But the knowledge that he also could have come to the house again when Tom was there deserved some appreciation, and, much against her better judgement, Jaime pulled the menu towards her. ‘Perhaps—perhaps I will have a sandwich after all,’ she mumbled, following the list of fillings with her finger. ‘Um—I think I’d like egg mayonnaise, if that’s all right with you.’
Ben frowned. ‘Why not?’ he agreed indifferently, checking what she wanted, and putting the menu aside. ‘One egg mayonnaise sandwich,’ he ordered, when the waiter brought their drinks. Then, ‘Cheers,’ he added, raising his glass to his lips.
Frustration almost choked Jaime. ‘Are—aren’t you having anything?’ she exclaimed, totally ignoring her glass.
‘Not hungry,’ responded Ben calmly. ‘Now, if you’ve finished wasting time, perhaps we can get to the point of this meeting.’
‘If I’ve finished—–’
Jaime was on the verge of another defensive outburst, when a premonition gripped her. Of course, that was what he wanted. This whole exercise was designed to upset her, to put her at an emotional disadvantage. And Ben, who had once used his controversial debating skills to disconcert Members of Parliament and foreign diplomats, knew that better than anyone.
So, instead of indulging his ego, she broke off and picked up her glass. ‘Cheers,’ she murmured, raising it towards him, and had the satisfaction of witnessing his frustration instead.
But it was a fleeting glimpse at best. Ben was too experienced a tactitian to allow his feelings to dictate his mood, and, returning his glass to the table, he said quietly, ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
There were any number of answers Jaime could have given, and she had spent long enough, goodness knew, considering all of them. Her first instinct was to pretend ignorance, to pretend it wasn’t true—to offer him the story she had given Tom not so long ago. But Philip was Ben’s brother, and that complicated matters. She didn’t want Philip involved in this. She had no intention of allowing her ex-husband to muddy the situation.
‘Jaime!’
Ben was waiting for an answer, and not even the return of the waiter with her sandwiches could delay it any longer. But she smiled at the man, and picked up one of the neatly cut triangles and examined its contents, before saying carefully, ‘It was nothing to do with you.’
‘Nothing to do with me?’ Briefly, Ben lost his cool, and his eyes blazed angrily. ‘I have a son, and you say it’s nothing to do with me!’
Jaime took a determined bite of the sandwich. ‘As—as you pointed out, you were married,’ she declared doggedly. ‘You ought to be grateful. I could have told Maura.’
Ben’s lips twisted. ‘That bugged you, did it? That I refused to leave my wife?’
‘Bugged me?’ Jaime could stand his baiting tongue no longer. ‘Well, yes,’ she said angrily. ‘Yes, I think you could say that. It’s not very flattering to hear that, although you’re good enough to go to bed with, you’re not worth sacrificing a perfectly good marriage for. Of course, I can appreciate that. I mean, I wouldn’t have been as understanding if I’d found out my husband had been sleeping with someone else. But, hey! What do I know? I was just a diversion. A little bit on the side. And the fact that I was your brother’s wife just added to the novelty!’
‘That’s not true.’
‘It is true.’ Jaime was into her stride now and, oblivious of where they were, or whether anyone else might be able to hear what she was saying, she went on, ‘I believed you, Ben. When you said you cared about me, I really believed you. What a fool I was! Totally naïve! Well, we were both suckered, weren’t we?’
Ben’s face was grim. ‘You don’t understand.’
‘Don’t I? I think I do.’ Jaime put the remains of the sandwich down, unable to even pretend she was enjoying it. ‘Can you wonder I’ve tried to keep Tom away from the Russells? One brother a sadist, and the other a bastard!’
‘You don’t understand,’ intoned Ben again. ‘I couldn’t leave Maura. She—needed me.’
‘Needed you?’ Jaime was scathing. ‘How convenient! Is that how you usually absolved your conscience?’
‘Usually, the situation didn’t arise,’ declared Ben harshly. ‘What happened between you and me—–’
‘Nothing happened between you and me,’ Jaime retorted grimly. ‘Tom—Tom’s conception was just a—a biological accident. I don’t regard you as his father. I never did.’
‘Well, damn you, I do,’ grated Ben savagely, and then glanced over his shoulder, as if afraid his angry words had been overheard. ‘Whatever kind of fiction you’ve managed to convince yourself of, Tom is my son! You can’t duck out of that as easily as you ducked out of our relationship.’
‘I’ve told you, we didn’t have a relationship,’ hissed Jaime angrily, leaning towards him, and then reared back in alarm when his hand moved to grasp the slim column of her wrist.
‘I hear what you say,’ he told her, in a low, dispassionate voice. ‘But the fact remains, we did have sex together—more than once—and I got you pregnant, just as surely as we’re sitting here exchanging insults!’
Jaime’s breasts rose and fell with the tumult of her breathing. She was intensely conscious of Ben’s fingers circling her wrist, and the heat of his possession was spreading along every nerve and sinew in her arm. She glanced anxiously about her, but to her relief no one seemed at all interested in what was going on at their table. They might have been alone in the garden.
‘And that pleases you, doesn’t it?’ she retaliated now, realising she would get nowhere by being submissive, but to her annoyance Ben nodded.
‘Yes, it pleases me,’ he agreed, his gaze dropping insolently down her body. ‘It doesn’t please me that you chose to keep my son’s existence a secret from me, but I remember his conception with rather more accuracy than you do, obviously.’
‘Bastard!’
‘Liar,’ he countered equably. His thumb moved insistently against the network of veins that marked the inner side of her wrist. ‘So—what are we going to do?’
Jaime swallowed. ‘Don’t you mean—what are you going to do?’
‘No.’ Ben’s eyes lingered on her mouth. ‘I mean, what are we going to do. I realise I can’t come back after all these years and expect us to take up where we left off—–’
‘Damn right!’
‘But there’s still a hell of a lot more than indifference between us, and we both know it.’
‘No!’ Jaime felt incensed.
‘Yes.’ Ben was implacable. ‘Why do you think I came to find you? I didn’t know about Tom then. I didn’t know what a consummate little actress you’d turned out to be.’
‘If you think—–’
‘I think we need a lot more time to handle this rationally,’ Ben cut in steadily. ‘Tom hardly knows me yet. I suggest we let events take their natural course. For the present, anyway.’
Jaime stared at him disbelievingly. ‘You can’t seriously conceive that I’d let you back into my life!’