Billion dollar baby bargain.txt

by Неизвестный

  With the exception of Suzy, she’d lost contact with most of her friends over the past ten years, too busy

  with work. Occasionally she’d gone out with Suzy and her teacher friends to a movie, or to dinner with a

  group from Archer, Cameron & Edge. But she wasn’t close to any of them.

  “What about family?” He shifted, crossing one ankle over the other where he leaned, the rustle of denim

  loud in the intimacy of the sitting room. “My brother’s coming.”

  “I don’t have brothers or sisters.” Victoria dropped her gaze away. “My mom’s dead, and I haven’t

  spoken to my father in years.”

  “Then this might be the time to invite him and mend some fences. Both my parents are dead—at least

  you still have a father who could be there for you.”

  She played with the stem of her glass. Connor couldn’t know what he was asking of her. “I thought the

  purpose of the day was to get married and provide a family for Dylan.”

  “Nothing wrong with using the opportunity for reconciliation, Victoria.”

  Connor’s arrogant assumption that inviting her tumbleweed father to her wedding would make amends

  for decades of irresponsibility and selfish neglect rubbed her the wrong way. “So I take it you’ll be

  inviting Dana and Paul?”

  There was a horrible pause. Then he said, “Okay, maybe we should just focus on the wedding.”

  “Good idea.” In an effort to restore the peace she said brightly, “I didn’t know you had a brother.”

  He drained his glass and set it down on the desk behind him. “Brett’s been living it up in London for the

  past few years.”

  “And he’s coming all the way out to New Zealand?”

  Straightening, Connor gave her a grim smile. “It’s my wedding—probably the only one he’ll ever see

  me celebrate. Of course he’s coming.”

  Less than a week after Connor had asked Victoria to marry him, the wedding took place.

  In sharp contrast to Suzy and Michael’s wedding, it was a small affair with no bouquets, flower girls or

  white lacy bridal dress in sight. In fact, Victoria decided that celebrate was a far too strong word for the

  civil ceremony that they rushed through in an anonymous Queen Street government building.

  Afterward, accompanied by Connor’s brother and Anne—who’d come to take care of Dylan but ended

  up acting as a witness—they went to a lovely restaurant set in the rolling, parklike gardens of

  Auckland’s domain. Sitting at a table on a verandah that overlooked a series of lakes shaded by budding

  willows and frequented by swans, Victoria’s gaze settled on Dylan perched in the high chair beside

  Anne, and she finally relaxed.

  Married.

  Her place in Dylan’s life was secure now.

  “Congratulations!” Connor’s brother waved a glass of champagne. “Welcome to our family.”

  Victoria smiled and raised her glass. Brett’s personality had come as a surprise. Younger than Connor,

  he had a boyish flirtatiousness that made her laugh.

  “Connor needs to be married,” he told her while Connor discussed their meal with the restaurant owner.

  “Even though I would rather you’d had a very unequivocal, big, splashy wedding instead of this hole-inthe-

  corner affair.”

  “Needs to be married?” Victoria raised one brow skeptically and carefully ignored the rest of his

  explosive statement.

  “Oh, yes. He likes domesticity.”

  “Connor?”

  She glanced at the man whose commanding presence had conjured up the owner and a trio of waiters in

  minutes. His baby brother was mistaken—Connor was as domesticated as a Bengal tiger.

  Brett nodded emphatically. “Oh, yes. He’s suffering from empty nest syndrome.”

  She must have looked blank, because Brett elaborated. “Since I left home.” His eyes widened. “He never

  told you that he raised me?”

  “No.”

  Victoria started to feel ridiculous. She knew nothing about the man she was marrying—except that he’d

  been dumped by his girlfriend and betrayed by his partner two years ago, and had built a multimillion

  dollar corporation out of the ruins of those relationships. She’d been crazy to think that was enough.

  “Until last week I didn’t even know he had a brother.”

  “What mischief are you whispering to my bride?”

  The owner had departed, wearing a very satisfied smile. But Connor’s eyes narrowed alarmingly as he

  focused on Victoria and his brother.

  “No mischief…yet. I’m still trying to impress her with how upstanding we are. I’ll get to the skeletons

  in the closet later.”

  Connor’s eyes crinkled into a smile. “Those are all yours, brother.”

  After that lunch became a noisy, happy affair—where even Dylan contributed much gurgling. The food

  was sublime and the pale-golden sunshine gave the occasion luster. After listening to the brothers

  bantering, Victoria met Anne’s eyes and both women collapsed in paroxysms of laughter.

  Dylan finally decided he’d had enough sitting.

  “I’ll show him the swans,” Anne said, rising to free the baby from the high chair. “And it’s probably

  time for a change, too.”

  “I’ll get a travel rug from the car—” Connor was on his feet “—for you to lay him on.”

  “You may have noticed that Connor doesn’t talk much about himself,” Brett said to Victoria once

  Connor had disappeared around the corner of the building.

  Now, that was an understatement. She flashed Brett a wry glance.

  “Our parents are dead—did you know that?”

