A Case For Trust (30 page)

‘He can meet us there.'

Why
was she making excuses? Having Matt accompany her to the awards was all she'd been daydreaming about since Eleanor's phone call.
Just say yes, stupid.

‘Thank you, Justin. Thank you so much. Let's call him.'

***

It had been a very strange night. On the one hand, aglow with professional success, Pippa had floated through the evening, accepting the accolades, chatting vivaciously with the local councillor who'd presented her award, trying to be coolly blasé when the councillor suggested she submit a proposal for a new community garden in an inner-city rejuvenation project.

On the other hand, there was Matt. His tone in that brief telephone call from Justin's car had been warm but restrained, and Pippa wasn't really certain Justin had been right about Matt wanting to be with her. Perhaps he'd just accepted out of his usual old-world courtesy? Of course, having met her at the entrance to the convention centre, he'd been an exemplary escort, never leaving her side all night, his broad hand hovering at the dip of her back as he guided her through crowds, his kiss on her cheek when her name was announced gentle but disappointingly fleeting. He'd held her hand afterwards, lightly, as they circulated through the small talk. Warm, but restrained. Not intimate. Not proprietorial. Not declaratory. Not a whiff of tightly leashed passion. When she leaned into his side he moved his hand from her back to her hip, allowing her closer, but there was no sexy stroking, no furtive caress of those havoc-wreaking fingers. Pippa thought she'd go mad with wanting. Was Justin wrong? Did Matt not want her any more? The weeks since they'd been together, that last morning in her kitchen before the Big Betrayal, when there'd felt like so much love, when there'd felt like a future for them, seemed an uncrossable chasm.

There was too much difficult history between them, too much unsaid, and Pippa didn't know how to start the conversation, how to breach the gulf. The journey to her house was silent and heavy with uncertainty, and when Matt parked the car outside her front gate, Pippa was gripping her hands together tightly, desperately seeking the words that would signal her love, her desire, without creating some awful obligation.

‘Can I come in?' His question in the deep silence of the car made her jump.

‘To … talk?'

‘To talk, yes. Just to talk. I know we said—you said—weeks ago it would be better for you if we didn't see each other again, but I thought … I hoped …'

She couldn't bear his unnatural hesitancy. ‘Shh. It's okay. I was wrong. I was so wrong.' Pippa launched towards him, her lips seeking his, her hands finding his. He let her kiss him, returned her urgent caress with the gentle pressure of his own before pulling away, running a finger tenderly down her cheek and tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

‘Phillippa, sweetheart, I desperately want to hold you, to kiss you, but we have some talking to do, some things to settle. I want to hold you and not let you go, but your life's a wreck—I've made it a wreck—and sex isn't going to fix it. More's the pity. I've missed you. Missed loving you.'

At last. ‘It's not such a wreck. Not now. Things are looking up. I got my insurance back, so I can work, and I've got some good project leads to follow up after tonight. I've got the money from Mum, and the prize money from the award, and I've got somewhere to live. So it's all good. You don't have to worry.'

‘You lost your house!' Self-hatred and guilt ravaged his tone. The glow from the dashboard cast shadows that hollowed his cheeks and deepened the creases in his beloved brow. Whatever his intentions when he first briefed his clerk about those damned insurance papers, Pippa couldn't doubt his sincere regret. He
did
care.

‘I lost my mortgaged house, yes. It's not like I had a lot of equity in it yet. I don't have any assets to speak of, but I don't have any debt to worry about either.' It might have been Matt she was trying to comfort, but Pippa felt her heart lift as she said the words. It was true. She felt free. ‘So actually, sex with you would be the icing on the cake.'

‘
After
we talk.' His vehemence startled her and he must have registered her alarm because his voice gentled, became tentative. ‘I mean, if you still want to, after we talk.'

