Page 29 of Her Diamond Deal with the CEO

‘You can go. I can manage on my own, thank you.’

She’d said that on the first day when she had unlocked the bathroom door and found him waiting for her in the bedroom. Wearing plain grey sweatpants, some kind of stretchy top and with her dark hair twisted into a kind of low, messy bun, she could have been heading off to some yoga class. Only the dark smudges beneath her ridiculously fluttery eyelashes gave any indication of the exhausting days and disrupted nights.

‘You don’t need to do this,’ she told him after another moment as if she’d needed a breath or two to regroup before she could speak again. ‘You don’t have to stay. Just go and catch lobsters or whatever it is you normally do when you come here—’

‘When I normally come here I’m not on my honeymoon.’

Titling back her face, her eyes met his. ‘Well, I’m sorry if you’re disappointed, Jack, but if you’re hanging around hoping that—’

That stung. Did she really think so poorly of him? His jaw tightened. ‘Seriously, don’t flatter yourself. Once was enough.’

‘Then you won’t mind leaving,’ she said coldly. ‘We were only hiding out together so we could pretend we were having sex but we’re obviously not doing that now.’

Her face had tensed then, just as it had out on the veranda, and she’d bolted back into the bathroom.

But she’d said exactly the same thing each time she returned to the bedroom, her mouth flattening when she saw him, and he knew he should be relieved. But for some reason her stubbornness had infuriated him, and so yesterday afternoon when she’d repeated the exact same words, he’d shaken his head and said, ‘That’s not going to happen.’

‘Why not?’ she countered immediately.

Her face had no colour at all. Even the blue of her eyes looked washed out, like faded denim, and he could hear the exhaustion in her voice. He knew that she was struggling. But she had already thrown one spectacular wrench into the works, from now on they were going to do things his way.

‘Because it would look odd. What would Sally think if I just left you being sick on your own?’ With Ondine being so ill, he’d had no choice but to tell the housekeeper and the rest of the staff. But he’d also made it clear the pregnancy was too early to be announced. That at least was something he could control.

She’d shrugged. ‘I’m sure you’ll think of some suitable explanation, Jack. You can be very convincing, remember?’ Beneath the fatigue there was a jaggedness that set his teeth on edge.

‘And I’m your husband, remember?’

‘No, you’re the man I married for money.’

That was inarguable but he still felt as though he’d been kicked by a horse. ‘That still makes me your husband.’

There was a hard pause, and then she gave a small shake of her head. ‘Only on paper. It isn’t real.’

‘But your morning sickness is.’ His eyes locked with hers. ‘That’s why I’m staying.’ During the hours of daylight anyway.

A faint tremor ran through her body. She lifted her head and stared at him mutely, her face set into taut, wary lines, and for a few half-seconds he was tempted to reach out and smooth them away with his fingers. Fortunately, before he could act on that impulse, she turned and, heart beating out of time, he watched her walk away, and he kept watching right up until she closed the bathroom door behind her.

CHAPTER SIX

ATFIRSTHEthought someone was laughing. That she was laughing.

It was a quarter to midnight. He was sitting on his bed, his eyes fixed on the connecting door to Ondine’s room.

It was the room his grandfather had set aside for his parents to use when they visited Red Knots. But despite having a nanny in tow, neither his mother or father had considered it relaxing to vacation with their young son, so it had been his grandfather who took him to the island, his grandfather who comforted him when he had a nightmare or a stomach ache that stopped him from sleeping.

Now he wasn’t sleeping for a different reason.

There was a faint strip of light under the door but that wasn’t what had caught his attention. It was the noise, faint, intermittent, jerky, fading to silence, then swelling again—

Crying, not laughing.

Shoulders tensing, he glanced away to the window. Outside everything was black on black and so quiet. Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. Just his conscience, he thought with a flicker of irritation as he found himself staring at the door again.

But why? Ondine wasn’t his responsibility. Their marriage wasn’t real. She’d said so herself.

‘But your morning sickness is.’He gritted his teeth. That was whathe’dsaid so that he could override her wishes.

Had she known that? He didn’t know. But it appeared that he wasn’t quite enough of an arrogant, entitled trustafarian brat to just sit here and let her struggle with her nausea alone.

---