It was the truth. She knew it; he could destroy her life and he would, if she didn't do what he wanted.
"I hate you," she whispered. Tears of rage rose in her eyes and streamed down her face. "I hate you, Slade. I'll always hate you-"
"Hate me," he said, clasping her face between his hands. "I don't give a damn. All I want is my son." He took a breath. "That," he whispered, "and you in my bed, at night."
"No," she said, "Slade, no," but he didn't listen. He kissed her, his mouth bruising hers. Lara groaned, at first with despair and then with self-loathing, as she gave herself up to the kiss.
* * *
CHAPTER EIGHT
SOME women dreamed about their wedding day. Lara wasn't one of them.
She'd never wasted time imagining what it would be like to be a bride. Why would she, when she knew the reality of marriage? Her father's terrifying anger. Her mother's soul-wrenching tears and blind obedience to every command he gave until one summer evening, he'd walked out the door and never returned.
Her sister was living that same life now, as if she'd never learned anything from their mother's misery. Emily was trapped in the same life that had been their mother's, worn out and dependent on a man for her survival.
Lara had vowed none of that would ever happen to her. She'd studied hard and made herself financially independent. She'd filled her life with things she loved, travel and music and books, and when she'd felt a gnawing emptiness inside her, she'd realized it wasn't for a man-what intelligent woman would think it was?
It was for a child of her own. For Michael.
And yet, for all her clever planning, she'd made a terrible mistake.
She'd chosen Slade to be her son's father for reasons that had seemed so logical. His good looks. His obvious health. His intelligence. That he wasn't a man who'd want to hang around and stay in her life had suited her plans, and if he'd excited her in a way no man had ever done... well, that was a bonus.
How stupid she'd been.
Looks. Health. Intelligence. Sex appeal. She'd checked them all off, as if they were items on a shopping list. But
Slade had another quality, one he'd shown when he'd picked her up that day in Denver, one she'd foolishly not considered.
Slade Baron was the most determined man she'd ever met.
When he wanted something, he went after it and to hell with anything that stood in his path.
He wanted Michael. And today he'd come to lay his claim.
Lara had refused to believe it. She'd spent the night telling herself that what had happened in that parking lot had just been a man showing he was stronger than a woman ... until the bell rang, at eight, and she opened the door and saw him standing on the stoop.
"You can't do this to me, Slade," were the first words out of her mouth.
"No, `good morning, Slade.' `Nice to see you, Slade.' Just, `You can't do this to me, Slade."' His tone mocked her. "I've already done it, Sugar." His words turned cold. "Dobbs is expecting us in-" he glanced at his watch "-in just a little over an hour."
"You've spoken with Mr. Dobbs?" The look on his face was all the answer Lara needed, and she felt her despair escalate into fury. "This is my life, damn you. You have no right-"
"I have every right." His eyes gaze raked over her face, paused at her lips, then lifted to meet hers. "Would you like me to prove it?"
Lara stared at him. What did the threat mean? That he'd see her in court? Or that he'd take her in his arms, as he had last night, and make a sham of her pathetic attempt at defiance?
"I hate you," she said, her voice trembling. "Do you hear me, Slade? I hate you! You can play your tin-god games with my life and with my son's, but you can't change the way I feel. I hate you, and I always will."
Something dark and dangerous flashed in his eyes but he spoke with a dispassionate calmness that only frightened her more.
"Are you packed?"
"Packed? No." Lara's heartbeat fluttered. "We didn't discuss-"
"It doesn't matter." He brushed past her. "In fact, I prefer it that way."
"You prefer...?" She rushed after him as he headed toward Michael's room. "He's sleeping. Don't-"
Her breath caught. Michael was clinging to the crib rail,waying unsteadily as he stared, round-eyed, at Slade.
"Hi there," Slade said softly. "Hi, Mike."
"His name is Michael. And he's frightened of strangers.
