Kitabı oku: «Long-Distance Marriage»

CHAPTER ONE

THE phone on Alessandra’s desk shrilled and she picked it up on the first ring with her usual brisk efficiency.

‘Yes?’ Always straight and to the point, Alessandra had acquired something of a reputation at Holloway Advertising for wasting neither words nor time. Once she had overheard two of the secretaries saying that she was as efficient as a robot, and had found it hard to believe that they were actually talking about her!

‘Alessandra—where the hell have you been all morning?’ came the voice of her boss, Andrew Holloway.

Long ago, Alessandra had recognised that Andrew had flair and imagination—it was just unfortunate that he was thoroughly convinced he was God’s gift to the opposite sex!

‘I wanted to deliver some artwork personally,’ explained Alessandra. ‘And I’ve only just got in.’

‘Well, I need to talk to you,’ said Andrew.

‘I’m afraid I’m busy right now,’ said Alessandra firmly as she surveyed her crowded desk and pulled a face at it. ‘Can’t it wait?’

‘It most certainly can,’ Andrew replied with satisfaction, and Alessandra got the distinct feeling that she’d been manipulated into something! ‘How about a drink after work?’

She sighed. ‘Andrew, I can’t. I have a heap of work to do before I leave, and—’ her voice instinctively softened into a soft purr as she glanced at the wedding photograph on her desk ‘—I have a husband at home waiting for me, remember?’

Well, that was a small white lie, she thought ruefully—Cameron wouldn’t be waiting at all. If there was one thing which was predictable about that gorgeous yet enigmatic husband of hers, it was that Cameron Calder waited for no one.

‘Alessandra—honey, please!’

Alessandra held back a smile. It amused her to hear her boss of three years still trying to turn the charm on like a tap! He never gave up! Never could understand why she hadn’t fallen into his arms like a ripe plum!

Yes, he was tall. Yes, he was hunky. Blond, blue-eyed and not short of a penny or two. The toast of London’s women and able to date just about anyone of his choice. Except for Alessandra. Oh, he’d asked her out often enough in the past, but she’d never accepted for the simple reason that she hadn’t been remotely interested in him. Alessandra had only ever gone out with one man.

And she’d married him.

She picked up the silver-framed photo taken after her wedding to Cameron. It had been a tiny ceremony. Neither of them had wanted a big wedding, each for their own reasons. Cameron’s parents were dead, and Alessandra’s lived in Italy. But Cameron was a powerful man with a lot of connections and, when they had been discussing wedding plans, he had turned to her and said, in that crisp, decisive way of his, ‘We either invite everyone or no one. A simple wedding or the whole works.’

There had been no contest for Alessandra. She’d had a few close girlfriends who wouldn’t be mortally offended if they didn’t get an invite.

And her family. Quite apart from the fact that they’d have been hard-pushed to find the air fares, she couldn’t exactly see them hitting it off with her husband-to-be. She’d tried to imagine the cool, enigmatic Cameron coping with her noisy, messy family, and failed.

She just hadn’t wanted to make a big deal out of the day—look how many people did that, and how many of them divorced soon after? She had been petrified of getting married in the first place—in fact, she had sworn that she never would marry. And she probably never would have done if she hadn’t met Cameron. She certainly couldn’t imagine anyone else changing her mind about something so important. But he had been so coolly persistent, and so damned gorgeous, that she just hadn’t been able to resist him!

‘A simple wedding,’ she had told him quietly.

Those blue-grey eyes had narrowed thoughtfully, a half-smile playing around the delectable curve of his lips. ‘But you do realise, Alessandra,’ he’d murmured softly, ‘that a simple wedding means just that? Registry office and two witnesses. No church or flowers or organ music. No big white dress and veil. I thought that’s what all women wanted?’

She had brought her chin up mutinously when she’d heard that, until she’d seen, from the soft light in his eyes, that he’d been teasing. She hadn’t taken the bait, just shaken her head. ‘None of that,’ she’d said firmly, wondering if she had imagined that he looked very slightly disappointed.

So she had gone ahead and bought a simple wedding dress and she hadn’t even opted for the conventional white or ivory. Instead she had chosen a short scarlet linen dress, which had clung flatteringly to her soft curves, and which had complemented the Italian colouring she had inherited from her mother, her glowing skin and huge dark eyes, her newly washed hair falling in a dark, silky cloud to her shoulders.

