by Dani Collins
“I’ll never say a word,” she promised.
He nodded, believing her because they were in this together now.
“You understand why I told you? If she had been honest and up front about her situation, I would have helped her, maybe even raised that baby if she had asked me to. I wouldn’t have punished the child for her failings.” His anger returned, making his nostrils sting. “But I don’t appreciate that you have also kept secrets from me, Poppy.”
He heard her breath catch as though he’d struck her.
“I will not ignore my actual blood. I want my daughter.”
She took a step back, but he caught her arm, keeping her close and tilting his head to peer through the shadows straight into her eyes.
“You will come to Spain. You will marry me and we will make this work.”
* * *
Poppy might have knocked his hand away if she hadn’t needed his touch to steady her; his words were that impactful.
“That’s a big leap,” she managed shakily. “I won’t keep you from knowing her, Rico. I see why Lily being yours has extra significance for you.” Her heart was aching under the weight of what he’d revealed and she had only just heard it. It had been festering in him for nearly two years. “But you and I barely know each other.”
“We know each other,” he scoffed gently. “I just told you something I haven’t told anyone.”
And she had shared her heartache over her parents’ neglect.
A similar thing had happened that day in the solarium. Their conversation had somehow become deeply personal. Her crush on him had been instant and she’d never meant it to become obvious to him, but for weeks she had longed to talk to him in a meaningful way. She had wanted to find out who he was beneath his shell of gorgeous looks, easy manners and unsmudged armor.
She recalled telling him about that liar of a backpacker who had stolen everything she had, then asked why he had agreed to an arranged marriage.
Why compete with a business rival if a marriage can turn them into a partner? Faustina’s very upstanding family would never connect themselves so intimately to any but the most exemplary politician, which polishes my father’s already stellar reputation in the upper house of Parliament. Faustina gains the social standing of marrying into a titled family. My mother gets the heiress and the wedding event she envisioned for my brother.
It had seemed so laughably factual. She had asked him what he stood to gain and he’d mentioned running a company he would control, allowing him to pursue ambitions away from working for his brother.
A rational part of her brain had warned her that she deserved someone better than a man bouncing off a broken engagement, but her pride had needed the focused attention of someone so much grander than she was. She had thought the camera thief had genuinely liked her, but he’d been flattering her to blind her. Rico hadn’t wanted anything from her except her. If he was rebounding after his own rejection, that was okay. It was one more detail that made them equals.
And when their kisses had escalated with passion, she hadn’t wanted to stop. His lovemaking had been exactly what she had needed in that moment. Much as she believed she would only marry for love, she had known a soul-mate connection was an elusive thing. Expecting the full package of love and pleasure and a lifelong commitment for her first time wasn’t realistic.
It had been enough to have infatuation and a man who ought to be firmly out of her reach, but who brought her entire body to life by simply watching the release of a button on her dress, then lifting his gaze to check in with her as his finger traced a caress against her skin.
She put a halt to recalling the rest or she’d succumb to him all over again without so much as a single protest.
“This is the second time we’ve spoken,” she pointed out, inwardly shaking at how profound their encounters had been. “We made love once.”
“With spectacular results.” His gloved hand took hold of her chin. “I’m not just talking about Lily.”
She was so glad he couldn’t see her blush, but her helplessness was on full display in her strained voice. “That was... You were relieved you weren’t marrying,” she accused. “Coming off a dry spell with the first woman you happened across.”
“I noticed you before that.”
They were close enough that the fog of their breath was mingling.
“I wouldn’t have kissed you if you hadn’t made a point of telling me you’d finished your last shift and were no longer an employee,” he reminded. “The attraction was mutual.”
“I didn’t make a point of it.” Maybe she had. He had asked if she wanted to leave and had moved aside, giving her plenty of space to walk past him to the change rooms where she’d been headed when she had bumped into him. She had stayed, eager to keep talking to him. Basking in the glory of being noticed by him.
“Do you ever think about that day?” he asked.
Constantly. She wouldn’t admit it, though.
“Hmm?” he prompted, lowering his head. He stopped before he kissed her.
She let her eyes flutter closed and parted her lips in invitation.
He only grazed his mouth against hers, provoking a buzzing sensation in her lips.
She put out a hand, but the knit of her mitten only found the smooth leather of his jacket, too slippery to hold on to.
While he kept up that frustratingly light tickle. His hand shifted to cup the side of her neck, the rough seam on his thumb grazing the tender skin in her throat.
“Do you?” He refused to give her what she wanted until she answered.
Her skin grew too tight for the anticipation that swelled within her. Beneath the layers of her thick jacket, her breasts grew heavy. Her thighs ceased to feel the cold through the denim of her jeans.
“Yes,” she admitting on a throb of longing.
He made a noise of satisfaction and stepped so his feet were outside her own. His hot mouth sealed across her lips.
