by Naima Simone
“At work, although I don’t see how that’s any of your business,” she snapped. “Which is becoming a common refrain between us. I might be in your home, but no clause in that contract mandated me having to run my every movement by you.”
A snarl curled the corner of his lips, and he shifted a step forward but stopped himself. “I beg to disagree with you on that, Isobel. When it has to do with Aiden’s care and no one knows where the hell you’ve been for hours, and you don’t answer your cell phone, then it most definitely. Is. My. Business.” He pivoted away from her, the action sharp, full of anger. His fingers plowed through his hair, fisting it, before he turned back to her. “Aiden started coughing and became irritable, and when Ms. Jacobs took his temperature, he had a low-grade fever. She tried to call you to see if you wanted her to make a doctor’s appointment for him. When she couldn’t reach you, she called me. Damn it, Isobel,” he growled. “I didn’t know if something had happened to you or if you were in trouble or hurt...” Again, he glanced away from her, a muscle ticking along his clenched jaw. “No one could find you,” he finally growled.
Worry for her son washed away her annoyance and propelled her forward. “Is he okay? I can take him to an after-hours clinic...”
“He’s fine. I had a doctor come out and examine him. He has a virus, probably a twenty-four-hour bug, but nothing serious. I’ve just looked in on him, and he’s sleeping.”
Relief threaded through her concern, but didn’t get rid of it. As a cashier, she wasn’t allowed to have a cell phone on the floor. When her mother had been watching Aiden, this hadn’t been a problem, as she’d trusted her mother to handle anything that came up. Not to mention that the store had been minutes from her mom’s place. Maybe she should’ve given Darius her work schedule, or told him she was continuing to work at the store, period. And she’d just told Ms. Jacobs she was going to be out.
Damn. She turned toward the staircase, her thoughts already on her baby. But Darius’s voice stopped her.
“I’ll be in the library, Isobel. After you look in on him, come find me. This conversation isn’t finished.” The “don’t make me come find you” was implicit in the order, but she ignored it, instead rushing up the stairs to her son.
Fifteen minutes later, after she’d satisfied herself that he was resting and breathing easily, she headed toward the library. Her heart thudded against her chest, her blood humming in her veins. Returning to the scene of the crime. She’d barely glanced at the entrance to the room since she’d last left it, and now she had to reenter it. Maybe sit on the same couch where she’d lost her control, her pride and possibly her mind.
She hated having to enter this room again and be reminded of how she’d come apart. Of how she’d cemented his belief that she was an immoral whore who would screw anyone. After all, she’d claimed not to want him, but at his first touch, she’d surrendered.
Break it... Break me.
Hadn’t those been the words she’d uttered as she begged him? Break the no-sex rule she’d instituted. Break her with his passion.
Briefly, she closed her eyes, attempting to smother the humiliation crawling into her throat, squatting there and strangling her.
Deliberately keeping her gaze off the couch, she strode into the room and located Darius, who was in front of his desk, with his arms crossed and his eagle-eyed scrutiny fixed on her.
“Isobel.”
“Can we get this over with so I can return to Aiden?”
He didn’t move, but she could practically see him bristle. “How is he?” he asked, surprising her once more with his concern for her son.
“Sleeping, as you said,” she murmured. “He’s still warm, but he seems to be resting okay.” Drawing in a breath, she mimicked his pose, crossing her arms over her chest. “I’m sorry you couldn’t reach me. That was my fault. I was at work, and management doesn’t allow us to have our cells on us. And I didn’t even notice I had missed calls when I left. So I apologize for worrying...everyone.”
“Work?” he asked, his voice dropping to a low rumble. “What ‘work’?”
“I’m sure the private investigator you hired included my job in his or her report,” she said, sarcasm dripping from her tone. “If not, you might want to request a refund for his shoddy performance.”
He shook his head, dropping his arms to slash a hand through the air. “Don’t tell me you’re still going to that supermarket?”
