“You know you’re welcome to stay with me as long as you like.”
“Thank you, Abuela,” Dina said and curled her feet up under her on her grandmother’s couch. “But I’ll start looking for a place for the four of us tomorrow.”
She sent a look at the three babies on her grandmother’s living room floor. Hopefully, they would get accustomed quickly to not having Connor around all the time.
“You’re not going back to the bungalow?”
“It’s too small,” she said. And crowded with memories. Connor had spent too much time there. She would see him in every room and be haunted by images of what might have been if he hadn’t been so stupid.
“Ah. Well, if it is only size that concerns you, maybe you should go back to the home you left this morning.”
Dina looked at her grandmother, surprised. “How can I go back there? After everything Connor said to me...no, I don’t belong with him. Not anymore. And he doesn’t want me, either.”
“Nieta, you love the man.”
“I’ll get over it.” In forty or fifty years.
“He loves you as well,” her grandmother said and Dina laughed shortly. “I know what I saw. And on your wedding day, I saw a man in love.”
“You’re wrong.” She wished her grandmother was right, but if she were, how could Connor have said all of those things to her?
“I am never wrong, nieta.” A warm smile softened that statement. “You should know that by now.”
“I’m sorry, Abuela,” Dina said. “I know you mean well, but this is one story that won’t have a happy ending. Even if Connor showed up right this minute and apologized, how could I ever forgive him for thinking so little of me?”
From her end of the couch, Angelica leaned forward, caught Dina’s hand in hers and said, “For love, we do many things. We forgive thoughtlessness, carelessly given pain and the mistakes that all people make. And you must take pity on a man as well,” her grandmother added, sitting back again. “They do not adapt to deep emotions as well as women do. They fight against love as if feeling deeply somehow weakens them.” She shrugged. “They’re foolish, because loving makes you strong. Strong enough even to forgive.”
Dina watched her grandmother and wished she were half as nice a person as Angelica Cortez. She didn’t know if she would be able to forgive Connor, but thought it probably didn’t matter since he would never come around to apologize. When the doorbell rang, the older woman said, “Ah. It is time.”
Suspicion awakened inside Dina. “Time for what?”
Her grandmother smiled and walked to answer the door. “Time to see how strong your love is, nieta.”
“Is she here?”
Connor’s voice pulled Dina to her feet. Her heart leapt, her stomach did a quick tumble, but she was standing when he rushed into the living room, followed more slowly by her grandmother. “Traitor,” she murmured.
“I love you as well,” Angelica said with a smile. Then she added, “I will be in the kitchen making some tea.”
Connor didn’t hear her leave. He hardly saw the elegant older woman. All he could see was Dina. All he was aware of was that his heart was beating again. He hadn’t been sure it ever would when he drove to Dina’s old bungalow and found it as empty as his own house was.
That’s when he remembered her grandmother. One call to the older woman had assured him that Dina and the kids were safe, and as Angelica had told him, the rest was up to him.
“Dina—”
“Da!” Sam called out and then all three of the babies were hurrying toward him and greeting him as if he’d been gone a year. And really, that’s what it felt like. He hugged, he kissed, he patted and when the trips had gone back to playing, he stood up and faced the woman watching him through dark eyes shadowed with wary caution.
He couldn’t blame her.
“Connor, I don’t want to talk to you anymore.”
“You don’t have to,” he said, taking a half step toward her. “Just listen. Please.”
She took a deep breath and then slowly nodded.
His gaze locked on her, Connor felt his world fall back into place. She stood in a slant of sunlight that shone in her hair and sparked in her eyes. Her features were closed, but she wasn’t throwing him out, so he called that a win. He had one chance to make this count. To convince her that she was the most important thing in his life.
“Everything I said last night was wrong,” he blurted and watched surprise flicker in her eyes. “I didn’t even believe it when I was saying it. Oh, and as for John Ballas, he’s done. We’re through working with him and if I ever see him again, I’ll punch him just for the hell of it.”
