"I haven't changed any parameters as you put it. I am well aware this is just another business arrangement for you. That's fine. Contrary to what my family seem to think I wouldn't be so stupid as to fall in love with you."
He'd flinched as though she'd had physically hit him, and the hurt she'd seen in his eyes for a brief second had made her almost want to tell him the truth, but she couldn't expose herself like that, she just couldn't. So she'd rambled on, her hurt feelings and jealous suspicions spurring her on like some demented fish wife.
"At the very least you could do me the common courtesy to not flaunt your bit on the side in front of me.
"You what?" He'd shouted that question at her and looked about ready to murder her. A small part of her had rejoiced at his outrage, for surely that meant he cared. It meant he hadn't done any of the things that devil sitting on her shoulder, whispering in her ear, said he had done. But the other part of her had been terrified as he'd advanced on her with white knuckled fists, and she'd flinched when he'd raised his hand. Why on earth she had done that she'd had no idea, other than it had been too reminiscent of the many arguments she'd witnessed Mary having with her so called boyfriend. Arguments that had ended up with her getting in front of her sister, taking the blows intended for her—blows that had to be covered by make up to not raise her parents’ suspicions—blows that had meant she'd kept quiet when she should have told of Mary and inevitably would have spared her sister so much. Of course that would also have meant they wouldn't have had Beth and she never would have met Lakota. Swings and fucking roundabouts. Alice gave a short laugh in the light of day, but it hadn't been funny last night.
Lakota had shut down utterly and completely at her reaction, and her heart had bled bitter tears at the tight set of his shoulders, and the awfully controlled way he'd been speaking to her.
"You really think that little of me, Alice? What, just because I'm half Sioux and grew up in a slum, I'm now a wife beating shit of crap as well as an adulterer, am I?"
"I didn't mean…"
"Spare me, Alice. Your face says it all. For the record, I didn't touch Selina. I wouldn't go near the likes of her with a fucking barge pole if you paid me for it. She is a means to an end. Just like you, as it turns out, my dear wife. Thank you for reminding me of that fact. I'll sleep on the couch tonight, so you can stop looking at me as though I'm going to jump you."
He'd slammed the bedroom door shut, and Alice had burst into tears. She'd cried herself to sleep, in fact, wondering when it had all gone so terribly wrong.
From the amount of swearing that was going on out on that terrace, things were about to go from bad to worse. Lakota was now on the phone to Percy it seemed, muttering about injunctions and breach of contract and lord only knew what else. The crying induced headache she'd woken up with turned into a full force brass band with clanging cymbals in her head, and Alice sought the oblivion of a hot shower. That would surely give her some temporary peace.
****
"We can sort this, but, Sir, be careful." Percy's nasal twang down the phone was the voice of calm reason in his ear, and some of the red mist floating in front of Lakota's eyes cleared. "I can force the papers to print a retraction, but that may cause more waves than if we simply went with it. I've already been in touch with your father. In fact he phoned me to offer his help. He's as outraged as you are at all of his private affairs being tossed all out into the open like that, but he did say in a way he's glad they have been. Lord Langton said and I quote, 'It's about time I acknowledged my son, and propriety be damned.'"
Lakota almost dropped the phone.
"He said what?"
"Yes, I was surprised, too. He also said something else, and I agree with him completely here. Whoever took this story to the papers wanted to create a rift between you and Alice, and stop this merger from happening. Now, I have my own ideas as to whom that person may be, but I do not believe for one minute that your wife is involved in any of this, regardless of what the papers are insinuating their source is. It doesn't make any sense for her to do so, for one, and if I may so, would seem completely out of character for her."
Lakota closed his eyes and forced himself to keep on breathing. Fuck it, this hurt.
"Until last night I would have agreed with you there, Percy. Now, I am not so sure."
"Did something happen I need to be aware of, Sir?" Percy sounded worried for the first time, and Lakota grimaced.
