A Child Claimed by Gold

by Rachael Thomas

  Before he could say anything which might stop the flow of words from her, she continued. Whatever he thought, this was something that had to be told. She couldn’t spend the rest of her life, whether living with Nikolai or not, worried that she might be classed as an unfit mother and her child taken from her. She knew what it felt like to be that child.

  ‘We were taken into care because my mother couldn’t look after us. She’d rather have cuddled a bottle of something strong and alcoholic than hold my sister, and certainly hadn’t worried about me.’

  She looked directly at the passing buildings, into the mass of stone and windows that created a maze that ordinarily she’d long to explore. Now it was just something to look at. She couldn’t look at Nikolai, didn’t want to see the disapproval on his face. All she wanted was the promise that, no matter what happened between them, she could be a mother to her child.

  ‘Do you really think I would keep a mother and child apart?’ The stinging anger in his voice forced her to turn and look at him, and his dark eyes sparked with annoyance, heightening her own sense of anxiety.

  ‘You made it virtually impossible for me to refuse the marriage deal.’ Had he forgotten how he’d dominated that discussion?

  ‘You were the one who quickly accepted the suggestion of funds for your sister.’

  ‘It wasn’t exactly a suggestion, Nikolai. It was more of a demand. It probably even comes much closer to blackmail.’ She should tell him about her father, about the fear and rejection she’d grown up with.

  Darkness clouded his eyes, as if the spring sun had slipped behind a cloud. ‘It was not a demand and most certainly not blackmail. What kind of man do you think I am that I need to use such underhanded tactics?’

  Defiantly she looked up into the icy blackness of his eyes. Her heart was pounding in her chest but she knew this had to be dealt with before they married. She didn’t want to enter into a marriage, even a loveless one, with unresolved issues such as these. She couldn’t live with that uncertainty hanging over her.

  ‘I don’t know, Nikolai. You have made it clear marriage isn’t something you want to enter into freely, and yet you insist your mother lives under the illusion that we are in love. What kind of man does that make you?’

  ‘I want only the best for my child. That’s what kind of man I am.’

  * * *

  The boat bumped against the pier and Nikolai looked at Emma, wondering just what kind of monster she thought he was. Did she really believe he would separate her and their child, after all he’d told her about his childhood? Anger rushed through him and he couldn’t look at her any more, couldn’t take the accusation in her eyes.

  Had he made a mistake, insisting on marriage? He couldn’t walk away from his child, but none of this felt right.

  No, it had to be this way. It was the only way he could prove he was not like his father, that despite the genes inside him he had his mother’s goodness, he could be a good father. He wanted his son or daughter’s childhood to be very different from what he’d known—and from what Emma had known, if what she’d told him was anything to go by.

  ‘Do you really believe a loveless marriage is the way to achieve that?’ she demanded hotly.

  Her question caught him off guard and neither of them moved, despite the need to leave the boat. That word again. Why did love have to come into everything?

  ‘Our marriage will achieve that precisely because it won’t be swallowed up by nonsense such as love.’ The hardness of his tone shocked her; he could see it in her eyes, feel it radiating off her.

  ‘And what if one of us falls in love?’ Her bold question challenged him from every side. Nikolai’s suspicion about the ever-helpful Richard increased.

  ‘If what you told me before is true, that will not happen. Neither of us believe in love—unless of course you are already in love with another man?’ Again that irrational jealousy seeped into him as he thought of how happy she’d been talking to Richard on the phone. How she’d smiled and laughed.

  ‘How can I love another man when I have known only you?’ The hurt in her voice was clear, but his rational sense had jumped ship, replacing it with intense jealousy for a man he hadn’t even met. A man who could make his fiancée smile so brightly that happiness danced in her eyes.

  ‘Do you love Richard?’ He couldn’t think clearly, and didn’t even register her words properly, but fired the question at her. She gasped in shock and stepped back from him.

  ‘You think I am in love with Richard?’

