Page 11 of A Nine-Month Deal With Her Husband

‘I don’t have the money to buy out your stake right now, not without finding investors and taking out loans with crippling interest rates, and it’s not top of my list of priorities. And you’ve been able to look after everything for many years now, Millie, and I’ve never doubted your ability to do so. You could manage your own money—’

‘But then I’d have to learn about the stock market, amortisation, capital gains and the difference between a hedge fund and a mutual fund.’ She shuddered. ‘I don’t understand any of it.’

‘You don’t want to understand because it bores you.’

‘It really does. You’re so much better at investments and things. And you said you didn’t mind,’ she muttered.

‘I don’t mind,’ he pointed out. ‘It takes me minimal time and it’s something I’m still happy to do.’

Her trust was incredibly healthy, partly because he made the same sound decisions for her as he did for himself, but mostly because she seldom pulled money from its overflowing coffers. She’d only taken money to buy her Notting Hill apartment and her car, purchases he’d approved of. She didn’t need his approval, but he admired her willingness to support herself and establish a career without using her inheritance as a cushion.

Being a workaholic himself, he appreciated hard work.

Ben climbed to his feet and went to stand beside her. He pushed his shoulder into the glass and looked down at her bent head. ‘If you want a divorce, Millie, that’s fine. It’s not as though our arrangement was supposed to last for ever. And I would be happy to stay on as your financial adviser if that’s what you wanted me to do.’

Her gorgeous green eyes, the colour of green grapes, met his. ‘You would?’

‘Sure.’

He wanted to touch her, to stroke his thumb over her lower lip, across her cheekbone, down the cords of her lovely, long neck. He jammed his hands into his suit pants to stop himself from doing something so idiotic.

‘I just want to knowwhy, Millie,’ he said. He wasn’t good with unanswered questions.

She managed a smile, just a small one. ‘My mum always said that you were tenacious and that you never gave up. I guess that’s how you expanded the business so quickly and came to be one of Europe’s best business people.’

‘So what’s the real reason you want a divorce, Millie?’

She sighed before looking him in the eye. ‘I want a baby. And I didn’t think it’s fair to have one while still being married to you.’

CHAPTER THREE

MILLIEHELDHERbreath while Benedikt processed her words. While he did have an inscrutable face, his eyes were a different story. A lighter blue meant he was amused, darker meant he was either angry or turned on and lightning-tinged purple indicated he was shocked. And, yes, a lightning storm was happening in his eyes right now.

‘You want a baby?’ he asked, his voice holding the slightest hint of a croak.

‘I’m not getting any younger, Benedikt,’ she told him. But more than that, she was very tired of being on her own, of having no one to love. And loving a baby was the safest option she could think of.

‘You are a few months off your thirtieth birthday, you’re not about to qualify for an old person’s pension,’ he snapped. ‘I’m thirty-eight! What’s your age got to do with any of this?’

‘Apparently, eighteen is the best time, physiologically, for a woman to have a child. And, from her mid-thirties, a woman is thought to be a geriatric mother.’

‘That’s ridiculous,’ he snapped.

‘That’s science,’ she retorted. She lifted her hand, her palm facing him. ‘We’re getting off track... I’ve always wanted a baby and I think it’s the right time to have one. My business is established, I work from home and I make my own hours. I can afford to hire help and, most importantly, I think I’m mentally ready to invite a little human into my life.’

Sometimes her dreams about holding her baby felt so real, she could smell his sweet smell, hear his cry and feel his warm little body snuggled into her arm. Millie felt the familiar tug in her womb and nodded. Yes, she wanted her little boy...

Benedikt rubbed the back of his neck before pulling down the knot of his tie. He opened the top button to his shirt and pulled the tie over his head, still knotted, and jammed it into the inside pocket of his suit jacket, which he then yanked off and tossed over the back of the couch.

Millie watched as he rolled up the sleeves of his shirt, marvelling at strong forearms covered in blond hair. When he was done, he rolled his shoulders and tipped his head up to look at the ceiling.

‘So you want a child.’

‘I do,’ Millie told him. ‘But I don’t think I should be married when I have one.’

Benedikt sat on the back of the low couch and stretched out his long legs. ‘You told me that you don’t have a partner, so how are you going to “have” one, Millie?’

She sent an anxious glance towards his window and grimaced. ‘Shouldn’t we be going? There’s a storm coming,’ she reminded him.

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