Millionaire Mavericks: The Oilman’s Baby Bargain. Michelle Celmer

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СКАЧАТЬ and be happy.

      Their last night in Greece, she lay beside Mitch, listening to his deep, heavy breathing as he slept, knowing she should get up and go to her own room, but feeling too lazy to move. She always waited until he was asleep to slip away. As much as she would have loved to spend all night with him, she was still getting sick every morning. Soon though, he would know about the baby, and she could stop hiding. But for now, she really needed to get up.

      Five more minutes, she told herself, letting her eyes drift shut and cuddling up against Mitch’s side.

      When she opened her eyes again, sunshine was pouring in the windows. Mitch was behind her, his breathing slow and deep as he slept, but one part of his anatomy was already wide awake.

      As she was considering the most pleasurable way to wake the rest of him, she felt a familiar lurch in her stomach. She broke out in a sudden cold sweat and a wave of nausea overwhelmed her. Swallowing back the bile rising in her throat, she slid out of bed as quietly as possible and pulled on her nightgown. There was no time to make it to her own bedroom. She had no choice but to use Mitch’s bathroom. She reached the commode just as her stomach violently emptied. The spasms were so intense, she was convinced she would look down and find an internal organ or two floating around. When she was finished, her entire body felt limp and shaky. She sat on the floor and rested her face against the cool tile wall.

      “Are you all right?”

      Lexi’s eyes flew open. Mitch was standing in the doorway, wearing only his boxers, his hair mussed from sleep, concern etched on his face. Damn it! She should have shut and locked the door.

      “I’m fine.” She reached over and flushed the commode, but it was obvious that she’d been sick.

      “No, you’re not.” He grabbed a washcloth from the towel bar and soaked it with cool water from the tap. He wrung out the excess and handed it to her. She wiped her face with it, feeling the nausea beginning to pass. She would be completely fine in an hour or so.

      He reached over to feel her forehead, but she held up a hand to stop him. “I don’t have a fever. I’m okay.”

      “What’s going on?” he asked.

      “Must be something I ate,” she lied, and she could see he wasn’t buying it.

      “I know something is wrong. You’ve hardly eaten anything all week, you’ve lost weight, and every morning you look pale and exhausted. I want the truth.”

      He knew. She could see it on his face that he’d already figured it out for himself. Or at least suspected. She had the feeling that her saying the words was a formality at this point.

      Maybe this was a good thing. The longer she put it off, the harder it was going to be, right? The more it would sound like a lie. And he didn’t look upset, exactly. More concerned than angry, so maybe it would be okay.

      She took a deep breath, blew it out, and finally said the words she had been holding on the tip of her tongue for more than a week. “I’m pregnant.”

       “Pregnant?”

      She could not have prepared herself for the look of dumbfounded shock on his face. Whatever he might have thought was wrong with her, pregnancy had clearly never crossed his mind. And if his reaction was any indication, everything would not be okay.

      “You didn’t think to mention this before?” he asked, his voice low and quiet, but she could see that he was ready to explode. And could she blame him? He’d said it himself, he didn’t want to bring a child into this. Had she really thought a week of fantastic sex was going to make him change his mind? Make him fall madly in love with her?

      She felt as if she might be sick again.

      “I only found out for sure a few days before we left,” she said, knowing it was a pathetic excuse. “I was waiting for the right time to tell you.”

      “That’s what this has all been about, hasn’t it?”

      “All what?”

      “The cooking and the cleaning. The sex. Did you think you could manipulate me?”

      Her heart sank. What was she going to tell him? No? Lie to him again? She had done that, just not in the way he thought. Not so sneaky and underhanded. “It wasn’t like that, I swear. I wanted you to see that I could be a good wife.”

      He looked so disgusted with her, so…violated. “I didn’t marry you so I could have a wife. I only did it for your father’s support.”

      And that was her life in a nutshell. She was only as useful as her political connections. No words could have cut deeper or stung more.

      “Does Lance know?” he asked.

      Lance? Why would he think that she would go running to his brother? “No, of course not.”

      “And he never can,” Mitch said.

      His words took her aback. What the hell was that supposed to mean? How could he not find out, eventually? Did Mitch expect her to give the baby up, or even worse, terminate? Was he that cold and heartless, or so arrogant that he believed the choice was his alone?

      What did his brother have to do with this, anyway? This was between her and Mitch. “Who cares if Lance does find out? What’s he going to do about it?”

      The veins at his temple pulsed. “You can’t mess with people’s emotions that way, Lexi. He and Kate are happy. Something like this could tear their marriage apart. I refuse to let that happen.”

      How could she and Mitch having a child ruin Lance’s marriage? This didn’t make any sense. “What are you asking me to do, Mitch?”

      “We’ll raise the baby as mine,” he said.

      Then it dawned on her. Their odd and confusing conversation suddenly made sense. He thought it was Lance’s child. Lance, who she had barely kissed, much less slept with. It had never even occurred to Mitch that the baby was his.

      Did he honestly believe that she would jump from Mitch’s bed right into his brother’s? Did he really have such a low opinion of her?

      Obviously, he did. This past week, all the time they had shared, it meant nothing to him. He was using her for a good time, because he apparently believed that was all she was good for.

      Her stomach lurched and she had to fight to keep from vomiting again. How had she gotten into this mess? Married to a man who considered her a garden-variety slut, one who jumped from one brother to the next as casually as she changed shoes. Even if she did try to tell him the truth, she doubted he would listen, or believe her. Or care.

      She had been hoping they might have a real marriage. Not just hoping, but longing for it. She desperately wanted someone to really see her. To love her. But it was clear that Mitch would never be that man. He could never respect or love her, and all the pretending, all the seducing in the world would never change that. It would never alter the preconceived notion he had of her.

      First rejected by her father, then by her husband. As long as she lived, she would never trust any man ever again.

      Using the wall for support, she pulled herself СКАЧАТЬ