  She nodded. “He mentioned it, but he didn’t give any details.” And she hadn’t asked because the last

  thing she’d wanted was Connor asking questions about her estrangement from her father.

  “A train crash.” Brett paused. “That’s why he was so upset about Michael. Brought back old memories.”

  She hadn’t even known; Connor had hidden the old, festering wound so well under that icy exterior.

  Brett leaned closer. “Has he told you about Dana?”

  “His ex?”

  “The viper.”

  A giggle escaped despite Victoria’s attempts to look disapproving. “Brett!”

  “She kicked him out of his own home, but in a way it was a relief when I heard. I was scared shitless

  Connor would marry her—she was angling for it.”

  “Should you be telling the new wife all this stuff?”

  “It’s on a need-to-know basis.” He dipped down close and lowered his voice conspiratorially. “Dana is

  poison. She told Connor she wanted children, but he didn’t believe her.”

  Despite her qualms, Victoria couldn’t resist probing for more information. It was unlikely to be

  forthcoming from Connor. “Why?”

  “He thought her work meant too much for her to take time out for kids.”

  Uh-oh. That went some way toward explaining his attitude in relation to Dylan with her. “How do you

  know all this?”

  He sat back in his chair and selected a toothpick. “I watched…and they sniped at each other sometimes.

  And after they split up Connor came to London and I took him on a pub crawl.”

  Victoria frowned.

  “Think of it as therapy—it was the only way I could get him to talk.”

  “You’re devious.”

  “Very,” he said with immense satisfaction. “And you’d better remember that, because I’m counting on

  you to feather Connor’s nest and keep him happy.”

&nbs
p; Victoria laughed at the outrageous comment. But the sound dried in her throat when a hand landed on

  her waist. “Be careful of my baby brother.”

  Connor’s husky growl close to her right ear caused her to shiver with delight.

  “He’s just been warning me of how dangerous he is.” She slanted a mirthful look up at Connor.

  Resting his arms across the back of her chair, he leaned closer, his body warm and his male scent

  familiar. Shuddery sensations of awareness tingled over her nape as her new groom said,

  “Unfortunately, it’s all true.”

  “Right.”

  “See, I told you to be careful of me.” Brett looked as innocent as an angel. “Now I’m off to whisper

  some secrets to Dylan.”

  “More like flirt with Anne,” Connor murmured as Brett took off down to the water. He slid into the chair

  that Brett’s desertion had freed.

  The latent tension in Victoria wound a notch tighter. No longer laughing, she pivoted on her seat to face

  Connor. “Brett tells me you brought him up.”

  “He exaggerates.”

  “So how old was he when your parents died?”

  “You mean he didn’t get around to telling you everything?” The humor vanished, and his eyes cooled,

  becoming remote.

  “He ran out of time. But I deserve to know—I’m your wife, remember?”

  “In name only.”

  The terse retort came like a slap in the face and she looked down, determined he shouldn’t see how he

  had wounded her.

  “Brett was fifteen.”

  Victoria snatched up the olive branch. Driven by an overwhelming need to know more about him, she

  lifted her chin and asked, “And you were?”

  “Twenty-two.”

  “Twenty-two! That would have been a demanding time of your life.”

  Connor didn’t say anything.

  “It was good of you to look after him,” she persisted.

  “Anyone would have done it.”

  “No, they wouldn’t.” Her father had shown next to no responsibility for his wife and child. Yet Connor

  had single-handedly raised his brother. She studied his guarded features, admiring the purpose and

  determination in the rocklike jaw, the sweep of the wide cheekbones and the dark hair that the late

  August wind had ruffled, giving him a sexy, rumpled look. “And now you’re doing it again. For Dylan.”

  He shrugged. “Michael was my friend—my best friend, as it turned out.”

  Without the irony, she might never have asked, “Tell me about your business partner.”

  “Brett talk about Paul, too?”

  “No.”

  “So what brought on this bout of curiosity?”

  His gaze was unnerving. Victoria gave a careless shrug and reached for her sunglasses. “Perhaps I’m

  just trying to understand what would drive a man’s friend to behave like that.”

  “You think I drove him to do it?”

  “I didn’t say that!” She blew out a breath in frustration. “I think what he did to you was despicable.”

  “And what do you think of Dana’s behavior?”

  She met his gaze squarely. “I thought that was pretty shabby, too.”

  He nodded slowly as though her answer had satisfied a question deep inside him. Then, pinning her with

  his intimidating gaze, he said, “I once heard you tell Suzy that you didn’t blame Dana one bit.”

  Victoria slipped her sunglasses on, and frowned. “I said that? When?”

  “The day that we first met. You called me a jerk.”

  Her eyes went around behind the dark lenses. “You heard that?”

  “So you remember.”

  “Yes, I was furious with you for attacking Suzy.” And it would have knifed him when he was already

  down. “So that’s why you were so hostile to me at the wedding.”

  “Partly.”

  She’d thought he’d taken an unreasonable dislike to her, and that had hurt. To learn that her own

  behavior had been a major part of the problem made her want to groan in dismay. “I’d found out while I

  was away on a grueling weeklong audit that Suzy was getting married. I was concerned about Suzy.”

