Reluctant Wife(53)

Then that green-flecked gaze slid down to study Roz, thoroughly, and for some reason she caught her breath and felt Adam’s hand tighten on her shoulder. She couldn’t tear her eyes away.



Until the croupier called, ‘Place your bets, please,’ and the woman in green smiled faintly and did the strangest thing. She raised one hand to sketch a salute, then turned to the table.



Adam said a moment later, ‘Had enough, Roz?’



‘Yes. Yes!’



* * *



They lay side by side high above the Paradise Centre in their room in the luxurious new Ramada Hotel, not speaking, not sleeping.



Adam had been quiet on the way back from the casino and Roz the same, still gripped by that curious encounter.



He had already been in bed when Roz came out of the bathroom, lying with his hands behind his head, and he hadn’t stirred as she moved quietly about the room, tidying up. Then she had slipped beneath the sheet beside him and he had slid an arm around her shoulder but not turned his head.



She moved closer now and laid her cheek on his shoulder. ‘Who was she?’



He said, when she thought he wasn’t going to answer, ‘Louise.’



‘I wondered if that was who she was,’ Roz murmured. ‘She’s very beautiful and unusual.’



‘So are man-eating tigers, I’m told,’ he said drily.



‘Is this,’ Roz hesitated, ‘the first time you’ve seen her since…’



‘Yes. They live in Perth.’



She asked no more questions, and presently he gathered her into his arms and as they lay together she felt the tension drain out of him. ‘I thought,’ Adam said into her hair, ‘rather, I used to think what a triumph; it would be to see her again, to be able to show her that I’d made it—show her what she’d walked away from.’



‘And it wasn’t like that?’ Roz. asked gently.



‘No. The opposite. It was her moment of triumph. Which made me angry, I guess. Because all these years I’ve avoided looking one fact in the face.’



Roz held her breath.



‘I might not have loved her,’ he explained, ‘but she dented my pride pretty badly. And all this time I’ve thought of her as grasping and on the make, deep down. I’ve thought … all right, even if I fell out of love ‘with her, or perhaps I was never in love with her, I didn’t do that to her—walk away into the arms of another woman. But she’s proved me wrong. And in doing so, exposed my ego.’



Do you mean …?’



‘I think I mean it would have been all right if I’d sent her away, but to be walked out on, and for another man who was richer and older, rather stuck in my gullet. Which is ridiculous, because the alternative was to live together in misery. I knew that—pride is a crazy thing, obviously.’



‘But she’s stuck to him ?’ Roz whispered.



‘Yes. And made him very happy, I would say, by the look of it.’



‘Do you think she fell in love with him, or …?’



‘I don’t know, Roz. Not at the time, I didn’t. Now it doesn’t seem to matter. What matters is that she had the perception and wisdom to take her life into her own hands. I believe they have four children.’



Roz winced. ‘And I have you,’ Adam said very quietly, and began to make love to her with exquisite slowness.





They left on Sunday morning quite early. But. as they were waiting to turn on to the highway, who should walk across their bows but none other than Michael Howard and a girl of about twenty.



Roz blinked and stared.



They were holding hands, Mike and his wife, and she was unexceptionally pretty and had quality Roz couldn’t for an instant put her finger on. Then it occurred to her, as they walked on down the pavement on her side of the car, that she looked practical and capable, somehow—like Mrs Howard.



She watched them as Adam drew out into the traffic, which was heavy, so for as time they kept pace. They were talking, engrossed in each other and, it was easy to see, happy. And for Roz it was like watching an acquaintance, not someone who once had desperately wanted to marry her.



Then they turned a comer and she turned to Adam. He took his eyes of the road and there was a query in them.



‘What a coincidence,‘ she said a little breathlessly. ‘I mean, you seeing Louise the other day and me seeing Mike today.’



He didn’t say anything, but when they stopped at a traffic light, he put his hand over hers.



‘How did you know about him? Being married?’ she asked.



‘He applied for at job with us—not Milroy Electronics but a subsidiary company. He probably didn’t realise it was connected. I happened to be attending a managerial conference when his application came up for consideration. All his particulars were on the form, and because the name rang a bell, I looked at it. They’re living with his parents—that was the address he gave, anyway—and his wife is a nurse. They’ve been married for about four months now.’