THE weeks that followed were a bittersweet time for Beth. In some ways she had never been busier or happier. She shared with Daniel many of the headaches and excitements of her expanding business. And there were leisure activities as well. Trail rides up in the hills, kayaking on the off-shore islands near Santa Barbara, picnics and swimming on the white sandy beaches that fringed the coast, and pleasant outdoor lunches in the quaint Danish village of Solvang. Not to mention nights of shared passion when she felt as if the earth had tilted on its axis and would never be the same again.
But, like a discordant counterpoint to all this happiness, Beth felt a growing sense of misgiving. However much shared passion and work and laughter their lives might have, she had the frustrating sense that she was not growing any closer to Daniel. In fact most of the time she felt as if he was deliberately pushing her away. Although they made love with urgent frequency, he never again spent an entire night in her cottage, always prefering to go home to his own house. He never talked to her about his feelings towards her. And, what was worst of all, he seemed to be spending more time than ever in the company of Sunny Martino.
Not that Beth thought Daniel was actually sleeping with the actress. He couldn’t be cynical or callous enough for that, surely? And yet she found her beliefs on this subject swinging wildly between two totally opposite poles. In the moments late at night when Daniel gasped her name and crushed her against him in the lamplight, Beth knew she was totally and utterly foolish even to imagine such a thing. Yet in daylight the suspicion refused to die. When Daniel went away for days at a time to Los Angeles or on the two occasions when he brought Sunny back to spend a weekend at the farm, Beth found herself a prey to a jealousy that both shocked and appalled her.
And the trouble was that she didn’t know what to do about it. She thought of tackling Daniel and demanding the truth, but it was an ordeal she didn’t want to face. Perhaps because the pain of learning that he was still Sunny’s lover would be more than she could bear. Or even because she still foolishly cherished the hope that one day Daniel would tell her he loved her and ask her to marry him. The mere notion brought a dry, mirthless laugh to her lips. What a fool she was!
Of course, she could have asked Sunny point-blank what was happening but pride made her shrink from that. It would be far too embarrassing. There were even moments when she felt a certain painful sympathy with the actress. If Sunny loved Daniel, the whole situation must be just as agonising for her as it was for Beth. Yet, on the few occasions when Beth saw her, she didn’t seem in much agony. She was pert, lively and full of studio gossip. And her flirtatious manner towards Daniel seemed as much a part of her as her magnificent bosom or her scarlet fingernails. Even if she is involved with him, thought Beth miserably, I don’t believe it matters to her the way it does to me. I should do something, she told herself despairingly. I shouldn’t just drift like this. In a moment of grim insight she knew she had let herself be caught in exactly the trap that she dreaded. A relationship without trust, without hope, without a future. And her joy in Daniel’s company began to give way to a smouldering resentment. I am not going to put up with this forever, she vowed. One of these days he’ll go too far and he’ll get the shock of his life.
By the end of July, Beth’s winter collection of clothes was completed and ready for the new season’s fashion shows in Los Angeles. A month of hard labour had gone into the preparations and, when Daniel suggested a weekend’s sailing in Santa Barbara, Beth was only too happy to agree. Out in the lazy blue tranquillity of the Pacific Ocean with nothing but the hot sun overhead, the creak of the rigging, the lazy slap of the dark blue sea against the hull, it was easy to believe that everything would come right between her and Daniel. Yet Sunny managed to ruin even this simple pleasure. As they were heading back for home, there was a call on the radiophone.
‘Who is it?’ asked Beth sleepily without much interest. She was lying on the deck, creaming sunscreen over her shoulders for a carefully timed tan.
‘Benson,’ replied Daniel, switching off the phone. ‘He said Sunny called about half an hour ago and says she has been on location up near San Francisco. She’s driving through to Los Angeles and wants to stop for supper with us around seven. Is that OK with you?’
‘Yes, of course,’ said Beth rather frostily.
