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‘I know you miss your old life. Don’t pretend you don’t!’
Honesty made her hesitate. ‘Well, now and then, but...’
‘Do you ever hear from him?’
She didn’t pretend she didn’t know who he meant. ‘No,’ she said flatly, meeting his eyes.
‘There was a review of this new ballet in the paper the other day; Suzy showed it to me. It seems to be a big hit. They’re going on a world tour with it, it said.’
‘Yes, I saw reviews of it.’ She had bought a pile of newspapers after the first night and read them avidly, then burnt them in the garden trash burner so that Ross shouldn’t know how much Michael and the ballet still mattered to her. ‘I’m very glad for them, him and his new partner.’
She saw the flicker of disbelief in his face. ‘Are you really? Even though it should have been you? Don’t tell me you don’t wish you had been the one to create that part?’
‘It was my decision, my choice,’ she said levelly, knowing she was lying but refusing to admit it. Only a saint would not have envied the new girl the chance to create an entirely new role in such an important ballet, and Dylan was no saint.
‘Does that make it any easier to bear?’ Ross turned away, looked towards the window, frowning. ‘It isn’t going to snow today. The forecasts all said no snow until the end of the week. I’ll be back tomorrow lunchtime, and the baby isn’t due until the end of January.’
Taking a heavy tweed jacket from the wardrobe, he threw her a brief, unwilling glance. He must be able to see how close to tears she was, but he refused to take her worries seriously—what else had she expected? They had so little in common. He didn’t understand her and she certainly did not understand him.
They were opposites in every way; they came from different planets. They should never have met, let alone got married. She had had no idea just how far apart they were when she made that fatal decision to marry him and give up her career and her life in London. Did Ross regret having married her?
‘If you really loved me you’d take me with you!’ she accused, and he swung towards the bed, face grim.
‘Stop it! You should know by now that I won’t stand for that sort of emotional blackmail. You knew the sort of life you were marrying into; I didn’t lie to you. I told you I might sometimes have to leave you alone for hours on end. I told you the house was isolated and we had no close neighbours.’
She couldn’t deny it. He had told her all that, warned her that his was not the sort of life she was accustomed to, that she might find it hard and lonely, but she hadn’t cared then. She had been head over heels in love. All she had registered was that they would be alone together day after blissful day. It had sounded like heaven to her, then.
‘It was spring and I wasn’t pregnant!’ The changes in her body had been mirrored in her mind; lately her thoughts were as heavy as the way she moved, and the weather certainly did not help. Winter was more depressing than she had ever realised during the years when she’d lived in the city. It was easy to forget bad weather when you didn’t have to put up with frequent power cuts, when the streets were brightly lit and you could take a train underground, away from the rain and snow.
He sighed. ‘I know, you’ve had a difficult pregnancy, and Ella told me in her last letter that the last month is the worst of all. She always gets very restless.’
His sister had three children; she should know. Dylan wished Ella lived somewhere nearby—it would be so reassuring to be able to talk to her every day—but Ella’s husband worked for an oil company, which meant he and his wife and children lived abroad. At the moment they were all in Dubai, and wouldn’t be home in Britain for another year.
Dylan’s own sister, who had children too, lived sixty miles away in the Lake District; they could talk on the phone, but that wasn’t the same as sitting down to chat together face to face. You could talk more frankly, take time to get out what was on your mind.
Ross sat down on the side of the bed and took her hand. He was trying to be patient and understanding, but somehow, in her contrary mood, that didn’t please her either.
‘Dylan, I have to be at that meeting. Try to see it from my point of view. My job is important to me. This is an emergency meeting. If I’m not there they may take decisions I don’t agree with and it might be too late to change those decisions later. I can’t take you with me. I wish I could, but there won’t be any other wives coming.’
Eagerly she said, ‘But I could stay in the hotel and...’
‘Dylan, I won’t have any free time. I wouldn’t be able to see you. And if you’re honest you know a long drive wouldn’t be a good idea. You would get bad cramp and backache; you always do lately, even on short drives.’
Bumping over rough roads to go shopping in the village two miles away was making her feel ill at the moment. In every way her body was letting her down, after years of discipline and obedience. She looked up at Ross, biting her lower lip in frustration, wishing she could deny what he had just said.
He put a hand into his inside jack
et pocket. ‘Look, I’ll leave my mobile with you—then if anything did happen to the phone lines you could still call for help.’ He put the mobile phone on the bedside table and bent towards her. ‘Feel better now?’
‘I’m not a child, Ross! Stop talking to me in that patronising voice. Being pregnant doesn’t make me stupid. ’
‘You could have fooled me!’ Ross pushed a hand impatiently through his thick black hair. ‘I can’t stand here arguing with you all morning. I’m sorry but I have to go. I must get to York in time for lunch with the others.’
He kissed her, his mouth warm against her cold, averted cheek. Her nostrils quivered, picking up his male scent, his skin freshly showered and shaved, his aftershave the fragrance of pines, arousing memories of those long-ago nights last summer, when they had made love in the forest, on a bed of green fern in the warm, breathing twilight.
It seemed so long ago. At the memory she was on the verge of tears again. They had been so happy in the beginning—where had it all gone, the laughter and passion, the closeness and need?
Ross didn’t love her any more. He hadn’t even tried to cuddle her for weeks; he always slept in the spare room.
