Claiming His Wedding Night (15 page)

She shook her head. ‘I thought it was. I thought I was free to marry you. But, when I met Jared again, I found we were still married. I should have told you straight away, I know, but…’

‘Instead, you let yourself get embroiled for a second time.’ He shot Jared a malevolent look. ‘Well, now
I’ll
make sure it’s annulled.’

‘It’s too late for an annulment.’

His face growing even redder, Martin snarled, ‘So, having kept me at arms’ length for almost three years, you’ve been fool enough to sleep with him! Or did he force you?’

‘No, he didn’t force me.’

Looking unconvinced, Martin said, ‘Then we’ll just have to postpone the wedding until your divorce comes through.’

‘I’m sorry, Martin, but I don’t want to marry you. I should never have said yes in the first place.’

‘You’ve let that swine influence you,’ he said furiously. ‘And you know as well as I do that you can’t trust him.’

‘But I
do
trust him,’ she said clearly.

Conscious that Jared was sitting stock-still, she added, ‘He told me he hadn’t so much as looked at another woman that night and I believe him. I should have realized sooner that he was telling the truth.’

‘You must be mad!’ Martin burst out. ‘You
saw
another woman in his bedroom.’

‘How do you know what I saw? I never told you.’

He looked momentarily put out, then he rallied. ‘But you
did
, didn’t you?’

‘It’s quite possible that it was just a mistake, that she got into the wrong suite.’

‘You’d be an idiot if you believed that.’

‘I
do
believe it.’

‘Can you also believe that she not only got into the wrong suite, but into the wrong bed with a strange man?’ he jeered.

‘She wasn’t in bed.’

As though making up his mind, Martin pulled an envelope from his pocket. ‘It’s a good thing I had the foresight to bring these. Take a look at them and tell me if you still think it was just a mistake.’

In the envelope were several photographs of the redhead and Jared in bed together. Though they weren’t actually touching, they were lying close, the covers pushed down so she could see they were naked. Both appeared to be asleep.

Just for an instant Perdita’s faith was shaken.

Seeing it in her face, Martin said triumphantly, ‘Pretty damning, wouldn’t you say?’

‘Where did you get these?’ she asked quietly.

‘It doesn’t matter where I got them.’

‘But it does,’ she insisted. ‘They could be fakes. It’s amazing what can be done these days with—’

‘Of course they’re not fakes,’ he snarled.

A growing suspicion made her push it. ‘How can you be so sure?’

After a moment Martin admitted boldly, ‘Because I arranged to have them taken.’

‘
You
arranged to have them taken…? Why?’

‘Because I guessed what would happen as soon as your back was turned—’

Her suspicion confirmed, she said, ‘You mean you set him up.’

She saw guilt written all over his face before he protested, ‘How can you believe I’d do such a thing? You know perfectly well I—’

She cut short his blustering. ‘Well, it should be easy to prove. As you may have noticed, because you’re sitting in it, there was an extra chair and also a glass…’

When he looked blank, she added sweetly, ‘Linda will be joining us shortly. She’s agreed to tell me exactly what happened. So, if you don’t want to be totally humiliated, I suggest you leave.’

‘But Dita, I—’

‘I’ll let you have your ring back. In the meantime you’d better try and make your peace with Dad because I intend to tell him everything.’

Without another word Martin got to his feet and, looking like a man who had suffered a knockout blow, shambled away, leaving Perdita limp with reaction.

Jared, who had sat like a statue, his eyes fixed on her face, came to life and signalled a waiter, who opened and poured the champagne before producing leather-covered menus.

Seeing Perdita was in no state to choose, Jared ordered for them both.

When the waiter had gone, she found her voice and asked, ‘Jared, why didn’t you tell me all this five days ago?’

Turning those cool silvery eyes on her, he said flatly, ‘I wasn’t sure you’d believe me.’

‘So that’s why you brought me here…But, in that case, why did you change your mind and stop Linda coming?’

‘Because of what I
thought
we meant to each other, I wanted you to
trust
me, to
believe
in me, to
know
me, to take my word without me having to prove it, and I finally realized that if you
couldn’t
then it was no use.’

