She must have drunk more champagne than she’d thought. She wasn’t usually like this. Normally she had the sunniest of natures and wanted everyone to like her, but there was something about Tye Gibson that got under her skin and left her feeling ruffled and somehow aggravated.
‘He wanted to see you,’ she told Tye, who lifted a disbelieving eyebrow.
‘Did he?’
Lizzy lost some of her assurance. ‘Well…that’s what I heard. I heard that he’d begged you to come home so that he could see you before he died.’
Tye laughed, but there was no humour in it. ‘I’d like to have seen my father begging for anything!’
It didn’t ring that true with what Lizzy remembered of Frank Gibson either, now that he mentioned it. Frank had been a proud man.
‘You mean it’s not true?’
‘Asking me to post a letter would have been giving in as far as my father was concerned,’ said Tye flatly.
Lizzy hesitated. ‘If he was dying, he might have looked at things differently,’ she suggested, but Tye only smiled ironically.
‘You didn’t know my father very well, did you?’
She looked at him in some puzzlement. ‘What are you doing here, then?’
‘I’ve come to sort out my father’s affairs,’ he said. ‘And to see Barra again.’
‘But I thought—’
Lizzy stopped, uncomfortably aware that she was repeating gossip.
‘You thought what? That my father had disinherited me?’
‘Well…yes,’ she admitted awkwardly.
Frank had made no secret of the fact that he had been bitterly hurt by his son’s rejection, and when Tye hadn’t come back when he was dying everyone had naturally assumed that he would do as he had long threatened and cut Tye out of his will.
‘No, he didn’t do that,’ said Tye, but his mouth was set in a grim line and Lizzy wondered what he was thinking about. It wasn’t anything nice, that was for sure.
What kind of man would refuse to visit his dying father? That had been cruel. She eyed him speculatively from under her lashes. No one had been the least bit surprised at his non-appearance, but it seemed to Lizzy that his face didn’t really live up to his reputation. It was guarded, yes, shuttered and stubborn, but it wasn’t cruel. He had the dark, difficult look of a wild horse that had refused to be broken, she thought. His mouth was hard, but maybe it hadn’t always been that way.
Maybe it would look quite different if he were happy. Lizzy’s blue eyes rested on his mouth, trying to imagine him smiling—not a cynical, mocking smile, but a real smile. What would make him smile like that? A woman? Maybe love? Lizzy found herself imagining what it would be like to see his face soften and his mouth curve, and something stirred treacherously inside her.
Jerking her gaze away, she took a slug of champagne. This was Tye Gibson, remember? Rumour was that he had had his heart surgically removed a long time ago. His idea of happiness was probably a nice day spent asset-stripping a company, followed by a relaxing hour of currency speculation.
A spoon was being banged against a glass for attention, and her father was climbing onto a chair to make a speech. Lizzy’s eyes softened as she watched him. Dear old Dad, so calm and quiet and unflappable. She would be lost without him. She couldn’t imagine not speaking to him for twenty years.
Her father was followed by Jack, who was very funny and made everyone laugh. He finished by toasting Lizzy as bridesmaid and they all clapped and cheered, turning to lift their glasses to where she stood with Tye at the edge of the woolshed.
‘To Lizzy!’ they cried, but she was uneasily aware that Tye was not included in their smiles.
Laughing, she blew a kiss of acknowledgment to Jack, but she was glad when everyone turned back to the bride and groom once more.
She slid a glance from under her lashes at Tye. In his place she would have been mortified by the obvious way he had been ignored, but Tye’s expression gave absolutely nothing away. Lizzy was sure that he had noticed, though. Those watchful eyes would miss nothing.
‘Lizzy!’ Ellie was calling her over the crowd, and Lizzy looked quickly away from Tye to see her sister waving her bouquet. ‘Catch!’ she shouted.
The flowers came sailing through the air towards her, ribbons fluttering. Instinctively, Lizzy thrust her glass into Tye’s hand and jumped, catching the bouquet between both hands, and the room cheered as she flourished them triumphantly.
‘Your turn next!’ someone called, and she laughed.
‘I wish!’
Her face was still alight with laughter as she turned back to Tye. He was watching her with an expression so peculiar that her smile slowly faded. ‘Thanks,’ she said, looking at the glass he still held, and he gave it back to her as if he had forgotten that he had it.
There was a pause. Lizzy was very conscious of Tye’s eyes boring into her face, and she put her glass down so that she could fiddle with the flowers. For some reason she couldn’t look at him.
‘I suppose you think this kind of thing is all very silly,’ she said, a defensive edge to her voice.
‘Why do you say that?’
‘You don’t believe in marriage.’
‘How do you know that?’
Lizzy thought of all the beautiful women who had been out with Tye and then appeared in the gossip columns, complaining about his coldness, his selfishness, his callous refusal to commit to a relationship. It had always been a wonder to Lizzy that they could all sound so aggrieved by their failure to turn a heartless recluse into a party-going romantic. It wasn’t as if they couldn’t have known exactly what to expect.
‘I’ve read about you in the papers,’ she admitted.
‘Oh, the papers!’ Tye didn’t even bother to conceal his sarcasm. ‘It must be true, then!’
‘Isn’t it?’
He shrugged. ‘Let’s say that I have trouble understanding what all the fuss is about.’ His disparaging glance swept the woolshed. ‘Weddings are all the same,’ he told her contemptuously. ‘Everyone looks the same; everyone says the same thing. The same tired old rituals every time. The dress, the photographs, the speeches, the bouquet.’
He sneered at the flowers that Lizzy held in her hand, and she pulled them protectively closer to her. ‘I love all the wedding traditions,’ she said with a defiant look. ‘If I ever got married, I’d have the lot!’
‘But what’s the point?’ Tye asked, and Lizzy could practically see his lip curling at the idea of her in a long white dress.
‘You can cut all the cakes and toss all the bouquets you want,’ he went on, ‘but it won’t change the fact that when it comes down to it marriage is a transaction like any other, and the moment one party thinks it’s not getting its fair share of the deal the whole thing falls apart. Before you know where you are, all the people who forked out for a wedding present are being sent notices about the divorce!’
‘You’re just a cynic,’ Lizzy accused him.
‘A realist,’ he corrected her.
‘Marriage isn’t a transaction! It’s about love and commitment and sharing.’
‘You’re just a romantic,’ mocked Tye.
‘Why do people always sneer when they say that?’ demanded Lizzy hotly, forgetting that she had accused him in exactly the same tone of voice.