Unwilling Wife

by Renee Roszel

  Unwilling Wife

  Renee Roszel

  Copyright © 1992 by Renee Roszel. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from Don Congdon Associates, Inc.; the agency can be reached at dca@doncongdon.com

  For the daughters in the world

  who lost their dads too soon:

  To us

  And to them;

  Most especially,

  To

  Norman V. Roszel

  Contents

  Copyright

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  1

  Gina was out of breath and close to tears, but she forced herself to keep her mind on the business at hand—getting rid of The Dean’s Wife! With gritty determination, she dragged the bulging suitcase down the stone steps from the lighthouse to the foam-scalloped beach.

  The bonfire she’d built was blazing. With the dying sun aflame far out on the heaving Pacific, the whole world, it seemed, was eerily drenched in crimson, taking on a bright foreboding—as though there was something dreadfully wrong with the air, the sea and the pink-hued sand. Gina bit her trembling lips. This was no time for faltering. She’d made her decision. Just because the raging fire of the dying day gave off an impression of widespread carnage, that was no reason to conjure up ill omens.

  She inhaled deeply, reviving herself with the crisp, salt-laden air. Gina was about to declare herself, once and for all, a separate and equal person—devoid of any further entanglement with the patronizing, dictatorial David Baron!

  Her resolve strengthened, she flipped open the suitcase fasteners, recalling the time David had brought it home, so delighted with his gift for her. It was a beautiful, monogrammed piece of leather luggage, but it had been his choice, not hers. She’d wanted the cute plaid set, but he’d said the fabric wouldn’t wear well, and that she would soon tire of the busy design.

  “Well, we’ll never know now,” she muttered aloud, as she dragged out an armful of her clothes and flung them into the middle of the greedy flames. “Goodbye you ugly aqua-chiffon formal! Last year at the Professors’ Wives’ Association installation of officers, when I was required to wear you, I looked like a fat glob of cotton candy and smelled of mothballs. Never again! And goodbye you homely, hand-tatted dickies—annual Christmas punishment from our college president’s dull wife! And so long, you squatty pillbox hat, stupid white gloves, and you, especially—you horrid black wool commencement suit!

  “Get lost, you wimpy Pep Club beanie!” With an angry flip of her wrist, she hurled a discus-shaped object into the flames, declaring, “May I be devoured by hungry bears before I ever again have to utter the phrase, ‘Scramble, Iguanas, Scramble’!”

  Another hearty toss disposed of her purple jersey floor-length VIP Reception dress. “Goodbye and good riddance to all of you, and to the Dean’s correct little wife!” she muttered.

  A twig snapped from somewhere in the shadows behind her—the unmistakable sound of someone approaching. Having just picked up another shoe, Gina spun toward the sound, her arm raised, prepared to defend herself as one can when armed with nothing more than a sling-back, summer pump. “Who’s there?” she cried in a fearful whisper.

  Sweetheart Point’s lighthouse, a gingerbread cottage, painted yellow and trimmed in white, with its tower striped yellow and white like a giant candy stick, was located on an isolated spine of land. It was perched on a craggy cliff facing an expansive vista of ocean, just fifty yards from a cathedral-like setting of redwoods and cypress trees that masked the secluded retreat from the access road. Its beach was out-of-the-way and remote, ten miles from the nearest neighbor. No one should be wandering about. Sinister possibilities flooded her brain, and she shivered.

  She searched the shadow for signs of life hidden in the blackness of the towering rock wall. Then she saw it—tall, wide shouldered, a menacing specter, especially for a woman alone with nothing but a flimsy shoe as defense. “Who’s there?” she repeated, willing her voice to be strong, unafraid.

  He took a step forward, and she flinched at the stab of recognition she felt in the pit of her stomach. But, no, it wouldn’t be, couldn’t be—

  “While you’re destroying things, darling—” a masculine voice cut through her musings “—why don’t we destroy these?”

  Horror swept through her. The deep, sardonic voice could belong to no one but her soon-to-be ex-husband. Yet, it simply couldn’t be David. She’d left him a month and three thousand miles ago.

  “It can’t be—you….” she gasped filled with dismay.

  “No? Who were you expecting, my love?” he returned bitterly.

  Gina had grown deathly still, but her heart thumped uncontrollably as his imposing form emerged from the ruddy dusk into the fire’s burnished glow. Precisely dressed, darkly handsome, he could be no one else but—

  “David,” she whispered, lowering her arm in a state of complete shock. Still, she retained the presence of mind to clutch the shoe like a weapon. He looked as if he might be capable of any violent act right now. Fearful, she asked, “What are you doing here?”

  “I’ve already told you,” he retorted. “I brought something to burn.” He circled around her in that sedate yet sexy saunter that had always turned her to mush, and, even now, she found she had to steel herself against it. Lean and broad-shouldered, his silhouette appeared even more striking than she recalled as he moved between her and the fire.