  ‘Why is that so implausible?’ Impatience filled him at her act of innocence. She’d used that act once before.

  ‘Because he’s a friend. But I’ll be honest with you—it hurts like hell to feel anything for someone who feels nothing for you. But you wouldn’t know what that’s like, would you, Nikolai?’

  Before he had a chance to ask more, she left him standing on the deck and he watched as she disembarked and strode away from him. What the hell had all that meant?

  CHAPTER TEN

  EMMA HAD TRIED to keep alive the flicker of hope that things had changed between them after returning from their engagement party. Nikolai had avoided the painful discussion they’d had that night, but had played to perfection the role of adoring fiancé. Yesterday on the boat had doused that hope and now the ever-increasing nausea was making everything so much more difficult to deal with.

  ‘I’ve cleared the diary for today,’ he said as he strode across the room to stand looking, brooding, out over the park and the vastness of New York beyond. His withdrawal from her made her feel insignificant and rejected, feeding into her childhood insecurities which were growing by the day.

  ‘You did that yesterday; please don’t feel you have to do it again.’ A wave of nausea washed over her. She pressed her hand against her forehead, her elbow on her lap, and curled over as a sharp pain shot through her. She didn’t feel well enough to do anything this morning, least of all play happy bride-to-be with Nikolai.

  Was it the strain of everything: the way he’d manipulated the whole marriage deal, using the one thing she wouldn’t wish upon any child, least of all her own? Another cramp caused her to take in a sharp breath and she bit down against the pain. There was something wrong. Very wrong. Panic rushed through her like a river breaking over a waterfall. She wanted this baby so much, with or without Nikolai’s support, but what was happening to her? What had she done wrong?

  ‘Nikolai,’ she said, her voice shaky. ‘The baby. Something’s wrong.’

  She closed her eyes against another wave of nausea and tried to fight back the tears—not just tears of pain, but tears of fear for her baby. She couldn’t take it if something happened. What if she lost her baby? In the back of her mind, as the fog of pain increased, the thought that it was exactly what Nikolai would want rampaged round like a wild animal, making her angry and more panicked.

  ‘Emma.’ Nikolai’s stern voice snapped her back from that fog and she looked up at him as he stood over her, phone in hand. His brows were snapped together in worry and his face set hard in stern lines. ‘I’m taking you to the hospital.’

  A tear slid down her cheek as relief washed over her. He was in control. But could he stop what was happening, what she feared was the worst thing possible? As another pain stabbed at her stomach she closed her eyes and the need to give in to the blackness rushing around her was too much. Would that be the best thing to do for the baby? Further questions were silenced as she let go and did exactly that.

  When she opened her eyes again she knew she was in hospital and panic charged over her like a herd of wild, stampeding horses. She tried to sit up, but Nikolai’s hand pressed into her shoulder, preventing her from doing so. ‘It’s okay. Lie still.’

  His voice was soothing and commanding without any of the panic she felt, but still she tried to get up. She wanted answers, wanted to know what was happening to her and her baby.

  ‘My baby?’

  He leant over her, forcing her
to look into his face, his eyes. She smelt his aftershave, felt the warmth of his hand on her shoulder, and relished the calm control he had. ‘The baby is fine. You are fine. So please, just relax. Stress won’t help you or the baby at all.’

  ‘Thank goodness.’ She breathed and closed her eyes as relief washed over her.

  What would she have done if she had lost the baby? A terrible thought entered her mind, slipping in like an unwanted viper. If this had happened just a week later, and it had had the most unthinkable consequences, she and Nikolai would have been married. What would he have done then, married to a woman who no longer carried the child he’d made a deal for?

  ‘You have been doing too much,’ he said sternly. ‘Rest is what you need.’

  ‘Maybe we should call off the wedding.’ She couldn’t look at him, couldn’t bear to see the truth in his eyes. She’d been rejected by her father before he’d even seen her and then again as a teenager. For him marriage and fatherhood wasn’t what he’d wanted in life and she knew it was the same for Nikolai; he’d made that more than clear. She couldn’t trap him into something he didn’t want but neither could she deny her baby the chance of knowing its father. A heart-wrenching decision, born out of the panic of the moment, grew in her mind. Who should she be true to—her child or herself?

