Convenient Brides (28 page)

Emily took the card, immediately feeling tainted by its presence in her hand. She felt as if she’d just stepped into a carefully laid snare, but it was too late to step back out of it now.

Danny waved a hand and was gone, disappearing into the crowd of Friday afternoon shoppers. She sat and stared at the card in her hand and wondered if today was going to get any worse. It hardly seemed likely, but she was wrong.

The bus she caught back to the city got swallowed up by a nasty traffic snarl approaching the Harbour Bridge. Emily sat clammily in the late-afternoon heat, her brow beading with perspiration in spite of the air-conditioning. The bus moved by millimetres every five minutes or so, as impatient drivers fought for their turn to merge into the already crowded lanes.

Emily began to think it would be quicker to walk, and was even considering asking the driver to open the door for her when all of a sudden the traffic started to flow. Relief seemed to spread through the bus as each of the other passengers settled back in their seats for the remainder of the journey.

She was exhausted by the time she walked up the path towards Damien’s front door. A raging thirst had given her a headache and her right foot had developed a blister on the heel. It was close to seven p.m. and she knew Damien would be wondering where she was. Before she could find her key in her bag the door opened and he stood there, all six feet four of him, his dark brown eyes raking her from head to toe.

‘I suppose it would be a complete waste of time to ask you where you’ve been?’ he drawled.

She brushed past him, her right shoe in her hand. ‘I could ask you the same question.’

‘I was at work all day,’ he said. ‘Waiting for you to call.’

Emily turned to look at him. ‘And was it a trying day at the office—darling?’ she asked with sugar-sweet derision.

He frowned as his gaze swept over her dishevelled form. ‘You don’t seem to be in a very good mood,’ he observed. ‘Has something happened?’

She could have screamed at him.
Yes, I’m having your child!
She could hear the words forming in her throat and hastily swallowed them. This was definitely not the right time to drop that particular bombshell.

‘I’m hot and tired. My bus was caught in traffic and I had to sit for an hour and twenty minutes while the lanes cleared. I have a headache too,’ she added despondently.
And I saw you with your mistress in the middle of town and your brother is a creep who’d sell his grandmother to make a dollar.

‘Why don’t you have a shower and I’ll bring you up some paracetamol?’

Emily sighed gratefully and carried on up the stairs.

She was towelling her hair dry after her shower when he came into the
en suite
bathroom with a glass of water and two white tablets. She tucked the ends of the towel across her breasts and took the glass from him. She was raising it to her mouth just as he reached down to pick up something off the floor near the vanity basin.

‘What’s this?’ he asked.

She stared in horror at the scrunched up packet in his hand. It was the pregnancy test she’d used that morning.

E
MILY
froze.

Damien unfolded the packet and stood looking at it for a long time. He scrunched it back up and tossed it in the bin near the basin. His expression when he turned to look at her was inscrutable.

‘I was going to tell you—’ she began uncomfortably. She cleared the restriction in her throat before continuing. ‘I’m pregnant.’

‘But I thought you said you were taking the Pill?’ His eyes lasered hers.

Emily lowered her gaze.

‘I suppose it’s rather impolitic of me to ask, but is it mine?’

Her stomach churned at the contempt in his voice.

‘What do you think?’ she asked, hoping he’d see beyond the mask of pride in her tone.

He sucked in a breath that she felt all along the length of her spine.

‘I think I’m finally starting to see why you married me.’

She didn’t trust herself to speak. His eyes hardened as they bored into hers.

‘I didn’t just solve your financial problems, did I? I also provided a convenient safety net for your love-child. Does Danny know?’

She shook her head, close to tears at his ready assump-tion that this baby wasn’t his. Did he really think so badly of her? That she’d use him in such a way?

He gave her a scornful look when she didn’t speak.

‘I can’t believe you managed to pull it off. Here I was,
thinking I had outmanoeuvred you, while all the time you had me falling neatly into a snare of your own.’

‘Damien, I never intended this to—’

He dismissed her with a carelessly flung hand. ‘Me, of all people. The irony, if only you knew, is unbelievable.’

‘It’s not what you’re thinking—’

‘Don’t try and weasel your way out of this,’ he barked. ‘I should’ve seen it coming but I didn’t. Quite frankly, I didn’t think you’d go so low, but then it proves how deluded us men really are. I should’ve known there’d be a high price to pay for the pleasure I’ve had from that delec-table body of yours.’ He gave her another sweeping glance that chilled her to the bone. ‘When is it due?’

Emily was beyond the maths in her upset state. ‘I’m…I’m not sure. I don’t know how far along I am.’

He turned around and slammed his fist into the wall near the door. She shrank from the violence in his action, her eyes widening in alarm. She’d never seen him so out of control before and it frightened her.

‘Please, Damien,’ she choked. ‘Please listen to me.’

He pushed himself away from the wall and faced her, his eyes like savage pools of hatred. ‘I need to be on my own for a while,’ he said. ‘Don’t wait up.’

Emily watched him leave the bathroom, her heart breaking with each step he took away from her.