She laughed a little at the image and he smiled too before he said, “The truth is, Dina, I’m out of my depth here. I didn’t expect you. Didn’t expect to care for you—”
“I know that,” she said softly. “You made it clear when we got married that you weren’t looking for a wife so much as a bed partner and a mom for the kids.”
Connor winced and if he could have, he would have found a way to kick himself. “Yeah. I did. And I was wrong about that, too.”
“Is that right?”
One corner of her mouth lifted briefly and Connor took that as a good sign. “I let my own past color how I treated you. In a way, I was holding you responsible for everyone who had ever tried to use me or my family.”
“I wasn’t—”
He held up one hand to stop her right there. “I know you weren’t using me. I know you didn’t lie or cheat or do any other damn thing wrong. That was all on me, Dina. I kept watching, waiting, sure that you’d betray me, and when you didn’t, I panicked, because if you really were as wonderful as I thought, then I was in big trouble. Jackie was the last straw, you know? She was family and she turned on me and that hit me hard.”
“Elena was my family and she lied to me about you, too,” Dina pointed out.
“I know.” He moved a little closer, sending a quick glance at the babies gathered on the floor. “And we let them get in the way. Me, more than you.” Closer, one step, then another. She wasn’t backing up. “Dina, when I went to the house and found it empty, something in me died. Without you and the kids there, it was emptier than anything I’ve ever known.”
“I couldn’t stay,” she told him. “Not after last night.”
“I know. I hurt you and I’m sorry. So damn sorry.”
“Connor—”
“No,” he interrupted quickly, feeling his heart begin to beat normally again at the shine in her eyes and the softening of her features. “Don’t talk yet. Let me finish. Let me say that I do trust you, Dina. I want you to come home. I want all of us to live together. To build a real life.”
She shook her head and he worried.
“Trusting me is good, Connor, but it’s not enough,” she said softly. “I told you last night that the reason I married you was because I love you. Well, I do. I love you so much that I can’t live with you knowing you don’t feel the same way.”
A slow smile curved his mouth. “That’s where you’re wrong. I do love you, Dina. I love you more than I ever thought it possible to love anyone. You’re the first thing I think of in the morning and the last thing I think of at night. I want to spend the rest of my life with you in my arms.”
“You do?” Her mouth curved into a dreamy smile and Connor’s heart filled.
“I do.” Then he grinned. “It’s like taking that vow all over again. I will love you forever, Dina. I want to take you and the kids home. I want us to build a life there. Have more babies there.”
“God, Connor. I want to believe. I really do.”
Dipping into his inside coat pocket, he pulled out a sheaf of papers and handed them to her. “I couldn’t get here earlier today because I was at my lawyer’s, havi
ng him draw up these papers for us.”
She opened them, but frowned. “What is it?”
“It’s the first of the steps we have to take to legally adopt the triplets.”
She inhaled sharply. “Oh, Connor...”
He moved in closer and cupped her face in his palms. The warmth of her skin, the love in her eyes, chased away the last of the cold that had been smothering him since the night before. “We’ll all be Kings, legally. We’ll be a real family. We’ll have each other. We’ll have love. And if you can trust me, Dina, we’ll be happy.”
She stared into his eyes. “I didn’t want to love you, Connor, because I was afraid that somehow I would lose myself in that love.”
She went up on her toes and planted a quick kiss on his mouth, and that one small taste of her wasn’t going to be nearly enough. But he kept quiet, needing to hear what she had to say, hoping it was what he needed to hear.
“But I’m not lost. I’m more found than I’ve ever been,” she said, with a quick look at the babies, babbling and laughing. “You have my heart and I’m trusting you with it. Trusting you with all of our hearts.”
The bands around his chest loosened and he drew his first easy breath in nearly twenty-four hours. Pulling her in close, he kissed her almost reverently. “I’ll never let you down again, I swear it,” he said. “And I will love you for the rest of my life and beyond.”
