while we go to Paris for a few days.’ And he opened his jacket so that she alone could see the airline tickets in his inside pocket. ‘What do you think, Mrs Hilliard?’
‘I think I’m the luckiest woman in the world.’
He reached up, brushed a tear from her cheek. ‘No. The bravest, truest, strongest woman. The luck is all mine.’
‘Daddy?’
‘Yes, angel?’
‘Now can I have a baby brother?’
Mark glanced at Jane, lifting his eyebrow, and she blushed. ‘We’ll work on it, sweetheart. I promise you, we’ll work on it.’
ISBN: 978-1-4603-6555-7
THE ENGAGEMENT EFFECT
First North American Publication 2002.
THE ENGAGEMENT EFFECT Anthology
Copyright © 2002 by Harlequin Books S.A.
AN ORDINARY GIRL
Copyright © 2001 by Betty Neels.
A PERFECT PROPOSAL
Copyright © 2001 by Liz Fielding.
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