Lusty Billionaires Bundle(115)
“That was different. You even said so.”
“I said many things I learned to regret,” he said heavily.
“Mama would have a hissy fit.”
“I will deal with your mother. She thinks I am a god, I have returned to her the family home.”#p#分页标题#e#
The remnants of Alexandra’s tears turned to laughter. “You mean it?”
“Yes.”
“Turn on the light,” she pleaded.
“Why?”
“I want to see you.”
He humored her and a second later the soft glow of the bedside lamp illuminated his chiseled features. Sincerity burned in his eyes.
“You really will support me returning to my Xandra Fortune career.”
“No.” His mouth set in a firm line.
She sucked in her breath on a wave of pain. She’d been mistaken. He couldn’t accept the woman she’d been.
“You can model, but you are Alexandra Petronides. You will not deny me my place in your life.”
The arrogant statement should have infuriated her, but instead it made her heart sing. Not only would he support her career as a model, but he had no desire to distance himself from it by her using a working name.
He didn’t love her, but he did respect her. “I don’t want to be a model,” she admitted.
His expression turned to stone. “What?”
“I want to stay home with the baby.”
“Then what the hell has this last half hour been about?” he demanded in a shout that hurt her eardrums.
“Don’t raise your voice to me!”
His jaw clenched and she could just see him counting to ten. “Why did you tell me you wanted to be a model when you did not?” he asked, teeth gritted, eyes spitting frustrated anger.
“I needed to know.”
“What did you need to know?”
“If you accepted the woman I was…the woman who became pregnant with your baby. When you asked me to marry you, I was living as Alexandra Dupree.”
“They are the same woman. I have said this before.”
But she hadn’t taken it in, or maybe she hadn’t believed him. “You tossed me out as Xandra Fortune.”
“You thought if you went back to modeling and calling yourself this other name, I would do so again?” he asked, outrage lacing every syllable.
“No, of course not.” But it all seemed muddled now. None of her thinking since discovering his second promise had been particularly clear. “I don’t know.”
He flopped back on his pillow and covered his eyes with his forearm. “You are never going to forget, are you?”
“What do you mean?” she asked anxiously.
“My stupidity. You will never trust me enough to let yourself love me again.”
“You don’t believe in love,” she reminded him.
He moved his arm and she flinched at his bleak expression. “You do not know what I believe in, Alexandra.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about the second promise to your grandfather?” she asked in a whisper. She hadn’t meant to ask, but now that the words were out, they could not be unsaid.
He sat up, his body vibrating with something she would not label defeat in a million years. “This is why you put me through hell tonight thinking you wanted to go back to a career that always came before me?”
“It didn’t come before you.”
“Ohi? No? I can’t come with you, I’ve got a photo shoot. I’ll be gone for a week to do the commercial. We can’t make love right now, I need to sleep so I won’t look like a hag in the morning.” He repeated excuses she’d given him in the past with cruel sarcasm. “Even our damned sex life was dictated by your career. Do not say you did not put it before me.”
“I had to work, Dimitri. You know why now.”#p#分页标题#e#
“But I did not then and you did not enlighten me.”
“I couldn’t.”
“Why not? Why could you not tell me who you really were?”
“Because…”
“I will tell you why. You did not trust me. You gave me your body, but not your trust. Not your heart.” His Greek accent had gotten very thick.
“That’s not true! I loved you!”
He slammed out of bed and towered over it on the opposite side. “Such a love I can do without. You lied to me every day we were together.”
She gasped in outrage. “I did not lie to you.”
“You said you were Xandra Fortune.”
“I was Xandra Fortune.”
He sliced through the air with his hand. “What is the use? You rewrite history to suit your own purpose.”
“I don’t have to rewrite history to know you kicked me out of your life like a pile of garbage!” she screamed at him, shocked at her own loss of control.