by Robyn Grady
Jordan led him into a large, feminine bedroom. The colors were peach and sage green. The windows overlooked the rhododendron garden that the Lake mansion was quite famous for. His eyes darted to the sports and dancing trophies lining one massive bookcase, and to a clutch of photos of her at a young age, wearing ballet costumes or a net-ball skirt or a school uniform. He wanted to inspect them more closely, but she had sunk down onto an unmade queen-sized bed. As he joined her, she grabbed a pillow, hugging it to her stomach.
“I was away,” he began, wary of implicating her mother in this part of it.
“Sydney.” She nodded.
“I found out I wasn’t Randall’s son, or my mother’s. I was—purchased.”
Nick still couldn’t believe it himself. He knew Randall and Melanie loved him, as did Adam. As for his birth mother, he’d made a start, and was grateful she’d given him up to the best possible family.
But he needed to be with Jordan. He needed her love to make him whole. She was home to him in a way he’d never felt before.
He felt the pressure of her hand on his shoulder, warming him, as welcome as the comfort, acceptance and empathy that showed in her eyes.
“I spent ten days in Australia, tracking my birth parents. I thought of you—often—but it was just so complicated. I didn’t want to get into it on the phone.”
“Did you find them?” she asked after a few seconds.
“My mother, yes. Not my father, though I’ve got some leads I’ll probably check out.”
“Did you like her?”
He nodded. “She’s nice, has her own family. She’d like to keep in touch.” At least he’d gotten one thing clear in his mind. “She may have given birth to me but Melanie was my mother.”
Jordan’s hand slid off his shoulder. He missed it immediately.
“How did Randall take all this?”
“I think he’s been expecting it—dreading it—for years. It’s probably a relief.”
Jordan looked down at her feet, swallowing. “That’s huge, Nick. I wish you would have told me.”
He should have, he knew that now. Maybe he was afraid that with all the barriers to them being together, his illegitimacy might be the last straw. Jordan wasn’t the only one capable of holding things back.
“Nick, I need to know if you planned this whole thing so you could get a promotion.”
He’d wondered when she’d get around to this. “We met, fell into bed, kept meeting. Jordan, I lived for our Fridays. When the case started,Adam made a lighthearted suggestion that a union between us might persuade our fathers to cool it, stop with the fighting and the legal battles. That comment fell on fertile ground because I was already halfway there. It wasn’t exactly a hardship,” he said earnestly, taking her hands in his. “We’re good together. Everything that grew out of that was real.”
Her thoughtful expression gave no clue as to whether she believed him.
“Anyway, it’s a moot point now. Dad’s going to announce it next week. You’re looking at the new managing director of Thorne Enterprises.”
She smiled faintly, “Congrats.”
Nick hadn’t expected much enthusiasm under the circumstances, but still, he squeezed her fingers and ducked his head to peer into her eyes quizzically. “Jordan, I’m so sorry about yesterday, and the lack of communication. I never meant to hurt you.”
She looked down at their joined hands. “I can’t remember ever feeling so—” her shoulders rose and fell “—low.”
“Hormones, I suppose,” he said, thinking of the pregnancy. “This puts everything in a new light. Jordan,” he said, reaching out to smooth a rogue strand of hair behind her ears. “I want our baby to be born legitimate, not like me. I want us to make a good home for him or her, a great family home…why are you crying?”
Tears began to slide down her face, and his heart did an ominous slide in his chest.
“I should never have said anything,” she blurted. “Not until I was sure, but I’ve been sick, and the home test was positive—twice—and you got me so riled…” She tugged her hands away from his and covered her face.
He sat there stupidly, wondering what she meant, helpless in the face of her distress.
“I’m not pregnant, Nick,” she said sadly from behind her hands. “I never was.”
Jordan couldn’t look at him, but felt his eyes on her. The sadness pressed down, making her neck ache. “Mom took me to a specialist yesterday for a blood test, and it came back negative.” A shuddering sigh caught her unawares and she pressed the pillow into her stomach. “I’m supposed to go back in a couple of days for anther test, but I probably won’t bother since I got my period in the night.”
“But you were sick.”
She shrugged, still not looking at him. “Nerves. Stress. A bug…”
They sat there for a minute in silence. She didn’t want to see his relief. In reality, she should be relieved herself, having no desire to raise a baby on her own. But all she felt was a dragging grief, as if someone close had died and nothing would ever be the same again.
Nick cleared his throat. “No baby,” he said, as if he still couldn’t believe it. She braved a look at his face. Incredibly, he looked dazed and terribly disappointed.
Disappointed? He was off the hook. “You must be relieved.”
She immediately wished the words back when he swallowed and looked away. “Relieved?” His eyes tracked slowly around each wall of the big room, an excruciatingly slow inspection, before finally coming full circle to her face again. “I don’t know,” he said slowly. “It’s amazing how quickly I got used to the idea, even embraced the idea, of having a baby with you.”
