The Millionaire's Marriage

by Catherine Spencer

  Maria. Gio thought you seemed quitetaken with them this afternoon, so I hope they’re to your liking. But if not, they can be exchanged for something else.”

  They were earrings, small and delicate, each with an oval of translucent jade poised like a teardrop above a small diamond—an exquisite gift, expensive without be ing ostentatious, and her mother’s flush of pleasure be trayed how delighted she was to receive them.

  “And this,” he w on, opening the other box and lifting out the aquamarine pendant they’d looked at ear lier, “is for my wife because she is the only woman I know lovely enough to do it justice.”

  Gabriella stared at the necklace, knowing everyone was watching her expectantly, and that she was supposed to make some sort of appropriately enthusiastic response. It was, after all, a truly magnificent piece. Instead, horrify ingly, she heard herself ask baldly, “What’s it for?”

  As if it were his habit to drop priceless jewels into her lap on a weekly basis, he smiled and said, “Why, to wear, my love. Put it on so we can see how it looks.”

  “No!”

  The tiny frown puckering his forehead told her she was stretching his good will past all reason. He’d made a grand gesture, to impress her parents, and now it was her turn to show suitable appreciation of the fact. “Come on, Gabriella, it won’t bite.”

  “I’m not wearing...” She backed away, semi- hypnotized by the pendant twirling and winking at her in the lamplight. “...the right clothes. A thing like this calls for an evening gown—something rich and sumptuous.”

  “It needs only you.”

  He stalked her until she found herself pinioned against the arm of the sofa. His fingers brushed the back of her neck, lifted her hair, fastened the clasp of the necklace

  securely in place. The gold filigree chain nested lightly against her skin; the aquamarine lay heavy and cold at her throat.

  He brought his hands to rest on her shoulders, turned her around to face her parents, and solicited another opin ion. “What do you think, Zoltan? Will it do?”

  “It is very beautiful.” Her father was completely won over. There were tears in his eyes. “In the old days, our daughter would have grown up taking such lovely things for granted, but times are not as they once were, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for restoring herS to the kind of life which should have been her birthright.”

  “In that case, you make me doubly glad I chose it.”

  Max paused long enough to cast a reproachful glance at

  Gabriella who stood there unable to dredge up so much

  as a semblance of enthusiasm. “Even if my wife wishes

  I hadn’t.” I

  “It’s riot that I don’t appreciate the thought,” she felt compelled to reply. “I just feel rather foolish wearing it when it clearly calls for a special occasion. As it is, I’m afraid it’ll spend most of its time in the safe, along with my other jewelry.”

  Max dug in his shirt pocket and hauled out her wedding band. “That reminds mc, let’s put this where it belongs before I forget I have it and it winds up in the laundry! Here, my love.”

  He slid it over her knuckle and, if she’d allowed it, would have raised her hand to his lips and kissed it. She forestalled him, snatching her fingers away as if he’d burned them, and pulling off the ring. “No! I can’t wear it!’’

  It was quite the wrong thing to do, and if her own common sense hadn’t told her so the minute it was too late to take back the words, her mother’s appalled gasp

  certainly conveyed the m “Gabriella, whatever is the matter? You should be proud to wear your husband’s ring!”

  “I know,” she said miserably. “And I would be, if only...” If only it ‘ere for the right reasons. But the truth was, having him put it on her finger on their wedding day had been difficult enough, knowing, as she had, that he was an unwilling groom roped into marriage because she’d thought she was expecting a baby. She could not stomach a repeat performance now when they had not even the excuse of an unplanned pregnancy to hold them together. “If only,” she amended, sliding the ring back and forth over her knuckle several times to demonstrate, “it weren’t so loose. But as you can see, it slips off very easily, and I’m afraid I’ll lose it.”

  Max rolled his eyes. “What do you expect, when your idea of a square meal is a stick of celery and a grape?”

  “Oh, Max, that’s an exaggeration, and you know it!”