You can't just-"
But he already had. He'd lifted Michael from the crib. And her son, her beloved, traitorous little boy, gazed solemnly into the face that was an adult version of his, and smiled.
"Hey, Mike," Slade whispered. The baby put a plump hand against his mouth and he kissed it, inhaling baby-sweet scents that were as foreign as they were welcome. He swallowed hard. There was a lump in his throat the size of a tennis ball. My son, he thought. My flesh and blood.
He turned at a muffled sound and saw Lara standing behind him, hand pressed to her lips, eyes wide and bright with tears. She looked like a woman who'd lost everything and, just for an instant, he almost felt sorry for her-but then he thought of what he had lost, the months without knowing he had a son, the years that would have been lost to Michael if he'd grown up without knowing he had a father, and his heart hardened.
"If there's anything here you really want," he said coldly, "get it now."
"I don't-" Her voice trembled. "I don't understand." "And pack whatever my son will need."
"He's my son. Mine, Slade. I planned him. I gave birth to him. I've raised him without any help from you-"
"Do it. And do it quickly. We have a lot to accomplish before one o'clock."
Lara stared at him. "What?"
"The meeting with Dobbs. And, at noon, the wedding-"
"No." Lara shook her head wildly. "No!"
"-and," he said, as if she hadn't spoken, "our plane leaves at one."
"Our plane?" She wrapped her arms around herself, as if that might stop her from trembling. "Slade. Slade, listen to me. You have to be reasonable. I-I have a life here. A home~„
"Your Mrs. Krauss is waiting in a taxi downstairs. She's agreed to take care of my son while you and I see Dobbs, and then the justice of the peace."
"How do you know about her? Have you been spying on me?"
"You can list your house with a rental agent or sell it. You won't be coming back to it."
"You have been spying!"
"I've been collecting information, Sugar. It's easy enough to get, if you really want it."
Lara knew his barbed remark had a second meaning but she ignored it. All she cared about, all that mattered, was regaining control of her life.
"Slade, listen to me. Think about what you're doing. You're asking me to give up everything. My job. My career-"
"I'm not asking you, I'm telling you." He smiled thinly. "You want a career? Well, you have one. You're going to be a mother and a wife, and you'd damned well better do a good job at both."
She shrank back as he strode past her. Slade told himself that was fine. It was the way it should be. Hell, after what she'd done to him, she deserved everything that happened...
But the fear in her eyes, and the despair, made his heart feel heavy as he carried his son away.
* * *
At nine, Lara stood beside Slade in Edwin Dobbs's office. His arm felt like a steel clamp around her shoulders as he explained that they'd fallen deeply in love almost at first sight. She wasn't sure which seemed phonier, the smile on his face or the story he'd invented, and she waited for the Beaufort chairman to laugh.
Instead he smiled.
"I know bankers aren't supposed to admit to being romantics at heart, but I am," Dobbs said. "I must admit, though, I'm stunned."
"So are we," Slade said, tightening his arm around her. Lara knew the gesture looked affectionate but she could feel the warning bite of each finger in her flesh. "Aren't we, darling?"
Did he expect her to help him? No way. Slade had ch
oreographed this show; let him do the dance by himself.
"And you're getting married immediately?" Dobbs laughed, shook his head in pleased disbelief. "When did all this happen?"
"Who knows the exact moment a man and woman fall in love, Edwin?" There was a smile in Slade's voice but the pressure of his arm was still unyielding. "Lara was going to tell you herself but I thought you'd appreciate hearing the news from the both of us."
"Well, that's wonderful for you, Slade," Dobbs said, as if Lara weren't there. He chuckled. "Bad news for me, though. I'm losing a fine executive."
"I'm sorry, Mr. Dobbs," Lara said. "I wish-I wish it were different."
"She means," Slade said briskly, "she wishes she could give you more notice." He looked down at her. "I'm sure Edwin understands, darling."
"If you insist," she said quickly to Dobbs, "I could stay on for a couple of weeks."
"And miss your own honeymoon?"