“Of course I am,” she replied. “That contract didn’t require me to give up my job.”
“Why?” he demanded. “You don’t need the job, especially when it pays basically pennies. And yes, I do know how much you make, since my investigator’s report included not only where you work but how much you’re paid,” he added.
“There’s nothing wrong with ringing up groceries. It’s good, honest work.” She thrust her chin up. “Maybe you’re so far removed from that time in the mail room, you don’t remember what that’s like.”
“No, there’s nothing wrong with your job.” He frowned, cocking his head to the side. “But what do you need it for, Isobel? If there’s something you want, why don’t you just come to me and ask?”
His obvious confusion and—hurt?—smoothed out the ragged edges of her anger. How could she make him understand?
After his parents had died, he might’ve lived with the Wellses, but he’d never been totally dependent on them. Not with a multibillion-dollar empire waiting on him. Not with homes scattered around the country and money in bank accounts. He didn’t know the powerlessness, the helplessness of being totally reliant on someone else’s generosity...or lack of it.
She’d learned that particular lesson the hard way with Gage. Yes, she might’ve held down the job when she’d been married, but Gage had considered his role to be manager of their finances. And he’d been horribly irresponsible with them. And later, when his parents had parceled out sympathy money to him, he’d stingily doled that out to her, holding money for things like groceries and diapers over her head.
Never again would she be at the mercy of a man.
And if that meant keeping a low-paying job with good hours so she could maintain a measure of independence, then she would do what was necessary. If it meant losing some time with Aiden while she squirreled away her wages, well, then sacrifices needed to be made. She needed to be able to provide for them when Darius’s charity finally reached its limits.
She was a mother first. And any good mother did what needed to be done.
“Then enlighten me, Isobel. Because I don’t understand. You have a home. You don’t have to pay any bills. You even have cars at your disposal if you’d stop being so damn prideful and use them—”
“No, you’re wrong,” she interrupted, her voice quiet but heavy with the emotion pressing against her sternum. Frustration, irritation and sadness. “You have a home. You have cars at your disposal. Your money pays the bills. None of this is mine. Even after we sign that marriage certificate and exchange vows, it still won’t be. If you put me out, I couldn’t leave with any of it. Couldn’t lay claim to it. And you could put me out at any time, on any whim, because of any conceived sin on my part. And I would be on the street, homeless, with no money or resources for me and my son. No.” She shook her head. “I won’t allow that to happen.”
He stared at her, shock darkening his eyes. His lips parted, head jerking as if her words had delivered a verbal punch.
“I would never abandon you or Aiden like that,” he said, the words uttered like a vow.
She knew only too well how vows could be broken.
“I know you believe you wouldn’t. But minds change, feelings change,” she murmured. Then, suddenly feeling so tired that her limbs seemed to weigh a hundred pounds, she sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Are we done here? I need to get back to Aiden.”
“No,” he said, the denial firm, adamant.
As if it’d pushed through a throat coated in broken glass. “You don’t believe me.”
“I wanted to return to college. Did you know that?” she asked softly. Without waiting for him to reply, she continued, “One of my regrets is that I quit school. I would’ve been the first one in my family to earn a degree if I’d stayed. So graduating from college was a dream of mine, but when I broached it with Gage, he convinced me to wait until after the baby was born. At the time, I thought him wanting that time for the two of us was sweet. So I agreed. But after Aiden came, I couldn’t go back. Working a full-time job, being a mom...” She shrugged. “College would’ve been too much, so I had to place it on the back burner. But I’ve always wanted to go back. To obtain that degree. To have a career that I love. And when Aiden is older, I’ll show him that no matter how you struggle, you can do anything you desire.”
Scrubbing her hands up and down her arms, she paced to the wide floor-to-ceiling window and stared sightlessly at the view of his Olympic-size pool, deck and firepit. Her admission made her feel vulnerable, exposed.
“Did Gage support your dream?” Darius asked quietly.