"No, I have just been reminded that women are not be trusted, that's all. Now that Beth is on the road to recovery and her trial participation is secured, it seems my wife doesn't need me anymore and is showing her true colors. Just tell me that this is grounds for an immediate divorce and the bitch cannot get her greedy mitts into any of my assets."
The strangled cough behind him alerted him to the fact that the object of their discussion had entered the terrace. But he'd known that anyhow. His cock had responded to her approaching scent with alarming speed. It seemed his body wasn't listening to his brain one iota and still wanted her with an urgency that took his breath away. Percy's answer did little to reassure him.
"Yes, Sir, it is, and of course she cannot, but, Sir, are you sure you want this?"
"Just get it done, Percy, whatever it takes."
He hung up and turned round slowly. Alice was back in her usual jeans, her still wet hair tumbling round her shoulders, not a scrap of make up on her face, and she looked so young, and vulnerable, and above all shocked, that he was almost fooled again—almost.
He hardened his heart against the pain in her eyes, and threw one of the newspapers in her direction.
It fell open in front of her feet, the headline screaming her guilt.
Inside the scam marriage of the decade -Read the truth behind this unlikely Cinderella story -Lord Langton's bastard son to take over- Scandal rocks the Aristocracy – Kinky goings on in one of England's oldest families
She glanced at them, and what little color she'd had in her cheeks fled.
"I don't understand. What happened?"
"You tell me, dear wife." He shoved his fists into the pockets of his jeans to stop himself from reaching out to her when she swayed. He would not be pulled into her histrionics; he would not.
"You think I did this?" Her eyes grew wide, and she put her hand over her mouth as if to stop herself from screaming, when he just continued to stare at her. "Oh my God, you do, don't you? You actually think I could do that to you—to us?"
He shrugged his shoulders, even though the first tiny seeds of doubt started to creep into his consciousness. Why did she not get angry and protest her innocence? Or confessed her guilt and begged for his forgiveness? Why did she just stand there and look at him as though he'd just strangled ten kittens with his bare hands?
Something was off here, and it made him furious and threw him off kilter.
"Didn't you?"
She closed her eyes and drew her shoulders back, and when she opened them again her usually so passionate emerald gaze had turned to icy flint. She twisted her wedding and engagement rings off her finger and stepped up to the table. Instead of flinging them at him, she placed them on the table right inside the steaming breakfast dishes that neither one of them would eat today.
"If you really think me capable of that, then I have nothing more to say to you. Let Percy do what he will. I'll expect he'll have us divorced in record time. I'll have whatever is left of the money I've earned transferred back to you. I don't want it."
There was a slight hitch in her voice when she finally looked up at him.
"I don't want anything of yours, and I don't ever want to see you again, Lance."
With all the dignity ingrained in his little Alice, she turned around and walked out of his life. Only she wasn't his little Alice anymore, never had been, had she? So why then did it feel as though part of him walked out with her?
****
Walking away from Lakota that morning had been one of the hardest things Alice had ever done.
How she'd made it out of there she would never know. She had bumped into a worried looking Forrester loitering with intent outside their suite, and he'd taken one look at her and had ushered her out of The Dorchester via the staff exits.
"There is a horde of reporters waiting outside that I am sure you do not wish to deal with," he'd said.
She'd shaken her head, and Forrester had had her seated in a nondescript black cab in no time at all. "Take good care of yourself, Mrs. Kemnay, and I hope to see you back home here soon, where you belong."
Alice had cried then and angrily swiped the hateful tears away.
"I never belonged here, Forrester. No offence to you, or the hotel, it's been amazing, but this is not my home. It never has been. Hotels are stop offs, not a place to live. That's the whole point."
He'd smiled at her, shut the door, and her rotund and jovial cab driver had whisked her home to her mum's place. Here, too, she'd had to run the gauntlet of the reporters, and had collapsed into her mother's worried arms the minute she had slammed the front door shut on the reporters clambering for her story.
