Kitabı oku: «Marriage And Miracles»

CHAPTER ONE

THE première of a new play by Nathan Whitmore had become quite an event in Sydney over the past few years. It was nothing to see the Prime Minister of Australia as well as other heads of state roll up with their wives, not to mention a good supply of the sort of socialites and celebrities who graced the pages of the tabloids and women’s magazines every other week.

Gemma surveyed the famous faces in the crowd gathered in the foyer with a sincere lack of interest or awe. Fame as such did not impress her. Why should it? There was a time—not very long ago—when she would not have recognised a single famous face here tonight, and her life had not been any the less for it.

‘Smile, Mrs Whitmore,’ one of the plethora of photographers directed her way. ‘And you too, Ms Campbell.’

‘Smile, Gemma,’ Celeste hissed under her breath. ‘This was your idea, remember? I did warn you not to come, but now that you’re here, you must grin and bear it.’

Both women smiled and Gemma wondered what the photographer would say if he knew he was not just taking a photograph of Ms Celeste Campbell and Mrs Nathan Whitmore, but mother and daughter.

There was no doubt that the news would set Sydney’s social set on its ear, especially if it were also publicly revealed that Gemma’s father-in-law, Byron Whitmore, was Gemma’s biological father as well.

The long-standing feud between the glamorous lady boss of Campbell Jewels and the handsome head of Whitmore Opals had fuelled many a discussion over the years. An affair gone sour had been whispered at occasionally, but no one could have guessed at the extraordinary set of circumstances which had brought about Gemma’s birth, her subsequent stealing as a baby by a man who thought he was her father, but who wasn’t, and her final return into the lives of her real parents twenty years later.

It had only been three days since Gemma had found out the truth, yet already she had forged a bond with her father and mother that was astonishingly close and full of love. They were both tremendous people, in her opinion. Not saints, of course, either of them, but basically good souls with deeply caring natures who only wanted the best for their long-lost daughter. The added news that they were finally going to get married had made Gemma very happy.

Her own marriage was another matter...

Gemma’s stomach began churning. Her plan to get Nathan back had seemed a good one in theory. In practice, it was dangerous and risky and nerve-racking. But what alternative did she have? She loved Nathan more than life itself and felt sure that he loved her back, despite everything. She couldn’t let cruel twists of fate and unfortunate misunderstandings destroy their marriage. Certainly not now, when she might possibly be pregnant.

‘What’s taking Byron so long?’ she said worriedly after the photographer had scuttled away. ‘I hope he’s not trying to play peace-maker between Nathan and me. I asked him not to meddle.’

‘Please give Byron more credit for intelligence than that, Gemma. He realises any influence he has over Nathan is at a low ebb at the moment. Nathan was far from impressed to find out Byron had slept with me while he was still a married man. Then when he added that we were going to get married...’ Celeste’s eyes rolled expressively. ‘He said Nathan stared at him as though he were mad.’

Gemma sighed. ‘Poor Byron. He deserves better than that from Nathan.’

‘Yes, he does. Frankly, Gemma, everyone deserves better than they’re getting from Nathan. Why you still love him after what he’s done amazes me. Keeping my identity from you was despicable enough, but when I think how he...he—’

‘You promised not to speak of that again,’ Gemma broke in sharply. ‘You know that Nathan was out of his head when he did that. If I can forgive and forget, why can’t you?’

Celeste pursed disapproving lips. ‘I’m sorry, but I can’t abide a man perpetrating any violence against a woman, no matter what the provocation. Still, I won’t mention it again. It’s your life and I can see you’re determined to try to save your marriage.’

‘And you promised to help me any way you could.’

‘God knows why,’ Celeste muttered.

Gemma reached out and gently touched her mother on the wrist. ‘Because you love me?’ she said softly.

Celeste was stunned by the rush of maternal love that flooded her heart, tears pricking her eyes. Blinking madly, she nodded acknowledgement of this, squeezing her daughter’s hands before finding her voice. ‘I suppose I’ll just have to take your word for it that Nathan is worth fighting for and not the coldest, most cynical bastard I’ve ever laid eyes on.’

‘Lenore thinks he’s worth it,’ Gemma argued with a quiet intensity. ‘And she was married to him for twelve years.’

Celeste sighed. ‘Whatever his faults, he certainly knows how to inspire loyalty in his wives.’

