Married For One Reason Only by Dani Collins

CHAPTER SEVEN

“WOULDYOULIKE to dance?”

Oriel was spellbound by the romance of the evening. The marquee was strung with fairy lights, the air laden with the scent of roses and jasmine. A twenty-piece orchestra played between courses and speeches. Several songs and recitations had been performed by close friends of the celebrating couple. She herself had given a final, heartfelt toast to her parents, and her mother had left everyone in tears with one more song that had earned her a standing ovation.

Now Estelle and Arnaud, had started the dancing and Vijay was standing over her, offering his gloved hand.

She was losing her mind over how sexy he was, and it had nothing to do with the tuxedo. It was all him. His sensual mouth and half-lidded eyes were pure seduction, his air of alert watchfulness and quiet command delicious.

She almost wished things had gone worse with her parents. Then she could hate him and use her resentment to hold him off. As it was, she was falling under his spell as easily as she had that night in Milan. Had she learned nothing? He was a destroyer of worlds.

“You waltz?” Her heart tripped as she placed her hand in his and he helped her rise.

Of course he waltzed. He was a man of infinite capabilities, hidden depths and fascinating angles.

“I know the basics. Don’t expect...that,” he said with a wry look at her cousin, who had married her fellow champion and partner from the professional ballroom circuit. They were swirling around the floor with airy grace.

“We’re a family of overachievers.” Oriel swooned as he took her in steady arms and confidently led her into the steps. “That’s why it was so hard to find my niche and why I still feel only moderately successful.” She was babbling out of nerves and felt like she had said too much when he frowned with perplexity.

“You seem pretty successful to me.”

“Well, yes. I am. I mean, most women would kill for the opportunities I enjoy, but my work is based on genetic luck and tricks like attending high-profile premieres with attention-starved actors. It’s not the same as rising through practice and mastering of craft.”

“Your work is still a performance. You have to distill a mood down to a single snapshot. I saw you do it tonight when you came down the stairs. I was captivated.”

“You don’t have to build me up,” she said with discomfort. “Maman and I made our peace with our differences a long time ago. I’m just saying...this is a lot to live up to,” she ended on a mumble.

“I was being sincere, but okay. How are things between you and your mother now? Is she upset by the news?”

“Unsettled. She came to my room earlier. We had a heart-to-heart.” And enough tears they had had to use cool compresses after or risk looking like puffy-eyed newts at the ball. “She said she always knew this could happen, and she only wants whatever I want. She asked about you. She wanted to know if you were more than my sort of bodyguard.”

“And you said?”

She didn’t know! She had first been drawn to him because he had sparked a more intense attraction within her than she’d ever experienced before. Since then, he’d made her feel all the emotions in the most intense ways. She couldn’t help but be wary of what more could come.

“I told her I’m trying to keep my distance since I have enough to worry about.”

“Trying,”he mused, mouth curving. “That sounds like you’re having to work at it.”

My hormones would love a sidebar with yours.

If her presence here for her parents’ celebration hadn’t been so important to her, she might have allowed them to fall into bed at the hotel. Vijay was an incredibly compelling man, confident and handsome and still capable of waking her senses with a glance. The fact he knew what she was going through and was actually facing her unplanned pregnancy with her made her gravitate to him even more.

She’d been starkly honest when she’d told him she was tempted to lose herself in the same wild excitement they’d shared in Milan so she didn’t have to think about the more mundane and difficult details of how they would proceed. Maybe there was something very basic to her desire, too. Her body recognized he was the father of her child and yearned to pair-bond with him as a way of reinforcing their connection, ensuring he would look after both of them.

No matter what it was, she was breathless and dizzy as he steered her from the cloying scent of cigar smoke and gave her a small twirl as the song ended.

He caught her close. “How are you feeling? It’s been a long day.”

“I had a nap before I dressed.” She was giddy from being in his arms, smiling even after he eased his hold and started to lead her off the floor. “I’m glad for the distraction of this party. Thank you for being my date. I know this is a lot.”

“What I find most fascinating is that I have the feeling this sort of evening is not unusual for you.” He nodded at the mime performing for a table.

“Not at all. Maman adores setting a stage and creating an experience. She began planning this two years ago, after Papa’s sixtieth birthday.”

“When I tell Kiran that tumblers served dessert while it was on fire, she will die.”

Oriel laughed. “I can’t wait to meet her. Will she be on the call with Jalil tomorrow?” They had agreed they would call in the morning for a brief introduction.

