by Lynne Graham
And beneath her gaze Max turned paper pale below his bronzed skin, his facial muscles jerking taut to throw his hard bone structure into shocking prominence. ‘Are you serious?’ he pressed in disbelief. ‘How can you be? You were clear—’
‘No. We thought I was and we were wrong.’
Max was shattered and struggling to hide the fact. She had conceived? Although his brain knew better, he had always subconsciously supposed that a pregnancy was unlikely after a single sexual encounter. He had simply assumed it wasn’t going to happen, had been convinced by the evidence that they were safe from that threat and he had relaxed. And now that she was cheerfully assuring him that it had happened he had no prepared strategy of how to behave to fall back on in his hour of need. And it was his hour of need, Max registered sickly as an image of his thuggish father’s face swam before his eyes and momentarily bereft him of breath. Like a punch in the gut, he had once seen his father’s hated image every time he closed his eyes to go to sleep, his father, his bogeyman, the memory of brutality that had haunted him since the dreadful night his mother had died.
‘But you can’t be sure yet,’ Max assumed, grasping hopefully at straws. ‘Surely it’s too soon to be sure? You’ll have to see a doctor.’
‘I saw a doctor this morning. It’s official. I’m pregnant. For goodness’ sake, it seems I’ve been pregnant all along,’ she divulged shakily. ‘We’ll be parents in six months’ time.’
Tia felt so sick because Max wasn’t a very good actor. He was appalled by the idea of her being pregnant and he couldn’t hide it. A tight band of pain seized her chest and she could hardly breathe for hurt and disillusionment. How could she have been so naïve as to credit that Max would welcome a baby that would undoubtedly disrupt his life even more than she had done? Max had given up his freedom to marry her and possibly he had hoped that he would eventually regain that freedom, but the birth of a child would make that process a great deal more complicated.
Max released his breath in a rush. ‘You took me by surprise.’
‘Obviously,’ Tia pronounced tightly, focusing fixedly on his scarlet silk tie, refusing to meet his eyes and see anything else she didn’t want to see because it hurt too much.
Yes, she had accepted that he wasn’t in love with her, but she had trustingly believed that he would welcome fatherhood even if the planning or the timing weren’t quite ideal. But that had been a false hope because she had judged Max all wrong. Max just didn’t want a child, which was a much more basic issue. Suddenly she was in a situation she had never ever envisaged and flinching in horror from the ramifications of what she was discovering. How could she possibly stay married to a man who didn’t want their child?
Even her own parents had not been that set against becoming parents. Her father would have been quite content to be a father if her mother had stuck around to take care of her, while her mother had been content to be a mother as long as her husband was a wealthy businessman based in London. When Paul Grayson had announced his plans to become a missionary and work in some of the poorest places on earth, Tia’s mother had been aghast and the baby she’d carried had simply become an inconvenient burden tying her down to a life she had very quickly learned to loathe.
‘We’ll discuss this later,’ Max breathed in a driven undertone. ‘Discuss how to handle it.’
Handle it? What did he mean by that? And what was there to discuss? A pregnancy didn’t come with choices as far as Tia was concerned. A cold shiver snaked down her spine as Max turned to address a man who had hailed him. Was he hinting at the possibility of a termination? Surely he could not credit that she would even consider such an option?
The evening wore on with Tia seeking out her grandfather’s company and sitting with a group of much older men. But she remained hyper-aware of Max’s every move and glance in her direction. He looked forbidding, his high cheekbones taut, his beautiful mouth compressed. It struck her as a savage irony that Max should seem as unhappy as she was and that that reality could only drive them further apart. He should have been more honest with her when he proposed, she thought bitterly. He should have admitted then that he didn’t want a child in his life. He had been prepared to marry her to throw a mantle of respectability over the possibility that she might be pregnant, but evidently even then he must have been hoping that she would fail to conceive.
Shortly before they left because Andrew was grey with exhaustion, her grandfather gripped her hand firmly in his. ‘Do you have any idea how much I regret not standing up to my son when he put you into that convent?’
