Needed: One Convenient Husband(19)

Eva backed her statement with a fiery glance, in that moment prepared  to cancel the wedding, cancel her very important plans for her business  and the gorgeous house of her dreams-all disastrous consequences. It  occurred to her that somewhere between sleeping with Kyle and agreeing  to marry him she had lost her perspective and was hatching into a  fully-fledged bridezilla.

Kyle muttered something curt beneath his breath as he accelerated through an intersection. "Are you always this difficult?"

Eva stared at oncoming traffic, barely seeing it. "You know I am. Mario would have wanted a church wedding. It's important."

"I guess I keep forgetting I'm marrying a wedding planner."

The easy way he said the words as if, ultimately, Kyle was relaxed with  the whole idea of marriage and prepared to give her her way, doused the  escalating tension. The dress, the ring and getting married in church  might seem inconsequential to Kyle, but they mattered to Eva. Her  upbringing with Mario had always included the church. In their small  family, faith had been central, deep and important. She wouldn't feel  married if it wasn't done in a church.

Kyle braked as traffic slowed. "Which church and what time?"

Kyle's sudden change of heart about the church, the ease with which he  had adapted, sparked a suspicion. "You knew about the church all along."

"I didn't know the details, but the twins gave me a heads-up."

Which meant, since he hadn't mentioned it before, that he had more than  likely saved the knowledge as a bargaining chip. In this case, to make  sure she had the engagement ring he wanted to give her.

Feeling suddenly, blazingly happy that he had gone to so much trouble  for her, she gave him the details. "It's the little church just down  from the house. I was lucky enough to get it at short notice."

The vicar hadn't liked having his arm twisted, since he'd had to  reschedule a regular session of the La Leche League, who had their  monthly meeting in an adjacent room, but she had doubled the fee, which  had smoothed things over.

A bus up ahead stopped for a set of lights. Eva winced as she  recognized one of her last lingerie advertisements splashed over the  rear of the bus.

The fizzing happiness died a death. Just what she needed, a reminder  that Kyle was marrying a woman who was more recognizable to the general  population half-naked than fully dressed. And in that moment it hit her  what that would mean to a man who made his living in the  ultraconservative world of banking. To say that she was an unsuitable  wife for a man who dealt with the stiff etiquette of that social world  was a massive understatement.

A car peeled right and, as luck would have it, they ended up snug  behind the bus, with her airbrushed, overly enhanced cleavage looming  large. Eva's fingers tightened on her handbag, as any hope that Kyle had  not seen the advertisement faded.

When she had been modeling, the profession had been so competitive that  this particular lingerie shoot had seemed a good business move. It had  certainly kept her in public view, but until now she had not noticed how  tacky the posters were.

Even more on edge now, she stared at Kyle's profile, the clean-cut  strength of his jaw and the way his broken nose made him look even  sexier. "Maybe you shouldn't marry me."

Kyle's gaze captured hers. "What's wrong now?"

The mild, patient way he asked the question, as if she was a  high-maintenance girlfriend with issues, made her stiffen. "Won't  marrying me be a problem in terms of your career?"

Mario had thrown up his hands often enough at her decision to become a  lingerie model. Added to that, over the years Eva had become sharply  aware that her career, coupled with the Atraeus name, had guaranteed the  kind of prying, intrusive media attention she hated.                       
       
           



       

Kyle pulled into a reserved space in the crowded, popular enclave that  was the Viaduct, a collection of bars and cafés and apartments on the  waterfront, just a stone's throw from the central heart of Auckland.  Unfastening his seat belt, he half turned to face her, and suddenly the  interior of the Maserati seemed suffocatingly small. "Is this about the  lingerie ads?"

She met his gaze squarely. "It could affect your business. I mean,  won't there be occasions when I have to socialize with some of your  clients?"

"Honey, I part own the bank. I can buy and sell most of my clients. If  they've got a problem with my wife, they can take their business  elsewhere."

A curious tingling sensation riveted her to her seat. As Kyle exited  the car, she registered what that sensation was: the recognition that in  that moment something basic and utterly primitive had taken place.  Without so much as the blink of an eye, Kyle had informed her that she  was more important than his business. More, he had given her an  assurance that he would uphold her honor and protect her  unconditionally. An assurance that was guaranteed to melt her all the  way through, because he had made her feel that she belonged to him.

Suddenly, it did not seem like a marriage of convenience to Eva.

Kyle opened her door and held out his hand. Still feeling electrified  by the uncompromising way Kyle had stated his solidarity with her, his  intention, on the surface of things, to treat her as a real wife, Eva  put her hand in his. When she straightened, for a moment she was close  enough to Kyle that she could see the crystalline clarity of his irises  and the intriguing dark striations, the inky blackness of his lashes.

Only one other person had done the same, and that had been Mario.

She was aware that Kyle would know some of the details of her  background, but only the parts that she and Mario had agreed could be  known. He did not know about the genetic disorder, the deaths of her  brother and sisters and her mother's depression; the constant moves to  avoid one of her mother's violent boyfriends. He could not know or guess  how difficult it was for her to trust anyone.

She had entrusted herself to Kyle, and now she knew why. Somehow,  beneath the battle lines they had drawn for so long and all the tension  and clashes, she had recognized that bedrock quality in Kyle. It was the  same quality that had attracted her when she was seventeen and still  raw from the disintegration of her family and being handed through a  list of foster homes. It explained why she had never really forgotten  him, even though he had walked away.

For a split second, his gaze rested on her mouth, and she realized that  in his sharp, percipient way, he had picked up on the intensity of her  thoughts and was going to pull her close and kiss her. She was so sure  of it that she unconsciously rebalanced her weight to lean in close.

"Kyle! I saw you from across the street. I've been trying to get hold of you."

"Elise. I was going to call you."

Eva stiffened as a tall, narrow brunette with dainty features and a  simple silk shift and jacket that she instantly recognized as Chanel,  stepped up to Kyle and kissed him on the cheek. The extremity of Eva's  reaction was easily recognizable; she was jealous. Why she hadn't  considered that Kyle had a girlfriend she didn't know.

Kyle disentangled himself, his expression neutral. His arm came around  her as he introduced Elise, a financial consultant with a rival bank. In  clipped tones, he introduced Eva as his fiancée.

There was a moment of stony silence, and Eva found it in herself to be sorry for Elise.

Elise recovered fast. "I know you from somewhere."

That would probably be from the back of a bus, Eva thought.

Minutes later, Kyle unlocked a private entrance sandwiched between a  high-end restaurant and an award-winning café. A few seconds in a  private high-speed elevator, and they stepped out into the hushed foyer  of a penthouse suite.

Opening a tall bleached oak door, Kyle indicated she should precede  him. A little perplexed that Kyle had brought her to his apartment,  rather than a café, Eva stepped into an elegant, spare hall that opened  out into a huge light space. Beech floors flowed to a wall built almost  entirely of glass, with sliding doors that opened onto a patio.

The apartment was vast and overlooked the bustling Viaduct with cafés  and bars and a marina filled with colorful yachts. Further out the  Harbour Bridge arched across the Waitemata Harbour linking the North  Shore to Auckland City. To the right the quirky suburb of Devonport with  its jumble of Victorian houses was clearly visible, and beyond, in the  hazy distance, the cone-shaped Rangitoto Island.

A dapper man in a suit rose from one of the long leather couches grouped around a coffee table. "Mr. Messena, Miss Atraeus."