Still, what he was suggesting was so...absolute.
‘Speak up, Goldie. What’s the problem?’
She laughed, unable to believe he was expecting an immediate answer from her on so monumental a subject. ‘If I decide to do this, I want a few stipulations of my own.’
His brow clamped in a frown. Then he gave a tight nod. ‘Let’s hear it.’
‘You...you can’t want to be saddled with me for the rest of our lives, nor I with you, so can we agree to a more temporary solution?’
He froze. ‘You want to enter marriage with a clause that ends it on a particular date?’
‘Please don’t make it sound so clinical. Until ten minutes ago you were a man who didn’t date the same woman for longer than six weeks! Now you expect me to believe you’re willing to give up the rest of your life?’
‘For the right reason—why not?’
The right reason. The baby. Not them.
‘I think you’re missing the point, Gael. You automatically assume that putting a ring on my finger will make this baby’s life stable. I’m not denying it will, but don’t you think he or she will be happier with parents who are content?’
‘Are you saying marrying me sentences you to a life of discontent?’
‘Don’t put words in my mouth. I just want us to take a step back, think about this—’
‘Five years.’
‘I... What?’
‘You want a fixed term? We’ll give it a try for five years. After that we’ll reassess the marriage. Whatever the outcome then, one thing will remain non-negotiable. We’ll live in the same city and do everything to provide a smooth home-life for our child. So—five years. Do you think you can give up your independence for that long?’ he bit out.
‘Gael—’
‘And in that time, provided you make our child’s happiness your number one priority, you will receive ten million dollars per year and five guaranteed box office smash movie roles courtesy of Atlas. You say your career is important to you? This way you can rest assured it will not be unduly interrupted.’
Shock held Goldie rigid for so long she wondered whether she was in danger of turning into a fossil. When she managed to speak again, her voice shook with effort. ‘And...and if I don’t agree to what you’re suggesting?’
Goldie was almost afraid to ask, because the purpose she’d sensed in him when he’d confronted her outside seemed to have magnified a thousandfold. She didn’t need to be a genius to work out that Gael had just given her the ‘either’ scenario. There was a very big ‘or’ coming her way.
‘If you don’t agree, then I’ll take steps to remove our child from you—completely—the moment he or she is born. I’m sorry, amante, this is too important for me to beat round the bush. So those are your only options. What’s it going to be, Goldie? Yes or no?’
* * *
Two days.
She’d argued for time to think about Gael’s proposal. He’d grudgingly given her the remainder of their time in South Africa.
So she had two days to come up with a different solution, one that didn’t involve marrying a man she barely knew, or fighting him in court for custody of their child. And so far, a day later and with twenty-four hours’ worth of filming a beach scene between Elena and Alfonso completed, she’d drawn a blank.
To fight Gael she needed far deeper pockets than she currently had. This was her first movie role, and the pay was more than she’d dreamed of, but it was nowhere near enough to take care of her child while fighting for its rights in a court of law—especially against a powerful man like Gael Aguilar. And part of her contract with Atlas involved exclusive work that might extend for almost half a year after filming, which meant that even if she wanted to be pounding the pavements on job-hunts while being heavily pregnant she couldn’t.
Which brought her to the option Gael preferred. Marriage.
Her heart caught every time she thought of that, but after a few times Goldie admitted that the idea wasn’t as stomach-clenching as it had first seemed.
Both their backgrounds had proved conclusively that coming from a broken home could damage a child. For the longest time Goldie had felt bitterness and anger towards her mother for not being strong enough, for pushing her father away and breaking up their family. And, although she loved and supported her mother now, she couldn’t help but feel bruised inside from the times when she’d lived in constant fear that her mother would never be strong enough to make the right decisions about the men she’d let emotionally abuse her.
In her darkest moments, Goldie had wondered whether she was potentially equally fallible. It was one of the reasons why she’d hung on to her virginity for so long. She’d been afraid to find out the depths of her strengths and weaknesses.
She didn’t plan on being alone for the rest of her life. And did she not owe it to her child to try and give it the best possible start in life? Even if it meant marriage, temporarily, to its father?