‘He’s only had two!’ Gemma protested.

‘So far. If he divorces you as he says he’s going to, that leaves the field clear for number three.’

‘Nathan and I won’t be getting a divorce,’ Gemma said with a stubborn set of her mouth. ‘And there won’t be any number three!’

‘Oh? And how do you intend to change his mind?’

‘By whatever means are at my disposal.’

‘Mmm...’ Celeste gave Gemma the once-over, a sardonic gleam coming into her eyes as they carefully assessed her appearance. ‘I was at a loss earlier on to understand what you hoped to achieve coming here tonight. Now I see it’s not your attending the play you had in mind but the party afterwards.’

Gemma felt a guilty heat seep into her cheeks but she refused to succumb to embarrassment over her appearance, or shame over her plan. Nathan was her husband, after all! Besides, she wasn’t nearly as provocatively dressed as she’d seen Celeste on occasions. OK, so her red crèpe dress was very form-fitting, the wide beaded belt emphasising her hour-glass figure. And yes, the deep V neckline showed clearly that she wasn’t wearing a bra. But that was hardly a crime these days, was it?

‘I only want to talk to him,’ she lied outrageously. ‘I can’t achieve anything unless I talk to him, can I?’

‘People who play with fire often get burnt,’ Celeste warned softly. ‘I should know. I’ve been there, done that.’

‘And you ended up with the man you love, I noticed,’ Gemma said. ‘I aim to do the same.’

Celeste blinked in surprise at the hard edge in her daughter’s voice, till it came to her that Gemma was a chip off the old block. Both her parents were pigheaded people who didn’t know when to quit. She almost felt sorry for Nathan.

‘Ah...here’s Byron now.’ Celeste smiled and linked arms with him. ‘We thought you’d got lost, darling. How are things backstage?’

‘Everyone’s a bundle of nerves. Except Nathan, of course. That man had nerves of steel.’

And a heart of steel, Celeste thought, but declined to say so.

‘What did he say about me?’ Gemma asked nervously.

‘Not a word.’

Gemma looked and felt crestfallen. ‘Does...does he know I’m here, and that I’m going to the party afterwards?’

‘I did mention it in passing, but he didn’t seem to care one way or the other. To be honest, I’m a little shocked at Nathan’s stand over this divorce business. I’ve never known him to be so inflexible, or so unfeeling. It’s as though he’s retreated behind some hard shell that nothing can penetrate.’

‘That’s just a faç ade he hides behind,’ Gemma stated, and did her best to believe it. Because if she didn’t, what then?

‘It’s time we went inside, isn’t it?’ Celeste jumped in, deciding a change of subject was called for when she saw a stricken look momentarily flash across her daughter’s eyes. God, if that bastard hurt her again, she was going to kill him with her bare hands, something she was capable of. All those years of martial arts training had to be good for something!

‘The bell hasn’t gone,’ Byron replied. ‘But yes,’ he added quickly on seeing Celeste’s withering glance, ‘I think we might go in.’

A photographer snapped the three of them as they walked into the theatre, Celeste and Byron flashing him a quick smile. Gemma’s face, however, reflected an inner misery that she could not hide. Her faith in her plan was already crumbling, as was her faith in Nathan’s love for her.

Their seats were in the middle of the fifth row from the front, the best seats in the house. As the play’s producer, Byron had access to this whole row if he wanted. He’d offered seats to both Jade and Ava, but they had declined to come in protest over Nathan’s unreasonable behaviour towards Gemma. Both women had declared they would never speak to him again till he came to his senses.

Gemma sat down and began flicking through the programme booklet Byron had bought her on arrival, anything to still the butterflies in her stomach. The sight of her husband’s face staring out at her jolted her for a second.

The black and white photograph brought a hardness to his looks that she had never noticed before. He’d always looked like a golden god to her, with hair the colour of wheat, skin like bronze satin, a classically handsome face, a highly sensual mouth and the most beautiful grey eyes. Now, those eyes stared out at her with all the warmth of a winter’s dawn, a slight arching of his left eyebrow adding a cynical edge to their cold expression, as did the twisted curve of his half-smile.

Oh, how she’d always hated it when he smiled at her like that, as though he knew things about the world that she was not yet privy to. Nathan had always declared the world a rotten place full of rotten people. He was cynical through and through about the human race, and the female sex in particular, probably because of the wicked, even depraved women who had played vital roles during his growing-up years.

