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Her expression changed as she gazed out over the shadowy garden edged by trees and the fields beyond.
How utterly her life had changed! How totally. All because of Marc...
She felt emotion crush within her. Should she regret what she had done? Wish that it had not happened? That it had not changed her so absolutely?
How could she regret it?
She gave a sigh—but not one of happiness. Nor of unhappiness. It was an exquisitely painful mix of both.
I can think of neither—feel neither. Not together.
Separately, yes, each one could fill her being. They were contradictory to one another. But they never cancelled each other out. Only...bewildered her. Tormented her.
She felt emotion buckling her. Oh, to have such joy and such pain combined!
She felt her hand clutch what she was holding, then made herself open her palm, gaze down at what was within. In the darkness the vivid colour of the precious gems was not visible, yet it still seemed to glow with a light of its own.
It was a complication she must shed.
I should never have taken it! Never kept it to remember him by!
She felt the emotion that was so unbearable, buckle her again. For one long moment she continued to gaze at what she held. Then slowly, very slowly, she closed her hand again.
She had kept it long enough—far too long. It must be returned. She must not keep it. Could not. Not now. Especially not now.
The emotion came again, convulsing her, stronger than ever. Oh, sense and rational thought and every other worldly consideration might cry out against what she was set on—but they could not prevail. Must not.
I know what I must do and I will do it.
With a slow, heavy movement she withdrew from the window, crossed over to the little old-fashioned dressing table that had once been her grandmother’s and let fall what she held in her hand.
The noise of its fall was muffled by the piece of paper onto which it slithered. That, too, must be returned. And when it had been the last link with Marc would be severed. Almost the last...
She turned away, her empty hand slipping across her body. There was one thing that would always bind them, however much he no longer wanted her. But she must never tell him. For one overwhelming reason.
Because he does not want me. He is done with me. He has made that crystal-clear. His rejection of me is absolute.
So it did not matter, did it? Anything else could not matter.
However good it was, it was only ever meant to be for that brief time. I knew that, and so did he, and that is what we both intended. That is what I must hold in my head now. And what he gave me to show me that he had done with me, so that I understood and accepted it, must go back to him. Because it is the right and the only thing to do.
And when it was gone she would
get on with the life that awaited her now. With all its pain and joy. Joy and pain. Mingling for ever now.
* * *
Marc was back in Paris. After New York he’d had the sudden urge to catch up with all his affairs in the Americas, making an extensive tour of branches of Banc Derenz from Quebec to Buenos Aires, which had taken several weeks. There had been no pressing need—at least not from a business perspective—but it had seemed a good idea to him, all the same, for reasons he’d had no wish to examine further.
The tour had served its purpose—putting space and time between those heady, carefree days at the villa and the rest of his life.
Now, once more in Paris, he was burying himself in work and an endless round of socialising in which he had no interest at all, but knew it was necessary.
And yet neither the tour of the Americas, nor his current punishing workload, nor the endless round of social engagements he was busying himself with were having the slightest effect.
He still wanted Tara. Wanted her back in his life. The one woman he wanted but should not want.
With the same restlessness that had dominated him since he’d flown to New York a few months ago he looked out over the Parisian cityscape, wanting Tara there with him.
