She had realized two minutes after they had walked in that Diego’s infuriating statement to the press had given new meaning to the term fairy-tale ending. It wasn’t enough that the incredible mockery of his statement—something she would have cherished in an alternative life—haunted her, pricked her.
With the news of his two-million-dollar investment in her company coupled with his revelation that he was the father of her child and that they were married, he’d suddenly become her knight in shining armor.
No matter that the same crowd—the same media—had called him a monster just days ago, for his predatory tactics when it came to new businesses, for the way he had recently used a man’s gambling losses to take ownership of an island off of Brazil’s coast. An ecological paradise, no less, which he was allegedly going to mine and destroy for its precious metals.
Her mouth hurt from the contented smile she forced to her lips as more people congratulated her for the fact that she had landed on her feet with Diego.
She didn’t know what infuriated her more—Diego’s charming smiles and the intimate glances he threw her way in the face of everyone’s prurient curiosity about them, or the educated crowd’s insulting joy that she finally had her act together.
As if Diego’s very presence in her life could somehow make her brain work better. She laughed at the irony of it.
By the time the awards presentation was over and her speech delivered—which had left a sour taste in her mouth—all she wanted was to escape the crowd, sink into her marble bathtub and lose her mind in a crossword puzzle.
But her torment was nowhere near over yet.
His grip on her wrist unyielding, Diego pulled her onto the dance floor. His hands around her waist, he enveloped her in a hard wall of heat until he filled her vision and the invigorating scent of him was all she could breathe.
He had held her at arm’s length ever since she had blurted out the news of her pregnancy. The sudden intimacy of his embrace now toppled her equilibrium, and her flesh sighed against his hardness.
Her skin tingled when his callused fingers moved over her back at images and sensations she’d rather not remember: the feel of those calluses on the sensitive skin of her thighs, the muscles in his back bunching under her fingers... Her body reveled in the memories his nearness evoked.
She sucked in a sharp breath, willing herself not to melt into his arms, not to enjoy it so much. Because all this was for show. He was playing to the media, leaving no doubt in anyone’s mind about them, leaving her no way out.
At least no way out with her life still intact.
He studied her, curious amusement playing on his mouth. “You’re not enjoying the evening?”
She pulled her head back and glared at him. “I’ve never been more disappointed in my entire life. I’m the same person with the same faculties I had yesterday. And yet you get lauded for sweeping me off my feet.”
A smile curved his lush mouth, and infuriated her further.
“You weren’t this upset even when I trapped you at the island.”
“I don’t like being thought an incompetent idiot,” she said, gritting her teeth.
His mouth narrowed with displeasure. “You mean you don’t like even the illusion that you’re in love? You have your investment, your company’s reputation is intact and you have my total support with the pregnancy. I don’t see what’s bothering you so much.”
Put like that, she sounded the very epitome of selfishness. But she couldn’t quiet the increasing panic that things were slowly but surely slipping out of her control. That Diego was stripping away everything she needed to survive. Whatever his intentions, the truth was that he would bring her down to her knees, plunge her into the same whirlpool of crippling hope, if she wasn’t on guard.
“There’s no need for this pretense that we’re living a happily-ever-after. As if this is Romeo and Juliet Reunited.”
“No? Have you thought of how this might have affected your sister and her life? Being continually mobbed by the media speculating on how she felt about her sister carrying her husband’s child?”
Her mouth fell open. “Liv always knew the truth.”
“Does it mean it doesn’t bother her? Hurt her? Cast a dirty shadow on her marriage? What about Alexander King? You went straight to him for help, and you claim guilt for having deceived him, but did you think for a minute what this twisted speculation might do to him? Do you care that you’ve asked them to pay a high price just because it raises your hackles to be tied to me?
Shame flooded her within, and her gaze wavered away from him. God, every word out of his mouth was true. She had been avoiding Liv, worried she would know that Kim was barely keeping it together.