by Jennie Lucas
“Give me a chance to change your mind about me,” he said.
I’d told myself it didn’t matter. He could pursue me as much as he wanted. I wasn’t going to marry him. And after that first amazing kiss in the garden, I stuck to my vow and never let him kiss me again. I think I was afraid what would happen if I did.
The time we’d spent together over the past month had been almost like Cornwall again—only far sunnier, of course, with summery blue skies and bright blue Pacific. And no sex. That was a big change. But that didn’t stop Edward from spending every moment with me, taking me out for dinner, giving me foot rubs, helping me shop for baby gear. I continued to sleep in my childhood bedroom at my stepfather’s house. One night, when I’d moaned about my cravings for watermelon and caramel pretzel ice cream, he’d showed up at the house with groceries. He’d had to throw a pebble against my window. Because it was three in the morning.
No man was this good. No man could work this hard for long. I couldn’t let myself fall for it, because there was no way it would last.
He’d made it clear what he wanted. Marriage. A shared home for our daughter. And me. In his bed.
But it wouldn’t last. Soon, his emotional breakdown—or whatever it was—would clear up, and he’d rush back to his selfish playboy workaholic life. As long as I never forgot that, or let down my guard, I told myself I’d be fine. But still...
“When are you going back to London?” I’d demanded yesterday. “How is St. Cyr Global managing without their CEO?”
Edward gave me a crooked grin. “They’ll just have to cope.”
He’d started accompanying me to OB-GYN visits. When he saw the first ultrasound images of our daughter, and heard her heartbeat, his eyes glistened suspiciously.
“Were those tears?” I asked as we left.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said gruffly, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. “Dust in my eyes.” And to change the subject he offered to take me to dinner at a famous restaurant which cost around four hundred dollars a plate.
I shook my head. “Nah. I want a burger, fries, frozen yogurt. How about a beachside café?”
He smiled at me. “Sure.”
“You don’t mind?” I asked later, as we sat on a casual wooden patio in Malibu, overlooking parked expensive motorcycles, the Pacific Coast Highway and the wide ocean beyond.
“Nope.” Edward shook his head, smiling as he helped himself to one of my fries. “If you’re happy, I’m happy.”
For the past month, his only apparent job in California had been to take care of me. He treated me as if I were not only the mother of his child, and object of all his desire, but was in fact Queen of the World.
It was pretty hard to resist. In spite of my best efforts, he was slowly wearing me down. I found myself spending every minute with him that I wasn’t working.
It irritated Jason to no end. “You never have time for me anymore,” he grumbled when we ran into each other last week on a studio lot. “You’re falling for him again.”
“I’m not,” I protested.
But now, I felt so oddly bereft as I walked through Edward’s dark, empty beach cottage, I wasn’t so sure.
Could he have suddenly decided he was bored with me and the baby, and flown off to London in his private jet, forgetting that he’d begged me to come over tonight?
Remembering the glow in his eyes as we’d had breakfast that morning, waffles and strawberries at an old diner near the set where I’d filmed a commercial today, I couldn’t quite believe it. A low curse lifted to my lips.
Jason was right.
I was starting to trust Edward again.
Starting to let myself care.
Setting my jaw, I walked across the cottage and pushed past the white translucent curtains to the pool area in the back, with its view of the beach. “Edward?”
No answer. For a moment, I closed my eyes, relishing the cool ocean breeze against my overheated skin. It was August now, and the weather was hot, and at my advanced stage of pregnancy, so was I. As I turned back to go inside, my belly jutted so far ahead of me it seemed to be in its own time zone. Sliding the screen door closed behind me, I crossed the living room, my flip-flops thwacking softly against the hardwood floor.
I should have been here hours ago. But the shoot had gone over, and then I’d gotten a call from my agent on the way here. He’d had news so momentous I’d had to pull over my car.
“This is your big break, Diana,” my agent had almost shouted. “You just got offered the girlfriend role in the biggest summer blockbuster. It’ll make your career. Another actress fell through at the last minute, and she suggested you...”
