Reluctant Wife(41)

She rubbed it mechanically and waited with baited breath.



‘What makes you think that, Roz?’ he said finally with a spark of anger in his eyes that frightened her. ‘And are you only asking that or hoping it?’



‘No! I’m sorry, I shouldn’t … I …’ She stopped and made helpless little gesture. ‘I’ll go to bed.’



‘And hope that in the morning things will have sorted themselves out?’ he mocked.



She trembled and said huskily, ‘I think you expect an awful lot sometimes, Adam …’ Only to to wonder immediately why she’d said it. Yet wasn’t it true that he’d married her without loving her and everything came back to that? Yes.



She tilted her chin and started to say goodnight, but he interrupted her. ‘Do I, Roz? Perhaps. Goodnight.’





Roz slipped into her own bed feeling exhausted and drained, her moment of defiance gone, and fell into an uneasy sleep until about eight o’clock when the sound of raised voices woke her. This was so unusual she sat up in alarm—and realised the voices were coming closer and she could hear Milly, saying, ‘She must have done it between the time I went to bed and you came home, or maybe later, I don’t know, but I didn’t hear a thing. Was her car in the garage when you …?’



‘I didn’t park my car in the garage, I didn’t even open the doors!’ Adams said furiously then. ‘I left it out front, where it still is if you’d care to look. Nor did I think to check her bed, but the real mystery to me is how this could have all blown up without you or Roz being…’



The voices stopped outside her bedroom door, then it opened violently and Adam stood in the doorway with a piece of paper in his hands and an expression of such anger on his face that Roz put her hand to her throat fearfully and stammered, ‘what is it?’ although she had an incredulous inkling.



‘He shut the door sharply behind him, but not before Roz saw Milly standing in the passage, her face white and worried.



‘Read this,’ said Adam through his teeth, and strode over to the bed to thrust the piece of paper at her. He was dressed in jeans and a T-shirt.



‘What is it?’



‘As if you don’t know,’ he said sardonically, and took the paper back. ‘I’ll read it—it’s from Nicky, and it was on the hall table. “Dear Roz, I hope you don’t think this is cowardly of me leaving you to explain things to Adam, but I’ve decided to take your advice. You did say I would have to make up my own mind. Well, I have. I want to marry Richard… ”’ he broke off, exclaimed violently, ‘Richard! I don’t believe it!’



‘Go on,’ Roz said. ‘Is there more?’



‘Oh yes! She says “… and if the family don’t approve they’ll never see me again” She then,’ he went on with such withering scorn that Roz blanched, ‘goes through detailed instructions about how, we’re to place an advertisement in the personal column of a newspaper to signify our approval.’



‘She … I …’ Roz put her hands to her mouth, because if she’d thought he looked angry last night it was nothing to how he was looking at her now.



‘You?’ he queried, then when she couldn’t speak, ‘Don’t worry, I just know I have you to thank for this, Roz. Were you trying to relive your life through Nicky when you gave her your advice? Were you thinking longingly of Mike Howard, the great love of your life that you let slip through your fingers because everyone told you he was too young, but most particularly me?’



‘No! No, you don’t understand,’ Roz cried.



‘Then Nicky’s lying? You never said that to her?’ he grated.



‘No! Yes, I did, but…’



‘Then you’ll pay for this, Roz,’ he said in the hardest voice she’d ever heard..



‘Adam, you don’t understand. It wasn’t like that at all!’



‘Oh, but I do,’ he said with soft menace. ‘And so will you shortly.’ He walked out and slammed the door.



Roz scrambled out of bed to go after him, then she hesitated and decided to get dressed first. At random she pulled on a pair of jeans and a. pink cotton blouse which she was still buttoning as she ran downstairs.



The kitchen was empty, so she tried Adam’s study and he was there with Milly, talking into the phone, Margaret she guessed as he said, ‘I want Richard down here within an hour, and if you can lay your hands on Amy bring her too. No buts, Margaret, just come.’ He slammed the phone, down and glanced at Roz.