Vijay’s expression froze.

Her heart stopped. “No? You don’t want me to meet her?”

“No, of course. I hadn’t considered how much I have to tell her. I won’t say anything about—” He dropped his gaze to her middle. “Not yet. But...”

“I know. It keeps hitting me at odd times, too.” Aside from avoiding more than a sip of champagne when she toasted her parents, Oriel hadn’t been letting herself think too much about the fact she was carrying his baby.

His hand came to her upper arm in a small caress. “Tell me if you need anything.”

She nodded. He stood close enough that she could feel the warmth of his body. Her shoulder was still tingling from his touch, and his mouth was right there.

Seducing you isn’t some master plan on my part.

Wasn’t it, though?

His gaze touched her mouth, and his lips twitched. “Bodyguard, you said?”

“You said it. We all went along with it even though you were holding my hand.”

“I was, wasn’t I? I’m thinking about doing it again.”

“Holding my hand?” She tried to suppress her grin, but her heart was soaring with excitement. Why? It was only hand-holding, for heaven’s sake! Even so, she gave him a coquettish bat of her lashes. “Perhaps while I accompany you on a patrol of the grounds?”

“I’m sure I’m overdue for that.” As he let his knuckles brush against hers, he dipped his head to speak in her ear. “I know you dislike that awkward moment of wondering whether a man will kiss you, so I’ll warn you now. I intend to.”

Her skin tightened with anticipation, and she opened her fingers for the weave of his.

It was a chilly night, something she felt as soon as they were away from the marquee. The music faded and the stars opened above them.

They weren’t the only ones seeking a moment of privacy. They passed two other couples tucked into shadows before they found a pocket among the hedges where the cool scent of cedar closed around them.

Oriel slid her arms over his hard shoulders and curled her hands behind his head, expecting the crash of his mouth onto hers.

He barely grazed her mouth with his own, running his lips across her jaw and blowing softly against her ear, making shivers rise up her arms and into her nape before he came back to lightly nibble on her bottom lip.

With a frustrated sob, she pressed herself tighter to him and slanted her mouth with invitation. He reacted by sealing them into the swirling darkness of a deep, passionate kiss, one that made them both groan in gratification.

His hands roamed her back and hips, pulling her tighter into the hardness behind his fly. When his tongue brushed hers, she sucked delicately. His whole body hardened and his fingers dug into her backside, holding her tight as he rocked her against his aroused flesh.

Oh, why be coy? She had known what she wanted in Milan, and she knew it just as clearly tonight. She dragged her head back.

“Let’s go inside.”

His nostrils flared. “For?”

“You need me to spell it out? I want to continue the affair we started. See where it might have gone.”

His gaze was flinty, his caress on her jaw light. “An affair is something you can walk away from. We’re beyond that.”

She couldn’t argue, not with his baby growing inside her, but lust had its talons dug into her. “You don’t want to see what our hormones can accomplish?”

He snorted and said in a graveled voice, “I’m quite sure they can level a city.” His mouth tightened. “You realize this is all I think about? I don’t have much room left in my head for being noble. Be sure, Oriel.”

“I am.” From a physical standpoint, at least. She led him into a side entrance up to her rooms.

Her suite was a pair of bedrooms off a shared sitting room, all with tall windows overlooking the pond. The curtains were already drawn, the only light a stained-glass lamp casting red and blue streaks across the walls and ceiling.

“Have I told you that you are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen?” He leaned against the door as he locked it.

“Have I told you that you are the sexiest man I have ever seen?” With slow deliberation, she bit one finger of her glove and began to draw it off, making a show if it.

“Is that how we’re playing?” He loosened his bow tie and opened one collar button. “Strip tease?”

“It seems a shame to waste the costumes. I was barely going to undress at all.” She sent him her most beguiling look and came across to press the hand that was still gloved against his fly.

He looked down at her diamond bracelet, which flashed and sparkled. His breath hissed in, and his whole body went taut.

“I can definitely work with that,” he said with a slow, wicked smile.

His gloved hand cupped her neck, and he ran his hot mouth into her throat. His other hand worked a finger beneath the neckline of her gown. The cool silk of his glove scraped erotically across her nipple, making tight golden wires shoot heat into her loins.

