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Now, she was upstairs packing Henry’s baby clothes for their trip to Seattle. They would get married in her home-town tomorrow, with her family in attendance. When he’d agreed to her plan, she’d thrown her arms around him and wept.
“You are so good to me,” she’d whispered. “Thank you for understanding. You are the most wonderful, kind man in the world.”
Wonderful? Kind? Because he was allowing her to have her family at her wedding instead of bullying her into an instant drive-through wedding in Las Vegas?
Théo was starting to feel a constant pain that started at the base of his skull and then radiated down his spine to the vicinity of his heart. Or at least the place where his heart should be.
He had lied to her. He’d lured her into marriage under false pretenses. Théo tried to tell himself that it was for a good cause—to raise his son in a solid home—but he knew his motivation hadn’t been entirely noble.
He couldn’t bear the thought of any man touching Carrie. He couldn’t endure the idea of her ever looking up so breathlessly, with such tender love in her eyes, into the face of another. Her love belonged to Théo—only to him.
Even though he was a selfish liar who did not love her.
Pacing the length of his dark, masculine study as Carrie packed bags upstairs for a flight that would leave in an hour, Théo tried desperately to shrug off his conscience.
He’d won everything he ever wanted. But at what price? Was this another Açoazul S.A.? A Brazilian steel company bought dear, not remotely worth the price he’d paid?
And what would it do to Carrie, to be broken up for her most valuable assets? Her assets. He froze in place, clawing his hair back with one hand. Carrie wasn’t a business. She was the kindest, sweetest woman he’d ever known. And her most valuable assets weren’t just her skills as a mother, or her passion as a wife. It wasn’t even the warmth and comfort she brought to his cold château.
It was the light in her eyes. Her cheerful optimism. Her belief in the best in people. Her ideals and dreams were the core of her. If Théo married her, ruthlessly letting that light in her eyes go dim as she realized his deception, he would kill the best part of her. Her heart.
He wasn’t taking her to a wedding, or even a funeral, he realized. He was plotting her murder.
Melodramatic nonsense, he told himself angrily. But it felt true. Had Théo ever once known what it felt like before to be truly loved? Had his home ever felt so warm before her arrival? Had he ever known such depths of passionate ecstasy with any woman?
He didn’t want to let her go. Ever.
But if he tricked her into marrying him, everything he admired most about Carrie—her cheerful selflessness, her hopefulness, her dreamy, idealistic heart—would be destroyed.
Grinding his teeth, he stared at all the leatherbound books on the other side of his study. He’d told himself that he had no choice but to be ruthless—for his son’s sake. But the truth was that Henry would always be happy with Carrie as his mother. He’d have a wonderful childhood in Seattle, playing baseball with kids in the neighborhood, part of a community, loved by all his cousins and grandparents.
What could Théo offer him except for a large bank account and a drafty gilded château?
“The only rich family is one that is filled with love.”
He thought about his own lonely upbringing. He’d never felt like he had a home. But even so, even at eight years old, he’d been glad when his parents had separated. Living in the same house with parents who coldly despised each other had been painful. Especially since, even as a child, Théo had known he was the shackle that imprisoned his parents together.
He thought of the beauty and hope in Carrie’s eyes when she’d spoken of the man she would someday love.
Théo ground his teeth, feeling like he wanted to punch the wall.
It doesn’t matter what she wants, he told himself angrily. I won’t give them up. My son is my blood. Carrie will be my wife. I will never let her be loved by another.
But could he selfishly possess her when he knew it would destroy the light in her that he loved the most?
Clutching his hands into fists, he closed his eyes. He took a deep breath. When he opened his eyes, he stared through the window at the blue sky, at the beauty of the gardens and olive groves stretching toward the craggy mountains.
Then he reached for his phone.
An hour later Carrie knocked on the door to his study, then peeked around the door.
“Is this what happens when you own the plane?” she teased him. “You can keep everyone waiting while you check your email? Even Lilley is already waiting in the car—”
Her voice was cut off when she saw another man in the study. Rising from the desk, from the papers where he’d just affixed his final signature, Théo nodded his lawyer’s dismissal.
“I don’t like this,” the man said grimly in French.
“I don’t expect you to,” Théo replied in the same language, coldly. The man stalked out of the study, brushing by Carrie. And Théo looked at her, knowing it was the last moment she would love him.
