"Bradley, Marion Zimmer - Claire Moffatt 02 - The Inheritor" - читать интересную книгу автора (Bradley Marion Zimmer)

She blinked, not following what he was saying. "I don't want to get married, not yet. We both agreed we'd wait till Emily was finished at the Conservatory, and you were moved up to a senior partnership. By that time, my practice—"
"Oh, your practice! Come on, Les. On the level. Isn't this why you're pushing this house hunting bit—to push me into grabbing while the grabbing is good, before you get your life all laid out on your own? You're ready to built a nest, and if we can't do it together, you'll do it on your own?"
He sounded so reasonable that for a moment she actually wondered; could her motives possibly be that devious? Then outrage took over.
"You can't possibly believe that, Joel!"
"Well, I've been thinking it over. Maybe you're right. Maybe we ought to get married, start building together, not separately. We love each other, why not settle down, start building a rational life together?"
Man is not a rational, but a rationalizing animal. She said quietly, not wanting to escalate this into an argument, "No, Joel. I think we should stick to our original plans; you want to establish your career without the demands of a wife just yet, and I want to establish mine and see my sister educated."
"But you're still set on having a house all your own?"
"Is there a reason I shouldn't, Joel?"
"Yes," he blurted, "I don't want you to set yourself up in a life so full you won't need me!"
"Darling, I don't think you need to worry about that," she said, reached across the table for his hand and held it. ' 'But just as you want to establish your career, so I want to get settled in mine—"
"Now you sound like one of those damned women's libbers. Your own property. Your own career. All this about what you want. Not what we want, or what I want. Me, me, me, that's all you're thinking about!"
She gasped at the monstrous unfairness of this. "It's what you said you wanted, not to get married yet—"
"I've changed my mind."
"And I haven't," she retorted. "If that is what you think, Joel, we are simply not communicating, and I think we'd better not talk about it. Let's just agree to disagree on that subject. I am not what you so contemptuously call a women's libber, but if there is one expression I hate, that's it, and I am absolutely appalled that you would say that about me." She pushed back her chair.
"Maybe you'd better take me home."
"No, damn it!" He did not raise, but lowered his voice. "I'm getting tired of this, Leslie. Whenever things don't go your way, you refuse to talk about it. We can't run away again."
"I'm not trying to run away," she said, knowing there was some truth in what he said, she did avoid this kind of confrontation, "but you seem to enjoy a good fight. I don't."
"I'm a lawyer," he said, "and you don't get to be a good one by backing down every time you have a little difference of opinion."
"And I don't like to be put on the witness stand every time we have what you call a little difference of opinion.'' She imitated his tone, angry now. "It isn't. It's basic. I can't reason you out of it—I tried. What you mean is that you want me to sit here while you bully me into changing my mind, since you're not going to change yours. And because I don't want to sit here and be bullied—"
"Love, I'm not trying to bully you. But let's look at this thing rationally. What will you do with a house of your own after we get married?"
"Rent it. Sell it. Let Emily live in it till she finishes at the Conservatory. Live in it ourselves till we find one we like better. Real estate is always a good investment—you told me that yourself! Why does it bother you that I should have a good investment?" She tried to make a joke of it. "Helen Gurley Brown says that a small portfolio of good investments is very sexy."
He didn't laugh. He pushed the wineglass away, staring at his plate. His hands were long and handsome, the fingers muscular and efficient. Sensuous, too, she thought, then hardened herself against the memory which could weaken her to the very core of her being.
"So all right," he said at last, "Maybe at bottom I'm more old fashioned that I ever thought. I'm liberal when it comes to human rights and personal freedom, but I guess when you scratch a country boy, and Nick and I are both country boys, you find a conservative. Nick's a cop; and he's a chump; he thinks law and order is something you do in the streets, where people can get carved up with knives. I want to do it the easy way; in the courts, establishing a rule of law. What was it they said, a society of laws and not of men. And that goes along with a traditional value system, a traditional profession, and a traditional marriage and home. With a traditional wife in it, I guess. And I hoped you would want to be part of that whole structure. To be—" he hesitated, searching for words, "to be half of a marriage; not a loose partnership of two independent people jogging along side by side until they find somebody they like better. I don't mind if you try out a career first—what's that phrase all you independent women are so crazy about? I don't mind if you try to find yourself." But the searing contempt in the words made Leslie wince, as he went on "I never figured you were lost anyhow. I'm ready to give you commitment for a lifetime, and that's what I want from you in return, and I was hoping you were grown up enough to make that commitment."
It was the longest speech she had ever heard him make, and she admired him for his willingness to take a stand on something important to him. But it was not her view of life, nor her view of marriage, and they should have explored it together before he had ever gone so far.