She fumbled at his fly and got her gloved hand into his pants. As she caressed and fondled, his teeth took hold of her bottom lip, and they stared into one another’s eyes. His pupils were huge and glazed with feral passion right before he slid his arms around her and plundered her mouth with his own.

This was what she had wanted to feel again—alive. Connected. She was still angry at his subterfuge, but this incredible desire had pulled her toward him from the first, and it was still here. He was. Kissing her as though he would consume her. Wrapping his arms around her as though she was everything he needed in life.

She was so lost to the passion of their kiss, she didn’t realize he had backed her to the bed until he tilted her onto it. She gasped and braced her hands on the mattress, but he was already lifting her gown, caressing her legs.

“The number of times I have thought about doing this again...” He went to his knees, and the heat of his mouth scorched the inside of her knee. He took soft, playful bites of her inner thigh, swirling his tongue against her skin until her legs trembled. Then the warmth of his mouth settled against the silk covering her most tender flesh. He began to lick around the edges of lace.

“Vijay,” she moaned helplessly and sank onto her back in surrender.

He shifted the silk aside to anoint her until she was molten with need. She dove her fingers into his hair and arched, abandoning herself to the pleasure he bestowed, but he didn’t take her over the edge.

When she was sobbing and tense and lifting into his caress, he rose and said, “Do you mind?” as he gently rolled her onto her stomach. “I just want to see how you look with the shoes and this icicle dress up around your waist—”

His voice faded into a guttural curse as she accepted the challenge and owned it. She planted her feet apart and braced her elbows on the bed, then arched her back to lift her bottom. She cast him a provocative look over her shoulder.

Did he think she didn’t know how to use her sex appeal to achieve a desired result?

His breath was rattling unevenly as his hands moved over her buttocks and thighs, caressing everywhere but the place she ached most. He told her how sexy she was. How much he wanted her as he slowly, slowly drew her panties down her legs.

When he crouched to draw them free of her ankles, his teeth scraped the tendon at the back of her thigh where her leg met her cheek.

She shook in reaction, hands fisting in the blankets as she waited in agony while he caressed her calves and kissed the back of one knee, then stood. She heard the rustle of his pants as he freed himself.

“Do you want to roll over?” His voice was deep and far away, buried in layers of carnal hunger.

“No. Like this...”

“Naked?”

“Yes.” She could hardly speak as his hot tip began to trace and slide, seeking, then pressing for entrance.

She was so wet and aroused, he entered her in one smooth, steady thrust that made them both groan with abandon. His hands splayed to brace her hips before he slid his palms up to her waist, exposing more of her.

“You’re exquisite.” His powerful thighs shifted hers apart a little more, feet planting firmly between hers. He took hold of her hip and shoulder and began to thrust with lazy power.

She pressed her face into the mattress, moaning unreservedly. It was base and hot and no one else had ever broken her down this way, pushing her past inhibition into a state of pure animalistic pleasure. No one could hold her on this pinnacle of acute near-climax for what felt like hours, so she was lost to all but the exquisite sensations rolling through her in waves.

Only him. Only him.

Then, just as she thought she would break from the agony of resisting satisfaction, his hand roamed to where they were joined. His long finger caressed across the swollen bud of her clitoris, strumming and sending her shooting past the limits of her control. She exploded, crying out at the sudden power of it.

He gave a final deep thrust and joined her with a ragged shout.

“We may not have thought this through.” Vijay could hardly speak, let alone find the strength to shift his weight off her back. He grunted with profound loss as he pulled free of her and collapsed on the bed beside her, legs dangling off the mattress.

It had taken everything in him not to hammer into her the way he’d longed to. Somehow, that controlled, exquisite lovemaking had been even more intense and left him utterly shredded.

“I have nothing left to get undressed.” Speaking was an effort.

“Same.” She turned her head on the mattress to blink at him. Her eyelids were heavy with gratification, adding a layer of smugness to his satisfaction.

“Was I too rough?” He had managed to hold back until the very end, but he’d lost some control as they’d hit their peak. This woman completely dismantled him every single time. He’d known it in Milan and had known it when they stood outside, necking in the hedges. He’d known coming in here that she would pull him apart in ways that weren’t comfortable, but he’d done it anyway.

That bothered him, yet here he was.

“I liked it.” Her smile kept the erotic memory glowing between them like a golden light of promise. “But you’re right. This won’t be my most graceful moment.” She stole his pocket square and asked, “Can you get my zip?”

