The Stand-In Bride Page 16

  He held it out to her. Maggie took it with shaking hands, and glanced briefly at the scorch-marks on the envelope before tearing it open. Slowly she slid the letter out, opened it, and lay it flat on her lap. But she didn’t read it. Then she said something strange.

  ‘I wasn’t a good wife. I was too young, and I knew nothing. If I’d been older I might have coped better with Roderigo, maybe helped him.’

  He wanted to shout, ‘Don’t make excuses for him.’ But it was too late. His heart was heavy as he realised that she’d guessed the contents of the letter, even as he had, and was preparing herself. He had given her the thing that would destroy them.

  ‘Shall I leave you to read it alone?’ he asked.

  She didn’t answer and he doubted she’d even heard. A stillness had come over her, like the stillness of death. She stared at the paper in her hands but he couldn’t tell if she saw it. At last she lifted it and read what was written. Then she read it again, and as she did so her head sank lower until she covered her eyes with her hand.

  A cold fear gripped him. He felt he ought to leave her but he couldn’t have gone away if his life had depended on it.

  ‘Margarita,’ he whispered. He stepped closer and put his hands on her shoulders, dropping to his knees beside her. ‘Tell me, my dearest,’ he said.

  She raised her head and stared into the distance. ‘I always knew,’ she said quietly. ‘In my heart, I always knew. I wish José had shown me this before. I know he thought he was acting for the best-but if I’d only read this sooner-’

  ‘Would it have made so much difference?’ Sebastian asked sadly.

  ‘Oh, yes-all the difference in the world. You can think you know what’s in a man’s heart, but when you see it set down in black and white, in his own words-’ She sighed, and his pain deepened.

  ‘And do you now know what was in his heart?’ he asked.

  She nodded.

  ‘Margarita, don’t be sad,’ he begged. ‘I know it’s hard to read his words of love when it’s too late, but what you had can never be taken away. Cling to that. Love him if you must. One day, perhaps, you’ll turn to me completely, but until then I can be content with what we have. You are worth waiting for.’

  At last she raised her head and looked at him. ‘What do you think this letter says?’ she asked.

  ‘I think it tells you of his love. That hurts you now, but one day it will bring you peace.’

  Maggie pushed the letter towards him. ‘Read it,’ she said.

  ‘Are you sure-?’

  ‘Quite sure. I want you to read this, Sebastian, because if you don’t, you and I will never understand each other.’

  Slowly, almost reluctantly, he took the letter and ran his eyes over it. The first shock came at once. ‘It’s dated eight years ago-before you were married.’

  ‘He didn’t write it to me,’ Maggie said. ‘He wrote it to José, from England, soon after we met. Read it.’

  Sebastian began to read.

  Hey there, little cousin,

  I did it! I found myself a real heiress. Her name’s Maggie, she’s eighteen, pretty enough in an English sort of way, which means she’s a bit insipid for my taste. But she’s loaded so I’ll just have to put up with her looks. Her parents just died, leaving her a couple of hefty insurance policies, plus a house. You should see that house! It almost makes me want to stay here and live in it, but I guess my creditors would prefer it sold.

  You never thought I could manage it, did you? Or maybe you just hoped I couldn’t. Get real, boy! When I was your age I put women on pedestals, too, but believe me, that’s not where they belong. A man needs money, especially a man like me.

  She’s young and she adores me. I can mould her, and I’ll be a good husband as long as she behaves herself. Besides, everyone knows women can’t manage money. I’ll be doing her a favour.

  I’ve written to the most awkward of my creditors telling them money’s on its way. That should stall them for a while, and with any luck I’ll be back in a few weeks with a new wife and enough to set me up in style.

  Life’s going to be good. As for ‘tying myself down’-who’s going to? There are plenty of hot, spicy women who like having fun with a man as rich as I’m going to be. I’ll live my own life, and my wife will do as she’s told.

  There was more, but Sebastian was too disgusted to read on. The whole man was there-selfish, faithless, treacherous, convinced of his own superiority, his divine right over the woman.

  And there was something more, something he was ashamed to admit. There were words in that letter that could have been written by himself. She’s young… I can mould her… Hadn’t he said much the same, while preparing to marry a vulnerable young girl that he didn’t love?

  But that had been a long time ago, in another life, before he’d learned the value of a woman’s heart.

  Half-afraid, he looked at Maggie. She was staring into space.

  ‘He never loved me at all,’ she said quietly. ‘I realised very soon that my money was a big attraction for him, but I made myself believe that there was some real love there too. But there was none. Some part of me must have suspected that, but I wouldn’t let myself know it.

  ‘After he died in that terrible way, I shut out the bad and magnified the good. And, when his name was cleared, I felt so guilty that I made myself forget the truth about him.’

  ‘The truth,’ Sebastian said, ‘was that he was a very nasty piece of work, who brought his troubles on himself.’

  ‘Yes,’ Maggie said. ‘That really was the truth. Before we even married he was planning to make me pay for his girlfriends.’

  ‘I wonder,’ he said slowly, ‘how you ever found the courage to trust yourself to another man.’

