Marnie chewed on her bottom lip, considering calling his bluff a second time and just severing the conversation with a light, ‘Shame, but no matter, forget I even called,’ kind of reply. It had worked several times in the past. They might be divorced, but not with Guy’s blessing. He had fought her all the way, until she had turned totally ruthless and used her trump card against him. But he made no secret of the fact that he was quite willing to do almost anything for her but die at her feet, and usually when she snapped her fingers he came running.
Then she remembered Clare, and any idea of playing cat and mouse with Guy on this one slid quietly and irrevocably from her mind.
‘I suppose you have your plane up there with you?’ she said.
‘Correct, my love,’ he said quite happily. Guy liked to thwart her when possible. She allowed it to happen so rarely that he tended to wallow in the few occasions when it did occur. ‘Of course,’ he went on, his velvet voice smoothly mocking, ‘if the idea of flying shuttle up here is totally abhorrent to you, then I think I can put Sunday afternoon aside for you...’
And what about Saturday? she wondered, feeling the biting discomfort of evil suspicion creep insidiously through her blood. Today was Wednesday. He said he was stuck up there for two days. That brought him to Friday. That could only mean one thing in Guy’s book, for he had this—unbroken little rule about never spending Saturday alone! He most probably had her with him now! Her suspicious mind took her on another step. After all, hadn’t she personal experience of Guy’s passions? One night without a woman and he wasn’t fit to know!
‘And I also suppose you are entertaining one of your ladies up there?’
‘Am I?’ he murmured in a maddeningly unrevealing drawl.
‘If I make the effort to get to Edinburgh, Guy,’ she went on tightly, ‘it will not be to play gooseberry to your latest fancy piece!’
‘Darling,’ he drawled, silky-voiced, refusing to be riled by her frankly aggravating tone, ‘if you can take so much trouble just to share my company, then I will make sure I am free.’
Which still told her exactly nothing! ‘And the poor fool who is living under the mistaken belief that she will be enjoying your full attention—what happens to her?’
‘Why?’ he countered. ‘Are you expecting to stay with me all night?’ He sounded insufferably at ease, mildly surprised, and horribly mocking. ‘If that is the case, darling, then I most certainly will make sure I am free.’
Marnie’s lips tightened. ‘If you’re still hankering after that, Guy,’ she told him witheringly, ‘then I feel sorry for you. I happen to be rather fastidious about the men who share my bed. One cannot be too careful these days.’
‘Bitch,’ he said. ‘Take care, Marnie, that one day I don’t decide to prove to you just how weak your aversion to me actually is, because you would never forgive yourself for surrendering to this—now, what was it you once called me?’ He was playing the silky snake now, slithering along her nerve-ends with that lethal weapon of a tongue of his. ‘A middle-aged has-been putting himself out for voluntary stud? Quaint,’ he drawled. ‘Very quaint.’
Marnie had the grace to wince at the hard reminder of those particular words. She had flung some terrible things at him four years ago. Unforgivable things, most of them. But she had been hurting so badly at the time, while he had been so calm, so utterly gentle with her that she had simply exploded, wanting to rile his sleeping devil with terrible insults and bitter accusations. She had not succeeded. All she had achieved was to make him walk abruptly away from her. It was either that or hit her, she knew that now. But four years ago his turning his back on her at that moment had hurt almost as much as everything else he had done to her.
‘It isn’t my fault you crave variety,’ she put in waspishly to hide her own discomfort.
‘It is that same “craving”, as you so sweetly put it,’ he countered, ‘that made our nights such—exquisite adventures.’
‘And I was so endearingly naïve, wasn’t I?’ Her full bottom lip curled in derision. ‘Such a pathetically gullible thing, and so willing to let you walk all over me.’
‘Look.’ His patience suddenly snapped. ‘I really have no more time to give to this kind of verbal battle today. If you called me up just to fill in a few spare moments trying to irritate me, then I think I should inform you that you have managed it. Now,’ he said curtly, ‘do you come up to Edinburgh or do we sever this conversation before it deteriorates into a real slanging match?’
‘I’ll check the times of the shuttle and let your secretary know my arrival time,’ she muttered, backing down. It would do her cause no good to have put him in one of his black moods before she’d even got to see him. Things were going to be difficult enough as it was.
‘I think I should also mention at this juncture that if this has anything to do with that brother of yours then you will be wasting your time taking that shuttle,’ he warned.
‘I’ll see you later,’ she said, and heard his sigh of impatience as she quickly replaced the receiver.
* * *
Jamie must have been standing by the telephone waiting for her to call, because he answered it on the first ring. ‘Clare’s resting upstairs,’ he explained. ‘I didn’t want the telephone to disturb her. Have you spoken to Guy?’
‘He’s in Edinburgh,’ she informed him. ‘I’m on my way up to see him right now.’
‘Thanks for doing this for me, Marnie,’ he murmured gruffly. ‘I know how much you hate going to him for anything, and believe me, I wouldn’t have asked you to do it this time if it weren’t for Clare...’
‘How is she?’ Marnie enquired concernedly.
‘Tense,’ her brother clipped. ‘Over-bright. Pretending she’s worrying about nothing, when really she’s so afraid of doing the wrong thing that she barely makes a move without giving it careful consideration first.’
‘Yes,’ murmured Marnie, well aware of all Clare’s painful heart-searching after that first miscarriage. She could understand how a woman must inevitably put the blame upon herself. Common sense and all the doctors in the world might tell you that it was just one of those natural tragedies that happened in life, but no matter how hard you tried you could never quite convince yourself of that. The feelings of guilt still tormented you day and night.
‘If we can just get her through this next vital month, then maybe she’ll begin to believe it’s going to be all right this time...’
‘Well, give her my love,’ Marnie said. ‘And just make sure you don’t give her anything else to worry about.’
‘I’m not a complete fool, Marnie,’ her brother said tightly. ‘I do know when I’m standing right on the bottom line.’
Well, that was something, Marnie supposed on an inner sigh. Perhaps—perhaps, she considered hopefully, this double crisis could just be the making of her scatter-brained, preoccupied brother. ‘I’ll give you a call the moment Guy decides what he’s going to do about it all,’ she assured him. ‘You just take good care of Clare.’
‘I intend to,’ he said firmly. ‘And—thanks again for doing this for me.’
‘Don’t thank me, Jamie,’ Marnie sighed a little wearily. ‘Thank Guy—if he agrees to help you out of this one.’
* * *
No one knowing only the Marnie Western-Frabosa who was the beautiful but very Bohemian-styled artist usually dressed in a paint smudged T-shirt and faded jeans would recognise her in the elegant creature who came gracefully through the Arrivals gate at Edinburgh Airport late that same afternoon.
To the man whose lazy black eyes followed her progress across the busy concourse she represented everything he desired in a woman. The first time