Claire had a horrible thought. “You didn’t catch them, did you?”
“Christ no.” He paused, his mouth kicking up into the barest trace of a smile. “Thank God. I’ve received several disgusted emails from poor shits who apparently did.”
“What are you going to do?” Claire worried her lower lip. “Amy and Leo are our best team.”
“Now we know why.”
Claire laughed at his quip despite herself, and Logan did too for a moment, before apparently thinking better of it. An awkward silence hung between them. Claire suddenly regretted pushing him away that morning. The urge to skirt his desk and kiss his sullen mouth, to coax him back into the softer Logan she’d seen glimpses of, was strong. She hated when he retreated to King Monroe mode. The gap between them seemed to widen to an enormous chasm.
Logan cleared his throat. She noticed he was tugging absently at his earlobe, a habit of his when he was agitated. “Claire, I want to make a deal with you.”
The abrupt change in subject matter startled her, as did the edge in his voice. Her response was hesitant. “What kind of deal?”
“I’ve realized you and I do best in a business relationship.” He slid a stack of papers to her. “My lawyer drew this up for me. Why don’t you take it with you, read it over, and get it back to me by Monday?”
Claire stared in disbelief down at the papers he’d given her. It was a contract, she realized, and Logan’s lawyer had emailed it to him just that morning. Her eyes skimmed over it quickly. When she finished, Claire didn’t know whether to tear it up or punch Logan in the face. Maybe both. She’d never been more enraged.
She stood. “You want me to stay on at LM, to live with you for a year, to inform you of every doctor’s visit I have, to agree to shared custody. This is absolutely ridiculous. You can take your stupid contract and shove it.” Angrily, she picked it up and tossed it at his chest. “I won’t sign it.”
Logan remained implacable, the arrogant, cold veneer firmly in place. “Naturally, I don’t expect you to sign it without consulting your own counsel. I’m sure we can iron out a mutually agreeable arrangement.”
Part of Claire, the part that had traitorously developed feelings for him, couldn’t reconcile this Logan with the other Logan she’d gotten to see. The Logan before her was the man she’d always assumed he’d been. Icy, hard, all-business, emotionless. But she’d been given a precious peek beneath that exterior and she knew there was more to him.
Unless she’d merely been deluding herself.
She searched his face for clues. “I thought you wanted a relationship with me. Something more, you said. Now you’re foisting this contract on me like this is some kind of business deal.”
He shrugged carelessly. “I thought it over and realized you and I only work well in business terms. Claire, the contract’s a formality. For peace of mind. Eventually, you and I will bring other partners into our child’s life. I want him or her to have as stable and normal a life as possible.”
Other partners.
Claire hated admitting it, but the idea of Logan’s future wife really, really annoyed her. Okay, she didn’t like it at all.
She forced that errant thought from her mind and turned it instead to the current conversation. “People provide their children with stable lives all the time, and they don’t need contracts to do it.”
God, how could he be so suddenly blasé about this when he’d been laying those smoldering kisses on her only this morning?
Logan slid the contract back across the desk to her. “My top priority at this point is our child.”
“And mine isn’t?” Totally outraged yet again by his I-wish-you-could-be-as-selfless-as-me attitude, she stood. “God, you can be such an unfeeling jerk sometimes. I’m not going to let you play corporate games with my life.”
“You’re the one who plays games.”
“Oh really? And what do you call shredding up my two weeks’ notice?”
His mouth kicked up in a semi-grin. “Clever.”
Oh, he could really be so annoying. And somehow sexy at the same time.
Claire sighed. “You know what? I’m tired of fighting with you all the time. Like it or not, we’re going to be parents soon, and we’ll have to get along. Maybe you’re right. Maybe we do need a contract.”
She couldn’t believe she was relenting, but Logan had this way of charming her out of being furious with him. All he needed to do was flash her a half-smile andpoof. Anger instantly dissipated. Her weakness where he was concerned troubled her.
“Or some time together,” he suggested, his tone smooth, silken. “We can put the contract on hold. My offer for next week still stands.”
So they were full circle, exactly where they’d been this morning. She had to wonder if this wasn’t exactly what Logan had planned with his little “contract.” He was definitely that underhanded, but to accuse him of it now would only incite another prolonged bout of arguing. And hadn’t she just decided to avoid arguing with him for the baby’s sake?
Even so, accepting Logan’s proposition would have a lot of ramifications. For one thing, she’d be forced to delay her departure from LM. For another, being alone with him for a week would seriously jeopardize her ability to resist him. And when her mother found out about it, she would have to go into the Witness Protection Program.
