“Are they still married?”
“Yes. At first she stayed for me. And because she wanted more children. She didn’t want to fail,” he added with a wince of understanding. “No one does. But while they were pretending to make it work, Dad had a string of affairs and Mom had three miscarriages. Their prenup was weighted heavily in Dad’s favor if she left him. She might not have married him for his money, but she contributed enough to his success that she feels entitled to a bite of it. She could embroil him in a big, ugly divorce if she wanted to, but she doesn’t have his level of ruthless disregard and he knows it. It’s become a marriage based on spite.”
“Family dinners must be fun.” Fliss poked at a chunk of chicken, having lost her appetite.
“They’re a nightmare,” he assured her. “Dad says it doesn’t make financial sense to give her half his fortune when I’ll only inherit from both of them. It’s better to keep it whole. That’s his way of claiming he’s being stubborn for me. It’s not for me.” Saint shook his head. “He fears that she’d come after shares in the company. If she got them, he wouldn’t have majority control any longer.”
“What’s your relationship with him like?”
“Terrible,” he said conversationally. “But I will inherit Grayscale eventually, and I do want it. I don’t overlook what it cost my parents to create this titan of the industry, but I also think, why? Why suffer that long, hating your partner, only to demand I be grateful for their sacrifice? Mom has her horses and Dad has his coven of toadies who scurry around telling him how smart he is, but is that really enough to compensate for all those years of being cruel to each other?”
“When they could have parted and found love elsewhere?”
“When they could have not actively hated each other. I don’t understand it. I really don’t.” He picked up his cup and brought it to his lips but didn’t sip. “I only knew that I never wanted to lock myself into a lifetime of the same thing.”
Ah. Fliss had wondered why he was telling her all of this.
“I don’t expect you to marry me, Saint,” she said quietly, ignoring the way her heart felt pinched in a vise.
“I know,” he said simply, causing her pulse to lift and dip as she felt understood and believed but also rebuffed. Then his arrow-sharp gaze hit her. “I still have to.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
“NO, YOU DON’T!” Fliss sat back in shock. “You just gave me a great reason why marriage is a terrible idea. All you have to do is say the baby isn’t yours and walk away.”
Saint finished lifting his cup to his lips, but his mouth wasn’t prepared for whatever this was. It was hot like coffee but weak. It had the color and bitterness of scotch but no bite. He didn’t think he’d had a sip of tea in his adult life. Not since he’d tried the stuff as a child and decided he didn’t like it.
He still didn’t. He set it aside with distaste.
“I don’t have the words to express how insulted I am by your thinking I would deliberately reject my child.” Especially when he’d just explained how unenthusiastically he’d been welcomed by his own father.
Saint held her wide-eyed stare for a full thirty seconds, until she dropped her gaze to her curry and rice. Then her brows lifted in a silent, cynical Whatever.
He was deeply insulted but also uneasy. He had put her in an impossible position.
Her bedsit was tiny and definitely inadequate for raising a child. The stairs alone were a guaranteed trip to the hospital, but as humble as this space was, she’d made it homey. It was tidy and organized and more colorful and welcoming than any home he’d ever occupied. Her bedspread was a kaleidoscope of fabric scraps he would bet she had quilted herself. There were doilies in psychedelic spirals under her handful of houseplants. The frame on the photo over the sink was pebbled with a mosaic of what looked like broken china plates.
The photo inside it showed Fliss with her arm around an elderly woman he presumed was her grandmother, judging by the resemblance around their eyes and smiles. Saint had the unnerving feeling that the old woman was watching him from that photo, judging him.
“The baby has become my top priority.” He’d had ample time while driving from London to let this situation sink in. He’d already projected through his father’s reaction and how this could impact the board’s decision. The gossip sites would have a field day, which would affect Fliss and, in turn, their baby. “That makes you my top priority. Your health and safety. I have to look after you, Fliss.”
Did her eyes gloss with tears? If they did, she hid it by taking her empty bowl to the sink where she kept her back to him while she rinsed the dish.
“I said some unkind things back at the hotel,” he acknowledged. “I was taught to go on the attack when I feel threatened.”
“I wasn’t threatening you.” She turned and crossed her arms, leaning her hips against the front of the sink. “I gave you information.”
“I know. I see that now.” He was still on the defensive, this time in a different way. It still made him uneasy and caused him to prickle with aggression. “What’s important for you to hear is that I don’t want my child raised in the sort of atmosphere I grew up in. I won’t be so hard on you again,” he vowed. “I know you’ll hold me to account on that.”
“That’s not my job. Hold yourself to account.”
“I am,” he said drily. “That’s why I’m here.”
She tsked and frowned at the foot of her bed. She had changed into jeans and a T-shirt before catching the train. Her faded yellow shirt hung loose over her waistband, so he couldn’t tell if her waist was thickening, but he would swear her breasts were fuller than the already deliciously round swells he had worshipped so thoroughly three months ago.
He swallowed, trying not to get distracted with memories.
“We have to try, Fliss. I live a very good life. One that our child is entitled to. I can offer you a very good life.” He glanced toward the sketchbook, impressed with her flare for a graceful line and a pop of unexpected color or pattern. “Are you really going to put your dreams on hold for the next eighteen years? I can help you achieve them, you know.”
“Ew! It’s not an achievement if someone hands it to you.”
Was that a dig at what he stood to inherit?
“It’s not cheating to maximize the opportunities you’re given. Try telling me that Ms. McCartney’s last name didn’t open doors for her. Tell me that growing up in a world where she already had access to designers and celebrities didn’t give her a leg up. That’s all I’m offering you.”
“That’s not why I’m having this baby, though,” Fliss blurted. “I need you to hear that and believe it.”
“Why, then?” he asked, more from curiosity than suspicion.
The tendons in her neck briefly stood out, as though his question put her under great stress. When she spoke, her voice was quiet and held an ache that penetrated far more deeply into him than was comfortable.
“I don’t have anyone anymore. Granny is gone and...” She waved toward the photo of her grandmother. “I want a family, even if it’s just me and my one child. I don’t want whatever it is that you just described.” Her splayed hand drew a circle to encompass the conflict that had been baked into his upbringing. “That sounds awful.”
“Understood.” He didn’t blame her for resisting an invitation into his family, but he didn’t regret warning her what it was like, either. She needed to know where he’d come from and what she was getting into. “You didn’t intend to get pregnant. I know that.”
He was heartened by what he perceived as genuinely sentimental feelings toward their baby, too. They didn’t keep a jaded part of him from remaining on guard against her, though, speculating whether her show of reluctance to marry was a long con of some kind. He wasn’t forgetting about that invitation she’d taken.
All of that aside, however. “We can still make the best of an unexpected situation.”