First there had been his mother, a spoiled rich bitch who had left home as a teenager to live a life of debauchery, drugs and total self-indulgence. Nathan had been illegitimate, his father unknown to him and possibly to his mother, who had spent her entire life going from lover to lover, orgy to orgy, trip to trip.

Gemma had heard about Nathan’s mother from several sources—though not Nathan himself. He never talked about the past. Apparently, she had put him in his first boarding-school at the age of eight, dragging him out whenever her latest lover left her or vice versa, then putting him back in school once a new man came on the scene. After she died of a drug overdose when Nathan was sixteen, he had become a street kid up at King’s Cross. When Byron had come across him several months later Nathan had actually been living with some woman old enough to be his mother, and there was nothing platonic about the relationship. Byron had befriended the boy and, later, adopted him.

Gemma shuddered to think what might have happened to Nathan if Byron hadn’t come along.

Not that Nathan’s life as Byron’s adopted son had ever been without its problems, especially when it came to the opposite sex. His relationship with the female members of his adoptive family seemed dicey from what she’d gathered, and his shotgun marriage to Lenore had not been a raving success, even if his plays were. By the time Gemma had met Nathan early this year when he was out at Lightning Ridge on an opal-buying trip, he’d become a rather world-weary thirty-five, divorced from Lenore and about to resign from Whitmore Opals to write full-time.

From the first moment they met, Gemma had been totally smitten by his mature handsomeness, his city glamour and smooth sophistication, while Nathan had seemed equally bowled over by her youthful beauty, countrified innocence and obvious inexperience with men. Gemma had initially been very wary of having anything to do with a divorced man so many years older than herself, but within a few short weeks of her coming to Sydney Nathan had seduced and married her.

Gemma had gone off on her honeymoon with many warnings about Nathan ringing in her ears. Not too many people had been confident that their marriage would work out, their view being that Nathan had only married her for the sex.

They’d been right and they’d been wrong. Sex had played a big part in their relationship so far. This did not bother Gemma as much as Nathan’s jealous possessiveness, plus his tendency to treat her as a naïve child. His extreme cynicism was another bone of contention between them, along with his obvious inability to communicate with women on any other level than the physical.

But none of that meant he didn’t really love her, Gemma kept believing staunchly. He just didn’t know how to express that love any other way, or how to trust in it. Gemma believed that time would bring about the real intimacy and bonding she was looking for with Nathan. Time and love. She had no intention of giving up on her marriage at the first hurdle.

OK, so it was a pretty stiff hurdle. Not many wives would forgive their husbands falsely accusing them of unfaithfulness and then virtually raping them. But Gemma had, after all, been the first to point the finger in the matter of unfaithfulness. As for the rape...she understood why and how that had happened, and with the understanding had come forgiveness.

Nathan had gone crazy when he’d found her in Damian Campbell’s bedroom. Fury had turned to a violent passion which had spun out of control before he could stop himself. Maybe if she had struggled instead of lying there in stunned horror, Nathan might have stopped. As it was, his remorse afterwards had been a palpable thing, and while Gemma had been shocked and appalled at first, in the end she’d been able to put the unfortunate incident into perspective.

Which was just as well, since it was possible Nathan had started a baby in her that afternoon. He’d obviously forgotten that he’d asked her to throw away her pills the previous weekend. But throw them away she had.

Most women might have revolted at a rape making them pregnant. But once Gemma had found it in her heart to forgive Nathan, she’d been consumed by an amazing feeling of rightness. It had also given her a way of getting her husband back. Hadn’t he married Lenore—a woman he hadn’t loved—on the strength of a pregnancy? Surely he’d come back to a wife he already loved if she was having his baby.

Which was why she was going to the post-première party tonight, hoping for an opportunity to seduce her husband, thereby increasing her chance of pregnancy, and at the same time freeing Nathan from having to accept that any baby she might have already conceived had been started on that awful afternoon. Gemma might have forgiven Nathan for the rape but it was clear to her that he hadn’t forgiven himself. She was sure this was one of the reasons he was insisting on a divorce, because of his own self-disgust and guilt.

‘It’s not a very good photo of Lenore, is it?’ Celeste suddenly commented, looking over Gemma’s shoulder at the page across from the one she’d been staring blankly at.

