The Husband She Never Knew(19)
Author: Kate Hewitt

CHAPTER TEN

NOELLE didn’t remember much of the train ride to Lyon. She sat and stared out of the window for the two hours it took to travel south, her mind no more than a numb fog. She felt as if she’d just said goodbye to Ammar, a horribly final goodbye, and she hadn’t meant to … had she?

She didn’t know what she’d meant to do. After last night’s revelations she’d wanted only to escape, flee from the tension and heartache and, most of all, herself and her own doubts. She didn’t think she could ever travel far enough for that.

The idea of visiting her parents had come with the dawn. The thought of going home, even if just for a weekend, had held a desperate appeal. She could be a child again, just for two days. Life could be simple.

Life, Noelle thought as she stared out of the window of the train, was never simple. And after seeing such terrible, bleak understanding in Ammar’s eyes, she couldn’t remember just why she had been so desperate to get away.

Her lips still burned from Ammar’s kiss. Her body ached. And her heart … her broken heart felt like nothing more than a fistful of jagged splinters, desperate to be stuck back together any which way.

She hadn’t thought through her sudden departure. She hadn’t thought through anything; she’d endured a sleepless night as her mind replayed the accusations that woman had fired at her. Ammar Tannous is completely immoral, totally corrupt, and Tannous Enterprises is rotten to the core. If he weren’t so damn rich he’d be in jail. So why are you with him?

That question beat a relentless tattoo in her mind. Why are you with him? Why are you with him? And even as her heart insisted the answer was because she loved him, her mind recalled all the things she didn’t know. All the things he’d done that even now he wouldn’t tell her. She told herself it shouldn’t matter, that he was different now, yet she still felt sick with misery. She’d said she loved him, accepted him, and yet she hadn’t known what she was accepting. How it would feel.

A tear leaked out of the corner of her eye and she brushed at it impatiently. She knew it was her own fault for getting into this mess, for closing her eyes for so long. She’d chosen to be naïve. And now that she wasn’t, she no longer knew what to do. How to feel.

Still, it was good to see her father’s familiar craggy face at the station. He smiled and hugged her but, as they drove back to their family chateau ten miles outside the city, Noelle thought he seemed distracted.

‘Is everything all right?’ she asked and her father gave her a quick sideways smile.

‘Oh, yes, yes, as ever. But you look so tired, chérie. Are you working too hard?’

Noelle managed a smile. ‘Maybe a little.’ She wasn’t ready to tell her parents about Ammar. ‘How are things here?’ she asked with an attempt at brightness. ‘How is Maman?’

Was it her imagination, or did her father’s hands tense on the steering wheel? Was she just being paranoid after such a tense confrontation with Ammar?

‘Maman is fine,’ he said after a pause. ‘There is nothing you need to worry about.’ Which seemed, Noelle thought, a strange thing to say, considering she had not said she was worried.

‘And the bank?’ she asked. Her father was an executive at Banque de Lyon, and had been in his position for her entire life.

‘You know you need never concern yourself with business matters. If it were up to me, you would not work at all.’

Noelle said nothing. Her father made a similar remark every time she saw him. He might have old-fashioned ideas about men and women’s roles, but fortunately he couldn’t refuse his only child anything, including a college degree and the opportunity of a career. Even if it was a career she no longer wanted.

What did she want?

Noelle gazed blindly out at the placid Rhône, the peaceful pastoral scene of meadows and trees blurring before her eyes. Seeing her father had eased her spirit a little, but she still felt deeply miserable and, worse, guilty. As if she was the one who had done something wrong. And maybe she had.

‘Maman will be happy to see you,’ her father said and, though he spoke lightly, she heard a tightness in his voice, saw new lines of strain and age from his nose to mouth. Noelle felt a cold pang of fear; she adored her father, had been his spoilt darling for most of her life. She couldn’t imagine him not being there, so safe and steady.

Spoilt darling. The throwaway phrase echoed uncomfortably through her. Had it been the actions of a spoilt darling to run back home as soon as things became difficult with Ammar?

Pushing the thought away, she turned to her father again. ‘And I can’t wait to see her. It’s been months.’