That was unexpected, although finding out recently that he wasn’t who he thought he was probably had something to do with it. While she mulled that over, Nick reached out and lifted her chin, his eyes full of concern.
“How do you feel about it?”
“Sad,” she whispered. She’d already told him she loved him. She didn’t have to hide anything now. “It was something of you, and the most worthwhile and important part of me.” She shrugged again. “So I thought, for a few hours, anyway.”
Nick slid his hands up her arms and around her back to draw her close. It was a relief to hide her face in his chest, to rest against all that clean warmth and solid support. She closed her eyes.
“There’ll be other babies,” Nick muttered into her hair. “It doesn’t change how I feel about you.”
She smiled gently, remembering. “Your luxury.” But she knew she couldn’t go back to what they were. Everything had changed. She wanted to be worth something now. “Our Fridays are in the past,” she said firmly, as if to convince herself. Would she ever feel the same burning need for anyone else? Perhaps companionship and common goals might be a safer gamble next time.
“I agree.” His arms tightened around her. “But I still want to marry you.”
Jordan snuggled in close, mentally saying goodbye to their Friday afternoons. Nick’s words took an age to filter into her woolly brain. Lack of sleep, of food, of anything resembling sunshine since their weekend away on the boat had withered her comprehension.
Had he just said he wanted to marry her?
She leaned back a little, squinting over the crisp collar and blue silk tie, past the strong, square chin and into his piercing eyes. Her heart gave a healthy kick.
No trace of amusement sullied Nick’s serious contemplation of her. Instead, he reached down and curled his fingers around her hand, squeezing gently. “I love you, Jordan, and I still want to marry you, baby or not.”
Her eyes filled, and a lump the size of Gibraltar invaded her throat. She shook her head impatiently. Why cry when she’d just heard the words she wanted to hear more than anything in the world? When she lay encircled in the arms of the man she loved more than anything in the world? When the sincerity and love shone from his eyes, soothing the hurt of the past few days, giving her hope for the future? “Really?” she as
ked, aware of how inadequate the question was. But her mind hadn’t yet cleared for takeoff.
Nick laced their fingers together and raised her hand to his mouth. “Really,” he murmured. “I really love you, Jordan.”
She shivered—delayed reaction. She could listen to those words all day.
“It was inevitable,” he continued, “once I got to know you, saw how hard you tried, how generous and giving you were. So sexy, you should be illegal.” He kissed her knuckles one by one. “You accepted me, although I gave you little enough. And I hate that it took me so long, and all this upset, to realize how I feel.”
A bit, fat tear escaped and slid slowly down her cheek. “Oh, Nick, I love you so much, it hurts.”
“Perhaps this will ease your pain.” He wrapped her up in his arms and bent his head to kiss her. At the first touch of his lips on hers, she tensed, waiting for the irresistible thrill that never failed to suck the breath from her lungs and sent her heart galloping. But this was a healing kiss, a kiss to say sorry, a tender, nourishing lifeline that she never wanted to let go of. She relaxed into contentment, trying to burrow closer, loving his clean, warm scent and the strength of his arms around her.
“There is still,” he told her a minute later, when he’d stopped kissing her into next week, “the matter of how your father is going to take this.”
She blinked slowly, still dazed by that kiss. “Mom likes you. She’s an amazing woman, my mother.” Jordan couldn’t quite believe Elanor had spied on her. “I’m only starting to realize how amazing—and exactly who wears the pants around here.” She smiled up into Nick’s eyes, feeling quite light-headed with happiness. Her stomach rumbled. It could be hunger. “What about your father?”
“He’ll do anything to stay in my good books at the moment,” he said, planting a kiss on each corner of her mouth. “I told him I was crazy about the devil’s daughter. He said bring the little hussy to his retirement party next week.”
“Will you protect me?” Her smile faded into pensiveness. “Wouldn’t it be great if they could be friends one day?”
“They started that way,” Nick said, nibbling his way around her jawline to her earlobe. “You’d be surprised at the impact a grandkid or two might have. It’s our duty to work on improving relations between the two most stubborn old goats in New Zealand.” He leaned back, his hands sliding from around her back to rest at the tops of her arms, holding her up. “To that end, Jordan Lake, would you marry me in the not-too-distant future? Any Friday will do.”
Jordan caged his face with both hands, unable to stop a huge smile stretching her mouth wide. “Friday works for me.” She leaned in and they touched foreheads, and stayed like that, smiling at each other, basking in a love that was sure to survive.
“Me, too,” Nick murmured. “As long as I can have you every day in between.”
Epilogue
The retirement party stepped up a notch once the formalities were dispensed with. It took Nick an age to get to the bar since everyone wanted to congratulate the new managing director along the way. He looked about for Jordan, thinking he’d barely seen her since the speeches. Randall had taken her under his wing and seemed determined to introduce her to every one of his cronies. With her tucked closely into his side, the old man practically dwarfed her slender form, in her striking, siren-red cocktail dress. He paraded her about proudly, as if she were his escort for the evening.
