Claiming His Bought Bride. Rachel Bailey

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СКАЧАТЬ I need to be secure.” Her own wage was enough if push came to shove, but this was a way to ensure her baby would never go without.

      He nodded, eyes calculating as she spoke. “Go on.”

      “And lastly, I want a contract ensuring these conditions are met.” She raised her chin, hoping he didn’t argue this point because it was an absolute bluff—she was in too far to walk away. Her baby’s needs were paramount.

      “You don’t trust me, Lily?” A rare emotion passed across his face, but she wasn’t sure it was hurt. Far more likely he was mocking her.

      “I’ll marry you and have the baby you need, Damon, but I’ll raise it on my own with money from both of us. Sign a contract to that effect or you’ll have to find someone else.”

      He rocked back on his heels, a smile playing around his mouth. “You drive a hard bargain. Good for you.” The smile that had threatened finally broke free and this time it reached his eyes. “These are precisely the qualities I want in the mother of my child.”

      He stepped forward but she moved sideways, evading him. She was shaking inside and, knowing the negotiations were at a critical point, needed all the distance from his masculine solidness she could manage. “You haven’t answered. Will you sign a contract with my conditions?”

      He reached for her, playing to her weakness, but she again evaded and crossed her arms under her breasts. “Damon?”

      His gaze rested on hers, intense and unwavering. “My child will grow up where he should—in my house with his mother and father.”

      She felt the blood drain from her face. Once Damon made up his mind, he was unwavering … and she had so little bargaining room. Her mind raced so fast she began to feel light-headed. She needed to find a way to give herself some emotional space in this arrangement.

      But there was only one option, and she sent up a quick prayer that he agreed, because she couldn’t back out of this deal now. “I’ll concede to living in your home, but only on the condition that we have separate bedrooms. On opposite sides of the house.”

      One side of his mouth quirked. “Are you sure that’s what you really want, Lily?”

      Her body screamed no, even as her mind continued to fine-tune her position. “This will be a paper marriage—we’ll live separate lives under one roof. I won’t share your bed, Damon. Now or ever.”

      He chuckled with genuine amusement. “Ah, sweetheart, you’re forgetting the child we need to make.” He cast her a look that in the past would have made her come to him. “I’m looking forward to that part immensely.”

      Lily finally allowed herself to return the smile. She knew he’d try to change the parameters, turn the situation to his benefit, but at least if she could get him to sign a contract, she had a leg to stand on.

      If only she felt as confident about resisting the invitation to his bed.

      “As it happens, that won’t be a problem,” she said, laying her hands over her waist. “I’m already pregnant with your baby.”

      Two

      Damon called up all his famed reserves of self-control to avoid swaying on his feet.

       She was pregnant?

      His head swam as if he’d been sucker punched. He supposed he had been. In all the preplanning and strategizing, he’d not once factored in this possibility. It had just never occurred to him that she already nurtured his baby inside her body.

      His gaze fixed on her stomach, searching for answers. He found none, just her flawless pale fingers stretched across the narrow expanse of her waist.

      Heart beating slower than usual with shock, mind trying to make sense of the new information, he lifted his eyes to meet hers. She stood very still; a serene mask covered her features. How could she be so calm after delivering news this momentous?

      Then it came—the crack in Lily’s veneer. She pulled one side of her full bottom lip between her straight white teeth and bit delicately down. He’d lost count of the number of people he’d played in his line of work, the number of meetings where he’d wrested control from unwilling board members. The key was always to wait until that small sign of unease appeared—to be able to recognize it—then to act without mercy.

      Yet he remained unmoving, emotions frozen.

       She was carrying his child?

      Then, as if time caught up with crashing reality, his body came back to life. Heart pumped hard, mind cleared, adrenaline flowed.

      He had a child. That baby in her womb belonged to him. He’d never considered children in his future, not until his uncle’s ultimatum, but now that the reality presented itself, he knew he’d never let that child go.

      Lily’s condition of separate bedrooms be damned. He hadn’t been prepared to sign his name to that idea even before her announcement, but now there was no way in hell he’d let her create distance between them. The baby and the woman carrying it were his and would stay that way no matter what he needed to do to ensure it.

      He glanced over at her. She was exquisite with her forest-green eyes, her alabaster skin, her silver-blond hair glimmering under the soft light. He desired her like no other. Even since first meeting her at a gallery fund-raiser, she’d gotten under his skin. And now she’d be forever tied to him.

      Unwilling to show her any of his innermost reactions, he spoke with little inflection to his words. “You played that card close to your chest, sweetheart.”

      “Not—” she cleared her throat “—not really. I suspected … thought I knew … but only had it confirmed by a doctor today. It’s why I came here tonight. To find you and tell you.” Her hands remained across her belly, almost protectively.

      “So you were pregnant when you left me.” His voice was flat, almost accusing, even to his own ears.

      She grimaced. “I didn’t know I was.”

      He raised a brow. The outcome was the same. And he had another question while they were on the topic. “Tell me honestly, Lily, why did you leave?”

      With shaking hands, she pushed a strand of hair behind an ear. “Is there any purpose in dredging this up now?”

      Maybe not, but the question had bothered him—pride had kept him from pursuing an answer. But now she was here in the flesh, he needed an answer. “We’re getting married. I think a short analysis on the breakdown of our past relationship has relevance.”

      She lifted her chin, but ruined the effect by biting down again on her full bottom lip. “Because I was too low a priority in your life.”

      That again! He’d prioritized her above almost everything, higher than a woman had ever been, and she still wanted more?

      Needing to move, to use some of the adrenaline hurtling through his veins, he strolled with controlled movements to look into a glass cage enclosing an ancient clay urn. Several museums had offered exorbitant amounts of money to buy the artifact, and yet here it’d stayed. Trapped by Travis in this mausoleum, the way Damon СКАЧАТЬ