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She took a shaky breath, opened her eyes and said, “Yes.”
* * *
The car was waiting outside.
“Congratulations, sir,” Stevens said, as he opened the door. He looked at Laurel and smiled. “And my best wishes to you, too, madam.”
Best wishes? On an occasion such as this? Laurel felt like laughing. Or weeping. Or maybe both but then, the chauffeur was as much in the dark about this marriage as everybody else.
It wasn’t easy, but she managed to summon up a smile.
“Thank you, Stevens.”
Damian seemed to find that amusing.
“Nicely done,” he said, as the car swung out into traffic. “I’d half expected you to assure Stevens that you were being carried off against your will.”
Laurel folded her hands in her lap and stared straight ahead.
“Stevens was just being polite, and I responded in kind.
I can hardly hold him responsible for the dilemma I’m in.”
“The dilemma you’re in?”
There was a soft note of warning in his voice, but Laurel chose to ignore it.
“We’re alone now, Damian. The judge isn’t here to watch our performance. If you expect me to pretend, you’re in for an unpleasant surprise.”
“I refer to your attitude toward my child. I will not have it thought of as a dilemma.”
“You’re twisting my words again. This travesty of a marriage is what I meant. I want this baby, and you damn well know it. Otherwise I wouldn’t be sitting here, pretending that—that all that mumbo jumbo we just went through is real.”
“Pretending?” His lips compressed into a tight smile.
“There’s no pretense in this. I have a document in my pocket that attests to the legitimacy of our union. You are my wife, Laurel, and I am your husband.”
“Never!” The words she’d kept bottled inside tumbled from her lips. “Do you hear me, Damian? In my heart, where it matters, you’ll never be my husband!”
“Such a sharp tongue, sweetheart.” He shifted in his seat so that he was leaning toward her, his face only inches away. “And such empty threats.”
“It isn’t a threat.” She could feel her pulse beating like a fist in her throat. “It’s a statement of fact. You may have been able to force me into this marriage but you can’t change what I feel.”
He touched the back of his hand to her cheek, then drew his fingers slowly into her hair. The pins that held it up worked loose and it started to come undone, but when she lifted her hand to fix it, he stopped her.
“Leave it,” he said softly.
“It’s—it’s messy.”
He smiled. “It’s beautiful, and it’s how I prefer it.”
It was difficult to breathe, with him so close. She thought of putting her hands against his chest and pushing him away, but then she thought of that night, that fateful night, and how they’d ridden in this car and how she’d wound her arms tightly around his neck and kissed him...
...how she longed to kiss him, even now.
God. Oh God, what was happening to her?
“Really,” she said, with a forced little laugh, “how I wear my hair is none of your business.”
“You are my wife.” He ran his hand the length of her throat. Her pulse fluttered under his fingers like a trapped bird, confirming what he already suspected, that though his bride seemed to have recovered her composure, she was not quite as calm as she wanted him to believe. “Is the thought so difficult to bear?”
“I learned something, when I was first starting in modeling. I never asked a question unless I was sure I wanted to hear the answer.”
He stroked his thumb across the fullness of her bottom lip. A tremor went through her, and her eyes darkened.
“Don’t,” she whispered—but her lips parted and her breathing quickened.
His body quickened, too. She wanted him, despite everything she’d said. He could read it in the blurring of her eyes, in the softening of her mouth.
Now, he thought. He could have her now, in his arms, returning his kisses, sighing her acquiescence against his skin as he undressed her.
He bent his head, pressed his mouth to the slender column of her throat. She smelled of sunshine and flowers, summer and rain. He shut his eyes, nuzzled her collar aside and kissed her skin. It was softer than any silk, and as warm as fresh honey.
“Laurel,” he whispered, and he drew back and looked into her face. Her eyes were wide with confusion and dark with desire, and a fierce sense of joy swept through him.
He ran his thumb over her mouth again. Again, her lips parted and this time, he dipped into the heat that awaited him. A soft moan broke from her throat and he felt the quick flutter of her tongue against his finger. Her hands lifted, pressed against his shoulders, then rose to encircle his neck. Damian groaned and pressed her back into the seat.
God, how he wanted her! And he could take her. She was his wife, and she wanted him. She was a sensual, sexual woman and now there would be no other men for her.
What choice did she have, but to want him?
He pulled away from her so quickly that she fell back against the leather seat.
“You see?” he said, and smiled coldly. “It will not be so bad, to be my wife.”
Her face reddened. “I hope you go to hell,” she said, in a voice that trembled, and as he turned his face and stared out the window at the landscape rushing by, he wondered what she would say if he told her that he was starting to think he was already there.
* * *
He had to give her credit.
He had told her they’d be leaving the country but she didn’t ask any questions, not where they were going, or why, and she didn’t blink an eye when they boarded a sleek private jet with Skouras International discreetly stenciled on the fuselage.
She settled into a seat, buckled her seat belt, plucked a magazine from the table beside her and buried her nose in it, never looking up or speaking except to decline, politely, when the steward asked if she’d like lunch.
But not even an actress as good as Laurel could keep up the deception forever. Four hours into the flight, she finally put the magazine down and stirred.
“Is it a matter of control?” she said. “Or did you just want to see how long it would take me to ask?”
He looked up from his laptop computer and the file he’d been pretending to read and smiled politely.
“Pardon?”
“Stop playing games, Damian. Where are we going?”
He took his time replying, signing off the file, shutting down the computer, stuffing it back into its leather case and laying it aside before he looked at her.
“Out of the country. I told you that yesterday.”
“You told me you had business to attend to and to bring along my passport. But we’ve been flying for hours and—” and I’m frightened “—and now, I’m asking you where you’re taking me.”
“Greece,” he said, almost lazily.
His answer shocked her. She’d been to Greece once; she remembered its stark beauty as well as the feeling that had come over her, as if she’d stumbled into another time when the old rules that governed behavior between the sexes were very different than they were now.
“Greece?” she said, trying not to let her growing apprehension show. “But why?”
“Why not?”
“I’m not in the mood for games, Damian. I asked a question, and I’d like an answer. Why are we going to Greece?”
There were half a dozen answers to give her, all of them reasonable and all of them true.
Because I own an island there, he could have said, and there was a storm last month and now I want to check on my property. Because I have business interests on Crete, and those, too, need checking. Because I like the hot sun and the sapphire water...
“Because it is where I was born,” he said simply, and waited.
Her reaction was swift and not anything he’d expected.
“I do not want my child born in Greece,” she said hotly. “He—or she—is going to be an American citizen.”
Damian laughed softly. “As am I, dearest wife, I assure you.”
“Then why...?”
“I thought it would be a place where we could be free of distraction while we get to know each other.”
Catlike, he stretched. He’d taken off his jacket and tie, undone the top two buttons of his shirt and folded back the sleeves. His skin gleamed golden in the muted cabin light, his muscles flexed. Laurel felt a fine tremor dance down her spine. Whatever else she thought of him, there was no denying that he was a beautiful sight to behold.
And now, he was hers. He was her husband. The night she’d spent in his arms could be a night lived over again, on the sands beside a midnight sea or on a wild hilltop with the sun beating down on the both of them. She could kiss Damian’s mouth and run her hands over his skin, whisper his name as he pleasured her...
Panic roughened her voice.
