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A thousand expressions flitted through his eyes, not a single one of them decipherable. Slowly, he shut the file and, without taking his eyes off her, tossed it on the coffee table.
‘Okay. Let’s talk about something else. Your mother is currently in a private hospital with health complications triggered by stage two cervical cancer, yes?’ he pressed.
Her heart lurched painfully. ‘Yes,’ she murmured.
‘With her insurance about to run out this month and her doctors all set to throw in the towel, nothing short of a miracle will bring any hope.’ There was no malice in his voice, but neither was there any warmth or sympathy. For reasons she knew were coming, he was laying out the facts of her life in bare chunks.
A spike of anger tunnelled through her bewildered emotions. ‘And let me guess, you suddenly have the power to grant miracles?’
‘I have more than that. I have the financial power that fuels particular miracles. I’m also trying to discover what your goals are. Is this baby you’re hoping to have a means of alleviating future loss? Having decided that you didn’t want a child before, you’re now desperate for one so should your mother not make it you won’t be left alone?’ he demanded chillingly.
‘I don’t know what kind of monster you think I am, but what you’re suggesting is detestable.’
‘Is it?’ he enquired, his tone a touch softer, a touch more...vulnerable.
Her eyes widened as what he’d said before made clearer meaning. ‘That’s why you want a child? So you’re not alone?’
Pain flickered over his face. ‘I want a family, yes,’ he confirmed.
‘And digging up my mother’s records, what does that achieve except to make me think you’re leveraging my mother’s health against me?’
‘It’s not leverage. It’s an offer of help so, when we reach agreement, you have one less thing to worry about. Those miracles you scoffed about can happen.’
She laughed. She couldn’t help herself. ‘You actually expect me to believe that you’d do that out of the goodness of your heart, after going to this trouble to bring me here?’
He didn’t answer for a long minute. When he did, his voice was bleak. ‘For some reason Luis held both you and your mother in high regard, and yet you were prepared to walk away from the inheritance he left you just to make a point when that money could’ve helped your mother. Luis isn’t around any more to make you see sense. But I am.’
She shook her head. ‘That money was meant for the child I never had.’
‘It was meant for you. But like everything else, you threw it away without a second thought. You think Luis just overlooked the fact that you were no longer pregnant when he chose not to amend his will? He knew your mother was ill. Did you not think this might be his way of helping you?’
‘I don’t know. I had no idea what he was thinking—’
‘Perhaps this! What is happening here right now. Maybe he rightly believed that you owe me answers. That you owe me, full stop.’ His fist was bunched, his nostrils pinched in a tight leash on his control.
She refused to back down. ‘Regardless of that, I don’t deserve that money.’
‘Does your mother deserve your abandonment?’
‘I haven’t abandoned her! I’ve done everything I can for her—’
‘Have you? Or did you make the barest minimum effort then stop, just like you did with our child?’
Fresh whips lashed her heart. ‘You have no right to say that to me—’
‘I have every right. And more. For what you did there is no coming back. Only reparations.’
‘I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the moment I found out! Is that what you want to hear? Do you want me to get down on my knees and beg your forgiveness?’
‘You know what I want.’
She flung her clutch on the sofa, every cell in her body too agitated to contain her. ‘How can you even propose something like this...how can you contemplate doing something so life-changing when you stare at me with such hate? And have you even paused for a second to think about my feelings?’
He swivelled towards the window, his features carefully schooled as he raked a hand through his hair. For a long time, she thought he wouldn’t answer her questions. When he turned back, his features were set even harder, his eyes completely inscrutable.
‘I don’t need to like you to take you to bed,’ he replied. While she was grappling with that, he added, ‘And vice versa. I believe right before our last connection we were less than impressed with each other. Yet, we still proved that we were compatible where it counted.’
Her senses reeled with the enormity of his reasoning. ‘You think that tipsy interlude compares in any way to this...clinical exercise you’re proposing?’
