Marion Lennox - The Heir’s Chosen Bride

‘You’re engaged to Marcia.’

‘I’m not marrying Marcia.’

‘Marcia thinks you’re marrying Marcia.’

‘I’ve made a mistake,’ he said. ‘Jodie told me I was making a mistake and I didn’t see it. It’s only now-’

‘Who’s Jodie? Another fiancée?’

‘Jodie’s with Nick. He’s a woodcarver.’ He thought about the way Jodie had said goodbye to him, the way she’d dared him to take this holiday and move on.

Jodie would be proud of him.

‘So you moved on to Marcia?’

‘Jodie’s my secretary.’

‘She’s still in your life?’

‘Susie, can we get back to the issue at hand?’

‘Which is that you’d like to marry me.’

‘Yes.’ This was dumb, he thought. He was sitting on one side of the room in a tangle of sweaters and socks. She was sitting on the far side of Angus’s bed, surrounded by papers. He should be down on one knee on her side of the room. At the very least they should just have had a candlelit dinner-not the Country Women’s Association Tuna Surprise.

He thought of the finesse of his proposal to Marcia and the dinner that had preceded it and he almost grinned. But not quite. A survival instinct was kicking in here, telling him that chuckling over cliché engagement settings wasn’t quite the thing to do right now.

‘Why do you think you love me?’ She still had the conversational tone. He’d like to move closer but her words…they were like a defence, he thought. A bit brittle. A bit too casual.

‘Susie, I don’t want you going back to the States by yourself.’

‘I’m not going by myself. I’m going with Rosie.’

‘You know what I mean.’

‘I’m not sure what you’re suggesting here.’ She still hadn’t moved and neither had he. It was like some crazy, stilted conversation about something that concerned neither of them. ‘Are you saying you want me to stay here and you’ll stay, too-or are you saying you want me to come back with you?’

He hadn’t thought that far ahead. He tried to make his mind work, but there was something akin to fog blanketing everything. Making it impossible to apply logic.

He was terrified, he thought suddenly. He was just plain terrified. Stepping off into some abyss…

‘Hey, Hamish, I’m not going to accept,’ she said gently. There’s no reason to look like that.’

‘Like what?’

‘Like I’m a cliff edge,’ she said gently. ‘I won’t do that to you.’

‘You’re no cliff edge.’ But he’d been thinking that. How had she known?

‘You don’t really want to marry me.’

‘I do.’ This seemed important. If he kept saying it then it’d start to make sense, he decided. It must make sense.

‘What would you do with me?’ She almost sounded amused. ‘Back in Manhattan?’

‘You could work. There’s all sorts of landscaping jobs.’

‘Window-boxes to be planted out. That sort of thing.’

‘We’d get a place further out,’ he said, starting to sound as dopy as he felt. ‘I can commute-or stay in Manhattan during the week and come home at weekends.’

‘In the tiny gaps you have from work.’

‘At least you wouldn’t be alone.’

She let her breath out in a long exhalation. She looked at him then, really looked at him-and then she pushed herself to her feet.

‘Hamish, this is crazy. You haven’t thought it out. Forget you said it. It’s time I went to bed. I’ll get up early and see how much of this I can cope with then.’

She was letting him off the hook, he thought, but he didn’t want to be off the hook. Sure, he hadn’t thought this through, but the essentials were there. He rose with speed, crossing to stand before her, reaching out to grasp her wrists and hold her at arm’s length.

‘Susie, it could work,’ he said urgently.

‘Don’t be daft.’

‘I’m not daft.’

‘If you didn’t feel sorry for me,’ she said softly, ‘would you be even thinking of marriage?’

‘No, I-’

‘That’s what I thought,’ she said flatly and hauled her arms back.

‘No!’ His word exploded across the room, frightening in its intensity. He took her hands in his, urgent. ‘Susie, it’s not like that.’

‘It’s not?’ She swallowed, seemingly as confused as he was. Struggling to figure things out. ‘If I wasn’t limping, would you be thinking you could possibly let Marcia down?’

‘I can’t marry Marcia. Not feeling as I do about you.’

‘But you’re talking about commuting. In the gaps from work. In the same breath as a proposal. To stop me being lonely.’ She took a deep breath and carefully, carefully disengaged her hands. ‘Hamish, when I was single I loved having my own space. I had lots of friends and loneliness didn’t come into it.’

‘But you’re lonely now.’

‘Because I met Rory,’ she said softly. ‘When he and I were together there wasn’t loneliness. How could there be? Sure, there were nights when we were forced to be apart, but our phone bills were enormous and we’d go to sleep talking to each other. Thinking of each other.’

‘As you and I-’

‘Shut up and let me finish,’ she told him, and her voice was almost kindly. ‘Because it’s important. Rory died and I learned what loneliness is. It’s the awful, awful emptiness when people leave.’

‘Susie…’

‘It gets filled,’ she said, almost conversationally. ‘Now I’m alone I’ve gone back a little to how I was. I depend on me for my company. It’s taken two years but I’ve learned to cope. But, you know, Kirsty comes to dinner, and then she leaves and the loneliness closes over me again. I fell for Angus and it was good, but when he died, it was bleakness all over again. Emptiness. You know, there are lots of single people who don’t like people staying overnight because the house seems so empty when they’re gone. Loneliness happens again and again and what you’re offering… Hamish, every time you walked out the door I’d be alone.’

‘I’d have to work,’ he said, startled, but she shook her head, as if she was sad about his incomprehension.

‘Yes, but when you went to work I wouldn’t come with you.’

‘What the-?’

‘In your heart,’ Susie whispered. As he stared at her in confusion, she smiled. ‘Hamish, you don’t understand and maybe if I hadn’t had it with Rory then I wouldn’t understand either. But Hamish, I’ve fallen in love with you.’

She’d fallen in love… He reached for her but she took a step back, holding up her hands to ward him off.

‘No.’

‘No?’

‘No,’ she said softly. ‘If you think that makes a difference…’

‘Of course it makes a difference. I’ve fallen for you, too, Susie.’

‘Have you?’ she said. ‘You’ve spent your whole life defending yourself, learning not to let anyone close, and you’re not about to stop now. You’re going to spend our entire married life waiting for me to manipulate you. If I was fool enough to marry you. Which I’m not.’

‘I know you won’t manipulate me.’

‘No, you don’t. You don’t know anything about me.’

‘I know you’re the most courageous person I’ve ever met.’

‘That’s pity,’ she said flatly. ‘Not love. If I died tomorrow, would you cry?’

‘I don’t cry,’ he said before he could stop himself, and she stilled.

There was a long, long pause.

‘No, she said at last. ‘You don’t cry.’

‘Susie, I’m not emotional.’

‘Well, there you go, then,’ she said softly. ‘Maybe we’re a match after all, because neither am I.’

‘Are you kidding?’

‘You see, that’s the problem,’ she whispered. ‘What you see is on the outside. You’re thinking you might marry the outside. But inside…you don’t have a clue. You just don’t have a clue. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to bed.’ She made to push past him but he stepped across the doorway.