She had deliberately and untraditionally spent the night before the wedding with Cameron, and travelled with him to Marylebone Register Office. She had been unable to hide her surprise and pleasure when he had stopped the cab at a market stall and bought her the biggest bunch of scarlet roses she had ever seen. And then they had picked two witnesses off the street and married. But she had noticed that Cameron was oddly quiet after the brief ceremony.

Alessandra stared at the woman in the photo who stood smiling rather uncertainly at the camera, with the dashingly tall, dark figure of her new husband beside her. It was the only photograph of the day they had.

Uncertain? she wondered as she peered at it more closely. Had she been?

Well, yes. And she still was, to some extent, although she hid it superbly. She had never been lacking in confidence but Cameron was so gorgeous, and she was so in love with him, that sometimes she had to pinch herself to believe that they were married. That out of all the women he could have chosen he had chosen her. Because a strange thing had happened once they were legally married. She had found that it was very difficult to remain the cool, rather aloof woman he’d fallen in love with. Instead, she’d had to try very hard not to become the clingy kind of doting wife he would have despised.

As always when her thoughts turned to Cameron, she felt the tips of her breasts stinging with dangerous excitement beneath the thin silk of her blouse and she immediately slammed the photo back down on her desk. Damn the man! You’d think that six months of marriage might have cooled down that unbearable ache she felt at the pit of her stomach whenever she thought of him. Instead it seemed to have done the opposite. Cameron was like a drug; she just couldn’t get enough of him. Heavens, couldn’t she even think about her husband for a moment without necessarily getting extremely and sometimes embarrassingly turned on?

She remembered how, once, he had turned up unexpectedly at the office and taken her out to the Savoy for lunch. They’d just sat across the table staring and staring at one another, silent and sensual messages sizzling between them.

When the food had arrived they’d scarcely noticed and they’d hardly touched their first course when, as if by mutual assent, Cameron had firmly taken her by the hand, booked an extremely expensive room upstairs, and spent the rest of the lunch hour making mad, passionate love to her.

If only one of the damned secretaries at the advertising agency hadn’t noticed that she’d come back with her sweater on inside out! That hadn’t done her reputation a lot of good!

With an effort she forced thoughts of Cameron to the furthest corner of her mind and asked her boss, who was still hanging patiently on the end of the phone, ‘What’s so urgent about seeing me that it can’t wait until tomorrow?’

Again she could hear the satisfaction in Andrew’s voice. ‘Just that the head of a certain highly prestigious American motor company has approached me—’

‘Which company?’ Alessandra shot out quickly.

Andrew named the company and Alessandra gave a silent whistle. Prestigious indeed. If not yet one of the world’s biggest car producers then it was soon set to be. ‘And?’ she prompted, since Andrew had fallen silent, presumably to let the full import of his words hit her.

‘They want to meet us.’

‘You mean they’re thinking of using us?’ Alessandra asked in disbelief. The advertising agency which Andrew owned and which she worked for was original and competent—they’d walked off with a couple of the industry’s top awards for the last two years—but they were strictly small-time. Their clients were all small to medium-sized British companies, and there was no one international on their books; certainly nothing on the scale of the American motor company. She simply couldn’t imagine having a client of that size!

‘They loved your campaign for the low-calorie chocolate-chip cookie,’ Andrew told her levelly.

‘But surely not enough to give their account to a tiny British company?’ squeaked Alessandra in amazement, her customary savoir-faire momentarily deserting her.

Andrew was noncommittal. ‘Let’s just say they aren’t happy with who they have at the moment, and leave it at that. But they hinted strongly that their account might be up for grabs. It’s up to us to convince them that we can handle it; and not just handle it—handle it brilliantly!’

‘And do you think we can?’ asked Alessandra.

Andrew laughed. ‘Honey, for the kind of budget they’ll be offering we can place a hoarding on the moon if they want it—hell, I’ll even fly it there myself and put the damned thing up! Which is why—’ his voice dropped conspiratorially ‘—I need you there. You’re so easy on the eye—’

‘Andrew!’ Alessandra’s voice became distinctly chilly. She liked compliments on the way she looked from one man only, and that man was Cameron. ‘Give me a break!’

He laughed. ‘I’m kidding, honey, you know that! I want you there because you possess the most creative mind I’ve ever encountered together with a frighteningly cool logic which leaves most of us mere mortals open-mouthed with admiration. Is that better?’ He paused. ‘Come on, Alessandra—isn’t this what we’ve worked together towards for all this time? Isn’t this the kind of dream we thought would never come true? It’s the chance of a lifetime—surely you can see that?’