Though he spoke quietly there was so much passion in his voice that she felt scourged.

As he finished speaking, their first course arrived. Head down, she ate automatically without tasting a thing and with no real idea of what was on her plate.

They had reached the coffee stage before she was able to struggle free from the morass of conflicting emotions that had engulfed her.

Lifting her head, she looked up, her beautiful turquoise eyes brimming with tears, and said simply, ‘Oh, Jared…’

He reached across the table and covered her hand with his. ‘I’m sorry. Knowing Judson’s part in it must have come as a shock to you.’

‘I’m
glad
I know,’ she said fiercely. ‘You were right when you said he was cunning and deceitful and a liar. You should have added
ruthless
.

‘He must have
caused
Dad’s heart attack by telling him we were in Las Vegas together. He
wanted
it to happen so he had an excuse to get me away. How
could
he? The shock might have been fatal.’

‘But it wasn’t,’ Jared pointed out. ‘Luckily, your father’s heart was strong enough to stand it.’

The slim hand resting on the white tablecloth clenched into a fist. ‘But it might not have been.’

Taking her hand, Jared straightened her fingers one at a time, kissing each one as he did so.

‘Bear in mind that he was mad about you, and jealousy is a cruel goad.’

‘How
can
you be so magnanimous after everything he did to you?’

‘I admit I haven’t always felt that way. When I first found out what he’d done I could have cheerfully broken his neck.’

‘I just
wish
…’ She broke off, momentarily choked by tears. Then after a moment she went on, ‘At the very least I should have
listened
to you. Given you the benefit of the doubt. If I hadn’t been so bitterly jealous…’

He shook his head. ‘I’ve come to realize it was asking a lot to expect you to give me the benefit of the doubt when at first even
I
wasn’t sure what was going on.’

‘Tell me what happened,’ she said huskily.

A spasm of emotion crossed his face, but his voice was level as he began. ‘After you’d gone, to pass the time I went down to the casino. I had a couple of drinks and played roulette until about twelve-thirty. Then, because I hadn’t heard from you, I went to bed.

‘I awoke in the early hours of the morning, muddled and with a thick head—later I learnt my drinks had been spiked—to find a strange woman in the bedroom getting dressed.

‘At that moment I was certain of only two things. I’d never seen her before in my life, and I’d gone to bed alone. When I asked her what she was doing there, she swore she’d come into the wrong suite by mistake. She said that, as all the suites looked alike, she hadn’t realized until she was about to get into bed. Adding that she was sorry she’d disturbed me, she headed for the door.

‘By this time I was wide awake and feeling uneasy because I hadn’t heard from you. In need of a cup of black coffee, I pulled on some clothes and took the elevator down.

‘The night security guard was in the lobby and, when he spotted me, he remarked, “I’m afraid you’ve missed her”.

‘I must have looked blank because he said, “The young blonde girl you were with earlier yesterday evening. She’s just this minute gone”.

‘I told him that he must be mistaken. But he insisted that he’d seen you and a tall fair man come in a short while before, and that while the man had hung around down here, you’d taken the elevator up. He added that you came down again after only a few minutes, and left with that same man.

‘I know these security guards are trained to notice things and not make mistakes, and I began to wonder if he could be right.

‘Suppose you
had
gone up to our suite and seen another woman leaving?

‘I asked him if by any chance he’d seen anything of a striking redhead.

‘He immediately said, “Oh, yes. Linda Dow…She came through here a little while ago. She’s a hostess in the casino. If you’re looking for her, at this time in the morning she’ll no doubt be having a quiet drink in the room behind the bar.

‘I thanked him and went in search of Miss Dow. She was where he’d said she’d be, and she didn’t look too pleased to see me.

‘However, she stuck to her story that she’d got into the wrong suite by mistake, and claimed she’d been looking for a somewhat drunken client who earlier that evening had hired her services.

‘When I pressed her, she admitted that while she was in my bedroom a blonde had come in and gone straight out again without a word.