The request brought home the difficulty of her situation. Even if she were married to Daniel, there might well be times when he would entertain people whom she didn’t particularly want, but not his mistress, surely? The thought sent a familiar barb of pain through her. Was Sunny his mistress? Beth stared down at him with a troubled expression, wishing she could read his mind, wishing he would tell her what was going on.
‘What’s wrong?’ he asked sharply, intercepting her look.
‘Nothing,’ she said huskily, managing a small unconvincing smile.
He stretched out his hand to her.
‘Come here,’ he ordered gruffly.
She slid down into the cockpit on the padded seat beside him. His right hand still held the tiller, but his left arm came round her and drew her firmly against him. So close that she could feel the warmth of his tanned thigh against hers and feel the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed.
‘Are you happy with me?’ he demanded harshly.
She nodded silently, letting her long fingers trail along the inside of his leg. She wondered bitterly why it was so easy to touch him intimately yet so hard to speak to him of her feelings.
‘No regrets?’ he demanded.
She sighed.
‘No regrets,’ she said bleakly.
It was after six o’clock when they reached Daniel’s house in the hills and delectable smells of fried chicken were issuing from the kitchen. Benson came out into the living-room to greet them.
‘I wonder if I could persuade you to join me in the kitchen, Miss Saxon,’ he suggested with a smile. ‘I thought I might try that new potato salad recipe you were telling me about.’
‘Yes, of course,’ said Beth, feeling rather flattered.
In the couple of months since she had first met Daniel, she had struck up quite a friendship with the reserved British butler. She suspected he was probably rather like herself, someone with strong feelings who found it very hard to express them. When she had showered and changed she made her way to the kitchen, with the comfortable feeling of joining a friend. She found it was quite soothing to fry chips of bacon and chop up parsley while Benson chatted about his years in the British navy. Fortunately he already had some cold boiled potatoes ready in the refrigerator, so all she had to do was add the chopped hard-boiled eggs, the bacon, parsley and mayonnaise and a plentiful grinding of black pepper.
‘There,’ she said with satisfaction.
‘May I taste it?’ asked Benson, scooping some on a saucer with a fork. ‘Yes, that’s excellent. You know it reminds me of a lunch I had with my late wife Barbara ten years ago in Torquay. Funny how the taste of food can take you back, isn’t it? I can see our cottage now, with the sea below us and the red geraniums on the terrace.’
‘That sounds lovely,’ said Beth sincerely. ‘Did you miss it when you moved to the United States?’
‘Oh, yes,’ agreed Benson. ‘But I felt a complete break was best after Barbara’s death. My sons were both grown-up and didn’t need me and Mr Pryor offered me a very tempting salary to come here and work for him. Very tempting indeed. And I always told him I would stay with him until he got married then I’d retire back to Torquay. Well, it looks as though I won’t have long to wait now, doesn’t it?’
‘What?’ echoed Beth aghast. ‘What do you mean?’
Benson cleared his throat and looked embarrassed.
‘Oh, well, I’ll say no more,’ he apologised. ‘Perhaps I’ve already said too much.’
Beth was still looking at him in consternation when the front doorbell suddenly rang.
‘Would you mind going, madam?’ asked Benson. ‘I’ve got my hands covered in flour and I doubt if Mr Pryor will hear it, shut away with that computer going.’
‘Not at all,’ agreed Beth.
She hurried out of the kitchen into the hall with her thoughts whirling. Was Benson implying that Daniel was about to get married? Well, if so, it certainly couldn’t be Beth that he had in mind, for he had never mentioned anything of the kind to her. And that only left one possibility. Sunny Martino! Beth reached the doorway of the living-room and stood frozen in her tracks. Obviously Daniel had heard the doorbell, for he was striding towards the front door with an eager smile on his face. As he opened the door, Sunny burst in and flung herself on his neck. Daniel swung her around in a circle and then set her on her feet again, whistling a snatch of that poignant little tune that Beth had first heard on the day of their trail ride.
‘Well, how are you doing, Sunny?’ he asked.
Sunny gave a low, sensual ripple of laughter and then stood on tiptoe lifting her lips to his.
