didn’t.’
‘How the hell…’
‘You asked her to visit you in New York. Visit! You implied she’d be your society hostess. Your wife in the short periods you had time for her. You told her you’d stay here for a couple of weeks a year. What sort of marriage is that?’
‘If she loved me…’
‘She’d give up her life for you. Is that what you want? Well, maybe she would. Maybe she’s breaking her heart because she can’t.’
‘She can.’
‘You know, the real Cinderella didn’t have commitments,’ Ruby said gently. ‘Stepping out of rags into riches is all very well if you have nothing to leave behind. Nothing to lose. As I remember, Cinderella had no alternative. But there’s Harry.’
‘Harry could come with her.’
‘And her three other brothers? They’re still really close. She’d never leave them. She has an old dog, Ted-dog. You met him. Ted-dog went off his feed last time Peta was in New York. He’d pine. So… Peta has a life here. And what are you offering? Diamonds? Diamonds don’t make very good bedtime companions.’
‘Ruby…’
‘It’s your fear,’ Ruby told him. ‘I’ve never said this before because I’ve been just the same as you. Dead scared of life. But you know very well that Peta could never accept your offer of riches and position. She loves you.’
‘How can she?’
‘Of course she does,’ Ruby snapped. ‘But you, you don’t love her. You love what she could be if she forgot her responsibilities-her family, her farm-yet it’s that very loyalty that’s made you want her. You’re deceiving yourself, Marcus. You’re telling yourself you’d like a wife but you’re making it impossible for her to be just that. You’re a loner. Your offer of marriage to Peta is nothing more than a taunt.’
‘Ruby…’
‘I know, I know,’ she said and her tone was suddenly almost cheerful. ‘This is no way to speak to my employer. Isn’t it lucky I quit?’
He was left alone. With his corporation. His fortune. His position in society. With the black marble in his bathroom.
Hell!
It took three months. Three months when every morning Peta sat in her dairy and thought of what she’d left in New York. Three months when the annulment papers weren’t served. She should do something about it herself, she thought, but each time she raised it Ruby said, leave it.
‘He won’t…’
‘He must,’ Ruby told her.
And then one morning she could bear it no longer. She woke and found Darrell and Ruby were already bringing in the cows. Harry was preparing his own breakfast, interspersing cornflakes with wedges of chocolate cake Ruby had made the night before. Peta walked into the kitchen: the warmth of the old wood stove reached out to meet her and her ancient dog wuffled around her feet.
And she couldn’t bear it.
‘Harry, would you mind if I went back to New York for a bit?’ she asked, and Harry gave it his careful consideration while he attacked his cornflakes.
‘To fetch Marcus?’
She took a deep breath. ‘Someone has to.’
‘Ruby says we have to wait for him to be sensible.’
‘I think I’ve waited long enough.’
Harry thought about it some more. And nodded. ‘Okay. Ace by me.’
‘You’ll be all right here by yourself?’
‘Darrell and Ruby will look after me. Will Marcus come, do you think?’
‘I hope so.’
‘Tell him Ruby cooks now. He doesn’t have to eat your sausages.’
‘If he loves me he’d eat my sausages.’
‘Even Ted-dog doesn’t like your sausages,’ Harry told her. ‘But good luck.’
Marcus emerged from a meeting and his chauffeur was waiting for him. Which was unusual. Robert usually met him at street level. What was even more unusual was his message.
‘There’s someone waiting for you on the fire-escape.’
‘What do you mean, there’s someone on the fire-escape?’ he demanded.
‘Just what I said. Someone with lunch.’ Robert smiled and Marcus’s heart gave a lurch.
‘Is it…’
‘See for yourself, sir,’ Robert told him.
Peta.
Of course it was Peta.
She was sitting on the fire-escape where he’d first met her, only this time she was seated on a step out of range of the swinging door. She was wearing tattered shorts, a faded T-shirt and sandals. She was holding a bag of bagels and a couple of drink containers were by her side.
‘Hi,’ she said and held out her bag. ‘You want a bagel?’
‘Peta,’ he said cautiously and she smiled.
‘Yep. You remember me?’
Remember her? It was all he could do not to lunge forward and take her in his arms-right now. But her expression forbade it. She was smiling but she was formal. Holding him at arm’s length.
‘What are you doing here?’ he managed.
‘I thought we could start again.’ She bit into a bagel.
‘You thought we could start again?’
‘We could share.’ She wiggled over on the step so there was room beside her. ‘I’ve brought enough for two.’
‘But why…’
‘I figured out we started all wrong,’ she said. ‘You saved me and I’m very grateful. By the way, I see Charles’s plate has disappeared from your list of occupants. That makes me even more grateful. But no relationship can exist on gratitude. Ruby says I should leave you a bit longer but I got lonely. So I figured… If I was lonely you might be worse. I thought I should come across and see if we can be friends.’
‘Friends.’ She was still sitting on her step, holding out her bag of bagels. She was taking his breath away. ‘I don’t know whether I can be a…a friend.’
‘Everyone needs a friend,’ she said, biting into her bagel as if the bagel and not the words were the most important thing. There was a moment’s pause while she chewed and swallowed. Then she stared down at the bitten bagel, considering where to bite next. Not looking at him. Chatting as if they were casual acquaintances. Nothing more. ‘According to Ruby, you think you can live in isolated splendour for ever,’ she told him. ‘But black marble’s not all it’s cut out to be.’
‘No?’
‘Sit. Eat your bagel.’ She held out her bag again and he sat and took one without thinking. The last thing he wanted at this minute was a jelly-filled bagel. ‘We get to share,’ she said and the seriousness in her voice was unmistakeable.
‘Share what?’
‘What friends share. Bagels. Fire-escape steps. Life.’
‘Peta…’
‘I love you, you know,’ she said conversationally. ‘You might have rescued me, but now it’s my turn to try to
