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‘Anywhere in particular you’d feel comfortable?’
Jack was asking her for her preference? Not telling her what he’d already planned? Her forehead puckered. Had her angry words about him always taking charge sunk in?
Maybe they had.
She’d realised when she confronted him in the car about his behaviour that she’d never really done so before. Through their marriage she’d tried to be the wife he wanted, not rocking the boat. When she left it had been more important to get away than discuss what had gone wrong.
Because she’d learned to avoid conflict? After her dad remarried she’d tiptoed around his new wife, fearing that to stand up against her pettiness would force her father to choose between them. His love was inconstant. His heartbreak over her mother’s death had been short-lived and his casual affection for Bess wasn’t enough to make him champion her against Jillian’s spite.
Bess had learned to ignore the jibes and unfriendliness so she could still see her father and Tom, her little half brother.
Had her habit of stoic silence morphed into cowardice?
You should have been frank with Jack about how you felt earlier.
As if that would mend their marriage! Jack might make a show of asking her opinion but it was still a vastly unequal match. She’d fallen in love with him while his deeper feelings weren’t engaged.
At the moment she’d almost have preferred it if Jack already had a solution to where she could hide out so she didn’t have to make a decision. How contrary was that?
‘There aren’t many places they wouldn’t find me.’
‘What about with your family? I know it’s one of the first places they’d look but it’s a large estate. Surely you could manage to keep out of sight there.’
Bess shook her head. ‘That’s not going to work.’ She refused to go into detail about her stepmother’s antipathy. ‘In other circumstances I’d try Freya but not now. I don’t want to drag her into this.’
Freya and Michael were back from their secret honeymoon and preparing for their official royal wedding. Bess refused to foist any negative publicity on them.
‘I could find an unobtrusive hotel.’
The words were barely out when Jack shook his head. ‘Don’t underestimate the paparazzi. It would take just one sighting to have them camped on your doorstep. And hotel staff can be bribed. It would be okay until they found you. After that you could say goodbye to any privacy.’
His words sent a chill through her veins.
‘I have a suggestion.’ He paused, capturing and holding her gaze.
Bess sighed. She wasn’t going back to him and their life in Paris. Not that he’d suggested that, she reminded herself. ‘All reasonable suggestions are welcome.’
‘I know of a house, a country house on an estate not too far out of London. You’d have complete privacy in the grounds so you could relax, undisturbed. Plus it’s close enough for you to be able to reach London easily, for a doctor’s appointment or whatever.’
‘A house in the country?’
She’d always loved the freedom of rambling over her family’s rural estate. Walking, riding, even pottering in the garden with her mother, had been therapeutic when she had things on her mind. She’d always yearned for a cosy home with rural views and had even tried to persuade Jack to live within commuting distance of the city.
‘There’s a village nearby but the grounds are private.’
‘What about the owner?’
‘Out of the country, but there are staff so you wouldn’t have to do anything but rest.’
Bess regarded him curiously. How did he know about this house? Clearly it wasn’t his, for Jack had always been adamant about the need to base himself in one vibrant city or another. Was it a friend’s?
At this point she was so tired she didn’t care. She was just grateful to have a place where she could rest and gather her thoughts while she worked out what to do next. ‘That sounds marvellous, if you can arrange it for a short time.’
‘Leave it to me.’
Jack’s mouth curved in a hint of a satisfied smile that made her wonder abruptly if she’d just walked into a trap.
CHAPTER TEN
