Page 51 of Bound By Her Baby Revelation (Hot Winter Escapes)

Leo gritted his teeth at her airy dismissal.

She couldn’t have made it more obvious that the last thing she wanted was to see him. Unfortunately, the more he thought about it—and he’d spent most of the past couple of weeks doing nothingbutthinking about it—the more his gut told him that, the longer she remained holed up in Vancouver, the less likely it would be that she would consider moving location to fit in with what he wanted.

She would find her comfort zone, the place where she felt she belonged, she would eventually just refuse point-blank to accommodate him and there would be nothing he could do about it.

‘You’ll be chauffeur-driven to my private jet and met at the airstrip by my PA, Kaya. Trust me, there won’t be any bother.’

‘Your PA...’

‘Would you rather she show you around with the estate agent?’ It was a job keeping the edge out of his voice. He couldn’t bear the thought of her not wanting to see him. He hated to think that she was toughening up, getting used to not having him anywhere in her life.

‘It might be a good idea.’ Her voice was cool and reasonable. ‘If I have to see a bunch of houses, then I wouldn’t want to waste your time by dragging you out every time one comes up on the market. That okay?’

‘Fine,’ Leo said through gritted teeth, thinking that it was absolutely in no wayokay. ‘No problem at all.’

Kaya was sitting in his private jet less than a day and a half later. She barely noticed the luxury, its leather and walnut perfection. She had had details of her trip texted to her and had realised that she couldn’t keep dodging the inevitable for ever.

If she’d wanted to, she could have stayed in Vancouver, made him tailor his busy life to suit her, but that would have been petty and spiteful. The truth was that, as Julie Anne’s house had started emptying, its soul had begun to disappear and, as it had disappeared, the little town where she had grown up had begun to feel small and constrained.

Leo, vibrant, dynamic and larger than life, had shown her the incompleteness of the life she’d been living. The prospect of moving to a different place, to open a new chapter in her life, held a certain appeal.

Boston was supposed to be a beautiful city. She would love it. It would be a fresh start and, if Leo was going to be the spoke in the wheel, then she would have to deal with that spoke and get used to it because it wasn’t going away any time soon.

Thankfully, she had a reprieve, because he wouldn’t be meeting her personally—and why would he, considering she had already been dispatched from his life in terms of marriage material? But she would have to face him sooner rather than later and, when she did, she wasn’t going to go to pieces and start getting sentimental.

She wasn’t going to think about women he might have been seeing or would be seeing, and she wasn’t going to create entire life stories in her head about what might or might not happen in his life over the next few years when it came to finding a partner.

Boston was in the grip of winter cold when she roused herself to notice that the jet was landing. Snow was falling and there was a determined layer of white everywhere, the sort of settled snow that would be around for the long haul.

She would be met at the airport by his car containing his PA, who was called Donna, and she would visit the house he had sourced for her. Everything would go exactly according to plan. Kaya knew that because everything Leo did went just as he wanted it to. She was under no obligation to like the place he had chosen but, unless it was downright objectionable, then what was the point in being fussy?

It wasn’t as though this house represented the start of a wonderful life for her with the guy of her dreams. This would be bricks and mortar and, as long as it did the job, then why worry? In time, she would move to a place she would call her own, once she had found her feet and come to terms with her emotions.

It was freezing.

Head down, she rushed towards the long, black car waiting for her.

He saw a slender, graceful figure layered with so much clothing that it was hard to see her shape, and wearing her woolly hat pulled so low down that Leo, waiting behind privacy glass in his chauffeur-driven four-wheel drive, marvelled that she could see anything at all.

He had come. He’d had to come. He couldn’tnot. She’d been holed up in Vancouver and, with each passing minute, the terror of losing her had got more and more acute. Having confronted the thing he’d never dreamt possible, it now had him in its vice-like grip and refused to let him go.

He’d got the message loud and clear that, released from the bind of having to marry him, she was moving out of his orbit. Her disembodied voice down the end of the line had been remote when they had spoken, and she’d shown next to no interest in the various places he had located for her to rent. There was no longer any need for her to grit her teeth, look on the bright side and channel her energies into making the best of the situation, starting with sex.

He thought about her every second of every minute of every day. He adored this woman and, for the first time in his life, he knew what it felt like to be vulnerable and he didn’t resent it. He accepted it.

Could he spend the rest of his life like this, tormented? No way.

She pulled open the door, head still down, and it was a couple of seconds before she realised that Leo was in the car, sprawled in the back seat, leaning against the door.

And then she gasped.

What was he doing here?

She looked away quickly. She hadn’t had time to rehearse her reaction. She could feel hectic colour flood into her cheeks and she made a business of fussing with her backpack, buckling herself in and slamming the door behind her.

He looked coolly, impossibly sexy in casual black jeans and a tan cashmere jumper, with what looked like a black, long-sleeved, skin-tight tee-shirt underneath.

‘I wasn’t expecting you.’ Kaya schooled her face into a polite smile but her heart was racing, her pulses were pounding and her mouth was dry.

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