by Red Garnier
He wanted it all.
He wanted a million dances and double that amount of her smiles.
He wanted her in his bed, to see her when he woke up, to find her snuggled against him.
He wanted to pay her credit card bills and he wanted her with a baby in her arms. His baby. His woman. His wife.
Mia. Mia. Mia.
He’d been alone his entire lifetime, pursuing meaningless affairs, convincing himself that was enough. It had all changed. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, but surely, ever since the day he’d hired Virginia Hollis.
Now he had broken her heart before she’d truly admitted to having lost it to him. He should’ve treasured it. Tucked it into his own and never let it go.
Sighing, he pushed his chair around and stared across his office. A dozen plasma TV screens hung on the wall to the right. They usually enlivened the place with noise and light, but were currently off. They lent a gloom to the area that Marcos found quite the match to his mood.
In fact, a morgue was quite the match to his mood.
He stalked outside, and made his way to a sleek wooden desk. Her items were still on it. He scanned the surface—polished to a gleam, all orderly, all her, and he groaned and let his weight drop into her chair.
Her rejection felt excruciatingly painful. Not even the day Marissa Galvez had stared up at him from his father’s bed had he felt such helplessness.
What in the devil did she want from him?
As he stroked a hand along the wood, he knew. Deep in the closed, festering pit of his emotions, he knew what she wanted. Damn her, she’d been playing him for it! Seducing him, delighting and enchanting him, making him love and need and cherish her.
And now he couldn’t even remember why he had thought she didn’t deserve everything she wanted. Because she was a woman, like Marissa? Why had he thought his bed would be enough for everything she would lack? Had he grown so heartless that he would rob her of a family?
He began opening and closing the desk drawers, looking for some sign of her. Something—anything—she might have left behind.
For the first time in his life, someone else’s needs seemed more important than his, and he loathed the overwhelming sense of loss sweeping through him like an avalanche.
If he had an ounce of decency in him, if he was not the unfeeling monster she thought him to be at this moment, Marcos would let her go.
And just when he was certain it was the right thing to do, just when he was determined to forget about her and all the days they’d pretended and all the ways they’d been both wrong and right for each other, he spotted the boxes crowded into the back of her bottom drawer.
And the three test strips. All of them had the same result.
“Nurse, is my father out in the hall?”
Virginia had been transferred to a small private room in the west hospital wing, where she’d slept for the night hooked up to an IV drip, and this morning the one person she longed to see hadn’t yet made an appearance. She wanted to go home already—she felt tired, cranky, lonely—and still the nurse kept delaying her departure.
The balmy-voiced nurse fidgeted around the bare room, organizing the trays. “I believe he’s outside. I’m sure he’ll come in shortly.”
Virginia sighed, the sensation of having been run over by an elephant especially painful in her abdomen and breast area. She cupped her stomach. Amazing, that the baby already had its heartbeat. Amazing that just as she left its father, the baby had tried to leave her body, too.
“Virginia?”
She went completely immobile when she heard that.
There, wearing a severe black turtleneck and slacks, stood Marcos Allende in the doorway. Her heart dropped to her toes. She felt the urge to snatch the sleek red carnation her father had set on the side table and hide her pale, teary face behind it, but she was too mesmerized to pull her eyes away. Large, hard, beautiful—Marcos’s presence seemed to empower the entire room, and she suspected—no, knew—everyone in this hospital must be feeling his presence.
He stood with his feet braced apart, his arms at his sides, his fingers curled into his palms. And something hummed. Inside her. In her blood, coursing through her veins.
“An acquaintance, miss?”
The nurse’s tone gave a hint of her preoccupation. Did she feel the charge in the air? Was the world twirling faster? The floor falling?
Virginia nodded, still shocked and overwhelmed by this visit, but as she stared at the sleek-faced, long-nosed young woman, she hated her mind’s eye for gifting her with another, more riveting image of Marcos’s dark, cacao gaze. His silken mass of sable hair. Long, tanned fingers. Accent. Oh, God, the accent, that thick baritone, softly saying Miss Hollis…
“I’ll leave you two for a moment, then.”
Oddly close to being devastated, Virginia watched the nurse’s careful departure, and then she could find no excuse to stare at the plain white walls, no spot to stare at but Marcos.
If she had just been torpedoed, the impact would have been less than what she felt when he leveled his hot coal eyes on her. He stood as still as a statue.
Why didn’t he move? Was he just going to stand there? Why didn’t he hold her? Why was he here? He was angry she quit? Angry she hadn’t collected her items? Did he miss her just a little bit?
She sucked in a breath when he spoke.
“I’m afraid this won’t do.”
The deep, quiet, accented voice washed over her like a waterfall. Cleansing. Clear. Beautiful.
Oh, God. Would she ever not love this man?
She pushed up on her hands, glad her vitals were no longer on display or else Marcos would know exactly how hard her heart was beating. “Marcos, what are you doing here—”
He looked directly at her as he advanced, overpowering the room. “I had to see you.”
She sucked in breath after breath, watching him move with that catlike grace, his expression somber. Her body quaked from head to toe. The unfairness of it all; he was so gorgeous, so elegant, so tempting. So unreachable. And she! She was so…so beat-up, tired, drained. Hospitalized. Oh, God.