‘Oh, it’s torture to go on seeing you like this, my darling,’ she trilled. ‘But soon the waiting will be over. The moment my divorce comes through we can be married at last. I can’t wait for the day!’
Beth didn’t wait to hear any more. An incredulous feeling of horror filled her as she backed away through the living-room and she was conscious of only one thing. The need to get as far away as possible.
Incredibly Benson was still in the kitchen frying chicken when she returned. She felt as if years must have passed and yet it couldn’t have been more than five minutes. With a dazed expression she looked about her, half expecting to see something like the devastation of the big San Francisco earthquake. Something to match the way she felt inside. But the kitchen looked just as always.
‘I’m leaving now!’ she blurted out.
Benson looked shocked. Or at least, if Benson had ever shown his feelings, he would have looked shocked. Both grey eyebrows rose by almost a millimetre and his lips pursed.
‘Indeed, madam? You’re not hungry?’
‘No. No! Benson, I have to...I have to go. I’ve forgotten something in...Los Angeles. The wedding-dress for the auction tomorrow. It needs more seed-pearls sewn on the hem.’
Benson sniffed.
‘Will there be any message for Mr Pryor, madam?’
Beth’s eyes shot blue fire. ‘Yes! Tell him...tell him...oh, what’s the use?’
Hastily biting her knuckle, she ran out of the room. There was no pursuit. Benson was like the three wise monkeys. ‘See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil’ was his motto, and he didn’t believe in interfering. And of course Daniel was too busy dancing attention on Sunny Martino out on the patio to care what Beth was doing. She saw their surprised faces as her car roared down the drive and felt a momentary surge of satisfaction. But it soon gave way to despair.
As she drove down the coast road every mile was filled with memories of Daniel. She could not breathe the salt air or see the dark mechanical shapes of the oil rigs against the red blaze of the setting sun without thinking of him. Was it really only a couple of months since they had driven down this road together for her first fashion show in Los Angeles? She thought of all that had happened since then and an ache like a physical pain spread through her body. Try as she might, she could not stem the flood of memories. Daniel fishing her out of the Santa Barbara harbour in her wedding-dress, cajoling and bullying her into the frenzied task of replacing her lost fashion collection. Daniel in the candlelight at Emilio’s, his eyes glittering as he told her how much he wanted her. Daniel on the trail ride, looking totally at home in the saddle with blue sky and sun-bleached hills all around him. Daniel’s kindness and patience as he started the young filly, his rage as he hurled Warren into the night, his passion as he made love to Beth in the red glare of the firelight. And now his betrayal.
‘I can’t bear it!’ she said aloud. ‘I can’t bear it.’
Although it was Sunday, the traffic in the centre of the city seemed almost as gridlocked as on a weekday and it was almost three hours before she reached Daniel’s apartment block. When she did, she sat outside, hesitating as she looked at the familiar palm trees and the pale blue plumbago spilling over the side wall. The first place Daniel would look for her was her cottage in the Santa Ynez Valley, but after that he would certainly come here. And he wouldn’t be in a good mood. Beth winced, dreading the inevitable confrontation. Sooner or later she would have to talk to him, but tonight she simply couldn’t face it. That left only one place she could go. The shop on Rodeo Drive.
It was close to midnight when she arrived there and the couch in the tearoom was just as uncomfortable as it looked. She lay awake for a long time, staring into the darkness, her throat aching with unshed tears. About two a.m. she drifted into a light doze, but was startled into consciousness by the clamour of the telephone. She jumped up and ran to it, but froze as her fingers touched the receiver. Daniel. It could only be Daniel. And she didn’t want to speak to him. Not now. Not ever. She let it shrill on and on, feeling as if every nerve in her body was in torment, until at last it stopped.
Yet she could not postpone the ordeal forever. The next morning she was at Cadogan Hall bright and early, dressed in a stylish blue honeycomb-knit dress with enough make-up to cover her pallor. As she helped the models dress and listened to the murmur of the growing audience in the hall, she half feared and half hoped that Daniel would come and find her. But he didn’t. The thunderous applause at the end of her show assured her that her designs had been a success, but she scarcely cared. Her stomach was churning nervously and only guilt and a sense of duty brought her out into the audience to watch the wedding-dress being auctioned for charity.
