“Valentin, you’re driving me crazy.”
“You want me to stop?”
“No, don’t stop. Whatever you do, don’t stop.” She heard him laugh and lifted her head to look at him. His eyes had darkened to indigo and they shimmered with desire and love and just a sprinkling of mischief. Oh, how she loved this man. Loved how he made her feel, loved what he did to her. “Please, don’t stop,” she reiterated in a voice that could barely be heard.
Without taking his gaze from hers, he lowered his mouth to her and she gasped as he flicked his tongue against her sensitive bud. “Like this?” he asked.
“Like that,” she managed.
“Or maybe more like this?” he asked before closing his mouth around her and sucking gently and rhythmically at her.
Her eyes closed involuntarily, her head fell back on the cushions, as sensation overtook her body and she climbed to the apex of pleasure and then tipped over into the abyss, her body lifting on the waves of pleasure that threatened to rob her very consciousness. When the pleasure began to slowly seep away, she felt him move again, heard the sound of him opening a condom packet and covering himself. Then she felt the blunt tip of his penis pressing into her swollen slick flesh, felt herself stretch and mold to accommodate him. She lifted legs that felt weak, like jelly, and buried her heels into his buttocks, lifting her hips and letting him slide deeper inside her. She groaned on a new wave of pleasure as he pressed against her.
“And like that,” she said on a moan. “Just like that.”
Valentin kissed her deeply, his tongue sweeping her mouth as his hips began to move, at first slowly, then more quickly as the momentum of their joining overtook them both.
“I can’t hold back,” he groaned against his mouth.
“I don’t want you to,” she replied, her hands tightening on his shoulders as she began to feel her second orgasm build deep inside her. Different from before. Stronger, deeper.
She felt his body surge, then surge again. A cry tore from his throat as his entire body tensed and shook and pulsed with the power of his climax. And as he shuddered against her she went over the edge again, soaring on a physical joy so intense, so incomprehensible in its strength, that she knew she was bonded to Valentin forever.
Fourteen
Tonight they were joining Alice Horvath for dinner. Imogene was a little worried about how it would go. Valentin had been very annoyed at being manipulated by his grandmother into their marriage, but Imogene had to admit, even though she’d been angry at first herself and while they’d had a rocky time of it, they were working things out. It was something they’d never have done on their own. And the longer Imogene was with Valentin, the more she knew he was the only man for her. She only wished she could be 100 percent certain he felt the same way.
He said and did all the right things—she knew he’d had meetings with his legal team and Human Resources regarding the situation with Carla—but as far as she knew, the woman was still very firmly entrenched in his day-to-day life. And after that stunt when Carla had come to Imogene’s office, Imogene didn’t trust her one little bit. With a sigh of resignation, she turned away from the walk-in closet, two dresses in her hands.
“Which one?” she asked Valentin, holding them both up for his perusal.
One was the purple dress she’d worn to his office the night they’d made love there, the other, something new she’d spied on a rare shopping trip with her mother the other day. Valentin nodded toward the new dress.
“That greeny-colored one. I like what it does to your eyes.”
She laughed. “You haven’t seen it on, so how do you know what it does to my eyes?”
“Trust me, I’m a man. I know these things,” he said calmly before kissing her firmly on the lips. “By the way, I wanted to tell you that we had a meeting at work today. My legal team and a representative from HR and me, together with Carla and her legal representative. She has accepted a very healthy severance package and will be leaving Horvath Pharmaceuticals immediately. I thought you would want to know that everything’s been taken care of.”
Emotion threatened to overwhelm her. He’d done it. For her. For them. “Oh, Valentin, I don’t know what to say.”
“‘Thank you’ will suffice. And maybe a kiss to embellish your thanks?” he suggested with a wry smile.
She did both, tossing both dresses on the bed and rushing across the room to jump at him.
“Thank you,” she said again as they drew apart.
“I’m sorry it took me so long. Maybe now we can carry on with a clean slate, yes?”
“Yes, I’d like that,” Imogene replied vehemently.
“Good, then let’s finish getting ready. If there’s one thing my grandmother can’t stand it’s a lack of punctuality.”
He went through to the bathroom and Imogene recovered her dresses from the bed, holding each one in front of her in turn, as she stood opposite the full-length mirror. He was right, she realized. The teal gown did make her eyes sparkle and glow. Or maybe it was just him, she thought as she hung the purple dress back in the closet. It had been two weeks since that night he’d come to her office. Two weeks of the kind of marriage she’d always wanted with him. Two weeks filled with hope and love and plans for a future she’d begun to think she’d never achieve. And now she knew her hope hadn’t been misplaced. Without the shadow of Carla in their lives, she knew they would make it.
When they got to the restaurant at the Waldorf, Alice was already seated at their table. As they approached, she rose from her chair, offering her cheek first to her grandson and then to Imogene.
“You two look happy,” she said with a genuine smile.
“We are,” Imogene said as Valentin helped his grandmother to be seated again. “But it remains a work in progress.”
