One Husband Required!

by Sharon Kendrick

  ‘It’s next weekend, isn’t it? And she’s going to be wearing the famous wedding dress of your mother’s which some enterprising man has tracked down—’

  ‘Yep. That’s right.’ Ursula drew in a deep breath and mentally crossed her fingers. ‘You know they meant it when they invited you along—she and Finn would love you to come. And Katy, too. The Irish are very welcoming to children.’

  ‘Yeah.’ He stared into space. ‘Sweet of them.’

  ‘Well, why don’t you come, then, Ross? It’ll be a lovely weekend away in Ireland.’

  ‘I’m hardly their best mate, am I?’

  ‘No, but that’s not the real reason you don’t want to go, is it?’ she challenged.

  He shook his head slowly. ‘No, it’s not. I’m not really into wedding mode just now—if you must know. And I’d hate to spoil their day by adopting a negative stance throughout the ceremony. Like when they ask if there’s any just cause or impediment—’ his eyes glittered with mischief ‘—you don’t want me leaping to my feet yelling, “For God’s sake, don’t do it—it’s a flawed institution!” Do you?’

  ‘Er, no! It wouldn’t really make their day.’ She hesitated. ‘Is that what you think it is, then?’

  He considered her question carefully. ‘No. Not really. I’m just being a hardened old cynic. I’m told that a good marriage is—’

  ‘Made in heaven?’

  He shrugged. ‘Maybe.’

  He picked up the tray of drinks. ‘Come on—let’s take these outside onto the veranda.’

  Ursula followed him outside to the where the veranda was shaded by the lime-green canopy of an overhanging vine. Ross put the tray on the table and Ursula sat down while he poured them both a drink.

  They drank in silence for a moment, the easy kind of silence they had always shared, but the conversation they had just had in the kitchen made Ursula realise that one day his feelings of cynicism and disillusionment would disappear. Then he would be ready—no, willing—to begin another long-term relationship. And where would that leave her?

  So much had happened in the year since Jane Sheridan had walked out and yet—fundamentally—nothing really seemed to have altered except that, if anything, she felt even closer to him than she had done before. He had been right about the ease with which they could switch work from Soho to Hampstead whenever they needed to. But maybe that had a lot to do with the fact that they were both committed to making sure that Katy’s life ran smoothly.

  Meanwhile, nothing had really been resolved in terms of his marriage.

  Jane was still in Australia with Julian Stringer. She hadn’t seen her daughter since the trip to Prague immediately after Christmas, and contact was limited to the occasional fax or letter or the odd phone call at funny times, because Jane claimed she could never remember the time difference properly.

  Ursula sometimes wondered whether Ross cared more than he ever admitted to.

  His eyes narrowed in her direction. ‘And what are you looking so fierce about?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Ursula, sometimes all the shutters on your face come tumbling down—like now. Something’s bothering you.’

  ‘It’s none of my business.’

  ‘Oh, I see.’ He threw her a knowing look, iced with mockery. ‘You want to know why solicitors’ letters haven’t been winging their way over the great divide? Why I haven’t petitioned Jane for desertion? Or filed for divorce yet?’

  ‘I...well...yes,’ she told him honestly.

  ‘Well, I have taken legal advice, if you must know.’

  ‘You have?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’ He leaned back in the garden chair and stared up at the vast blue dome of the cloudless sky. ‘And the advice I’ve been given is to do...nothing.’

  ‘Nothing?’ asked Ursula blankly. ‘But isn’t that a bit like being in limbo? Just waiting...?’

  ‘Waiting’s fine. I don’t want things turning nasty,’ he murmured. ‘Or rather, I don’t want Jane feeling that I’m backing her into a corner and pressurising her into making a decision about Katy’s welfare. Because Katy’s doing fine, too.’

  Ursula sipped her drink; it was icy and sharp and delicious. ‘She’s more than fine—she’s fantastic!’

  He smiled. ‘Remember Prague?’

  ‘Of course I remember Prague,’ she answered softly.

  The three of them had flown there after Christmas to meet up with Jane. Julian’s band had been playing a gig in the city on New Year’s Eve, and it had been Jane’s first time back in Europe since she had left England.

