"So, if you're not in Paris, it's because something's wrong with the apartment. You should know by now that I don't get involved with nitty-gritty details of my houses. That's your job."

Meeta stiffened. Her job. That said it all. Just what every young girl dreamed of. . . a marriage completely lacking in romance which could be described as a job.

"There's nothing wrong with the Paris apartment. I just decided that. . ." she took a deep breath and gulped down some wine " . . . I decided that we need to have a talk. . ."

"Really? What about? Don't tell me that you're angling for a pay rise, Meeta? Your bank account is more than healthy. Or have you seen something you'd really like? House in Italy? Apartment in Florence? Buy it." He shrugged and finished the remainder of his whisky. "As long as it's somewhere that can be used for business purposes, then I don't have a problem."

"Why would I want to buy a house, Nikhil?"

"What, then? Jewellery? A painting? What?"

His air of bored indifference set her teeth on edge. This was worse than normal. Usually, they could manage to  be polite for five minutes they were forced to spend in one another's company----- cooped up in a taxi, maybe, or else waiting for his driver to take them to some opening or other; or else back one of their grand houses, removing coats and jackets before disappearing to opposite ends of the house.

"I don't want to buy anything." Restively she began walking, stopping to look absently at some of the expensive artefacts in the room. As with all their houses, this one was the last word in what money could buy. The paintings were breath-taking, the furniture was all hand-made, the rugs were priceless silk.

No expense was ever spared and it was her job to ensure that all these high-end properties with their priceless furnishings ran like clockwork. Some were used by him, if he happened to be in the country at the time; occasionally they both found themselves in one at the same time. Often he arranged clients to have use of them and then she had to oversee all the arrangements to make sure that his client left satisfied, having experienced the last word in luxury.

"In that case," Nikhil drawled, "why don't you get to the point and say what you have to say? I'm having a night in because I need to get through some work."

"And of course, if you'd known that I would be waiting here like a spare part, "Meeta retorted, "you would have made sure you didn't bother returning."

Nikhil shrugged, allowing her to draw her own conclusion.

"I feel. . ." Meeta breathed in deeply ". . .that circumstances between us have changed since.... since dad died six months ago. . ."

He stilled and dropped his empty glass on the side table next to him, although his chocolate brown eyes remained on her face. As far as he was concerned, the world was a more pleasant place without Mahesh Solanki in it. Certainly a more honest one. Whether his wife would agree with him, he didn't know. She had been composed at the funeral, her eyes hidden behind over-sized sunglasses and, since then, life had carried on as normal.

"Explain."

"I don't want to be shackled to you any more, and there's no longer any need." She did her best to get her thoughts in order but the cool intensity of his gaze was off-putting.

"You also happened to be shackled to a lifestyle that most women would find enviable."

"Then you should let me go and you should find one of those women," she retorted, her cheeks burning. "You'd be happier. I'm sure because you must know that I'm. . . not happy, Nikhil. Or maybe, " she added in a lowered voice, "you do know and you just don't care." She sat and crossed her legs but she couldn't meet his eyes. He still did thing to her, could still make her feel squirmy inside, even though she had done her best over time to kill that weak feeling. It was inappropriate to be attracted to a man who had used you, who had married you because you happened to be a social asset. That didn't make sense. Yes, when he had pretended to be interested in her, she could understand how she had been hot for him, so hot that she had spent her nights dreaming about him and her days fantasising about him. But not when she had found out the truth, and certainly not now, after all this time of cold war.

"Are you telling me that you want out?"

"Can you blame me?" She answered a question with a question and finally met those cool, deep brown eyes. "We don't have a marriage, Nikhil. Not a real one. I don't even understand why you married me in the first place, why you took an interest in me at all." Except, of course, she did. Mahesh Solanki had been happy enough to tell her. Nikhil had wanted more than just the company; he had wanted social elevation, although why he should care she had no idea.

It was something she had never asked her husband. It was humiliating to think that someone had married you because you could open a few doors for them. She had been a bonus to the main deal because she had looked right and had had the right accent.

"You could have bought my father out without marrying me, " she continued, braving the iciness of his eyes. "I know my father tried to shove me down your throat because he thought that, if you married me, he wouldn't end up in prison like a common criminal. But you could have had your pick of women who would have flung themselves in your path to be your wife."

"How would you have felt if your dear daddy had ended up in jail?"

"No one wants to see any relative of theirs in prison."

It was an odd choice of words but Nikhil let it go. He was shocked at the way this evening was turning out but he was hiding it well.

Had she really thought that she could play games with him, reel him in, get the ring on her, only to turn her back on his bed on their wedding night? And then, as soon as her father died, turn her back on him a second time?

"No, a relative in prison tends to blight family gatherings, doesn't it?" He rose to pour himself another drink because, frankly, he needed one. "Tell me something, Meeta, what did you think of your father's. . . . how shall I put it?. . . . creative use of the company's pension pot?"

"He never told me in detail. . . . . .what he had done, "she mumbled unconfortably. Indeed, she had known nothing of her father's financial straits until that overheard conversation, after which he had been more than willing to fill her in.

Meeta thought that Nikhil might have been better off asking her what she had thought of her father. Mahesh Solanki had been a man who had had no trouble belitting her, a man who hsd had wanted a son but had been stuck with a daughter, a chauvinist who had never accepted women could be equal in all walks of life. Her poor, pretty, fragile mother had had a miserable existence before she had died at the tender age of thirty eight. Mahesh Solanki had been a swaggering bully who had done his own thing and expected his wife to stay put to and stuck it up. He had womanised openly, had drunk far too much and, behind closed doors, had had fun jeering at Sunita Solanki, who had put up with it with quiet stoicism because divorce was noth something her family did. Cancer had taken her before she'd been able to put that right.

Meeta had spend her life avoiding her father----- which had been easy enough, because she had been farmed out to a boarding school at the age of thirteen-----  but she had never stopped hating him for what he put her mother through.

Which wasn't to say that she would have wanted to see him in prison and, more than that, she knew her mother would have been mortified. There was no way she would have sullied her mother's reputation, not if she could have helped it. She would rather have died than to have seen her mother's friends sniggering behind their backs that Sunita Solanki had ended up with a crook.