  “Do I?” Once more, he appealed to her parents. “You must have noticed how she picks at her food, and you can’t have missed the fact that she’s dropped at least two dress sizes since you last saw her.”

  “But not because I’ve been dieting,” she insisted. “It’s all the traveling that’s done it. Jet lag and too hectic a schedule.”

  That, and eating my heart out over you! Did you ever try packing away a steak, Max, when you’re hollow with inisely inside and there’s a permanent lump in your throat?

  “Well, your father made a good point earlier,” he said. “You’re not traveling now, and before you take off on your next whirlwind tour, I want to see you put back those pounds you’ve lost.”

  “As if you care!” A slip of the tongue too bitter to be contained, it was out before she could contain it.

  “I care,” he snapped, making no effort to hide his an noyance at her attitude. “Being seen with a wife who looks like a bone rack isn’t my idea of a good time, nor do I think you’re setting any sort of example to the ranks of gullible young women around the world whose ideal is to wind up looking just like you!”

  “Then don’t be seen with me, if it offends you so much! I’ve grown quite accustomed to being on my own, and you’ve as good as admitted you never are, so—!”

  They were hurling angry words at each other, unmind ful of their audience, and who was to say what irreparable damage she might have done with her last remark had Max not suddenly yanked her to him, and stopped her in midflow with a kiss which resonated throughout her body.

  Arms hanging limply at her sides, she flopped against him like a rag doll, aware of his eyes glaring into hers and sparking blue flame. His mouth sealed hers so thor oughly, so crushingly, she could barely breathe and when she tried to squirm free, he nipped her lower lip just hard enough to remind her that if a contest of brute strength was what she wanted, she’d better be prepared to come out the loser.

  But the really pitiful thing—the shameful, humiliating fact of the matter—was that for all her outrage, her body...and yes, her mind and heart and soul, relished every second! Just as well he had her encased in a steel grip, she thought hazily, or she’d have wound up in a mindless, soggy heap at his feet.

  Sensing he’d won this latest round, Max softened the kiss. The nip became a nibble so persuasive that her lips parted and allowed his tongue to mice an apology inside

  her mouth, to flick and swirl against hers in tormenting reminder of what intimacy was all about.

  A flash of heat, so sudden and intense it made her thighs quiver, shot to her lower abdomen and dissolved into liquid yearning. If she could have had one wish, it would have been to freeze the moment and make it last forever. To cast it like a veil over their marriage and dis guise all the ugliness which kept her and Max apart.

  He labored under no such fanciful delusion. With a dis arming show of remorse, he pulled her into a tight hug and, resting his chin on the crown of her head, addressed her parents who sat in paralyzed fascination watching the entire performance. “I guess the secret’s out and there’s no use pretending it’s not, so we might as well come clean. The truth is—”.

  Appalled that he seemed prepared to reveal their du plicity in all its shabby glory without regard for the fallout sure to follow, Gabriella struggled free. “No, Max, please! Don’t do this!”

  She might as well have saved her breath. “Sometimes ‘we fight,” he explained blithely, hauling her back and pressing her face into his shirtfront to silence her, “and I’m the first to admit I’m usually t
he one who starts it. But the truth is, I wony that Gabriella’s pushing herself too hard with this modeling business. I wish she could spend more time here where she belongs, so that I can take better care of her, but that’s just not feasible with her schedule.”

  “So you love her,” her mother crooned. “We under stand. And she loves you. And people who love with pas sion, they fight with passion.”

  “They make up with passion, too, Maria,” he inter jected quickly.

  Her mother’s English might not be perfect, but she Un-

  derstood well enough what he was implying. “So go!” she chuckled, shooing at them as if she were chasing away chickens. “It is time now to make up!”

  Keeping Gabriella cinched to his side, Max picked up the bottle of cognac and offered it to her father. “Zoltan, I couldn’t quite see you wearing earrings, but I remember you appreciate good brandy, so this is for you. I’m sure you’ll forgive us if we leave you to enjoy it in relative peace and quiet.”

