‘Exactly the same things I have for the last half an hour.’ She gave a sad smile at the acknowledgement. ‘And I couldn’t, in all conscience, marry you with that between us.’
He scowled darkly. ‘Surely I’m the one it affects the most, and if I’m sure it’s just a temporary aberration …’
‘But we don’t know that, Paul, and so I can’t do that to you.’ She shook her head in firm denial. ‘I think you’ve taken this all wonderfully.’ She touched his arm gently. ‘I just don’t know what happened …’ Her eyes were shadowed with pain.
‘I do.’ He was breathing heavily in his agitation. ‘I’ve been too much the gentleman, that’s the trouble. Maybe if I had made love to you instead of holding back until after we were married, none of this would have happened. I just wanted to treat you with respect and—and love. But what do I have to lose now …’
Eve didn’t even attempt to fight him as he took her fiercely into his arms and began to kiss her with hard lips; she owed him this much at least.
Usually she found enjoyment in Paul’s arms, felt cherished by his kisses, but this morning he was angry, so angry. And her lack of response just seemed to make him angrier, so much so that Eve suddenly became shakingly aware of how alone they were in his apartment. And anger was apt to make people do the strangest things, things normally out of character. Not this way, it couldn’t be this way!
She wrenched her mouth free of his. ‘Paul, stop this!’ she gasped, genuinely frightened, for both of them. ‘You’re only making the situation worse …’
His mouth twisted, as swollen as Eve’s felt beneath the tentative touch of her tongue. ‘How could it possibly be worse than it already is?’ he said bitterly, not relinquishing his hold on her in the slightest. ‘Your becoming involved with Adam Gardener has destroyed all our plans.’ He scowled.
‘But surely you can see——’
‘All I can see clearly is that you no longer intend to marry me.’ He put her abruptly away from him, as if suddenly aware of the way he had been holding her against her will, thrusting his hands into his trouser pockets and stepping back.
Eve looked at him pleadingly once again. ‘It’s only until I’ve sorted out my emotions.’
His mouth twisted. ‘I wonder how many other poor fools have heard the same thing and gone on hoping?’
She frowned. ‘But it really is only until I feel more sure of myself.’
He glared, his mouth thinning. ‘And how long do you expect that to take?’
His scepticism was so obvious, and it didn’t help that Eve knew she had no real answer for him.
‘I don’t know …’ She gave a self-conscious grimace, feeling very uncomfortable, wringing her hands together nervously.
‘I do,’ Paul bit out tautly. ‘You’ll never marry me now.’
‘That’s not true,’ she cried, desperate at the thought of losing him. ‘Things just have to be delayed for a while,’ she insisted.
‘Indefinitely was the way you put it a few minutes ago, I believe,’ he reminded bitterly.
What else could she say? She didn’t want to cancel her wedding to Paul, it had been her dream for as long as she could remember, but no woman should marry one man while desiring another.
There was something else she had come to terms with during her wakeful hours of the night; she did desire Adam, would gladly have given herself to him the night before. And that was the reason she couldn’t go through with marrying Paul, not until she was sure the attraction she felt towards Adam wasn’t a temptation she would give in to, married to Paul or not.
‘Until I’m doing the right thing for both of us,’ she nodded.
Paul turned away disgustedly. ‘And to think I believed you had come here today to apologise for your outburst to me last night,’ he muttered with self-derision.
‘But don’t you realise,’ she looked at him imploringly, ‘that my outburst of last night is all part of what’s been happening to me over the last week?’
Paul frowned heavily. ‘I don’t think I care for the changes,’ he rasped dully.
She was changing, Eve acknowledged sadly on the drive back to Ashton House, and, like Paul, she wasn’t sure those changes were for the better. But, until she could be sure she had stopped changing, it wouldn’t be fair to even try and commit herself to marrying Paul. He might not even like her at the end of all this!
She wasn’t altogether sure she liked herself at the moment, after what she had just had to do!
* * *
Not in the mood to face anyone, she quickly made her way up to her studio once she got back to the house. Time enough later to explain—at least, partially—that her wedding to Paul was off for the moment. And, taking into account the fact that Paul hadn’t seemed eager to see her again, she didn’t know if the wedding would ever be on again!
The studio was full of paintings she already had finished for the winter exhibition, images that were so much a part of her, resting against all of the walls.