Her Own Rules (8 page)

She struggled, managed to partially push him away, and pulled herself up on the sofa, straining to extricate herself from his arms.

Unexpectedly, Reed let go of her as abruptly as he had grabbed her. Giving her an odd look, he said in a quiet, icy voice, “Why did you pull away from me in such a violent manner as if I’m suddenly a leper?

What’s wrong?”

Meredith bit her lip, said nothing. Then she 78 / Barbara Taylor Bradford

sprang to her feet, hurried over to the window, and stood looking out.

A cold silence filled the room.

Meredith was shaking inside. She wanted to get this over. Be done with him. End the whole thing as gracefully as she could. But he was being difficult, and worse, imagining things that hadn’t happened.

After a moment or two, when she was calmer, she turned to face him and said slowly, in her kindest voice,

“Reed, listen to me…things are…well, not right between us anymore. They haven’t been for weeks.”

“How on earth can you say that! We had a wonderful time in New York. Only a month ago, unless I’m sadly mistaken.”

Meredith shook her head, her dismay intensifying.

She wanted to be considerate, to let him down lightly, yet she knew within herself that she must make her feelings absolutely clear to him. “It wasn’t wonderful, Reed, at least not for me. I realized you and I were completely incompatible, and not suited to each other at all. I began to feel ill at ease with you, and I certainly knew our relationship was on the skids, that it couldn’t possibly work.”

“That’s not so, and you know it. If you lived here and we weren’t conducting our relationship long distance, everything would be entirely different. Please move to London to be with me, Meredith.”

“Reed, I’ve just told you, as far as I’m concerned we don’t have a future together. And anyway, I have such a huge commitment to my business.”

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“Oh don’t go on so, Meredith. I can’t believe for one moment that you’re such a dyed-in-the-wool career woman as you claim to be. I couldn’t love that kind of woman, and I do love you.”

Meredith was silent.

He repeated, “I love you.”

“Oh Reed, I’m so sorry…but I just don’t feel the same way.”

“That’s not what you led me to believe,” he said softly, his eyes narrowing.

“I admit I was infatuated with you last fall, that’s true. But it
was
an
infatuation
, nothing stronger or more lasting. I can’t make a commitment to you, I just can’t.”

“It’s been so good between us, Meredith. Why are you saying these things?”

Taking a deep breath, Meredith plunged in. “I very quickly came to understand that you don’t take my life seriously. Not my personal family life with my children, and certainly not my work. I will not negate my children’s existence for you, or anyone else for that matter, and I will never give up my work. It’s far too important to me. I’ve put too many years and too much effort into my business.”

“You’re not living up to my expectations of you, Meredith,” he said, his voice suddenly grown cold and disparaging. “Not at all. I thought you were different.

I thought you were an old-fashioned woman with old-fashioned values. What a miscalculation on my part.

I can’t believe my judgment was so flawed. Or perhaps you simply deceived me.” He raised a dark brow.

80 / Barbara Taylor Bradford

Slowly, and in a cold tone, Meredith answered, “You know, you’ve just put a finger on something of vital importance, Reed. I
feel
the weight of your expectations, and I just can’t handle that. I began to realize in November that you believe you come first in my life.

I’m afraid you don’t. The reason I wanted to see you tonight was to explain this, to tell you about my feelings and to bring our relationship to an end.”

Reed Jamison was speechless. In all of his forty-one years he had never been discarded by a woman. He had always been the one to end affairs or start them, controlling, manipulating, pulling the puppet’s strings and getting his own way.

He continued to stare at Meredith. She was the only woman who had ever bested him, and a terrible rage began to fulminate in him. He leapt to his feet, glaring at her. “I’m glad I found out what kind of woman you really are! Before I made the terrible mistake of marry-ing you!” he shouted.

Without another word Reed strode across the room, picked up his coat, and left, banging the door behind him with such ferocity the chandelier rattled and swayed on its chain.

Meredith ran to the door and locked it; she leaned against it for a few seconds. She was shaking. Calming herself, she walked over to the desk, sat down, and dialed Patsy’s number. It rang and rang. She was just about to hang up, when she heard Patsy saying,

“Hello?”

