A Convenient Husband

‘You’re such a cynic, Rafe.’

‘Better than being a victim.’

His casual contempt really hurt. ‘I am not—!’

He was pleased to see the spark of anger in her eyes; anger was way better than that awful dull, despairing blankness.

‘Whatever,’ he drawled. ‘You could convince this Osborne guy he doesn’t want a kid around.’ With a thoughtful expression he drew a hand slowly through his thick hair.

Tess stared at him. Only Rafe could come up with an idea like that and make it sound reasonable. ‘I don’t think I want to know what machiavellian schemes are running around in your warped little mind. I need to do what is best for Ben,’ she responded firmly, trying to sound braver than she felt. ‘I need to do what I should have been doing all along, I need to prepare Ben to go live with his mother.’

If it was going to happen she’d have to put her feelings on the back burner and make this transition as painless as possible. And if Chloe and this Ian person made him unhappy she’d make them wish they’d never been born!

‘You can’t prepare someone to lose the only mother they’ve ever known!’ His hooded eyes were veiled as she stiffly turned away from him. ‘What we need is inspiration. In the meantime, will you settle for coffee?’

‘I don’t want coffee.’

‘You need it; you’re drunk.’

She opened her mouth to deny this when it occurred to her he was probably right. If she weren’t drunk they wouldn’t be having this conversation. If she weren’t drunk his shirt wouldn’t still be damp from her copious tears.

‘Don’t move, I’ll make it.’

Tess, who hadn’t been going to offer, retained her seat. If she hadn’t felt so dog-tired she might have asked Rafe since when he’d made her problem his crusade. She already knew, of course, even if he didn’t recognise the reason himself at least consciously. The parallels might be tenuous, but she could see exactly why he was so fired up.

Rafe had doted on his own mother; he still did. The reasons that had made her run away, leaving her two young sons behind, had been wide and varied depending on who you listened to in the small community—everyone had their own pet theory.

To say Rafe’s relationship with his stepmother had been bad would have been like saying he was quite tall and fairly good-looking. A child of seven or eight didn’t have the weapons required to prevent a clever, manipulative woman from alienating him from his father. These days Rafe wasn’t short of weapons, or overburdened with moral qualms about using them. In short, Rafe could be pretty ruthless. Maybe that was what the situation called for…? She firmly pushed aside the tempting idea of letting Rafe have free rein.

A few minutes later Rafe returned carrying two mugs of strong black coffee. ‘Do you take sugar? I couldn’t remember…’

The small figure on the rocker stirred restlessly in her sleep, but didn’t waken.

CHAPTER THREE

GROANING, Tess subsided weakly back against the pillow. Her head felt as though it might well explode.

‘That wine should carry a warning.’ The not unsympathetic response to her visible discomfort came from a point not too far from her left ear.

If her head hadn’t felt so fragile she’d have nodded in rueful agreement. ‘If I go so far as to look at that stuff again…’ With a disorientated gasp she opened her heavy eyelids with a snap—actually, in her head it sounded like a loud, painful clang.

Dark eyes smiled solicitously back at her. Her disorientation deepened and the clanging got infinitely worse.

‘You’re in my bed.’

Tess tried to sound as though finding an extraordinarily attractive man in her bed was an everyday occurrence. She failed miserably to achieve the right degree of insouciance.

Her manic thoughts continued to race around in unhelpful circles without delivering a single clue to explain away this bizarre situation.

‘On your bed,’ Rafe corrected pedantically as he curved an arm comfortably under his neck and rolled onto one side.

Did that make a difference? She hoped it did! A quick glance beneath the cosy duvet confirmed she was still wearing the least glamorous night apparel in her admittedly largely unglamorous wardrobe. Tess felt anything but cosy at that moment but she did clutch eagerly at this small crumb of comfort. And Rafe was fully clothed; that had to be a good sign…didn’t it?

A sign of what? a drily satirical voice in her head enquired. It wasn’t as if Rafe had ever displayed anything remotely resembling interest in her body. Why would he, when he had an obvious weakness for the tall, statuesque type? His married lover was probably another in the long line of blonde confident goddesses.

When she looked at the situation sensibly Tess was forced to concede that it bordered on the bizzarely improbable that he’d been overcome by lust! A fact which ought to have cheered her up, but since when did being forced to face the fact you didn’t have any sex appeal cheer up any girl?

