by Zee Monodee
The phone rang again. Jane. He answered on the spot.
“We have a problem.” Even her voice trembled.
He sighed and brought his hand up to rub the back of his neck. “I saw the trash. Rory sent me a file.”
“No, there’s worse.”
He instantly stood straighter, all notions of fatigue gone.
“Security at the bank has been fending off reporters all morning here. And there’s a swarm of journalists and a TV crew in front of my building. And the paparazzi are tailing my every move.”
Michael wasn’t sure he had a curse word that would be effective to describe the shithole they were in. “Where are you?”
“At the bank. In my office. Security won’t let anyone on the executive elevator without my permission.”
Good. At least, she was safe there.
“Listen.” He sighed. “Hang in there. Stay where you are. I’ll be in touch.”
He cut the call and dialled straight to his office. Rory picked up on the first ring.
“I don’t care what you need to do, but get me on a bloody plane out of here right now.”
***
Jane stayed put, but as the hours stretched by, so did her patience. She tried calling Michael, but all she got was the blasted voice mail. Rory, in the meantime, seemed to have perfected the “I know nothing” line to an art. Come to think of it, with a man like Michael as boss, the poor lad could really be in pitch-dark.
Afternoon was drawing to a close when her desk phone rang.
“Mam, Michael Rinaldi here for you. I checked his ID, and he’s clear.”
Ouch. She would bet a man like Michael had never been asked for his ID. But they couldn’t take any chances. She hoped he’d understood.
“Let him through.” She placed the receiver down.
He walked into the office less than a minute later. She wanted to run into his arms when she saw him, but she restrained herself.
“Thank goodness you’re here,” she said instead before letting out a long sigh of relief.
Umberto chose that very moment to step out of the adjoining room.
Father and son stood in a staring match in the closed premises, and Jane hoped they wouldn’t have a rerun of the last time these two had met here.
Umberto crossed his arms in front of his chest. “What do you plan to do?”
Michael nodded before turning to her.
“You’re coming home with me.”
Chapter Ten
“Home? With you?” Jane paused, wanting to be sure she had understood what he meant. “At your place?”
He nodded. “You’ll be safe there. The property has top-notch security.”
Seriously? He could be as nonchalant about this?
“But we can’t,” she blurted out.
“Why not?” Umberto stepped closer to her.
She turned to look at her boss, trying hard not to let the horror penetrating her appear on her face. Live at Michael’s place, as in, live with him? This was going too far much too fast. That was akin to moving in with him. For all the worst of reasons. She could still recall in vivid detail that cringe-worthy moment on the threshold of his bedroom. She would not have another such episode again.
“It would do you two good to live together. You’re going to have a baby, after all. Parents have to be there for their kids,” Umberto continued in a gruff tone.
Michael gave a low growl. “Like you’ve been here for yours?”
In any other premises, the sound wouldn’t have registered. But in the lofty confines of the waiting room, his voice echoed, making his words just audible. Goodness, he’d just thrown oil over the fire.
She gazed from one man to the other, expecting a brawl to break out any second now. Both stood the same way, back stiff, arms hanging, but poised at the same time, wide jaws set with defiance.
“We’re not talking about me here. We’re talking about you and Jane.” Umberto took a step back, defusing that tense stance.
She closed her eyes in relief for a few seconds.
“Thank goodness.” Michael spat the words.
And it stopped at that, thankfully. Her headache returned with full force, and she winced.
“Get your things.” Umberto turned to her and nodded at her desk. “You’ve had a long day. And Jane, take the rest of the week off. You need to rest.”
Wait, what? He wouldn’t survive a day without her, let alone the rest of the week. “But there’s the meeting with the Brinks team on Friday. You don’t have all the information, and the papers aren’t ready—”
“I’ll manage.”
The quiet authority in his tone silenced her, and she took a good long look at her boss, as if seeing him for the first time. Never before had she seen Umberto as a man who took charge. He’d always been a bit loopy, needing her to cover his back, a far cry from the tycoon she’d heard about before she’d accepted the job here.
And Michael is so like him. If only the Rinaldi son could see that one day.
But back to the actual problem here. They had bigger fish to fry, and she had an impossible situation to get out of.
“You really think this is a good idea?” She turned to Michael, ready to debate this with him.
“They’ll hound you if you go back to your place. No peace at all.” Her boss sounded resigned. “Go with him. It’s better for all.”
Suddenly, that gnawing feeling returned in her womb, and she clasped a hand over her belly.
In a flash, Michael had reached her side, his hand on hers.
“What’s wrong? Is there a problem? Are you in pain?” Concern could clearly be seen in the frown on his forehead.
Goodness, she should de-escalate this situation. He sounded panicked.
“It’s nothing. Just this strange, nibbling sensation inside.” A lot like heartburn, but much lower than her stomach.
“Are you sure this is normal?”
She nodded. “Nothing to worry about.”
He watched her for long seconds. “You look knackered.”