She heard the front door slam and then the roar of his Lamborghini as he sped out of the driveway as if the hounds of hell were after him. She sank to the floor and bent her head into her knees. There was nothing she could do—he’d already made up his mind. There was simply nothing she could do.

Emily crawled into bed some time later and slept fitfully until she heard the sound of Damien’s car returning. She heard him clatter about in the kitchen downstairs and then in the lounge, where she heard him switch on the television. The noise of the replay of a one-day cricket match made it
impossible for her to go back to sleep. She listened to the background drone for a few minutes before she dragged herself out of the bed. She reached for her bathrobe and, giving the lounge a wide berth, headed for the kitchen for something to settle her squeamish stomach.

She was peering into the refrigerator when Damien spoke from behind her. ‘Can I get you something? Some toast or an egg?’ There was no trace of the earlier anger in his voice.

Emily shut the fridge and looked up at him. There were lines of tension around his firm mouth, but his expression remained impassive.

‘I’ll have some toast.’ She moved towards the toaster.

‘I’ll get it,’ he said, crossing the room. ‘You sit down.’

Emily sat down on the nearest kitchen stool and watched as he took bread from the freezer compartment and popped it into the toaster.

He leant back against the bench while he waited for it to cook, his arms folded across his chest. ‘I should apologise for my behaviour earlier,’ he said.

‘It doesn’t matter.’ She looked away, frightened she might start crying.

‘Yes, it does.’ She heard him reach for a plate and a knife. ‘I hadn’t taken into account at that stage the impact of this on you.’

‘What do you mean?’

He turned at the pop of the toaster and began spreading the toast with the margarine he’d taken from the fridge.

‘I was thinking of how your news impacted on me. I’m afraid I hadn’t given much thought to how it impacted on you.’

Emily retreated into one of her helpless silences.

‘I assume this pregnancy wasn’t planned?’

She shook her head.

‘Then what do you plan to do?’

‘I…I hadn’t thought that far.’

‘You not intending to…’ he paused as he searched for the right euphemism ‘…get rid of it?’

‘Of course not!’ She snatched at the toast he handed her and turned away. ‘This is my fault—I’m the one who has to face the consequences, not the totally innocent party.’

‘I don’t think you should tell Danny, at least not now. I don’t think he’d take it too well.’

Emily toyed with the toast on her plate with agitated fingers. Damien handed her the honey jar and a knife. Their fingers touched briefly and she pulled her hand away as if it had been burnt.

‘I hate to destroy any image you might have of your expected child’s father, but Danny’s prime motivation in life is to make money at someone else’s expense.’

‘Danny isn’t—’

‘I know what you’re going to say,’ he interrupted her. ‘I’ve heard it all before from the various girlfriends he’s had in the past. I’ve had to pay off quite a few before you came along.’

Emily’s stomach hollowed.

‘I wasn’t really his—’

‘Quite frankly, I’m not too interested in the details.’ He cut across her denial. ‘Danny is somewhat of a law unto himself. You’d be wise to give him a wide berth. Why not pass this child off as mine? No one will question it.’

No one but you!
she thought despairingly.

‘But—’

He stalled her protest with a raised hand.

‘No, I insist. It will do me good to bring up someone else’s child. It will help me get a perspective on some old issues that keep cropping up.’

Emily pushed away her toast. ‘Damien, I need to explain—’

‘Please.’ He grasped her hand, stalling her confession. ‘I insist. We’re both adults. We can deal with this.’

‘But you don’t understand!’ she cried.

‘Oh, but I do,’ he said. ‘More than you’ll ever know.’

She gave up at that point. Her head was still pounding and the toast he’d made was lying untouched in front of her.

‘I’m so tired,’ she said in defeat.

‘Come on.’ He took her by the arm, helping her to her feet. ‘Let’s get you into bed where you belong.’

Emily leant on him gratefully, too exhausted to say the things she needed to say. Her mind was scrambled with a host of erratic thoughts. How could she prove this was Damien’s child? Would he consent to a DNA test? What would he say when he finally found out the truth, or would it be too late? Hadn’t they already said and done too much?

She slipped in between the cool sheets and closed her eyes. Damien drew the covers over her and stood by the bedside for a moment, thinking.

‘We should call a doctor,’ he said after a moment or two. ‘Have you checked out.’

‘I’m fine, really.’

‘You don’t eat properly,’ he said. ‘You’ve lost even more weight since we’ve been married. You’ve got to think about the baby.’

‘I know,’ she said into the pillow. ‘I’ll try.’

She sighed and closed her eyes, her body insisting on sleep even though her mind was tortured with the anguish of her situation. Her body won. Within minutes she was asleep, oblivious to the dark, concerned gaze of her husband, who was standing looking down at her.

The nausea hit her hard the next morning. As she dryretched over the basin she was aware of Damien listening on the other side of the
en suite
bathroom door.

‘Open the door, Emily,’ he commanded.

She retched again and turned on the tap.

‘I…I won’t be long,’ she gasped.

‘Open the damn door!’

She grabbed a towel with one hand and unsnibbed the door with the other.