  ‘If the doctor agrees you are well and can come home, that will not happen.’ There wasn’t a drop of gentleness in his voice. The man who’d become more gentle and loving each night had gone and the cold, hard man who’d walked out on her in Vladimir was back.

  ‘But this isn’t what you want.’ She hated the pain that sounded in her voice, hated the way she still clung to the hope he could one day love her.

  ‘What we want is irrelevant.’ He looked down at her, his dark eyes narrowed with irritation. ‘It’s what is best for the child, Emma. We will be married.’

  * * *

  Nikolai fought hard against the invading emotions as he helped Emma to sit up. This was more than the physical pull of sexual attraction that had surrounded them since the day they’d first met in Vladimir. This was something he’d never known before. Something he’d been running from since the night he’d made her his.

  He cared, really cared, not just about the child who was his heir but about the woman he’d created that child with. When had that happened? When had lust and sexual desire crossed the divide and become something deeper, something much more powerful than passion?

  He had no idea when, but all he knew was that it had happened. He looked down at Emma, her face full of uncertainty, and knew without doubt that he cared for her. And it scared the hell out of him. Caring caused pain.

  ‘We will take Emma for a scan now.’ The nurse’s voice snapped him back from that daunting revelation. A scan? Would he be able to see his child? Now?

  ‘Is there something wrong?’ The quiver in Emma’s voice reached into his heart and pulled at it, making him want to hold her hand, give her reassurance. Making him want to love her. But how could he do that when he didn’t know how to deal with the emotions that were taking over? Or even exactly what they were?

  ‘Is there?’ he demanded of the nurse.

  ‘Everything is fine,’ she said with the kind of smile meant to dispel any doubts. ‘We just want to reassure both of you.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Emma’s reply called his attention back to her and he looked down at her, noticing, as he had done several times in recent days, how pale she was. Should he have done something sooner? Guilt ploughed into him. He’d pushed her too hard, not taken enough interest to see how tired she’d become. He’d risked his baby.

  His baby.

  Those two words crashed into him and for a moment he couldn’t draw a breath. Then he felt Emma’s hand on his arm, the sympathetic touch almost too much. He didn’t deserve that from her.

  A short time later, and with no recollection of how he’d got there, he was in a small room with Emma. She lay on the bed, the soft skin of her stomach exposed as the nurse pressed the scanner probe against her. He noticed her hand was clenched as it held her top out of the way, as if she feared the worst. He watched as the nurse moved the probe, trying to get a clear image on the screen. He wouldn’t have been able to tell Emma was pregnant with his child, her stomach was flat, but the first image filled the screen and he knew the machine didn’t lie.

  In his mind he tried to add up how many weeks’ pregnant she was. How many weeks was it since they’d had the most amazing night which had had such far-reaching consequences. Before he could work it out, the nurse’s voice broke through his thoughts.

  ‘There we are. Baby at ten weeks.’

  He looked at the screen, not able to take his eyes from it. The fuzzy image had a dark centre and in that darkness was his baby. Small, but unmistakable. He couldn’t move, couldn’t do anything but stare at it.

  A tense silence filled the room as the nurse continued to move the scanner around, losing the image briefly. He couldn’t look at Emma, couldn’t take his attention away from the screen that showed him the secret of his baby.

  ‘And everything appears normal,’ the nurse added as she paused once more, showing an even clearer image. ‘See it moving and its heart beating?’

  Fierce protectiveness rose up in him like a rearing horse and he knew in that tension-filled moment he would do absolutely anything for his baby. He would go to the ends of the earth for him or her. It would want for nothing and he would love it unconditionally.

  Love.

  Could he love it? Could he give it the one thing his father had never given him? The one thing which terrified him?

