Penny Jordan Tribute Collection. PENNY JORDAN

he was sick three times,’ a small voice piped up from Mary-Beth’s side, the little girl’s face stern with big-sisterly disapproval.

      ‘This is Tara.’ Mary-Beth introduced her daughter. ‘And that smelly, damp bundle you’re carrying is Abe junior…’

      ‘Abe senior is my daddy,’ Tara piped up. ‘But he hasn’t come with us. He’s—’

      ‘Hush now, Tara,’ Mary-Beth interrupted quickly. ‘I’m sorry,’ she apologised to Claire. ‘We’re putting you to an awful lot of trouble. I should have rung Brad before we left but…’

      Tears suddenly filled her eyes, and as she looked away Claire felt her own throat closing up in sympathy for her.

      Half an hour later, when the children had both been fed and were soundly asleep upstairs in one of the bedrooms, Claire poured her unexpected visitor a fresh cup of coffee and tried again to persuade her to let her telephone Brad.

      ‘No, no… Oh, where is he? I need to see him to talk to him. He’s the only one…’

      Fresh tears filled her eyes.

      ‘When everything you thought you could rely on—everyone you thought you could rely on—lets you down and it seems that there’s only one person left for you to turn to, you don’t always think things through properly… Brad’s always been more than just a brother to us. He’s the one we always automatically turn to when things go wrong for us… and I guess that’s why…’

      She bit her lip and looked directly at Claire as she went on huskily, ‘You’ve probably already worked out why I’m here… I found out three days ago that Abe, my husband, has been having an affair with a girl at work.

      ‘He tried to deny it, of course, but they were seen downtown in a bar by a close friend of mine. He told me that he had to work late… and I believed him, even though I knew she’d been making a play for him. I thought he loved me, you see,’ she said sadly.

      ‘Look, you’ve had a long flight. Why don’t you go upstairs and lie down?’ Claire suggested gently. She could see from the deep unhappiness in the other woman’s eyes just how much her husband’s infidelity had hurt her.

      ‘Abe kept insisting that it wasn’t true—that he was simply trying to help the girl sort out her personal problems. He said he hadn’t told me because he knew the way I’d react… He said that I never had time to listen to him any more anyway, because the children were more important to me than he was. He even said that Brad mattered more to me than him… that I paid more attention to what Brad had to say… that it was Brad I always turned to for help…’

      As her emotions caught up with her she swallowed painfully and then said huskily, ‘I think I will go up and have a rest, if you don’t mind. I’m beginning to feel that so much has happened that I can’t even think straight any more… Abe doesn’t even know I’m here,’ she added tiredly. ‘I just wanted to see Brad so much… I needed him so much… I just kinda grabbed the kids and some stuff and phoned the airline and the next thing I knew we were all on our way…’

      As she stood up she stifled a yawn, her eyes dark with exhaustion.

      Claire waited until she was sure that Mary-Beth was asleep before telephoning the office.

      Brad, she discovered, wasn’t there and so she spoke to Tim instead, who informed her that Brad was expected back within the hour.

      ‘Could you ask him to give me a ring as soon as he comes back?’ Claire asked her brother-in-law, without explaining why she needed to speak to him. Brad’s family was his private affair and she didn’t think it right to discuss what had happened with anyone else.

      A quick check upstairs confirmed that her visitors were all still asleep.

      As she put fresh towels in the bathroom she wondered how long they were likely to stay, and also wondered, half-enviously, what it must be like to have someone like Brad to turn to—someone you could rely on so completely that you could simply walk out of your home with two children and a couple of suitcases, knowing that if you could get to him he would solve your problems for you.

      She was being a little unfair, Claire reproved herself. No amount of brotherly concern could surely compensate for an unfaithful husband and a broken marriage. And she had seen the apprehension and confusion in little Tara’s eyes. An uncle, no matter how loving and concerned, could not replace a father.

      Not that she blamed Mary-Beth for feeling as she did. To discover that your husband—the man you love and to whom you had committed yourself and who you believed had committed himself to you, the father of your children—had been seeing another woman… had been making love with her… must be one of the most painful experiences that life could hold.

      As she went back downstairs Claire checked her fridge. From the way Mary-Beth had toyed with the food she had had earlier Claire doubted that she would have much appetite, but the children were a different matter, especially the baby.

      She had plenty of fresh vegetables and fruit that she could cook for him and put through the blender, Claire decided, and as for Tara—well, with a bit of luck the little girl might be enticed into helping her, which would give her mother the chance to have some private conversation with Brad.

      Claire suspected from the anxious looks that Tara had given her mother when her father had been mentioned that the little girl was already aware that something was wrong between her parents.

      Children, even very young ones, were dismayingly quick to pick up on things like that and to suffer through it, Claire knew, often blaming themselves for the problems between their mothers and fathers.

      A small sound from upstairs checked her and she paused to listen to it… Was it the baby crying?

      As she went towards the door she heard the sound of a car pulling up outside.

      Brad? She had expected him to telephone her, not to come straight back. A small flutter of apprehension gripped her stomach.

      This would be the first time they had seen one another since last night—the first time since… But this was not the time for her to become involved in her own feelings; she…

      She tensed as the kitchen door opened and Brad came striding in. When he saw her anxious expression his forehead creased in a frown and he hurried towards her.

      ‘Claire, what is it? What’s wrong?’ he asked, starting to reach for her as though he was going to take her in his arms, Claire recognised, her throat tight with emotion, her colour starting to rise self-consciously as she fought the temptation to move closer to him, her body already reacting to his presence, his proximity, to its need to recreate the intimacy they had shared last night, its need to encourage the physical bond it wanted to establish between them.

      Claire acknowledged how easy it would be simply to close the distance between them, to walk into his arms as though it was her right to do so.

      Against her will she found herself looking at his mouth, her glance lingering on it betrayingly as she felt her own lips start to tremble slightly. Last night’s intimacy had left her so sensually, so sensitively attuned to him that she could almost feel the warm pleasure of his mouth on hers.

      ‘Claire…’

      The hoarse urgency with which he said her name brought her back to reality, her body tensing as she heard sounds from the hall.

      ‘Brad—’ she began warningly, but the door was already opening and Mary-Beth was rushing into her brother’s arms, crying emotionally,

      ‘Oh, Brad, thank the Lord you’re here…’

      ‘Mary-Beth…?’ Claire could hear the surprise in Brad’s voice as he held his sister and looked questioningly at Claire over her head. ‘What…?’

      Quietly Claire left the room and closed the door behind her. They would have things to say to one another that needed to be said in private, without