“I wouldn’t say no to some rest,” she admitted with a wince, knowing right then that she had already lost this fight. No one could put up against both Rinaldi men at the same time. Best she cut her losses. All the muscles in her body seemed to sag as tension left her and fatigue crashed down in its place.
“Let’s go.” Michael settled his hand against the small of her back. “You want me to take your bag?”
She shook her head. “No, thanks.”
She was tired, all right, but that didn’t mean she was physically out of order. She turned to look at Umberto. “You sure you can manage?”
He nodded. “Don’t worry.”
Quiet confidence. An aberration where he was concerned, she would’ve said only an hour earlier. But looking at him, she couldn’t help but see a formidable man. Exactly what Michael would look like in twenty-five years. How uncanny.
The younger Rinaldi escorted her to the lift. Just before he stepped into the carriage, Umberto called out.
“Michael.”
He froze next to her, and she caught the play of conflicting emotions on his face. Surprise battled with a frown and with ice, the frost winning over. He did, however, turn to face her boss.
“Take care of her.”
“I will.” He then nodded as if in silent accord.
The doors of the compartment slid closed, severing the invisible link between the two men in the process. She heard Michael’s sharp intake of breath, but she refrained from acknowledging it with a word or a touch. He’d had no personal contact with his father for more than a decade. What had taken place today had to be as close as they’d gotten to one another in years, if one overlooked the incident of a few days earlier.
His face remained tense throughout the ride down. Once in the underground parking, a security guard met them at the lift and escorted them to the Mercedes. Michael waited until she was seated, then slid into the driver’s seat.
Jane couldn�
�t help but think that one such occurrence just a few days ago had set in motion everything that had just happened. She’d left with Michael in this very car for Tabitha’s Cove, where this crazy notion to pretend to be her baby’s father had started. And, right outside that very eatery, a tabloid reporter must’ve spotted them, and the spark leading to the furore of this morning had ignited.
“What are you thinking?” He paused on the verge of starting the car.
“A snowball effect.” She forced her gaze to meet his.
He gave a dry chuckle. “You could say that again.”
“Michael.” She paused, not knowing how to breach the topic. How did you ask a man who was neither a lover nor a boyfriend, in fact simply an acquaintance, what it would be like to live with him? “How long do you think this will go on?”
He placed one suit-clad forearm on the steering wheel and turned his body towards hers. “What?”
“This whole … situation.”
He gave a small shrug and brought his arm down. “I have no idea.”
That was reassuring. “What about my things?”
“We can’t go pick them up, if that’s what you’re asking. We’ll buy what you need, and you can always call the twins and tell them to bring some stuff over.”
She nodded. What he said made sense, but what about everything else? Living arrangements, sleeping arrangements, proximity ...
She’d read that many women’s sexual drives went up a notch during pregnancy. She had no trouble imagining the raging hormones could do the same to her. How would she cope if those very hormones compelled her to want to jump his bones all the time?
Her face went hot, and she was sure a red-hot blush must be flaming upon her cheeks.
“You want me to put on the air con?” Michael glanced at her.
She could only shake her head in response.
For the rest of the drive, she kept her gaze lowered to her lap. She wanted to look out and away from him as much as possible, but that hadn’t been possible. As soon as they’d exited the underground parking, they’d been met with a barrage of flashes and clicking cameras. If she wasn’t mistaken, some people on motorcycles had even followed them until Michael had cleverly lost them in the afternoon London traffic.
They both breathed a sigh of relief once they’d entered his courtyard and the massive metal gate had rolled closed behind them.
Michael cursed as he cut the engine. She wanted to let out a string of not so polite words, too, but she had a feeling that if she did, she would add oil to the fire already burning strong in him. She couldn’t let him see how upset she really was.
She let her gaze roam over the wide gardens. Trees concealed the property from almost all angles, and they were too far from the house to allow anyone to actually see inside the rooms. Of course, with lenses that could zoom a hundred times on a distant pinpoint, everything was possible for the paparazzi.
Michael seemed to read her mind. “They can’t get in here.”
“You sure?”
“There are motion sensors all over the grounds and CCTV cameras that cover every angle of the garden. They’d get caught very easily.”
She nodded and ran her hand over the nape of her neck.
“Come on, let’s go in.” He opened the car door.
She exited the vehicle and followed him into the house. Once in the hallway, she paused, unsure about what to do and how to go about the situation. He was already on the way, going up the stairs.
“Michael?”
He turned to face her from the first step.
“Uh, where do I go now?”
He blinked before frowning. “You want the room you used last time?”
She nodded.
“That’ll be fine. Uh, I need to use the bathroom.” She fibbed to get away as she edged towards the stairs.
“Be careful on those steps.”
She all but took them two by two to get away from him and the bizarre, overwhelming tension that had crept up between them once they’d set foot in his place.
At last in the guest room, she flopped down on the bed and stared at the ceiling for a long time.
What on Earth had she gotten tangled into? She was pretty sure this was the day the rest of her life started.
*
Michael slumped onto a seat in the lounge.
