She dipped her head in silent acknowledgement of his words, biting down hard on her lower lip, sucking it between her teeth, holding back dredging disappointment.
Stupid to have hoped he was ready to say he believed what she’d told him, was willing to go forward, build on the rebirth of trust and understanding.
Had he asked for more time just to stop her walking away? Making the breakdown of their marriage public, shattering Catherine’s happy illusions and making it difficult for him to have a say in his brother’s child’s future welfare—much less be the constant presence in his or her life he had always insisted on?
Or had he really had a change of heart? Had he been telling the truth when he’d implied he was trying to come to terms with everything that had happened, that he wanted to be able to believe she loved him?
She didn’t know. But she had to take the chance because it was the only one she had.
‘I’ll go along with that. Take all the time you need. I want you to believe me because, God knows, it’s the truth,’ she told him falteringly, and hoped to heaven she was doing the right thing in letting herself hope, not storing up more pain for the future, handing him a sharpened stake to thrust through her already bleeding heart.
CHAPTER NINE
RELUCTANTLY, Elena left the rustic seat at the far end of the garden, the one with the view over miles of open countryside, and began to amble slowly back towards the house.
She treasured these early-morning walks and the solitude she found; it was her way of escaping for just a little while. During the three days of Jed’s absence his mother had done nothing but chatter. She’d wanted to know every last detail of the ceremony, had clipped out every newspaper report she could find and was proudly sticking them in a scrapbook. And when that subject was temporarily exhausted she chattered excitedly about the cottage, the changes she and Susan would make after they moved in.
It was perfectly understandable. Talking non-stop about everything and anything took her mind off the recent loss of her son, and Elena was more than happy to listen, but she did need a few quiet times of her own in which to do some thinking.
Jed had phoned each evening. Until last night they’d been duty calls, largely made, Elena suspected, for his mother’s benefit, nothing personal.
But that had changed last night, when he’d said, ‘I’ve thought a lot about what you told me and there’s more I want to ask. But I’m beginning to think we can work this out—if you want that. I’ll be home tomorrow evening, hopefully around dinner time? Perhaps we should go back to Las Rocas. What do you think? We need to talk some more, and we can do it more easily on our own.’
Hope had lapped her body with warmth as she’d agreed shakily, a little breathlessly. ‘That sounds fine.’ And it had. It couldn’t get much finer. At least now he was willing to talk, perhaps to believe her and begin to understand the desperate, gnawing need that had driven her to accept Sam’s offer. ‘Shall I book the flights?’
‘No, leave it to me. I’ll arrange it for Friday, if I can.’
She had said, because it had been bothering her, ‘I really do think Catherine should be told about the baby before we leave. I couldn’t fasten my jeans this morning, so by the time we come back from Spain—’ fingers crossed they would be coming back together ‘—it might be obvious. I’ve no idea how quickly these things happen.’
His ensuing silence had alarmed her. Had it been too soon, taking too much for granted, to talk about her pregnancy with such apparent ease? It was a subject he couldn’t be happy with, and she could understand that. But the need to tell Catherine the truth had been playing on her mind.
‘You’re quite right,’ he’d agreed at last. ‘Whatever happens, she has to know the truth. Would you prefer to break the news on your own, or would you rather wait until I can be there?’
‘On my own, I think.’ The way he’d said ‘whatever happens’ meant he wasn’t sure about their future at all, she’d recognised dispiritedly. She didn’t want any bad vibes coming from him to spoil whatever pleasure Catherine could take in knowing her beloved Sam had left a child.
And now she was going back to the house to find Catherine and have that talk. Elena’s mouth went dry at the prospect. Unconsciously she straightened her shoulders, and tucked her workmanlike blue and white striped shirt more firmly beneath the waistband of her loosely styled white cotton chinos.
She ran Catherine to earth in the morning room, making designs for her new garden on graph paper. ‘Darling! You were quick—did you get everything you needed?’