She saw him then and her heart missed a beat at the sight. He was wearing a pale grey suit with a blue shirt and striped tie and one glance was enough to tell her that he was seething. He sat forward in his place with his elbows resting tautly on his knees and his chin jutting forward. When his gaze met Beth’s he glanced instantly away and said something to the woman beside him. Beth’s spirits sank as she realised it was Sunny Martino.
Even the auction of the wedding-dress wasn’t enough to take her mind off Daniel, although the bidding seemed to be climbing to astronomical heights. It was a dream of a dress in white organza with puffed sleeves, a lace overskirt, a dramatic train and a bodice and hem embroidered with tiny seed-pearls. Beth’s eyes widened as the final bid was announced and a bald, middle-aged man came forward to claim his trophy. Forty thousand dollars! It was unbelievable. Then her gaze slewed back to Daniel.
He was coming towards her with a grim smile playing around the corners of his mouth and an unholy light blazing in his eyes. As he reached her he gave her a curt nod.
‘Hello, Beth. May I take you upstairs to lunch?’
‘Well, I—’
‘Good.’
His fingers closed around her arm like a vice. This time there was no insistence on sending her off to fend for herself. Throughout the next hour he stayed beside her while buyers came to her with orders, photographers clustered to take her photo and the gossip columnists surged around interviewing her. Not that anyone would have been tempted to suppose he was in love with her. His expression was frankly murderous.
‘Right, we’re getting out of here,’ he announced at precisely two o’clock.
‘I don’t want to leave yet!’ protested Beth.
‘Sweetheart,’ growled Daniel in a voice that sent thrills of panic chasing down her spine, ‘we have business to discuss and, unless you want to discuss it here, we’re leaving now.’
The drive home passed in ominous silence. Daniel ignored her tentative attempts at conversation, clearly determined to have the showdown on his own ground. Only when they were inside his apartment and the door had slammed shut behind them did he speak.
‘Well?’ he said in a soft, menacing tone as he advanced towards her. ‘Running out on me seems to be getting quite a habit of yours. Would you mind telling me why you left me this time?’
Beth felt a flicker of alarm at the controlled rage in every line of his powerful body. Then an answering spark of anger flared up inside her, like a cinder whipped by a sudden wind.
‘No, I wouldn’t mind at all!’ she retorted, tossing her head. ‘I left because I’m not prepared to share you with Sunny Martino. Or anyone else.’
‘Share me with Sunny Martino? What the hell are you talking about?’
His shock and outrage were so blatant that Beth paused for a moment. Could she possibly have made a mistake? Then she remembered her conversation with Benson and the words she had overheard between Sunny and Daniel and her anger flared up again.
‘You know perfectly well what I’m talking about!’ she exclaimed. ‘Benson dropped me a pretty broad hint that you were planning on getting married and I overheard that stuff that Sunny told you at the door last night about how it was torture to go on seeing you and how she was going to marry you the minute her divorce came through... What are you laughing at?’
For to her astonishment Daniel’s stern expression had suddenly broken up. He stood staring at her for a moment, with twitching lips and gleaming eyes and then it was all too much for him, and he laughed until the tears came to his eyes. Beth watched coldly, wondering if he had lost his senses. At last he straightened up and shook his head, but even then his words made no sense.
‘I’ll be darned. Destiny’s Favourite.’
‘What are you talking about?’ demanded Beth in a hostile voice.
Daniel was still grinning and shaking his head but he managed to compose himself enough to whistle a few bars of a haunting little tune. The poignant melody that Beth had first heard on the trail ride. Then the notes petered out.
‘I’m not going to marry Sunny,’ he said flatly. ‘What you heard from her wasn’t a statement of undying passion, it was the opening lines from Destiny’s Favourite. Hell, that scene must have been played fifty times or more on television. It’s a private joke between Sunny and me.’
