He took a step closer to her, enough so that Maria could smell the seductive hints of his aftershave and see the hard gold glittering in his eyes.
‘I would become a hound of hell myself,cara, if it was necessary,’ he vowed, and she believed him.
Tears pressed at the backs of her eyes, but she would not, could not, let them fall. Not in front of him. What she did behind closed doors was her business, but she couldn’t show this man a single hint of her vulnerability.
He was right. Shedidcare what her family thought. She did care how news of her pregnancy would shake the very foundations of Gallo Group—a company that prided itself on traditional family values. A family that prided itself on them, even though not a single one of Gio’s children had ever entered into a happy, successful marriage.
But she also cared that at one point in her life he was the only man she thought she might be able to have this future with: a child, a husband. He had always been the shadowy face in her fantasies. But the hatred, the anger that she saw in his gaze right now? Oh god, it was the nightmare that had come from a beautiful daydream. But she couldn’t dwell on that right now.
‘So other than your ego, is there a single reason that you can provide that would stop us from getting married? Stop me from providing the kind of security thatour childwould need?’ he asked.
‘I have my own money, Micha,’ she reminded him.
It devastated her, the way he made it sound as if it were nothing but selfishness to refuse his proposal—and what proposal?Demandmore like.
But she didn’t want her child to grow up the way that he had, with the scars that he had. Oh, he might hide them well these days, but once he’d been vulnerable enough for her to catch a glimpse of them. He’d never once blamed his mother, never once treated her with anything but the respect she deserved. But Maria knew those scars were there. And she’d do anything to protect her child from those same wounds.
‘This weekend?’ Maria asked, hating the weakness in her voice.
‘What would you gain by waiting?’
She opened her mouth, but he pressed on, regardless.
‘You’ve already had two months. And what has that brought you? Other than a house in the middle of nowhere?’ he remarked, looking around him as if the place that she had hoped would be her salvation, her sanctuary, was lacking in some way.
She wanted to argue. She wanted to rail against him, against his accusations. She wanted to pound her fists against that powerful, broad chest of his. And he looked at her as if he knew it. As if he could so easily read her every desire. Just like he had looked at her the night she’d visited him in Paris.
‘Mmm?’ he prodded, as if he were actually waiting for an answer.
It had brought her nothing but the mirage of time. She’d not gotten anywhere other than where she’d been when she first arrived. She’d barely even been able to unpack. As if she too knew that she wouldn’t be here long.
Because in truth, she’d always known. She’d go back to him. She’d go back to him because no matter what she felt, she couldn’t,wouldn’t, keep his child from him, nor keep her child from its father. Because no matter what passed between them, she knew that he would expend his last breath making sure that his child had whatever it needed.
And that was a man she’d marry.
As if sensing her surrender, he pulled his hands out of his pockets and rocked back on his heels.
‘Registry office,’ she bargained.
‘No.’
‘What?’ her head snapped up.
‘No; it’s a one-syllable, very common word,’ he defined unnecessarily.
‘Micha.’
‘If you think that you will start your life as my bride, come into my home as my wife, if you think you’re going to stand by my side at the very least until our child is of legal, adult age, having had some secret, out-of-the-way wedding with no photos or family as if we areashamed, then you are very wrong.’
She flinched, seeing it how he’d seen it and regretting her request instantly. ‘I didn’t mean it like that,’ she whispered.
‘Then what did you mean? Every single Gallo that has married in the last twenty years, with the exception of Antonio, has had the centre spread inHello Magazine.’
‘Oh, and you think you can organise that in less than four working days, do you?’ she shot back, instead of answering his question.
‘You would do well not to underestimate me, Maria,’ he warned and she heeded.
‘Nor you, me, Micha,’ she said, feeling the hot scouring heat of anger crawling up her spine. She was tired of his threats, and if she was being honest, was a little bit hurt too. ‘You think you can come in here and make demands that upend my life and that I have no say? What about after the wedding, huh? What aboutafteryou’ve put your ring on my finger and claimed me in front of the world?’Like some trophy, she mentally added. ‘You’ll go back to work running the company you know should be mine, while I stay at home and play wife and mother?’