An hour later, sitting outside on the terrace with the afternoon sun turning the surface of the Rhône to burnished gold, she felt herself relax. Or at least try to give the appearance of being relaxed, for as Elizabeth Ducasse handed her daughter a glass of iced tea, her eyes narrowed.

‘Something has happened.’

Noelle tensed. So much for seeming relaxed. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Something is wrong.’ Elizabeth sat across from her daughter with the English elegance and coolly reserved manner that had attracted Robert Ducasse to her thirty-five years earlier. ‘You look terrible, Noelle. Is it a romance? Have you fallen in love again?’

Noelle nearly choked as she sipped her tea. ‘If I have, my appearance certainly doesn’t recommend it,’ she tried to joke, but her voice sounded tight and choked.

Elizabeth pursed her lips. ‘I saw a photograph of you in the society pages—with Ammar Tannous.’

Noelle froze, her fingers clenched around her glass. Her mother arched her eyebrows. ‘It is him, is it not? It is him again.’

It’s always been him. She looked down, saying nothing.

‘How has he hurt you this time?’ Elizabeth asked, her voice sharpening, and Noelle shook her head.

‘He hasn’t.’ Yet sitting here, with the warmth of the sun and the comfort of her family home, she had a feeling she’d hurt him. Terribly. She’d rejected him as surely as he had her all those years ago. How could she have done such a thing—and so unthinkingly—when she knew how much it hurt? Ammar had frozen her out during their brief marriage, and now she was the one who was wrapping herself in silence, refusing to meet his eye. And running away.

She let out a long shuddering sigh. ‘It’s complicated,’ she said.

Her mother’s mouth tightened and she looked away. ‘It always is.’

For a moment Noelle wondered if her mother was talking about something else, something bigger. She leaned forward, her troubled thoughts about Ammar momentarily forgotten. ‘Maman, is everything all right?’

Her mother swung back sharply to look at her. ‘Why do you ask?’

‘I don’t know,’ Noelle said slowly. ‘Only that you and Papa both seem a bit tense …’ She trailed off because with the sun shining and everything golden and lush all around them, her parents both healthy and well, her vague sense of unease seemed both absurd and paranoid. The tension of the last few weeks with Ammar must be really taking their toll.

‘We’re fine,’ Elizabeth said firmly, but she didn’t meet Noelle’s gaze as she said it and Noelle wondered what, if anything, her parents were hiding.

She found out the next day. She’d spent another restless night barely able to sleep, her mind going over every poignant memory of the last few weeks, even as her body cried out for Ammar. She missed sleeping in the solid strength of his embrace, of being woken up by his playful, nudging kisses. She missed the startled suddenness of his smile, as if he were surprising both of them with his own happiness. She missed his wry jokes, so carefully made, as if he really had to think about it, and the way his gaze seemed to burn when he looked at her.

She missed him. More than she’d ever thought possible, even more than she’d missed him when she’d stumbled out of the hotel in Rome that awful night and gone—

Here. She’d run back home, just as she’d done now. Instead of facing him, them, whatever was causing the problem, she’d run away. The realisation made Noelle flinch with regret and shame.

And yet the safety and security of the home she’d always known crumbled to dust when she came downstairs to find her parents facing each other across the dining room table, a newspaper spread out on it.

‘How could you?’ Elizabeth’s voice rang out coldly and Robert glanced at Noelle, his mouth tightening.

‘Let’s not talk like this, Elizabeth. In front of—’

‘It’s in front of the whole world.’ Elizabeth gestured to the newspaper. ‘If you had to have an affair, could you not have chosen someone more discreet?’

Robert’s mouth tightened. ‘And is that all you care about? What’s presented in the papers?’

‘Would you prefer I be heartbroken?’ Elizabeth asked sharply, but her words ended on a choked sob and she turned away, one fist pressed to her mouth.

Sighing tiredly, Robert shot Noelle an apologetic glance before leaving the room.

Numbly, Noelle stepped forward. ‘Maman, what on earth is going on?’

Elizabeth simply gestured to the newspaper. ‘It appears you’ve come at a bad time.’