“Patsy, it’s me. Reed was here, and I told him it Her Own Rules / 81

was over between us. He’s gone…he marched out in a fury.”

“Well, that’s a relief. That you told him, I mean.

And naturally he left in a high dudgeon. He’s not used to getting dumped unceremoniously. That’s part of his problem, you know. He’s always been spoilt by women, and he thinks he’s God’s gift to everything that walks in skirts.”

“Yes, I know what you mean. He’s also a male chauvinist pig, to use a very outdated phrase. However, it is appropriate. That’s something I guess I detected when he was last in New York. He doesn’t take my business seriously, or my life. He’s self-involved, and he just can’t imagine why I’m not rushing over here to set up house with him. He said he wanted me to marry him.”

“He proposed! Good God! Well, I must say, you must’ve really gotten to him, Meredith my girl. Ever since his divorce from Tina Longdon, he’s been a hit-and-run man.”

“I’m not sure what that means.”

“You know, the kind of chap who has an attitude…
love me on my terms, darling. Thanks for
everything. Farewell
. Hit-and-run chaps, that’s what we call them over here. I know several women who have suffered at Reed’s hands.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I did, Meredith, at least I tried to warn you as best I could. I did say he was a difficult man.”

“Actually, you said he was a brooding Byronic hero, or words to that effect, and I never did
really
understand what you meant by that.”

82 / Barbara Taylor Bradford

“Oh that’s only the role he’s adopted for years. In essence, it’s a pose. But I suppose it has been rather effective, got him a long way with women. Not that he needs a pose, actually. His looks aside, he’s charming most of the time, despite that smoldering manner of his.”

“All too true. But do you think women fall for that…for that brooding stance?”

“Oh yes, I think so. Let’s face it,
many
do. The smoldering eyes, the soulful expression, the moody demeanor, can be appealing. There are a lot of women who go for the suffering, anguished Heathcliffs of this world. They want to change them, make them happy.”

Patsy paused, then said, “Wasn’t that one of the things about him that attracted you?”

“No,” Meredith answered quickly. “To tell you the truth, it was only this past November, in New York, that he turned morose and moody. It irritated me more than anything else.”

Patsy laughed. “I bet it did! Anyway, the main thing is you don’t sound any the worse for giving him the boot.”

Meredith also laughed. “I’m not. Naturally, I’m not thrilled about hurting someone’s feelings. But it had to be done; Reed had to be told. I needed that closure.”

“I realize you did.”

“I thought it only fair that Reed knew exactly how I felt. And immediately. It was much better to clear the air, cut it off before it dragged on any longer. These kinds of situations can end in such bitterness.”

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“Don’t I know it!” Patsy exclaimed. “Tony’s been bitter about our divorce for years. Blames me, of course. Listen, do you want to come over for supper?

Or we could go out if you like, if you don’t want to be alone…” Patsy’s voice trailed off.

“That’s sweet of you, but I want to stay in tonight.

I’ll order room service and pack. You did say you were picking me up at six tomorrow morning, didn’t you?”

“Yes. Sorry about that, but we do have to leave early.

We’ll be about four hours on the road, three and a half if the traffic’s light. We’ll spend a couple of hours in Keswick and then head down to Ripon. We’ve a great deal to do in one day. In fact, we might have to spend the night in Ripon.”

“No problem. And Patsy?”

“Yes?”

“I don’t think I hurt his feelings too much, do you?”

“You may have. Don’t underestimate the effect you had on him.”

“I’ve probably damaged his ego, that’s all.”

“Oh definitely, Meredith, I’m certain of that. But I also believe that our Reed, the glamorous playboy, fell rather heavily for you. That’s
always
been my opinion.

Oh well, what can one do…so he finally met his Wa-terloo.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

M
eredith found it hard to fall asleep.

For a long time she tossed and turned until finally, in exasperation, she got out of bed. After putting on a warm woolen dressing gown, she went and sat on the sofa in the sitting room. Her mind was racing.