‘It was his decision, not yours,’ she responded gently.
‘I should’ve fought him, offered him money for his good works in return for you,’ Andrew sighed wearily. ‘But he was my son and I wanted him to come home and I was afraid to take the risk of arguing with him.’
‘I was fine at the convent. I am fine,’ Tia pointed out quietly.
‘You’re a wonderful girl,’ Andrew assured her as they waited indoors for the limousine to arrive.
‘And I have a little secret to tell you,’ Tia whispered, suddenly desperate to give her news to someone who would appreciate it.
Her grandfather responded to her little announcement with a huge smile and he squeezed her hand with tears glistening in his blue eyes. ‘Wonderful,’ was all he could say. ‘Wonderful.’
‘Congratulations,’ Andrew told Max when he swung into the car with them. ‘Our family will continue into another generation.’
For once Max experienced no inner warmth at being included in Andrew’s family and his lean, strong face remained taut, his hard jaw line clenched. He was furious with himself. He knew his lack of enthusiasm had hurt and distressed Tia. He had allowed his emotions to control him, filling him with a fearful sense of insecurity. Man up, his intelligence urged him with derision. Be an optimist, not a pessimist. If he put his mind to it, surely he was capable of being a good father?
‘I’m very tired,’ Tia admitted at the foot of the stairs. ‘Perhaps we could talk tomorrow.’
‘You go on up to bed,’ her grandfather urged cheerfully. ‘Max and I will have a nightcap to celebrate.’
‘You’re not supposed—’ she began.
‘One drink,’ Andrew specified with a wry grin. ‘Surely even the doctor would not deny me that on a special occasion?’
Tia mounted the stairs, striving not to relive Max’s reaction to her pregnancy. She fingered her pendant with its ninety-odd diamonds as she removed her jewellery. A diamond for every day she and Max had been together. She had thought that that was so romantic but obviously it had just been a gesture, the sort of gesture a man made when he wanted to look like a devoted new husband. That newly acquired cynicism shocked her, but what else was she to think?
Tia clambered into bed and, in spite of her unhappy thoughts, discovered that she was much too tired to lie awake. She slept, waking as dawn light broke through the curtains to find Max shaking her shoulder.
Max gripped her hand, which struck her as strange and she frowned up at him. ‘What’s wrong?’ she framed.
‘You have to be very brave,’ he breathed with a ragged edge to his dark deep voice.
Tears were shimmering in his liquid dark eyes and that fast, she knew. ‘Andrew?’ she exclaimed.
‘He passed away in his sleep during the night. A fatal heart attack. I’m sorry, Tia...’
A sob formed in Tia’s tight throat. She didn’t think she could bear the pain. Max and Andrew together had been her support system but Max had let her down the night before and now Andrew was gone as well. In a world that now seemed grey, she wondered how she could go on and then she remembered her baby and knew that she had more strength than she had ever given herself credit for.
CHAPTER EIGHT
TIA SAW HER MOTHER, Inez, seated inside the church and almost stumbled on the way to the front pew.
‘What is it?’ Max murmured.
‘My mother’s here,’ she framed, dry-mouthed.
‘Well, Andrew was her father-in-law for a while,’ Max conceded. ‘Perhaps she felt a need to pay her respects.’
But the former Inez Grayson, now Inez Santos, was not a religious, respectful nor, for that matter, a sentimental woman. And her presence at Andrew’s funeral shook her daughter, who had not seen her parent in almost ten years. The past few days had turned into a roller coaster of grief, disbelief and anger for Tia. Max had kept his distance, using another bedroom after telling her that he didn’t want to ‘disturb’ her. Tia had run the gamut of frightening insecurities. Was her pregnancy such a turn-off that he didn’t want to be physically close to her any longer? Or did Max need privacy to come to terms with his own grief at the loss of the man who had done so much to support him when he was young and vulnerable? And, moreover, who had expressed his confidence in Max to the extent of making him CEO of one of the largest business concerns in the UK.