Six weeks later she was staring at her Decree Nisi. It had arrived by courier this morning, and even though she'd known it was coming, had insisted on in fact, despite Percy's pleas to think about her options and to slow the process down, it was still a shock. To know she would once again just be Miss Wanderlund in just six short weeks was a sobering thought indeed. It would be as though the last few months had never existed.
A screech from the garden made her look up, and she smiled through her tears. Sara had come by for a visit and moral support, and she was pushing Beth high on the swing. There was color in her cheeks, and to all intents and purposes Beth looked like any other six year old little girl. The treatment was still on-going, and Beth had responded to it beautifully. Mr. Jamison had only reassured them all last week that Beth was all set to be one of the major success stories of the trial. A huge weight had been lifted off Alice's shoulders, and she had pledged the last of Lakota's money to Great Ormond Street Hospital later that day.
She'd meant what she'd said to Lakota, she didn’t want his money, but she wasn't going to cut her nose off to spite her face, so she had hung onto the money needed for Beth's trial only to find out that it had all been taken care of. In fact there was enough money in trust for Beth to go through several more rounds of treatment.
When she'd queried this with Percy, he'd assured her that the money was hers as per the prenuptial agreement. It sure explained why every time she had tried to transfer the funds in her personal account back to Lakota, the transaction had failed, and the money had been returned to her. It had driven her round the proverbial twist.
"I don't want his fucking money, Percy. Even though I have earned it I guess. I'd rather give away than keep a penny of his."
Percy had sighed, and in her mind's eye she could see him adjusting his glasses and rolling his eyes. "That is of course your prerogative, Alice."
It was beyond ironic that the first huge donation she had made, had garnered her an invitation to the charity ball. She hadn't gone, of course, because she would have run into Lakota. As one of the major benefactors of the charity he attended with his ever present arm candy, Selina.
Alice's mum had tried to hide the pictures from her, but it had been useless. Lakota and Selina were the paper's current obsession. It meant the reporters had stopped lying in wait for Alice at every turn, at least. The discarded wife was old news, not when Lord Langton had officially acknowledged Lakota as his son and heir, and the former bad boy was now admitted into the finest drawing rooms in London. And Lady Selina Horsley was the perfect foil to his ….
"Are you all right, Alice?" Her mum's hand closed over hers, and she gently tucked the offending piece of paper out of Alice's clenched fist. She hadn't even been aware that she had crunched it into a ball in her distress.
"So he's really going through with it?"
"Of course he is, Mum. No doubt the minute the ink is dry on the decree absolute, Selina will be dragging him down the aisle. He will be the perfect gentleman then, won't he? Son of a Lord of the realm and married to a Lady. Halleflippingjula." Her voice broke, and she couldn't continue. It hurt too fucking much. He'd ripped her heart clean out with his actions, so how could something that wasn't there anymore hurt so damn much?
Alice leaned into the comforting hand placed on her shoulder.
"It's not too late, you know, if you decide to fight for him."
"Why on earth would I want to do that? He's made his choice, and it isn't me. Let him lie in his bed with his cold hearted bitch and see if I care."
However, the problem was that she did care—far too damn much. When all was said and done she missed him. His warmth, his scent, and the way he always used to pull her back to him when she rolled away in the middle of the night. She missed his laughter, his teasing, and his hands on her body, the deliciously wicked things they had experienced together. They said time was a great healer, but Alice couldn’t see herself ever caring for another man in the way she did for Lakota. She had fallen utterly and irrevocably in love with her own Sioux warrior, and if she never laid eyes on him again, he would be forever imprinted into the very fabric of her soul.
"I've said it before and I'll say it again. You protest far too much, and you never did give him a chance to explain. One could say at the first sign of trouble you ran like a frightened little girl back to mummy's apron strings."
Her mum softened the words with a kiss on her forehead and a warm smile, but the inherent criticism still stung.
"You know what he accused me of. How could I stay after that, Mum? Would you?" Alice couldn’t keep the hurt out her voice.