‘Then you’re not in love with her?’ said Beth uncertainly.
‘No.’
Beth bit her lip, feeling humiliated and very, very foolish. The half-hidden grin on Daniel’s face didn’t help matters much. Angrily she pushed past him into the living-room.
‘Well, you can hardly blame me for thinking that you were,’ she flared. ‘Heaven knows you’ve done your best to make me believe that ever since I first met you.’
She heard Daniel’s footsteps behind her. His voice was suddenly sober.
‘That’s true,’ he admitted, his warm hand descending on her shoulder. ‘I wanted you to think that.’
She swung round to face him, anger surging through her.
‘Why?’ she demanded. ‘Just to get a good laugh out of how stupid I was?’
‘No,’ insisted Daniel. ‘Look, at first it was just to throw the reporters off our trail, but after that I kept it up because I wanted to make you jealous.’
‘Jealous! Why?’
Daniel winced and seemed to search vainly for words.
‘Oh, I can’t explain it,’ he said impatiently. ‘It was all to do with Warren. I thought if you got the idea that Sunny was keen on me you’d realise you wanted me more than him and you’d give him up.’
Beth gave a mirthless laugh.
‘You could have saved yourself the trouble,’ she said. ‘I gave up Warren the morning after the first fashion show. I just couldn’t keep on seeing him when I was so attracted to you.’
Daniel let out a long, bewildered sigh and ran his fingers through his hair.
‘Well, if you were so attracted to me, why were you always fighting me off?’ he demanded.
Beth felt as if she was skating on very thin ice. The memory of Greg flashed back to haunt her, but curiously it no longer seemed to have any power. She shrugged.
‘You reminded me of someone,’ she said. ‘Someone I knew a long time ago.’
But Daniel was shrewd.
‘The guy you were involved with before you started seeing Warren?’ he demanded.
‘I suppose you could say that,’ said Beth with an uneasy grimace.
Daniel’s eyes were narrowed and hostile.
‘Who was he?’ he rapped out.
Beth flinched.
‘My sister’s husband,’ she said.
‘You had an affair with your sister’s husband?’ echoed Daniel in horror.
‘No!’ cried Beth. ‘He—he kissed me once. It made me feel terrible. Guilty, ashamed, distrustful of men with that kind of raw animal magnetism, men who had meaningless affairs with women they didn’t care about. When I met you, you reminded me of him.’
‘Thanks,’ said Daniel wryly. ‘I appreciate the character analysis. But it may interest you to know that I fell in love with you the first day I met you and my intentions towards you have never been anything but honourable.’
Beth stared at him in shock, unable to believe what she had just heard.
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ she asked slowly.
Daniel paced angrily around the room, clenching and unclenching his fists.
‘Because you were involved with Warren,’ he said. ‘Or I thought you were. And also because you accused me of manipulating and railroading people. There was enough truth in that accusation to make it hurt. And I sure as hell didn’t want to railroad you. I wanted you to be certain of your feelings for me, so I never told you how much I loved you for fear of putting pressure on you. But maybe Sunny was right. She always insisted that I ought to tell you the truth.’
Beth stared at him in shock.
‘Sunny insisted?’ she demanded. ‘You discussed this with Sunny?’
Daniel nodded. ‘We’re very old friends,’ he said.
‘Not lovers?’ demanded Beth suspiciously.
‘No,’ insisted Daniel. ‘We never have been. I’m very fond of Sunny but that’s all there is to it.’
‘But you stay overnight with her! You keep your clothes in her closet!’
‘In her spare bedroom closet,’ retorted Daniel. ‘Staying overnight saves me time dodging the traffic. Besides, I like to play pool with Sunny’s husband.’
‘Sunny’s husband?’ echoed Beth in astonishment.
Daniel grinned.
‘Yes. She married Lane Galloway last year, although that’s the best-kept secret in town, so don’t let it out.’
‘But why doesn’t she want anyone to know?’ asked Beth, momentarily diverted.
