They were still strangers and would remain so. He kept his heart behind thicker walls than she had ever hidden behind.
“If you insist. Trella.”
“Thank you.” She wasn’t grateful. She was shattered. “Can you—” She waved at the door. “I’m tired.”
“Will you be all right alone?”
She had thought he couldn’t hurt her any further, but that did it. After rejecting her so roundly, did he really think she would want to cling to him through another emotional storm? How did he manage to sound like he cared if she suffered alone?
“I have to learn to be, don’t I? I’ve known that for a long time. Goodnight.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
I NEED TO stop thinking we’re friends.
There was no reason he should have lost sleep over that. Perhaps the bella endearment had always rolled off his tongue very easily around women, but for some reason knowing it held a more intimate connotation for her made it something he wanted the right to use. He doubted he would ever use it again with anyone else. It was hers now, which made it doubly frustrating she refused to hear it from him.
He went into his first meeting of the day, unrested and gritty eyed, only to face the woman still torturing him. They were about to negotiate their prenuptial agreement.
He introduced her to the palace attorney who fell under her spell at the first flash of her smile. She wore a pin-striped sky blue jacket over a white shirt that draped untucked over her matching skirt. It made her look smart and capable, yet sensual. Achingly vulnerable.
“I should have invited your brother to stay for this,” he said as he directed her into a comfortable armchair.
“Why?” She cooled when he touched her arm and delicately removed her elbow from his loose touch, adjusting a cushion behind her back as she sat.
“To protect your interests.”
“You can email the draft to him,” the attorney said with a magnanimous smile. “If he has concerns, we can address them before you sign.”
She sat back and folded her hands on her lap, smiling in a way that could only be called patronizing.
“Gentlemen. Along with our mother, my siblings and I jointly own Sauveterre International. Ramon votes Gili’s share and Henri votes Mama’s because they don’t take an interest. I vote my own, thank you very much. Maison Des Jumeaux is not the only enterprise I’ve asked SI to underwrite. One hundred percent of my initiatives have turned a profit because I have a brain and use it. So...” She cut a glance toward Xavier. “The Prince may show the draft to his grandmother before he signs, to ensure his interests are protected, but I’m confident I can look after my own.”
The attorney cleared his throat and shuffled papers.
Xavier held her lofty stare.
He should have been affronted. It was a well-executed burn in front of the attorney and his PA, but he was darkly thankful for that scorn in her.
He had watched her all through their meal with her brother yesterday, captivated by her rallying spirit. The glimpse of her family dynamic and the new facets in her personality had only made him want to know her far better than he would be allowed to. It had taken genuine effort on his part to stick to the plan and outline how they would proceed. If he had had a choice—
He didn’t. So he had said what needed to be said.
She’d been angry. Injured. She was sentimental. And despite his claims to be anything but, he didn’t take pleasure in hurting others. If things were different...
Wistfulness was a useless emotion. He steeled himself against futile if onlys. “Let’s get started.”
As promised, Trella protected her abundant interests with pointed questions and clear language. The details were hammered out with very little fuss until the attorney asked, “And the dissolution of the marriage? Midnight, December thirty-first?”
“That’s fine. But if I lose the baby, the marriage ends immediately.”
Her statement was jarring. Xavier swung his head to regard her, disturbed.
“There would be no reason to draw it out,” she said stiffly. White tension ringed her mouth.
A strange void opened in him. Why? She was right. What else was there between them besides the baby?
You don’t know what that’s like, do you?
Her disturbing accusation last night kept ambushing him, but his parents had been disruptive forces in his life, dividing his loyalty, creating nothing but turmoil and disappointment. If that was love, he didn’t need it.
His grandmother’s levelheaded reason and clear outline of what was expected from a future monarch had been a welcomed relief. Taking responsibility meant taking control.
Like love, Trella was an unpredictable influence. Too much was at stake to indulge any latent desires for either. She was right. Without the baby, they had nothing holding them in their union .