  Finally he looked at Emma as she watched the screen, a small tear slipping down her cheek. Did he love her? What was the powerful sensation of crushing around his chest and the lightness in his stomach each time he saw her or thought of her? Was it love? Had he fallen in love with a woman who could never love him? A woman whose heart was already elsewhere?

  * * *

  Emma looked at the screen and tears began to slide down her cheeks. They were in part tears of happiness: her baby was well. She’d seen it move, seen its little heart beating. But those tears of happiness mingled with tears of pain. Nikolai had been silent throughout. He hadn’t uttered a word, had barely moved, and she could no longer look at him. Was he now seeing the reality of the deal he’d made?

  She glanced up at him now as the nurse completed the scan and then left them alone. No doubt she thought she was giving them private time to be happy together, but then she didn’t know the truth.

  The truth was that Nikolai didn’t want this baby. He’d stood stiffly by her side, his hard gaze fixed rigidly on the screen as the first images of their child had appeared. Now he couldn’t move, couldn’t look her in the eye.

  The elation that filled her from seeing the baby, from knowing it was well, cooled as the tension in the room grew to ominous levels and she wished the nurse hadn’t left. At least then she might have been able to avoid the truth.

  ‘You must rest,’ Nikolai said, his voice deeper and more commanding than she’d ever known it. Was he blaming her? Was he even now thinking she was as uncaring as her mother had been?

  ‘I—I think we should at least postpone the wedding.’ She stumbled over her words as his fiercely intense gaze locked with hers. If she could get him to agree to postpone it then it would give them both time to decide if it really was the right thing to do. She loved him but couldn’t marry him, tie him to her, if there was never going to be a chance that he would one day feel the same for her.

  ‘No, but you won’t need to worry about anything. I will arrange for your final dress fittings to be at the apartment.’

  He moved away as she sat up and slipped off the bed, but she felt more exposed than she had that morning she’d first woken in his bed. It was as if he knew everything about her. She knew he didn’t, knew that she still guarded her fear of rejection—his rejection. Her father had rejected her. Richard had too, just by refusing t
o see her as anything other than a friend, and the last thing she wanted was to be rejected by the father of her baby, the man she’d fallen in love with.

  ‘I’m not sure marriage is the right thing for us at the moment.’ It was like standing on the shore, allowing the waves to wash over her toes, each wave taking her deeper into the conversation until it was swim or allow the depths to swallow her up.

  His eyes narrowed. ‘Why?’

  ‘It doesn’t feel right, Nikolai.’

  ‘We made a deal, Emma.’ The uncompromising hardness of his voice shocked her.

  ‘It’s almost as if you’ve bought me, bought the baby.’

  ‘You agreed to the deal, Emma, and if my memory serves me right held out for just that little bit more. Not content with securing yours and the baby’s future, you also wanted to secure your sister’s.’

  ‘But this isn’t right. We don’t love each other.’ The plea in her voice must have reached him somehow because he moved closer to her and she waited with bated breath to see what he was going to do or say.

  ‘Love isn’t always needed, Emma.’ He touched her cheek, brushing his fingers across her skin so softly she could almost imagine he cared. ‘Sometimes passion and desire is a better base on which to build a marriage and we’ve proved many times that exists between us.’

  ‘But that’s not love, Nikolai.’ She drew in a shuddering breath as he moved even closer. Why couldn’t he just admit he didn’t love her, that he would never feel that for her?

  ‘I don’t care what it is, we made our deal with it.’

  ‘But will it be enough?’ She stepped away from him, wanting to get out of this dimly lit room and away from the sudden intensity in his eyes.

  * * *

  Nikolai looked at Emma as she tried to evade him. Was she that desperate to get away from him? Was he doing the right thing, insisting the marriage deal went ahead?

  ‘For me, yes.’ There was no way he was going to reveal the depths of the emotions seeing his baby had unlocked. He wanted to protect his child, always be there for it. He also wanted to do the same for Emma, but after the call from Richard he doubted Emma felt the same way.