All the anger and fight drained out of her as the truth slapped her a second time.
There was nothing left to fight for.
There never had been.
Xavi hadn’t played her for a fool. She’d played herself.
Pain gripping her heart in a vise, she stumbled onto the armchair next to her dressing table and hugged her arms tightly.
Her voice was a distant ringing in her ears as she dully said, ‘Yes, I wanted to destroy you. I wanted to take your precious company away from you and hurt you the way you hurt me.’ Even though her eyes were struggling to focus, she could see the contempt etched on his features, a contempt that tightened the vise until she could hardly breathe. ‘I never moved on, Xavi. I never got over you. I tried so hard, but I just couldn’t do it. I tried to sleep with other men, but they left me so cold I couldn’t go through with it. I’ve carried you with me every minute of every day since we parted, not just you but our…our…’ She had to swallow hard to say it. ‘Our baby.’
His head reared back as if she’d slapped him.
The silence that followed was absolute.
Eyes wide, the colour draining from his face, he just stared at her.
‘I was pregnant, Xavi,’ she whispered, saying the words aloud for the very first time. ‘Don’t you remember how we were trying for a baby?’
‘But…’ His voice was hoarse. ‘You’d only come off the pill that month. It was too soon…’
She shook her pounding head. ‘No. We were one of the lucky ones. It happened straight away for us. I took the test when you were in Milan, and I was the happiest person alive. I was having your baby, the child we both wanted, and that it happened so quickly was, for me, proof that it was meant to be and that we were meant to be.’
He sank onto the dressing stool. ‘You didn’t tell me.’ His voice was barely audible.
‘I wanted to see your face when I told you. I imagined your happiness…’ Tears were stinging the backs of her eyes, and she fought desperately through their burn. ‘I had all these fantasies of how it would play out, but then you came back and you…you…you…’
The tears finally spilt out, splashing down her cheeks in a torrent.
‘I thought you would come back to me,’ she sobbed, her chest heaving as she drew her knees up to hold herself tightly. ‘I didn’t—I couldn’t—believe you meant it. But you didn’t come back, and I lost it five days later.’
He dragged his hands down his face and expelled a long breath. His eyes were shining when he whispered, ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘I would have done, but nature took the decision out of my hands.’ After grabbing a handful of tissues from the box beside her on the dressing table, she blew her nose and tried harder than ever to get the rest of her words out. ‘When I lost the baby, what could I do but go home to England and try to pick my life up and start again? And I did try, I really did, and I succeeded in many ways, but the pain never left me, and when you made your proposal at my grandfather’s wake, it all opened up again. I hated you for asking that of me almost as much as I hated you for excising me from your life the way you did. One minute we were trying for a baby and dreaming of a big white wedding, the next…’ She lifted her hands in the air and flicked her fingers. ‘Poof. Gone. You threw me away without even checking if our wish had come true.’
‘Dios…’ It was like he’d aged a decade in a stroke. ‘I’m so sorry.’
‘So am I.’ She pulled air into her ragged lungs and wiped her nose. ‘So now you know everything. I agreed to marry you so I could destroy you.’ A wave of sadness that was close to unbearable rose inside her. She met his stare. ‘I knew when we exchanged our vows that I couldn’t go through with it, but I’d already set the wheels in motion. I meant to pull the brakes when we got back from our honeymoon, but then I got ill and…’ She closed her eyes and sniffed back more tears. ‘By the time I knew probate had been granted, everything had happened. If you want to fight me then fight me, but there is nothing to fight about. I’ve already set the wheels in motion for half the extra shares I bought to be transferred into your name. It should go through on Monday.’ She nearly managed a smile as she locked back onto his stare. ‘All equal again.’
Lifting his gaze to the ceiling, his chest rose slowly and deeply.
‘You know, since you left for New York, I’ve had the most awful intuition that history was going to repeat itself, and now it has, in all possible ways.’ She took a long breath and gathered what remained of her strength. ‘Xavi, I’m pregnant.’
Chapter Twelve
XAVI FELT EVERYatom in his body petrify into a statue. The red-hot fury that had driven him since that shark Paul Haldron told him his wife had been playing him for a fool had turned to static when Beth told him about the child they’d conceived and lost, and now he couldn’t think at all. Couldn’t move. He felt like he’d been hit at full speed by a truck.
‘We never did discuss contraception, did we?’ Her sad whisper was barely audible above the white noise crashing through his head. ‘Well, I’m on the pill, but for whatever reason, we’ve made another baby. I guess we must be the most fertile couple in Europe,’ she added, her attempt at levity dying as her voice choked. ‘So if you are still planning to go to war with me, know you’ll be going to war with your child, too.’
Your child, too…
He lowered his shocked gaze to hers. ‘You’re pregnant?’
Her usually crystal-clear green eyes were red and puffy from crying, but where there had been disconsolation just moments earlier was now…not hardness, he thought distantly, but clarity.
She jerked a nod. ‘I took the test this morning.’ Unfolding her legs, she dragged herself unsteadily onto her feet. ‘I’ll make an appointment to see a doctor on Monday and see what happens from there… Can I use your driver to take me to my grandfather’s villa or should I call a taxi?’
With the white noise having only reduced a little, he was sure he’d misheard her. ‘What are you talking about?’
