“So generous,” he muttered.
“My mother got to live in her home and my father couldn’t sell it out from under her. It was an absolute triumph as far as I’m concerned.”
“It’s indentured servitude, Scarlett, and it’s illegal. What else did you have to do?”
“Nothing like you’re implying.” She rose, willing to suffer his disparagement over poor choices, but she wouldn’t stand for being vilified over crimes she hadn’t committed. “I had to work all hours crunching numbers and find rare Scotch at midnight in dry countries and face the scathing sarcasm of his recalcitrant sons.”
He crossed his arms, tracking his one eye from the top of her head to her feet and back, much the way he had the first time she’d turned up in front of him on Niko’s behalf.
“He must have been giddy when you said you were pregnant with my child.”
“Not exactly. He insisted on tests, obviously. Then he was pleased, but…” She moved to the opening to the terrace, hugging herself, still miserable over the way Niko’s hard-won regard for her had shifted. “He was disappointed in me.”
“Disappointed? You made the ultimate sacrifice.” Still so scathing he made her flinch.
“He didn’t agree with me for making that final effort to bring you and Val to see him. He had his heir in Aurelia and didn’t care if that shut out you and your mother. I knew I would be on the hook to have to defend that after he was gone, though. We would all be sitting through litigation for a decade. I couldn’t betray his plans to you, but I had to give you both an opportunity to discover what he intended. I had to give you that. Because what he was doing was wrong.”
She didn’t mention the part where she had been sure Javiero would never speak to her again after all of that shook out. That she had been driven to see him one more time while they had a small chance at civility.
“I didn’t mean to sleep with you. I didn’t plan to get pregnant. But he saw my behavior as similar to Evelina’s when she allowed herself to get pregnant with Val, and he lost some respect for me.”
“That’s how it looks to everyone. Including me.”
Her entire being flattened under that indictment, all shreds of hope lost. She conjured a distant smile to hide her despair. “You’d best not reward my underhanded behavior by marrying me, then.”
He made a humorless noise. “You’d prefer a settlement without any promises or investment on your part? I’ve read that book. It’s called Val and Evelina Ruin Everything.”
“And I’ve read the one where Mum made promises to a man who didn’t love her. It’s stacked in the horror shelves. Why would I marry a man who may not hate me but sure as hell doesn’t care one little bit about me?”
He looked right past her then, eye narrow and flinty, mouth a flat line.
“I have a new baby, Javiero. I can hardly think straight from one moment to the next. What you see as overwork on my part is me trying to keep a grip on the one thing I can control. I’m trying to ensure my own security. I can’t stop working and become reliant on you. My mother showed me what a mistake it is to put absolute trust in someone else. At least when I was beholden to Niko, he empowered me at the same time. He gave me an education and experience and a really good salary. I have authority and a job I already know how to do.”
“You have a son.”
“So do you! And you have a family relying on you, same as me.” She flung her hand toward the open doors to the terrace and his small kingdom beyond. “Tell me, as someone who had to make hard choices in order to support his family, do you really expect me to give up my ability to help mine? To put that duty in your hands? You refused Niko’s offer when he finally said he wanted to give you a piece of his fortune again. What’s different about me refusing your offer to do the same thing?”
His shoulders bunched, and then he threw up his hands in frustration. “Fine. Work,” he snarled. “But you’ll set proper hours and you will sleep here.” He pointed at the bed again.
“Why? Because you don’t trust me?”
“No. I don’t. And you don’t trust me, obviously. Which annoys the hell out of me because the one thing I pride myself on is how well I take care of my family. So you and I will share a room and a bed along with a son, and we’ll work on trusting each other.”
Scarlett experienced a sudden, crushing insecurity that he would discover all the other little flaws that would make him truly hate her. She couldn’t stand his doubts and cynicism as it was, but she didn’t know how to break down the barriers between them.
Her fingertips found the grinding knot of tension between her brows and tried to smooth it away. It wasn’t like her to have all this insecurity and angst. She used to feel confident in herself, but lately she felt like an awful fraud. She was blaming it on lack of sleep and all the changes around her. She doubted she would magically recover her confidence by sharing a bed with Javiero, but part of her wanted to believe that being around him in a more intimate setting would help them communicate better.
And maybe she was trying to orchestrate something that looked a lot like them going back to that torrid afternoon when they had conceived Locke. She wanted to see how far their relationship might have taken them if she’d allowed it to play out. Would they have fallen in love and married?
Oh, no, Scarlett. She closed her eyes. Don’t start dreaming about castles in the sky.
The sound of a crying baby approached. It hadn’t even been thirty minutes
