Chapter 4 I STILL LOVE HIM

'I still love him, Pat.' Marianne was staring down into her glass as she spoke and missed Pat's green eyes narrowing shrewdly on her unhappy face. 'But then last night we had a terrible row.'

She raised her head then, and the stark misery in the azure blue eyes took Pat's breath away. But before she could say anything the waiter was at their side for their lunch order, and once he had gone Marianne changed the subject, insisting on hearing all Pat's news, and how she was progressing in her job as surgery nurse at the local veterinary practice in Bridgeton.

It was as they finished their first course it happened. Pat had just eaten the last mouthful of her avocado and prawn cocktail-one of Rochelle's specialities-and had leant forward across the table, saying quietly, 'Annie, have you told your father how things are?' when she became aware her friend's eyes were transfixed at a point over her shoulder.

'Oh, Pat.' It was the merest thread of a whisper, but as Pat made to turn in her chair Marianne said urgently, 'No, don't turn round, whatever you do, and talk-talk about anything, quickly.'

Pat had always been the person you could most depend on to rise to any emergency, and as she obediently began to prattle about one of the veterinary surgery's most amusing patients, Marianne forced her eyes away from the little party who had just come into the restaurant and on to the perplexed face of her friend. But on the perimeter of her vision she saw a tall, dark figure stop abruptly and then, as an obliging waiter showed the party to their seats, leave the others and start to make his way across towards them. He had seen her.

'Marianne?' Pat's voice was cut off as though by a knife as Zeke's deep drawl sounded just behind her. 'You didn't tell me you had a luncheon date.'

'Hallo, Zeke.' Marianne was amazed to find her voice was perfectly calm and composed. 'Pat only phoned me this morning to tell me she was in town so I didn't know.'

Pat had turned in her seat by this time, and as cool grey eyes met bright green Zeke smiled coldly, before he said, 'Pat, I didn't know it was you. How are you?'

'I'm fine, Zeke.' Pat had never been one for flowery effusion, but even so it was succinct in the extreme.

'I'm sure you are.' It was neither condemnatory or approving, and Zeke's grey eyes took on all the warmth of cold granite as he nodded in abrupt dismissal of the other woman before turning to Marianne again. 'I'll see you later,' he said smoothly. 'Did you get my message before you left?'

'Your...?' And then she remembered. Gerald Morton's pâté! 'Yes, Zeke,' she said steadily. 'I got your message.'

He looked impossibly handsome as he stood there, his ebony hair sleek and shining and immaculate and the big, lean body clothed in a beautifully cut suit that couldn't disguise the leashed strength of the hard, masculine frame. Deep grooves splayed out from either side of his straight nose to his mouth, a mouth which very rarely smiled except with mocking amusement, and the uncompromisingly severe quality of his dark good looks was tantalisingly at odds with the sensual knowledge in the darkly lashed grey eyes.

And he was a sensuous lover, lustful and imaginative, but with a sensitivity and tenderness to his lovemaking that made her-even with all that was wrong between them-ache to be in his arms whenever they were alone.

'Excuse me. This is a business lunch and there's plenty to get through.' There was a message in the cool, even tone that was for Marianne alone, but she merely stared back at him, her eyes steady and her small chin uplifted.

And then he turned, walking back to his table without another word and without glancing their way again.

This time Marianne didn't stop Pat when her friend turned round and made a swift, but thorough assessment of Zeke's companions. The two men Pat glanced over, but the green eyes stopped on the fourth figure at the table, who was engaging Zeke in animated conversation and totally ignoring their colleagues, and remained there for a full thirty seconds before Pat settled herself back in her seat.

Marianne answered the question Pat was too tactful to ask. 'She's Liliana de Giraud,' she said flatly. 'You might have heard of her? She's the hottest interior designer around.'

Why, oh, why hadn't she considered the possibility that Zeke might come here for lunch? She knew it was his favourite eating place in the lunch hour when he was entertaining clients and such, but he had said he was going to fly to Stoke and wouldn't be back until mid-afternoon. Had that been a lie? Had he been intending to take Liliana out for lunch all along?

'She's full of herself.' Pat's down-to-earth evaluation was spoken scathingly.

'That's because she's very pleased with life at the moment,' Marianne said painfully. 'Zeke has just acquired her services for a massive development deal that will provide luxury homes for the élite in one of the best parts of London. Apparently he was very fortunate to get her.'

