Roarke's Kingdom

His attorney had sighed and said there was no need for that.

But there was a need. In some terrible way, he wanted to see Jennifer’s face when she understood the reason for his visit.

When she understood that he knew what she had been after all along.

“I asked you a question, Roarke. Why are you here?”

“I’m here for a reason best dealt with in private,” he said as footsteps sounded in the hall behind him. “Unless you want an audience while we discuss Susanna.”

That did it. All that showy bravado fled.

“Is she—is Susanna all right?”

“She’s fine.”

She let out a long breath. “Then what—”

He made a gesture of impatience, stepped around her and walked into her tiny living room.

She stared after him, transfixed, while her brain made fevered attempts to understand what was happening. None of this made sense. Why would he suddenly turn up here? Not because he’d missed her, which had been her first ridiculous thought. His tone was coolly polite. Everything about him was polite including the way he was dressed, in a navy pinstripe suit with a white shirt and maroon striped tie.

He looked as if he were about to conduct a board meeting right here in her living room.

And yet, that one moment when she’d come close to fainting and he’d caught her in his arms, that one moment when the feel of him had been so wonderfully, painfully familiar…

She watched as he looked around him.

Her chin went up.

He’d probably never seen a room this small, this shabbily furnished, but she wasn’t ashamed of it. This was her life. Her real life.

The life she had not wanted for her child.

He swung toward her. “I hope I haven’t inconvenienced you.”

She almost laughed.

The man who’d said he loved her, who had discarded her without hesitation, who had not even asked her to tell him her story—not that she would have, but still, he hadn’t even asked—

This man was now hoping he hadn’t inconvenienced her?

But she couldn’t laugh.

Despite everything, she was drinking him in. Filling the empty spaces in her heart with images and memories for the future.

The ruggedly beautiful face. The tall, leanly muscled body. The wide shoulders. The ruler-of-his-ki

ngdom stance.

It infuriated her that the sight of him could still leave her yearning for what could never be.

She saw that he had changed. Not a lot, but he looked different. Older. Wearier. There were new lines fanning out from the corners of his eyes, deeper ones etched beside his mouth.

She longed to go to him. Kiss those lines. Smooth them with her fingertips…

“I probably should have called first.”

Was he going to make polite conversation? Not with her. She wasn’t interested in conversation of any kind with him.