One Night: Sensual Bargains: Nine Months to Redeem Him / A Deal with Benefits / After Hours with Her Ex. Jennie Lucas
all right, dear?” Mrs. Corrigan said cheerily as I came out of the study.
This is all I can give you, Edward had said, the night he took my virginity. No marriage. No children. All I can offer is—this.
It was more true than I’d realized. Because sex was truly all he gave me now. Sex that felt almost anonymous in the dark shadows of our bed. Sex, and a beautiful house to live in while I attempted to create the acting career that was supposedly my Big Dream. Except it made me sick.
Or maybe it was the pregnancy doing that.
What would he say when he found out? Would he be furious? Indifferent? Would he think I’d somehow done it on purpose? Would he ask me to end the pregnancy?
No way. My hands unwillingly went to my slightly curved belly. Even in my shock, I already knew that I was keeping this baby. There was no other option for me.
But I was scared of his reaction.
I feared I already knew what it would be.
Mrs. Corrigan was whipping the frosting, humming merrily as I walked into the kitchen. Her plump cheeks were rosy. “Such an afternoon it is!” she sighed, looking out the windows. “Rain and more rain.” She looked at me. “Would you care for some tea? Or maybe some food, you’re looking skin and bone,” she chided affectionately.
Skin and bone? I looked down at my full breasts, my plump hips. At my belly, which would soon be enormous. I felt another strange twinge of queasiness that I now knew was morning sickness. “Um, thanks, but I’m not hungry. Edward’s taking me to a party tonight, to celebrate that his deal just went through—”
“Wonderful!”
“Yes. It is.” Not so wonderful that I’d be spending time with his friends. All those bankers and their wives, and the worst of them all, Rupert and his wife, Snooty McSnotty. A low buzz of anxiety rolled through me, heavy gray clouds through my soul with lightning and rain.
And at that thought, thunder really did boom outside, so loud it shook the china cup in its saucer as the housekeeper poured me tea.
“Ooh,” said Mrs. Corrigan with a shiver, “that was a good one, wasn’t it?”
The rain continued all afternoon and into the evening. I paced the floor, tried to read, had to reread every page six times as my mind wandered. I managed some bread and cheese for dinner, and a little bit of lemon cake. I went upstairs and showered and dressed. I blow-dried my hair, making it lustrous and straight. I put on makeup. I put on the designer cocktail dress he’d bought me. It was tighter and skimpier than anything I’d ever worn before. Especially now. For heaven’s sake, how could I not have noticed my breasts were this big?
I was ready early, at seven forty-five. Going into the front room, I sat shivering on the sofa as I waited. Outside, the traffic had dissipated, and the street was dark. Beneath the rain, puddles shone dull silver against the street lights. I waited.
It wasn’t until an hour later, almost nine, that I heard the front door slam. He ran upstairs, calling my name.
“I’m in here.”
“Sitting in the dark?” he growled. Coming into the front room, he clicked on a light, glowering at me. “What are you doing, Diana?”
I blinked, squinting in the light. “I just didn’t notice.”
“Didn’t notice?” Edward looked handsome, British and rich, a million miles out of my league in his tailored suit and tie. A warrior tycoon ready to do battle by any means—with his fists, if necessary.
But his eyes looked tired. I suddenly yearned to take him in my arms, to make him feel better. But I doubted my news would do that.
“Edward.” I swallowed. “We need to talk....”
“We’re late,” he said shortly. “I need to change.”
Turning, he raced back up the stairs, his long legs taking the steps three at a time. He seemed in foul temper for a CEO that had just made a billion-dollar deal. In record time, he returned downstairs, wearing a designer tuxedo, and looking more devilishly handsome than any man should look. I felt a sudden ache in my heart. “You look very handsome.”
“Thanks.” He didn’t return the compliment. Instead, his lips twisted down grimly as he held out my long black coat, wrapping it around my shoulders. His voice was cold. “Ready?”
“Yes,” I said, although I’d never felt less ready in my life. We left the house, getting into the backseat of the waiting car.
“How was your audition today?” he asked abruptly as his driver closed the car door.
As the driver pulled the car smoothly from the curb, I looked at Edward, suddenly uneasy. I licked my lips. “It was...surprising, actually.”
“You’re lying,” he said flatly. “You didn’t even go.”
“I did go,” I said indignantly. “I just didn’t stay, because... Wait.” I frowned. “How do you know?”
“The director is a friend of mine. He was going to give you special consideration.” Edward glared at me. “He called me this afternoon to say you never even bothered to show. You lied to me.” He tilted his head. “And this isn’t the first time, is it?”
Lifting my chin, I looked him full in the face. “I haven’t done a single audition since we got here.”
He looked staggered. “Why?”
I tried to shrug, to act like it didn’t matter. “I didn’t feel like it.”
His jaw tightened. “So you’ve lied to me for the last two months. And every morning before I left for work, I wished you good luck... I feel like a fool. Why did you lie?”
As the car wove through the Friday evening traffic on Kensington Road, I saw the Albert Memorial in Kensington Gardens, the ornate monument to Queen Victoria’s young husband whom she’d mourned for forty years after he died. I took a deep breath. “I didn’t want to disappoint you.”
“Well, you have.” His jaw went tight as he looked out at the passing lights of the city reflected in the rain. We turned north, toward Mayfair. “I didn’t take you for a liar. Or a coward.”
It was like being stabbed in the heart. I took a shuddering breath.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “Why didn’t you tell me the director was your friend?”
“I wanted you to think you’d gotten the part on your own.”
“Because you think I can’t?”
He shook his head grimly. “You hadn’t gotten a single role. I thought I could help. I didn’t tell you because...” He set his jaw. “It just feels better to be self-made.”
“How would you know?” I cried.
I regretted the words the instant they were out of my mouth. Hurt pride had made me cruel. But as I opened my mouth to apologize, the car stopped. Our door opened.
Edward gave me a smile that didn’t meet his eyes. “Time to party.”
He held out his arm stiffly on the sidewalk. I took it, feeling wretched and angry and ashamed all at once. We walked into the party, past a uniformed doorman.
Rupert St. Cyr, Edward’s cousin, had a lavish mansion, complete with an indoor pool, a five-thousand-bottle wine cellar, a huge gilded ballroom with enormous crystal chandeliers hanging from a forty-foot ceiling and very glamorous, wealthy people dancing to a jazz quartet.
“Congratulations!”
“You old devil, I don’t know how you did it. Well done.”
Edward smiled and nodded distantly as people came up to congratulate him on the business deal. I clutched his arm as we walked toward the coat room.