He did, stealing a caress of her spine before she pushed up from the mattress. As she straightened, she let the gown fall to the floor in what was actually a very supple, unselfconscious display of glorious nudity before she disappeared into the bathroom.

With superhuman strength, he tucked himself back into his fly and rose to pick up her gown. He was still looking for the hanger when she appeared in a pink silk robe.

“That poor gown.” She tutted. “Never tell my mother what it’s been through.”

“You think I’m going to tell your mother that I bent you over the bed and made love to you in it?”

She found the hanger and came across with it, offering him a lingering kiss as she took the gown. Her hair was still up, her jewelry on, her makeup smudged in the most libidinous way.

He could get used to this, he decided as he began to undress. The fog of sexual satisfaction was particularly delicious while watching her move around her personal space, seeing her in a way that very few others were allowed to.

She slid a knowing smile at him when she caught him admiring her. A hunger that wasn’t purely sexual nestled in the pit of his gut. It was desire for all of her. Her thoughts, her laughter, her moments of doubt. He imagined her belly swelling and being at liberty to press his hand there anytime so he could feel their baby kick.

At some point she would go into labor, and that thought was enough to send a cold rush of protectiveness through him, one that propelled him across to still her hands from fiddling with the gown. He gathered her in and kissed her, holding her close, trying to convey the myriad emotions gripping him.

Her arms came up around his neck, and for long moments they were lost to lazy, sexy kisses. When they broke to catch their breath, her hands slid down to his vest.

“Careful,” she said with an unsteady smile. Her gaze skittered from his as though she was as unsettled by the intensity of the moment as he was. “We’ll wind up forgetting to get undressed again.”

He stole a last fondle of her bottom through the silk of her robe and released her.

“Who do I return this to and how do I pay for borrowing it?” He unbuttoned his vest. “Max wouldn’t say.”

“Because I bought it for you.”

Vijay bristled.

“Oh, don’t look at me like that.” Oriel began to remove her jewelry and set it in a crystal bowl on the dresser. “You didn’t expect or particularly want to attend this party.”

He’d managed to put aside their different backgrounds and enjoy the evening, but it came around hard enough to slap him now.

“I can afford my own tuxedo, Oriel.” Aside from tonight, he had no use for one and had no doubt this one was priced at a premium, given this had been a last-minute alteration, but he wasn’t a pauper. He’d recently inked his name onto a deal that gave him a lot more disposable income than he’d had when he had bought her a gourmet dinner in Milan.

“My father can afford his own Maserati and rarely drives,” she said, “but my mother still bought him one for his birthday. Don’t worry about it.”

“They’re married,” he pointed out. “If you’re buying me clothes, does that mean you intend to marry me?”

“You haven’t asked, have you?” she shot back. “But consider this before you do.” She held up a finger like a scolding schoolteacher. “The reason my parents chose to adopt me was that my mother values her career. She has always had to work very hard to balance her personal aspirations with being a wife and a parent. Papa has a decent income from his books and papers, but Maman is the one who can afford a custom-built house like this. Yet she is constantly judged for not being maternal enough. For emasculating her husband by earning more and holding the spotlight while he takes a supporting role and arranges his life around her touring schedule. If the shoe were on the other foot, no one would bat an eye.”

“You’re warning me I will have to play second fiddle to you and the riches you stand to inherit? I’m well aware, Oriel.” His voice hardened along with every muscle in his body. All his sexual afterglow was gone.

“I’m saying that if you’re already threatened by it, you should definitely save your breath on proposing, because I won’t marry you if you expect me to apologize for who I am or what I have.” She waved at their surroundings. “I’m proud of my mother for all she has accomplished. I won’t reject this or her to appease your ego.”

Vijay removed his cuff links and dropped them into the dish with her own jewelry. The sound was very loud inside their thick silence.

“Those were a gift, too,” she said frostily. “I thought it would be a nice keepsake from a special night. Most people were very honored to be included, but apparently this evening isn’t something you consider worth remembering. Good to know. Sleep in the other room.” She turned her back and started into her bathroom.

“My father was corrupt,” he bit out, loath to talk about it, but it had to be addressed. This fight wasn’t about whether their lovemaking was memorable—it was imprinted on his soul never to be forgotten—or whether he would keep a pair of cuff links. He probably should have mentioned this blight in his history before he started talking about marriage. “I was complicit in his crimes.”

“What?” Her jaw went slack.

