Because she couldn’t ever let him into her heart again.
‘Helen!’ he muttered in alarm when she screwed up her body in despair. His grip tightened and he shook her slightly. ‘Please! What is it?’
‘You! Don’t you understand? I can’t bear to look at you!’ she yelled in misery.
Dimly she heard Dan thundering out of the room. To her confusion, she began to sob, because she’d wanted him to be there beside her, stroking, soothing… What a fool she was. It seemed she didn’t know what she wanted at all.
Weak and defeated, she slumped against the pillows. Perhaps he was leaving and she’d never see him again. Horrified, she began to wail in earnest, her whole body succumbing to the sense of terrible desolation she felt.
To be alone, without him. Never seeing his face, never hearing his breathing beside her as they lay in bed together, never lovingly and lingeringly smoothing out that dent in his pillow…
Oh, why hadn’t she seen the danger signs, noticed that they were neglecting one another, put her foot down and insisted that they had time together?
If only she could put the clock back! Then she’d never know he was really weak and flawed. But…was that so surprising? He’d had such a harsh and unloving upbringing… Maybe, she mused, he’d always covered up his faults, in a desperate attempt to make successive foster parents like him. And so he’d built his life on lies, on a mask that hid his true nature.
She almost felt sorry for him. And consequently was more muddled than ever. But she had to remember that he wasn’t the man she’d imagined. She’d married an illusion—and couldn’t live with the reality: someone who cheated and lied for his own selfish ends.
‘Helen.’ His voice was strangled, close to her ear. She put her hands up to shut him out but he hauled her up and roughly dabbed at her streaming eyes. ‘Don’t cry. Please don’t cry,’ he said rawly. ‘I’ve brought you some brandy. You must drink it—I insist. You’ll be so ill…’
She couldn’t be ill. She must be strong and organise her new life. See solicitors. Produce lists of things to do.
The jagged sobs came less frequently. She allowed him to hold the glass to her trembling lips, to enclose her feeble hands with his because they both knew she’d drop the glass otherwise.
The brandy silked a warm and beguiling path to her stomach and revived her. She kept her gaze fixed on the glass. On his hands. She’d always loved them. Big and capable but with long, slender fingers that had lain against her face while his mouth had slowly descended in a sweet or sometimes blistering kiss… She choked.
‘Just drink,’ he husked. ‘Don’t think about anything. Don’t torture yourself. It’s all right. Honestly.’
But it wasn’t. And the sooner she accepted that the better. Though she couldn’t help grieving.
‘How is it all right?’ she whispered mournfully, her voice cracking midway.
He swallowed, some unknown emotion overcoming him. ‘It is. Believe me. We’ll sort this out. I can’t bear to see you so upset,’ he husked.
‘You should have thought of that before you played hunt the dolly-bird,’ she muttered.
His mouth clammed up and he stalked over to shed the towel and grab his robe, turning around once he’d drawn it around his nakedness and had begun to yank the belt into an angrily tied knot.
‘You know how hard I’ve been working!’ he lashed. ‘I’m not Superman. I would never have had the energy for a dolly-bird!’
She fell silent. Energy could always be found for the things one wanted to do. And he’d proved a moment ago that his sex drive was still active.
He stood there, brooding, dark eyes narrowed and hostile.
‘I need you to be calm,’ he said flatly.
Her eyes silvered and she averted her head again. Calm? Yes, she was—but only because she felt numb with cold, as if the blood had stopped bothering to do the trip around her body.
She shivered and slid further under the bedclothes, suddenly scared of hearing some trumped-up explanation that had so many holes in it she’d be sieving out the lies for days to come.
‘Superficially I am,’ she replied in stilted tones. ‘But don’t let that fool you. Go on. Let’s have your explanation.’
Dan inhaled long and hard. ‘I can’t talk to the back of your head.’
Sullenly she turned over and glued her eyes to the ceiling, her body a taut mass of terror.
‘Get on with it,’ she whispered.
‘Give me a break!’ he protested.
‘Why?’ she blurted out.
His hands clawed into fists. ‘If you see no reason, then there isn’t much hope for us, is there?’
After that bitter statement, there was a long and painful pause. A sickening atmosphere of hate and suspicion thickened the air between them. She could feel Dan mentally leaving her, the bonds being severed. Despair entered every corner of her heart.
It was incomprehensible to her that he was angry. Surely he realised she was all but dying inside?
‘Tell me,’ she said in a flat monotone.
He was silent for a few seconds. ‘To my mind, it’s perfectly simple,’ he began eventually, so quietly that she had to strain her utmost to hear. ‘I’ve worked it out. I think that Celine had been planning this for a while.’
‘Sex in our home?’ she shot miserably before she could stop herself. ‘It’s the crowning triumph, isn’t it?’ she cried, more unhappy than she could ever have imagined. She glared at him. ‘Like a dog marking a tree on another dog’s territory!’
Oh, God! she thought. What awful things was she coming out with?
Dan winced. ‘You’re overwrought. Don’t say things you’ll regret—’
‘I’m not going to make this easy for you!’ she cried, her eyes huge in their hopelessness.
Dan muttered under his breath and bowed his head. Buried his face in his hands. He who had always been invincible. Her rock. She was still finding that she couldn’t cope with his distress. It was worse than her own.
What did that mean? she wondered. That she still loved him enough to forgive him? Would she have him back if he begged? Could she ever let him come near her again without thinking of that woman?
‘I can’t cope with your hatred,’ he whispered rawly.
An incredible agony ripped through her flesh, tearing her nerves into ragged strings. And she could not stop shaking, misery and sickness forcing their way up till she had to repeatedly swallow them back down.
He’d been rejected all his life. In his own mind he must see this as yet another rejection. But what did he expect, when he’d behaved so badly? She was hurting. She’d been