With a hard-beating heart Noelle picked up the paper and read the three-inch headline in disbelief. Family Man’s Mistress Tells All.

She sank down in one of the dining room chairs as she read the article, each word dousing her in disbelief. The article was an interview with her father’s mistress. A woman he’d been seeing for nearly twenty years.

I can’t live a lie any more, the woman was claimed to have said. I need to tell the truth about Robert and me. He’s loved me for so long.

Eventually she looked up from the newspaper. ‘Did you … did you know?’

Elizabeth didn’t answer for a long moment. She stood in front of the window, her back to Noelle, the sunlight creating a halo of gold around her bowed head. ‘I suspected,’ she said quietly.

‘All this time—’

‘I didn’t know how long. But something, yes. I suspected something.’

‘Oh, Maman.’ Noelle felt her chest tighten, her throat squeezed. She could barely get the words out. ‘How could you … how could you stay, knowing—’

‘Oh, Noelle, you can be such a child sometimes.’

The accusation stung. ‘Am I a child for thinking you should have more from your marriage—’

‘No—’ her mother cut her off ‘—you’re a child if you believe it makes a difference when you love someone.’ She turned to face her daughter, her expression one of both stubbornness and sorrow. ‘I loved him. I’ve always loved him, and so I just didn’t think of anything else. Anything that would come between us.’

Noelle shook her head slowly even as realisation stole through her with cold, creeping fingers. Hadn’t she been just like her mother, sinking her head into the sand, refusing to think of anything that might disturb her untarnished view of the world, of Ammar?

‘I’m sorry,’ Elizabeth said after a moment. ‘This is more of a shock to you than me, I think.’

‘What … what happens now?’

‘I don’t know. Now that this woman has told the papers … they’ll have a field day. Robert always liked to be thought of as a family man.’ Her mouth twisted bitterly.

‘A field day,’ Noelle said slowly. ‘You mean, more press?’

‘I imagine,’ Elizabeth said grimly, ‘they’re gathering outside right now, the vultures. This will be a big story, Noelle. Your father is a prominent man. Tabloids sell scandal.’ She sighed. ‘It might be better if we go away for a while. To the Caribbean, perhaps. We could have some time together. Would you like that?’

Noelle stared at her mother in disbelief. She could not believe what she was suggesting, as if a holiday would make things better. As if she could even think of a holiday when her family was falling apart. Yet perhaps that was the only way Elizabeth had been able to live with her husband’s faithlessness: by closing her eyes. Smiling and pretending it didn’t matter, it didn’t exist. Just like she had done with Ammar’s own difficult history. But she wasn’t going to run away this time. She needed to face both her father and Ammar. ‘No,’ she said quietly. ‘I don’t think so, Maman. I’m going to stay here.’

‘As you wish.’

The same words Ammar had used last night. As you wish. But she didn’t wish for any of this. And wishing didn’t do any good. It was time for action, for truth. ‘I’m going to talk to Papa,’ she said, and rose from her chair.

She found him in his study, going over some papers as if it were a normal day, as if nothing had happened. Noelle leaned against the door, the pain and shock of it all streaking through her again.

‘Aren’t you,’ she asked, ‘going to say anything?’

He looked up, guarded, guilty, like a little boy who had been caught stealing sweets. ‘I’m sorry, Noelle. I never meant to hurt you.’

The words were rote. She could not tell if he meant them. ‘Why?’ she asked, the one word scraping her throat. ‘Why, all this time, for so long?’

Robert looked down. ‘I was lonely,’ he said quietly. ‘I travelled for work, you know that, and your mother was busy with you, with her charities—’ He sighed, shrugged. ‘I never meant to hurt anyone.’ He looked up at her, spreading his hands as if she would now absolve him. Excuses. He had given her nothing but excuses.

Noelle felt everything inside her clench in a hard fist of understanding. Ammar had never spoken like this. He’d been honest, so excruciatingly honest with her about his faults. He had never lied or dissembled. He hadn’t even offered one excuse. He had, in fact, told her the worst of himself, how he’d once enjoyed wielding that kind of power, wanting her to know everything. Hoping she would still love him. And she’d turned away. She’d rejected him, as surely as he had her all those years ago.