Harlequin Presents--June 2021--Box Set 1 of 2

by Dani Collins

  He told himself it was better that he return to his mostly solitary life before he couldn’t face it without feeling like a limb had been amputated, but that was exactly how it felt. From the moment he installed her in his penthouse in Shanghai and left for New York, the pit of his gut became heavy with dread. He moved through his days as though walking through gelatin.

  He hadn’t started his medication. That was the problem. It had some unpleasant side effects, so he had done what he had scolded Ivy for doing. He had put up with a few more days of feeling worked up and overloaded with apprehension and self-doubt, suffered a little longer and a little longer, hoping it would go away.

  Once the wedding had been behind them, his symptoms had evened out into something he thought he could handle, but he was missing the hell out of her now.

  He was a grown man, far beyond the age where he should be suffering terminal homesickness and missing a wife he’d only had for ten weeks.

  He didn’t want to feel this tearing need to be in two places. It was impossible. Painful. It wasn’t as though his responsibilities away from her were unimportant. Given the proposed expansion into aeronautics, there was only so much he could delegate. Much of the decision making rested on him.

  This sense of dependence on her was an additional stressor. This was why he hadn’t wanted a wife and child. They were people he had to worry about, but also people he had to worry about being without.

  Wrapped around all this was the knowledge that he wouldn’t feel this resentment and irritation, wouldn’t be brooding this hard when he ought to be paying attention in a meeting, if he had started taking his damned pills when they were prescribed to him.

  “Sir.” His assistant tapped his shoulder and showed him his phone with an incoming call from Ivy. He had tried her earlier, before this presentation, but her assistant had said she was lying down.

  “I have to take this,” he said, rising and swiping to accept the call as he left the boardroom.

  “I’m sorry I missed you earlier,” she said, sounding tired. “I feel silly for calling, but I promised I would tell you if I wasn’t feeling well. I don’t.”

  “What’s wrong? Have you called the midwife?”

  “She’s here now. She said my blood pressure is up a bit, which is weird because I was reading a book, not doing anything strenuous. She’s not worried worried, but she wants me to go to the clinic for a few tests as a precaution. I have a headache, too. I think I picked up a bug. I don’t mean to worry you. I just wanted you to know.”

  “Do you want me to come home?”

  “No. I’m sure it’s fine. I just wanted you to know.”

  “Ivy.” Everything in him had gone very still. “What do you need from me right now? Be honest.”

  There was such a long pause, he almost spoke her name again to be sure the call hadn’t dropped. Then he heard her ask, very quietly, “Will you please come home?”

  His heart flipped over in his chest, and his mouth went dry.

  “I will,” he said unsteadily, instantly repeating to himself the lies she had served him. He was sure it was fine. “I’ll text once I’m in the air. You text as soon as you have news.”

  “I feel like I’m making a fuss over nothing. You really don’t mind?”

  “I really don’t.” In one way, he was glad for the excuse to go to her, but it was the worst possible reason. Asking for him was killing her, he could tell. She would only do it if, deep down, she truly felt something was wrong. “I’ll see you soon.”

  “Okay. Thank you.” She sounded subdued, not like herself at all.

  He ended the call and reentered the board room long enough to excuse himself from the rest of the week’s meetings and presentations. He could see the faces twisting with annoyance over the delay, but he turned his back on it, discovering he cared very little what they thought of his departure.

  Two hours later he was in his private jet, reaching cruising altitude. He texted Ivy to let her know.

  She texted back.

  They think it’s preeclampsia.

  He looked up the term, read for fifteen minutes, then went to his stateroom and cracked the childproof cap on his prescription.

  CHAPTER TEN

  BED REST.

  It could be worse—that was what Ivy kept telling herself. It was a mild case of preeclampsia, so she wasn’t hospitalized, but she was only allowed to move from her bed to the sofa or a lounger on the terrace. She had to lie on her side and drink a million glasses of water and give samples to the midwife so often, she felt like a pincushion. She was scheduled for an ultrasound every week and had to wear a fetal heart rate monitor at different times to reassure everyone that things were not escalating.

  Two weeks in, so far so good, but Ivy had to work at not stressing out over what “escalating” would mean: early delivery. They were already talking about inducing labor at thirty-four weeks. She had crossed into thirty today. Every minute was a slightly better chance for their baby, so she was doing everything she could to buy them that time.

  Which meant four more weeks of watching mindless sitcoms and reading all the romance novels she had saved to her e-reader over the last several years. She’d been trying to find time to conquer her digital to-be-read pile, but it was hard to concentrate. Every day her father offered to leap on a plane, but for what purpose? So he could pace the house restlessly the way her husband was doing? Setting her nerves on edge?

  It wouldn’t be so bad if she could occupy herself with continuing to shop for nursery items, but she didn’t want to tempt fate.

  Maybe Jun Li felt the same. She wouldn’t know because he didn’t want to talk about the baby. Or even to the baby. Yesterday, he had caught her singing to her bump. She had asked him if he wanted to join in or tell the baby what a silly mom it had.