Alessandra stared at the receiver which she held in her slim pale hand. On the third finger of her left hand, next to her wedding band and completely dominating it, sat the enormous square-cut emerald which blazed in all its green, glorious fire. Cameron had given her the ring when she’d agreed to marry him.

They’d been in bed at the time. She remembered how his features had been carefully composed into a rather enigmatic look of satisfaction after he’d got his own way, and she’d told him rather gravely that, yes, she would marry him.

He’d waited until after they’d made love before producing the ring, pulling it casually from the pocket of his discarded trousers, like a magician producing a rabbit out of a hat.

Her breath had caught in her mouth as he’d placed the magnificent emerald on her finger and, in spite of her insistence that she cared for none of the trappings which came with matrimony, her eyes had widened like saucers. ‘Oh, but Cameron—it’s...exquisite,’ she’d breathed. ‘How did you know it would fit?’

He’d given that smile then. That lazy, sexy smile which had first captivated her, though she’d tried her damnedest not to let it. It still made her heart pound like a runaway train.

‘I just knew.’ And there had been a glint of sexual promise in his eyes as he’d spoken more softly. ‘Just wait until I start buying you lingerie. That will fit you perfectly too. You see, my delectable Alessandra, I know every inch, every centimetre of your delicious body...it’s emblazoned on my mind,’ he’d finished on a sultry murmur as he’d traced a slow, provocative finger from throat to navel.

Alessandra had been so in love with him, so sexually excited by that look in his eyes, that she hadn’t dared touch him back, afraid to kiss him just at that moment because she was so emotionally overcome that she’d feared she would frighten him away! So instead she’d searched around for the kind of response he would expect from her, forcing her habitually serene smile to curve her lips into an almost Madonnalike expression.

‘When did you buy it?’ she queried, as casually as if she were asking him the time.

‘Is that all you can say?’ he replied, with a kind of stunned disbelief which became a sardonic laugh.

‘What would you like me to say?’ she asked evenly.

‘I suppose you do realise,’ he told her in a deliberately mocking tone, ‘that women have been trying to get me to marry them for years? And that a lot of those women would have been overwhelmed to get my ring on their finger?’

It was a very arrogant thing to say, and possibly the only man who could have got away with saying it was Cameron Calder. He was teasing her, yes—but Alessandra was wise enough to know that he had spoken the truth. She was also mature enough to recognise that it was her air of insouciance which attracted him to her. ‘And they would have fallen at your feet in gratitude, would they?’ she queried solemnly. ‘If they had been the recipient of this magnificent ring?’

Cameron gave her a look of bemused admiration as she mocked him back. ‘God, you’re so damned cool,’ he murmured appreciatively. ‘So damned unflappable. I’ve never met a woman like you in my life.’

She learnt another lesson then. Because that avid declaration made Alessandra relieved that she hadn’t given in to her desire to tell him that in a few short weeks he had become her entire world. Because that wasn’t the Alessandra Walker that the world, and Cameron, knew. And that was who he’d fallen in love with—the cool, serene, unflappable woman who could mock him back for his arrogance. He’d had enough of the other kind—the kind that couldn’t keep their hands off him, whose eyes told him he was their lord and master.

She looked up at him from beneath her thick black lashes and this time there was laughter in her eyes. ‘So when did you buy the ring?’ she queried again.

‘When I decided to marry you, of course.’ Cameron smiled.

Alessandra frowned. ‘You mean—when you decided to ask me?’ she corrected.

‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘When I decided to marry you,’ he emphasised.

Some strange emotion quivered in the air. Her heart began to pound. ‘And when was that?’ she asked, suddenly breathless again.

He smiled, but it wasn’t a particularly warm smile. More wary than warm, and definitely bordering on the reluctant. He regarded her steadily. ‘The first time I met you,’ he said.

‘And you were that sure?’ asked Alessandra slowly. ‘So sure of me? So sure I’d say yes?’

‘Darling, do you want me to lie to you?’

She shook her head, her thick brown hair damp from the exertion of their lovemaking so that it hung in limp tendrils to her shoulders. ‘No, Cameron,’ she said quietly. ‘I don’t want you to lie to me.’

‘Then yes,’ he murmured. ‘I was that sure of you.’

‘Alessandra!’ Andrew’s voice cut into her reverie. ‘Are you still there?’

‘Yes, Andrew,’ she said thoughtfully, still gazing at the emerald on her finger. ‘I’m still here.’

‘So are you coming tonight or not?’

