‘It doesn’t mean they will fit,’ she reiterated glumly.
‘Maternity clothes,’ Leon said quietly.
‘What?’ Her chin came off her chest so that she could stare at him.
He sighed impatiently. ‘I may be a mere man,’ he mocked, ‘but I do have some sense. These are garments specially designed for a woman in your condition.’
He was not mere anything, Jemma thought peevishly as she slid her eyes back to the four dresses hanging on the outside of the wardrobe. They didn’t look like maternity wear. One was a slinky blue thing that looked from here as if it poured itself down to the ground. The next was short straight and black, and she knew, because she’d looked, that it had no back in it whatsoever. The red one was pure Ginger Rogers with a gathered layer of fine georgette over a satin underdress. And the last one was white, short and strapless, made in an unusual fabric that was soft and stretchy and as light as air—and looked as though it would fit her rather like an elastic tube would—hiding nothing.
None of them was suitable. ‘Specially designed or not,’ she grunted, ‘I would rather wear one of your shirts than any of them.’
‘Fine,’ Leon said, deliberately, she suspected, taking the wind out of her bad-tempered sails. ‘If that is what you will feel most comfortable in, then wear one.’ He shrugged as if he didn’t care less. ‘But make up your mind quickly because the car will be here in ten minutes to pick us up.’
‘Chauffeur-driven, I presume,’ she jeered.
‘Jemma!’ He sighed. ‘What is the matter with you?’ He glanced at his watch, solid gold and glinting against his dark brown wrist. ‘You have done nothing but mock me since we arrived here this afternoon! What have I done to deserve it?’
‘Nothing,’ she mumbled, and he hadn’t—not really. If anything, Leon had been as pleasant and attentive as a man could be since he’d told her about tonight. Soothing her into a false sense of security, that bitchy voice in her head taunted. She let out a short sigh of defeat, and looked uncertainly back at the dresses. ‘You choose,’ she told him. ‘I’m just too nervous to make up my mind.’
He looked about to argue, his good mood ruined by her peevish manner. Then he saw the honest anxiety in her deep blue eyes and sighed heavily. ‘Jemma, you have to trust me. I won’t let them lay a single finger on you.’
‘Maybe not,’ she agreed. ‘But you can’t stop them looking at me as though I were a rogue cow who’s just run off with their prize bull!’
‘Prize bull, am I?’ He grinned, sharp even teeth gleaming white between his attractive lips. ‘Then you had better wear the red,’ he decided ruefully.
Jemma looked at the red, then shook her head. ‘It’s long and it must be thirty degrees out there. I’ll be too hot in it.’
‘Which therefore cuts out the blue, also,’ he said, ‘which leaves only the black or the white.’
‘I don’t want to wear black.’ She would really feel as if she was going to a wake in black. ‘And the white one is too—clingy-looking. They’ll know at a glance why you married me if I wore that!’
Silence. Jemma wasn’t sure what she had just said to make him react like that, but Leon was suddenly very still and very grim-faced. She soon found out. ‘Are you ashamed, by any chance, of the fact that you carry our child?’ he questioned silkily.
‘No!’ she denied. ‘Of course I’m not!’
‘Ashamed of me, then?’ he suggested.
‘Don’t be stupid, Leon!’ she scoffed. ‘Why should I be ashamed of you?’
‘Then it has to be yourself you are ashamed of,’ he decided, walking towards her with a mood about him that had her jumping warily to her feet.
‘I’m not ashamed of anything!’ she snapped as he reached out and took hold of her upper arms.
‘Good,’ he said. ‘Because no wife of mine has anything to be ashamed of, do you hear?’ He gave her a small shake. ‘And neither does she have to hide the evidence of our lovemaking as if it were some dirty secret!’
She winced visibly at his cutting words, but found she could not deny there was a hint of truth in them.
Letting go of her, he moved away, his back stiff with anger. ‘Be ready to leave in ten minutes or be sure, Jemma,’ he threatened, ‘I shall come and dress you myself!’
She wore the white, and was surprised to discover that, far from clinging to every generous curve of her, it had a clever cut to it that made it skim rather flatteringly. She left her hair down, mainly because it gave her greater confidence to feel the long, twisting waves brushing against the sun-kissed skin of her shoulders. And, on impulse, she added a second protection, with a large white silk-fringed shawl which she draped around her shoulders.
Leon was standing by the salon window frowning out at the pitch-black night, but he turned when he heard her come in, then went still, his eyes dark and appraising as they ran slowly over her from her white strappy mules to the free-flowing richness of her sun-streaked hair.
‘Beautiful,’ he said simply, and held out his hands in a ‘what else can I say?’ kind of compliment that warmed her all the way through. Then he was coming towards her, a sudden sober expression on his face.
‘I have something I want you to wear for me,’ he murmured, producing a flat velvet box from his pocket. ‘They will expect to see it,’ he explained, and flicked open the lid.
Jemma stared down at it, and felt an odd chill clutch at her heart. It was a necklace. Big and conspicuous, almost gaudy with its huge sparkling diamonds surrounded by rich dark rubies. Priceless it had to be; she did not even think of questioning its authenticity. But it was ugly to the point that she actually shuddered, and was relieved when Leon said drily, ‘I know, it’s awful. But it was my mother’s and they will expect to see it on you—even though it was a well known fact that she hated it too.’