It would be typical of Max to choose not to share that grief with her. He was much more likely than she was to wall up his feelings and hide them, particularly when he was already very much aware that he was not actually related to his former mentor except by marriage. It hurt her that yet another event that she felt should have brought them closer had in fact driven them further apart. They had both fondly trusted that Andrew would be spared to them for another few months and unhappily they had learned that no timer could be set on death. Her grandfather’s heart had given out under the strain of his illness and that was God’s will, Tia reminded herself, and she would not question that.
‘The minute I heard I dropped everything to come to you!’ Inez gushed as she intercepted Tia on the church steps. ‘You need your mamae now more than ever.’
‘Your maternal concern comes a little late in the day,’ Max murmured with lethal cool.
As a muscle pulled tight on Inez’s perfectly made up and undeniably exquisite face, guilt assailed Tia because, for the first time, her mother looked her almost fifty years. ‘You’re welcome back at the house,’ she forced herself to declare.
‘Why did you invite her?’ Max asked drily as soon as they were back in the limousine. ‘You know Cable’s waiting to read Andrew’s will and she can’t be present for that.’
‘Inez can mingle with the other guests,’ Tia retorted. ‘Whatever else she is, she’s still my mother. I should respect that.’
And not for the first time, Tia resented the reality that the funeral had been rushed to facilitate the will reading because the stability of her grandfather’s business empire depended on smooth continuity being re-established as soon as was humanly possible. It was all to do with stocks and shares, she recalled numbly, the weariness of stress and early pregnancy tugging at her again.
She took her seat in the library with Andrew’s other relatives for the reading of the will. The lawyer read out bequests to long-serving staff first before moving on to the children of Tia’s grandmother’s siblings. Disappointment then flashed across a lot of faces and Tia stopped looking, thinking that people probably always hoped for more than they received in such cases and, mindful of her own inheritance, she was determined not to be judgemental. Silence fell as Mr Cable moved on to the main body of the will and the disposition of Andrew’s great wealth.
Redbridge Hall and its contents were left in perpetuity to Tia and any children she might have, along with sufficient funds to ensure its maintenance and a sizeable private income for her support, but the bulk of Andrew’s money and his business holdings were left exclusively to Max. Only if Tia and Max divorced would there be any change in that status quo and, even then, Max would have the final word on every decision taken in that situation.
A shocked muttering burst out amongst Tia’s companions as a wave of dissension ran around the room. Tia was disconcerted by the will but not surprised, having long since recognised that her grandfather’s strongest desire had always been to ensure that Grayson Industries survived for future generations. Building Grayson Industries into an international empire had been Andrew’s life’s work, after all, and, as far as Tia could see, how he chose to dispose of his life’s work and earnings had been entirely his business.
As threats to take the will to court and distasteful insinuations and accusations about Andrew’s state of mind and undue influence being used on him were uttered, the lawyer mentioned that Andrew had taken the precaution of having a psychiatric report done a couple of months earlier to make bringing a court case on such grounds virtually impossible. He also intimated that his employer had for several years been very frank about his hope that Max would marry his granddaughter and take permanent charge of his empire. Amidst much vocal bad feeling, Tia rose from her seat and quite deliberately closed her hand round Max’s, for as far as she was concerned Andrew’s last wishes were sacrosanct and she did not want anyone to think that she stood anywhere but on Max’s side of the fence.
Not that Max, his dark head held high as they left the library, seemed to be in need of her support, particularly not when those also present at the will reading spread amongst the other guests. A low, intent murmur of chatter soon sounded around them and Tia could tell that she and Max were the centre of attention. Her face went pink at that acknowledgement but Max seemed gloriously impervious to the interest of other people.
‘How do you feel about all this?’ Max enquired almost lazily.
‘Andrew wanted you to inherit,’ Tia murmured with quiet emphasis. ‘It was his business and it was his right to dispose of it as he saw fit.’
His lean, strong profile taut, Max dealt her a frowning appraisal from glittering dark deep-set eyes as if questioning that she could really feel like that. Tia evaded his direct gaze because what had happened between them in Brazil was playing heavily on her mind and she knew she had questions to ask her husband before she was willing to bury the subject.