She had not drawn the heavy velvet draperies earlier, and moonlight was filtering in through the muslin curtains that hung against the windowpanes.

Everything had a silvery sheen from this natural light, and the room was peaceful.

Meredith leaned back against the silk cushions of the sofa, thinking of Reed. How unpleasant their parting had been, and how foolish she had been to get involved with him in the first place. She was forty-four years old; she ought to have known better.

How unlucky she was with men. Always.

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No, that was not quite true.

There had been one man.
Once
. A man who had been exactly right for her. He was dead. He had died too young. Such an untimely death…that’s what they had all said. And how truthfully they had spoken.

To die at the age of thirty-six was some terrible trick of God’s, wasn’t it?

Meredith had asked herself this question a thousand times. She had striven hard to find some special meaning in that awful, untimely death. She had found nothing. There was no meaning in it. None at all.

And all she had been left with was a void.

Of course there had been Cat, just a toddler, and Amelia, poor Amelia, and they had shared that void with her, and the grief. How they had mourned him…endlessly…she and Amelia. His women. The women who had loved him.

I’ll always mourn him, Meredith thought, the old familiar sadness rising in her, filling her throat. Oh Jack, why did you die? How many times had she asked herself that in the silence of her mind. There was no answer. There had never been an answer. Not ever in twenty-two years.

And how many times had she asked herself when she would meet another man like Jack. She never would, she knew that now, because men who were like him were among the very few. And they were already spoken for. Jack had been spoken for early on in his life, when he was only twenty-two. And he had married that youthful love of his.
Amelia
. Then one terrible day she had been thrown by her horse. When she was only

86 / Barbara Taylor Bradford

twenty-five and pregnant. And she had lost the baby and been crippled for life, a paraplegic trapped in a wheelchair. But he loved her; he would always love and cherish Amelia and she would always be his wife; he had told Meredith that and she had understood.

And she had loved Amelia and Amelia had loved her and Jack; and Cat, she had loved her, too. Amelia had given them her blessing in her own silent, smiling way, full of approval, and gratitude for their love and kindness and loyalty.

Jack
.

Blond, blue-eyed, tanned. So quick and sprightly and energetic. Full of good humor, tall tales, laughter, and life. No wonder she had fallen in love with him instantly, the first day she had set eyes on him. A
coup
de foudre
.

So long ago now.

May of 1969.

She had been just eighteen.

Meredith closed her eyes. Behind her lids she could see his face. She remembered what had gone through her mind that day as she had stared back at him, held in the grip of his mesmeric gaze.

Such a beautiful face for a man, she had thought, such a sensitive mouth and those extraordinary eyes.

Such a lovely blue. Bits of sky, she had thought then.

His eyes are like bits of a summer sky.

Now, tonight, so many years later, Meredith saw herself as she had been on that May afternoon…the images of the three of them floated before her eyes.

They were all so clear…so very vivid and alive…she and Jack and Amelia.

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The decades fell away.

She tumbled backward in time…tumbled back into the past.

“Can I help you?” the young man asked politely, getting up off the steps where he had been sitting, pulling off his tortoiseshell sunglasses and peering intently at her.

Meredith stared back at him. “I’m looking for a Mr.

Silver,” she answered, jumping off her bike, almost falling in her haste and sudden confusion. Unexpectedly she was feeling self-conscious in front of this handsome man, so well groomed and well dressed, wearing gray pants and a dark-blue cashmere sweater over his lighter blue shirt.

The man walked over to her, thrusting out his hand.

“Well, you’ve found him,” he announced, “I’m Mr.

Silver.”

“Mr.
Jack
Silver?” she asked, shaking his hand.

He nodded. “That’s right. And the only Mr. Silver who’s alive and kicking. That I know of, anyway. The rest are over there.” He indicated a plot of land behind him.

She followed the direction of his gaze and saw a small walled cemetery to the right of a copse of trees.

“You have your own graveyard?” she asked, sounding awed.

He nodded, and there was a questioning expression on his face as he asked, “How can I help you?”