Colby's Wife

CHAPTER THREE

‘GREER has done very well for herself,’ Jem said as Greer moved across the veranda. ‘The Passing Fancy label has really taken off. Tell Colby, dear, about your new workshop on Spadina Avenue!’

‘A workshop on Spadina?’ Colby had gotten to his feet when Greer came outside; now, as she perched her hip on the railing, he dropped back into his chair. ‘So,’ his tone was light, ‘you made your dream come true after all.’

‘It was a goal,’ Greer said quietly, her gaze dropping to the mug of coffee nestled in her hands. ‘Not a dream.’ The achievement of a goal needed only drive, talent, hard work... and luck. Dreams were different. Dreams required magic to make them come true. Goals and dreams. She had had one compelling goal, and one shining dream.

She and Colby had sat on this veranda more times than she could remember, her eyes sparkling with excitement, his with determination, as they talked about their goals. Hers: to become a respected and successful lingerie designer with a workshop on Toronto’s Spadina Avenue. His: to work with his father, learn everything he could about the business, and eventually have his own branch of Darken Construction. Of her secret shining dream she had never spoken—Colby was the last person to whom she could have spilled out this most cherished part of her soul, because he, Colby, was at the very heart of it. And he had never spoken to her of any dreams—at least, not till after he’d fallen in love with Eleanor; then he could talk of nothing else—

‘A goal, then.’ Colby sprawled back lazily. ‘And, if my memories serve me correctly, you’ve achieved it a couple of years earlier than you’d expected to.’

‘Greer?’ Jem’s tone was curious.

‘Yes, Gran—I’d always planned on having my own place, even when I was a little girl playing with cutout dolls and paper dresses...but he’s right. I hadn’t expected to get there quite so soon.’

‘Nothing to be proud of in your case, young lady,’ Jem said bluntly. ‘If your life had been balanced, if you’d been involved in a steady relationship with a man—and if that man had been worth his salt—you’d have had to spend less time working, and more time just plain living.’

‘I’ve had men in my life,’ Greer protested stiffly, her cheeks hot with mortification as she sensed Colby’s gaze on her. ‘You know I have. Nick Westmore, and Jared Black—you met them both, you liked them both! At least you said you did—now you claim not even to remember them!’

‘Oh, way back then!’ Jem’s expression was scornful. ‘Now it’s a different man every Friday night! Easy come, easy go! What ever happened to commitment—isn’t that the modern buzzword for what my generation called love?’

Greer treated her grandmother to a glare that would have withered any normal person but only seemed to intensify the challenging glitter in Jem Westbury’s eyes.

‘If you’ll excuse me.’ With a haughty tilt of her chin, Greer slid off the railing. ‘I think I’ll go for a walk.’

Colby got to his feet, and Jem pushed herself up, too. Leaning on her cane, she addressed Jamie.

‘Young fella,’ she said briskly, ‘I brought some tomato plants from the city and they have to be put in the ground. I need someone to help me, someone handy with a watering can. I don’t suppose you’d like the job? Of course, you’d have to take off your sneakers, and puddle about in the earth and probably get awfully wet and mucky—’

‘I’m not allowed to get dirty. Mommy doesn’t like—’ Jamie broke off abruptly, his cheeks suddenly bright pink.

Jem blinked in surprise, and Colby stood gazing at his son as if the boy was a complete mystery to him. Greer realized she was the one who was going to have to respond to the child’s comment.

‘Jamie?’

He looked at her with obvious reluctance, and she gave him another of her reassuring smiles. ‘Honey, things are different here at the lake. Nobody minds when we get grubby, it’s just part of cottage living, and it’s one of the very nicest parts. I’m sure your mommy didn’t want you getting dirty when you were in your school clothes, or when she took you for outings, or when she had friends in, but—’

‘I wasn’t to get dirty. Ever.’ Jamie’s eyes glistened, but small muscles flexed determinedly in his jaw. ‘I won’t get dirty. You can’t make me.’

Good grief, thought Greer, what kind of upbringing had Eleanor subjected her son to? Telling a boy he mustn’t ever get dirty?

‘Then you must come and watch me,’ Jem said firmly. ‘I’m going to get very dirty, and when I’m done, if you like you may turn the hose on my bare feet and legs and wash them off. Does that appeal?’

