Nik watched her narrow shoulders droop, her head bow, concern clawing at him even while he remained astonished by her behaviour. She had given him a glimpse into her outlook and he was reeling from it.
You broke my heart, Nik, and I’ll never forgive you for it.
He turned her round, slowly, carefully. She looked up at him, eyes bright with unshed tears in the street light. His mouth came crashing down on hers without warning and suddenly he was lifting her up to him to part her soft lips and drink deep of the sweet, tender interior of her mouth. She felt as if her head were swimming as her body ran from cold to very hot and she wanted to climb him like a tree and cling. Molten desire laced with helpless self-betrayal powered her treacherous response, a wild but necessary release from the unbearable tension. He tasted so good. He tasted hotter than the flaming heart of a fire. Nothing had ever been as primitive as that devouring kiss and yet nothing could have drawn her down so efficiently from her distressed emotional high and grounded her again. He steadied her with both hands as he set her down on her own feet again because she was tottering, dizzy, in another place altogether from the mood she had been in before he reached for her.
‘My car will drop you at the station... I’ll stay on here,’ Nik murmured in a hoarse undertone, but it was the only outward sign he gave that what had just transpired had had any kind of effect on him.
It was a huge challenge but Betsy contrived to relocate her brain and, shaken though she was, she made it down the steps, across the pavement and into the upholstered comfort of the limousine, breathing again only when the car drew away from the kerb. That kiss... No, she wasn’t even going to think about that. It was just part of the craziness that happened when people lost their temper and fought and she wasn’t used to fighting with Nik. Even the day she had told him to get out of Lavender Hall there had been no real fight. While she had ranted about the vasectomy he had kept secret he had stood in brooding silence without explaining, excusing or even attempting to justify his behaviour.
As the limo departed, it finally occurred to Nik that he had set himself much more of a challenge than he could ever have imagined. Telling Betsy that he was coming home to look after her and their unborn child would go down like a brick thrown through a glass window because she didn’t want him back.
Returning indoors, Nik turned in a blind, uncoordinated half circle in the hall of his brother’s elegant town house and he wasn’t aware of anything, of where he was or even of who might be watching for such a moment of weakness. Why had he just assumed that she would want him back? Women had always wanted Nik and it was simply a reality he took for granted. But then he had made that mistake with Betsy before when she’d ditched him on their first date, he recalled abstractedly, an iron bar pounding painfully behind his temples. Of course, Betsy had never been like other women, which was why he had married her in the first place.
When he had brought her flowers she had admitted she would simply prefer an apology for his long absences and more frequent phone calls and texts while he was away.
When he had brought her gifts she had scolded him for wasting his money as if he were an extravagant child. ‘You can’t impress me with that stuff,’ she had once told him gently. ‘That’s not why I’m with you. I’m here because I love you and you can’t put a price on that.’
Perspiration dampening his brow, Nik asked himself for the first time why Betsy had tried to claim half his wealth, because that claim from her had never made sense with what he knew of her character. He wondered what love really felt like, never having experienced it except when it came to her loving him. That love had given him the strangest sense of security... Ridiculous! As if he were insecure. He almost laughed out loud at that idea but somehow couldn’t crank up even a shadowy atom of his sense of humour.
He wondered if it would be possible to kidnap Betsy and take her abroad where she would have to listen to him. Would she really call the police? Ultimately, she had to listen to him. Catching himself up on that peculiar kidnapping fantasy, he raised his brows and wondered if he had taken a sudden nosedive into insanity.