‘I set off at once for the airport, but could find no sign of you. I wasn’t sure whether you would have gone home or back to Los Angeles. As soon as it was a reasonable time, I phoned the hospital. I learnt that after a mild heart attack your father was doing well. But no one seemed to have seen anything of you.’

His voice holding an edge of strain now, he went on, ‘After phoning several times, with still no sighting of you, I flew back to San Jose.

‘When I got to Judson’s house it appeared to be shut up. There was no sign of life. No one answered either the doorbell or the phone.

‘The next day I went to JB’s offices but was told that, apart from the ordinary office staff, everyone was away. No one seemed to know where.

‘By this time I was fairly certain that you must be in Los Angeles so I flew there and for the best part of three days I hung around the hospital, hoping against hope to see you.

‘At the same time I kept phoning Judson’s house, without success. When I did finally manage to get through, it was Elmer Judson who answered.

‘As soon as he realized who it was, he hung up.

‘Then I learnt that your father’s tests had been completed and he was to be discharged the next day. I felt sure he would be going to wherever you were, so I followed him back to San Jose and to Judson’s house. Guessing what would happen if I rang the bell, I simply walked in.’

His voice harsh, he added, ‘The rest you know.’

With a shiver, she said, ‘I’ve never understood why you didn’t fight back.’

‘Because your father was still recovering from a heart attack I didn’t want to make matters worse. I was hoping, if possible, to keep things low-key.’

Remembering his cut lip and the trickle of bright blood that had run down his chin, her voice full of pain, she insisted, ‘You didn’t have to let them beat you up. You could have stopped them.’

‘Only by using my fists.’

Her face contorted, she said, ‘Whereas I could have stopped them by saying just a couple of words.’

‘Had you chosen to.’

‘With that scene in the bedroom still so clear in my mind I didn’t want to have to admit that we were married, admit what a fool I’d been.’

‘I quite understand,’ he said heavily. ‘I’m not blaming you.’

But how many times had she blamed herself?

Unsteadily, she asked, ‘How long were you in hospital?’

‘Five days.’

‘Five days!’

‘The forced inactivity gave me time to think, and the conviction began to grow on me that I’d been deliberately set up. But you refused to see me or listen to me and, in any case, I had no proof. Then you delivered the coup de grâce by telling me you wanted an annulment. In desperation, I went back to Vegas to try and find out the truth.

‘I eventually succeeded. Linda admitted that Judson had offered her five thousand dollars to do exactly as he said. He wanted you to see her in bed with me but, in case that didn’t come off, he hired her boyfriend to take those pictures. When I asked her how they got into the suite, she admitted that one of the chambermaids, who was a friend of hers, had lent her a master key.

‘Now I knew what I needed to know, but by the time I got back to San Jose you’d vanished.

‘Elmer Judson was my only hope but, even when I told him we were married, he refused point-blank to help. He said you were better off without me, and advised me to get the marriage annulled.

‘When, seeing nothing else for it, I told him how Martin had set me up, I could see by his expression that he already knew and approved.

‘That was when I tumbled to the fact that I was fighting a losing battle. He and his son were in it together. The only one of the men who didn’t know the truth was your father.

‘During the days that followed I was sunk in black despair.
My company was almost on the rocks, but when I should have been working out some kind of rescue package, all I could think of was finding you.

‘In the end it was my godfather who saved me, and I don’t mean just financially. He said, “I know the future looks bleak right now, but concentrate on getting back in a position of strength. Then, if you still want her, I’m sure you can find her again.”’

He stopped speaking and for the first time she became aware of the music and the voices, the laughter and the popping of champagne corks.

The orchestra came to the end of a medley and a minute or so later it was announced that the cabaret would begin shortly.

‘Do you want to stay for the cabaret?’ Jared asked.

With her heart and her mind so full, and so much that still needed to be said, Perdita shook her head.

A hand at her waist, he escorted her out of the restaurant and up to their suite.

She had hoped that once the door had closed behind them he might take her in his arms. But instead he asked politely, ‘Perhaps you’d care to shower first?’