Her lips trembled. As if she weighed next to nothing, he bent and gently scooped her up against him, and Virginia liquefied.
I almost lost our baby, she thought as she wound her arms around him and buried her face in his neck.
He inhaled deeply, as though scenting her. Then, into her ear, his voice ringing so low and true it tolled inside of her, “Are you all right?”
Only Marcos could render such impact with such softly spoken words. Her entire being, down to her bones, trembled at his concern. And then came more. It was just a breath, whispered in her ear, and he whispered it with fervor.
“I love you.”
Her muscles clenched in protest, and her head swiveled to her father’s when she spotted him at the open doorway. The weathered man’s face was inscrutable and his suit was perfectly in place; only the ravaged look in his eyes spoke of what he’d done.
He’d told Marcos about the baby?
“You lied to me, you left me, and yet I love you,” Marcos continued, his voice so thick and gruff, as though he were choking.
After the fear, the cramps and the possibility of losing her baby, Virginia had no energy. She just wanted him to speak. The sturdiness of his hard chest against hers gave her the most dizzying sensation on this earth. She’d thought she’d never feel his arms again and to feel them around her, holding her so tight, was bliss.
She didn’t realize she was almost nuzzling his neck, breathing in his musky, familiar scent, until her lungs felt ready to explode.
“Do you think we could pretend,” he whispered into the top of her bent head, “the past two days never happened, and we can start again?”
More pretending? God, no! No more pretending.
But she refused to wake up from this little fantasy, this one last moment, refused to lift her face, so instead she rubbed her nose against the side of his corded neck. A st
range sensation flitted through her, like the soaring she felt when she played on the swings as a child.
His voice was terse but tender as he wiped her brow with one hand and smoothed her hair back. “And our baby?”
Shock didn’t come close to what she experienced. Her nerves twisted like wires. “P-pardon?”
“You lost our child?”
For the first time since Marcos had come through that door, Virginia noticed the red rimming his eyes, the strain in his expression. Even his voice seemed to throb in a way she’d never heard before.
She moved not an inch, breathed no breath, as her mind raced to make sense of his question. Then she glanced out the small window, not at what lay beyond, just at a spot where Marcos’s face would not distract her. “What makes you say that?” she asked quietly, her fingers tugging on themselves as she scanned the room for the possible culprit behind this misunderstanding. Her father.
“Look at me.” Marcos’s massive shoulders blocked her view as he leaned over the bed rails. His breath stirred the top of her head as he scraped his jaw against her hair with absolutely no restraint, and then he spoke so passionately her middle tingled. “Look at me. We’ll have another baby. I’ve always wanted one—and I want one with you.” He seized her shoulders in a stronghold, his face pained and tortured as he drew away and forced her to meet his gaze. “Marry me. Today. Tomorrow. Marry me.”
“I— What do you mean another baby?” After many moments, she pinned Hank Hollis with her stare. “Father?”
Wide-eyed, her father hovered by the opposite wall, shifting his feet like an uncertain little boy. He opened his mouth, then snapped it shut, then opened it again, as if he were holding on to great words. “I told him you’d lost the baby.”
She gasped. What a horrible thing to say! “W-why? Father! Why would you do that?”
The man rubbed the back of his neck, pacing the little room. “So he’d leave. You said you didn’t want any visitors.”
While the honest words registered in her foggy mind—the first protective thing her father had done for her in ages—Virginia stared at the aging man. Her heart unwound like an old, twisted shred of paper.
For years, she had been so angry at this man. Maybe if she hadn’t changed, become pregnant, fallen in love, she’d still be. But now—she didn’t want resentment or anger. She wanted a family, and she’d take even one that had been broken.
Virginia leveled her eyes on the beautiful, thick-lashed cocoa ones she’d been seeing in her dreams and straightened up on the bed, clinging to that fine, strong hand. “Marcos, I’m not sure what he told you, but I’d like to assure you I’m all right. And so is the baby.”
When she pictured telling Marcos about a child, she hadn’t expected an audience, nor having to do it in a hospital room.
Still. She would never, in her life, forget this moment.
Marcos’s expression changed, metamorphosed, into one of disbelief, then joy. Joy so utter and pure it lit his eyes up like shooting stars.
“So we’re expecting, then?”
The term we coming from his beautiful mouth made her giddy with excitement.
He smiled, and it was brilliant, that smile, that moment.
Did this please him? Yes! She’d bet her life on it.
She nodded, her heart fluttering madly, a winged thing about to fly out of orbit. “I’d like to go home now,” she admitted, and although her father stepped forward to offer assistance, the words weren’t meant for him.
She gazed up at Marcos—quiet and mesmerizing—as she eased out of the hospital bed with as much dignity as she could muster.
His attention was no longer hard to bear. She wanted it; she wanted him.
Virginia Hollis knew this man. Inside and out, she knew him. How true he was to his word. How dedicated. How loyal. And how proud. She didn’t need any more proof than his presence here, his touch, the look in his eyes and the promise there.