Hell! I just wish I could remember so I know what I need to forget!

Unfortunately her amnesia only covered the problem of how, when and with whom—cancel the with whom, that was fairly obvious—she had gone to bed. The other awful events of the previous day were not at all fuzzy. Chloe and her betrothed were coming to take Ben to the zoo. Even Chloe had recognized—after a little judicious nudging—that she couldn’t remove her baby son without a little preparatory work.

Discovering she’d done something she would definitely regret with Rafe of all people might confirm her irresistibility, but it would also round off the worst day of her life perfectly! No, I couldn’t have…could I…? She surreptitiously searched his handsome face for some clue and discovered only a moderate degree of amusement, which could mean just about anything.

‘It isn’t the first time I’ve shared your bed, Tess—not by a long chalk, if you recall.’

Tess was surprised at the reference. Her tense expression softened. She did recall; she recalled hugging his skinny juvenile body to her own and as often as not falling to sleep with his dark head cradled against her flat chest.

The poignant image unexpectedly brought a lump to her throat. She’d never had a friendship as close as the one she’d once shared with a much younger, more vulnerable Rafe. It wasn’t reasonable to expect that degree of intimacy to extend into adulthood, but it was depressing to realise how far apart they’d grown recently. If something was that good it was worth making a bit of effort to preserve it. Their friendship might not have thrived on neglect, but at least it hadn’t withered and died.

She let out a tiny sigh and allowed herself to feel hopeful. If this time had been as innocent as those far-off occasions he was referring to, she had nothing to worry about. She’d have felt even more relieved if Rafe didn’t have the sort of voice that could make something as innocent as a nursery rhyme sound suggestive.

‘Is the old walnut tree still outside the bedroom window?’

These days women usually opened the door for him…except for Claudine…His eyes grew chilly as he recalled that significant door that had been closed firmly in his face. Pity it hadn’t closed before he’d made a total fool of himself!

‘No, it was diseased, we had to have it chopped down,’ Tess told him in a brisk tone that didn’t even hint at how upset she’d been by this necessity.

‘Time gets to us all,’ he sighed mournfully.

Her eyes made a swift, resentful journey over his large, virile person. Sure, he looked really decrepit! To add insult to injury, she suspected that even in this sizzlingly spectacular condition he was some way off his prime just yet.

‘It doesn’t seem right,’ he continued. ‘A Walnut Cottage without a walnut tree.’

The same thought had occurred to her but she didn’t let on. ‘You’re not going all nostalgic on me, are you? If it makes you feel any better,’ she conceded, ‘I planted several seedlings after they cut the old one down. And in the interests of accuracy I ought to point out that this was Gran’s room back then; so was the bed.’

The one he had shared with her had been a narrow metal-framed affair that would probably collapse under him these days, she thought, letting her eyes roam over his lengthy, muscular frame.

Who’d have thought that skinny kid would turn into something as perfectly developed as this awesome specimen? Aware that her breath was coming faster as her eyes lingered, she took a deep breath and passed the tip of her tongue over her dry lips. When she swallowed, her throat was equally dry and aching as if she wanted to cry—only she didn’t.

It was all right to notice that a man oozed sexual magnetism; it was quite another to let the fact turn you ga-ga. Rafe had enough people raving on about his physical perfection without her joining the fan club! She looked up anxiously to see if he’d noticed her drooling display and saw his eyes weren’t on her face at all.

‘A lot of things have changed since then.’ His deep voice was warmly appreciative as he continued to stare at the up-tilted outline of her small breasts.

He lifted his head and his eyes were slumberously sexy. Her breasts responded as though he’d touched the soft mounds of quivering flesh with his warm mouth. The startling image banished all rational thoughts from her head for one long, steamy moment. Nostrils flared, cheeks burning, she fought her way back to sanity.

‘Some things don’t change—things like your complete disregard for other people’s feelings.’ It was a whopping big lie, so to justify it she began to feverishly search her memory for some example to prove her point. Triumphantly she discovered one. ‘Your family must have worried like crazy about you when you went missing all those times…?’ Looking at it now through adult eyes, she saw aspects to Rafe’s frequent nocturnal wanderings that her childish eyes had never seen.

‘If concern is expressed by the vigour of the punishment, they were deeply concerned.’ Something in his cynical voice made her search his stony face.