“Unknowingly.” He ran his hand into his hair. “But it went on way too long. I’m deeply ashamed, but it’s something you should know about me, whether or not we marry, given we share a child.”

She moved to lower herself onto a velvet stool and blinked somber eyes at him. “What happened?”

“I told you my parents died when I was in my teens.”

“And that you raised Kiran, yes.”

He nodded abruptly. “She was in the car when they died. She uses a wheelchair now, which I only tell you to help you understand how I could have been so oblivious to what was going on beneath my nose. After we lost our grandmother, we still had possession of the house we grew up in. Technically our aunt had care of us, but she had a family and a busy medical practice in Delhi. We stayed in our home with some staff. I was Kiran’s de facto guardian. She still required surgeries and other therapies. We were grieving and trying to move forward with our lives, going to school and making what felt like a normal life. My father’s construction business continued to run under his top managers. I met with them once or twice a year, but I didn’t involve myself in it. I was grateful I didn’t have to worry about money on top of everything else.”

“You were a child,” she said, as if that might excuse his ignorance.

“I was fifteen when I started meeting with them. I was twenty-two before I took a proper interest in how the company turned such a healthy profit.” He still hated himself for trusting so blindly. “When I did, I realized our success was built on bribery and backroom deals. Intimidation, in some cases.”

“Are you sure those weren’t the tactics of the people who were left in charge after your father passed?”

“I’m sure. They were following the playbook he had created when he took over a handful of broken-down machines from his own father. He had been bribing officials to win contracts for roads and bridges from day one. Sometimes he failed to meet the building requirements. At one point, a bridge had collapsed and they’d paid to cover up their deliberate watering down of material. Thankfully, no one was injured or killed, but it was only a matter of time. The level of corruption was astonishing.”

“What did you do?” Her eyes were wide with muted horror.

“I took the evidence to the police. Records and assets were seized, arrests made. They were lenient with me because I cooperated, but we lost the house, the business. Everything of value. It was social and financial suicide. All of my friends were connected to the relationships my father had built. To avoid going down with the ship, many turned on us and tried to smear our name. When that happened, even our family turned their backs on us, especially my father’s side.”

“Because you were trying to make reparations for a wrong that wasn’t even your crime? Since when is integrity worse than living off ill-gotten gains?” Oriel asked crossly.

“Since it affected their own social standing and ability to keep their jobs. But thank you for that.” He pushed his hands into his pants pockets. “Kiran was the only one who stood by my decision to come clean. Everyone else said I should have kept my mouth shut and wound it down quietly if I didn’t like it. Instead we had death threats. That’s why Kiran started our security system, to protect us. Many people tried to undermine our success with it, retaliating by suggesting I employed my father’s methods to win the few installations we were hired to make. Our success has been achieved honestly,” he stressed. “Killian, the owner ofTecSec wouldn’t have touched us with a ten-foot pole otherwise. So it’s not ego that makes me reluctant to accept your gift, Oriel. It’s my conscience. I need to earn what I have.”

What a terrible betrayal. She couldn’t fathom how hurtful it would have been for him and his sister to lose everything, including their friends and family, after suffering so much loss already.

“I’ll have Max invoice you if it’s important to you.”

“It is.”

She nodded, compulsively running the silky tail of her robe’s belt between her fingers. “I won’t take that money from Jalil. It’s not mine—”

“Don’t let my feelings color yours.” Vijay moved to crouch before her. His big hand stilled her fidgeting fingers. “Whether you accept that fortune or not is between you and him. Just as what you do with this...” he lifted his gaze to the ceiling of the chateau “...and the rest of what you inherit from your parents is completely up to you. I don’t expect you to renounce any of it. Just know that if we marry, people are going to suggest I came after you for your money. That will get under my skin sometimes, and now you know why. But I know what I’m worth. And it’s not insubstantial.”

Nothing about him was insubstantial. He would be a lot more easy to dismiss if he was.

“Okay, but I hope you won’t think what you just told me, or the fact I will inherit all of this, has anything to do with my concerns about whether or not we marry. We barely know each other, Vijay. I always imagined that if I married, it would be because...” Why did it make her feel so gauche to admit it? “That I would be in love.”

He didn’t laugh. He accepted that with a nod of understanding and stood.

“Did you know that something like ninety percent of marriages in India are still arranged?” he asked. “The couples aren’t usually strangers anymore, but they don’t always know each other well. Even so, our divorce rate is really low. People wind up very content. Why don’t we approach it that way? Tell me what you’re looking for in marriage beyond love.”

