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‘I’m supposed to experiment on a child? I’m supposed to wait to see how I feel when it’s born?’ he exclaimed, growing increasingly heated.
‘I hope you know that’s not what I meant,’ Rosie said with real concern. She’d never seen him like this before. ‘Both of us knew this would never be easy.’
‘Easy?’ He huffed an ugly laugh. ‘That’s an understatement. Are you saying you want to pull out?’
He sounded almost hopeful. ‘You should know me better than that,’ she said firmly.
‘Maybe you want me to slow down—give you more time?’ Xavier suggested.
‘What difference would waiting make?’
He seemed to be the one needing reassurance, and so she admitted quietly, ‘My only concern is for the baby.’ She couldn’t help but smile. Her heart was full to overflowing at the thought of a child. ‘A child needs security and a proper home—’
Xavier cut her off with an impatient gesture. ‘A Del Rio child will have everything it needs. And the ring?’ he prompted, moving on from one subject to the next as if they held equal importance. He looked for it on her hand.
‘Here—’ The diamond had swung around again. She righted it, and put out her hand so he could see it. ‘Take it and put it away somewhere safe. Return it to the jeweller, if you can. It’s served its purpose.’ She tried to pull the ring off her finger, but the band was so tight she couldn’t get it over her knuckle.
‘Leave it where it is,’ he said. ‘There’s no going back. You made a promise.’
‘And I will keep that promise, with or without this ring.’
Leaving him, she went to the bathroom to find some shampoo to ease the ring off her finger.
‘Here,’ she said, going back into the room and holding it out to him.
‘You’re sure about this?’ he said, hesitating before taking it back.
‘I’m absolutely certain.’ What purpose would a flashy ring serve on the island? She wouldn’t wear anything that might put distance between her and the people she cared about.
As he took the ring their hands touched, and she felt the same heat and the same longing she always felt when he was close. Her gaze flew to his, and, of course, he was watching her. His grip on her hand slowly moved to her wrist, and from there to her sensitive upper arm, until he was bringing her close and dipping his head and kissing her, and she was clinging to him, with need and want, and tears were stinging the backs of her eyes.
This was insane. She was asking to be hurt.
‘I haven’t slept all night, thanks to you,’ he growled.
‘You must have a guilty conscience,’ she said, burying her growing feelings for him beneath another joke. ‘I slept like a baby.’
‘Liar,’ he murmured against her kiss-bruised mouth. He caged her against the wall with one hand planted above her head and his other caressing her cheek. ‘I know this isn’t easy for you—’
‘But it’s the best—the only solution,’ she insisted, trying to convince herself. She’d come up with the solution out of sheer desperation, and now it was up to her to shut her mind to the hurt waiting in the wings.
‘I’ve never made allowances for another person’s feelings before,’ Xavier admitted, his dark stare blazing into hers. ‘Maybe I’m clumsy at it.’
‘You’re terrible at it,’ she assured him, curving a smile. ‘But that’s only because you’ve never allowed yourself to care for anyone.’
‘Are you calling me a coward?’ he challenged softly.
‘Where feelings are concerned? Yes. I am.’
‘You have the same problem,’ he argued. ‘You’ve never risked your heart.’
‘Which is why I understand you.’ She met the challenge in his eyes with a level stare.
‘Do you understand me?’ Xavier queried. He looped his arms around her waist and stared down at her. ‘If you do, you must know that the ring was a showstopper, designed for that purpose. I asked for something striking and I got it.’
‘You didn’t go to a store, then?’
He frowned. ‘I commissioned it from the royal jewellers, of course.’