Rising to her full height, she linked her fingers through his and squeezed, feeling flutters in her stomach when he smiled encouragingly down at her. “Yes, Marcos Allende. I’ll marry you.”
Epilogue
The day arrived three months before the baby did.
Walking up to the altar, with the music shuddering through the church walls, Virginia had eyes only for the dark, mesmerizing man at the far end of the aisle. Tall and smiling, Marcos stood with his hands clasped before him, his broad shoulders and solid arms and steely, stubborn jaw offering love and comfort and protection.
Virginia was certain that nobody who watched him would be blind to the way he stared at her. Least of all she.
They shared a smile. Then her father was letting go of her arm.
Soon Marcos was lifting the flimsy veil to gaze upon her face and into her eyes, eyes which she used to fervently tell him, I love you!
Their palms met, their fingers linked, and the moment they did he gave her a squeeze. She felt it down to her tummy.
I, Virginia, take thee, Marcos, to be my lawfully wedded husband…
When he spoke his vows, the simplest vows, to love and cherish, her eyes began to sting. By the time the priest declared them man and wife, she was ready—more than ready—to be swept into his arms and kissed.
And kiss her he did. The priest cleared his throat. The attendants cheered and clapped. And still he kissed her.
Virginia let herself take her first relaxed breath once they were in the back of the limo. Gravitating toward each other, they embraced, and tiny tremors of desire spread along her torso and limbs. She’d had this fool idea of waiting to be together again until they married—and she was dying for him to touch her.
As they kissed, Virginia found her husband already dispensing with her veil. “There we go,” he said contentedly. “Enjoy the dress because I assure you, it is coming off soon.”
Actually relieved to be without the veil and anxiously looking forward to Marcos dispensing with the dress, she leaned back on the seat and cuddled against him. “I never knew these things were so heavy,” she said. The skirt ballooned at her feet but thankfully there was no volume on top to keep her away from the man she most definitely intended to jump at the first opportunity.
“Come here, wife.” He drew her close as the limo pulled into the street and the city landscape slowly rolled past them. Staring absently outside, Virginia sighed. His arms felt so good around her, being against him so right. Being his wife.
Both protectively and possessively, Marcos pressed her face to his chest and with his free hand, reached out to rub her swelling stomach. She’d noticed the more it grew, the more he did that. “How is my little girl today?” he asked against her hair.
Her eyebrows drew into a scowl. “We’re having a boy,” Virginia countered. “A handsome, dashing boy like his daddy. No girl would kick like this little guy does, trust me.”
“Your daughter would, you saucy wench,” he said with a rolling chuckle. “And my instincts tell me we are having a plucky, curly-haired, rosy-cheeked daughter. She’ll run my empire with me.”
Virginia smiled against his chest and slid a hand up his shirt to find the familiar cross lying at his throat and play with it. “Father keeps asking how many grandchildren we plan to have, he’s obsessed with wanting it to be at least three.”
Marcos laughed, and that laugh alone warmed her up another notch.
“Ahh, darling,” he said. “He can rest assured we’ll be working on that night and day.” The praise in his words and the suggestive pat on her rear filled her with anticipation of tonight and future nights with her complex, breathtakingly beautiful, thoroughly giving and enchanting husband.
“He’s so changed now, Marcos,” she admitted, feeling so relaxed, so happy.
“His work in Allende has been impressive, Virginia. Even Jack is amazed.”
“And you?”
He snorted. “I got to say to the moron ‘I told you so.’”
She laughed. Then she snuggled closer and said, “
Thank you. For believing that people can change. And for forgiving that little fib he told you at the hospital.”
He nuzzled the top of her head. “He was trying to protect you—he didn’t know me yet, and I respect that. Your father deserved a second chance, Virginia. We all do.”
She sighed. “I’m just glad he’s put all his efforts into making the best of it. And I’m proud of you, dear sir, for being wise enough to put the past behind you and keep Allende.”
And for being most decidedly, most convincingly, most deliciously in love with her.
The band played throughout the evening, and the guests at the reception laughed and danced and drank. Hardly anyone would notice the groom had kidnapped the bride, and if they did, Marcos sure as hell didn’t care.
He still could not understand why Virginia had gotten it into her head to play hard-to-get leading up to the wedding, and even less could he comprehend why he had obediently complied.
But now in the cloaked shadows of the closet, he had Virginia right where he’d always wanted her. In his arms. His mouth feasted on her exposed throat while his hands busily searched her dress for access—any access—to the smooth, creamy skin beneath.
“Careful!” Virginia screeched when he yanked on the delicate zipper at the back and an invisible button popped free.
He laughed darkly and maneuvered through the opening. “You’re not wearing it again, reina. I could tear it apart and dispense with all this silliness.” The guests had been crowding them for hours when all Marcos wanted was to be with his bride. Now his hands stole in through the opening at the small of her back, where he instantly seized her cushy rear and drew her up against him. “Come here. You’ve been teasing me all night.”
“How kind of you to notice.”
“Hmm. I noticed.” He kissed the top of her breasts, all evening looking lush and squeezable thanks to Christian Dior, and then used his hands to gather the volume of her skirts and yank most of them back.