What else was there?

“I always thought love was the key,” she said. “My parents have very different personalities, but they’re in love, and that seems to be what makes their marriage work.”

“I’m not going to promise you a life of love, or even that I’m capable of falling in love. But looking at your parents as an outsider, I see a couple who seem to have friendship, respect, affection. Loyalty. We could have those things.”

It was a fair offer, but seemed like a pale knockoff version of the connection she really yearned for.

“What do you want?” she asked, playing her fingers into the space between his shirt buttons. “Don’t say ‘someone who cooks.’ I promise you, I will disappoint.”

His mouth twitched. “I like that you make me laugh. I want that.” He ran his hands over her waist and hips. “Passion is a ‘nice to have.’” He nodded at the wrinkled impression they’d left in the blankets on the edge of her bed.

“Not a deal breaker?”

“It’s not.” He sounded surprised by his own admission. “Don’t get me wrong, I definitely want it. My mouth is watering thinking about all the ways I want to make love with you.” His mouth twisted with self-deprecation while his hand drifted down to fondle her bottom. “But if that was all we had, if I thought I couldn’t trust you, then no. That would be the deal-breaker. Trust is hard for me. It’s going to take time.”

She could understand that, given what he’d just told her, but she drew a slow breath that felt as though it spread powdered glass all through her chest.

“Given the way we started this relationship, I have to question how much I can trust you, too.”

He acknowledged that with a stiff nod and moved his hands to her hips.

“Where does that leave us, then? With me sleeping in the other room?”

“No.” The word escaped her as a barb of loss caught at her heart. She flashed her thick lashes up at him. “We’re not going to learn to trust each other if we put walls between us.”

“Or oceans,” he said pointedly and started to draw her closer.

“No,” she said, pressing away. “We have such different ideas of what a marriage means. I don’t want to think about it anymore. I am washing off my makeup before you distract me again.”

“Fine. I’ll go brush my teeth. But Oriel.” He caught her wrist. “If you want to sleep, tell me to stay in the other room.”

She gave him her smokiest smile. “We’ll sleep. Eventually.”

Oriel had a rough start to her morning. They had slept, but not much. They might still be tentative about trusting one another, but between the sheets, she felt completely safe with Vijay. When she was with him like that, she felt, well, loved. It was kind of addictive.

When she woke and rose, however, she was tired and a bit achy and had to face the reality that sex hadn’t solved anything. She was still pregnant by a man who was a bit of a mystery. Her life had still been cracked wide open by her birth family.

She barely swallowed her breakfast and was worried about it staying down by the time Vijay was placing the call to India.

“Do you want me to put it off?” he asked, frowning with concern.

“I think it’s nerves.” She had never felt so many caterpillars spinning cocoons in her middle.

His sister Kiran answered with a cheerful hello that immediately put Oriel at ease.

Thankfully, she had the excuse of a late night at her parents’ party to explain any colorlessness on her part. It was also such an emotional call for both her and Jalil, bringing sharp tears to her eyes when she heard the break in his voice, that they could both hardly speak.

They kept it short, and she promised to be in touch soon to let him know when she might book a trip to meet him in person.

Afterward, she had a reactive cry in Vijay’s arms, then pulled herself together and asked him to drive her to her childhood physician, where she was pronounced healthy and definitely pregnant. If her morning sickness became debilitating, she was advised to seek further medical attention. Otherwise, she should take her prescribed vitamins and consider scaling back her workload.

Oriel already knew she would have to do that, and it was eating at her.

“I know I don’t have to work, but I’ve put in so much effort to get this far. Now my entire life is a row of dominoes that are falling over, one after another,” she complained as Vijay drove her home. “I’ll have to tell Payton to break my contracts. He’ll want to tell the clients why, because some will say it’s okay if I’m pregnant. Sometimes that works for their show or campaign. But I can’t leak my pregnancy to the whole industry without telling my mother first. If I tell her, she’ll want to know who the father is.” She rolled her head on the headrest. “And what our plans are. Then there’s your sister. I don’t expect you to keep this from her, but will she tell Jalil? How will he react?”

“There is one more domino to consider.”

“No,”she said petulantly and turned her face away. “I don’t want to hear it.”

He pulled the car off the road to a spot that gave them a view of the river. The fronds of a willow dangled to play with the lily pads at the edge of the water.