A sob of delight broke in her throat as his hard lips raked across hers, making real all the erotic fantasies she’d replayed in the long nights since leaving Spain. Her arms went up around his neck and he swept her closer still. So close she could hardly breathe.
She didn’t care. The thick layers of their coats were a frustration, one that seemed to hold them off from one another. She wanted them gone. Wanted passion to take her over the way it had that day, blanking out the world around her with levels of excitement and pleasure she hadn’t known existed.
His kiss deepened with greed, as though he couldn’t get enough of her, either. She opened fully to him, licked into his mouth and felt his arms tighten around her in response. She ran her hand up past his scarf, pressed the back of his head, urging him to kiss her harder and harder still. She wanted him to mark her. Savage her.
Because he already had.
This passion between them was as destructive as it was glorious. She needed to remember that. Otherwise, she would succumb and wind up far out of her depth again.
As though he recognized the risk as well, he dragged his head up and sucked in a breath, but he didn’t let her go.
Panting, she blinked her eyes open. His face was in darkness with a kaleidoscope of colors haloed behind him.
“Look.” She seized the distraction to pull herself out of his arms. She wasn’t even sure if what she was seeing was real or the leftover fireworks he had so easily set off behind her eyelids.
She staggered slightly as she led him out of the trees. The expanse of sky was bigger than a thousand movie screens above them and the stars had faded behind glowing swirls. Shimmering bands of pink and purple and red danced within the curtains of green. Every few seconds a spear of color shot toward the earth in knifelike streaks. The jabs of color felt so tangible and close, she expected to be struck by one.
“This is beautiful.” Rico drew her ba
ck against his chest and folded his arms across her collarbone and stomach.
She was still weak from their kiss. She leaned into the wall he made, wondering if he could feel the thump of her still unsteady heart through their winter layers.
“One of my first memories is coming out here with my grandfather,” she confided softly. “I asked when my mother was coming back and he brought me out here. I thought he was going to tell me she had died. He said he didn’t know if she was coming back, but then he pointed to the sky. I asked what it was and he said he didn’t know that, either. That there would always be things in this world we’re left to wonder about.”
“Gas particles from the sun collide with the earth’s atmosphere,” Rico informed her.
“Don’t ruin it.” She nudged her elbow back into his ribs. “It’s magic. I’ve taken a million photographs of them, but none capture how amazing this really is. How small it makes you feel.”
“I’ve never seen it like this.” His chin touched the top of her head.
“Me, neither.” This was the most glorious display she’d ever witnessed and she didn’t care that she didn’t have her camera. She would never forget sharing this with him: the timbre of his voice vibrating through her jacket, the heat of his breath against her earlobe where it poked from beneath her toque, the weight of his arm across her and the way all those colors glowed inside her even as they danced before her unblinking eyes.
She hesitated then confessed softly, “Gramps brought me out here when I was pregnant, too. I wanted to keep Lily, but I didn’t know how I would manage it. It felt too much of an imposition to stay with them. He was upset that he wouldn’t be around to look after me and Gran. We had a little cry then saw these lights. He said it was a reminder that even dark nights offer beautiful moments and said that’s what Lily would be for all of us if I stayed with them.”
Rico’s arm tightened across her chest. His voice was low and sincere. “I’m sorry I didn’t meet him.”
Her chest ached. “I think that’s him right now.”
A startled pause, then, “I don’t believe in things like that, Poppy.”
“It’s okay.” She touched the arm that continued to hold her close. “I do.”
“If I did—” His lips pressed to her ear through the knit of her toque. “I think we both know what he’s saying.”
Her throat grew tight. Marry Rico.
He drew back slightly so he could reach into his jacket. When he brought his hand around in front of her, he held a small box. He stayed behind her as he pried up the lid so she stood in the circle of his arms as he offered her the ring.
The band could have been silver or yellow or rose. The diamond caught glints of colored light, blinding her.
Had he really come all this way, not knowing for sure if Lily was his, but brought a ring just in case?
She let him pick up her left hand and tug at the mitten. She took the discarded mitt with her free hand. As though under a spell, she turned to face him.
She tried to think of reasons to persuade him this was wrong or stupid or doomed to fail. Marrying him was all of those things.
But she wanted to marry him. Her compulsion to know him remained. Beneath the anger and armor of indifference was a man who wanted to know his daughter. That meant everything to her.
As the aurora borealis continued to crash silently over them, full of mystical power and spirit voices, she told herself that Gramps wouldn’t steer her wrong. He wouldn’t tell her to marry Rico if this would ruin her life. He was telling her to say goodbye to her home and family and begin building her new one.
The cool ring caught slightly on her knuckle, then it was on her finger, heavy as the promise it symbolized. Rico’s mouth came down to hers again with magnificent heat, burning away her bleak doubts and fears, filling her with hope and possibility.
CHAPTER FIVE
You should have told me sooner. I would have made arrangements. Someone from the family should have been there.
RICO READ THE TEXT from Pia and swore, then dropped the phone onto the custom recliner beside the one he occupied.