She didn’t turn around and face him. Didn’t let him see the pain and anger she couldn’t hide. Darius didn’t want to hear the truth. Wasn’t ready to hear it. And he wouldn’t believe her anyway. College, money for tuition—those had been givens in his and Gage’s worlds. He wouldn’t understand or see how his friend would begrudge his wife that same experience.
“Gage had specific ideas about the wife he wanted,” she whispered instead. “A wife like his mother.” One to cater to him. Be at his beck and call. Place him as the center of her universe, at the exclusion of everyone else.
Images from that time flashed across her mind, and she deliberately shut them down, refusing to tumble back into that dark time when she’d been so helpless and powerless.
Silence descended on the room, and she swore she could feel Darius’s confusion and disbelief pushing against her.
“If what you say is true, how—”
She’d expected him not to believe her. But she hadn’t expected the dagger-sharp pain to slice into her heart. Uttering a sound that was somewhere between a scoff and a whimper, she turned, unable to stand there while he doubted every word that came out of her mouth. This is what she got for opening up and letting him in even a little.
Lesson learned.
“Wait. Damn it, Isobel,” he growled, his arms wrapping around her, his chest pressing to her spine. His hold, while firm, wasn’t constrictive, and it was this fact that halted her midescape. “That came out wrong. Just give me a minute. Don’t I have the right to ask questions? To try to understand?”
A pause—where the only sound in the room was the echo of their harsh breaths. He loosened his arms, releasing her and taking his warmth with him. Turbulent emotions surged up from the place deep inside her that remained wounded and bruised. The place that cried out like a heartsore child for satisfaction, for someone to hear her, for acceptance. That place urged her to lash out, to hurt as she’d been hurt.
But flashes of Darius being so affectionate with Aiden, of him upset on her behalf after the dinner with the Wellses, of him kissing and touching her—those flashes filled her head. And it was those flashes that tempered her reply.
“Love blinds us all.”
Unable to say any more, unable to hear him defend his friend and family, she left the study and climbed the stairs to return to Aiden.
How they could ever forge a peaceful, if not loving, marriage when the past continued to intrude?
And to that question, she didn’t have an answer.
Ten
“No, Mommy!”
Darius heard Aiden’s strident, high-pitched objection before he stepped into the doorway of the boy’s room. Isobel sat on one of the large beanbag chairs, Aiden curled on her lap, reading a book. Well, Isobel was reading anyway, Darius mused, humor bubbling inside him.
“No,” Aiden yelled again, stabbing a chubby finger at one of the pages. “Nose.” He twisted around and declared, “Eye,” nearly taking out hers with his enthusiastic poke. “Nose,” he repeated, squishing his with the same finger.
Isobel laughed, dropping a kiss on his abused nose. “You’re right, baby. Nose. Good job!”
“Good job,” he mimicked, clapping.
Warmth slid through Darius’s veins like liquid sun. The previous evening had left him confused, and the maddening cacophony of questions lingered.
Gage had specific ideas about the wife he wanted.
She’d made it sound like she hadn’t met Gage’s standard. If so, had there been consequences? What had those consequences been? Had he and Gage’s family been so fixated on Gage’s side that they’d missed clues about the truth of Gage’s marriage?
Darius closed his eyes, but when the image of Isobel’s face, filled with sadness, hurt and resignation, just before she left the study, flashed across the back of his lids, he opened them again.
Nothing could excuse breaking one’s marriage vows. But if her dreams had been crushed, if her marriage had been less than what she’d expected, if her husband had changed, was that why she’d turned to other men? Had she been seeking the affection and kindness she believed her husband hadn’t given her?
Darius longed to ask her, because these questions tortured him.
“Darry!” Aiden shrieked, jerking Darius from his dark jumble of thoughts. Catching sight of him, Aiden scrambled out of Isobel’s lap and dashed on his little legs toward him.