  He had stiffened and dismissed the suggestion very quickly, saying he had a call to return. When she had asked him about work later, he said, “What call? Oh. It was fine.”

  There hadn’t been a call. She was sure of it. Why would he lie? In so many ways, he was the height of attentiveness, but there was this wall between them, one that had arrived with her diagnosis. When she had been traveling with him, she’d thought they were falling in love. Now, she wondered if he felt anything toward her at all.

  Brooding, she told him she was going to nap.

  He came up a little while later to check on her, found her awake and reading, so he fetched his laptop.

  “Just go to work,” she blurted, unable to deal with his mixed signals any longer.

  “I am working,” he claimed, but he set aside the laptop and rose from the chair to look out the window.

  He wasn’t working effectively or efficiently or even literally now that she’d spoken to him. She could tell he was agitated. He wasn’t sleeping any better than she was, and she saw him chew an antacid several times a day.

  “I’m glad you aren’t traveling, but you could at least go in to your office. It’s only a couple of hours back if you need to come home. I’ll move to the penthouse if you want.”

  “The midwife and clinic are closer to this house. You need to be here, and I’m managing well enough working remotely. Quit trying to solve a problem that doesn’t exist.”

  “I am a problem that exists, and I feel guilty about it,” she muttered, plumping the pillow beneath her cheek.

  “Why? Did you do something to make this happen?”

  “No.” She hated when he logicked her out of a perfectly good sulk. “But there’s nothing that either of us can do. Your hovering doesn’t change anything, so you should go to work.”

  “Ivy.” He came to stand over her, hands hooked on his hips. “I am a grown man who makes his own decisions about whether to go to work or hover over his wife. If you want me to work in the other room, say so and I will.”

  “I want you to tel
l me you’re angry. Or that you begrudge that I got pregnant. Tell me you regret sleeping with me.”

  He tucked his chin. “Is that how you feel?”

  “No.” Her heart thunked as she realized she had started a far more sobering conversation than she had meant to. She couldn’t look at him, but she had to know. “I keep thinking you must resent me, though. I’m just this lump that lies around making demands.”

  “I feel none of those things. I’m concerned for both of you and angry with my inability to help, but I regret nothing.” He sank onto the edge of the bed. “I know that relying on me is hard for you, but I hope you know me well enough by now to believe I would hire someone to fetch your socks if I didn’t want to do it for you.”

  She couldn’t help a small “pfft” of laughter, because it was such an arrogantly truthful statement. She did know that much about him, but not a lot more. That was what was bothering her. She didn’t know what he was thinking or feeling.

  “What is this really about, hmm?” He rubbed her arm. “I can see you’re miserable and frightened. I can’t fix that. I can’t even tell you not to feel those things. They’re warranted. All I can do is be here so you know you’re not alone.”

  Why did he have to be so freaking perfect? If she had had doubts about whether she was falling for her husband, they incinerated as her heart practically exploded with love for him. It was so powerful, her eyes stung with the force of the emotion. She had to bite her lips together to keep them from quivering.

  “You play your cards so close to your chest.” She caught his hand, needing to touch her lips to his knuckles, needing to give this thing happening inside her a small outlet. “I’m never sure how you feel.” How do you feel about me?

  She was too frightened of the answer to ask it aloud. It had been a lot easier to feel confident about how he regarded her when she had felt more like a partner in this marriage. When her own feelings had merely been developing, not filling her to brimming. When she’d been able to show him—

  “Do you want sex?” she asked with dawning realization.

  “What?” He pulled his hand away. “Where did that come from?”

  “You’re so edgy. Is it because we can’t make love? We could get creative. Figure something out.” She wanted—needed—to feel close to him.

  “You’re determined to have a fight today, aren’t you?” He spoke with indignant wonder. “I’m offended that you think I would ask my sick wife, who is barely moving so she can keep our child alive, to perform sexual favors. There is a perfectly good shower in there if I feel a need for an orgasm.”

  “So I’m just a plumbing device?”

  “Now you’re being horrible. We’re not talking about this.” He rose.

  “I need to know how you feel, Jun Li!” Frustrated tears arrived to wet her lashes. “You think I can’t sense you pulling away? You’re doing it right now. We were so happy when I was traveling with you. Weren’t we?” Maybe she was deluding herself.

  “This is a stressful and difficult time. Of course neither of us is happy.”

  Another nonanswer that quashed her confidence in his feelings toward her.

  “I was afraid to marry you because I thought the baby was all we had between us,” she reminded him. “But if that’s true, what happens if...if...”

  “No.” He used the sternest tone she’d ever heard from him.

  Fractures were working their way across her heart, though, spreading outward, making her entire being ache with anguish. She sniffed back the tears pooling in her sinuses.

  “Stop. Ivy, no. Shh. Stop thinking that.” He slid onto the bed and gathered her in gentle arms. Held her. Enveloped her. “Don’t go there, blossom.” His voice softened as he crushed her to his chest. “Stay here. Stay right here with me. We’re all okay right now. Hmm?”