The relief that swept Pippa from toes to top was almost as overwhelming as the desire. ‘Let's talk fast, then, because god knows, I've missed you, too.' She was hurrying to unbuckle her seatbelt when she remembered. ‘Oh. There's only a sleeping bag on the floor, I'm afraid. Everything else is already gone. The house settles tomorrow at nine.'

His heavy sigh of exasperation stilled her fingers on the door handle.

‘Philippa, why didn't you ask me? Or if not me, Eleanor, or Marissa? Why would you choose to sleep in a bag on the floor when you know you have friends who would gladly offer you a bed, who want to help you?'

The bubble threatened to burst. Not this again. Pippa tried to brush aside the question, tried to hold onto the magic. ‘They've helped me enough. I would never have this award without Eleanor, and Marissa won't take any payment for the help she gave me with my insurance.'

Matt groaned with frustration. ‘Eleanor didn't win you the garden prize; your own work did that. And Marissa told me you gave her the winning argument for your case. And in both instances, I'm sure they'd tell you it cost them very little to help and they were very glad to do it. So do you really think they wouldn't give you somewhere to sleep when you needed it?'

‘I know they would. That's not the point.'

‘That's exactly the bloody point!'

Her refusal had been automatic, reflexive, and she was in no way prepared for the anger that had laced Matt's response. It fired up her own defensiveness, lit the ember of pride and determination that always burned just below her surface. She leashed it as best she could, tried to explain as best she could.

‘No. The point is, I don't want to always be the one in need of help. I don't want to be needy. I don't want to be that pathetic, clinging, small kind of person people are always happy to help, while they patronise and pity me!'

Matt stared at her with a kind of bemused horror. ‘Philippa, there's a big difference between needing and being needy. You are
not
that kind of person. You are not somebody that others patronise or pity. You are not your mother. There was never any risk—'

‘You don't know! You don't know anything! I
have
been that person.' Years of pain and fear and shame combusted into an eruption Pippa had no chance, now, of controlling. ‘After Mum died, I needed things. Text books. Gym shoes.
Tampons
, for god's sake. There was never any money for those things. I had a job at McDonalds and worked every shift I could get outside school, but that barely covered the rent. On dole day, once Dad had found his way home from the pub, I'd be emptying his pockets for loose change, all the time scared he'd wake up and find me and wallop me. The kids at school got sick of lending me lunch money and calculators and deodorant, and god knows, I was so sick of asking for them, so sick of the looks on their faces, the smirking behind my back. The day I got my uni offer, I swore I'd never ask anybody for anything ever again. Since I was sixteen I've worked my arse off at every kind of job I can get—waitressing, dishwashing, landscaping, weddings—so that I
don't
need to ask. It's not anybody else's responsibility to give me the things I need, and I am never,
never
going to be that pathetic, small person again.'

Her ferocious outburst had drained her, but there were no tears. She could look into his face to judge his reaction without having to worry about blubbering all over him. And at least now he knew. He might never be able to understand, he of the wealthy and privileged dynasty, he of the perfectly stable and upright family. He might be appalled, he might be repulsed, but at least now he knew who she was, what she was. At least now he knew why she would let herself desire him, love him even, but would never allow herself to need him. And if he rejected her? That's when the tears threatened. That's when her throat clogged. She swallowed hard to clear it. Well, if he rejected her, it was no doubt best for them both. And so she looked into his face with defiance and pride, with a challenge rather than a hope.

Matt reached across to cradle her chin between both his hands, drew her face closer to his, and his eyes when she lifted hers to them were serious, and sad, and tender. ‘You are the strongest, bravest person I have ever met. The toughest. The proudest. The smartest. But sweetheart, you are so wrong. You have to understand. Try to understand. Needing somebody doesn't make you less of a person. It makes you more of one. It makes you vulnerable. It makes you human. It makes you reachable. If you won't be helped, you can't be reached. It's important to be independent, and you are. You never will be that poor, struggling little girl again, whatever the world or insurance companies or stupid lawyers throw at you.

