Ruthless Magnate, Convenient Wife

Alissa was so exhausted that she had no strength left to move. She consoled herself by dabbing kisses on whichever part of him she could reach and he stretched indolently and this time around he stayed close, letting her have her way.

‘Yelena told me you’re still stressing about the breakdown of your parents’ marriage,’ Sergei murmured. ‘That’s crazy—’

Alissa stiffened. ‘Why is it crazy?’

‘You lived in a happy united family for over twenty years. You should appreciate how lucky you were.’

Alissa blinked in shock at that rebuke from an unexpected quarter. ‘Why? What was your experience?’ she snapped, mortified by his criticism.

‘A father in and out of prison for stealing cars—he was a thief and a stupid one. I also had to put my mother to bed drunk every night,’ he breathed wryly. ‘My father was shot dead in the street for stealing a local gangster’s car and a year later my mother’s liver finally quit and she died…’

Caught up in the dark story of his childhood, Alissa wriggled round in the circle of his arms to look at him wide-eyed with disquiet. ‘What age were you then?’

His lean strong face bore no emotion. He might have been talking about someone else’s life. ‘Thirteen. Yelena insisted on giving me a home with her. We were strangers because my father was a lousy son as well

,’ Sergei recounted levelly, grim dark eyes meeting hers. ‘She was my only experience of family life and I gave her a hard time. I was as feral as a wild animal.’

Alissa traced the stubborn shape of his sensual lower lip with an admiring fingertip. ‘I can imagine that.’

Sergei released a spontaneous laugh of disagreement. ‘No, you can’t. We grew up in different worlds. Yours was cosy, middle class and protected. I bet you got just about everything you ever wanted.’

‘No, I didn’t!’

‘Tell me one thing you didn’t get,’ Sergei challenged, absorbed in the constant play of animation across her heart-shaped face, while he wondered why he was talking to her when he never wasted time doing that with a woman.

‘I fell in love with someone else’s boyfriend once,’ Alissa admitted, offended by his apparent belief that she had been spoiled and cosseted with good fortune all her days. ‘I had to get over it, but it was a very unhappy time for me.’

‘Didn’t you make a play for him?’

Alissa gave him a shocked look. ‘Of course not. He was my sister’s boyfriend.’

‘If you weren’t prepared to fight for him, you can’t have wanted him that much, milaya moya,’ Sergei quipped, wondering darkly if she would fight for him or whether she was guilty of being as shallow as her profile beneath that surface show of niceness.

‘Sergei…’ she said ruefully. ‘There are such things as family loyalty and moral standards.’

‘I wonder if our child will inherit your outlook.’ His dark brows drew together in a slight grimace. ‘I’m very cold-blooded when it comes to protecting my own interests. One or two of your genes mightn’t do too much damage but too many would make him or her weak in my world.’

In receipt of that speech, Alissa blinked in bewilderment and jerked back from him. ‘Our child? What are you talking about?’

Scanning her perplexed face with a frown, Sergei loosened his hold on her, allowing her to break the connection. ‘If that’s a joke, it’s not a very good one.’

‘Why would it be a joke? I agreed to marry you…’

‘And have my baby, as you are very well aware,’ Sergei countered with impatience. ‘But if you agree, and I don’t see why you shouldn’t, I’m willing to push the time frame back a month or two.’

And have my baby. That fatal assurance rang like a clarion call in Alissa’s head and froze her to the marrow. Alexa could not possibly have agreed to such an iniquitous contract. It couldn’t be true, it couldn’t be!

Chapter Seven

‘WHAT are you doing?’ Sergei demanded as Alissa slid soundlessly off the side of the bed like a wraith trying to avoid detection. In almost the same movement she reached for her discarded nightdress.

Alissa’s upper lip was damp with perspiration. She had broken out in a literal cold sweat. Why would Sergei lie? Nor had there been anything teasing about his voice or manner. Indeed he’d had been terrifyingly matter-of-fact when he mentioned putting back the time frame for a while. A baby? She was to give him a baby as part of the contract? He had to be out of his mind!

She pulled on her nightie with shaking hands, for the nakedness of intimacy seemed more wrong than ever now that she was being forced to confront the reality that to protect her sister she had deceived him. Was it possible that Alexa could have set out to deceive her as well? It was after midnight and Alissa was incredibly tired. There were no bright ideas in her mind to inspire her and no magical escape hatch in sight. So desperate was she to know exactly what Sergei was talking about that she felt that her only option was to come clean.

‘We need to talk,’ Alissa breathed tautly.

Wondering what on earth she was up to, Sergei had already sat up to view her with narrowed and intent dark eyes. ‘It’s late,’ he responded, wishing he hadn’t broken the habit of a lifetime and started sharing confidences with her. Somehow she was getting under his skin and he didn’t like that.