She said a stilted good night, and they left.
* * *
Joy was both relieved and sick with apprehension. Her enjoyment in this evening was fully gone, but she wasn’t ready to face the censure she was certain was coming.
The drive home was completed in ominous silence, making her stomach churn.
The second they walked into the penthouse, she blurted, “I’m so sorry.”
“Youare. Why?” Axel asked with muted outrage. “I knew where you worked when we married, Joy. There’s no reason for you to be sorry. God.” He poured drinks for both of them, asking sharply, “Have you told anyone?”
“No.Only Heskel’s friend, Zander, the dance instructor he took me to that one time, but Heskel asked him to keep it confidential.” Would Axel balk at her pursuing dance now, worried it would inflame the rumors?
“This stinks of Otto.” Axel brought her a glass and took a deep gulp from his own. “The next time you speak to your father, ask if anyone has been snooping around.”
“He knows not to talk to reporters.” Axel had warned her their marriage would generate curiosity. “But the neighbor knew,” she recalled.
“He must have had someone investigate you, looking for something to undermine our marriage. He’s trying to damage my reputation when I’m on the verge of competing with him. He’s trying to—” He bit that off and looked away, profile flexing with remorse.
“What?” she prompted, sensing something unpleasant was coming.
His mouth tightened, before he said reluctantly, “He’s trying to build a case for not accepting you as his daughter.”
For rejecting her.
Against her will, a low sob resounded in her throat, leaving an ache in her chest.
“I shouldn’t have said that,” he said.
“Why not? It’s true.” Her throat hurt. She had been fully prepared forAxelto reject her over this, but he seemed to be infuriated on her behalf. “What are you going to do?”
“Everything in my power to destroy him,” he said with a curl of his lip and another sip of his drink.
“I mean about how this ruins your reputation.”
“I didn’t say it ruins it. I said he’s trying to damage it. If he wants to play dirty, I’d like to issue a press release that he’s your father and sought you out for a marriage contract he refuses to honor. But that affects you and your family.” He emptied his glass and set it down hard. “So I’ll find another way to gut him.”
He took the glass she offered that she hadn’t touched.
“Can I…” She cleared her throat. “Can I talk to Dad first? To explain all of this so he’s not blindsided by it?”
Axel’s brows crashed together. “You would consider making a statement? You don’t have to acknowledge that Otto is your father, Joy. He’s caused you enough pain. Tonight—” He closed his fist and stalked a few steps away, shoulders a hard line. “I’m sorry. That should never have happened. The fact that you knew how to deal with that bastard’s remark because you’ve faced derision like that before? You wouldn’t have had to work in the club if Otto had reached out to you when he learned about you.”
“I don’t care about that.” Her voice broke a little at how ferociously he was defending her. “It’s not about money that he did or didn’t promise me. I don’t care about getting one up on him, either. I just don’t want him to have the power to ambush me like that. If all of my secrets are out, and Dad knows about him, Otto can’t use any of it against me. He ceases to have any power over me.”
Axel set aside the glass and came to her. He settled one hand on her hip, the other alongside her neck. His brow was pulled with concern, his gaze shadowed by remorse.
“I know I should apologize for drawing you into this, Joy, but Otto was always going to come after you. If not to keep me, to push out Mira. I’m sorry for what you’re going through, but I’m not sorry for getting to you first and making this hard for him.”
Her lips quivered. She had to press them together to steady them before she could speak.
“I thought you’d be angry at me. And think I was a liability.”I thought you’d send me home.“I don’t know what I bring to this marriage except—”
“You,” he said, shifting his hand so he could set his thumb against her lips. “You bring you. That’s enough.”
Oh.Now she really was going to cry.
CHAPTER TWELVE
