Page 24 of Pregnant After One Forbidden Night

Of course, she would tell the truth. Jenna valued it as much as he did, though she rarely weaponized it.

She stuffed a bag full of clothes and wrote a longer note than Sebastian had anticipated, but soon they were heading through the window.

As she went through before him, he asked, “Can you manage?”

Lifting an eyebrow, she said cockily, “With my eyes closed.”

Smiling, he followed her through the window carrying her bag, feeling lighter than he had upon entry even with the extra weight. He hadn’t been sure she would go with him.

He didn’t know what he would have done had she refused. Seduction was no longer an option, not when he’d resolved to resist the dangerous attraction that remained between them, and he could not bodily force her.

It was fortunate, then, that he had not needed to devise an alternative. The fact that he felt the relief of that acutely, as if it were a matter of luck that things had gone smoothly, was a testament to how perilously footed he became when dealing with Jenna.

But if it emphasized the danger of getting closer to her, it also showed that he could navigate the thin middle way. He had underestimated her allure in thinking a single taste would render her harmless, but he had learned from his mistakes.

He would not touch her again, would not feed the hunger that he could now recognize as the same kind of obsession that had driven his father. Instead, they would work together to give their child the kind of childhood that produced a soul like Jenna’s. Jenna had earned his trust long ago—enough to appoint her to the most important security detail in the nation. She would be an excellent mother. He would keep them safe and provide them with what they needed.

They moved in silence to where he had parked his Trevita a distance from her house. The sleek and stealthy car was a ghost gray that was a one-of-a-kind deviation from the extremely limited three-car run that the greater public knew about. The King of Sweden had gifted Sebastian the rare car as a thank-you for information services rendered and it was stealth incarnate.

“Nice car,” Jenna said, a little breathless at its passenger side. Her tongue came to her lips, wetting them, as they took in the vehicle, and the eroticism of her perusal hit him like an invisible wall.

At a glance, the car looked like a standard luxury sports model, as common as any slate-gray Lamborghini. Upon closer examination, however, the infinite superiority of its craftsmanship was evident in every gorgeous fiber of its diamond-weave exterior. It wasn’t paint that gave it its distinctive color and texture, but strands of woven carbon fiber. The handling was so responsive that he felt like he could drive it with his mind—a pleasure that was almost as unique as Jenna.

He was grateful for it for more practical reasons tonight, however. He was also appreciative of the moonless night above. The vehicle had been made to move invisibly through a night like this. But tonight, what had pleased him the most about the car was the way Jenna’s eyes lit up when they’d landed on it.

Its top speed was outrageous for Cyrano, but tonight he would get close to it, if only to please the gearhead he suspected lurked beneath Jenna’s exterior.

The journey passed quickly enough that they left the picturesque country lane in a blur.

A drive that should have taken him forty-five minutes took him twenty, and just as he’d planned, between the vehicle’s color and the darkness, and the speed, no one saw him as he took the long dark road to the Redcliff estate. He didn’t want to deal with the fanfare of arriving during regular hours.

The forbidding wrought iron gated entrance to the walled estate opened for him, the massive R in their center splitting to welcome the prodigal son home.

Named not for seaside cliffs, as most assumed, Redcliff was landlocked, located to the northeast of the seaside capital, so-called because of the high, clay-rich cliffs that slashed through the center of its boundaries, carved into the countryside over thousands of years by the Soleil River.

As they climbed the curving road that followed the river at an incredible height toward the main residence, the shocking cliffs were invisible in the darkness. Just as was each and every one of the other small details about Redcliff that generally never failed to bring a smile to his cynical mouth. The vibrant green of the grassy hills and clifftops, all the more luminous for the contrast of the red soil beneath. The trees packed together in dense patches and groves sporadically dotted across the landscape, clinging to the hills for dear life. The faded brown brick and terra-cotta tiled rooftops of the village homes. The structures lined the roadway, tight together, often so close they touched, built atop and into the sturdiest of the cliffs, connected by families, clotheslines, Wi-Fi passwords and busy lives.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d come to Redcliff. Possibly not since his last annual tour.

Too long.

At the top of the cobblestone drive was the ducal complex. Neither a manor nor a palace, the Redcliff compound was a sleek and contemporary structure that had been designed to blend seamlessly into the landscape. Boasting the very best of every modern convenience, with everything tastefully built into the structure itself, the luxurious space ensured that one could remain entirely connected to the world while feeling absolutely free from human society.

He knew this because he was responsible for its design.

Tearing down the old manor—a stately and stiff monstrosity that had been drafty, sat uncomfortably with its modern additions, and was haunted by memories of his mother and father’s failures—had been his first act when he’d taken over the title upon his father’s death.

He had been younger then, still passionate about architecture, before he’d realized that even a perfectly designed house did not make a home.

He had thought it would somehow change his memories of Redcliff if he replaced the house, that it would eradicate the persistent sense of isolation which dogged him every time he climbed the hill from the village and saw the ancestral grounds come into view.

He had been young and wrong, but the complex he had built was beautiful.

Elegant and comfortable, it had been designed for a family, a thing he could admit now that it was on its way to becoming a reality, but stepping inside with Jenna at his side, her bag slung over his shoulder, he realized immediately why it had always remained so cold.

Jenna had never been here.

And because she was with him, it felt profoundly different when he crossed the threshold this time.

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