  She watched his stalwart profile, hardened in anger, as he neared the fiery beast that was ravenously consuming the physical evidence of the ten years of their life together. He was holding what looked like a batch of papers. With infuriated dispatch he tossed them into the flames. This done, he turned to confront her. His face was half lit by the fire, his brown hair, glowing a rich mahogany color, as he vowed, “There will be no divorce between us, Gina. Not while I live.”

  She forced herself to face his hardened stare. “It’s done, David,” she protested hotly. “Face it and go back to Boston.”

  “Like hell, sweetheart.”

  His tone was cold, his features twisted with hurt and rage. His lips were drawn down in a thin-lined scowl—those full, masculine lips that had seemed to be made for smiling. She realized she’d hardly ever seen David angry. Of course, that was because David had always made the decisions. Gina, darling, your hair looks so much neater pulled back away from your face. Gina, my love, you will never forgive yourself if you don’t volunteer for the campus beautification committee. Gina, for your own good, you should reconsider taking up bowling. You’d be much wiser to enroll in aerobics. Gina, as the dean of the physics department’s wife, you’ll be expected to entertain, so I’ve signed you up for a gourmet cooking class. And on, and on it had gone! Ten years of dominating and controlling, instructing and cajoling with a smile and a kiss.

  Well, now, for once, when things weren’t going his way, he was madder than she’d ever imagined he could be; he’d taken on the look of a wounded beast. His gray eyes, shadowed by wicked, curling lashes, glittered severely.

  “What did you throw on the fire?” she managed, her voice tight.

  He smiled—a grim show of teeth that made her blanch. “Our divorce papers, darling. What did you think I’d do with them? Frame them and hang them in the den?”

  “Our divorce…” she echoed, her fears confirmed. “You can’t just
burn them!”

  “Like, hell, I can’t. That’s where they belong.” He moved a step toward her. “Do you have any idea where I was when those blasted documents were delivered to me?”

  Unable to withstand his intent gaze, she scanned the blood-red foam of the darkening sea, and struggled to appear unaffected. “How could I know that?”

  “I’ll tell you, then. I was guest-lecturing at Harvard. That smirking baboon of a sheriff’s officer bounded up to the podium and thrust them under my nose in the middle of my ‘Wonderful World of Waves’ speech.”

  She pictured him—so correct, so conservative, so respectable—standing there before hundreds of students and faculty. Interrupted in mid-oration, he lost his renowned cool and became downright flustered upon discovering his wife wanted out of their marriage. She was positive he’d been more mortified than most people would be caught nude in the middle of a busy intersection. Feeling a surge of delicious glee, she chided, “It looks as though I’ve finally made a few waves in your wonderful world!”

  His expression menacing, he took another step toward her.

  Gina backed away. When she did, she saw distress flash across his face.

  “Damn it, Gina,” he protested. “Do you really think I’d hurt you?”

  She stared at him for a long moment as his eyes searched her face, his expression furious yet somehow vulnerable. She shook her head. “No—you wouldn’t hurt me, David.”

  “What in heaven’s name is all this about?” he asked, this time without malice. “I thought, after giving you a month to come out here to think things over, you’d come home. But yesterday, when those damned papers were delivered to me, I couldn’t believe it.”

  She should have known David wouldn’t simply sign them and fade silently out of her life, and that he’d come after her. He wasn’t the type to simply fade away.

  That day, ten years ago, when he’d first walked into the bookshop her father had just bought, she’d known it immediately. He was a man who knew what he wanted and got it. She’d been nineteen, and it was her first day behind the counter when the tall, striking college professor had ambled up to her, graced her with a heart-stopping grin and said, “Working here, you must love books.”

  She’d been nonplused, telling him her father had owned a sporting-goods store for the past five years, and that the book business was new to her. He simply continued to smile, promising, “You’ll learn to love them. I’ll teach you.” Then he’d told her he would be back at six o’clock to pick her up for dinner—not even knowing her name. She’d been thrilled by his take-charge personality. He’d been a self-possessed, secure man, like her father, and she’d been drawn to him instantly.

  So bold, so sure of himself, so determined to get his way, David had remained the same. But as she’d matured, his desire to nurture and teach her had grown tedious and restrictive. And when her mother had died… She shook off the unhappy memory. Well, she’d promised herself things would change. She couldn’t allow his domination over her to continue. Her whole future depended on her being strong—now. Still, she’d been hopelessly naive to think he would give her up without a fight.

  Not sure how to handle this, she resumed feeding the fire. Stooping down, she tossed another load of clothes onto the flames. This time she noticed a red knit dress fly into the inferno and pointed to it with a jerky wave of her hand. “There. I hope that makes you happy. Since you bought that dress for me, I thought it would be permissible to wear it to the college president’s house. Silly me, for not asking for detailed wearing instructions! Well, I won’t be embarrassing you at any more college functions, turning up in inappropriate clothes!”

