Page 19 of The Rings that Bind


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By the time he had dressed, donning a short-sleeved navy linen shirt and charcoal chinos, and left the bedroom, Rosa was back at her desk. It didn’t surprise him.

‘What are you doing?’

She jumped and slammed down the lid of her laptop. ‘Nothing.’

‘Nothing? Really? Then why have your cheeks gone red?’

‘It’s personal.’

‘Did you remember to save it before you closed the lid?’ he asked pointedly.

Rosa’s cheeks coloured even brighter. Her face tight, her lips clenched into a thin line, she got up from her chair and stalked past him, grabbing a small clutch bag off the table. ‘Are we going?’

Nico briefly debated opening her laptop and doing a thorough investigation into what she had been up to.

‘If we don’t leave now we’ll be late,’ she reminded him. ‘And we wouldn’t want to be late for Robert and Laura, would we?’

What would his demanding answers achieve? He knew who she had been in touch with. If she hadn’t been corresponding with Stephen why else would she be so evasive?

Swallowing the bile that had risen in his throat, and making a mental note to check out her laptop after she had fallen asleep, Nico locked the front door behind them and they set off.

‘Why have you removed your shoes?’ he asked, after glancing at her and realising she had shrunk. The top of her head was once again barely level with his armpit.

‘Believe me, these shoes are not made for walking.’

‘So why wear them?’

‘I’m not. I’m carrying them.’

‘Your feet will get cut.’

‘This pathway’s so smooth I bet Robert’s had the sweepers out.’

There was not a lot he could say to that type of logic—especially when his mind was still consumed with rabid, ugly thoughts.

He had to know.

‘Have you heard from him?’

‘Who?’

‘Stephen.’

Her answer came succinctly. ‘No.’

‘Do you think you will hear from him again?’

A mirthless sound that might have been some form of laugh escaped from her throat. ‘Nico, it was a disaster. I should never have gone out with him...’ Her voice trailed off before she added quietly, ‘I doubt Stephen will ever want to see me again.’

But did she want to see him again? For some reason the question stuck in his throat.

And if she hadn’t been corresponding with Stephen then what had she been up to on the laptop?

‘How did you meet up with him again?’ he asked, keeping his voice on a nice, even keel. ‘I thought you had cut him out of your life?’

‘I had.’

Deliberately he let the silence envelop them.

‘I bumped into him a couple of months ago at the dealership when I went to buy my new car.’

‘You have a new car?’

‘Yes.’

‘What did you get?’

‘A Fiat 500.’

‘Ah, yes. I recall seeing it in the garage. I assumed it was Gloria’s. Why didn’t you go for something more selective?’

‘By “selective” I assume you mean more expensive?’

‘Da. If it was a matter of cost, I would have been happy to pay for it.’

‘That’s very generous, Nico, but I’ve made it perfectly clear I don’t want your money.’

‘You are my wife, Rosa. I appreciate ours is not a conventional marriage but it still means something. If you need anything you only have to ask.’ In eleven months of marriage she hadn’t asked for anything from him. She really was—had been—the perfect wife.

They arrived at the hotel, pausing for a moment so Rosa could put her shoes back on before walking into the lobby. He felt her stiffen beside him and knew without asking that she had seen Laura King, who was propped against the bar, towering over her diminutive husband.

At the functions they’d attended as a married couple he had noticed the way Rosa’s generous smile would not quite meet her eyes when she was introduced to the starlets and models that littered the social scene. Often he had wondered if she disapproved of them—an irrelevant question he had never before felt compelled to ask.

She’d displayed the same stiffness then as she was displaying now, with Laura looming towards her.

It suddenly dawned on him that it was not disapproval she felt. He didn’t know what it could be—and neither should he care—but in that brief moment of understanding a strange compulsion swept through him, an impulse to wrap his arm around her and offer reassurances that everything would be fine.

Internally he recoiled. The idea of offering comfort, or reassurance, or anything of a physical nature beyond sex, was anathema to him. He didn’t have a clue what the requirements of such an act were, and nor would he know the right words to say.

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