Page 5 of His Forgotten Wife
“That’s too goddamned long, Dahlia.” His distress came through in his thickening Greek accent. “I need you more.”
She laughed past the tears clogging up her throat. “And there’s the demanding billionaire baby I know.”
“Is this some kind of petty revenge for something I did?” His gray eyes bored into hers. “Did I upset you before I left for Greece?”
And just like that, he came straight to the messy point. “That’s not how…” She swallowed. “I would never…”
The words wouldn’t come because she was doing exactly what he was suggesting: punishing him—because it was a punishment for Ares to deal with people who didn’t know him and whom he wasn’t comfortable with. That included his family.
She was punishing him for what he didn’t feel for her. Which was so wrong of her.
His mouth took on a tight set. “You’re a liar, Dahlia.”
Dolly flushed. “I can try to be there in two weeks. No earlier. And you’re footing the bill for the live-in nurse.”
“Of course.” The tension seeped out of him instantly, as if someone had suctioned it out using a tube. Which only madethe dark circles under his eyes and the gauntness of his face more pronounced. Guilt stabbed her in tiny pinpricks because she could see that he really did need her. “I’ll have Christina send you the paperwork for reinstatement.”
“That’s not necessary, because I’m not coming to you in a professional capacity.”
“I don’t need your fucking pity,” he bit out.
“There has to be something between pity and being paid for every moment I spend with you, Ares.”
“I have been out of it for seven weeks, Dahlia. Christina said the board has been giving her a hard time. Most of the R & D has stalled. I need a bloody assistant to put things to rights.”
“Okay, fine,” she said, giving in. And then, because she was a pushover when it came to him, she said, “I’m glad you’re well. I worried about you.”
“Come here and make life easier for me, then.”
She laughed at his sheer arrogance and how he didn’t see it that way at all. “You can’t dictate how I show my…care for you. That’s not how this works.”
“What use is it, then?” he demanded, a petulant note creeping in.
Tucking her hair behind her ear, Dolly resisted getting into it with him. “I’ll be there only temporarily though. A month at the most. My grandfather needs me here.”
“It’s kind of beneath you,ne? Using him as an excuse to get out of dealing with me and whatever problems exist between us?”
How was the man so perceptive one second and so dense the next?Because he doesn’t understand emotions, came her own answer. “Fine, you want the truth? I think it’s time I moved on from…you, from being your assistant. So I won’t be coming back to work for you.”
“You make it sound like I tortured you?” The sliver of doubt in his voice—as if it truly were a possibility—pierced her like a needle stabbing into her skin. All she wanted was to reach out and hold him, for both their sakes.
Good thing there was a screen and thousands of miles between them.
“Of course you didn’t,” she said, threading a smile through her words. “And I wouldn’t have stood for it if you had.”
“So what was the problem, then?”
Dolly chose her words carefully. After all, she had prepared them for weeks while praying to the universe that he would come out of the coma, healthy and whole. “Working for you meant I had no life outside of the job. I’m twenty-six and have hardly even been in one serious relationship. I had no friends, no fun, no…existence outside of circling you like a planet stuck in orbit. Let’s just say my biological clock is ticking and I heard it loud in the last few months.”
“Why am I under the impression that you aren’t someone who would let society’s arbitrary constructs railroad you into following a decided schema for your life?”
Damn it but the man knew her so well.
“You’re under the wrong impression. It seems I do want grand romantic love and companionship and really fantastic sex and friendship and…babies.” If she sounded belligerent, it was to cover up the tremors in her voice. But she couldn’t hide the heat cresting her cheeks.
While their relationship had always straddled the line between friendship and more, it was the first time Dolly had verbalized her personal desires in such bare words.
Weeks ago, she’d been foolish enough to assume she could have them with him. As long as they were on the path to seeing each other as more than friends and colleagues, she didn’t care how long it took to get there.
