key in the lock.
Well, it had to be Isobel, he mused blackly, aware that she couldn’t have chosen a more awkward time to return. Here he was, trying to placate his girlfriend, with his wife as an unwilling audience.
EMILY came into the room at that moment, too. She must have heard Isobel, and she bounded eagerly across the living room to meet her.
‘Daddy and I have been playing computer games,’ she exclaimed, by way of a greeting, and Jake didn’t have time to cover the mouthpiece of his phone before Marcie latched on to the anomaly.
‘Daddy and I?’ she spat angrily. ‘What’s going on, Jake? I thought you said you weren’t the kid’s father.’
‘I’m not.’
Jake balked before saying anything more with his wife regarding him from the hall doorway. Dammit, there was no easy way to do this. Whatever he said, he was going to offend somebody.
‘Jake.’ Isobel was civil enough, but he could see the strain in her face. ‘It was good of you to stay.’
Yeah, right.
Jake bit back the sardonic response, giving her a brief nod of acknowledgement as Marcie spoke again. ‘Is Isobel there?’ she demanded. ‘Jake—’
‘Look, I’ve got to go,’ he interrupted her, aware that he was building up trouble for himself later, but unable to do anything about it right now. ‘Take a cab to the hotel, will you? I’ll join you there as soon as I can.’
‘Jake—’
‘Just do it,’ he said tightly, and felt a momentary pang of remorse when she rang off without saying another word.
Flipping his phone closed, he was aware that Isobel was still watching him. ‘I’m sorry if we’ve upset your dinner arrangements,’ she said stiffly. ‘I was as quick as I could be, but my mother isn’t well.’
‘I’m sorry.’
It was a standard response and her lips twisted a little wryly at his words. ‘Yes—well, that’s not your problem.’ Her face softened as she looked at Emily. ‘I hope you’ve been a good girl.’
Emily grimaced. ‘I’m not a baby, Mummy. Like I said before, Daddy and I have been playing Black Knights.’ Her face brightened. ‘He owns Dreambox. Did you know that?’
Isobel’s lips thinned. ‘Yes. He’s very clever,’ she said drily, unbuttoning her navy overcoat and unwinding a silk scarf from around her neck. ‘Now, why don’t you go and make me some tea, Em? I think—’ She looked questioningly at Jake. ‘I think we have to talk.’
Emily pulled a face. ‘Do I have to?’
‘Em!’
‘Oh, all right.’
Emily flounced out of the room and Isobel finished taking off her coat. Underneath, she was wearing a cream silk shirt and a navy skirt that ended an inch or two above her knees, but Jake barely noticed. What disturbed him was how thin she had become; the bones of her shoulders were clearly evident beneath the thin fabric of her shirt.
Yet she was still beautiful, he reflected unwillingly. The pale oval of her face was framed by ebony-dark hair, drawn back from a centre parting and secured in a loose chignon at her nape. Luminous blue eyes and high cheekbones only emphasised the generous width of her mouth, and her porcelain skin gave her a fleeting resemblance to the Madonna.
But Jake knew she was no saint. Isobel was—had always been—a warm, passionate woman, and although he despised her for the way she’d treated him, he had never lost his admiration for her grace and elegance.
Now, however, he was concerned by her appearance, and with the comments that Emily had made still ringing his ears he said abruptly, ‘Is there something you’re not telling me?’
Isobel carefully folded her coat and laid it over a chair. ‘I don’t know what you mean,’ she said, avoiding his eyes. Then, straightening, ‘I’m sorry you’ve had to hang about, but there was nothing I could do. Mama phoned and…’
Her voice trailed away and Jake’s mouth compressed. ‘And you couldn’t let her down,’ he remarked sardonically. ‘Tell me something new.’
Isobel’s lips tightened. ‘You don’t understand. She’s been extremely—fragile—since her—well, in recent months.’
‘Since her operation, you mean?’ Jake regarded her with cynical eyes. ‘Emily told me.’
‘I see.’ Isobel hesitated. ‘Then you’ll know that by-pass operations on the elderly can have—complications.’
‘So that’s what it was.’ Jake nodded. ‘I didn’t know.’
Isobel frowned. ‘But you said—Emily—’
‘She was pretty vague.’ He shrugged, and then glanced about him. ‘Look, why don’t you sit down? You look tired.’
‘Thanks.’
It was hardly a compliment, but Isobel was glad to accept his advice. She was tired; exhausted, actually. She had been for weeks; months. Ever since she’d heard that her husband was involved with Marcie Duncan.
Of course, he’d had affairs before. Several, actually, over the years, and she’d suffered through every one of them. But his relationship with Marcie was something different. It had gone on for so much longer, for one thing, and for another a friend had told her that Marcie was telling everyone that he was going to marry her.
Except he was still married to Isobel.
Expelling a quivering breath, she moved into the room and seated herself on the sofa nearest to the door. Then, as he lounged into the chair opposite, she forced a formal smile.
But it was difficult. Bloody difficult, actually, she thought with a sudden spurt of anger. Sitting opposite the man you had once thought you loved better than life itself was never going to be easy, and she despised the fact that he could come here and behave as if all they had ever been to one another was polite strangers.
He looked so damned relaxed, she mused tensely. In the kind of casual gear he wore to work, which her mother had always deplored on a man in his position, he looked completely at his ease and she resented it.
A black tee shirt was stretched across his broad shoulders and exposed the ribbed muscles of his stomach. He didn’t appear to have an ounce of spare flesh on him, and tight-fitting moleskin pants hugged his narrow hips and long powerful legs. A leather jacket, still displaying the fact that it had been raining when he arrived, was hung over the back of a chair and one booted foot rested casually across his knee.
He was not a handsome man, she assured herself, unwilling to admit that his strong, hard features possessed something more than mere good looks. His skin was darker than the rest of his colouring, his hair streaked in shades of silvery blond and amber, and eyes as green as his Irish roots should have indicated a fair countenance. But somewhere in Jake’s mongrel ancestry—as her mother would say—there had been a darker strain. Just another reason why Lady Hannah Lacey had opposed his marriage to her only daughter.
‘Have you been waiting long?’ she asked at last, rather than broach the subject she was sure was his reason for being here, and Jake regarded her through narrowed lids.
‘What do you think?’ he asked. ‘Our appointment was for five o’clock, wasn’t it?’
Isobel sighed. ‘Do we have to have appointments?’ She smoothed her damp palms over the slim lines of her skirt. ‘This isn’t a business meeting, is it?’
Jake didn’t answer that. Instead, he said, ‘I guess you know why I’m here,’ and a shiver feathered its way down her spine.