  Ursula, Ross and Katy had arrived from London on a snowy December afternoon. To Ursula it had been the trip of a lifetime—but maybe that was because she hadn’t travelled enough to get blasé about it. Or maybe it was just because Ross had been there with her. And Katy.

  It had been bitterly cold, the skies crisp and clear—with a thick, white mantle of snow clothing the beautiful ancient buildings.

  At first Ursula had been uneasy about her presence on such an emotional reunion—scared of being in the way, afraid of doing or saying the wrong thing. But Katy had wanted her there and so had Ross.

  Katy, she suspected, had needed a third person present in case her parents began to argue. Ross’s reasons had been more practical—he had claimed that he’d simply wanted someone to sightsee with while Katy had been with her mother. There must have been tens of women who would have eagerly offered to accompany him, and Ursula had said so. His reply had been direct and honest, but less than flattering.

  ‘If I ask another woman, then she’ll expect more than I’m prepared to give. And I don’t want to take anybody to bed right now,’ he had explained, completely ignoring Ursula’s horrified expression. ‘Besides—there isn’t any other woman who hits it off with my daughter the way you do.’

  ‘Thanks very much,’ Ursula had replied, not sure whether to be flattered or insulted.

  But it had been the best time of her life, like every fantasy come true—bar the ultimate one. Because he hadn’t taken her in his arms and kissed her. It had been too easy to imagine what life would be like if she were the woman in his life. And that was the trouble with day-dreams—they left you deeply dissatisfied.

  He was looking at her now expectantly.

  ‘Going to Prague was an experience I’ll never forget,’ she told him carefully. ‘It was the most gorgeous—’

  But he shook his tousled head. ‘I don’t need a travelogue of the place! I know all that,’ he interrupted impatiently. ‘But do you remember how Jane was?’

  Of course Ursula remembered; how could she not?

  Jane had been like a child. A beautiful, spoilt child who had seemed to view her daughter as she would a doll or a pretty plaything. To Ursula it had been inexplicable that Jane should not have wanted to make up for lost time and spend every waking moment with her daughter.

  But Jane had not. She had wanted Katy only on her terms and at her times. All dressed up in a party frock to take to the ballet, or decorously drinking hot chocolate with her in Wenceslas Square. Katy as a dinky accessory, with little opportunity to pour out all her hopes and fears.

  Afterwards, Ursula had tried to tell herself that she was not in a position to sit in judgement. That she was too involved to be impartial.

  ‘Well?’ Ross demanded.

  Was there a diplomatic way to say that she thought his wife was a lousy mother? ‘I thought that Jane seemed rather—distracted,’ said Ursula carefully.

  ‘Yes? And?’

  Ursula shifted uncomfortably in her seat. ‘What else do you want me to say, Ross?’

  ‘You could try being truthful with me.’ His eyes had never looked darker than they did at that moment. ‘Hell, Ursula,’ he said exasperatedly. ‘Whatever happened to honesty? I used to be able to ask you something and you’d always shoot straight from the hip—whether I liked what you were going to say or not!’

  Ursula put her glass down on the table. ‘That’s not fair! You used
to ask me whether an advert worked, or whether I thought a slogan was snappy enough, and that’s different—’

  ‘How?’ he demanded.

  ‘You’ve just asked my opinion on how I thought your wife had behaved—’

  ‘And is that so very difficult to answer?’

  She shook her head, knowing that evasion wasn’t what he wanted from her. ‘Not difficult—just slightly embarrassing. But if you want my honest opinion, then I’ll give it to you. I just couldn’t understand why she didn’t want to spend more time with Katy.’

  His mouth hardened. ‘She never was a hands-on mother.’

  ‘No.’ And then the burning questions came blurting out, before she could stop them, or stop to think about the consequences of asking them. ‘Oh, why did you get married in the first place, Ross? Did you love her so much? I mean—I know that Jane was pregnant, but it couldn’t have been just that. Yes, you’re a decent man—but even you wouldn’t surely have married a woman if you didn’t feel something!’

  His laugh was cold, and the hollow sound of it chilled Ursula to the bone, in spite of the blistering heat of the day. Fingers of apprehension stroked gently at her skin. She had never imagined that Ross could sound like that.