“Who suggested me?” I’d said, confused.
“Someone with good taste, that’s who. Movie will start shooting a few weeks after your due date,” he said, cackling with glee. “How’s that for perfect timing? You’ll have three whole weeks to lose the baby weight before you need to report to Romania...that won’t be a problem, will it, kiddo?”
Lose thirty pounds in three weeks? “Um...” Then I was distracted by the other thing he’d said. “Romania?”
“For three months. Romania is lovely in the fall.”
I was dumbfounded. “But I’ll have a newborn.”
“So? Bring the baby with you. You’ll have a nice trailer. Get a nanny.” When I didn’t answer, he said hastily, “Or leave the kid here with its dad. Whatever you want. But you can’t turn this role down, Diana. Don’t you get it? It’s a starring role. Your name will be above the title. This is your big chance.”
“Yeah,” I’d said, wondering why I didn’t feel more thrilled. Of course I would say yes. I had no choice. Wasn’t this what I’d wanted, what I’d dreamed of and strived for? This kind of luck didn’t happen every day. But as I imagined losing thirty pounds in three weeks then taking my newborn off to live in a Romanian trailer, all I felt was exhausted. “I...have to think about it.”
“Are you kidding?” He’d been stunned. “If you’d turn this down, I’m not sure how much I can help you in the future,” he’d said warningly. “I need to feel like we’re on the same team.”
“I understand.”
“I’ll call you for your answer first thing tomorrow. Make it the right one.”
I didn’t know what to do. I was tempted to talk it over with Edward, but I had the feeling he’d just tell me he supported whatever I wanted to do. Heck, for all I knew, he’d come to Romania with me. So much had changed.
So where was Edward now? I was two hours late. Had he given up waiting for me and left, to walk off his irritation with a stroll on the beach? Malibu was a beautiful place. I should know. I was the one who’d talked him into renting this place.
The very first day he’d come to Beverly Hills, he’d recklessly told me he planned to buy a nearby house, on sale for twenty million dollars. “I want to be close to you.” Privately, I’d thought he was out of his mind; even more privately, I thought if he lived forty minutes away, it would be a case of out of sight, out of mind and he’d stop pursuing me. So I’d convinced him he should instead rent a beach house getaway.
“You have to help me pick out the house,” Edward had agreed. Backed into a corner, I’d consented. The estate agent had taken us to ritzy McMansions all over town, but I hadn’t loved any of the newly built palaces, all of them the same with their seven bedrooms and ten bathrooms, with their tennis courts and home theaters and wine cellars. When Edward saw I wasn’t interested in them, he wasn’t either. Finally, in an act of pure desperation, the estate agent had brought us here.
Built in the 1940s on Malibu Beach, this cottage was squat and ugly compared to the three-story glass mansions around it. When Edward saw it, he almost told her to drive on.
“Wait,” I’d said, putting my hand on his arm. Something about
the tiny, rickety house had reminded me of my family home in Pasadena, where I’d lived when I was a very young child, before my father had died.
When he saw my face, Edward was suddenly willing to overlook the house’s flaws. Good thing, because there were so many. No air conditioning. The kitchen was ridiculously tiny and last remodeled in 1972. The wooden floorboards creaked, the dust was thick and the furniture was covered with white sheets. When I pulled the sheet off the baby grand piano, a dust cloud kicked up and made us all cough, even the estate agent.
“I shouldn’t have brought you here,” she said apologetically.
“No,” I’d whispered. “I love it.”
“We’ll take it,” Edward said.
But where was he now? I went heavily up the creaking stairs to the second floor. I’d been up here only once before, when we’d toured the house with the estate agent. It was just a small attic bedroom with slanted ceilings, and a tiny balcony overlooking the ocean.
As I reached the top of the stairs, the bedroom was in shadow. I saw only the brilliant slash of orange and persimmon to the west as the red ball of the sun fell like fire into the sea.