“Marriage is always a work in progress. It never stops being one, nor should it,” Alice said sagely before focusing her attention on Valentin. “You look better, my boy. Less strained.”
“Thank you, Nagy. And you look as beautiful as ever.”
His grandmother blushed at the compliment but Imogene noticed Alice wasn’t looking quite as well as she had nearly three months ago.
They turned their conversation to more general things, Valentin’s brother, Galen, included.
“He’s coping better with fatherhood than I expected,” Alice admitted after taking a sip of the champagne she’d ordered for the table. “Ellie is a charming child. Missing her parents, obviously, but she loves Galen. She has a fear, though, that he’ll be taken from her unexpectedly, like her parents were.”
“Understandable, I suppose,” Valentin said. “No one could have predicted her losing both of them like that.”
“Yes, but Galen’s taking it seriously. He’s asked me to find him a wife. One who wants a ready-made family.”
Imogene looked as her husband sat back and stared at his grandmother in shock. “A wife? Oh, no, not Galen. Not through Match Made in Marriage anyway.”
“And why not?” Alice bristled visibly, bright spots of color rising to her cheeks.
“Not for Galen. Not with everything else he’s dealing with. You have to admit, both your pairings for family members didn’t start out so well.”
Imogene knew he was referring to his cousin Ilya’s rocky start to marriage with his business rival Yasmin Carter. Yasmin had left her husband early on in the marriage, but they’d worked things out in the end and had appeared to be very much in love at her and Valentin’s ceremony. But she knew Valentin had a point and she watched as Alice’s expression set in stone, much as it probably did back in the days when she ran the entire Horvath Corporation—an iron hand in a velvet glove, she’d heard it described as—and no one had dared go against her.
* * *
Alice looked at her grandson. “Are you saying the two of you are in crisis?”
She watched as Valentin and Imogene exchanged a glance.
“It hasn’t been smooth sailing.”
She sniffed audibly. “As I said before, marriage is a constant work in progress. Are you two giving up?”
“No, definitely not,” Valentin hastened to assure her.
“Then why should Galen not find his perfect match?” she pressed, irritated beyond belief that Valentin had the gall to suggest she not find Galen’s future bride.
The all-too-familiar pain in her chest asserted itself again. She didn’t have time for this now, she thought angrily, and she was equally annoyed that this dinner, which was supposed to be a happy celebration, had started on the wrong foot.
“I just don’t think Match Made in Marriage is the right vehicle for Galen to find long-term happiness,” Valentin said, sticking to his guns as he always had, even as a child.
“Well, it’s a good thing he feels differently. I’m already screening our database for a suitable applicant. Now,” she said, indicating an end to the subject, “let’s concentrate on the purpose of this evening.”
“And that is?” Valentin asked with one of his disdainful looks down his perfectly straight nose.
A nose that had looked equally handsome on the dear face of her late husband, Eduard. It was moments like this, when she caught glimpses of her late husband in the wonderfully large and growing family they’d created, that she missed him so very, very much. The niggle in her chest grew a little tighter.
“To celebrate your impending three-month milestone, of course. Unless you’ve come here tonight to tell me you’re separating at that juncture?”
She gave them both her most supercilious stare, daring them to refute the evidence she’d seen with her own eyes as they’d entered the restaurant together. She’d observed the solicitous way Valentin had taken his wife’s coat. Watched as his hand had lingered on her shoulder and how Imogene had smiled at him, her eyes never leaving his for a moment. This was not a couple on the verge of separating.
“Of course not, Mrs. Horvath,” Imogene hastened to assure her.
“Imogene, call me Alice or Nagy. We’re family now,” she instructed her granddaughter-in-law with a benevolent smile. “So, we’re celebrating, yes?”
To her great relief, the two of them exchanged another of their deep and meaningful glances, then both nodded. The sensation in her chest eased a little, allowing her to draw in a deeper breath.
“Good,” she said. “Then I propose a toast. To Imogene and Valentin and their long and happy and, dare I say it, fruitful marriage.”
“Well, isn’t all this just darling?”
Alice stopped midsip as another woman came to stand by their table. She looked up at the petite creature. Pretty enough, but with a hardness about her face that was distinctly off-putting. And there was something else about her, an energy that bordered on frenzy. Whatever it was, it made her feel very uncomfortable. Alice glanced across the table to see whether Valentin or Imogene had any inkling as to who the creature was. Imogene’s features had frozen into a mask of disbelief while Valentin looked angrier than she’d ever seen him.
“I’m sorry,” Alice said, when the others failed to speak. “You have me at a disadvantage. I’m Alice Horvath, and you are?”
“Carla Rogers,” the other woman said. “Ask Valentin, he knows me. Well.”
“Carla, please leave. This is a private family function,” Valentin said sternly. “We said all we needed to say in the meeting today.”
“You may have. However, there is one little detail I think your wife ought to know,” Carla said firmly. Then, placing the palm of one hand over her lower belly, she looked at Imogene. “Please, do the right thing. His child deserves to know its father, not be banished into oblivion.”