Jamie’s glasses slid down his nose. He pushed them up, and to her surprise, Greer saw the beginnings of a wavery smile tug the corners of his mouth.

‘All right,’ he said gruffly. ‘I can do that.’

‘Good lad.’ Jem held the screen door open for him, and they went inside, the door swinging shut behind them. As the snap of the catch echoed, and then faded, Greer became all too aware that she and Colby were now alone.

“Well,’ she said tersely, stepping quickly away from him, across the deck, ‘I’m off then.’

He caught up with her as she reached the short flight of steps leading from the veranda to the beach area. ‘Not so fast.’ He grasped her forearm. ‘Where are you going?’

The touch of his fingers on her bare skin sent a tingle of sensation rippling through her, a sensation that was as pleasurable as it was disturbing. She shook herself free. ‘Don’t you listen?’ She looked up at him...and wished she hadn’t. The blue of his eyes bedazzled her; the arrogant tilt of his head alarmed her. ‘I’m going for a walk.’

‘I’ll join you.’

‘I don’t want you to join me. I want to be left alone.’ Her voice had a breathless quality. ‘I have some thinking to do—’

‘About the cottage?’

‘Yes.’ How unfair that a man should have such lustrous and seductively long black eyelashes. ‘About the cottage.’

‘We can stand here all day,’ he said equably, ‘with you refusing to walk unless I go away...which I warn you I’m not about to do...or we can stroll along the beach... together. I’m going to be here for the summer, your grandmother tells me you’ll be spending most of your weekends here, too. You apparently don’t have a man in your life at the moment, and at present I am also unattached. We have a history, you and I...so why don’t we add to it!’ His lips twisted in a smile. ‘Just a summer affair, Greer—what do you think?’

Had Greer not been so stunned by his suggestion, she would have cut him off the moment he made it. But she was stunned...and not only stunned, outraged. Yet to be honest she had to admit he must feel it perfectly in order to make such a suggestion; after all, when she was seventeen she had allowed him to believe she’d slept with Brad Pierson...and just minutes ago her grandmother had remarked on her ‘easy come, easy go’ relationships with men. What Gran didn’t know was that the men she dated now were—because she wanted it that way—just friends, and nothing more.

‘You’re suggesting we have an affair?’ Greer raised her eyebrows mockingly. ‘In spite of my...promiscuous behavior? Don’t you think that might be dangerous—for you—all things considered?’

‘There are ways to...get around...that.’ A breeze gusted from the lake, tossing a heavy strand of hair over his forehead; gold gleamed at his wrist as he raised a hand and impatiently raked the strand back into place.

‘You’ve changed a lot.’ He really had beautiful hands, she reflected distractedly; long-fingered, elegant, with neatly trimmed spatulate nails. Just watching him thread those fingers through his glossy black hair had sent an odd dark shiver spiraling to some indefinable place deep inside her. ‘You’re not the man I once knew.’ Her tone was icy. ‘You say we have a history. We do, and that’s all it is. History! As far as I’m concerned you are history!’

He sidestepped her and blocked her way as she tried to go down the stairs. Now that he was standing on the step below her, their faces were on the same level...and she was staring right into those lethal blue eyes.

‘I’ve always found it impossible to understand,’ he said roughly, ‘why someone as lovely as you would need to look to a married man like Brad Pierson for satisfaction. You could have had any man you wanted. Why did you have to set out to seduce him? Good God.’ His voice had hardened. ‘I’d known him for years and I’d have sworn he was the last person to have gotten involved in an adulterous affair.’

‘You thought you knew Brad but you didn’t. You thought you knew me but you didn’t.’ Greer couldn’t keep the bitterness from her tone as memories of that long-ago summer rushed in again...

And shock froze her as, with a swift and totally unexpected movement, Colby grasped her by the shoulders and jerked her toward him. Before she could even gasp, he took her mouth in a deliberate and soul-shattering kiss.

It was over in a few seconds. Nothing was left of the abrupt assault but his harsh breathing, and her own...and the bruised tingling of her lips. She and Colby had never touched before, in any sexual way. This...this attack had her cringing from him as surely as if he slapped her.

‘Don’t ever,’ she whispered raggedly, ‘try to do that again.’ She stared at him through blurred eyes, seeing the dark mass of his hair, the bronzed color of his face, the brilliant blue of his eyes...

The cynically twisted slash that was his mouth.

