Wife By Contract, Mistress By Demand

‘Oh, God…!’ Rufus choked. Now that he loved her, and ached for her to love him in return, he could see what he must have done to her five years ago.

‘I fell in love with you the moment I set eyes on you,’ Gabriella continued huskily. ‘I never set out to trap you that day; I only wanted you because I loved you, and wanted to be with you, wanted you to love me in the way I loved you.’

Rufus was white now, lines of strain beside his eyes and mouth. ‘And instead I mocked and scorned you until you hated me,’ he agonized achingly. ‘You were amazing that day, Gabriella. More, so much more, than I had expected. I daren’t make love to you, because I knew that I would be lost if I did. And so I set out to make you hate me, instead.’

‘I think you succeeded for a while, too.’ She nodded. ‘It certainly stopped me ever wanting to love anyone else, let alone become involved in a physical relationship!’

‘God, Gabriella, no wonder the thought of marrying me five years later filled you with such horror!’ he muttered.

But it hadn’t. Not really. Because underneath it all she had still been in love with him. As she was still.

‘Rufus,’ she began softly. ‘I only said it was partly because of our time together in Majorca that I haven’t been involved with anyone else,’ she reminded lightly. ‘Do you really love me not knowing why my mother needed that hundred thousand pounds? Knowing that I borrowed money from James, too? Thirty thousand pounds, as it happens. Do you love me not knowing the answer to those things?’

‘I would love you, Gabriella, even if you really were the money-grabber I’ve so often accused you of being—damn it, I did fall in love with you believing that!’ he admitted ruefully.

He must have done, because she still hadn’t told him about her mother, and why Heather had needed that money James had so willingly given her. Or why she herself had needed thirty thousand pounds a year ago. And he had believed her about Toby with no proof whatsoever except what she had told him, and what he had come to realize from loving her.

She nodded. ‘Then I think you should know that I still love you. That I’ve always loved you and I always will. And that’s the real reason why I could never become involved with anyone else this last five years,’ she added with certainty, only just realizing that herself.

Rufus stared at her as if he couldn’t believe what she was saying.

He continued to stare at her, until Gabriella couldn’t stand it any more, and launched herself into his arms as she had so often longed to do.

‘I love you, Rufus,’ she choked. ‘I love you!’

‘But—but you said you were leaving me,’ he finally managed to gasp, at the same time holding her so tightly against him she could barely breathe.

‘Because I love you,’ she insisted.

Rufus shook his head dazedly. ‘That makes no damn sense to me whatsoever,’ he mused incredulously. ‘But as long as you love me, as long as you’ll stay with me, I don’t care if anything else ever makes sense again!’

Gabriella gave a choked laugh, that laugh fading as Rufus began to kiss her.

Heaven.

Being in Rufus’s arms, feeling the unconditional love he felt for her, was absolute heaven.

‘Marry me, Gabriella,’ he urged as he lifted his mouth from hers to kiss the hollows of her cheeks, the dark shadows beneath her eyes.

‘We’re already married, silly.’ She laughed softly as she nestled against his chest.

Rufus shook his head. ‘I want to marry you properly, Gabriella. I want us to have a blessing in a church, to say our vows and mean them, to know that we’re doing so because we love each other.’

She gazed up at him with her wonderful violet-coloured eyes. ‘If that’s really what you want.’ She nodded.

‘More than anything,’ he assured her huskily, cradling each side of her face as he looked down at her intently. ‘You are the most important thing in my life, Gabriella. Without you I’m only half—a quarter!—alive.’ He gave a self-disgusted shake of his head. ‘I don’t know how I’ve lived the last five years without you. If it’s any consolation, no other woman has ever meant anything to me. How the hell could they after that afternoon in Majorca?’ He groaned.

‘But—’ she frowned ‘—you didn’t—only I—’

‘Yes—and you spoilt me for any other woman,’ he assured her fiercely. ‘And how I hated you for it!’

‘I would never have guessed!’ she teased, kissing the hard line of his jaw.