Daniel brushed her question aside impatiently. ‘Because they’re both heart-throbs of the silver screen,’ he said. ‘The fans wouldn’t like it. But never mind that. It’s us I want to talk about, not them. I love you, Beth. More than any woman I’ve ever known.’
Beth stared at him doubtfully.
‘Even the one who turned you down?’ she asked. ‘The one you told me about on the trail ride?’
‘Susan? Hell, yes! She was a fellow law student at Harvard and once I quit law she didn’t want to know me. All she was interested in was money and status, not me. But that experience really made its mark on me. I never fell in love again. Until I met you.’
‘You really mean to tell me that you’ve loved me all this time and you’ve never said a word about it?’ she demanded.
Daniel made an impatient movement with his hands.
‘I thought you’d guess,’ he said. ‘From the way I looked at you. The way I touched you. The way I made love to you. Wasn’t that enough?’
‘It was magical,’ Beth admitted huskily. ‘But I wanted more than that. I wanted love too. I wanted to know where I stood.’
Daniel reached out his hand and trailed it caressingly down her face and on to her shoulder.
‘Come into the bedroom with me,’ he said hoarsely. ‘I’ll show you where you stand.’
Beth stepped back out of reach.
‘No,’ she said in torment. ‘You know, it’s kind of ironical, Daniel, but you told me once that I should assert myself and you were damn right. Well, I’m doing it now. I don’t just want love, I want everything. Marriage, children, a home. And if I can’t have all of that from you, I don’t want any more to do with you. Telling someone you love them is easy enough, but how much does it really mean? Not much. Certainly not enough to make me jump into bed with you any more.’
Daniel’s eyes met hers full of naked, glittering emotion.
‘I’m serious, Beth,’ he said. ‘Come with me. I promise I won’t touch you, if you don’t want me to. But there’s something you must see.’
Seizing her hand, he led the way across the hall and flung open the bedroom door. Uneasily Beth stepped inside and then caught her breath. A warm, sweet perfume filled the air. Gazing around her, she saw that the entire room was filled with white roses and carnations. Laid out on the centre of the bed was the wedding-dress that had been auctioned at the fashion show, a dream of frothing white lace and organza. She turned with a question in her eyes.
‘How did this get here?’ she demanded.
‘I bought it,’ said Daniel.
‘But the bald man...’
‘My attorney, acting on my behalf.’
Beth bit her lip and walked over to the bed. With trembling fingers she picked up the dress and held it against her.
‘Why?’ she breathed.
Daniel’s lips twisted into a smile.
‘Isn’t that obvious? I want you to wear it on our wedding-day. Will you?’
Beth’s heart gave a violent lurch and suddenly she was in his arms with the dress crushed between them.
‘Yes. Oh, yes,’ she exclaimed joyfully.
His lips came down on hers in a long, bruising kiss and the dress fell unnoticed to the floor. Winding her arms around his neck Beth stood on tiptoe and whispered in his ear.
‘Daniel,’ she said unsteadily. ‘Could I change my mind about jumping into bed with you?’
She felt rather than heard his low rumble of laughter.
‘Be my guest,’ he invited.
An hour later as they lay naked and sated together, Beth raised herself on one elbow and trailed her fingers through the dark mat of hair on Daniel’s chest.
‘Daniel?’ she said curiously.
‘Mmm?’
‘How did Benson know you were going to get married? Did you have the hide to tell him before you proposed to me?’
Daniel looked shifty.
‘Hell, no, honey,’ he said in injured tones. ‘All I did was ask him what would be the best place to hold a wedding reception. And maybe I did drop him another slight hint.’
‘What kind of hint?’ asked Beth suspiciously.
‘Well, I just said, “Benson, don’t you think Beth will be the most beautiful bride Santa Barbara has ever seen?”’
Beth gave an incredulous gasp of laughter.
‘And what did he say?’ she demanded.
Daniel gathered her in his arms and began kissing her all the way down her throat to her breasts, punctuating his words with kisses.
‘What...could he say...? He said...yes...of course.’