‘Am I to be allowed no privacy?’ she flared at him. ‘I don’t need an audience right now.’

He stepped into the bathroom, his height and breadth instantly shrinking the room. ‘You shouldn’t lock yourself in here. You could faint, or something, and injure yourself.’

‘And why should you care?’ she sniped at him. ‘All your problems would be over then, wouldn’t they?’

His mouth set into a tight line as he looked down at her pale features, taking in her shadowed eyes and trembling bottom lip, which she was trying to disguise by biting down on it with her straight white teeth.

‘Emily…’ He touched her on the shoulder but she flinched away.

‘Excuse me…’ She bent over the basin again and he winced at the wretched sounds of her being sick.

‘Oh, Emily.’ His hand on the curve of her back was gentle as he stroked her.

‘I’ll be…I’ll be fine in a minute.’

She rinsed her mouth and washed her face. He handed her a towel and she buried her face in it.

‘Perhaps I should take you to a doctor.’

‘No.’ She put the towel in the washing hamper. ‘I just need some dry toast or something. It’ll pass in a few minutes.’

‘Go back to bed and I’ll bring some up,’ he offered.

Emily went back to the bed and lay down to wait for his return. She felt a rush of warmth at his gentle handling of her, as if he cared for her in some small way. But then, she reminded herself, he was just doing what any normal person would do for someone who was suffering.

Damien came back with tea and toast on a tray and set it down across her knees. ‘Here you go—breakfast in bed.’

‘Thank you.’ She tentatively nibbled at a piece of wholewheat toast, conscious of his watchful gaze.

‘I thought we might go out somewhere today,’ he said, sitting on the edge of the bed. ‘That is, if you’re feeling better.’

Emily swallowed the mouthful of toast and asked, ‘Where were you thinking of going?’

‘What about lunch at one of the Bondi Beach cafés, followed by a leisurely walk around to Bronte? We could take our bathers and have a swim. It would do you good to get some fresh air.’

Emily wondered if Bondi was such a good idea. She didn’t want to run into Danny, certainly not while she was with Damien.

‘I’m not very good at beach swimming,’ she prevaricated. ‘I got swamped by a wave a few years ago. I only dip my toes in now.’

‘I’ll be with you,’ he assured her. ‘There’s only a small swell today. I just heard the surf report on the radio.’

She knew he was making a huge effort to make peace with her and found it hard to resist his easygoing charm. It was a side of him she hadn’t experienced and she wanted more of it.

‘All right.’ She picked up the second quarter of toast. ‘I’ll come.’

The crescent of Bondi Beach was a riot of colour and activity, crowds of people either sunning themselves on the golden arc of sand or swimming in the deep blue of the gently rolling swell.

They sat at one of the pavement cafés and Emily sipped at a freshly squeezed orange juice while waiting for the sandwiches Damien had ordered. An easy silence had fallen between them. Emily was trying to relax more in his company, feeling she too had to make some sort of effort as well.

‘You’re looking a little better already,’ Damien observed as he reached for his latte.

‘It’s a heck of a way to start the day,’ she said ruefully. ‘But I’ve heard it only lasts a few weeks.’

‘I hope so, otherwise you’ll fade away to a shadow. There’s not much of you now.’

‘There’ll soon be a whole lot more of me.’ She twirled the straw in her glass reflectively.

‘Emily—’ He shifted in his chair slightly. ‘I think we need to discuss our future.’

Emily’s heart sank. She felt certain this was the part where he would inform her of his intention to release her from their marriage. The deal was off. He’d got what he wanted—the book was never going to be written now. There was no real point in continuing, especially now he was convinced she was carrying his brother’s child. Was it too late to tell him the truth? All she had to do was open her mouth and say the words. But somehow she couldn’t. She didn’t want to tie him to her because of their child. She wanted him to love her just for her, nothing else.

She looked across at him, her fingers around the glass tightening to stop the slight tremble of her hand.

‘We don’t need to continue this arrangement,’ he said. ‘It’s not appropriate under the circumstances.’

‘I understand.’ She lowered her eyes to the glass in her hand.

‘I forced you into it, and it’s not fair to expect you to carry it through.’

‘When…’ She cleared her throat delicately. ‘When would you like me to leave?’

‘What?’

She raised her eyes to his but his expression was puzzled, his brow creased in a heavy frown.

‘I can go back to my apartment. Or, if the tenants don’t want to vacate it just yet, I can always rent something else.’

‘Emily, I’m not following you. What’s this about leaving?’

Now it was her turn to look puzzled.

‘Isn’t that what you want?’ she asked. ‘For us to dissolve this marriage—or
arrangement
, as you put it.’

‘I wasn’t talking about ending our marriage.’

‘You…you weren’t?’

‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘I was referring to our six-week deal. I’m calling it off.’

She blinked at him uncomprehendingly. ‘Off?’

‘Things are different now,’ he said. ‘You’ll need support over the next few months.’

‘You want me to stay?’ She stared at him. ‘For how long?’

He shrugged. ‘For as long as it takes. It’s not easy bringing up a child alone. I think we should at least make an effort to provide a stable home for him or her.’