Sara Craven - Marriage By Deception

He led, Ros thought, a very ordered life, and she had become part of that order. Which suited her very well, she told herself.

In any case, love was different for everyone. And she certainly didn’t want to be like Janie—swinging deliriously between bliss and despondency with every new man. Nor did she want to emulate one of her heroines and be swept off her feet by a handsome rogue, even if he did have a secret heart of gold. Fiction was one thing and real life quite another, and she had no intention of getting them mixed up.

Life with Colin would be safe and secure, she knew. He’d give her few anxieties, certainly, because he didn’t have the imagination for serious mischief…

She stopped dead, appalled at the disloyalty of the thought. Janie’s doing, no doubt, she decided grimly.

But, whatever her stepsister thought, she was contented. And not just contented, but happy. Very happy indeed, she told the beige reflection with a fierce nod of her head. After all, she had a perfect house, a perfect garden, and a settled relationship. What else could she possibly need?

She wondered, as she returned to her desk, why she’d needed to be quite so vehement about it all…

Usually she found it easy to lose herself in her work, but for once concentration was proving difficult. Her mind was buzzing, going off at all kinds of tangents, and eventually she switched off her computer and went downstairs to make herself some coffee.

Her study was on the top floor of her tall, narrow house in a terrace just off the Kings Road. The bedrooms and bathroom were on the floor below, with the ground floor occupied by her sitting room and dining area. The kitchen and another bathroom were in the basement.

On the way down, she looked in on Janie, but the room was deserted and there were a number of screwed-up balls of writing paper littering the carpet.

Ros retrieved one and smoothed it out. “‘Dear Lonely in London”,’ she read, with a groan. “‘I’m also alone, and waiting to meet the right person to make my life complete. Why don’t we get together and—”’ A violent dash, heavily scored into the paper, showed that Janie had run out of inspiration and patience at the same time.

Ros sighed as she continued on her way to the basement. She could only hope that ‘Lonely in London’ would indeed be swamped by replies, so that Janie’s would go unnoticed.

In the kitchen she found the debris of Janie’s own coffee-making, along with the remains of a hastily made sandwich and a note which read, ‘Gone to Pam’s’.

Ros’s lips tightened as she started clearing up. Pam was a former school buddy of Janie’s, and equally volatile. No wise counsels would be prevailing there.

Well, I can’t worry about it any more, she thought. My whole working day has been disrupted as it is.

Nor would she be able to work that evening, because she was going out to dinner with Colin. Which was something to look forward to, she reminded herself swiftly. So why did she suddenly feel so depressed?

‘Darling, is something the matter? You’ve hardly eaten a thing.’

Ros started guiltily, and put down the fork she’d been using to push a piece of meat round her plate.

‘I’m fine, really.’ She smiled with an effort. ‘Just not very hungry.’

‘Well, I know it couldn’t be the food,’ said Colin. ‘This must be the only place in London where you can still get decent, honest cooking at realistic prices.’

Ros stifled a sigh. Just for once, she mused, it might be nice to eat something wildly exotic at astronomical prices. But Colin didn’t like foreign food, or seafood, to which he was allergic, or garlic. Especially not garlic.

Which was why they came to this restaurant each week and had steak, sauté potatoes, and a green salad without dressing. Not forgetting a bottle of house red.

‘I hope you’re not dieting,’ he went on with mock severity. ‘You know I like a girl to have a healthy appetite.’

Whenever he said that, Ros thought, wincing, she had a vision of herself with bulging thighs and cheeks stuffed like a hamster’s.

‘Colin,’ she said suddenly. ‘Do you think I’m dull?’

‘What on earth are you talking about?’ He put down his knife and fork and stared at her. ‘I wouldn’t be here if I thought that.’

‘But if you saw me across a roomful of people would you come to me? Push them all aside to get to me because you couldn’t stay away?’

‘Well, naturally,’ he said uncomfortably. ‘You’re my angel. My one and only. You know that.’

‘Yes, of course.’ Ros bit her lip. ‘I’m sorry. I just have a lot on my mind at the moment.’

Colin snorted. ‘Don’t tell me. It’s that girl causing problems again, I suppose?’

‘She doesn’t mean to,’ Ros defended. ‘She’s just a bit thrown at the moment because she’s split with Martin and—’

‘Well, that’s a lucky escape for Martin.’ Colin gave a short laugh. ‘And I hope a lesson for Janie. Maybe she won’t rush headlong into her next relationship.’

‘On the contrary,’ Ros said, needled. ‘She spent the entire afternoon replying to an ad in the Clarion’s personal column. “Lonely in London”, he calls himself,’ she added.

‘She’s mad,’ Colin said. ‘Out of her tree. And what are you thinking of to allow it?’

‘She’s over twenty-one,’ Ros reminded him levelly. ‘How can I stop her? And it doesn’t have to be a disaster,’ she went on, Colin’s disapproval making her contrary for some reason. ‘A lot of people must find happiness through those ads, or there wouldn’t be so many of them.’

‘Dear God, Ros, pull yourself together. This isn’t one of your damned stupid books.’

His words died into a frozen silence. Ros put down her glass, aware that her hand was trembling.

She said quietly, ‘So that’s what you think of my work. I’d often wondered.’

‘Well, it’s hardly Booker Prize stuff, angel. You’ve said so yourself.’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘But that doesn’t necessarily mean I want to hear it from anyone else.’

‘Come on, Ros.’ He looked like a small boy who’d been slapped—something she’d always found endearing in the past. ‘It was just a slip of the tongue. I didn’t really mean it. Janie makes me so irritated…’

‘Oddly enough, she feels the same about you.’ Ros leaned back in her chair, giving him a steady look.

‘Indeed?’ he said stiffly. ‘I fail to see why.’

‘Well don’t worry about it,’ she said. ‘From now on I’ll keep her vagaries strictly to myself.’

‘But I want you to feel you can confide in me,’ he protested. ‘I’m there for you, Ros. You know that.’ He swallowed. ‘I’m booked to go with the lads on a rugby tour next week, but I’ll cancel it if you want. If I can help with Janie.’

Ros smiled involuntarily. ‘I appreciate the sacrifice, but it isn’t necessary. I think the two of you are better apart. And the rugby tour will do you good.’

It will do us both good, was the secret, unbidden thought that came to her.

He looked faintly relieved, and handed her the dessert menu. ‘I suppose you’ll have your usual crème caramel?’

‘No,’ she said crisply. ‘Tonight I’m having the Amaretto soufflé with clotted cream.’

He laughed indulgently. ‘Living dangerously, darling?’

‘Yes,’ Ros said slowly. ‘I think maybe I will. From now on.’

‘Well, don’t change too much.’ He lowered his voice intimately. ‘Because I happen to think you’re perfect just as you are.’

‘How strange,’ she said. ‘Because I bore myself rigid.’

She smiled angelically into his astonished eyes. ‘I’d like brandy with my coffee tonight, please. And, Colin, make it a double.’