Andrew cut through Jessica's dismayed protest. ‘I won't be long.’
‘Take your time,’ Alicia murmured softly. ‘I'm sure Jessica and I can find—something to talk about—a mutual interest, perhaps.’
Jessica knew that the only thing she had in common with this woman was Andrew, and he knew it too, giving a rather cruel smile in her direction before going to the bar.
‘Shall we sit down?’ Alicia suggested softly.
Jessica seated herself opposite the other woman, knowing they were the centre of attention. They knew, all these people knew, and her humiliation was complete as she saw Matthew Sinclair watching them some distance away, in conversation with another man, although his gaze was fixed on her.
She looked away before that fierce gaze gave way to pity. Matthew Sinclair's sympathy was the one thing she couldn't take right now. No wonder he had tried to kiss her upstairs in his office—he obviously knew of Andrew's affair with his secretary!
‘Why don't you let him go?’ The purring quality had gone from Alicia's voice, the hardness in her beautiful face now evident in her voice too.
Jessica blinked dazedly, frowning at the other woman. ‘I beg your pardon?’
Alicia's mouth twisted. ‘Andrew doesn't love you, so why don't you let him go?’
She swallowed hard, shaking her head. ‘I don't know what you're talking about.’ And she didn't. If Andrew had wanted to leave her she knew there was no way she could stop him.
Alicia was angry now. ‘Andrew told me how you refuse to divorce him, that you use your daughter to hold him——’
‘That isn't true!’ Jessica gasped at the irony of it.
The other woman's expression was scathing. ‘I've heard about women like you, I've even met a couple, but I can tell you now that you've met your match in me. Andrew and I want to get married, the only thing stopping us is you. I mean to have you out of his life, Jessica. I'm even willing to put up with the child to get him.’
‘Child?’ Jessica paled, her hands clenching. ‘You mean Penny?’
‘Yes—I mean Penny,’ Alicia scorned.
‘You aren't taking my daughter from me!’ Her breath was coming in short disturbed gasps, her eyes huge in her pale face.
‘Believe me,’ the other woman drawled, ‘I'd rather not. But Andrew is determined to keep her——'.
‘No!’ Jessica's tone was sharp with distress. ‘No one is going to take Penny away from me. No one!’ Her voice rose hysterically at the thought of life without Penny.
‘Hey, calm down!’ Alicia looked about them selfconsciously. ‘Maybe I chose the wrong place to discuss this——’
‘Anywhere would be the wrong place to discuss taking my child from me!’ Two bright spots of colour heightened Jessica's cheeks. ‘I won't let you——’
‘Jessica, for God's sake!’ Andrew had returned unnoticed by either woman. ‘People can hear you!’ he muttered, sitting down.
‘Really?’ Her eyes glittered. ‘And do you think they aren't hearing what they already know? I'd like to go home,’ she told him coldly.
‘I've just got you a drink——’
‘I want to go,’ she repeated firmly. ‘Either you take me or I get a taxi.’
He frowned. ‘Jess——’
‘Then I'll take a taxi.’ She stood up, moving with as much confidence as she could towards the exit, and took the lift down to the ground floor.
‘Jessica!’ Andrew caught up with her in the car park, swinging her round to face him. ‘How dare you talk to me like that in front of Lisa?’ He flushed with anger.
‘How dare you use me?’ she returned furiously.
‘I—What do you mean?’ he frowned.
‘I've just been informed by your girl-friend that I'm the only thing stopping you marrying her.’
‘And aren't you?’ he snapped.
‘You know I'm not!’ she flushed. ‘How many other women have you told the same thing so that you're free from any commitment to marry them?’ she scorned.
‘Hundreds,’ his mouth twisted, ‘and it worked every time. I just explain to them that I have this frigid little wife at home who'll deprive me of my child if I so much as mention divorce.’
‘Well, tonight Alicia mentioned it for you,’ Jessica snapped disgustedly. ‘So maybe you just weren't convincing enough for her.’
His eyes glittered, his dark good looks contorted with rage. ‘Maybe I didn't want to be. Lisa is my kind of woman—she likes to act like a woman,’ he added cruelly. ‘And she has brains too. Yes, maybe I just might marry her after all.’
‘No …’ she paled.
‘Yes,’ he said with enjoyment. ‘The other women never meant a thing to me, but Lisa is different. I wouldn't at all mind being married to her. Not that you haven't had your uses oyer the years,’ he added scathingly. ‘You've been a good deterrent to marriage-minded women. God, that's the only reason I stayed married to you,’ he laughed. ‘You have little else to offer.’
His laugh was the final insult as far as Jessica was concerned. She had taken too much tonight already—Matthew Sinclair's strange behaviour, Ed Taylor's insults, pitying looks from almost everyone who looked at her, Alicia's ‘friendly’ little chat, and now this definite threat of divorce from Andrew, and so cruelly given.
Her hand seemed to rise almost in slow motion, hitting the side of Andrew's face with such force that for a moment he seemed to stagger.
But he soon regained his balance, his eyes glittering dangerously as he advanced towards her. Jessica didn't even flinch as he coldly, calculatedly, hit her back.
There had been too much violence from him in the past for it to matter to her; she did not even feel the pain any more. Andrew was one of those men who hit out when he was angry. For herself she had ceased to care, and as long as he didn't use that same violence on Penny she would continue to cease caring.
‘I'm going back to the dance,’ he growled. ‘I could be home later, but then again I may just stay out all night. And I mean it about the divorce, Jessica. And you know what that means?’ he sneered.
Pain contracted her chest. ‘Penny …’
‘Yes!’ His smile was cruel in the extreme. ‘You aren't a fit mother for her, we both know that. Lisa will be much better for her.’ He turned and strode away, a tall, athletic-looking man with rakish good looks.
Jessica had ceased to be aware of those looks long ago; she knew only raging pain at this moment. Never! She would never allow Alicia to be Penny's mother.
The
