Page 208 of Modern Romance Collection December 2024 Books 1-4

‘You shouldn’t have come here,’ she said sharply. Her hazel eyes flashed with misplaced anger as she stared up at his beautiful face, noting the way the shutters dropped.

‘I wouldn’t have,’ Mateo returned tightly, ‘if I’d known that the reception was going to be as hostile as it is. Why’s that?’

Alice was steaming full ahead. Maybe it was just the fact of seeing him here, on the last day of life as she’d known it. She didn’t know. She just knew that everything seemed to have piled up on top of her and this was where it burst its banks.

She glared at him, and in return he raised cool eyebrows and stared right back at her with unflinching aloofness.

‘You don’t get it!’ she snapped miserably, half-stepping out of the room and then drawing the door behind them so that the world wasn’t witnessing this stupid spat that had sprung from thin air.

‘Tell me what I don’t get.’

‘I feel...’ Alice left the sentence hanging in mid-air because she wasn’t quite sure what she did feel. Things were not ideal but she thought she’d reasoned her way past the business of being in a loveless marriage. She knew that it was the right thing to do. So why all of a sudden was she miserable and tearful?

Was it because he had showed up here unannounced? Was he a reminder of the world she’d be entering in stark contrast to the one she would be leaving behind? Was there a part of her that was just pretending to accept the situation because she was afraid of the alternative? It felt unfair that love could be so painful.

She looked at him in mute, misplaced anger and then glanced down.

‘Talk to me, Alice.’

He put one hand on her chin and tilted her face to his. When their eyes met, his were gentle and curious, which actually didn’t make her feel much better.

‘I don’t want to talk,’ she said with a defensive toss of her head.

‘What do you want to do?’

‘I’d quite like to make love to you.’

She watched the way his eyes darkened and the flush of simmering heat that stole into his face.

She didn’t wantpoliteand if this was the only way to getpassionthen, right now, it was a ploy she wasn’t averse to using.

‘I don’t think an empty hall outside a staff room where there are forty people celebrating your imminent departure is going to do the trick, do you, Alice?’

‘We could leave.’

‘No, we could not.’

‘Don’t you want me? Don’t you want to make love to me?’

‘Where the hell is all this coming from?’

Alice shrugged, dealt him a challenging, provocative stare from under her lashes and felt a kick of power. However polite he might be in his role of perfect husband to be, nothing could hide the flare of passion he still seemed able to provoke. How much longer that would last, she had no idea, and she knew that this uncertainty was just something else that unsettled her.

She sighed and looked at him ruefully.

‘I’m just kidding,’ she said. ‘Come on through. It’s fun in there. Everybody’s really put themselves out and you know they all like you.’

‘It was a mistake coming here,’ Mateo returned roughly. ‘But it’s obvious something’s on your mind and I want to know what that something is. I’ll wait up for you.’

‘You’ll wait up for me?’

‘I’ll be at your place and, Alice...don’t overdo it tonight.’

‘Because I’m pregnant?’ she couldn’t help but ask sweetly, immediately spotting his area of concern which, of course was for the precious cargo she carried. ‘Staying up late isn’t going to damage the baby, Mateo. I’m pregnant. I’m not ill!’

He didn’t say anything. He gave her one final look before turning on his heel and walking away and she followed him with her eyes until the door had shut behind him.

Mateo was sprawled on the sofa in Alice’s apartment and was consulting his watch for the eighth time in less than an hour when he heard the sound of her key being inserted in the door.

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