The Mistress's Child (17 page)

Lisi blushed. She hadn't thought that she would have to go back all sticky and redolent of the scent of their sex— but she wouldn't, not really. Unlike last time, he had used a condom.

'Use the bathroom off the main bedroom,' he suggested. 'It's—'

'I know where it is, thank you, Philip,' she said impatiently, shaking her head. I used to live here, remember?' And then she remembered just which room they were in.

He felt her tense. 'What's the matter?'

She bit her lip as she reached for her underwear. 'This used to be my room,' she moaned. 'And soon it will be Tim's, and we've just...just...'

'Just had sex in it?'

Lisi turned away before he could see her face. He could not have termed it in a more insulting way. 'Yes,' she said tonelessly, and suddenly the desire and the passion which had made her want him so very badly—seemed like the worst idea she had ever had in her life.

'Lisi?'

Despairing at the hope which leapt up inside her, she turned around again. 'What?'

'Here!' He threw over her blouse and noted that she caught it like an athlete. 'There's nothing wrong with what we just did,' he said softly. 'It's as natural and as old as time. So what if it is going to be Tim's room—how can what we just did in here possibly harm him? It's how he got here in the first place, after all!'

I don't need you to give me a basic lesson in sex education,' she said crossly, pulling her skirt up over her hips and zipping it up.

No, she certainly didn't. He had never met a woman so

free and generous in her love-making before. Still slightly reeling from learning that there had been no other lover, he came over and began to button up her blouse for her, tempted to lay the flat of his hands over the magnificent thrust of her breasts, but her unsmiling face told him not to bother trying.

'What's the matter?' he asked quietly. 'Are you regretting what just happened?'

There was no reason to be anything other than truthful— not now. Too much water had passed underneath the bridge for coyness or prevarication.

'A little. Aren't you?'

He shrugged as he slipped his shoes on. 'There's no point in feeling regret—you know it was inevitable.'

'I don't understand.'

'I think you do.' His eyes pierced her with their green light. 'Don't you think we needed that? To get rid of some of the tension between us?'

'You make it sound so...so...'

'So what, Lisi?"

'So functional..' She shuddered.

'Sometimes sex is. We were always going to have trouble creating the candlelight and roses scene, weren't we— what with Tim being around and your obvious low opinion of me?' He picked up his jacket. 'So what happened to make you change your mind about hating me? Was it purely jealousy—because you thought that  had something going with Tricia?'

'And do you?' she asked boldly. 'You never did answer that.'

The question angered him. 'You really think I would have just had sex with you, if I was involved with Tricia?'

She wanted to say that he had done once before, except that now she was beginning to look at that night differently. Could a man who was married to a woman who lay in a

deep coma be considered married in the true sense of the word? She looked at him and shook her head, some bone-deep certainty giving her an answer she had not expected. 'No,' she said quietly. 'I don't.'

He expelled a long, pent-up sigh. 'Well, thanks for that, at least.'

'I have to go.' She straightened her jacket and at that moment felt almost close to him, though maybe that was just nature's way of justifying what they had just been doing. But she plucked up the courage to ask another question, one which had been praying on her mind for much longer. 'Philip?'

He narrowed his eyes. 'What?'

'What made you make love to me?' She saw the gleam in his eyes and hastily shook her head. 'No, not this time— last time. When you didn't really...know me...nor I you. Was it just lust? Me being in the wrong place at the wrong time?'

For a long time he had thought that it was simply lust— but if that were the case, then why hadn't he followed up one of the countless other invitations which had come his way? He remembered what Khalim had said, but then Khalim was a born romantic. He shook his head, knowing that he owed her his honesty. 'That's just it, Lisi—I don't know.'

It was not the answer she had wanted—but it was better than nothing.

'Listen,' he said, and she prayed for some sweetener, something to tell her that she wasn't just Lisi-the-body, but Lisi a woman who was entitled to a modicum of respect.

'What?'

'Can I come to the nursery with you later, when you collect Tim?'