  His hands stroked over her from crown to tailbone, grounding her and reassuring her as she fought back the wraiths and demons that were trying to steal her faith that her long-held dream of a family would come true.

  “I’m really scared,” she admitted, cold to the marrow of her bones.

  “I know.” His arms tightened. “I can’t allow myself to fear, though. I can’t let you see any doubt in me. If I’m turning away, it’s because I don’t want you to see anything but strength in me. And belief in our best outcome.”

  “Oh, Jun Li.” Oddly, she felt a compulsion to reassure him. She curled herself closer, so the bump of their baby was nestled securely between them.

  His touch faltered briefly before he continued petting her hair.

  She tilted her head back to see up into his face. “You’re doing it again.” Dejected, she shifted back an inch so her bump wasn’t touching him.

  He made a noise of reluctance before he admitted, “I feel guilty. I don’t regret sleeping with you. Never. But I feel responsible for what you’re going through.”

  “You shouldn’t. It’s no one’s fault.” She had already run through the gamut with the doctor. This was one of those complications that could strike any pregnancy.

  He rolled away for a tissue and handed it to her. As she used it to mop beneath her eyes, he sat up with his back to her. Doing it again.

  She sighed.

  “I know,” he said, voice not quite even. He kept his back to her, rubbing his hands restlessly on his thighs. “There’s something I’ve been keeping from you. I want to tell you, but it’s difficult to talk about.”

  Her heart clunked. A chill froze her motionless. “What?” Her heart began to pound so hard she worried it was bad for the baby.

  “I’m taking an antidepressant.”

  It was so far from anything she had expected—her mind had gone straight to divorce, cheating, terminal illness—she didn’t know what to say.

  “I had no idea,” she stammered. “I mean, you’ve never left a bottle around or anything.”

  “I only started taking them again since...” He glanced over his shoulder and nodded at how she was lying on the bed. “I didn’t like hiding it, but I didn’t want you to think getting married and becoming a father has made me depressed.”

  “Has it?”

  She watched his profile wince. “Kind of.”

  She stifled her gasp of hurt but felt the tendons in her neck flex.

  “This is why I didn’t want to tell you.” He shifted so he was angled to face her. “I’m not sure I’m capable of the kind of happiness you want me to feel, Ivy. I’m wired to worry about what will cause unhappiness. Once I start down that road, it’s all I see. Heaviness and darkness. When I’m in control of my life, those shadows fade.”

  “But I showed up and you couldn’t control this.”

  “Exactly. I got through our wedding without medication and thought I would be able to handle starting our life together without falling back on it.”

  Got through? She had to swallow another knot of agony forming in her throat. A sensible part of her understood this wasn’t about her, but it still hurt to think of herself as something he endured.

  “But when this complication happened...” For one brief second, torment flashed across his expression. His anguish was so tangible, it made her feel small for thinking he wasn’t as deeply invested in this pregnancy as she was.

  He smoothed his expression, and his mouth quirked. “If I’m on the pills, I worry the appropriate amount. The darkness is there, but at the edges. It doesn’t take over. Maybe I’m still worrying a little more than necessary, which is why I’m hovering.” He rubbed the backs of his knuckles on her upper arm. “But if I wasn’t taking the pills, I would risk a far more serious depression and be no use to you at all.”

  His hand went back to his thigh as he regarded her. The wall was up again, but she saw it for the defense mechanism it was.

  She reached to cover his hand. “And you knew what was happening because...”
>
  “I’ve been here before.” He nodded.

  “In Vancouver.” All the pieces were coming together.

  “Yes. That’s why Kevin came to live with me.” He caught her fingers in a warm grip, but his mouth flattened.

  “It’s okay. I’m not judging you. Tell me as much or as little as you want.”

  After a moment, he pressed her hand under his, sandwiching it against his hard thigh.

  “I’d been living alone for years and didn’t really have any friends. I didn’t understand that depression made the idea of making friends feel like too much work, like no one would want to be my friend. I came out of class one day and there was a flyer on my windshield about mental health. It said, ‘Are you suffering from?’ and had a list. I ticked every box.” He snorted, but there was no humor in it.

  “There were numbers for counseling and meeting times for group therapy. I was standing there thinking I should do something, but already knew I probably wouldn’t. Classic symptom,” he said in a rueful aside. “Then Kevin came up to me. His car was parked next to mine, and I was so embarrassed to be caught with that thing in my hand.”

  “You shouldn’t be.” She squeezed his thigh and slithered closer.

  “I know. But he must have seen how guilty I looked. He said he answered phones at the counseling office if I ever wanted to talk. He called me ‘one of the quiet ones,’ the ones he worried about. I didn’t even realize he was in two of my classes, I was that checked out of the world around me. But while I was standing there feeling like a tool, I noticed he had pillows and blankets in his back seat. He said he stayed late to help at the group sessions, then had morning classes, so he slept in his car half the week. I had never invited anyone into my house, but I said I had a room he could sleep in if he wanted to. He followed me home and stuck around for two years.”