  Brushing aside her father’s thanks, he then turned a wicked smile on Gabriella. “Now, what do you say, sweetheart? Ready to take your mom’s advice?”

  What choice did she have but to return his smile and go along with the suggestion? Fully aware of her parents’ watchful gaze, she linked her arm around Max’s waist and let him lead her toward the stairs.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Tw charade came to an end the minute they reached the bedroom. “Well,” he said, strolling to the window and casually unbuttoning his shirt while she wilted against the closed door, “for someone supposedly bent on preserving the myth of happy-ever-after, you certainly came close to blowing it! Care to tell me why?”

  “I’m not stupid, Max,” she said. “I don’t know why you came home early tonight, but I do know it had noth ing to do with wanting to be with me.”

  “As a matter of fact, it did. Looking back, I decided I was out of line in the way I handled our rather tense exchange in Gio’s.”

  “So you thought you’d try to bribe me into forgetting about it with this?” Unclasping the pendant, she flung it at him. “No, thanks. I’m not that easily bought off.”

  He caught the thing and regarded her impassively. “So what do you suggest I do with it?”

  Resisting the urge to give him quite graphic instruc tions, she said, “Give it to someone who’ll appreciate it.”

  “You have a specific ‘someone’ in mind, or will just anyone do?”

  “Oh, stop playing games!” she exploded. “For obscure reasons known only to you, you decided to make a few more brownie points with my parents tonight by playing the doting husband and son-in-law. Well, congratulations! You gave a near-flawless performance and they were def initely impressed. But the curtain’s been rung down now

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  and there’s no one but me left in the audience, so you can drop the phony act.”

  He examined the heap of gold and precious gems cra died in his palm. “There’s nothing phony about this, I assure you. Would you like to see the appraisal certificate that came with it? Or the receipt, perhaps? Would they convince you it’s the genuine article?”

  “I’m not questioning the authenticity of the jewelry. It’s your integrity that’s on the line here, Max. Pretending we’re happily married is one thing, but you take things too far when you show up loaded with expensive gifts, and start quizzing me about where I’ve been as if you were worried sick about me.”

  “You didn’t come in until after nine, and there was no sign you’d been home since morning.”

  “I wasn’t aware I had to report my every move to you or that I was under any sort of curfew.”

  “Jeez, Gabriella, will you stop making something out of nothing, and try being reasonable for a change? Your parents are getting on, your dad had to get his doctor’s permission to make the trip over here, and you have the kind of high public profile that leaves you vulnerable to every weirdo Out there, so naturally I was concerned when I got home to find the place empty.”

  “Rubbish! You were trying to justify your own behav ior by shifting guilt on to me.”

  He stared at her blanidy for a moment, then said, “You know what? You’re nuts! You’re so caught up in your own fantasy world that you can’t tell the difference be tween it and reality.”

  “The first night I was back here, you as good as told me you’re seeing someone else, and that’s just plain fact, Max. Not my imagination playing tricks on me, and not another of the lies you’re so quick to accuse me of man-

  ufacturing. When I confronted you about it this afternoon, you wouldn’t—or couldn’t—simply tell me I was woi rying about nothing. So you bought me a trinket to ease your conscience.”

  He dangled the pendant from his forefinger and let loose with a bellow of laughter. “Some trinket! I know you think I’m made of money; Gabriella, but even I don’t throw it around quite that casually.”

  “Stop trying to change the subject,” she fired back. “This isn’t about money—it’s never been about money, for all that you like to think that’s why I married you! It’s about principles...and....” She fought back the sob rising in her throat. Damn it, she wouldn’t let him make her cry! She wouldn’t back down when every instinct told her she was right!

  “You’re a fine one to preach to me about principles, given the way you went about snagging me in marriage!”

  Beside herself, she gave in to the jealousy and doubt eating holes in her heart. “I’m not the one with a lover waiting in the wings, either.”