‘We’ll talk in here.’ Max flung open a door off the crowded drawing room. ‘By the way, don’t feel sorry for your cousins. Andrew made generous settlements on all of them before he died.’
‘Good to know.’ Tia preceded him into a small sitting room. Faded curtains and rather outmoded furniture attested to the fact that it had once been her grandmother’s favourite room. It had stayed unchanged for over a quarter of a century and the sight of it and the beautiful view out over the colourful rose garden never failed to touch Tia’s heart. Her grandfather had mentioned how he still liked to picture her grandmother sitting writing letters at her bureau and of how in the initial stages of his grief he had liked to sit there to feel close to her again.
‘How do you feel?’ Max prompted again, standing with wide shoulders angled back and legs braced as if he expected her to attack. ‘You can be honest...tell me.’
‘Did you know?’ Tia asked hesitantly, her luminous gaze welded to his devastatingly handsome, lean dark features.
‘What would be in the will? Andrew filled me in on the details only after we had married,’ Max admitted flatly, raking a frustrated hand through his tousled black hair. ‘Prior to that I assumed he would leave it all jointly to both of us.’
The will had shaken Max and it was ironic that, while the disposal of Andrew’s assets had made Andrew’s other relatives jealous, it had almost made Max groan. He didn’t need the ownership of Grayson Industries to feel good about himself or the future. As far as Max was concerned, Grayson Industries would always rightfully belong to Tia, who was a Grayson by birth. He was not sorry, though, to be left with complete autonomy over the business because he would not have enjoyed interference from any other source.
But what Max disliked most of all was the suspicion that Andrew’s will had muddied the water in his marriage and no matter what Tia said, she had to have serious doubts about how much she could trust him now. Did she secretly suspect that he had married her for her money? He needed to be more frank with her about why he was with her and why he had been willing to marry her, he acknowledged grudgingly.
The worst of Tia’s tension had already dissipated. �
��It would never occur to me to think of you as a fortune hunter, Max,’ she confided ruefully. ‘I would never think that of you.’
‘Then possibly you should think again. I have to tell you the truth because I won’t lie about it. Before I came out to Brazil to collect you, Andrew told me how worried he was about bringing you home here when he was dying. He was worried sick about how you would cope as his heiress in a world so far removed from that of the convent and he asked me to marry you to protect you.’
All her natural colour draining away in the face of that unwelcome revelation, Tia fell back a step from him in consternation: Max had not freely chosen to be with her. It was as though her whole world lurched and spun around her because she suddenly felt sick and dizzy and disorientated. Her legs like woolly supports, she dropped down heavily into an armchair and stared back up at him, her cornflower-blue eyes huge in the white triangle of her face.
‘That is the one secret I won’t keep from you, bella mia,’ Max declared harshly. ‘Andrew came up with the original idea. You heard the family lawyer refer to it. It was news to me, however, that he was considering the idea years before he mentioned it to me. I said I’d consider it after I had met you but the minute I saw you, I stopped considering anything. I wanted you and I didn’t want any other man to have you.’
Tia gazed back at him in shock, never having associated such strong emotions with Max.
‘Right there and then, I became determined that you would be mine,’ Max continued in a harsh undertone. ‘I didn’t think about the business or the money. That didn’t come into it for me. I’m an ambitious man but prior to meeting you I had built up enough wealth to satisfy me and anything more was icing on the cake. Somehow in a very short space of time you became both the icing and the cake. Even so, I was intolerably greedy and selfish. I didn’t want any other man to have an excuse to come near you.’
‘Intolerably?’ Tia queried his choice of words shakily.
‘A more honourable man would have wanted you to come home and have the freedom to explore the dating scene. My blood ran cold at that prospect. I’m possessive. I didn’t want to run the risk of losing you to someone else. I didn’t want anyone to have the chance to take you from me. I knew I would meet Andrew’s expectations and look after you and, whatever happens, I will continue to do so. When I give my word, I stand by it, and you are my wife and I will always stand by that.’