  ‘They say that the past is a different country,’ he reflected. ‘And now it seems so long ago that I can barely remember how I felt at the time. I got to know Jane when we were both students. We all used to meet in a pub on the corner which used to play live music. Everyone knew Jane. She was larger than life, with those distinctive looks, and her outstanding talent for design. Nearly every man in the place was fascinated by her.’

  ‘Including you?’

  ‘Not at first, no. Not especially. I found her a little too predatory for my taste, if you really want to know.’ He took a thoughtful sip of his drink. ‘And, of course, that indifference made me irresistible in Jane’s eyes. For once she wasn’t being hunted. The tables were turned.’

  ‘How very exciting for you,’ she said woodenly.

  He shot her a glance, an assessing look narrowing his eyes. ‘It was an exciting time,’ he agreed, and unbuttoned the top button of his shirt with a lazy precision which drew Ursula’s gaze like a magnet. ‘We were drunk with our youth and our talent. Both rising stars in our own little firmaments. I guess it was only a matter of time before we got together.’

  Stupid to be jealous of a man who had never shown the slightest sexual interest in her. Even more stupid to be jealous of something which had happened long before she’d ever known him. So why did it hurt so much? Why did she find herself longing to obliterate that past of his—wishing that she could score right through it, like a teacher scoring through a page of poor work?

  ‘And how long before Jane became pregnant?’ she heard herself asking, as conversationally as if she had been enquiring about the temperature.

  ‘Almost straight away.’ He gazed into the middle distance, to where delphiniums blazed as blue as the sky above. ‘In fact, that was one of the first things she said to me—that she and I would make beautiful babies together. I think she saw giving birth as the ultimate creative gesture.’

  Ursula gulped as she tried to imagine herself marching up to a man and saying something like that! ‘But didn’t that scare you off?’

  ‘It should have done. But I was too young and too arrogant to be anything other than flattered,’ he admitted wryly. ‘My father had died at the beginning of that year. He was such a strong, dependable sort of man that when he went my mother kind of gave up on life. They died within months of one another.’

  ‘Oh, Ross, that’s terrible.’

  He nodded; shrugged. ‘Pretty terrible,’ he agreed. ‘I guess I was feeling rudderless.’ His eyes glittered. ‘And Jane soon picked up on that. And even though it was extremely unfashionable to want to settle down at such a young age the fact that I was doing it with such a free spirit as Jane seemed to make it acceptable. Both to me and to the rest of the world.’

  Ursula swallowed down the bitter taste of jealousy. ‘So Jane became pregnant and you married?’

  ‘Yes.’ There was a pause. ‘And at first we were happy enough. The trouble was that the idea of having a baby was a totally different proposition to the reality. Katy wasn’t an easy baby. What baby is? Especially when you’re both so young. And Jane had a career she was passionate about—a career she had no intention of postponing, and you could say why should she?’

  ‘It must have been hard for her to cope,’ suggested Ursula tentatively, trying to picture the reality of a screaming baby conflicting with youthful dreams of freedom and wanting to set the world on fire.

  ‘I think it would have been a difficult situation for any twenty-one-year-old to cope with,’ he reasoned fairly. ‘But for someone with an erratic personality and a huge, almost overwhelming talent—well, yes, Jane found it hard.’

  ‘But you managed?’

  ‘Oh, we managed all right. People usually manage—that’s the way of life. Jane slowly built up her business, designing one-off designs which made the acting and music worlds sit up and take notice, while I started climbing the ladder of advertising.’

  ‘And what about Katy?’

  His dark eyes were rueful—soft as pansies and dark as raisins. ‘You think I left her to fend for herself?’

  ‘Of course I don’t! But a tiny baby doesn’t look after herself.’

  ‘Don’t I know it! We had nannies to help care for her at first, and that was fine—then when she started school we switched to au pairs, and most of them were fine as well.’ He saw the anxious look which clouded her eyes.

  ‘Of course, we had the odd hiccup—some of the au pairs Katy simply couldn’t or wouldn’t take to—but I’ve always trusted my daughter’s judgement implicitly. And just as I wouldn’t work with someone I couldn’t communicate with neither would I expect Katy to be around someone she disliked or couldn’t respect. In the end, Katy decided that she didn’t want any more au pairs, and that’s when Jane really started feeling trapped.’