  ‘Not all men are the same. I took too long to understand that. But what I still don’t understand-’ she rose and looked into his face ‘-is why you gave this letter to me, if you thought it was a love-letter.’

  ‘I thought it might help you find peace. There is nothing I wouldn’t give, or do, to bring you that peace.’

  She touched his cheek. There was a strange, shining light in her eyes. ‘You love me as much as that?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said simply. ‘I love you as much as that.’

  ‘And thanks to your love, I’m free. It’s as though a terrible weight has gone from me. It might have crushed me all my life, but you freed me.’

  He was dazed by the memory of how close he’d come to burning the letter, and destroying them both. Or perhaps he merely thought he had. He only knew that when he held it out to the flames some power had drawn him back before it was too late. Looking at her eyes, fixed on him, candid and unshadowed for the first time, he thought perhaps he knew the name of that power.

  He couldn’t tell her about his temptation. At least, not yet. One day, long in the future, he might say, ‘You too set me free, and this is how it happened.’

  Or perhaps, by then, they would no longer need words.

  ‘Sebastian,’ she said softly, ‘have I ever told you that I love you?’

  He shook his head. ‘But then, I have never before told you.’

  ‘Not in words, but in many other ways.’

  ‘You are my whole being and existence,’ he said slowly. ‘You are my love and my life. You are everything to me. You are more, even, than our child.’

  ‘I lost faith in love. Thank you for giving me back my faith.’

  ‘And-him?’

  ‘You want to know if I love you as I loved Roderigo? No, I don’t. And I’m glad of it. You should be too. There was always something wrong with that love, and now I know what. He wasn’t worth loving. That’s the greatest pain of all, to waste love on someone who isn’t worth it. I shall never know that pain with you.’

  She tossed the letter into the fire, then lifted the photograph and studied it, while Sebastian never took his eyes from her.

  ‘It’s there, isn’t it?’ she said at last. ‘The slyness and meanness-it was there in his
face all the time. But I wouldn’t let myself see it.’

  With a quick movement she cast the picture into the flames where it shrivelled. The last thing they saw was Roderigo’s face curling up, blurring, vanishing.

  ‘He’s gone at last,’ Maggie said. ‘Now there is only us.’

  ‘Only us,’ he echoed, taking her into his arms. ‘Yes, only us. Forever.’

  In the church of San Nicolas the Christmas greenery was piled high about the pulpit, the font, up against the walls. Down below, the lights glowed softly over the manger. The wooden child lay in the crib, his arms stretched slightly upward to the living baby looking down at him from wide dark eyes.

  ‘Look, my darling,’ Sebastian murmured. ‘He is greeting you. Say hello to him.’

  ‘Sebastian,’ Maggie chided him, smiling, ‘she’s only three months old.’

  ‘No matter,’ he said. ‘In years to come she’ll know that she came here in her father’s arms. She may not remember, but she will know.’

  ‘A beautiful child,’ Father Basilio said, reaching up to lay a finger against the baby’s cheek. And then, being-for all his sanctity-a man and a Spaniard, he added consolingly, ‘And the next one will probably be a boy.’

  ‘Don’t let Sebastian hear you say that,’ Catalina laughed. ‘He thinks his little Margarita is a queen.’

  ‘Fate sends what fate sends,’ Sebastian said, straightening up and settling his baby daughter lovingly against his shoulder. ‘Fate sent this little one to be a jewel for her Papa.’

  ‘Who’s that in the doorway?’ the priest asked, screwing up his eyes against the poor light.

  ‘José and Alfonso,’ Sebastian said, ‘waiting to see who will be honoured with this baggage’s company on the way home. It’s time you decided between them, Catalina. You are bringing scandal on my house.’

  Catalina went down the aisle to where José and Alfonso waited humbly. The old priest followed her to greet them.

  Sebastian looked over the baby’s head at his wife. He had more than one jewel, but he never spoke of the other one to outsiders, only to her. Maggie smiled at him, then looked back at the crib, touching the wooden baby with a gentle hand.

  ‘That was how I saw you this time last year,’ Sebastian reminded her. ‘And I think I understood in that moment that you were far more to me than a woman I had tried and failed to conquer. You touched my heart, and that was when I began to be afraid.’

  ‘Afraid? You?’

  ‘You sought no quarter and you gave none. It was I who yielded. And I have been glad ever since. You took a robot, and brought him to life.’ He kissed his child. ‘And only life can give life.’

  His wife reached up to where his cheek lay against their baby’s head, caressing them both at the same time. ‘Let’s go home now,’ she said fondly. ‘Life is only just beginning.’

  They walked out of the church together. At the door she looked back at the Christmas scene and smiled, but she didn’t linger.

  It would be there again next year.

  Lucy Gordon

  Lucy Gordon cut her writing teeth on magazine journalism, interviewing many of the world’s most interesting men, including Warren Beatty, Richard Chamberlain, Sir Roger Moore, Sir Alec Guinness, and Sir John Gielgud. She also camped out with lions in Africa and had many other unusual experiences which have often provided the background for her books. She is married to a Venetian, whom she met while on holiday in Venice. They got engaged within two days.

  You can visit her website at www. lucy-gordon. com and look out for The Italian’s Passionate Revenge which will be available in May!

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