Joy unlike anything he’d ever experienced burst in his chest as he scooped the boy up and held him close. His heart constricted so hard, so tight, his sternum ached. But it was a good hurt. And not just because Aiden had thrown himself at Darius with the kind of confidence that showed he knew he would be caught. But also because, for a moment, Aiden’s garbled version of his name sounded entirely too close to Daddy. And as selfish as it might be, he yearned to be Aiden’s father. Already he fiercely loved this boy as if they shared the same blood and DNA.
He kissed Aiden’s still-warm forehead. “How’s he feeling this morning?” he asked Isobel.
For the first time since he’d entered the room, she met his gaze. He noted the wariness reflected in her eyes. Noted and shared it. He might have been knocked on his ass by her confession the previous night, but he still didn’t—couldn’t—trust her. No matter how much his body craved hers. Actually, that grinding need only cemented why he had to be cautious with her. He’d shown in the past he could be led around by his dick, and he would never be that foolish again. Especially with a woman who had already betrayed her vows of fidelity.
And that was the crux of the war waging inside him.
Though it was difficult to reconcile the materialistic gold digger with the woman he was living with—the doting, sacrificing mother, the proud fighter—loyalty came down to family.
They’d earned it.
Isobel hadn’t.
“He’s still running a small fever, but it’s lower than yesterday, and he has more energy. As you can tell,” she added dryly.
He nodded, poking Aiden in his rounded stomach and chuckling at the child’s giggling and squirming. Setting the boy on his feet, Darius straightened, finding Isobel’s stare again.
“Can I see you downstairs for a moment?”
“Fine,” she said after a brief hesitation, rising from the floor and setting Aiden’s book on his bed.
“I’ll wait for you in the living room.” Not waiting for her response, he retraced his earlier path down the hallway and staircase. He’d purposefully chosen the living room. Right now the study contained too many memories.
Minutes later, Isobel entered the room, and though he resented his reaction to her, his blood sang and his pulse drummed, the throb echoing in his cock. This was what she did to him by simply breathing. How d
id he armor himself against her?
God forbid she discovered his weakness.
“You wanted to see me,” she said.
“Yes.” He picked up a manila envelope from the mantel over the fireplace and offered it to her.
Frowning, she strode forward and gingerly accepted it. “What is this?”
“Open it, Isobel.”
Flicking him a glance, she reluctantly acquiesced. He studied her as she withdrew the thin sheaf of papers and scanned the contract and bank documents. Bewilderment, shock and finally anger flitted across her face in rapid-fire succession. Her head snapped up, and her eyes narrowed. She pinned him with a glare.
“What. Is. This?” she repeated, her tone as hard as stone.
“Exactly what it looks like,” he replied evenly, unsurprised by her response. “An addendum to our original contract. For entering our agreement, you receive one million dollars that will be deposited in an account under your name alone, as the bank documents reflect. It’s yours free and clear. Even if you seek a divorce, it will still be yours.”
“Like a signing bonus?” she drawled, the words acerbic.
He dipped his head. “If that’s what you want to call it.”
“No.” She dropped the papers and the envelope on the glass table next to them as if they burned her fingers. “Hell no.”
“Isobel—”
But she slashed a hand through the air, cutting off his explanation. “Is this about last night?” She shook her head so hard, her hair swung over her shoulders. “I didn’t tell you that to make you feel guilty. If you hadn’t pushed me, I wouldn’t have said anything. At. All. But I damn sure won’t take pity money from you now. If you wanted me to have that money—” she jabbed a finger in the direction of the papers “—then you would’ve included it during our original negotiations.”
“You’re right,” he growled, and from her silence, he surmised his admission shocked her. “But at the time, I didn’t want to hear anything except a yes. But now I want you to have it. And I can’t unhear your fears or your dreams.” Or the other things hinted at but left unsaid. “Maybe I need to give you what you missed. Your education. A father for your son. Help raising him. Time with him. Let me try to give it back to you, Isobel.”