He lifted a finger, indicating the attorney should record that their marriage would end if the pregnancy did. He ignored the grate in the pit of his stomach.
* * *
They signed the contract a few days later, once the DNA results had been confirmed. Afterward, Trella hurried to greet her mother, who had arrived for the ceremony that would be held in the palace chapel.
“We agreed on a private ceremony,” Xavier said when she informed him her mother would attend.
“She’s giving me away.” Trella hadn’t mentioned her sister had cried over missing the ceremony. “All of my family wanted to be here, but neither of us is getting the wedding we wanted, are we? Well, I guess you are. Later.”
His expression had hardened as he looked away.
She wasn’t trying to be “combative,” just stating fact. She had hoped she and Xavier would have something to build a family upon, but they didn’t.
That made her sad, but all her soul-searching had been done in the months of keeping her pregnancy under wraps. Xavier had given her a chance at motherhood that she had believed was out of reach. For that, she would always be grateful.
But he saw her as, at best, one of the many staff who would tend to his offspring so he wouldn’t have to. They might marry, but she wouldn’t be his wife.
He didn’t want her.
She had to ignore how spurned that made her feel. She already had people who loved her, after all.
“Mi niña hermosa,” her mother exclaimed as she finished buttoning the gown and Trella turned to face her. “Truly, this is your pièce de résistance.”
Trella had been working on the gown in secret, not even showing it to her mother or Gili. It was understated, like her makeup, with a high waist to cover her bump and a simple bodice with cap sleeves. The seed pearls and crystals had been the time-consuming work and she was proud of how it had turned out.
Her hair was in a loose chignon. Her mother placed a bridal comb over her ear in lieu of a veil. The brushed silver flowers with pearls and diamonds was a family heirloom, not ostentatious, just right for a small afternoon wedding.
They followed the ever-efficient Mario to the palace chapel.
Xavier was already there, speaking to the bishop. He wore a bone colored tunic-style jacket with dark gold epaulettes and gold leaf embroidery at the cuffs and hem. His royal red sash sat across it, decorated with a number of pins, including a key and a family shield. A sword hung off his hip.
My prince, she thought, and ached inside.
He wasn’t, and he never would be.
* * *
Xavier turned and splendor kicked him in the stomach.
Her dress was white, which somehow wasn’t ironic despite being a maternity gown. Perhaps it was the fact her bump was still modest, or the way the gown drew his eye to the beading at her neckline and across her shoulders. The detailing resembled angel wings but also projected strength. Delicate armor.
The rest of her was incandescent. Her skin held the warm glow he had noticed the night they’d met, as if firelight reflected off a creamy nude. She was both waif and warrior. Goddess and maid. Infinitely fascinating.
She came forward, expression guarded as she introduced her mother.
Elisa Sauveterre was a tall, elegant woman of Spanish ancestry with sensual features and a single streak of white in her black hair.
As she held his hand in both her warm ones, shadows in the misty depths of her eyes told him she had feared this day would never come for her daughter. It made him feel churlish for bristling when Trella had informed him her mother was coming.
“It’s an honor to have you here.” He was embarrassed now that his grandmother wasn’t attending, and that they hadn’t extended an invitation for Elisa to stay at the palace. His impatience with himself sharpened his tone as he told Trella, “You look beautiful.”
Her mouth tightened. “Thank you.” But she might have been speaking to Mario who handed her a bouquet.
Mario was Xavier’s witness, which suddenly felt like a disregard for the significance of the occasion. Xavier understood ceremony. His entire country was up in arms, wanting to witness this moment. The least he could have done was invite a friend to be his best man. He might not have many friends, but he had some.
Friends would come next year, though, when he married Patrizia in a spectacle he already dreaded.
Today’s occasion was far more to his liking, even though the exchange of words seemed to hold extra power when spoken in such an intimate setting, heard only by the three witnesses. Even those few extra pairs of eyes and ears fell away as he spoke directly to Trella, losing himself in the shift of gray and green in her irises.