‘And you?’
‘Any finer feelings on the matter I have long since dealt with.’
‘Please don’t. Please don’t fob me off. I need to understand, to know what raising our child together means to you,’ she begged.
He exhaled harshly through thin lips, as if desperately fighting his own self-preservation instincts against giving her what she wanted. She could tell that this was a vulnerability that he didn’t reveal to many, if at all. But, from the look in his eyes, she sensed that he understood her need to know.
‘I grew up as the illegitimate son of a single mother. And, yes, there are many, many others who grow up exactly the same way. But it was different for my mother. She lost too much, sacrificed too much for me…’ He trailed off, shaking his head. ‘She blamed herself,’ he continued through gritted teeth. ‘I blamed myself, until I was old enough to understand the selfishness of my father’s actions. Growing up, my mother did everything she could to make sure that I was loved enough. She worked three jobs to keep a roof over our heads, to keep food in the fridge, and it was just us against the world. So when she got ill…’
‘It was just you,’ Ella concluded for him. And in that moment she realised why Roman had been so good at helping her with her grandmother. Why he had known and seemed to understand what she needed even before she’d realised it for herself. ‘And you were thirteen?’ she asked, pulling other details from their time together in France, adding it to what she knew had happened after Roman had gone to see Vladimir, and her heart ached for him. Ached not only for his loss and the cruel actions of his grandfather, but for what it had caused him to become, how it had forged the path his life had taken.
‘I was eleven when my mother first became ill. Tatiana had always been small, which was why she’d been such a wonderful dancer. Small but powerful,’ he added with a sad smile Ella was sure was purely unconscious.
‘What kind of dancer?’ Ella asked the man lost to memories of his childhood.
‘Ballet. Before she met my father and Vladimir disowned her, Tatiana was the principal ballerina at the Utonchennyy Ballet Company.’
Ella’s shock must have shown on her face because Roman looked up and smiled, proud of his mother’s incredible achievement. A pride that was both contagious and shocking. Shocking because, for just a moment, she caught a glimpse of the fiancé who had courted her, who had—at the time—appeared proud of her.
‘But after Vladimir and her lover abandoned her she was alone, Ella. She had no one and no help. She worked herself to the bone and it didn’t seem to matter how much she did, or how much she tried to love me, she never felt it was enough.
‘So hear me now, Ella. My child will know me. They will bear my name and they will want for nothing in this world. They will never have to beg for anything, from either parent.’
That vehemence in his tone she understood. The need to protect she felt beat strongly within her own heart. Her own loss, melding with his, made her determined to find a way for them both through this. But she’d meant what she’d said when she’d proclaimed herself no longer naïve. And that forced the next words to her lips.
‘I have some conditions.’ He caught her gaze and gestured for her to proceed. ‘I need to know who you are. I married out of deceit—I will not continue that way. Neither will I blindly sign my life and my child’s life away to a man who has broken every single piece of trust I had. You cannot lie to me again.’
He nodded.
‘I mean it, Roman. I will not live like that.’
‘I understand.’
‘And I also need to know that you are done with your plans of revenge. Which means that I need to know that you’re not taking down the company.’ She wavered on the edge of a precipice, half hoping and half fearing that he would agree. But she needed him to understand. ‘That company might have been Vladimir’s, but it was just as much my father’s. It is a part of our child’s history.’
‘A history that you would own? How on earth do you plan to explain that to our child?’ he demanded, anger vibrating within his words. ‘That company was more important to Vladimir than his own daughter and even you. How can you want anything to do with it?’
* * *
Everything he’d ever done, every single achievement, every single motivation, goal and broken thing within him, had been about bringing the destruction of Vladimir’s company and now she wanted him to keep it? His heart rent in two, half denying her request and half ready to do whatever she wanted.
‘It is the only thing I have left of my father. A father I barely remember. And, like you, that is not something I want my child to experience. So I would very much like you to agree to my conditions. But know this—if, at the end of the next five months I don’t want to be in a relationship with you, then you will buy my shares from me, give me a divorce and let me go.’
‘Why would I buy your shares?’
‘Because if I don’t want to be married to you, then I don’t want any kind of relationship with you, professional or personal.’
‘And the child?’
‘You will grant me sole custody.’
He nearly laughed. A choking bitter laugh that caught in his throat and burned. Because, no matter what she thought, in this moment he had no intention of letting either her or their child go. And if she thought he’d let his plans for Vladimir’s company go, then
