So what Brett had begun in anger became instead the most fantastic experience. He forgot his rage, forgot the insults she'd thrown at him, all he wanted was to please her, to carry her along with him on this wonderful road of love that he could travel only with her…only with her. It was a mountain road that climbed ever higher, reaching peak after peak until that last climb to the most glorious summit, when the world exploded into brilliant light and happiness, a beautiful dawn that seemed to last for ever.
He heard Tasha's own moans of delight and knew that he had carried her along the road with him, that her pleasure was as great as his, and he slumped down beside her, smiling with happy satisfaction.
After a while, when he could breathe properly again, Brett turned to look at her. She had her Mona Lisa smile on her mouth, that secret look of intense fulfilment, and he knew he had to try and put things right between them. 'Tasha?' Slowly she opened her eyes and looked at him. Her anger was gone and she smiled at him. 'We can't let it end like this. You must let me—'
The sound of the phone ringing cut through his words. Tasha made no move to answer it but the answering machine in the next room cut in and they heard the message clearly through the open door. 'Tasha, it's Sarah. Have you told him yet? I wish I'd been there to see his face when you told him it was all a con, that we hatched it up together. As you said, the rat certainly needed teaching a lesson. I bet he'll think twice before he tries to dupe another woman. Call me as soon as you can. I'm dying to know what happened.'
When the machine clicked off Brett swung off the bed and started pulling on his clothes. 'So you hatched this together, did you? I suppose you had a good giggle while you worked out how to make a fool of me?'
Sitting up and pulling the edges of her blouse together, Tasha said, 'I thought you'd just walk out and I'd never see you again. I never dreamed you'd—'
'Well, thanks,' Brett cut in. 'But don't mix up my standard of behaviour with your own.'
Her voice growing cold, she said, 'You can keep the notes; you didn't have to force yourself on me to get them.'
'Force?' He gave a harsh laugh as he found his shoes and pushed his feet into them. 'No one forced you, you always were a sex-cat.'
Ignoring that, she threw the biggest insult she could find at him. 'Do what you like with them. I hope they make you a lot of money. That's what you want, isn't it?'
He rounded on her and the fury in his face made her shrink back. He took his wallet from his pocket and for an appalled moment she thought he was going to throw money at her, but he pulled out a piece of paper and dropped it on the bed beside her.
'Here. This is the telephone number of the stewardess you interviewed. Yes, I got money for the article. I used it to go over there and get her, bring her back to England before the story came out. I set her up in a safe house and helped her find a new job under a new name. I thought it was your dearest wish to set her free and see her boss shown up for what he was. It was too dangerous for you to do it so I did it for you. That was the surprise I had for you.' He laughed again as he saw the growing amazement in her face. 'Not that I expect you to believe me, of course. But, you're right, one should always cross-check one's research, so why don't you phone her and let her tell you for herself? That's unless you think we've hatched up a dirty little plot together to deceive you, of course.' Then he turned and strode towards the door.
'Brett!'
But he had gone, slamming the door violently behind him.
It was a couple of months later before Brett saw Tasha again. He had gone down to Cornwall to try and work on his new book, to put the whole sordid episode out of his mind. Chalk it up to experience and make sure he never made the same mistake again. But the cottage, the beach, even the garden were too full of memories. Everywhere he turned Tasha was there, laughing at him, teasing him, in his arms as they made love. Somehow he would try to put her out of his mind, but he only had to walk into a room and smell the lingering scent of her perfume, or notice a pretty plate that she had insisted on buying for him, and he was lost again. So he had come back to London and tried to work there instead, putting the wonderful photo of her among the foxgloves firmly away in a drawer.
Until he glanced out of the window of his study one afternoon and there she was, leaning against the wall that bordered the river. He grew very still, completely dumbfounded, and as he stared she turned and looked up at his window. She didn't wave or anything, just stood and waited. For a couple of minutes he sat transfixed, all his senses reeling, his mind only slowly beginning to function. He supposed he could have ignored her, but he had spent too many hours gazing despondently at a blank computer screen over the last weeks, so he shrugged on a jacket and went out to her.
He had forgotten how lovely she was. No, not forgotten, because he had dreamed of nothing else, waking or sleeping, since they had split up, but even imagination couldn't come close to her living, breathing vitality.
'Hello, Brett.' She was studying his face but he deliberately made it mask-like, giving nothing away.
'What do you want?'
'Could we take a walk?'
He hesitated, then shrugged. 'All right.'
They began to walk along the empty riverside together but at first she didn't speak. He found that his heart was thudding in his chest and his throat was dry with tension. And he had to shove his hands in his pockets to stop them from shaking.