‘But let other people be generous. It's one of the great joys of life, to be able to give to the people you love, and Philippa, there are people who love you but you won't let them give. When you won't let us help you, it makes us feel like you don't trust us. It makes all of us feel smaller. It makes
me
feel small, not being able to help you when I'm the one who's hurt you so badly. And that's only fair; I deserve to feel small about what I did to you, and you are entitled to whatever recompense—financial, legal, emotional, vengeful—you choose against me. But Eleanor doesn't deserve it. Or Marissa. Or Justin. They love you. Let them help you get back on your feet. I love you, too. Please, won't you let me help you?'

He was sweet, and loving, but he was the one who didn't understand. In his world, people might be happy to give, to help. That wasn't her experience. It was a beautiful sentiment, and she'd love to believe it, but …

‘I'm already back on my feet. I don't need to be rescued. It might make you feel better, but it does nothing for me except put me in your debt. I don't need that.'

‘Well, perhaps I do. Perhaps
I
need to be rescued. I don't want to control you, or to own you.
I
need
you
. I'm learning, Philippa, that it's okay to be vulnerable. To be weak and powerless. That's what loving you makes me. I don't like it, either, it frightens the hell out of me, but I'm prepared to live with it, if it means being with you. I'm prepared to live with an awful lot—or with nothing at all—if it means being with you. So help me.
Please
. Please let us depend on each other. I want to be with you, but how can we be together without needing each other, without supporting and giving to each other?'

‘What would I give you? I have nothing to give.'

He closed his eyes briefly, shook his head, then leaned forward and brushed his lips softly against hers. ‘Your love, Philippa. Give me your love.'

She pulled back a little and looked at him uncertainly. ‘You're talking about more than sex.'

‘I'm talking about
much
more than sex. Give me that warm, generous soul that sees beauty everwhere and in everyone, in spite of how it's been hurt. Give me that fierce spirit that defies the world to do its worst and still comes up smiling. Give me that look, every day, that tells me no matter what stupid, thoughtless things I've said or done, you still believe I'm a man worth loving. Give me that, Philippa. That's all I'll ever need. It's all I want. That's more than the whole world can give me.'

She pressed her body back into the seat, away from his intensity, while her eyes searched out the truth in his face. ‘I don't know how you see all that in me. You don't know me that well. I do love you, but what if you're wrong? What if I'm not enough? Why don't we just take it slowly for a while, see if we really are who we think we are together, whether we can trust what we feel. Then, if it doesn't work out, there's no hard feelings, no blame on either side. We have an out clause.'

‘I don't want an out clause, Philippa. I want a forever clause. I don't need more time to know that.'

He was holding something out to her, but in the dim glow of the dashboard, she couldn't see what it was. She leaned closer, received the little box in her hand, flipped it open, ran her finger across the surface because in the dark, it looked empty.

It was empty.

Matt reached for her left hand and drew it close to his chest; she felt the smooth, cold metal slide over her finger; realised she'd forgotten to breathe again.

‘I love you, Philippa, and you love me. I need you. You can trust in that. Trust in
me
. Marry me.'

Until he said the words, she hadn't realised how very frightened she was of them. She shook her head vigorously, trying to pull her hand away. He wouldn't let her, pulled her close to his chest instead. She felt his heart beat below her ear, smooth and regular anvil to her own rapid hammer.

‘What are you really afraid of, sweetheart? You still don't believe I love you?'

She buried her despair in his tuxedo. ‘No. I believe you. But Matt, love's not a good enough reason to marry. My mother loved my father and he made her miserable every day of her life, until he killed her.'

‘Eleanor slept with my father's brother, Jack. My brother, Garrett, is actually my half-brother.' Philippa gasped in shock at Matt's words, at the bald, matter-of-fact tone he delivered them in. ‘So I don't exactly have a strong family track record in successful marriages either. But I'm willing to chance it. For you, I'm willing to take the risk.

‘It's a big risk,' she whispered. ‘We've spent most of the time we've known each other either fighting with each other or in bed with each other. How is that any basis for successful marriage?'