“At some point your connection to Lakshmi will become public. You can put that off, but I doubt you can keep it hidden indefinitely, especially once you’re in India. Her face is very well known. I recommend staying in front of the story to control how it rolls out. Once it’s known, much will be made of the fact that Lakshmi was an unwed mother. Do you want to be judged for being the same?”

“That shouldn’t matter! Not in this day and age.”

“I agree.” He held up a hand. “And to many it won’t. To some it will be an affront. Unfortunately, those are the voices the media will amplify because that’s what gains them clicks and revenue. I wouldn’t want our child to suffer because we wished to make a point about free will.”

“Ugh. What kind of a world are we bringing this baby into?” she muttered, bracing her elbow on the door and covering her eyes with her hand.

“Come. Let’s walk a minute. Clear our heads. Is this the park your cousin teased you about last night?”

“Yes.” She couldn’t help a small laugh. She had forgotten about their childhood game in the pavilion of pretending to be a princess locked in a tower, taking turns rescuing the other.

“Show me.” Vijay left the car and came around to open her door.

“I will not re-enact it,” she warned, but enjoyed the short walk along the river’s edge to the structure that overlooked the river. A family of tourists left it as they arrived.

“I don’t know what I thought a knight in shining armor was supposed to save me from. My life was very simple and happy back then.” She moved to the spot with the best view and curled her arm around the post. “Honestly, my life is not that difficult right now, just very unclear. I wish I knew what to do first.”

“Oriel.”

She looked over her shoulder.

Vijay was on one knee. He opened a ring box and offered it. “Will you marry me?”

She slapped her hand over her mouth, but a muffled squeak of shock came out. Inexplicably, tears came into her eyes. She wouldn’t have expected to be so moved by a proposal from a man she had really only known a few days, but she was.

“How did you...?” She came closer. The ring was lovely. Modest, but eye-catching with its center diamond surrounded by smaller ones in a daisy pattern, all set in yellow gold. It looked like an antique. “Is that a family ring?”

“I went shopping while you were with the doctor. The jeweler said it came to him through an estate sale. It was likely made in the middle eighteen hundreds, but its provenance is mostly unknown.”

As she had been for much of her life.

Her throat closed and her eyes grew hot. She could hardly speak.

“You’re a romantic,” she chided.

“I am not,” he said with indignation. Then, with gentle affection, he added, “But I think you are, given your games here. I don’t know what sort of white horse or dream castle I can offer you that you can’t buy or make or achieve for yourself, but we’re going to be a family. I think we can make a strong one if we go all in. I think we can make it work, even though it won’t be ideal.”

That was really what a family was—wholehearted, unconditional commitment. She knew that. It was how she already felt toward their child, and she believed he felt the same. It only made sense that they would close that final link between them.

The hollow pang that had sat in her heart all her life said, But he doesn’t love you, and he’s said he won’t be able to love you too. It hurt quite a lot to acknowledge that, especially when that same ache made her fear she would never be loved, that there was some flaw in her that made it impossible for her to be cherished the way she longed to be.

That was something she had to resolve within herself, though. She had to believe she was worth being loved and not put it on others to prove it. Besides, maybe Lakshmi hadn’t been given a choice about giving her up. By revealing that, Vijay had already gone a long way to helping her heal all those old insecurities inside her. She was grateful to him for that.

The even starker truth was, even if he never loved her, she knew she could love him. She was already halfway there. Maybe he hadn’t been completely honest when they first met, but in the time since, he’d been considerate and protective and open in a way that must have been difficult for him. She admired the man he’d made of himself and knew she wasn’t done learning who that man was.

It was terrifying to let her heart make such a huge decision for her, but she moved to perch on his bent leg and cupped his stubbled jaw. Her voice shook with unsteady emotion.

“Yes, I will marry you, Vijay.”

He closed his arms tightly around her. His hot mouth captured hers. It was sweet and so intense it would have been frightening if he hadn’t been so tender about it.

As tears of joy and trepidation burned behind her closed eyelids, she heard a faint cheer go up.

They broke away to see the family of tourists had been watching from a distance.

She and Vijay tipped their heads together in embarrassed laughter. Then he grasped her close to balance her while he got them both upright on their feet.

As he slipped the ring onto her finger, he said, “I’d prefer to marry as soon as possible.”

“I have a few days of vacation left.” She wrinkled her nose. “How do you feel about eloping?”

“Done.”