  David’s brow knit in consternation as he watched the dress blacken and disintegrate into ash and smoke. “Dammit, Gina, all this can’t be because of that! Besides, it was you—my loving wife of ten years—who dumped a serving platter of aspic over my head in front of the entire Albert Einstein faculty.” Frustration tinged his voice. “Who do you thing was humiliated? You, when I whispered that you might consider wearing something less snug to the college president’s home, or me, when you tossed that glutinous mess over my head and ran out wailing. If you’ll recall, sweetheart, that party was in my honor.” His tone grew caustic. “What kind of time do you think I had once you were gone and I was left there—alone—with tomato aspic dripping down my face?”

  She sighed heavily, not wanting to think about it. That had been a terrible thing to do to him, but it had been the last straw in ten years of straws! It should have been a happy occasion—a party celebrating the critical acclaim he’d received for his latest physics textbook. But his condescending remark about her dress had been the final blow, and she’d gone a little crazy.

  Trying to control her raw emotions with physical activity, she lugged the now empty suitcase to the fire and threw it on the crackling heap. When she’d competed her final act of defiance, she turned to face David. Observing his pained expression as he watched his most recent gift to her scorch and shrivel before his eyes, she felt grimly victorious.

  “David,” she began, breathless from exertion and tenseness, “I suppose I shouldn’t have done that—I mean the thing with the aspic. But you never listened to me. Every time I told you I wanted to do something that deviated—even slightly—from your idea of what was proper, you patted me on the head, kissed me, made me do it your way and told me I’d thank you for it later. Remember that community-theater production of Hair I got a part in, and you made me drop out?”

  “It was impossible for me to allow you to go naked onstage!” he protested.

  “Impossible for you!” she spat. “The director told us we could perform undressed or not—according to our moral standards. I don’t know what I would have done, David. The point is, you didn’t allow me to make that decision.”

  “But, darling, I’m a college dean. There are standards—”

  “I know all about your standards! And, I don’t thank you for your concerned attempts to instill them in me. I’m tired of being married to a man who treats me like a mindless Kewpi doll!”

  “That’s absurd. I think of you in no such way. Is it too much to ask that a man’s wife show a little decorum?”

  “Is it too much to ask that a husband show his wife a little faith?”

  He scowled. “All I ask is that you be concerned with my well-being, my wants and needs. Isn’t that what all men want?”

  “You want a sex slave! And maybe some men do want that—if they’re macho jerks.”

  “You’re being melodramatic,” he admonished softly. “I merely want to be proud of you, to display you as my charming life’s companion—”

  “Like a prize hog!” she broke in.

  “No, of course not. Don’t you understand, I want you well versed in the correct way of the running of a household and the elegant entertaining of our colleagues—”

  “Dammit, David! What you want is a submissive, sex-starved charwoman who can win you blue ribbons at the state fair!” she cried, effectively cutting him off. She’d had this fight bottled up inside her for along time, and having David show up when she’d quit vacillating—finally having decided to make radical changes in her life—was like putting dynamite to a dam. The floodwaters of her discontent came gushing out in a torrent of harsh words.

  “I have no intention of being a submissive, sex-starved charwoman with a chest full of blue ribbons for you—not anymore!” she retorted. “Just because you’re thirteen years older than I am, and just because I married you when I was nineteen and you were a high-and-mighty physics professor, doesn’t mean you can go on acting like my father—my master—forever. I’m a grown woman! I need to be given a chance to do my own thing—to spread my wings and fly! My way!”

  “I think I understand.” He nodded reluctantly, his expression softening. “You’re upset because you’re going to turn thirty next month. Gina, darling,” he offered more gently, “lots of women face their own mortality when they’re about t
o—”

  “No!” She stomped her bare foot. “This has nothing to do with turning thirty or mortality! This is about my wholeness! The me I want to be! I’ve outgrown you, David. It first hit me when mother was dying…” Unable to go on, she bit her lip to regain her composure.

  “Your mother?” he asked. “She died five years ago. What could that possibly have to do with us, now?”

  “Everything! Don’t you see? When Dad died, Mother just faded away. As she lay dying, she told me how alike she and I were—how devoted I was to being your wife. How proud she was of me. And she smiled, David. She actually smiled. She was dying because she was nothing but an empty shell after my father died, and she didn’t even see that as a tragedy.” Gina’s voice broke and she struck away a tear angrily. “I’ve tried, David. I’ve tried to tell you for five years. I’m through trying! I refuse to be dissolved bodily into your life force. And that’s what will happen to me if I stay with you. You’re so strong, so dominant, and every day I can feel myself slipping further and further away from the person I want to be. I—I want to be somebody in my own right—not just the dean of the physic’s department’s … wifely tentacle.”

  He scowled. “You’re being hysterical. No one could every consider you any such disgusting thing. But you’re damn well going to remain my wife, because I have no intention of letting you go.”

  “You’ll have to, because I’ve moved out here to Northern California for good. This lighthouse was left to me by Grandpa Johnson, and I intend to make a new life for myself here.”

  “In a deserted lighthouse?” His voice had grown incredulous.

  She nodded. “I realize it is rather unorthodox by your standards. But I can’t be bothered by what you approve of or disapprove of, anymore.” His heated gaze seemed to dare her to go on. With a trace of reservation, she took that dare. “I—I’m here. I intend to stay. And it’s none of your business.”