Gemma refocused on the booklet in her lap and examined the photograph of the woman who was not only Nathan’s ex-wife but also the leading lady in his new play.

Celeste was quite right. It was not a particularly flattering photo, though once again the black and white print did not do justice to Lenore’s vivid beauty. In colour and in the flesh, Lenore was strikingly lovely, her bright red hair and flashing green eyes projecting a ‘look-at-me’ quality which no doubt served her well as a stage actress. Gemma imagined that from the moment Lenore walked on stage, all eyes would turn to her as though magnetised.

Though going on thirty-five, Lenore looked much younger, her figure still as spectacular as her face, its model-slim tallness and elegance adding to her already captivating package. Gemma had always felt gauche by comparison. No matter how many people complimented her pretty face and eyes, no matter how many men ogled her voluptuous curves, Gemma only had to look at Nathan’s wife to feel inadequate and inferior.

Lenore’s stunning sex appeal was the main reason Gemma had been so quick to believe what she had believed last Sunday, which was that Nathan had spent the weekend with his ex-wife while she’d been out at Lightning Ridge trying to find some clues to her till-then missing mother’s identity. When Gemma had come back unexpectedly early and found Lenore in their flat with Nathan, she’d been right and ready to misunderstand tragically the seemingly shocking conversation she had overheard.

If she’d had a little more faith in her husband’s love, she would have stayed and found out that they’d been rehearsing a section of their play, not discussing their previous night’s dalliance. Instead, Gemma had fled, eventually to the Campbell house, thereby putting into motion the awful circumstances that had led to Nathan assaulting her.

The only good thing to come out of the horrors of the past week was that she not only found out her mother’s identity, but had discovered, with a degree of relief, that the man who she had thought had been her father all her life and whom she had never been able to love was not her father after all!

‘Byron tells me Lenore is having an affair with Zachary Marsden,’ Celeste whispered. ‘Apparently, they intend to marry next year after he’s divorced his wife.’

‘Yes, I know.’

‘She’s no danger to your marriage, Gemma.’

‘Yes, I know that too. Now.’

‘Better late than never.’

Gemma smiled across at her mother. ‘Is that how you feel about marrying Byron?’

Celeste grinned. ‘You’d better believe it. I can’t wait to hog-tie him to me forever.’

‘When’s the big day?’

‘As soon as we can arrange it. No long white dresses or anything. Just a simple ceremony. I have no patience with frippery at my age. All I want is Byron’s ring on my finger.’

‘And all I want is my Nathan back again.’

Celeste sighed. ‘Are you sure your love for this man is not blind, Gemma? Do you know what you’re dealing with? You were very young when you married him. Just twenty. You’re only a few months older now.’

‘You were only seventeen when you fell in love with Byron.’

Celeste shook her head. ‘That’s different.’

‘How?’

‘Will you two women stop whispering together?’ Byron hissed down the line. ‘The curtain’s about to go up.’

Celeste patted his arm. ‘Keep your shirt on, darling.’

‘It’s my shirt I’m worried about,’ he grumbled back. ‘I’ve put a hell of a lot of money into this play.’

‘Don’t worry, if it bombs I’ll sell my yacht and give you the proceeds.’

‘I just might keep you to that!’

‘Sssh,’ someone in the row behind them said as the lights dimmed and the curtain rose.

It wasn’t long before everyone was silent and totally engrossed in what was going on on stage.

Gemma soon realised why the play was called The Woman in Black. The heroine, played by Lenore, was a widow in her mid-thirties, whose elderly husband had just died. Her wickedly handsome black-sheep stepson showed up at the funeral and immediately created an atmosphere of tingling suspense and sexual tension. It quickly became obvious that he had once had an affair with his stepmother and the affair had resulted in the birth of a son who the dead husband believed was his and who was now heir to the bulk of his estate.

Towards the end of the first half of the play the widow was once again in danger of being seduced by her evil stepson. He came to her bedroom the night after the funeral, where by some very devious and seductive manoeuvres he succeeded in binding her hand and foot to the bed. He was about to cut her nightwear off with a pair of scissors when the curtain came down.

‘Good God,’ Celeste let out on a shuddering sigh as the lights came on. Slowly, she turned wide eyes towards Gemma. ‘And the man who wrote that is the man you love?’