The chairman laughed. Slade laughed. They both looked at her as if she were feebleminded and she thought, for one awful minute, they'd chuck her under the chin, these two men busily arranging her life as if she had no stake in it.
Nonsense, Dobbs said. She was the model of efficiency. He was sure her assistant could take over with hardly a break in stride.
That seemed to sum it up. What was happening-the fact that her life was spinning out of orbit-didn't seem to matter to anybody but her. Her house was up for sale. Mrs. Krauss was earning a morning's wages. Dobbs would replace one auditor with another. Everybody was satisfied, except her, but what could a marionette do when somebody was pulling its strings?
An hour later, they stood before a justice of the peace who either believed all brides shook through the all-too brief ceremony or simply didn't notice. Mrs. Krauss stood alongside with Michael in her arms. The ceremony took less than five minutes. At the end, when the J.P. said Slade could kiss his bride, Lara stiffened and waited for him to take her in his arms.
Whatever he might expect, she would not kiss him.
That she'd responded to him last night was a sign of weakness, and weakness could be overcome. The bottom line was that sex wasn't going to part of this farce of a marriage, not unless Slade was into rape and she was sure he wasn't. He was everything she despised, and she hated him for what he'd done to her, but she knew he was a man who'd never force a woman into his bed.
He hadn't needed force with her, eighteen months ago. And she, pathetic fool that she was, would pay for that night for the rest of her life.
But Slade didn't touch her. He didn't look at her. He thanked the J.P., shook his hand, clasped Lara's elbow in a gesture so impersonal it was meaningless and led her outside. Two limousines were waiting, one to take Mrs. Krauss to her home, one to take Lara, Slade and Michael to the
airport.
Lara's heart congealed into a hard, cold lump. She grabbed Mrs. Krauss, who looked startled, and hugged her.
"Goodbye," she said, through a veil of tears. Then she stepped into the car that awaited. Slade got in with Michael in his arms. The door slammed shut behind him with an awful finality.
She'd played a dangerous game-she knew that now. She'd won Michael, but she'd lost everything else. Her pride. Her independence. Her freedom.
She wasn't Lara Stevens anymore. She was Slade Baron's bride.
They sat side by side in the first-class compartment of the jet, two strangers with nothing between them but a night of passion.
And a child.
Lara shuddered and drew her son closer in her arms. He was asleep, his dark head against her breast, his teddy bear clutched in his arm. He'd cried the first few minutes of the flight, wrenching sobs the sympathetic flight attendant said were probably the result of the change in pressure on his eardrums. It was a logical explanation and yet Lara's heart told her the baby's tears were for the life they were leaving behind, and for the unknown existence that lay ahead.
Slade had tried to soothe Michael's tears. He'd wanted to take him from her arms but Lara had clung fast.
"I'll hold him," she'd said.
His eyes had darkened and she'd waited for him to insist. But he hadn't. He'd simply opened his briefcase and pulled out a stack of papers. In minutes, she could see that he'd forgotten all about Michael.
Her mouth thinned.
She should have expected as much. It wasn't his son Slade wanted, it was victory. Now that he had it, he'd lost interest-although, just for a moment this morning, when he'd plucked Michael from his crib, she'd thought she'd seen something real and loving in the way he'd looked at the baby.
Real? Loving? From a man who made a point of ensuring she knew that what they'd done-the hours they'd shared in each other's arms-was unimportant?
Lara bit back a sob and pressed her lips to her son's head.
The only thing real about Slade was his arrogance. If he loved anybody, it was himself. He was already losing interest in Michael; with luck, disinterest would change to boredom. And then maybe, just maybe, he'd let his unwanted wife and his trophy son return to their own lives.
Lara eased her seat back, drew the baby closer and wearily shut her eyes.
Until then, she'd have to make the best of things, not for her own sake but for her son's.
Slade stared blindly at the papers strewn over his tray table and wondered what in hell he was supposed to do now.