He had kissed her. In days gone by she would have sold her soul for one kiss, just one kiss, from Colby Daken.

She would never have believed it would come to this. A tiny sob escaped her, before she could stifle it.

‘Very good,’ he said softly. ‘Very convincing. And oh, my God, very tantalizing. This summer—’ slowly, eyes never leaving hers, he ran the tip of his index finger over the chiseled curve of his upper lip, as if he would capture and store forever the memory of his stolen kiss ‘—is going to be far more fun than I’d expected. And before it ends, my darling Greer, I shall take you to my bed. And there I’ll find out just what it is about you that can make a man like Bradley Pierson succumb to your advances while his wife is in hospital waiting to give birth to their child. A challenge.’ His breath hissed in through narrowed nostrils. ‘That’s what you are. And one I accept.’

With a self-assured swing of his shoulders, he turned away and bounded down the steps. A moment later, she heard him open the screen door at the east side of his cottage; and then she heard the door clatter shut again.

Her mind in turmoil, Greer walked slowly down the steps, across the lawn and out onto the sandy white beach.

Why had she agreed to come with Gran to the cottage? Oh, what a mistake that had been. How she wished she had never come...

Still, when she thought of Jamie, and his troubled little mind, she acknowledged that perhaps something good would come out of this summer. Jem would get to know her great-grandson, and with her wonderful way of dealing with children, she might well be the means of drawing the boy from his state of unhappiness and confusion.

Had it not been for that, she would have reneged on her promise to Jem, and insisted they go back to the city right now.

She couldn’t. There was Jamie to consider.

She would just have to handle Colby as best she could, when he started his campaign to get her into his bed.

For that must never happen.

If she slept with him, he would discover she was a virgin. He would know she had never slept with Brad Pierson....

And he would have no option but to come up with another scenario, one that had obviously never crossed his mind.

It was Eleanor who had been involved with Brad. Eleanor, Colby’s own wife, the woman he’d loved so blindly it had verged on idolatry...and it would have destroyed him, Greer had believed then and still believed now... if he’d discovered she had betrayed him.

And this, of course, was why she’d agreed to cover up for her cousin. Oh, not for Eleanor’s sake—she had despised the woman for her adulterous behavior—but for Colby’s, to protect him from the truth that would have shattered him.

Now all Colby had left of his wife were his precious memories. And she, Greer, would do anything in her power to keep those memories intact.

Lisa Pierson and her three children turned up at Lake Trillium that afternoon.

Greer didn’t see them arrive. She’d gone out to the shed in the backyard after lunch, and had spent a couple of hours sorting out tools and planters and half-empty packages of this, that and the other, telling herself she was just getting things organized in case Jem had to sell the cottage...but all the time knowing in her heart that she was trying to avoid Colby.

Around four-thirty, she had just flopped down on an old tree stump outside the shed, and was wiping a grubby hand over her brow, when she heard the back door of the cottage swing open. Expecting to see Jem, she looked up with a smile...the smile changing to an exclamation of astonishment when she saw the woman coming down the path toward her, a petite brunette in her late thirties, dressed in a navy blouse and a pair of shorts.

Greer stumbled to her feet. ‘Mrs. Pierson?’

Lisa Pierson’s eyes glowed with pleasure. ‘Greer, I couldn’t believe it when Jem said you were here. I thought you’d given up on cottage living!’

Greer made a helpless gesture with one hand. ‘Is it really you? You look great—so slim and—’

She broke off, grimacing. But even as she started to murmur an embarrassed apology, Lisa laughed delightedly.

‘Don’t apologise, honey—it took two long years to lose those extra fifty pounds, and believe me, there’s nothing I like more than people complimenting me on my changed appearance. But you—’ she embraced Greer, and then stood back to examine her ‘—you look pretty wonderful yourself.’

Greer chuckled. ‘I hardly think so, Mrs. Pierson—I must look a sight, all cobwebs, and dust, and—’

‘Oh, drop the Mrs. Pierson, please!’ Lisa rolled her eyes. ‘You’re no longer a little girl...besides, you make me feel ancient. Call me Lisa. Look, I’ve got to dash—the kids and I just got here and I’ve left them unloading the van—but I’ll see you later. Jem has told me just enough about your successful career to whet my appetite—if I have one weakness, it’s gorgeous silk lingerie! But we’ll have loads of time to talk about that. I’ve brought enough steaks to feed an army and you and Jem are coming over for a barbecue. Around seven. Give us time to settle in. Okay?’