Alessandra hesitated, but suddenly it wasn’t a difficult decision to make at all. She glanced at the pale gold watch on her wrist. It had just gone six. Cameron would be on a flight somewhere over the Atlantic right now—he’d been in New York for a week on business. His plane was due in at nine, and then he would take a hire-car from the airport, so he wouldn’t be home until after ten. She had offered to drive to meet him, but he had been adamant that she wasn’t there to act as his chauffeur. And he was one of those men you couldn’t argue with, not once he’d made his mind up!

‘Yes, Andrew, I’ll come for a drink with you tonight,’ she said decisively. She hardly imagined that Cameron had been sitting alone in his hotel room every night for the past week, pining for her! He had friends and business acquaintances in the States he’d doubtless been having dinner with—so what was the difference?

‘And what about Superman?’ sniped Andrew childishly, rather unnervingly voicing her own thoughts. He and Cameron had never exactly hit it off, and neither man had made a secret of it. Alessandra, stuck in the middle, had kept her own counsel.

‘Won’t he object to his darling wife fraternising with men after work?’ added Andrew slyly. ‘You usually break the land-speed record getting home to him.’

Alessandra smiled to herself. Cameron? Superman? Mmm! She liked it! ‘I’m not going to reprimand you for your continued use of that ridiculous nickname you have for my husband, Andrew—because I’ve decided that it’s actually quite accurate. You’re absolutely right—he is a bit of a Superman.’ She sighed.

She could almost hear Andrew’s ego bristling indignantly down the phone. ‘Oh, and I’m not, I suppose?’

‘Different league, I’m afraid,’ she teased him smugly, secure in the knowledge that tonight she would be in the place she most wanted to be—in Cameron’s arms. With difficulty she dragged her mind back to the conversation. ‘Where are we meeting for a drink, and when?’

‘Henry’s Bar—at seven.’

‘Oh, Andrew, must we?’ She looked down, aghast, at the stone-coloured linen suit she was wearing with the apricot silk shirt beneath. Her outfit was elegant and smart, but it simply screamed ‘Office’! ‘It’s so dressy at Henry’s Bar.’

‘Their choice, honey. You know how impressive that place is.’

‘Pretentious, you mean.’ Alessandra sighed. ‘I guess I’ll just have to go home now and find something suitable to wear.’ She did keep a change of clothes in her office for emergencies, but it was strictly casual—cotton trousers and a cotton sweater and fresh underwear. Certainly much too casual for a drink at Henry’s Bar.

‘Why bother going home?’ said Andrew. ‘You’re two minutes from one of the finest dress shops in this city. Why not treat yourself?’

He was talking about a famous Italian designer who dressed most of Hollywood! ‘Because I—’ Alessandra halted, aware that what she had been about to say would sound so stupid. That she couldn’t afford it. Of course she could afford it! She was on, if not a fabulous salary, then an extremely good one. And, even though she had firmly refused Cameron’s offer of a generous dress allowance, she could still afford to buy in the exclusive shops which abounded in the area where she worked.

The trouble was that she had never before spent several months’ salary on just one gown! She loved good clothes, yes, and they were necessary to her high-powered job and sophisticated lifestyle, but there was a limit, and old habits died hard. It had been hard to learn to spend. Hard to disregard the parsimony which had been instilled in her by her upbringing—by watching her poverty-ridden and feckless parents fritter away whatever money did actually come into the house. Alessandra had vivid memories of wearing charity-shop clothes and shoes while her parents had thrown yet another uproarious party.

‘Alessandra—’ Andrew cut into her thoughts once more. ‘For heaven’s sake, go and buy a dress on the company.’

‘No.’

‘Yes.’ He laughed. ‘All right, then—as your boss I’m ordering you to! Look on it as part of your bonus for getting us this new client.’

‘And if we don’t win the account?’ asked Alessandra, ever practical.

‘Oh, we will, we will,’ said Andrew confidently. ‘We’re bound to, with you there!’

Alessandra took the lift up to the penthouse apartment and yawned. Her jaw ached from smiling and her feet were killing her. She’d stood at the counter of Henry’s Bar—standing at the counter was the place to be seen—and had dutifully drunk vintage champagne with the prospective American clients, who had listened to her ideas with enthusiasm.

‘We love your quirky British style,’ the older one, named Billy, had told her earnestly.

‘It sells,’ his colleague, whose eyes had been riveted to her cleavage all evening, had added. Alessandra had decided that, if they did win the account, she would not wear anything low-cut like this again; she couldn’t stand men leering at her like that. The irony was that she’d bought the dress because she had been sure that Cameron would love it. It was beautifully cut and he absolutely adored seeing her wear black.