Make the best of things, not for his sake but for his son's. Well, yeah, he'd already figured out that much. The question was, what about Lara?
Lara, his wife.
It was still almost more than he could take in. He'd flown south Friday, a guy with a dinner appointment and, after that, a weekend in Texas. Well, he'd had his dinner appointment. He'd gone to Texas. And now he was returning home with a wife and a son.
His son.
The words were still so strange. Just thinking them sent a warmth through his blood. He hadn't planned on having a child, certainly not now, maybe not ever. Having a kid was a huge responsibility, one he wasn't sure he'd been cut out to handle. It meant tying yourself to one woman for the rest of your life because, just as he'd told Lara, he'd vowed, long ago, never to repeat his father's mistakes. A man had a son, he owed the kid something. Time and respect. Love and stability. A boy had the right to know he'd come home from school each day to a mother and a father, with no changes in the cast of characters between eight in the morning and the three o'clock bell, the way there had been when he was growing up.
Then he'd taken one look at a sleepy-eyed kid and his whole world had turned upside down. And this morning, when he'd taken that kid in his arms...
Oh, hell.
He had to stop choking up like this or he'd never be able to think straight. And he had to think straight because, even if Lara thought he was a coldhearted, cold-blooded, mean tempered son of a bitch who knew each step he was taking, it wasn't true.
In his heart, he was terrified.
What he'd done this morning was as irrevocable as it was inconceivable.
He had a wife. Her name was Lara. Other than that, he didn't know a damned thing about her. She was good in bed, yeah, but somehow, from the way she was treating him now, as if he were a cross between Count Dracula and the Frankenstein monster, he had the feeling he could forget about that part of their relationship.
Relationship? Slade smothered a groan. He had no relationship with this woman. She'd turned down the flight attendant's offer of lunch. Lobster salad, it had been, and Lara had said no. Was it because she didn't like lobster? Because she never ate lunch?
Or because she hated his guts?
He shot his wife a hooded glance. She was lying back in her seat, Michael clasped in her arms. Her eyes were closed. Was she sleeping, or was she just trying to avoid him?
So many questions, and he had no answers. But that was okay. There'd be plenty of time to learn what made her tick, assuming he wanted to bother. It wasn't really necessary. Two civilized people could live together, go through
the motions of civility, pretend they didn't despise each other, all for the sake of their son...
Except, that wasn't what he wanted from Lara. He hated her for what she'd done, not just getting pregnant deliberately and then not telling him, but for all the rest. The way she'd sighed in his arms, all those months ago. Her whispers. Her caresses. The heat of her skin, the taste of her mouth... It had all been lies. It hadn't been him she'd wanted, it had been what any healthy man could have provided via a test tube.
All the things he'd remembered about making love to her were lies.
Weren't they?
She'd melted in his arms last night. God, the feel of her. The softness. He could have taken her there, in that parking lot, her against the car and him deep inside her, her mouth hot on his, his hands lifting her, holding her to him...
"Flight attendants, please prepare for our descent into Logan Airport. Ladies and gentlemen, the weather in Boston is bright and sunny..."
Bright and sunny, Slade thought, and almost laughed.
He felt Lara's seat come up straight. Michael whimpered and he turned and put out his arms. Lara stared at him.
"Give me my son," he said coldly.
He saw what little color there was drain from her face. Slowly she held the child out. He took him from her, but not before he felt the tremor in her hands.
She was afraid.
Good, he thought coldly. That was just the way he wanted her. Afraid. Terrified. Because, dammit, that was exactly
what he was. Scared to within an inch of his life. The only difference was, Lara would never know it.
He'd left his car parked at the airport.
Fitting a woman, a baby, a baby seat, assorted luggage and a bag stuffed with diapers, toys, cans of juice and boxes of crackers inside his Jag wasn't easy. Lara stood holding Michael, saying nothing while he packed things away and installed the baby seat, but Slade had the feeling she was laughing at him.
Sandra Marton - Slade Baron’s Bride Page 11