It would be his first 'outing' as Tim's father and she knew that she could not refuse him—but he hadn't needed

To male love to her first to ensure that she said yes. She nodded. The only way forward was with truth and honest and no game - playing.  She wasn't going to regret what she had been unable to resist, and neither was she going to use Tim as a pawn to try to make her feel better about her mixed up emotions..

 She smiled. 'Of course you can,' she said simply, but the smile cost her almost as much as the words to make.

CHAPTER TEN

Marian glanced across the office. 'Telephone, Lisi.' She smiled. 'For you. It's Philip.'

Lisi reached out for the phone. As if she needed to be told! Marian's gooey expression said it all, because her boss seemed to be labouring under the illusion that all was hunky-dory between the two of them.

She sighed. Maybe that was what it looked like to the outside world. He visited Langley nearly every weekend and he took the three of them to the zoo and to parks. Dragged them on long walks around the beautiful countryside. Tim liked it that way and so, stupidly, did she.

Philip had even started teaching Tim to play football and she had watched the bond between them grow and grow, happy for her son that it should be so, convincing herself that it did not mean that she was in any way marginalised.

But he had made no further attempt to make love to her again, and, while she didn't know why, she couldn't bring herself to ask him. She feared that once had been enough for him. He had got all the hunger out of his system and now he could move on. What choice did she have, other than to respect and accept that, even though in the long, restless nights her body ached for him?

She still wanted him like crazy, and she guessed that she always would—certainly no man had ever captured her quite so completely, neither before nor since. But sex complicated things and sex with Philip sent her whole world spinning into a vortex of confusion.

Sex with Philip made you long for the impossible—the

impossible in this case being his love. And in her heart she knew she would never have that.

'Hello?'

'Hi. How are things?'

'Good.' He only ever rang her at the office, and part of her wondered whether this was because this guaranteed her polite courtesy towards him. Perhaps he thought that she would not be nearly so compliant if she didn't have Marian half listening in on the conversation. And if he thought that, then he was a fool—because all the fight and hostility had left her. Sex could complicate things, yes—but it could also help define what was most important, and Lisi knew, rightly or wrongly, that she loved him with a fervour which made her ache for him.

'How's life in the big metropolis?' she asked.

'How long have you got?' he asked, with a short laugh, thinking that the quiet village life of Langley was the one true oasis in his high-powered life these days. 'It's busy, crowded, pressured, competitive. Want more?'

Lots more. More than he would ever give her. She laughed back. 'I think I get the picture.' She waited. Was today's request going to be the one she most dreaded? That he would ask if Tim could spend the night at The Old Rectory with him alone, and the separation of their lives as joint parents would begin? She had been astonished that he hadn't asked already, when the bright yellow room with its Mickey Mouse curtains had been ready for occupation since mid-January, and they were now well into April.

I was wondering whether you were free on Saturday?' he asked.

'Saturday? Of course I am—why?'

He thought that most women might have pretended to think about it. 'There's a ball I have to attend up here—it's usually pretty good fun. I know it's short notice, but I wondered whether you'd like to come?'     

As your guest?' she asked stupidly.

'I wasn't planning on asking you to be my chauffeur!' Had he been instrumental in heightening her insecurity? His voice softened. 'Of course as my guest!'

'I don't know whether I can get a babysitter for Tim, not this late. And anyway, I don't know if I'd want to leave him while I went up to London,' she added doubtfully.

'You wouldn't have to. I want you to bring him—an old friend of mine has offered to babysit. It's all arranged, if you're agreed?'

Her heart was pounding with excitement. Oh, for goodness' sake—calm down, Lisi! she told herself. Somebody else has probably let him down at the last minute.

'Well?'

She swallowed. 'Okay,' she replied, as casually as she could. 'I'd love to.'

'Good.' There was a pause. 'And I'd like to buy you something to wear.'

Lisi froze, and her fingers tightened around the receiver. 'I'm not sure that I understand what you mean,' she said icily.

'Something nice—a pretty dress. Whatever you like,' he amended hastily.

So he was ashamed of his country bumpkin, was he? 'What's the matter, Philip?' she asked sarcastically. 'Afraid that I'll turn up in something completely inappropriate and let you down?'

