the one who told the reporters—”
“You knew I wouldn’t let them foul-mouth you,” he snapped.
“I had no idea they would say anything about me at all. I’m pretty small potatoes compared to the great Mr. Landrill. If you feel that angry at the idea of marriage, you shouldn’t have said what you did.”
“I didn’t hear you denying it. Either to them or to me while we were on the train. I waited for you to repeat what you’d said last night about not bargaining or demanding a ring, but not a word. Then I thought you didn’t want to discuss our private business in front of the Britishers, so I waited for us to be alone here in the car. But no, clever Mrs. Rose has got what she’s been angling for ever since she found out who I was. Or had you looked me up before you left Los Angeles?”
This was a nightmare. Lauren could hardly recognize the man beside her as the one who had made love so passionately on the ship. There was only one thing to do.
“Of course, I’m not going to marry you. I don’t—”
He cut her short. Apparently he was so angry that he hadn’t even heard her rejection.
“My father and mother destroyed each other—he, by his callous neglect of her, she by her greed and cold nature. Lilith took me to the cleaners emotionally even worse than she did financially. She had a dozen lovers, male and female. She’d pick up with my best friends. For two years after I got rid of her, I couldn’t look at a woman without wanting to vomit. And now Buffy is doing the same number on my brother. Women! You’re disgusting.”
Lauren could have protested that she was not his mother or Lilith or Buffy, but what was the use? Her failure to reject the announcement he’d made to the reporters had damned her in Mike’s eyes. He was so afraid of being trapped and then destroyed that he wasn’t ready to hear anything she could say. So she kept very quiet and stared straight ahead. Even when Mike snarled. “Well?” at her, she resisted the urge to explain, to comfort. He would only think it was another move in a campaign to get power over him.
“I was right, then,” he snapped as the limousine drew up in front of the Ritz. “It’s a good thing I found out so quickly.”
He got out and stalked into the hotel without waiting for Lauren. There were three reporters hanging around the entrance, and they followed at his heels, yelping questions.
The chauffeur had opened the trunk and was taking out the bags. Lauren went to him, took her case, smiled her thanks—she couldn’t manage to speak—and looked around for a taxi. She saw one and gestured the driver over.
The chauffeur appeared at her shoulder, a worried expression on his face.
Lauren found her voice. “It’s all right. I’ve thanked Mr. Landrill for the lift. Thank you, also.”
She climbed up into the big boxlike cab. The chauffeur handed in her bag and shut the door. He still looked worried. He touched his cap to her as the cab drew away from the curb.
“Where to, miss?” asked the cabby.
“The Bristol Hotel, please,” Lauren said. She was glad of the gloomy interior of the musty old cab. She could cry without anyone seeing her. But somehow, she didn’t.
It was a very short trip to the Bristol. When she got there, she found that Dani and Nella hadn’t checked in yet. Also no one had canceled her reservation, thank God. She signed the register and followed the bellboy up to her room. It was small, tastefully decorated, and empty. It also had a lock and key, which she used as soon as the boy had left her suitcases. Slowly she took off her clothing, dug into her suitcase for a nightgown, and got into bed.
I wish, she thought drearily, I was dead.
And then she cried. For a long time.
It was the telephone ringing that awakened her. She made no effort to answer it. However, a few minutes later, there was a pounding on the door. Lauren said nothing. And then Dani’s voice, shrill enough to be heard through the door, called to her, “Lauren! Are you in there?”
Wearily, feeling more like a hundred than thirty-five, Lauren padded over and unlocked the door. Dani took one look at her face and grabbed her. “It’s all right, Lauren, we’re here now. Nella and I will look after