  “Oh, for pity’s sake!” He smacked the heel of his hand again his forehead and advanced toward her. “Listen carefully, Gabriella, because I’m going to say this as plainly as I know how, and I’m only going to say it once. There is no other woman.. .not anymore.”

  At his denial, initially so clean and convincing, a huge uprush of hope rose inside her, only to be smashed into oblivion by the squalid little qualification he tacked on at the end.

  “But there was,” she mourned on a fragile breath, the pain of his admission so acute that her words were barely audible. Only a sadist would withdraw the knife from a person’s heart for the pure pleasure of plunging it in more deeply a second time!

  “Yes.” Recognizing the wound he’d inflicted, he caught her hands in his. “But not in the way you think When it came right down to breaking my marriage vows...” He lifted his shoulders in a mystified shrug. “I couldn’t do it.”

  She should have taken comfort wherever it was to be found, but the perverse need to punish herself further made her ask, “Are you saying you’ve never kissed her?”

  He hesitated, his eyes scouring her face, his own ex pression a mixture of regret and amusement. “Oh, I’ve kissed her,” he finally admitted, cupping her face in his hands and bringing his mouth so close to hers that she could almost taste it. “But never like this.”

  She had thought nothing could equal the upheaval he’d created with his earlier kiss, put on for her parents’ ben efit. She had thought nothing could ever erase the dev astation of hearing him concede he’d turned for solace to someone else. But the way he settled his mouth on hers, unprompted by obligation or duty, swept aside all the pre vious hurts. All at once, the sincerity of the here and now were all that counted.

  “You’re a thorn in my side, Gabriella,” he murmured, the words grazing her lips. “I would prefer to ignore you.. .forget I ever met you.. .but even when you’re half a world away, I’m never really free of you.”

  “And you hate me for that,” she whispered without any real conviction.

  ‘.‘You irritate the hell out of me.” His mouth drifted to her jaw and down the side of her neck, stitching expert little kisses between each word.

  “I know,” she sighed, aware in a distant corner of her mind that his hands had strayed down past her waist and were tracing delectable patterns over her hips.

  If she had an ounce of moral fiber, she’d put an end to

  his seduction. What kind of woman settle
d for the Iran sient pleasure of the moment when the past• was riddled with one betrayal after another, and the future too uncer tain to contemplate?

  Yet, what right had she to object, when she herself had thrust aside the open front of his shirt and was conducting an uninvited tour of the planes of his chest? How warm and solid he was; how deeply, dearly familiar!

  He reached behind her to pull down the zipper on her dress. “You infuriate me.”

  “At least I haven’t kissed another man since I married you.” Reaching up, she punished his transgression by nip’. ping lightly at the smooth, tanned skin of his shoulder..

  He let out a faint gasp..

  Annoyance? Pleasure? She thought the latter.

  “You’re never going to let me forget that, are you?” He’d inched her dress off her shoulders. It slithered the length of her body and fell with a rustling sigh around her ankles. She heard the soft click of her bra being undone. A cool draft of night air whispered over her skin except where his hands warmed her bare breasts. “You’re going to blackmail me with it for the rest of my life.”

  “That shouldn’t come as any great surprise. You persist in believing I’m a conniving witch out to trick you at every turn.” Her throat closed over the accusation as he took her nipple in his mouth. Could he tell that each time his tongue circled her flesh, a tiny paroxysm of sensation throbbed deep within her? Did he know she was wet with wanting him?

  “But you did trick me,” he said, dropping to his knees and leaving the damp imjrint of his kisses against the thin silk of her panties. “You told me my baby was in here.”

  She was aching; shuddering all over. Knotting her fin gers in his hair, she pressed her knees together to keep

  herself upright. “I thought it was. My period was late and I panicked.”

  “You let me think other men had touched you—here.”

  Sweet heaven, he had cupped his hand over, the drenched patch of fabric between her legs! He knew how eager she was for him; how incapable of pretending in difference to his encroachment. His fingers were inching inside her panties. Inside her, and moving with such deft purpose, she was about to shatter into a million pieces!