Lee Wilkinson - Claiming His Wedding Night

Difficult, but not impossible…

‘This OK?’ The driver’s voice cut through her jumbled thoughts.

‘Oh, yes…fine, thanks.’

Gathering herself, she paid him, added a tip and climbed out.

As he drove away, she started to walk on. It was about a quarter of a mile to the Calder Street offices, but she had been afraid to be dropped any closer in case Jared had managed to get the number of the taxi.

Her legs still felt shaky, and she wished Martin was here in London rather than in Japan.

Whilst she had struggled to forget Jared and all the pain his perfidy had caused, Martin had been her anchor, her safe harbour, and she missed his reassuring presence.

He was an attractive man, tall and sturdily built, with fair hair and cornflower-blue eyes. A man she felt sure would make a good husband and father.

Even so, it had taken three years of patient, undemanding devotion on his part to finally get her to accept his proposal of marriage.

Now she would be glad when the wedding was over and they were man and wife. She would feel safer. Be—almost—able to believe that she had finally managed to escape from the past.

But though Martin had admitted that he had first fallen madly in love with her when she was just seventeen, she knew she would never again feel the kind of passionate love she had felt for Jared.

Nor did she want to. It was too traumatic. It had brought nothing but bitter disillusionment and heartbreak.

Or so she told herself.

In truth, it was simply that having once given her heart she had nothing left to give, just a void where her heart should have been.

All she felt for Martin was gratitude for his unfailing support, and an almost sisterly affection.

But, even so, he still wanted her and she was satisfied that she could make him happy and, while he would never rock her world, neither would he cause her pain.

When John and Elmer were told the news the two men had been highly delighted.

‘I’ve always known how he felt about you,’ Elmer had told her, ‘so I wasn’t surprised when he decided to follow you to England. I’m just pleased that his tenacity has finally paid off. There’s no one I’d sooner have for a daughter-in-law.’

While her father had said gladly, ‘I can’t tell you how pleased I am that you’ve finally decided Martin’s the man for you. Dangerfield couldn’t be trusted and would never have amounted to anything; I was beginning to think you’d never get over him.’

Only Perdita knew in her heart of hearts that she hadn’t got over Jared, and she never really would. Hadn’t she spent the last three years trying?

Reaching the glass and concrete tower block that housed JB’s suite of offices, Perdita exchanged greetings with the security guard before taking the lift up to the second floor.

In the outer office, Helen, their attractive blonde secretary-cum-PA, glanced up from her computer to ask hopefully, ‘Did you have any luck?’

Perdita shook her head. ‘Unfortunately not.’

Helen, who’d been with them for the past three years, sighed. ‘How did your father take it?’

‘Very well, really. I think he’d resigned himself.’

‘So now your only hope is Salingers?’

‘I’m afraid so.’

‘Then you’ll just have to charm their Mr Calhoun.’

‘I didn’t manage to charm the bank manager,’ Perdita said wryly.

Helen grinned. ‘Perhaps you just weren’t his type.’

Once in her own office, Perdita disposed of her handbag and hung up her jacket before sitting down at her desk.

But, though she had a great deal of administrative work to get through, try as she might, she couldn’t concentrate. Jared was once again occupying her thoughts to the exclusion of all else.

She found herself rerunning the little scene outside the Arundel over and over again in her mind, wondering how it might have ended if the taxi hadn’t been there at just the right moment.

But it was, she told herself sternly, so she must avoid dwelling on other possibilities and try to dismiss all thoughts of Jared from her mind.

Only that was easier said than done.

His dark face and the memories it brought flooding back refused to be banished and by four-thirty she had achieved very little in the way of work.

She had just decided to give up and go home when the phone rang and Helen told her, ‘Mr Calhoun’s secretary would like to speak to you. She’s on the other line.’

‘Thanks.’

Fearing the worst, Perdita picked up the receiver and said, ‘Perdita Boyd speaking.’

A woman’s voice, sounding cool and efficient, responded, ‘Miss Boyd, I have a message for you. Unfortunately, Mr Calhoun has been forced to cancel your appointment.’

Knowing only too well how urgently they needed the lifeline Salingers had appeared to be holding out, Perdita’s heart sank like a stone.

Trying to keep her voice level, she asked, ‘Can you tell me the reason?’

‘Mr Calhoun needs to fly to the States tomorrow morning,’ the secretary told her crisply. ‘The only way he can find time to see you is if you can meet him at the airport and talk to him over breakfast.’

Unable to hide her eagerness, Perdita agreed, ‘Yes. Yes, I can do that.’

‘In that case, if you’ll give me your home address I’ll arrange for a car to pick you up at six-thirty tomorrow morning.’

Perdita gave her the address and thanked her before ringing off.

Feeling like a condemned woman who had been granted a last-minute reprieve, she phoned her father to tell him of the change of venue.

Then, having pulled on her jacket, she collected her bag and made her way through to the outer office, where Helen was just preparing to leave.

‘Problems?’ the other woman enquired, her face sympathetic.

‘Just a change of plan, thank the Lord.’

Perdita explained briefly what that change of plan involved, adding, ‘So it could have been worse. I only hope he’s not in too much of a hurry to really listen to me.’

‘Amen to that. Well, if you want to get off, I’ll lock up.’

‘Thanks. See you sometime tomorrow.’

The phone call had temporarily driven thoughts of Jared from the forefront of Perdita’s mind but, as she started to walk home, memories of the past came flooding back in a relentless tide.

She had been born in the States, but her American mother had died soon after and her distraught father had taken her back to England with him.

After she’d left school, in order that she should see something of the country of her birth, her father had taken her over to California for a prolonged visit.

Elmer, who owned a large house near Silicon Valley, had insisted that the pair of them stay there with himself and Martin.

Perdita had been in San Jose for only a matter of days when she and Jared had met at a party. She had fallen in love with him at first sight—love like a deep, fast-flowing river that she had plunged straight into without stopping to ask herself if she might drown.

Right from the start, it had been like sharing a self with him. They had completed each other, filled each other’s lives and hearts. She had thought of them as soulmates.

But in the end that whole concept of closeness, of belonging together, had proved to be just an illusion. A lie.

He was tall, dark and handsome—a hackneyed phrase but a true description—a charismatic man who had always attracted the opposite sex like buddleia attracted butterflies.

But, with eyes only for her, he had never seemed to notice them. Even so, in the early days of their relationship she had had to struggle hard to hide her jealousy when one of them had touched him or smiled at him.

When one day she had admitted as much, he had kissed her and said, ‘There’s no need to be jealous, my love. I’m a one woman man, and you’re that woman. There’ll never be anyone else for me.’