"I would have demanded an explanation, Alice. Love is a thing of give and take, never more so than in a marriage."
"Hah." Alice snorted in disgust. "If we'd had a marriage then maybe you would have a valid point there, but he only married me to take control of his father's company, and I was not going to put up with having his mistress flaunted under my nose. I have some pride left."
"As well you should, but sometimes stubborn pride gets in the way of allowing our true feelings to shine through. Tell me Alice, do you truly believe, hand on heart that he cheated on you with Selina?"
Alice opened her mouth to say yes, but she couldn’t. He had been too outraged and too hurt at the accusation, so she shook her head.
"Maybe he wasn't then, but he is certainly fucking her now."
"Alice, language!"
"Sorry, Mum, but really, they are always together. He might have needed her for business then, but what possible reason could he have to keep her around now, truly?" She picked up the latest Hello magazine and shoved the offending article under her mum's nose. "Look at her. She is draped all over him. It's disgusting."
Elizabeth just smiled.
"Yes, she is, but tell me this, Alice. Have you seen him smile in just one of those pictures? Does he give any indication that he actually wants to be at these parties, or does he look bored out of his skull in every one of them, and drunk in most of the others? Look at him, truly look at him. What do you see?"
Alice screwed her eyes shut and shook her head.
"I can't. I don't want to. I miss him too much as it is. I don’t want to be reminded of all I've lost."
Elizabeth drew her in for a hug, and Alice savored the moment.
"Oh, Alice, sweetheart. I tell you what I see. I see a man in pain. A man on the edge and barely holding it together. A stubborn and proud man, for sure, but also a man desperately in love with his absent wife. Why else would he phone me twice a week still to find out how we are? It’s not for my benefit or even Beth's, is it? No, it's because he hopes that this time, maybe, you'll speak to him."
Her mum drew away and tucked her hair behind her ears in a gesture as familiar as time.
"Perhaps next time he rings you should talk to him. Because if there is any chance that you got this all wrong, then you owe it to bot
h of you to try to work this out."
Alice didn’t want to hear this, yet her heart wasn't listening to the rational side of her brain, not at all. No, her emotional head-over-heels-in-love-with-that-man-part skipped around like an over eager puppy.
"Why are you telling me all this now, Mum?" Alice asked.
"Because you weren't ready to hear it before now, darling."
Chapter Fourteen
Lakota frowned at the sight of his driver appearing without Selina.
"Let me guess she's not ready?"
"No, Sir, in fact she … err … well I'm not sure how to put this delicately, Sir, she is en dishabille, and to quote her ladyship, 'If he wants me, he has to come and get me.' Sorry, Sir, I did try."
Lakota grumbled his annoyance and exited the limo. So, Selina had chosen to be difficult again. A lot was riding on this meeting with the overseas investors, and the bitch damn well knew that. Too bad that Mr. Hassan had taken a liking to Selina's now bleached blonde locks, and expected her to attend. Lakota was pretty sure the oil baron also hoped to get Selina into his bed, and he fervently wished the man would make his move already, so he would have the perfect excuse to dump her sorry ass.
She was not taking the fucking hint that he was not interested in her and never would be, regardless of what provocative outfit she chose to drape her surgically enhanced curves into.
Sure enough by the time he made it up to her apartment he found the lights dimmed and jazz music playing in the back ground. He groaned under his breath and clicked on his phone.
Percy answered on the first ring.
"Please make my apologies to Hassan and re-arrange for next week. Has the entertainment turned up yet?"
"Yes, Sir, he seems much taken with the ladies. I'm pretty sure he won't mind your absence at all. May I ask what the problem is that detains you?"
Lakota sighed and loosened his tie.
"I'm sure you can guess. The great Selina is proving difficult."
"I see, Sir. With the greatest respect, perhaps now would be a good time to disassociate from Lady Horsley? She has served her purpose, after all, and your affair has taken the heat off the situation with Alice."
The Billionaire's Unwanted Virgin Page 14