"I'm glad you have been honest enough to tell me what you want," she said slowly, thinking that she sounded like a therapist, not a lover. "But I have to be honest with you. That isn't what I want out of life. I want to be an independent person, to have a life of my own apart from marriage. Just as your career will be outside of our marriage partnership, I want mine to stand on its own. I intend to keep my own name, not become Mrs. Joel Beckenham. Do you seriously think that I can make a life managing the money you make?"
"I had hoped it would be enough for you; I will need a wife who will be an ornament to the firm, a conservative wife in a conservative marriage—"
"And I can't see marriage as based on politics, and the politics yours, Joel," she said, "Would you expect me even to vote a conservative line?"
"I'd hoped you would have the sense to realize it's the only rational way to go," he said, "I see marriage as pulling together, not in different directions."
' 'Pulling your way,'' she pointed out. ' 'And my work—''
"You can't expect me to be happy, having you spend your life with losers and crazies," he retorted, "I'd hoped it would show you what a sick, grubby world it is out there, and realize life would be better for you as my wife. I think it's time to reassess the whole thing; get married—oh, this summer, maybe in August?—and find a house together.
Maybe build one. You could keep working for a year or two, maybe," he offered, "until Emily is on her own—"
"That's very generous of you," she said waspishly, "only I am going to need time to take all this in. I am beginning to think we have both made a big mistake. I could never be happy in that kind of marriage." She pushed her chair back. "If you won't take me home now, Joel, I am going to call a taxi."
He pushed a credit card at the waiter, hurried after her. "Leslie, I'm not going to let you go like this. Please come back and sit down. Can't we discuss this rationally?"
She let him coax her back to the table, though her throat ached and she wanted to cry, "You keep beating me over the head with that word rational, Joel. Did you ever stop to think there is more to life than logic?"
"I thought you had had enough of the irrational in Sacramento. I thought that was one of the reasons you got out of there," he said, and pushed the wineglass across the table. "Drink it, Les. You're upset; I won't let you walk out on me like this because of a little difference of opinion.''
"But it's more than that," she said, reluctantly sipping the wine and pushing the glass away, wishing it could steady her nerves. "We're miles apart, Joel. We should have talked like this before. Maybe it's my fault that we haven't. But now we should accept that what you want and what I want are different—"
"But what I want is you," he said, leaning over the table to grip her hand, his eyes warm in the candlelight. "We've been together long enough to know that's the important thing—that we want each other."
Treacherously she felt the warmth spreading inside her. The memory of all the good times, the sex, the togetherness, the fan. Something in her still wanted him. Even the logic, the severe rationality, had been welcome after the exploding hysteria of Sacramento, her face in the National Enquirer, the craziness. But she said "That's only one part of life, Joel. The other things—"
"There's one thing I know," he said, "and that's this; if the sex is right, everything else can be worked out."
She said in a rage of frustration, "Joel, you haven't been listening to a word I've said! Can't you see, even if I wanted to get married now, and I don't, it would never work. Now that I know your view of marriage—"
"It's the idea every sensible man has, and every women too, really. Just try it—you'll like it. Let's get married now, and I'm betting—I'm betting my whole life, Leslie— that when you see what a marriage to me would be like, you'll never want out!"
"You're betting your life," she said, "but I'm not gambling mine. And now I really am leaving, Joel, so unless you want that scene, you'd better let me go."
The waiter brought the check; he scribbled his name, not looking.
"No, Les. We have to talk this out. We can't run away from it—"
She said coldly, "Now you're repeating yourself."
"And I'll keep on doing it. I'm a stubborn man, and I know what I want, and sooner or later, you'll give in to it." He leaned to refill her glass with the last of the wine.
"I don't want it, Joel." She pushed at his hand, holding the neck of the bottle, but he laughed and tipped it into her glass.
"Did it ever occur to you that perhaps I know what you want better than you do yourself?" His fingers moved suggestively on hers, a private memory. "We only get into trouble when we talk, Les. Come home with me and let's work it out the only way a man and a woman can ever really work things out—in bed." His hand squeezed hers, his breath was warm on her face, tender and beloved even through the exasperation she felt. There was a warm sense of melting through her body.
If I go home with him he can talk me into anything. A clear flash of their lovemaking came into her mind, a rush through her body, his face over hers… how could she give this up? Whatever he asked, wasn't it worth it?
And this is how half my clients get into the impossible situations I hear about every day, thinking with their emotions and glands instead of their brains. She started to pull away; his hand was hard on her wrist. He wasn't going to let go. His other hand was still clutching the wineglass, and Leslie watched, in shock, as the wineglass flew up, free of his fingers, dashing the entire contents full into his eyes. He coughed and spluttered, releasing her, snatching up a napkin to wipe his eyes free of the stinging fluid.