At last she said, 'I suppose you think I owe you an apology. Well, maybe I do, but that isn't why I came here.'
He waited for her to go on but she didn't. 'You didn't phone Anne to check on what I'd done,' he felt compelled to say, having rung the ex-stewardess himself.
'No. It wasn't—necessary.'
'Why not?'
'I believed you,' Tasha said simply. 'And I read in the paper that her boss had lost his job and been kicked off the boards of all the charities. I was really pleased about that. But you haven't written any more articles?'
'No,' he answered curtly. He made no further explanation and it really wasn't necessary; she knew he wouldn't touch her research after what had happened between them.
'I've been thinking in these last weeks,' she remarked. 'On life, that kind of thing.'
'Is that what you've come to talk about?'
'Yes, partly.'
'And your conclusions?' Brett deliberately let his voice sound bored.
'I've realised that the warmth and love of another human being is what we all live for.'
'Very original,' he said with heavy sarcasm.
She glanced at him, gave a small smile. 'And I also learned that sex is important, vitally important in a relationship. It can be the difference between leading a happy, fulfilled life or an unfulfilled life.'
'It always has been.'
'But I mean good sex. The kind of sex we had together,' she added deliberately.
Brett was silent for a moment, his face taut, then he said roughly, 'What are you leading up to, Tasha?'
'You once said that you loved me, asked me to marry you.'
'The circumstances have changed,' he said shortly.
'Well, no, actually, they haven't.'
He frowned. 'What do you mean?'
'I'm pregnant.'
Coming to a jolting stop, he swung round on her, instantaneous anger in his eyes. 'If you think you can pull that trick twice then you can…' His voice trailed off as he looked into her face and saw the radiance in her eyes. Slowly he let out his breath. 'My God, you mean it.'
'Yes.'
His eyes grew cold. 'Congratulations. Who's the proud father?'
She laughed. 'I suppose I deserved that.' But she wasn't at all put out. 'It was a rotten trick to pull, wasn't it? But I thought you'd done the dirty on me, you see. That you were just another rat of a journalist who would do anything for a story. I'm afraid I forgot for a while that you were—well, you.' She looked at him but his chin was still up, his mouth set into a thin, resolute line. Ignoring it, Tasha went on, 'It was that last time
that did it, when you were so determined to teach me a lesson and instead it turned out to be such fabulous love.'
'Until the phone rang,' he pointed out acidly.
'Oh, yes. Sarah. She's found a new boyfriend, by the way.'
'Good, maybe she'll keep her nose out of other people's business for a change.'
Tasha smiled, and said casually, 'The answer's yes, by the way.'
'What?' He was still thinking venomously about that she-devil Sarah, sure that Tasha would never have had the idea at all if it hadn't been for her.
'Yes, I will marry you. And as soon as possible, please.'
He gasped incredulously. 'Do you think—?'
'That you still want to marry me? Yes, of course you do.'
Brett stared in disbelief, then saw perfect certainty in her eyes and slowly began to laugh. 'Yes,' he agreed. 'Of course I do.' And he swept her into his arms and kissed her, kissed her so deeply that they were both out of breath when he finally let her go. Then he grinned. 'Well, at least I wasn't completely floored this time.' Putting his arms possessively round her, he said, 'Do you know what made me realise how much I loved you and how much I wanted you to have the baby last time?' When she shook her head, he went on, 'I was thinking of all the terrible things I'd heard about fatherhood, but I suddenly saw in my mind a little girl with your hair and your incredible eyes, smiling at me and holding her arms out to me. And then I was completely hooked.'
'Good, I'm glad.' She reached up to kiss him. 'I've missed you.'
'Would you have come back to me if this hadn't happened?' he asked tensely, afraid of what she might say.
'Yes, of course, you idiot. But I had a lot of thinking to do first, a lot of self-accusations to answer. I made the terrible mistake of lumping all journalists together instead of following my instincts, my own heart when it told me that I was in love with you.'
'Well, that's nice to know. You've never said that before.'
'Of course I have. You were too busy reaching a climax to listen.' He let that go and she said, 'Now will you write the rest of that series?'
Brett raised an eyebrow. 'Do I have the copyright owner's permission?'
'Definitely. But only if you promise to do the story on my old college tutor first.'
That made him burst into laughter. Lifting her off her feet, he said with intense happiness, 'I can see I'm going to get into constant trouble with you around.'
Tasha smiled down at him. 'But at least you'll never be bored.'
'No. Never that.'
He kissed her again, and Tasha found herself at the end of the corridor and stepping into a golden morning that would stretch for ever. With a sigh of content she firmly closed the door behind her and walked confidently into the future.
Sally Wentworth - A Typical Male Page 15
