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Duarte felt her words hit him square in the chest. He hesitated, looking away from her for a moment to try to school his features, and apparently that was all the confirmation she needed.
Her harsh exhalation of breath held the smallest hint of sadness. But he wouldn’t lie to her to make her accept his proposal. He wouldn’t make promises and say things he didn’t mean. He believed she would put their son first and come to realise that this was the best way forward for the three of them. Surely his honesty was better than empty words?
She turned herself away from his gaze. ‘Don’t do it, Duarte, whatever it is you’re about to ask of me...’
‘You know exactly what I’m asking.’ He reached across the table for her hand.
She pulled it away, closing her eyes. ‘And if I say no?’
Her voice was barely a whisper and he heard the fear in it. ‘I won’t force you, if that’s what you’re asking me.’
He sat back in his chair, furious at her and at the way she viewed him. He took a moment to compose himself, feeling the urge to reach across the table and haul her into his arms to dispel those shadows from her eyes. He knew he needed to go into this with a cool head, but his logic seemed to go out of the window when it came to this woman, time and time again.
‘I cannot abide the idea of splitting my son’s life across two countries on opposite sides of the world, Nora.’
‘That is not fair...’ Her voice broke slightly on the last word.
‘I never promised to play fair.’
‘Why marriage?’
Nora could feel hurt and anger warring within her at the knowledge that he could be so cold and calculating.
‘Do you trust me so little that you think I won’t agree to any reasonable terms for co-parenting?’
‘Marriage makes sense.’
Duarte took a sip from his coffee mug, as though they were discussing the weather and not the future entwining of their lives.
‘From a practical viewpoint, we live on different continents with very different legal systems. It would make my legal rights regarding my son unclear.’
‘That’s not an answer,’ she challenged him. ‘Nor was there an actual marriage proposal anywhere in that ridiculous statement.’
He stood up and took a step towards her. ‘I grew up with two loving parents and had a very happy childhood. I’m not some eternal bachelor; I always planned to settle down and start my own family someday.’
‘What about my plans?’ she asked, trying to ignore the warm, needy feeling his words stirred up. That yearning she had always harboured to truly belong somewhere, to be a part of a steady, happy home.
To give that kind of life to her son...
It would be so easy to say yes—to become his wife and commit to live with him, raising their son together. She had a feeling he wasn’t suggesting a cold marriage of convenience—he would want her back in his bed—but that was where it would end for him. She would always be the woman who had lied to him. She would always be the daughter of the man who had killed his parents.
She closed her eyes against that painful truth, preparing herself to reason with him as to why marriage was never going to work between them...
The noise of a loud whistling from the marina below jarred them both.
‘Duarte Avelar—you’d better not be hiding from me on my own ship.’
The female voice was calling from a distance and Nora felt her brows rise into her hairline.
Duarte cursed under his breath, and a thoroughly apologetic look crossed his features as he raised a hand and motioned for her to stay where she was while he strode across to the top of the steps.
Nora waited a few minutes, trying and failing to hear more than the slight murmur of voices as Duarte stood halfway down the stairs and greeted whoever it was. She moved to check on Liam, scooping him up into her arms and breathing in his comforting baby smell.
When the voices came closer, she turned to see a woman emerging onto the deck. Her hair was a cloud of thick ebony curls, her skin the same dark caramel as Duarte’s. Even her golden eyes were a mirror image of the man who stood by her side. Another man followed them, sallow-skinned and blue-eyed.
Nora recognised him from the night of the Avelar Foundation dinner. The night of the kidnapping.
She felt a slight wobble in her legs as Valerio M