The pain in Alice’s chest increased tenfold as the dreadful woman’s words sank in. Valentin’s child? With this creature?
Imogene rose abruptly to her feet, her chair toppling behind her as she did so. “No,” she said in a voice that shook with horror and emotion. She turned to Valentin, who looked equally shocked. “She’s pregnant? With your baby? So this is how you take care of things? I believed you when you said it was over. I won’t stand for this. It’s the final straw. I can’t stay in a marriage riddled with lies!”
“She’s the one lying, Imogene. I told you the truth.” Valentin rose also and reached for his wife, but she was already moving out of range.
Alice stood, too, her legs unsteady and her breathing becoming more and more difficult as the pressure in her chest built.
“Imogene, please, wait.” Alice caught Imogene’s arm as she made to brush past, halting her in her tracks. She then directed her attention to the interloper. “And you, Ms. Rogers, leave us this instant. You’re not welcome here.”
That was all she managed before the pain became overwhelming. She could no longer draw a breath and the faces in front of her began to swim and blur before disappearing altogether as she collapsed slowly to the restaurant floor.
* * *
Imogene did her best to catch Alice as she crumpled, but caught unawares, she could do little but break her fall. She looked back as she heard Valentin cry out, “Nagy!”
He moved quickly to his grandmother’s side. Imogene remained rooted where she was, recognizing instantly that her husband’s beloved grandmother was possibly dying of a heart attack before his very eyes. Valentin looked up at Carla, who stood to one side, staring at the tableau before her with a strangely blank expression on her face.
“Carla, I need your assistance. I’ll do compressions and you breathe for her,” he said abruptly.
Without looking to see if Carla had followed his directive, he straightened Alice on the restaurant floor, checking her vital signs as he did so. Then he began compressions, at the same time looking up for Carla. It was only logical that he would, Imogene told herself. Carla was a doctor after all. They’d worked together in the ER in Africa. They were experienced with this high-need urgent-action situation. But Carla turned her back on them all and started toward the door. Imogene moved to intercept her.
“Help him,” she urged. “He needs you.”
“He doesn’t need me. He chose you,” she said bitterly and continued walking.
“You’re a doctor. You can’t just walk away!” Imogene cried out to Carla’s retreating back.
Carla looked over her shoulder. “Watch me,” she said coldly and continued for the door.
Imogene looked back at Valentin, who kept up compressions on Alice’s tiny frail chest, keeping her heart beating for her when it had given up on itself. There was no time for hesitation. She pushed through the growing crowd that had formed around them and knelt on the floor opposite Valentin.
“I’ve done CPR training, but only ever on a dummy,” she said with a faint tremor in her voice. “Tell me exactly what you need me to do.”
Without breaking his rhythm on his grandmother’s chest, he gave Imogene clear instructions.
“Where’s Carla? I asked for her help,” he said, briefly looking up and around to see where she was.
“I saw her walk out the restaurant soon after Alice collapsed,” Imogene said between breaths. “It doesn’t matter. You don’t need her here.”
Imogene forced back the instinctive sense of being second choice in her husband’s life. The woman might be carrying his baby, but she wasn’t here for him when he needed her most.
They worked in tandem until a commotion behind them announced the arrival of an emergency team. Valentin gave the details to the lead paramedic and only sat back as the highly trained EMTs, armed with a defibrillator, took over. He didn’t relax until he heard the magic words. “We’ve got a pulse.”
Imogene went to Valentin’s side. Despite everything, she still wanted to comfort him. “She’s going to be okay, Valentin.”
“I ca
n’t lose her. Not because of this,” he said brokenly as the paramedics began transferring Alice to a gurney.
“You won’t. Go now. Go with her.”
Even though the paramedics were beginning to wheel Alice away, he hesitated, his hands grasping Imogene’s. He looked feverishly into her eyes. “Imogene, Carla was lying. She’s not carrying my baby. It’s impossible. I promise you.”
“It’s not important now.”
“It is important that you believe me. Please, say you’ll wait for me, that you won’t do anything rash until we’ve spoken properly.”
“I won’t go anywhere. Not yet.”
“Sir, are you coming with us in the ambulance?” one of the emergency team asked.
“Yes, I’m a doctor. I’ll travel with my grandmother.” He turned back to Imogene one more time. “Please, wait for me,” he pleaded before pressing an urgent kiss against her lips and then moving quickly through the restaurant to follow the gurney.
Imogene stood there, oblivious to the people milling around her asking her if she was okay. She finally sat down in a vacant chair at what had been their table and began to shake as the reality of what had just happened sank in. Carla’s arrival. Her bald statement. Alice’s heart attack. Working with Valentin to save her life. It was all too much.
“Ma’am, can we assist you with a ride home?” the restaurant manager asked. “Or perhaps to the hospital?”
“I...I’m not sure where they’re taking her, to be honest. But, yes, our driver can be reached at this number.”
She fumbled in her bag for a card and gave it to the manager.
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