Free Presumed Dead by Vince May Page A

her! Maybe
I’m in denial, she thought, but I just can’t believe he would do such a thing!
She went back over the years of their life together for the fiftieth time in
the past two days, trying to find a reason.
     She remembered how she’d been supremely happy
during the first few months of their marriage, except in one important respect.
As soon as she’d discovered she was pregnant, Ross had refused to share her bed
on the basis that any marital activity, as he put it, might harm the unborn
child. She’d found it very difficult to be angry with him because his motives
had been so pure and noble, and she’d thought he was making such a supreme
sacrifice. She’d been bitterly disappointed though, after such an active and
exhilarating start to their married life. Every time she raised the subject,
he’d promised that once the child was born, things would return to normal.
    After Charles was born though, and the
doctor had given her the all-clear, she’d gone to Ross, only to be disappointed
again. Finally, she’d confronted him, and had been shocked when he’d broken
down and wept. He’d told her it was the worry of not having any money that was
preoccupying him, and that if only he didn’t have so many financial worries,
he’d be a different man, the man she wanted him to be.
    Although they’d never discussed it, she’d
always assumed that he had a steady income from some source or other. He’d
always seemed to have plenty of money. When he cried in front of her,
confessing he was virtually bankrupt and up to his ears in debt, her heart had
gone out to him. The following day, she’d cabled her lawyer in the States and
made him a gift of half of her stocks and bonds, which had immediately given
him a personal income of over a million pounds a year.
    He’d been grateful and happy with that
initially, and even made the occasional effort to visit her room, but it wasn’t
the same as Monte. He started spending more and more time away. Before long his
debts had mounted again and he’d come to her for more. She’d lost count of the
number of times since then that she’d bailed him out of trouble with various
gambling houses.
    In the end, she’d been forced to accept
that he just wasn’t interested in her physically. At first that made her
question her own sexuality. Then it made her angry. Then she’d just been sad.
But she’d stuck at her marriage and been faithful and giving, trying to make
the best of it. In fact, she’d thought things had started looking up recently.
    Just before the school holidays, Charles
had asked if he could have two of his friends to stay, because their parents
were abroad. The three young teenagers had arrived down from Eton like a
whirlwind, and just as she’d been wondering how on earth she was going to cope
on her own, Ross had cancelled all his gambling trips and stepped in.
    He’d spent nearly the whole summer with
them at the farm, swimming with the boys, carrying them around on his
shoulders, wrestling with them and generally fooling about. They’d adored him,
and he’d often taken them off for joyrides in his car or for flights in one of
his planes from the private airstrip behind the house. And at night, he’d been
more attentive towards her too, on quite a few occasions.
    It had been a wonderful summer and she
could see no reason why now, just as things were starting to come right, that
he should dump her out of his plane like a sack of trash.
    Alice stayed in the bath until the water
was nearly cold, soothing her aching bones and soaking her cuts and bruises.
Eventually, she let the water out then stood up and turned the shower on to
wash her hair. She went back into her bedroom wearing the bathrobe and a towel
wrapped around her head like a turban to find that Philippe had been as good as
his word. On the bed were four separate piles of clothing. There were knickers
and bras, T-shirts and blouses, jeans and trousers and some summer dresses.
    On the dressing