  Ursula was silent for a moment, feeling a salty rivulet of sweat as it tracked down between her shoulderblades. She wriggled them uncomfortably.

  ‘And do you?’ she wondered aloud. ‘Feel trapped now?’

  ‘Trapped?’ His smile was almost carefree.

  She thought how robust he looked, the strong virile body contrasting with the formality of suit trousers and shirt.

  ‘Believe me when I tell you that I’ve found this whole experience completely liberating!’

  When he looked at her like that—his dark eyes glittering with life and vitality—she wanted to get up and run away, to leave the stultifying atmosphere. What was she doing just sitting here, weaving her little fantasies about him? ‘It’s too hot,’ she complained limply, waving her hand ineffectually in front of her face. Much too hot...

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  ‘MMM. Hottest day I can remember.’ Ross made a murmured moan of agreement as he drew the back of his hand across his damp forehead. The humidity had transformed the waves of his hair into dark little kiss-curls—framing his head like a classic sculpture of a Greek god. ‘I think I’ll go and change out of this suit.’ His eyes narrowed against the bright glare of the sun. ‘I can’t believe you’re wearing tights on a day like this, Ursula.’

  Having him look at her legs like that was more than a little distracting. ‘I’m surprised you can tell from that distance!’

  ‘Well, I can tell that your legs aren’t bare, if that’s what you mean.’

  It wasn’t. ‘But I might be wearing stockings for all you know!’ she challenged.

  His smile was slow, almost reluctant ‘Oh, no.’ He shook his head. ‘They’re most definitely not stockings. There’s a distinctive way a woman has of moving when she’s wearing stockings. She’s far more aware of her body, and so, consequently, are the men watching her—which I guess is the main reason for wearing them.’

  ‘You’re saying that women wear stockings just so that
men will watch them?’

  ‘I’m saying that’s one of the reasons, yes.’ He smiled. ‘They’re cooler too, of course.’ He looked at her legs again. ‘Don’t your legs get all prickly with heat?’

  ‘Don’t yours get all prickly in those trousers?’ she retorted.

  ‘Well, of course they do.’ He smiled. ‘Which is why I’m going inside to change into something cooler. Why don’t you?’

  ‘Like what? Fly all the way down to my flat for a pair of shorts and then fly back up again?’

  He laughed. ‘There’s no need to be that enterprising, Ursula. You keep a swimsuit here for when you take Katy swimming, don’t you?’ he asked her, his gaze as steady as his voice. ‘I know you do.’

  It was a curiously intimate observation, and it made her aware of a pulse which had suddenly started beating deep within her belly. ‘And what would I want to put on a swimsuit for?’ she asked, looking around the garden with an exaggerated show of interest. ‘Unless you’ve suddenly had a pool built without my knowledge!’

  He laughed again. ‘Oh, come on! Loosen up, Ursula—for goodness’ sake! It’s a boiling hot summer’s day. People are wandering round the streets of London wearing next to nothing and nobody bats an eyelid. Would it offend your Victorian sense of propriety so much? Gone are the days when men flew into a violent frenzy of passion at the sight of a bare ankle, you know!’

  ‘I wasn’t suggesting that for a moment,’ she answered stiffly.

  ‘Well, then,’ he observed. ‘You’re always dashing off.’

  That was purely so that she didn’t base her whole life round him. ‘I can’t spend all my time here!’ she objected.

  ‘No,’ he agreed. ‘But the occasional lunch won’t hurt. Like today. Why don’t you stay? What else were you planning to do?’

  She was not going to tell him that she had been planning a visit to the library followed by a trip to the supermarket. Neither would she tell him that she had stashed a bag of toffees in the cupboard and was planning to work her way through them while reading the latest best-seller in the cool of her patio garden.

  In the past that might have been considered a sad way to spend an evening. These days she had convinced herself that it was liberated to please herself. Her life was busy and fulfilled—she didn’t need to go to pubs and clubs which were smoky and crowded. Or go looking for a man just because she didn’t have one.