Then I saw Edward, sitting on the bed.
And then...
I sucked in my breath.
Hundreds of rose petals in a multitude of colors had been scattered across the bed and floor, illuminated by tapered white candles on the nightstands and handmade shelves. When Edward saw me standing in the doorway, in my sundress and casual ponytail, he rose from the bed. His chest and feet were bare. He wore only snug jeans that showed off his tanned skin, and the shape of his well-muscled legs. Stepping toward me, he smiled.
“I’ve been waiting for you.”
“I can see that,” I whispered, knowing I was in trouble. Knowing I should run.
He lifted a long-stemmed red rose from a nearby vase. Leaning forward, he stroked the softest part of the rose against my cheek. “I know your secret.”
I blinked. “My...my secret?”
Leaning back, he gave me a lazily sensual smile. “How you tried to resist me. And failed.”
“I haven’t. I haven’t agreed to marriage or fallen into bed with you. Not yet,” I choked out. Then blushed when I realized the insinuation was that I soon would.
His smile lifted to a grin. He nodded toward a pile of books in a box in a corner of the room. “I just got that box this afternoon from Mrs. MacWhirter. It seems you left something, buried in your bedroom closet at Penryth Hall.
I looked down at the open box. Sitting on top was the faded dust jacket of the fine manual written by Mrs. Warreldy-Gribbley, Private Nursing: How to Care for a Patient in His Home Whilst Maintaining Professional Distance and Avoiding Immoral Advances from Your Employer.
“Oh,” I said lamely, looking back at Edward with my cheeks on fire.
He gave a low laugh. “Didn’t do you much good, did it?”
Biting my lip, I shook my head.
Tilting his head, he looked at me wickedly. “What do you think Mrs. Warreldy-Gribbley would say if she saw you now?”
I looked down at my hugely pregnant belly, which strained the knit fabric of my sundress. “I’m not sure she’d have the words.”
“I think...” He ran his fingertips lightly over my bare shoulder, turning me to face him. “She’d tell you to marry me.”
A tremble went through my body. My bare shoulder pulsed heat from the place when he touched me.
Scowling, I glared at him. “Do you always get your own way?”
Lifting his hand, he cupped my cheek.
“Ask me tomorrow,” he said softly.
And Edward fell to one knee before me.
I stared down at him, my mouth wide with shock. “What are you doing?”
“What I should have done long ago.” He looked up at me in the small, shadowy attic bedroom. “You know I want to marry you, Diana. I’m asking you one last time. With everything I’ve got,” he said quietly. “All I want is to make you happy.” He drew a black velvet box from his jeans pocket and held it up in the flickering candlelight. “Will you give me the chance?”
Looking down at him, I couldn’t move or breathe. I suddenly knew that whatever happiness or misery came to me—and my daughter—would all stem from the choice I made in this moment.
“Diana...” Edward opened the black velvet box. “Will you marry me?”
I saw the enormous diamond ring and covered my mouth with my hands. I blinked hard, unable to believe my eyes. “Is that thing real?” I breathed. “It’s the size of an iceberg—”
“You deserve the best,” he said quietly.
I’d spent years in Hollywood. So I’d seen big diamonds before. Madison had worn lots of big diamonds to awards shows—gorgeous borrowed jewels to go with her gorgeous borrowed gowns. But even in Hollywood, the million-dollar jewelry was an illusion. When the event was over, the jewelry had to be returned. Faster than you can say glass slipper.
But this wasn’t borrowed. This was meant to last.
Edward meant this to last.
“Don’t do this to me,” I whispered, stricken. “We don’t need to get married. We can live apart, but still raise her together....”
“That’s not what I want,” he said quietly, still on one knee. “What is your answer?”
I looked down at him. Looked at the rose petals, the candlelight. I took a deep breath. “You’ll change your mind....”
“I won’t.” He hesitated. “But if you love someone else...”