Across from him, buckled into her own, Poppy looked up from distracting Lily with a book. Lily was making noises of dismay at being strapped into her car seat while the view beyond the windows turned to clouds.
“What’s wrong?” Poppy asked him.
“A text from my sister, scolding me about the wedding.”
“She’s upset?” Poppy’s expression dimmed.
“That I didn’t invite her. I pointed out there hasn’t been time.”
It hadn’t occurred to him Pia would want to come. His parents had urged him to wait for the DNA results and expressed consternation that he hadn’t. Cesar’s reaction to his impending nuptials had been a curt text.
Sorcha told me. Congratulations.
Rico had given up at that point and focused on the tasks at hand.
Poppy’s gran had been moved to her sister’s apartment, where she would occupy a guest room for a few days. Rico had had to push to make it happen, but he had arranged to have her personal items moved into a nearby, private seniors’ complex that was so well-appointed, Eleanor had asked him if he’d won a lottery.
Poppy had been anxious about the entire process until she’d spoken with the extremely personable, on-staff doctor who had already been in touch with her grandmother’s specialist. A nutritionist had made note of her grandmother’s dislike of cumin. Her sensitivity to certain detergents had been conveyed to the housekeeping staff. Eleanor had looked in on the pool where physical therapy sessions were held and checked out the lively games room, approving the entire complex with a delighted nod.
Poppy’s father had pointed out that the location in Regina would be easier for him to visit, too. He typically spent half a day driving after his flight landed. Rico had even hired a caretaker to look after the house until decisions had been made on whether to keep it in the family.
The last task had been a brief civil service at the courthouse. Poppy’s father had given her away and her grandmother had wept happy tears. They had eaten brunch at an upscale café then climbed aboard his private jet.
Another text rang through, but he ignored it.
“Tell her I didn’t even have my mother there,” Poppy said.
“I explained why I was keeping it private.”
“That wasn’t a complaint,” she said stiffly, making him aware of how tersely he’d spoken. “I didn’t want my mother there.” She picked up the book Lily dropped, mouth pinched.
Poppy had said she would inform her mother after Rico issued the press release. He’d had enough to juggle in the moment that he hadn’t questioned her. Now he did.
“Why not?” Had she been afraid she wouldn’t show up? Her mother sounded even less emotionally accessible than his own. At least La Reina Montero maintained appearances.
“I was afraid she wouldn’t keep her mouth shut,” Poppy muttered crossly. “I agree with you that it’s kinder to let your parents inform Faustina’s parents and give them a few days to prepare their own statement.”
Loathe as he was to bring Faustina into this marriage on any level, he appreciated Poppy’s understanding. Having a child Lily’s age wouldn’t reflect well on his fidelity, narrow window of a called-off wedding notwithstanding. This news would come as a shock to many, including Faustina’s parents.
“I didn’t mean to speak sharply. I don’t usually make mistakes and they’ve been piling up lately.”
For the most part, Rico was a meticulous planner. He had always been taught success was a matter of research and preparation. That lesson had played out as true more often than not and he had heeded its wisdom—right up until he had impulsively made love with his mother’s maid.
He had promptly fallen back in line with the precisely orchestrated pageant his first wedding had been, o
nly to discover his wife’s betrayal. As resentful as he still was of that, he had to face the fact that if he had refused to marry Faustina when she had come back that next morning, she might be alive and happily ensconced with her lover and child. He wouldn’t have the presidency that had seemed like such a delectable consolation prize, but he would have had the first year of Lily’s life. Poppy bore some responsibility for his missing that, but so did he.
He had believed his tryst with Poppy was all the bucking of expectations he had needed before settling into the life laid out for him. Even after Sorcha had dropped this earth-shattering news on him, he had attempted to defuse it with surgical care, ordering an investigation and telling no one.
Then the test had come back inconclusive and he had come out of his skin. Mere days later, he had a wife and child. His parents thought he was behaving recklessly and a rational part of him wondered if they were right. He was relying on instinct without concrete evidence or other facts to back it up.
He caught Poppy’s affronted glare and heard his own words.
“I wasn’t suggesting this marriage is a mistake. But it will cause a tragic death to be splashed across the gossip sites again. You will be cast as the Other Woman.”
She would be labeled an opportunist and a gold digger. Given her shock at his arrival, he couldn’t accuse her of that, but others would.
“I’ll look like a faithless husband and a deadbeat father. I’m not proud of any of that. Scandals are not my MO. I’m disgusted with myself for creating this situation.”
“And what about Lily? Are you sorry you created her?” The fiery challenge in her expression was quickly schooled as the flight attendant approached to ask after their comfort.
Lily lifted her arms at the woman and pitifully begged, “Oof?”
“She thinks that means up,” Poppy explained with a stiff smile. “I guess I was making that noise whenever I lifted her and didn’t notice. Button, you have to stay in your seat. I’ll apologize now for how miserable she’s going to become.”