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His eyes felt gritty with tension and lack of sleep. In two hours’ time he needed to leave for the airport. The last thing he felt like doing was walking away from Polly right now, absenting himself from her life and leaving the field wide open to Phil Bernstein, knowing the other man would be bombarding her with flattery and attention.
Just what was the attraction the other man possessed that he did not? What was it that had made Polly turn to Phil and not to him? Pushing back the bedclothes, Marcus got out of bed. Polly was deeply asleep and he knew that if he stayed where he was the temptation to wake her up and demand to know what made Bernstein so attractive to her and not him would be too much for him.
Wasn’t it the female sex that was supposed to need emotional reassurance and close physical contact after sex and not his own? But, when it came to the feelings of longing and insecurity that loving someone who did not return one’s feelings provoked, Marcus suspected that there wasn’t that much difference between the sexes.
He might as well get dressed and leave for the airport, he told himself; there was nothing to be gained by staying where he was, waking Polly and provoking an argument with her which he knew would result in her defending her feelings for Phil Bernstein.
Half an hour later, as he gently closed the bedroom door behind him so as not to waken Polly, he couldn’t help reflecting that another man—a man who did not care as deeply as he did—might have taken a rather macho pleasure in knowing that, whilst Bernstein might be the man Polly had fallen in love with, he was the one she had gone to bed with and given herself to…But then it wasn’t Polly’s body he wanted; it was her love, her commitment, herself—all of her.
Two hours later, when the early-morning call Marcus had booked for himself came through from the reception desk, it woke Polly, who reached automatically for the telephone receiver, listening as the voice on the other end told her brightly, ‘This is your early-morning call, Mr Fraser. You wanted to be woken in time to catch your flight to China.’
China…Marcus had gone to China? Numbly Polly replaced the receiver.
Blurred images of the evening’s events replayed themselves over and over again inside her head whilst she shivered in a mixture of despair and disbelief.
How could she have behaved in such a way; cheapened herself like that? Oh, she knew that the modern view was that a woman had as much right to freedom of sexual expression as a man, but she was not a modern woman, not in that respect, and it hurt her to know that she had betrayed herself so badly and allowed her emotions, her love to override her normal caution.
Now Marcus must know just how she felt about him. No wonder he had left without so much as waking her up to say goodbye. In just a few self-indulgent, sex-crazed hours she had demolished all the years of careful defences and subterfuge she had hidden her secret behind.
Would he tell Suzi? Would they laugh about it…her…together?
Not even Briony, her own daughter, had known how she felt about Marcus.
‘I’ve found the perfect woman for Uncle Marcus,’ she had trilled happily, never realising that there was and always had been only one woman Polly could bear to see sharing Marcus’s life and his bed: herself.
And now everything she had done to prevent Marcus from guessing the truth had been undermined by her own foolish actions.
Oh, no, there was no need for her to question just why Marcus had walked out on her whilst she lay asleep. No need to ask at all.
CHAPTER SEVEN
AFTER ordering a room-service breakfast, which she’d felt totally unable to eat, Polly was packing for her return journey when the bedroom telephone rang.
Drearily she picked up the receiver, knowing that the only person whose voice she really wanted to hear was Marcus’s and, of course, there was no way that Marcus was going to ring her.
‘Polly?’
‘Oh, Phil, I was just about to leave,’ she answered.
‘Good; that means I’ve caught you just in time,’ Phil told her warmly, adding before she could say anything, ‘There’s something I want to discuss with you—a proposition I want to put to you.’
‘A proposition?’ Polly queried uncertainly.
‘Mmm…of a strictly business nature,’ Phil assured her, before adding teasingly, ‘Not that I would be averse to propositioning you personally if I thought there was any chance you would respond! No, this is strictly business, Polly…but I’ll tell you about it when you get here. Just come straight up to the suite; I’ll be waiting.’
‘Phil—’ Polly began, but it was too late. Phil had already replaced his receiver.