  She paused, then decided he deserved the whole truth. “I was dog tired and your in-your-face arrogance

  was more than I could stomach.” Of course she’d bristled in return and the whole sorry situation had

  snowballed.

  “And the other part of your hostility? Where did that come from,” she asked, curious now.

  “It’s complicated.”

  He was a complicated man. She decided to humor him, make him laugh. She shifted her chair back a

  little. “Come on, how complicated can it be? You’re a male, men are supposed to be easy.”

  “I am definitely easy,” he deadpanned.

  Victoria rolled her eyes. “You’re not getting out of this conversation by relying on sexual innuendo.”

  “I wanted to see you blush so deliciously again.”

  “I don’t blush.” She felt the rush of color even as he quirked a dark brow at her.

  “That was so much easier than I thought,” he murmured, his eyes full of lazy humor.

  “Oh, stop it!” She didn’t know where to look. He was altogether overwhelming in this mood. “Tell me

  the other reason you disliked me.”

  “You reminded me of Dana.”

  Her breath caught. Ouch. All relaxation and lazy desire fled. “I would never do what she did to you.”

  She turned as Brett and Anne came up the grassy back toward them, Dylan happily squealing in Brett’s

  arms. “Don’t confuse me with Dana, Connor—I’m nothing like her.”

  “Sure,” said Connor from behind her.

  But he sounded far from convinced.

  Silence fell over the house.

  Victoria had discarded the pale-ivory suit she’d worn for the wedding, and showered. Anne had long

  since left for home, and Brett had taken off to meet the old friends he was staying with. Victoria set the

  empty baby bottle on a table beside her, Dylan having been lulled to sleep by Connor’s reading. She

  looked over the baby’s sleeping head to where Connor lay sprawled on the dark-blue carpet at the foot

  of the rocker, his head propped up on his elbow…watching her.

  She shifted, and the nursing chair rocked in a gentle motion.

  “Is the baby getting heavy?”

  “A little,” Victoria prevaricated, taking the easy excuse he offered for her sudden restlessness.

  Connor pushed himself to his feet in one lithe movement. “I’ll put him to bed.” His eyes sought hers.

  “Then we can go downstairs and share a toast to our marriage.”

  Butterflies fluttered in her stomach at the thought of being alone with Connor. “Oh, he’s fine—”

  But it was too late. Connor had already swept Dylan up.

  For an instant the emptiness in her arms roused an ache of separation and she felt a flare of anxiety that

  she might never hold Dylan again.

  She shook off the foolish fancy.

  There would be lots of time to spend with her baby. She would be here for every day of his life—she

  could watch him grow, reach out to the world, become a real, rounded person.

  Marriage to Connor had ensured that.

  And, in spite of their differences in the past, both of them were committed to making this unlikely

  marriage work.

  It had to.

  Not only for Dylan, but for them, too.

  Pulling her dressing gown more tightly around her, Victoria crossed the room to the oak crib where

  Connor stood, his broad shoulders accentuated by the white dress shirt, his hip
s lean in dark pants. She

  leaned forward as he tucked Dylan in.

  “He’s getting big. Must be devouring rubber bands.” Maternal pride filled her as she studied the length

  of the oblivious baby. “He’s going to be tall one day.”

  Connor pulled up the patchwork Peter Rabbit quilt. “He’s still just a baby. So many hopes and dreams

  tied up in one little person.”

  The words moved her. “You feel that way, too?”

  He turned his head, and in the dim glow of the nursery lamp part of his face remained in shadow. “I love

  him.”

  She hadn’t imagined Connor capable of love. He’d always seemed too remote, too self-sufficient. Yet

  clearly he loved Brett, and now he was telling her that he loved Dylan, too. The tender expression he

  wore as he glanced down at Dylan made Victoria feel all soft and molten inside.

  Connor doesn’t talk much about himself, Brett had said earlier. Well, she’d just have to learn how to

  draw him out, Victoria decided. The man she’d just glimpsed would be worth finding.

  Downstairs the overhead lights in the living room blazed, illuminating the sculpted lines of the wide

  deck outside and reflecting off the glistening surface of the swimming pool under the night sky beyond.

  “What about a glass of champagne?” Connor offered, and Victoria nodded.

  He pushed some buttons in a wall panel and the brightness in the room dimmed, immediately

  transforming the mood from stark sophistication to shadowed intimacy. Victoria came to a dead

  standstill in the middle of an exquisite kelim and cast him a wary glance.

  The invitation had been for a toast, she’d thought—not a seduction.

  He extracted a bottle of champagne from a fridge concealed in a mahogany wall unit and two longstemmed

  glasses from a cubbyhole above, and came toward Victoria where she stood dithering. Giving

  her a glass, he took her free hand.

  Immediately, conflicting sensations rushed through Victoria. Trepidation. Nerves. And something far

  too close to desire for her comfort. But instead of fighting to free her hand she let him lead her to the

  black leather couch, her heartbeat loud in her ears.

  “I prefer to sit on the deck outside at night, but it’s a little fresh out there tonight.” Connor increased her