Claimed for the De Carrillo Twins

It was the last question she wanted to ask, but she had to. ‘What happens now?’

He smiled, but it was mirthless. ‘What happens now? What happens now is that you could be pregnant. We didn’t use protection.’ He cursed volubly. ‘I didn’t even think of it.’

Trinity sank down onto the side of the bed nearest to her as her legs gave way. ‘Neither did I,’ she said faintly. She’d felt it...the hot rush of his release inside her...and she’d conveniently blocked it out.

She stared at Cruz’s grim countenance as the significance of this sank in. The full, horrifying significance.

If she was pregnant then he wouldn’t be able to disentangle himself from this marriage—and she didn’t need to be psychic to intuit that that was exactly what he wanted. He was angry.

‘There was two of us there,’ she pointed out, feeling sick. ‘It wasn’t just your oversight.’

His mouth twisted. ‘As much as I appreciate your sentiment, I was the one who should have protected you.’

You. Not us.

Panic galvanised Trinity at the prospect of Cruz resenting her for ever for a moment of weakness.

She calculated swiftly and stood up. ‘I’m sure I’m not pregnant. It’s a safe time for me. And even if it happened, by some miracle, it doesn’t mean anything. We don’t have to stay married—we could work something out.’

‘That,’ Cruz said coolly, fixing his amber gaze on her, ‘would never be an option in a million years. If you are pregnant then we stay married.’

‘But if I’m not

...?’

‘Then we will discuss what happens. But for now we wait. I have to go to Madrid again in two weeks. I’ll set up an appointment with my doctor and we’ll go together. That should be enough time for a pregnancy test to show up positive or negative...’

Feeling numb, Trinity said, ‘We could just wait. I’ll know for sure in about three weeks.’

Cruz shook his head. ‘No, we’ll find out as soon as possible.’

Trinity really hated the deeply secret part of her that hoped that she might be pregnant, because that was the only way she knew she’d get to stay in Cruz’s life. But if she wasn’t... The sense of desolation that swept over her was so acute that she gabbled something incoherent and all but ran out of the room to return to hers.

Cruz didn’t come after her, or try to stop her, which told her more eloquently than words ever could how he really felt about her.

* * *

Cruz stood in the same spot for a long time, looking at the door. He’d had to let Trinity go, even though it had taken nearly everything he possessed not to grab her back. But he couldn’t—not now. Not after the most monumental lapse in control he’d ever experienced.

He started to pace back and forth. He’d fallen on her in his study like a caveman. Wild. Insatiable. Filled with such a maelstrom of emotions that the only way he’d known how to avoid analysing them was to sink inside her and let oblivion sweep them away. But he couldn’t avoid it now.

He’d been angry with her for revealing the extent of Rio’s antipathy—but hadn’t he known all along, really? And she’d just been the reluctant messenger.

He’d felt anger at himself for indulging in that delusion in a bid to forge some meagre connection with his only family. And he’d felt anger that Trinity had been so abused by Rio and him. He hadn’t deserved her purity and innocence after all he’d put her through, and yet she’d given it to him with a sensuality and abandon that still took his breath away.

He stopped. Went cold. He’d actually had a tiny moment of awareness just before he’d come that there was no protection. But he’d been so far gone by then that to have pulled away from Trinity’s clasping heat would have killed him... Cruz knew that there was no other woman on this earth who would have had that effect on him.

The insidious suspicion took root... Had he subconsciously wanted to risk getting her pregnant? Because he was aware that after what she’d told him he could no longer insist they stay married if she was innocent of everything he’d thrown at her?

Cruz sank down heavily on the end of the bed. If that was what had happened then he was an even sicker bastard than Rio.

When he thought of how he’d treated Trinity...how he’d shoved the past down her throat at every opportunity without giving her a chance to defend herself or explain...he deserved for her to walk away without a second glance.

But if she was pregnant then she would stay. And Cruz would be aware every day of his life that he had trapped her for ever.

That moment when she’d said so emotionally, ‘I don’t want to tell you because I don’t want to hurt you,’ came back to him. Its full impact.

The fact that she’d actually been willing to keep it from him—the full extent of Rio’s ambition and hatred—made him feel even worse. At best she pitied him. At worst she would come to resent him, just as Rio had, if she was pregnant and had no choice but to stay...