Just as I thought I was about to nod off, the bathroom door opened. I realised I’d wilted a little, so I pulled myself up straight, sucked my stomach in and smiled at him. Not a beaming, gushing kind of smile, more of a ‘come over here and see what I’ve got for you’ kind of smile.
He was wearing one of the hotel bathrobes, which gave me a bit of a start, but I reasoned it had been a long day, and he’d probably forgotten what we’d talked about. It didn’t matter, I told myself. It would still be wonderful.
He walked towards me but didn’t smile back. As he neared me, I stood up, offering myself up like a delectable present he could unwrap.
‘I thought you’d have that thing off by now,’ he said, looking me up and down. There was no hint of the sexy frisson in his tone I’d imagined would accompany any mention of getting naked this evening. And before I could reply, he turned and headed off to the well-stocked bar, bypassing the champagne bucket, and poured himself a large brandy. Then he looked back at me and saw me frozen to the spot,staring at him. ‘What?’
A sliding sensation began in my stomach. I refused to acknowledge it. Not now. Not tonight. Everything was going to be perfect tonight. He’d promised! I’d married him, showed him how committed I was to him. He’d said it would make all the difference. What more did I have to do?
He nodded towards the bathroom. ‘Your turn.’ Then he walked into the living room of the suite and turned on the television.
I stood there for a moment, unsure of what to do. It was crucial I took the right approach. We were on a knife-edge, but I might still be able to rescue the evening if I played it right.
My first thought was to go out there, to lean over the back of the sofa, put my arms around him from behind and kiss his neck, but I discounted it. ‘Your turn’ might have sounded like a piece of useful information – bathroom’s free! – but I knew it was a request. An expectation. And doing what Justin wanted when he was feeling tetchy always went better than following the script running inside my own head. When I came up with my own lines, he always got more upset. I’d been with him long enough now to know how to follow his stage directions, to say what he needed me to say to make everything nice again so, incorporating a few contortionist moves, I undid my own buttons with trembling fingers and had a quick shower.
When I emerged, the television was off, and Justin was in the bedroom, a single reading light illuminating the room from his side of the bed. My heart rate accelerated. It had worked.He was back with me … He was ready to start our honeymoon properly.
He glanced fleetingly at me, slipped off his robe and climbed between the sheets, then flicked the light switch, plunging the room into darkness.
I stood there for a moment, unsure of what to do, and then I peeled back the duvet, sat down on the edge of the mattress and started to get into bed.
‘What do you think you’re doing?’ His voice wasn’t low and sexy but hard and crisp, the same tone he used on the dancers in his company when they weren’t getting things right.
I froze, one leg planted on the floor, one foot under the covers. ‘I’m … I’m coming to bed.’
‘I’m not sure I can cope with that tonight, Angel.’
I slid my leg in a little further, steadying myself with one hand as I prepared to scoot the rest of my body under the covers. ‘It’s okay … If you’re too tired, we don’t have to do anything but cuddle.’ I kept my voice smooth and light and soothing, hiding my disappointment. ‘There’s always the morning, and we’ve got the rest of our lives to—’
‘Don’t play innocent with me. You know exactly how you ruined our wedding night.’
‘I … No. Justin, what are you talking about?’
He let out a hard, barking laugh. ‘You want me to spell it out for you? I saw you, Angel. I saw you talking tohim. Laughing and smiling. You even touched him!’
Him? Oh …
‘Do you mean Sam?’ I vaguely remembered saying hello to him and the rest of his family. He’d leaned in to kiss me on the cheek, just as his brother and his parents had, and maybe I’d placed my hand on his elbow as he did so,but I really couldn’t remember.
‘Of course I mean him! Or were there other men in the room you’d slept with too. Are you really that much of a slut?’
His words silenced me as effectively as a slap. My jaw tightened, and I glared at him in the darkness. ‘I can’t believe you just said that to me! On our wedding night!’
‘I can’t believe you flirted with another man on our wedding day!’
I sat there, mouth open. I’d woundedhim? Well, he’d definitely got me back for that, and there was no way I was having sex with him tonight, not even if he got down on his knees and begged me.
I moved the leg that was dangling off the edge of the bed towards the floor and flumped down hard on the mattress beside him, turning away from him.
‘No.’ The word left an imprint in the silence that followed.
I ignored him.
I was just pulling the duvet up to tuck under my chin when he spoke again. ‘No. You can’t sleep here. I can’t share a bed with you after the way you’ve made me feel.’
‘But …’ I rolled over and looked at his back.
‘You need to get out.’ He said it so softly, so calmly, that at first I thought I must have misheard him. ‘Now,’ he added, and this time there was steel beneath his words. In my mind, I saw a flash of the man he’d become on the balcony two weeks earlier. The stranger.
