She was a very lucky girl, and, curling her feet beneath her, she brushed her long hair, now almost dry, behind her ears. She couldn’t believe she had actually thought of divorce a few weeks ago. She shivered. She had so nearly made a huge mistake, but then, didn’t the cliché say that the first six months were the worst in a marriage? Lisa’s eyes filled with latent laughter. In her case, it had been the first six weeks!
‘Something amusing you, Lisa?’ Alex’s deep, melodious voice echoed in the silence.
She turned her head, her eyes unerringly finding his. He filled the conservatory with his presence and her heart did its familiar leap in her breast. ‘No, I was just thinking. What took you so long?’
He lifted the fax in his hand. ‘This. I read it.’ He waved the paper in the air. Whether he thought it was good or bad, Lisa couldn’t be sure. His dark face was curiously expressionless. Restlessly he prowled around the room, while Lisa watched him with lazy, loving eyes.
‘And?’ she prompted.
‘I think your man appears to have been pottering at pottery, excuse the pun, using his garage as a studio. He needs that unit more than you need him,’ Alex drawled cynically. He glanced down at her, his brown eyes assessing her sun-kissed features. ‘Don’t make a decision tomorrow. Have the man investigated first.’
‘You have no faith in human nature,’ Lisa teased.
Something bleak moved in the depths of his eyes, and then it was gone. ‘I’ve lived a lot longer than you, Lisa. People are rarely what they seem.’
Her eyes held by his, Lisa shivered, suddenly chilled. ‘Sorry, I forgot you’re heading for your dotage,’ she quipped, dismissing the shiver in her mind.
‘Dotage, indeed! I’ll have you know I am in my prime,’ Alex informed her. He reached down and tilted her head back with one hand. His brown eyes darkened and she trembled in anticipation; she knew that look so well. ‘Come to bed now, and I will show you,’ he purred as he bent over her and his lips took hers in a long, lingering kiss.
The following afternoon, Lisa let herself into the house and dropped her briefcase on the hall table. The weather was scorching hot, and the drive back from Stratford-upon-Avon had been horrendous. She walked wearily upstairs to the bedroom, and kicking off her shoes, slipped out of her clothes. A shower or a swim in the pool? She couldn’t decide. Grimacing, she walked into the bathroom and turned on the shower. Maybe her determination to keep on running Lawson’s was not such a great idea. At the height of an exceptionally hot summer there was a lot to be said for being a lady of leisure. Especially with a husband like Alex.
Five minutes later, when Alex joined her in the shower, she almost told him as much. Except he diverted her very effectively from all normal thought by a gentle but thorough assault on her senses until she could only stare into his deep dark eyes, her own hazed with mindless desire. She hadn’t even realised he was home…
Jake arrived midday Saturday, and whisked Alex off to play golf. Lisa spent a lazy couple of hours at the poolside before retiring to her study, and her E-mail, and that was where Alex found her on his return from golf.
‘Talking to friends again?’ he growled. ‘I might have guessed.’
‘You don’t look very cheerful,’ Lisa commented, swinging around to face him. ‘Bad golf day? She arched one delicate brow enquiringly. He had a face like thunder.
‘You could say that,’ he muttered. ‘I need a drink.’ And walked out.
Lisa chuckled to herself. Tina had told her that Alex and Jake were fiercely competitive on the golf course, although they were the best of friends. Personally she couldn’t see the fascination in knocking a little white ball around all afternoon. But it gave her some satisfaction to know her arrogant husband didn’t win at everything.
The following Saturday Lisa glanced at the bedside clock and, pushing Alex’s arm from around her waist rolled off the bed. ‘Jake will be here in an hour for you, and I’m going up to Town.’ She glanced back at his reclining form and caught a look of such terrifying anger in his eyes that she stopped. ‘Alex?’ she queried uncertainly. Surely he wasn’t upset because she had got out of bed? They had made love already this morning, and last night. In fact for the past week Alex had made love to her every night and morning with a hungry intensity, a driven passion, that if she had not loved him so much she might have found disturbing.
‘Lisa?’ he mocked, one dark brow arching sardonically. ‘I understand; less than three months and our honeymoon is definitely over.’ And rolling off the other side of the bed, he stood up. ‘I am collecting Jake today. So I’d better get a move on.’
Reassured, Lisa blew him a kiss from her open palm, and, turning with a deliberate wiggle of her hips, she sauntered into her bathroom.
A quick shower was followed by a laborious twenty minutes drying and styling her long hair. She walked back into the bedroom, but there was no sign of Alex. Hardly surprising, she thought, with a tiny smile playing around her mouth. The only occupation her husband lingered over was lovemaking, much to her delight. Everything else in his life he achieved with a speed and efficiency that left lesser mortals standing.
Lisa took her time. She slipped on a pair of cream lace briefs, and then, seated at the dressing table, she applied the minimum of make-up. She selected a cream soft cotton dress from the wardrobe, and slid her arms into its tiny cap sleeves. Pulling the edges together, she deftly fastened the tiny buttons down the front, from the low scooped neckline to the hem that flared out jauntily a few inches above her knees. Slipping her feet into a comfortable pair of cream canvas sandals and picking up a matching canvas shoulder bag, she surveyed her reflection in the mirror, flicking a long curl back over her shoulder.
‘Very nice.’ Alex appeared behind her.
Spinning around, a broad smile lighting her face, she bobbed a curtsey. ‘Thank you, kind sir.’ Her eyes roamed over him; dressed in black trousers and a black knit polo shirt he looked so vibrantly masculine she wanted to reach out and touch him, and he knew it.
His brown eyes darkened. ‘I could give golf a miss and we could, perhaps, find something more interesting to do. Does the notion appeal?’
Any other day Lisa would have said yes, but not today. She was meeting Jed in London and they only had three hours together—not much for five years of friendship.
‘Jake would never forgive you standing him up, and I have to meet my friend in London,’ she said with a rueful smile.
‘Forget I asked,’ Alex drawled lightly. But his eyes glittered hard as they flicked over her. ‘How are you getting there? I don’t want you driving into London on your own. Get Bert to take you.’
‘There’s no need. I’m driving to the station and taking the train.’
‘So be it,’ he said curtly, and left.
What had rattled his cage? she wondered with a frown as she followed him downstairs a few moments later. Alex had been angry last week when he’d returned from golf. This week he was mad before he started! For a sport that was supposed to be relaxing it didn’t seem to do much for Alex. Still, it was not her problem, though she winced as she heard the screech of tyres on the gravel drive…
The taxi stopped outside a large building, left over from the era of the grand London townhouses.