'Oh, yes?'

'Of course the fact that they were lovers for a while five years ago might have swayed her agreement, added to which she still wants him...badly.' Marianne's voice was expressionless, with a flatness that spoke of deep hurt. 'She had made that very clear to me several times when we've met socially.'

'This was the cause of that row last night?' Pat asked in sudden understanding.

Marianne nodded with a brittle smile. 'Zeke thinks I'm being over-emotional,' she said evenly. And this from the man who didn't like her dancing with another male-even one of his friends-and who objected if he thought she was spending too long in conversation with any one man at the various social functions they attended.

'And you're sure you're not?' Pat probed gently.

Marianne's lovely deep blue eyes took on a bleakness that was an answer in itself. 'Oh, I'm sure, Pat,' she said quietly. 'I'm not the jealous type-' unlike Zeke '-but Liliana has gone to great pains to let me know how much she hates me. Never in front of Zeke, of course, she's all sweetness and light when he's around, but she wants him back and she doesn't care what she does to get him. She's the master of innuendo and acid jibes coated in sugar towards her own sex, but the men just can't see it. I don't know one woman who is comfortable with her.'

'I'm not surprised,' Pat said drily.

In the first heady days of her marriage she hadn't been threatened by Liliana de Giraud's manoeuvrings, in fact she had even felt sorry for the other woman and had tentatively offered her the hand of friendship before Liliana's covert hostility had made her aware she was likely to get it bitten off. So much for magnanimity, Marianne thought wretchedly, allowing herself one glance across the room and then wishing she hadn't as she saw Zeke and Liliana's heads close together. She had been innocent, far, far too innocent, when she had married Zeke.

She forced herself to eat all of her lunch with every appearance of enjoyment, and although she didn't glance over at the other table again her heightened senses made her aware of each time Liliana looked their way.

By unspoken mutual consent she and Pat lingered over their liqueur coffees-Marianne hadn't relished the thought of passing Zeke's table on their way out-and so it was that Zeke left first. She acknowledged his raised hand of farewell with a nod and a cool smile, and then tensed as she saw Liliana reach up and speak in Zeke's ear before beginning to make her way over.

'Liliana's coming.'

It was all she managed to say to Pat before the redhead came within earshot, and then in the next moment she was engulfed in a cloud of expensive, sultry perfume as Liliana bent to brush her cheek with cool lips, gushing, 'Sweetie, how lovely to see you. We didn't know you'd be lunching with your little friend today.'

'Hallo, Liliana.' Marianne was eternally grateful for the fortifying effects of the excellent meal-not to mention the wine and liqueur coffee-as she looked up into the redhead's ice-blue eyes. 'This is Pat, by the way. Pat, Liliana.'

The 'little friend' didn't smile, neither did she bother to speak as she inclined her head, but the green eyes narrowed with such naked feline coldness that it actually seemed to take Liliana aback a little. She wasn't used to such overt honesty.

'I must dash.' Liliana turned back to Marianne, her exquisitely creamy skin-which went with her vibrant hair-flushed from the effect of Pat's scrutiny. 'Zeke and I have heaps to discuss. We're going to be tied up for days on this project, so you'll have to be brave in doing without him, sweetie.'

'Will I?' Marianne called on all her father's stoical, imperturbable genes and her mother's poised, self-possessed ones as she smiled with a serenity she was far from feeling and said, 'I'll have to make sure we spoil each other when we're together, then, won't I, Liliana?'

The cruel, self-assured smile that had been hovering on the red-painted lips vanished for a second before it was immediately brought back into play, and Liliana slanted her almost colourless, opaque blue eyes at the two women as she said, 'I mustn't keep him waiting; patience has never been one of Zeke's attributes,' in a way that suggested the redhead was only too knowledgeable about the man in question.

'What a truly horrible woman,' Pat murmured as they watched the slim, elegant figure weave her way out of the restaurant. 'She wants a good slap, if you ask me.'

'Probably.' The down-to-earth comment brought a reluctant smile to Marianne's lips. 'But she's incredibly good at what she does and she knows it.'

'I just bet she is.' Pat's sober words had a dual meaning, and the two women stared at each other in perfect understanding for a long moment before Marianne caught the young waiter's eye and gestured that she wanted the bill.