He gave a self-derisive smile at her teasing. ‘You’re pleased about that, aren’t you?’ he guessed ruefully.

‘Absolutely,’ she acknowledged unhesitantly. ‘Why should I have been the only one to suffer?’

‘Why, indeed?’ he acknowledged dryly. ‘Where would you like to go for our honeymoon?’

‘Majorca?’ she came back mischievously.

Rufus laughed at her intended irony. ‘I may not let you out of the villa for a month!’

‘I may not let you out of the villa for a month!’ she assured him huskily.

Rufus laughed again. ‘Sounds good to me!’

‘And me.’ She nodded before moving back slightly. ‘But there are still some things I need to tell you, Rufus—’

‘I don’t need to know.’ He gave a decisive shake of his head. ‘Whatever was between my father and your mother was their business, not mine.’ And it really wasn’t, he finally acknowledged. His own marriage to Angela had been one thing, but his father’s marriage to Heather had been something else. As Gabriella was something—someone—else.

Completely.

‘I wasn’t actually talking about that.’ Gabriella gave a slight smile. ‘Although you do need to know why my mother—’

‘Why do I?’ Rufus reasoned. ‘Whatever Heather’s reason, I’m sure it was a good one. My father couldn’t have loved her in the way he did if she hadn’t been the woman he thought she was,’ he added with absolute conviction.

Gabriella looked up at him wonderingly. ‘You really have changed, haven’t you…?’

He nodded grimly. ‘I watched Jen, the wife of my manager in New York, sit by his bedside until he died. And I knew then that I had let my own prejudices and disillusionment rob me of so many things in life. I wish now I had got to know your mother better. And there is no way, absolutely no way, I am ever going to let you go out of my life, Gabriella,’ he assured her as his arms tightened about her. ‘No separation. No divorce. Just fifty or sixty years of being married to you, of seeing you every day, of loving you every day—’

‘Of having children together,’ Gabriella put in softly.

His expression softened. ‘Only if that’s what you want, Gabriella.’ The thought of this gloriously beautiful woman pregnant with his child was enough to stop his breath, but he only wanted that if she did. He only wanted whatever Gabriella wanted for the whole of their future life together.

She swallowed hard, her eyes dark as she looked up at him. ‘I’m pregnant, Rufus,’ she revealed huskily. ‘That’s why I was leaving you.’

He stared down at her in stupefied silence, definitely having stopped breathing. Gabriella was pregnant? But—

‘About four weeks, I think.’ She nodded as if in answer to his unasked question. ‘It happened that afternoon at your apartment after we were married, probably,’ she added ruefully.

She hadn’t been able to believe it herself when, getting out of Rufus’s bed yesterday morning, she had instantly swayed and sat down again, at the same time remembering a couple of other instances when she had felt slightly light-headed in the last two weeks, occasions she had just put down to the emotion of the situation she found herself in.

But sitting there yesterday morning, thinking of the weeks since she and Rufus were married, she had realized that she hadn’t had a period since they were married, so her first stop on the way into Gresham’s yesterday had been to a chemist, where she had bought a pregnancy-testing kit.

Positive.

Her emotions had been mixed. Joy, that she was expecting Rufus’s baby. Fear, as she knew that he was likely to accuse her of becoming pregnant on purpose in order to trap him. Her only solution had seemed to be to leave him. Even if by doing so Rufus lost Gresham’s.

Rufus moved his hand down to cradle her abdomen. His baby. Their baby. Gabriella’s baby.

He could hardly believe it!

‘Are you okay about that?’ he prompted anxiously.

‘Oh, very,’ she assured him with certainty. ‘It’s more than I ever dreamt of, more than I ever hoped! Oh, yes, Rufus, I’m very happy about this baby!’

‘Then so am I!’ He held her tightly in his arms as he began to kiss her, knowing that she was his whole world, that he couldn’t go on another day without her.

‘How do you think Holly will feel about having a little brother or sister?’ Gabriella prompted minutes later.

Rufus gave a rueful smile. ‘My daughter has already informed me that if I don’t keep you as her mother she is going to be most unhappy with me!’