The Marriage Renewal. Maggie Cox
Читать онлайн книгу.
as for having the time of my life, well…’ Colouring helplessly, Tara momentarily forgot her deep sorrow at unhappy memories she’d rather not dwell on. ‘I think I had that for the first two and a half years I was with Mac.’
‘The man’s a fool!’ the older woman declared in disgust. ‘I said it then and I’ll say it again now. I wonder if he has even the slightest clue just what he walked away from?’
Mac pulled over into a lay-by to study the map once again. Satisfied he was on the right track, he wound down his window to breathe in some fresh country air. It was nearly autumn and the Indian summer that had lasted well into the first week of September was at last showing real signs of abating. Leaves were already scattered beneath the hedgerows and there was the scent of wood-smoke in the air. There was also a refreshing drop in the temperature that right now Mac found he welcomed. The cool air helped him think straight and God knew he’d done some thinking over the past three nights. He had the bags under his eyes to prove it. Flipping open the glove compartment, he delved inside for a photograph—a dog-eared colour print of Tara standing outside the Tower of London that he’d snapped years ago when they’d first met. Laughing back at him into his camera lens, she looked completely ravishing with her soft blonde hair, sparkling green eyes and pretty summer dress that moulded itself to her lithe, slim body. Mac had hardly been able to take his eyes off her and she’d been so sweet, insisting on paying for lunch and treating him when they both knew he was easily the more solvent of the two. But he had soon discovered Tara was like that: generous and loving to a fault. And Mac had lapped it up, the attention and the loving, like a man who’d been living underground all his days until he’d met her. She’d brought light and joy and humour into his life, and the day he’d walked away from her had been the darkest of his life. Until she’d told him about the baby, that was…
The pain of that thought was like a knife ripping through his chest. Releasing a harsh, dizzying breath, Mac dropped the photograph onto the passenger seat beside him and started the ignition. There was a deep frown between his dark blond brows as he checked his mirror then navigated the silver Mercedes out onto the country road to continue his journey. If he’d calculated the distance just right, he should arrive in Tara’s little market town round about lunch-time. He’d check into his hotel, get some directions from the desk clerk and go in search of Beth Delaney’s antique shop, Memories are Made. Whether she liked it or not, Tara and he had some talking to do. He just hoped that she or her aunt wouldn’t simply slam the door shut in his face and deny him the opportunity.
‘You can badger me all you like, Mac Simmonsen, but I have absolutely no intention of telling you where Tara is. I made the mistake of doing that only a few days ago and she’s been a different girl since you and she met up again. She took a long time to get over you…losing the baby—’
‘God dammit, Beth! Why didn’t someone tell me she was pregnant? As her husband, I had a right to know!’ Glad that the little antique shop was helpfully empty of customers, Mac knew his temper was on a dangerously short rein. He could accept he’d been in the wrong. He wasn’t so arrogant that he blamed Tara for keeping her pregnancy to herself—not when he’d walked out—not when he’d been the one who’d asserted he wasn’t ready for fatherhood. But he did hold her family responsible for being so damned self-righteous that they couldn’t even contact him on her behalf…especially in her hour of need.
Beth Delaney bristled. Her long topaz earrings shook alarmingly as she crossed her arms in front of her thin chest and squared up to the impressively built male in his perfect designer suit with blue eyes that would dazzle a less immune woman at twenty paces. But Beth prided herself on being stronger than that. Her beloved niece’s well-being was her priority and no amount of hectoring or pleading would shake her conviction that right now Tara should keep well away from this man. Not that she could imagine the proud, self-contained, Mac Simmonsen pleading for anything.
‘Let me remind you that you relinquished all your rights as a husband when you coldly and unfeelingly walked out on my niece as if she was less than nothing to you! You put your business and your ambition way above your relationship, and that’s a fact. It’s just a shame you deceived Tara by marrying her in the first place!’
‘Deceived her?’ His handsome brow furrowing, Mac’s heart thudded heavily inside his chest.
‘Yes, deceived her!’ Beth reiterated angrily. ‘You didn’t want a wife! You must have known you weren’t interested in a real marriage when your work so obviously came first. You deceived Tara by telling her you were doing it for her. She’s a trusting soul, Mac. She believed every word you told her. No matter how many times you let her down—and believe me, I know there were many because she cried on the phone to me—she would still end up giving you the benefit of the doubt. “One day he won’t have to work so hard,” she’d tell me. “One day Mac and I will be able to have a real holiday together somewhere wonderful.” She worshipped the ground you walked on and what did you do to her?’ Beth paused to inhale a deeply outraged breath. ‘You walked away without so much as giving her a chance at a reconciliation. I’m not privy to all the details of what went wrong between you both, but the fact is you broke her heart. And when she lost that much loved, much longed-for baby of hers…you broke it all over again. I really think it’s best for all concerned that you just turn around and leave. After all, it is what you do best, isn’t it?’
He told himself he deserved the tongue-lashing Beth had given him but, even so, anger welled up inside his chest because she’d made his walking out on Tara seem so premeditated and cold when the truth was it was anything but. He’d anguished over his decision for days and days, unable to bear the sight of his lovely wife looking so desperately unhappy. At the time, Mac hadn’t had a clue how to put things right between them—they had seemed to want different things and the gap between them had grown wider. The demands of his business had swallowed up most of his time—too much—a fact he now bitterly regretted. He should have paid more attention to his wife; shouldn’t have left her alone for most of their married life. Somehow he’d fooled himself that she’d wait until he’d secured them the future he wanted for them; fooled himself that she’d understand why it wasn’t practical for them to have children right then. One day he’d make it up to her, he’d promised himself. One day he’d give her everything she ever wanted… Well, he’d made his fortune but he’d lost the woman he’d loved—lost her long before he finally walked through the door and never looked back.
‘Marriage doesn’t come with an instruction manual, you know?’ Sighing deeply, Mac glanced at Beth and speared his fingers frustratedly through his hair. ‘I made a mess of things. I know that. Trouble is…we stopped communicating.’ A self-deprecating little crease appeared between his brows. Something inside Beth melted a little.
‘I stopped listening,’ he continued. ‘It’s just a wonder that Tara stayed around as long as she did. As for the baby…’ Those deep blue eyes of his that could be as icy as a Scandinavian winter shimmered with a vivid flash of pain. ‘Did she think I’d abandon her when I found out she was pregnant?’
Beth examined the two gold rings on her fingers and shook her head. ‘Perhaps she worried you might think she was trying to trap you into staying. I don’t know, Mac, but, knowing Tara as I do, I’d say that had something to do with it. She tells me you want a divorce—that you’re going to remarry?’
‘No.’ Mac stared past Beth at the row of grandfather clocks that were unanimously chiming the hour in a cacophony of bells and gongs. ‘Amelie and I broke up.’
‘I see.’
‘She wasn’t the right woman for me.’
‘So what are you doing here, Mac? Why do you want to see Tara?’
‘Is she seeing anyone right now?’ He couldn’t help himself. He just had to ask the one question that had been bothering him since he’d seen her at the museum. There was no way a beautiful girl like Tara would have spent the last five years alone—but it still made him feel sick with jealousy to think of her with someone else.
‘There’s never been a shortage of interested young men lining up at the door