What the hell was going to happen from here on?
What else could get worse?
He brought his hands up to cover his face. Weariness engulfed him and made him curse. Bloody hell. He really needed to stop cursing like a sailor. What had just happened could in fact be only the tip of the iceberg—it was a well-known fact that tabloids were more vicious and dangerous than a pack of starved wolves coming upon an innocent lamb alone in a deserted field.
A beeping sound caught his attention. It came from the security system console hidden in a wardrobe in the hallway. Someone had just opened the main gate.
Who the hell? He leapt off the couch and went to the window, where he could get a clear view of the entrance. What he saw made him groan and curse at the same time.
A blue Toyota Prius sped up his driveway, stopping in a cloud of dust right behind his Mercedes. Thank goodness the driver hadn’t crashed into his car.
He groaned as a petite blonde woman exited the vehicle and charged up to the front door where she slammed the brass knocker with enough force to bring the wooden panel down.
With leaden steps and suddenly overcome by weariness, he sighed. Of all people, she wasn’t one he wanted to see just right now. Still, he went to the door and pulled it open.
“Hello, Mum.”
She didn’t reply, just glared at him under her lashes and barged into the house, heading right for the living room.
He closed the door and followed her, feeling exactly like he had on the day Olivia had been called to the principal’s office because he and Phillip had trashed one of the bullies who’d been picking on the younger students. Like that day, he knew he’d done nothing wrong per se, but just having her there in a blind rage that made her blue eyes glitter with fury proved enough to unsettle him. Even now, at thirty-three years old.
“When were you planning to tell me?” She crossed her arms and tapped one foot in a nerve-racking clatter as he joined her in the room.
He knew that tone, and disliked it with a vengeance because it made him feel like a child again. “You saw the paper.”
She closed her eyes for a brief second. “Yes, Michael, I saw the paper.”
He shrugged and smiled. “Guess you’re going to be a grandma.”
“And it took a stinking piece of trash to inform me of that? Why did my own son not think it necessary to tell me himself?”
He sighed, careful not to let her see his turmoil. He couldn’t ever allow her to know what had actually transpired between him and Jane. “Mum, listen—”
“For God’s sake, Mike, you didn’t even hint that you had a girlfriend. And now, not only are you with someone, but you’re about to have a baby together. Tell me, how am I supposed to grasp all this at the same time?”
He moved over to her and placed his hands on her shoulders, gently making her sit on the sofa he’d just vacated. “Calm down. I’ll explain.”
“What is there to explain?”
“Everything.” He spoke through clenched teeth.
She sighed. “Mike, you were at my place just last week. Why didn’t you say anything?”
Because he hadn’t even known Jane then. “I didn’t know.”
“You mean, your girlfriend didn’t tell you she was pregnant? But how could she keep you in the dark like that?”
“Mum, it’s nothing like that. Even she didn’t know. It took a freak visit to the doctor’s to learn she was expecting.”
“Oh.” Her shoulders seemed to sag suddenly.
“I met Jane and learned about her condition shortly after I left your place.” At least, he wasn’t lying there. “Things just … snowballed from there.”
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“Oh.” She paused, looking lost in thought. “How did you meet her?”
He winced but didn’t let the emotion show.
“We worked on a common project.” Better leave it at that.
“And you’ve known her long?”
He laughed. “Actually, no.”
“So I gather this baby wasn’t planned.”
“Not exactly.”
“I see.” She paused. “What are you going to do?”
Good question. He shrugged. “We’re taking it one day at a time for now. We didn’t expect the press would get involved.”
“They’ve got a nose for sniffing every piece of news, and then they come poke that nose everywhere.”
He nodded.
“Mike, tell me something. You are going to marry her, aren’t you?”
“No, he isn’t.”
A woman’s voice had come from the threshold of the room.
Both Michael and his mother looked around to see Jane standing there.
“Even if he asked, I’d say no.”
*
Talk of meeting the ‘mother-in-law’ in such a way! This was a situation worthy of featuring in the most melodramatic soap operas. Jane cringed.
Not that Olivia Whitmore-Rinaldi was really her mother-in-law, but under the circumstances in this twisted game of pretend, the woman really was cast into that part.
“You must be Jane.” Olivia stood.
She nodded, but remained rooted to the spot. She had come down for a glass of water but had heard the voices, and curiosity had made her follow the sounds. Then, she had heard the question and known she had to answer. Never would she allow Michael to go that far.
Unless nothing were a pretence any longer, but that would be dreaming. She was already living in a warped universe, and the parameters couldn’t be altered any further.
She brought her gaze to the woman coming towards her. Michael didn’t take after his mother at all. She was tiny, and even though Olivia wore heels, Jane had to peer down to look into her face.
“You are Michael’s mum, but you two look nothing alike.” She frowned.
Olivia gave a small laugh. “He favours his father.”
The easy way with which Olivia said the words surprised her. Didn’t she know World War III brewed between those two? A quick glance at Michael’s face showed that scowl frozen on his features again.