AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Skye shook her head, but Matteo moved to the table, holding a chair out.
‘Sit down, Skye. You’re not going to win this, so you might as well save your breath to argue about something that matters.’
‘You don’t think my personal freedom matters?’ she snapped, staying right where she was.
‘I think the baby’s safety is our number one priority.’
Chastened, she dipped her head forward. ‘I’ll be fine.’
‘Yes. And I will be here to make sure of it.’
He took his seat at the table and returned his attention to the newspaper, flicking straight to the finance section.
Skye expelled a soft sigh. It was a big house. The fact that he was going to be somewhere in it didn’t mean that they’d be falling all over each other. She’d just make a point of staying in her room, or on the rooftop terrace—places where he wouldn’t be.
‘Okay, whatever.’ She shrugged. ‘Just remember, there’s many months of this to go. That’s a long time for you to be out of the office.’
His shrug was pure, sexy indolence. ‘I’ll be cutting my hours back once the baby is born anyway, so why not start now?’
‘Why would you?’ Skye demanded, appalled.
‘You don’t think I will want to spend time with our child? You don’t think his or her birth warrants my being here?’
‘No!’ Too desperate. Too urgent. ‘Matteo, this is my baby! You agreed to divorce me yesterday. And now you’re acting as if we’re going to spend every spare moment together for the next eighteen years.’
‘At least,’ he remarked, his expression droll.
At Skye’s obvious panic, he issued a somewhat placatory smile. ‘Skye, I had no idea you were pregnant when you came to obtain my signature, as you very well know. Surely you can see that it changes everything?’
‘Not for me,’ she pointed out caustically. ‘I have as little desire to be married to you now as I did then.’
‘And I have as much conviction that you are lying now as I did then.’
‘Why do you find it so hard to believe that a woman wouldn’t want to be married to you? Are you that arrogant, Matteo? Do you really think that after everything you did I’d want to be your wife?’
He sat back in his chair, his eyes resting on her face with curiosity. ‘And what did I do?’
Skye’s laugh was a hollow intonation. ‘Seriously? You want me to catalogue your faults? You’ve already admitted them.’
A muscle jerked in his jaw. ‘I wanted the hotel,’ he said with a shrug. ‘It changed nothing about our marriage. Nothing about how you felt for me.’
‘It changed everything! My God, Matteo! You targeted me! I had no idea who you were that night but you knew everything about me. I didn’t even know about your feud with my family until a little over a month ago. But you did. You knew all about it! You flirted with me and you seduced me, yet it had nothing to do with who I am, right? It was all a fake!’
‘The passion was not.’
Though it was such a meagre compliment, a tiny crumb of assurance, Skye shook her head dismissively. ‘Would you have felt the same way if there was no hotel? Would you have asked me to marry you?’
His eyes gave nothing away. He was all ruthless, dynamic tycoon. The breakfast table might as well have been in a boardroom, for how comfortable he looked behind it.
‘What do you want me to say, Skye? We have discussed this. I married you for the hotel. I wish it hadn’t been necessary. But this does not mean there weren’t certain...benefits to our marriage.’
She dropped her jaw, her eyes clashing with his ruthless gaze. ‘I truly can’t believe you would stoop so low!’
‘I used what means were necessary.’ He shrugged his shoulders with apparent unconcern. ‘You were all too eager to merge our assets. To give me open slather of your portfolio. That was not my decision, but yours.’
‘Yes,’ she agreed softly. ‘But only because I was in love with you. And I thought you loved me back! Only because I thought our marriage was genuine and your affections were true. If I’d known that the assets were the sole reason you’d proposed then believe me, Matteo, I would have fought you every step of the way.’
‘Which is precisely why I had to marry you.’ The words were softly voiced.