But, in the changing room at the shop, she had been in such a hurry, so intent with swirling round and checking the back and the length and the shape of the garment, that she had allowed the sales girl’s opinion to sway her. And had ended up with, she realised, a spectacular dress, but one which exposed far more of her skin than usual. It drew attention to the heavy lushness of her breasts, the stark colour making her skin seem almost translucently creamy.

A fact which had obviously not been missed by the younger of the two Americans.

Alessandra had been reluctantly persuaded by Andrew to join them for an early supper after their drink, and so the four of them had moved on to the Savoy—and eaten a too rich combination of caviare, followed by lobster Thermidor, accompanied by still more champagne. Alessandra had felt full, tired and jaded, and she had eventually excused herself at nine-thirty by announcing that one very jet-lagged husband would be arriving from the States shortly, and she wanted to be at home to meet him. She’d felt her pulses stirring at the thought of seeing Cameron again soon.

‘Of course, of course,’ said Billy, beaming at her. ‘It’s been a great pleasure meeting you, Mrs—’

‘It’s Miss,’ corrected Alessandra quickly. ‘I’m still Alessandra Walker. I decided to keep my maiden name when I married.’

‘Really?’ queried the leerer, his eyes still hypnotised by the creamy swell of her breasts.

‘Yes,’ said Alessandra, standing up quickly, thinking that if she didn’t get away from his creepy stare she might say or do something rude which might jeopardise the account! ‘I’m well-known in the advertising world by that name, and so it seemed a pity to lose it.’

‘And it’s the modern way,’ agreed Billy, smiling. ‘In Canada, where two of my daughters live, it’s quite common to do so. Just so long as your husband doesn’t mind!’

Well, she wouldn’t exactly go so far as to say that. Cameron hadn’t objected when she’d told him she wasn’t planning to take his name, he’d just given her that coolly quizzical stare of his and then nodded without comment.

Andrew slipped her coat around her shoulders and gave them a little squeeze, which Alessandra guessed was his way of telling her that the evening had been a success, and Billy stood up, seeming eager to compensate for his partner’s blatantly obvious preoccupation with her body.

‘What kind of business was your husband doing in the States?’ he asked conversationally as he shook her hand.

Alessandra smiled. ‘It’s not really his business, more a kind of sideline. He has a factory here, in the north of England, and others in western Europe, but he dabbles in property for fun.’

‘For fun?’ expostulated Andrew. ‘I’d hardly call owning numerous apartments and a hotel on the East Side of Manhattan “fun”—or heaven help us all if he decides to get serious!’

Even Leerer’s interest had strayed from her bosom now, and Billy looked as eager as a dog who had scented a bone. ‘Really? Would I happen to know your husband, ma’am?’

Alessandra shrugged. ‘I’ve no idea. He’s quite well-known in England—’

‘Understatement of the year,’ interrupted Andrew drily. ‘His name is Cameron Calder.’

He might as well have said ‘the President of the United States’, Alessandra giggled to herself now as she pushed the key into the lock of the flat. For the two businessmen surely couldn’t have been more impressed! She’d had no idea that her husband was so well-known in New York for his entrepreneurial skills.

But then, how would she have known? Cameron had never once taken her to New York with him, and he certainly wasn’t the kind of man to boast. A man like Cameron didn’t need to boast, she thought longingly, a little sigh automatically escaping her lips as it hit her just how much she had missed him.

She closed the door of the flat behind her and yawned widely, dropping her wrap carelessly onto the back of the low sofa. She would change out of this clinging black number, run herself a deep, perfumed bath and then lie—literally, she thought with hungry amusement—in wait for her gorgeous husband.

It took a moment or two for her to register that there was a light shining from the direction of the bedroom. Surely she hadn’t been so careless as to have left it on this morning? Though she had been in a tearing hurry. She’d overslept after a troubled night of disturbed dreams, in which Cameron’s face kept appearing tantalisingly before her.

For a moment she froze as she heard a sound coming from the bedroom, but the fear fled immediately, for she recognised that much loved step at once. She pushed back her dark hair, which had been all mussed up by the wind, to see the tall, shadowy figure of her husband appear framed in the doorway, set against the soft glow of the lamp behind him. In the semidarkness, even more than usual, his body appeared all hard-packed muscle and power.

He snapped on the main-light switch and the room was flooded with a harsh glare. Alessandra’s welcoming smile died on her lips. Because she looked up into Cameron’s harsh, unwelcoming face and suddenly, inexplicably, she really was frightened.