“Scotch, rocks,” Nick said to the barman, and helped himself to an hors d’oeuvre from the platter on the bar. Jasmine had done an amazing job of organizing the re-tirement-cum-birthday-cum-promotion party on such short notice. Stunning floral arrangements and clusters of cheery balloons lifted the small former ballroom at the top of the Thorne building into an elegant venue, far removed from its normal function as a conference facility. The food and drink were top-notch, and the two hundred guests seemed to be enjoying themselves. Nick reminded himself to give his trusted personal assistant a decent bonus for her efforts.
“Well, big brother, it’s your night, and not before time.” Adam appeared out of the throng of people and saluted him with his glass. Nick reciprocated, and the brothers leaned with their backs to the bar, surveying the party.
“They look cozy,” Adam commented, indicating their father and Jordan. “When are you going to let the best-kept secret out of the bag?”
Nick and Jordan’s public relationship had sent the press into a frenzy, coming on the heels of the court case. Their expected engagement even had punters at the betting agency jostling for odds. “Soon,” Nick replied. “I didn’t want to steal Dad’s thunder tonight.”
“I suppose I’ll have to come home for the wedding.”
The happy couple wanted to get married as soon as possible, but Elenor confirmed that, even though he technically wasn’t talking to them, her husband would expect the biggest and most flamboyant wedding ever staged in Wellington. They were doing their bit for family relations. It just wasn’t possible to organize such a huge event before Adam left for England.
“You’ll be back in the next few months, anyway.” Nick turned to Adam, but his brother wasn’t listening. He was watching something or someone in the crowd. Nick followed his gaze and, sure enough, it was his personal assistant who held Adam’s rapt attention.
Nick sighed. His brother hadn’t taken his eyes off Jasmine all afternoon. Jordan had even commented on it. Hell, if he honestly thought Adam would ever settle down and take a woman seriously, Nick would be delighted in his choice. But Jasmine was too nice a person, and too valuable an employee, to have her heart broken by her boss’s careless brother.
He took Adam’s arm and turned him slightly. “I’d like to introduce you to a couple of our new corporate executives, Sandra and Melanie.” He indicated two extremely attractive women in their twenties, deep in conversation by the punch bowl.
Adam didn’t even look over. Jasmine had retreated to the corner of the room and slid her jacket off the back of a chair.
“I think I’ll hit the road,” Adam said, and drained his glass.
Nick laid a hand on his brother’s arm. “Adam, you’ll be gone in a day or so. Don’t start anything with her.”
Adam turned his light brown eyes on him. “I can give a woman a good time without breaking her heart, you know.”
Nick knew there was little use in arguing once Adam’s mind was made up. He was devilishly stubborn. Nonchalance might be a better weapon. “I’m only trying to keep you from making a fool of yourself. A woman like Jasmine wouldn’t even give you the time of day. You’re just not her type.”
His brother only smiled, and giving him a look that clearly said, “Wanna bet?” Then he hightailed it toward the exit after the departing Jasmine.
Nick smelled Jordan’s perfume and turned his head as a vision in red walked up to him. “I think your brother has just broken the hearts of every single female here by leaving,” she quipped.
Nick gave her a rueful smile. “I should know by now that saying ‘no can do’ is like a red rag to a bull where Adam’s concerned.”
Jordan raised her brows.
Nick put his arms around her waist and pulled her in close. “Never mind. I have much more important things to think about. Such as—” he nuzzled her ear “—when can we leave?”
“Where are we going?” Jordan picked up his glass and stuck her nose into it, inhaling.
“I have a private function to attend at a certain hotel.” Nick bumped their lower bodies together suggestively.
Grimacing at the smell of his Scotch, Jordan raised her eyes to his innocently. “I thought we were giving up the hotel on Fridays.”
“Now why would we want to do that?”
“Because it’s environmentally unfriendly, all that cleaning and polishing and lighting and so on.”
Nick looked down into her shining eyes and beautiful smile, and silently thanked the Lord for cantankerous old men.
“And anyway,” Jordan continued, “I spend ha
lf the week at your place and you spend the rest at mine.”
“We’re not married yet,” Nick told his secret fiancée, “and until we are, you’re my Friday mistress.”
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IMPRINT: Special Release eBooks
ISBN: 9781460890608
TITLE: AUSTRALIA: WICKED MISTRESSES - FIRED WAITRESS, HIRED MISTRESS/HIS MISTRESS FOR A MILLION/FRIDAY NIGHT MISTRESS
First Australian Publication 2013
Copyright © 2013 Robyn Grady/Trish Morey/Jan Colley
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilisation of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the permission of the publisher, Harlequin Mills & Boon®, Locked Bag 7002, Chatswood D.C. N.S.W., Australia 2067.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Table of Contents
Title Page
FIRED WAITRESS, HIRED MISTRESS
About the Author