Gemma flushed fiercely. ‘It’s only a play, Celeste. It’s not real!’

‘Still...’

‘My God, I’m on a winner!’ Byron exclaimed excitedly. ‘Just look at the audience. They can’t stop talking about it. I knew when I first read the darned thing that it was a powerfully emotional and erotic drama, but to see it enacted...’ He shook his head in disbelief and admiration. ‘Lenore’s quite brilliant, isn’t she? And that chap they’ve got playing the hero is simply incredible!’

‘He’s hardly a hero, Byron,’ Celeste remarked drily.

‘You know what I mean. Besides, I’ll bet there isn’t a woman in this theatre who’d say no to him if he put his slippers under her bed.’

‘You could be right,’ she said, revelling in the look of instant jealousy that burnt in his intense blue eyes.

‘In that case, I’m not taking you to the party afterwards. That devil will be there. Gemma can go alone!’

‘I doubt she’ll mind that,’ Celeste muttered, thinking Gemma might not want her father to see what she was up to. Despite Byron’s passionate nature, he was basically a man of old-fashioned principles. It was the man’s place to do the chasing, in his opinion, not the woman’s. Seduction was not supposed to be a woman’s domain. He was still coming to terms with Celeste’s liberated views and would not condone his daughter doing her darnedest to get her husband back in her bed by the methods she obviously meant to employ later tonight. Celeste decided it might be wise to coax Byron away from the party afterwards as early as possible.

She didn’t think she would have any trouble.

Her hand came to rest with seeming innocence on his thigh. ‘Don’t be silly, Byron,’ she said, her eyes locking on his. ‘You’ll be expected to attend. At least for a little while,’ she added, dropping her voice to a husky whisper, her hand moving ever so slightly up his leg. ‘But I see no reason why we can’t slip away early. If Gemma wants to stay and talk to Nathan she can go home to Belleview in a taxi.’

‘You’re wicked,’ he groaned, but did not remove her hand.

She simply smiled. The things a mother did for her children, Celeste thought with a stab of perverse amusement.

Byron cleared his throat. ‘Can I—er—get you two ladies a drink?’ he offered, his voice a little shaky.

‘That would be nice, darling,’ Celeste returned smoothly. ‘Champagne, I think. Celebrations are obviously in order.’

‘Champagne it is.’

‘What are we celebrating?’ Gemma asked after Byron left them. Clearly, she hadn’t been listening to their ongoing conversation.

‘The success of the play.’

Gemma grimaced. ‘I suppose I should be happy for Nathan, but I’ll never like that play. How can I when it was responsible for breaking up our marriage?’

‘The play wasn’t responsible for breaking up your marriage. Nathan was, when he refused to listen to you, when he closed his eyes and ears to your love.’

Gemma frowned as the reality of what Celeste was saying sank in. Why had Nathan turned his back on her love? Why? His blunt confession to having kept her in the dark about Celeste being her mother had been a deliberate act to drive her away and make her agree to a divorce. Would a man genuinely in love do that?

Her highly practical and logical brain reached for an answer but her heart didn’t like the one it came up with. Nathan couldn’t love her, in that case. Maybe he never had. Maybe everyone else was right and he’d only married her out of lust. Maybe he’d even found someone else...the number three Celeste had mentioned.

Panic began to set in till Gemma remembered the baby she might be carrying. Could she afford to think negative thoughts, even if they were logical ones? Love wasn’t logical, she reminded herself frantically. Love had never been logical. Perhaps it was shame and guilt that had impelled him to push her away with the only weapon he could find. That report. He did love her. He must! For if he didn’t...

God, if he didn’t!

Black thoughts swirled in her head.

‘You don’t have to go to the party afterwards,’ Celeste said quietly.

Gemma blinked, her confusion clearing as she realised that if there was even the smallest chance Nathan loved her she had to take it.

‘Oh, yes, I do,’ she said, her nerves calming a little in the face of having no alternative. ‘I don’t have any choice.’

Celeste almost argued with her daughter, till she recalled all the stupid, crazy things she had done in the name of love. Could anyone have dissuaded her at the time? She doubted it.

So she remained silent, and eventually Byron returned with the champagne. Eventually, too, the play resumed, the second half as compelling and shocking as the first. And eventually, the three of them left the theatre to go to the post-première party.