He sighed. Hadn't he anticipated just this response? She could be so damned proud about some things. Like her dogged insistence on paying her share whenever the three of them went out. Time after time she had infuriated him by letting him pay for Tim, but not her, and he worried about how much their outings were eating into her limited budget.

'That wasn't what I meant!' he protested.

'Well, that's what it sounded like!'

'Let's call it a Christmas present, then,' he said placat-ingly. 'Since I didn't buy you one.'

They had scarcely been able to be civil to one another at the time, so that was hardly surprising, but Lisi felt the slow pulse of anger ticking away inside her. Anything more designed to make her feel like a kept woman, she could not imagine!

'Thanks, but no thanks,' she said shortly. 'I'm sure that I can dig something suitable out!'

Philip sighed, recognising a stubbornness which would not be shifted, no matter how he played it. 'Okay, Lisi. Have it your own way. I'll arrange to have a car pick you and Tim up on Saturday afternoon—let's say about three. Does that suit you?'

I can get the train!'

'Yes, you can—but you aren't going to,' he argued grimly. 'It'll take you for ever, and I'm sure that Tim would enjoy travelling in a big, shiny car.'

Yes, he would absolutely love it—of course he would. Philip could give Tim all kinds of expensive toys which she would never be able to. Perhaps that was why he always rang her at work—so that she would not be able to point out little home truths like that one.

'Shall we say three?' he persisted.

'Yes, Philip. We'll be ready. Goodbye,' and she put the phone down to find Marian watching her.

'What's happened?' she asked quickly.

'He's invited the two of us up to London. He's sending a car, he's arranged a babysitter for Tim and he's taking me to a ball.'

'Oh, for heaven's sake, Lisi!' exclaimed Marian. I thought he'd given you bad news! Why on earth are you sitting there with such a long face? What woman wouldn't give the earth for an invitation like that?'

Lisi forced a smile. If only it were as simple as Marian seemed to think it was. 'I'm sure it will be very enjoyable,' she agreed evenly and saw Marian shake her head in disbelief.

She told an excited Tim, and that night, after she had tucked him up in bed and read him his story, she went into her bedroom to survey the contents of her wardrobe.

Ballgowns were long and she had precisely two long dresses—one she had worn during her pregnancy and which now looked like a tent, while the other was flower-sprigged and hopelessly outdated. She zipped it up. And cheap.

Had she been out of her mind to refuse Philip his offer of a dress?

She pulled a grim face at the milk-maid image reflected back at her from the mirror.

No. She would not be in any way beholden to him. By hook or by crook she would make a transformation as total as Cinderella's had been.

She just wasn't sure how!

The next morning she left Tim with Rachel and Blaine while she went to the nearby town of Bilchester to investigate its ballgown possibilities, but after two hours spent solidly trudging from shop to shop she was approaching a state close to despair.

The kind of dress which an evening with Philip would require would create an impossibly huge hole in her tight budget.

'Why don't you hire?' suggested an assistant at her very last port of call.

Lisi shrugged, her naturally parsimonious streak baulking at paying out good money for a dress she would only get to wear once. I want something to show for my money,' she admitted.

The assistant grinned. 'Makes a nice change to get some-

one in here who isn't completely rolling in it!' She lowered her voice as the manageress drifted past in a heavy cloud of cloying perfume. 'Have you tried the thrift shops?' she questioned.

'Thrift shops?'

'Charity shops,' the assistant amended. 'There are two here in Bilchester, and it's such a rich area that you never know what you'll pick up. I shop there myself,' she confided. I get staff discount in here, but the stuff is way too expensive.'

'What a brilliant idea!' said Lisi, with a grateful smile. 'Thanks!'

In the second charity shop she could scarcely believe her luck, because she looked in the window and found her dream dress staring her right in the face.

It looked old—but fashionably old—as if someone had bought this dress many years ago and looked after it with loving care. It had a tight, strapless silk bodice from which the many-layered tulle skirt flared out like a black cloud. It was a fairy-tale dress.