Greer knew, from Jem’s reports over the past several summers, that Lisa and her husband were still married, and still, apparently, happy together, but it sounded as if, on this trip at least, Lisa and the children were here on their own. Perhaps Brad was too busy at work to get away. Greer hoped that was the case; it was enough that she’d had to face Colby, without having to be in the company of the man she was supposed to have seduced into an illicit affair.

But even if Brad had been there, how could she have gotten out of the invitation? What possible excuse could she have come up with that would hold water? Besides, as far as she was aware, Lisa knew nothing of the incident that long-ago summer; she, Greer, would make sure it remained a secret. ‘I’ll look forward to it,’ she said. ‘Thanks a lot.’

‘Great. See you around seven.’

Greer stood watching Lisa bounce away along the path, her short brown hair as sleek as a seal’s, her trim behind attractively set off by her striped shorts and the shapely curve of her legs enhanced by the heels of her espadrilles.

Brad Pierson, Greer reflected wearily, was one very lucky man. Why would he ever have been foolish enough to risk losing a wife like Lisa?

She went back into the shed, but somehow, she had lost the zest for cleaning. It was too hot, of course...but Lisa’s visit had opened the doors to the past and, despite Greer’s earlier decision not to haul out her unhappy memories till later in the summer because she still felt too vulnerable to confront them, those memories—driven by forces over which she had no control—came rushing in...

Memories of the night her own happiness ended.

The night of the betrayal.

That summer, in late August, Mackenzie Daken had died, and Colby and Eleanor had come back to Canada for the funeral.

They’d been living in Australia since their wedding almost three years before, having chosen to settle there because Eleanor had wanted to be close to her widowed mother in Melbourne. Colby had started an Australian branch of Daken Construction and was doing extremely well.

Jem had attended the memorial service, but Greer—in the throes of final exams—had been unable to accompany her. Right after the exams were over, she had driven up to the lake with Jem, and didn’t come into contact with Colby till he and Eleanor turned up a week later; the couple planned to spend a few days there, readying the Daken cottage for sale.

For Greer, seeing Colby again was a taste of heaven, but she made sure she showed no sign to anyone that she was in love with him. Brad Pierson had come to the cottage for a few days, too; Lisa was carrying their third child, and it wasn’t due till October, but she’d been threatening to miscarry, so her doctor had hospitalized her. Brad’s mother was taking care of his two daughters, Brittany and Sarah, and Brad—stressed out with worry over Lisa, and with problems at work to boot—had taken some time off to relax.

That Colby was as besotted as ever with Eleanor was plain; and because it made Greer’s heart ache to watch them together, she’d spent a lot of time with Brad, laughing and joking with him much more than she normally would have, to make sure nobody suspected her real feelings.

On the third day after Colby and Eleanor arrived at the lake, Colby had gone to Toronto to meet with his father’s lawyers regarding the sale of Mac’s house in the city. Since the meeting was scheduled for evening, Colby planned to stay over and drive back to the cottage in the morning.

That night, Jem went to bed around eleven, leaving Greer and Eleanor sitting on the veranda at the Daken cottage, the moon lighting up the beach in a way that made it look like a silver and purple fairyland. Eleanor seemed restless, and disinclined to chat. In the end, Greer left her, and went off to bed.

But once there she couldn’t sleep for the heat. She tossed and turned for almost an hour, naked, on top of the covers, but sleep still eluded her, so in the end she got up. After slipping on a bikini, she tiptoed out of her room, hoping a stroll in the night air might cool her off.

She walked along the beach just below the cottages. All three were in darkness...and the occupants, she guessed, all asleep—Eleanor in the Daken cottage, Jem in the Westbury cottage and Brad in his.

But after she’d gone a little way past the Pierson place, she heard an unfamiliar sound ahead. It seemed to come from the edge of the forest about ten feet away, from the black-shadowed grassy area under a large maple tree. It sounded, Greer decided with a frown, like someone crying.

She paused, listening intently. It sounded like Eleanor. But whatever could be wrong? Trying to decide what to do, Greer crept forward hesitantly, stopping with a shiver after she’d gone a few steps into the dark shadowy area under the tree.