“You’d better,” she warned, then smiled as he bent his head to seal his promise with a kiss.
When they broke apart, he rested his forehead against hers. “Louise went on strike.”
“What?” Her laugh made him feel warm right down to his bones.
“Yep. Threatened to make me eat my own cooking until I brought you and the kids home where you belong.”
“Well,” Dina said with a grin, “no wonder you hurried over here.”
“Exactly,” he said and kissed her again.
“This is wonderful.”
They broke apart to look at Angelica as she walked into the room carrying a tray of cookies. Taking a seat on the couch, she set the tray onto the table and began dispensing cookies to the babies, who crowded eagerly around her.
“Now,” the older woman said with a wink, “nieta, if your husband would bring in the tea and cups, we’ll have a celebration before you all go home.”
“Abuela,” Connor said, bending to kiss the woman’s cheek, “that’s a great idea.”
“We’ll go together,” Dina said, threading her fingers through his.
“Even better,” Connor told her and kissed her again, knowing he was the luckiest man in the world.
* * * * *
If you loved Connor’s story, pick up his twin’s tale from USA TODAY bestselling author Maureen Child
DOUBLE THE TROUBLE
Colt King discovers he’s the father of two adorable twins. Now this unsure father is falling in love with his ex and their babies!
Available now from Harlequin Desire!
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BILLIONAIRES AND BABIES story,
WHAT THE PRINCE WANTS
from Jules Bennett.
Available June 2015!
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A SPECIAL EXCERPT FROM
Will Rafe Montoro have to choose between the throne and newfound fatherhood?
Read on for a sneak preview of
CARRYING A KING’S CHILD,
a Dynasties: The Montoros novel by USA TODAY bestselling author Katherine Garbera.
Pregnant!
He knew Emily wouldn’t be standing in his penthouse apartment telling him this if he wasn’t the father. His first reaction was joy.
A child.
It wasn’t something he ever thought he wanted but the idea that Emily was carrying his baby seemed right to him.
Maybe that was just because it gave him something other than his royal duties to think about. He’d been dreading his trip to Alma. He was flattered that the country that had once driven his family out had come back to them, asked them—him, as it turned out—to be the next king. But he had grown up here in Miami. He didn’t want to be a stuffy royal.
He didn’t want European paparazzi following him around and trying to catch him doing anything that would bring shame to his family. Including having a child out of wedlock.
“Rafe, did you hear what I said?”
“Yeah, I did. Are you sure?” he asked at last.
She gave him a fiery look from those aqua blue eyes of hers. He’d seen the passionate side of her nature and he guessed he was about to witness her temper. Hurricane Em was about to unleash all of her fury on him and he didn’t blame her one bit.
He held his hand up. “Slow down, Red. I didn’t mean are you sure it’s mine. I meant…are you sure you’re pregnant.”
“Damned straight. And I wouldn’t be here if I wasn’t sure it was yours. Listen, I don’t want anything from you. I know you can’t turn your back on your family and marry me and frankly, we only had one weekend together so I’d have to say no to a proposal anyway. But…I don’t want this kid to grow up without knowing you.”
“Me neither.”
She glanced up surprised.
He’d sort of surprised himself. But it didn’t seem right for a kid of his to grow up without him. He wanted that. He wanted a chance to impart the Montoro legacy…not the one newly sprung on him involving a throne but the one he’d carved for himself in business. “Don’t look shocked.”
“You’ve kind of got a lot going on right now. And having a kid with me isn’t going to go over well.”
“Tough,” he said. “I still make my own decisions.”
Don’t miss
CARRYING A KING’S CHILD
by USA TODAY bestselling author Katherine Garbera, available June 2015, only from Harlequin Desire
www.Harlequin.com
Copyright © 2015 by Katherine Garbera
ISBN-13: 9781460380956
Triple the Fun
Copyright © 2015 by Maureen Child
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