I shook my head.
“Then what?” he asked gently.
I took a deep breath, and met his eyes.
“I’m scared. I loved you once, and it nearly destroyed me.”
His hand seemed to tighten on the black velvet box. His voice was low. “You don’t have to love me.”
Marriage without love? The thought was a jarring one. I licked my lips. “I’m afraid if I say yes, you’ll soon regret it. You’ll wish you could be single again, and date all those women....”
“I’ll only regret it,” he said, “if you say no.”
“Where would we live?” A hysterical laugh bubbled to my lips. “You don’t want to spend your life waiting for me, as I film commercials... Sooner or later you’ll have to get back to work.”
He looked up at me, his dark eyes inscrutable in the fading twilight. “You’re right.”
“I won’t live in London. We were so unhappy there. Both of us.”
“There are other choices,” he said quietly.
“Like what?”
“The whole world.” Rising to his feet, he pulled my left hand against his chest, over his heart. “Just let me give it to you.”
I could feel his heart pounding beneath my hand. The strong rapid beat matched my own. My fingers curled against his warm skin.
“I won’t let you break my heart again,” I choked out.
“I’ll never hurt you, Diana. Ever.” Dropping the rose and the black velvet box to the end table, Edward pulled me into his arms. His hands stroked back my hair, down my bare back that was only covered with the crisscross lines of my sundress. “Let me show you....”
Lowering his head to mine, he kissed me.
And this time, I could not resist.
His lips were tender. They enticed me, lured me, soft and sensual as the whisper of a sigh. I exhaled. There could be no fighting this. It didn’t just feel as if he were embracing my body. It felt like he was caressing my soul.
“Marry me, Diana,” he whispered, his lips brushing against mine.
All the reasons I couldn’t marry him rose to my mind, but as he kissed me they dissipated into thin air like mist.
What was fear, against the incessant pull of his body against mine? His muscles were solid
beneath my hands, his body powerful and strong. Something to cling to. Someone to believe in. And oh, how I wanted to believe.
I’d been keeping the secret for so long. Even from myself. But it had been right there all along. The real secret in my heart.
I loved Edward.
I’d never stopped loving him.
And all I’d ever wanted was for him to love me back....
“Say yes.” Edward kissed my cheeks, my lips, my eyelids. “Say it—”
“Yes,” I breathed.
He drew back. His handsome face looked vulnerable, his blue eyes caught between hope and doubt. “Do you mean it?”
Please let this be right. Please let this not be a mistake.
Unable to speak, I nodded.
Grabbing the black velvet box, Edward slid the obscenely huge diamond ring onto the fourth finger of my left hand. I felt its heavy weight for just a moment before he lifted my hand to his lips, kissing my palm.
In the candlelit bedroom, with the open window overlooking the twilight sea, the reverence of his gesture, like a private unspoken vow, lacerated my heart.
“You said yes,” he said in wonder. He shook his head. “I was starting to think...”
His voice trailed off. With an intake of breath, he lifted me in his arms, as if I weighed nothing at all. Gently setting me down on his bed, he pulled off my sandals one by one, kissing the tender hollow of each foot.
Leaning forward, he pulled off my sundress, leaving me stretched across the bed in only my white cotton panties and a bra that seemed barely adequate, trapped between my overflowing breasts and full pregnant belly. The enormous diamond ring on my left hand felt heavy as a shackle, making me suddenly afraid. After everything I knew about Edward’s soul, was agreeing to marry him, giving him not just body and soul but offering up all my future, all my life, and my child’s in the bargain—an act of insanity?
Edward cupped my face in his hands. His expression was tender, his eyes shining. “All I want is to take care of you forever....”
“I want to do the same for you.” I was in so deep now. I wanted desperately to believe the fantasy was true. Wrapping my arms around his shoulders, I kissed him with trembling lips. Twining his hands in my hair, he kissed me back, matching my passion, exceeding it. A fire roared through me, and I gasped.