For long minutes, she stood there, but heard nothing now but the whisper of the breeze in the leafy branches above her head. She had just convinced herself she’d been mistaken, when she heard the sobbing again...very close by. But...no, not sobbing. Moaning. Moaning that, as she stood frozen, bewilderedly peering down into the dark shadows, became more anguished, pained...a panting, desperate—

She thought she saw a shimmer of blond hair not a yard away. She was about to whisper ‘Eleanor? Is that you?’ when she heard it. Heard the sound that jolted her heart against her lungs so she could scarcely breathe. A groan...

A man’s groan.

And a voice. A man’s voice. Brad’s voice, rasping out words...of passion.

Then Eleanor’s whisper—husky, and brittle with excitement. ‘Do you like this?’ There was a rustle of sound. ‘Oh, I know you’re going to like this...’

Another groan. Again a man’s groan, thick, deep-throated.

And then...an escalating series of inarticulate pleas, Eleanor’s whimpered ‘Don’t stop, oh, don’t stop now...’ and then a crescendo of—

Hands pressed hard against her ears in a desperate attempt to block out the horrible, the unthinkable, Greer stumbled behind the maple tree. With a stifled cry, she sank to the ground, and squeezing her eyes shut, rocked back and forth, back and forth—

‘What the hell is going on in there?’

Colby’s voice shattered the air. Harsh, challenging, it ripped through Greer like the jagged blade of a chain saw. For a terrifying moment, she thought he was addressing her. Aghast, she peeked around the tree trunk...but when she saw where he was standing on the beach, his white shirt fluorescent in the moonlight, she knew he couldn’t possibly have seen her. No, he was addressing the two people who had been making love in the shadows, so close to her she could now hear their ragged breathing. He must have come walking along the beach, to stretch his legs after the long drive from Toronto—

‘Pierson!’ Colby’s bellow almost deafened Greer. ‘I can see it’s you! Get out here!’

A frantic female whisper sizzled in the air then Greer heard a startled protest, swiftly cut off. Immediately after, someone brushed past her into the forest—Eleanor, light on her feet as she scrambled by in the dark, leaving behind nothing but a hint of her perfume. And then... Brad’s voice, panicky, uncertain. ‘Greer—wait—’

Greer felt her heartbeats jar. Why was Brad saying her name? But as her mind reeled confusedly, she heard Colby’s voice again, so harsh now it was almost unrecognizable.

‘Greer, come out this minute. If you don’t, by God, I’ll come in and get you!’

She had never heard him so angry. Hardly knowing what she was doing, she uncoiled her body and got up unsteadily. She reached out to the tree trunk to support herself, but lost her balance. With a cry, she fell sideways against the sun-dried branches of a bush, the crackling noise echoing in the stillness, echoing and reechoing, over and over.

Colby thudded toward her, and before she could draw a breath, he had pulled her out onto the moonlit beach.

Brad had come out of his hiding place, too, right behind her, but she had no time to waste thinking of Brad. All her thoughts were centered on Colby...and when she saw the expression of revulsion on his face as he looked at her, she felt as if she was sliding down into a dark bottomless hole. It was obvious he believed she’d been the one making love with Brad...because Eleanor—with Brad’s cooperation—had set it up that way.

Oh, what a sly and selfish mind her cousin had...and oh, what a swiftly manipulative one. She could have had no idea that Greer was close by; she was probably on her way now to the Westbury cottage, intent on securing Greer’s cooperation in this deception. Greer knew it was in her power to wipe the look of contempt from Colby’s face; knew that with a few quiet words, she could exonerate herself and regain his respect.

But even as pain twisted her heart so she almost cried out with the intensity of it, she realized that his pain would be even greater than her own, if he were to find out the truth.

‘Oh, spare the tears,’ he said with soft menace as his steely grip on her wrist tightened, ‘spare me the tears.’ His indrawn breath was harsh...his tone cruel as he said, ‘Get inside! I have some things I want to...say... to Brad Pierson and you don’t want to be around to hear them!’

Greer spun her blurred gaze to Brad. Would he say the words that would clear her? She could see by the evasive shift of his gaze that he would not. Oh, she was well aware that all she ought to feel for him was repugnance, but she couldn’t help feeling a faint welling of pity, too. He had had his moment of pleasure, and now he’d have to pay for it. She just hoped he felt it was worth it. At least, in her own case, she knew that Colby would never lay a hand on her.