Beating the System

by E V Darcy

  ‘I apologised for that. You know I support you both now, now that I see how much you do love each other.’

  ‘Yes, well.’ Clearly it was still a sore point for the eldest Snape sibling. ‘Tell me what’s going on and I’ll consider… my words more carefully.’

  Hattie sighed. ‘I can’t tell you; I can’t prompt you. He needs to hear the truth Victoria, about why you had to marry Cormac and how you proposed to him. I promise, he won’t say a thing.’

  ‘And just who exactly is him?’

  ‘Roman.’

  ‘Roman? Roman Tyrrell?’

  ‘Yes, Lady Snape,’ Roman interjected, eyeing Hattie.

  ‘It’s Blake. Hattie, wasn’t it his twin who—’

  ‘Yes,’ she snapped. ‘Just tell him the truth… About everything.’ Roman heard the long-suffering sigh before Victoria finally confirmed everything Hattie had told him.

  ‘…And so, as I only had a few months in order to find a husband, I offered to pay Cormac to marry me. He accepted. We’re married and I have access to some of my inheritance. When we have a child, I’ll get it all.’

  ‘Thank you, Tori.’

  ‘Don’t call me that. Now, tell me what this is all about—’

  ‘I’ll tell you later.’

  ‘Hat—’ Roman raised his brow when Hattie hung up on her sister.

  ‘Do you believe me now?’ she asked, not looking at him as she tucked her phone back in her bag. She was embarrassed, not only in showing him she was helpless, but in having to turn to the one sister she loathed asking for help.

  He braced his elbows on his thighs and rubbed his hands over his face as he considered all his options. It wasn’t his child, no, but it was his flesh and blood. It was his brother’s—his twin’s—baby, and while he and Jensen may not have been close in their latter years, he had a responsibility to he or she. If they were to be the only heir to the Tyrrell name, fortune, and company, he had to ensure they had access to the best things in life.

  And even though he hated that he wasn’t the father, wasn’t the one who’d been able to be with his Henrietta the way he longed to again, to be to her what Jensen clearly had, he wanted to be there for her. He owed her that much.

  Dammit, why couldn’t it have been him?

  It could be you…

  He sat up straight at that stray thought, trying to unpick what his brain was hinting at. Something earlier in their conversation, something she’d said about—

  I suppose with you two being so genetically similar, it could be questioned which of you were really the father…

  It could very well be questioned. Their DNA had been analysed the world over, science baffled by their genetic similarities. Hell, the only visibly identifiable difference between Jensen and him, had been the way they dressed. And two tiny freckles on opposite little toes. It would take years to break down their code enough and the child’s to be able to tell exactly who had fathered the baby.

  At your brother’s wake and with her! Of all the people you could have shagged today, why her?

  Fiona’s shrill voice rang loudly in his head; she already thought he’d slept with Hattie that day, that could be used to their advantage. He licked his lips as he weighed the idea, carefully, trying to see the potential pitfalls…

  He could do it. He’d always said he wouldn’t raise another man’s child, but this was different. This was Hattie. His Henrietta.

  He eyed her speculatively.

  ‘Well?’ she asked, turning to him, her eyes filled with challenge, hope, and desperation. ‘Do you believe me now?’

  He did. But more than that, she was offering him the perfect chance, the one thing he’d dreamt of, but never thought he’d ever obtain.

  ‘Henrietta’ He swallowed and rubbed his palms over his trousers as nerves began to flutter in his stomach and his brain protested the stupidity of the idea. His heart beat frantically, eager for him to listen to it and not his head for once in his damn life. He hadn’t been this nervous the last time he’d done this, but then that had merely been business. A way to get his father off his back, to stop Fiona’s demands. He’d never intended to actually see her walk down the aisle to him. As soon as his father was dead and he inherited the business and family fortune, Fiona would be gone. He didn’t care what her father threatened him with.

  But this… This was a day he never thought he’d see. A day when every dream that had floated through his head, every wish he’d ever made over a birthday cake, every hope he’d secreted away in his usually hardened heart came true.

  He slid off the couch, down to one knee, and turned to the woman he’d always desired.

  ‘Will you marry me?’

  ‘Henrietta’—Roman dropped to one knee—‘will you marry me?’

  Hattie’s mouth dropped open, her hands flying to her cheeks in delighted surprise as her eyes moved from his to the ring and back again. His eyes shimmered with love and happiness, mirroring her own as her mouth turned from an ‘oh’ of surprise, to a wide beaming grin!

  ‘Oh yes, Roman! Yes! Of course, I’ll marry you!’…

  At least that had been the dream. The one she’d conjured at thirteen-years-old after becoming sweet on the boy who always seemed to know when she needed him. The one who would hold her carefully as she cried or as she whispered her fears into the darkness. The one who would lay next to her as they held hands, while they shared their hopes and wishes for the future. Or who would just simply wile away time with her, lying in a field and staring up at the sky, making stupid images out of the clouds as they floated by.

  Hattie blinked the dream away.

  Roman was down on one knee and he had indeed said the words—the ones that went with such a pose. But there was no happy gasp from her, no love shimmering in either of their eyes.

  It wasn’t even close to her evolved dream, the one where they’d bump into each other one day and he’d beg her forgiveness and declare he’d been such a fool. He’d never loved Fiona, it had always been her, before dropping to one knee and uttering those magical words.

  She’d always been elated when hearing those four words in her dreams. But now… Her first proposal and it was so empty, so hollow, the complete opposite of what she’d always imagined.

  Her mind scoffed. No, she had been proposed to before. Jensen had asked her to marry him plenty of times, always with the aim to put a smile on her lips. She fondly remembered the first time, when he’d found her sobbing after the fight between her and Fiona.

  He’s a dickhead for not seeing what’s in front of him. He’d told her, gently brushing the tears from her cheeks. She’d mewed and leaned into this touch, closing her eyes tightly as if that could somehow help the pain. Or at least pretend that Jensen was really his brother. Tell you what, if he can’t get a clue and see what an amazing woman you are, Hattie, I will. Marry me, Hattie, and I’ll always make you smile.

  Marry him, was he serious? She’d opened her eyes and stared up at him. The face was the same, even their voices were identical… If he closed his eyes, she’d be able to believe it was Roman. But the kind, gentle eyes of Jensen were the ones that had held hers. She’d huffed a laugh, loving that he was so kind and wished she could love him instead of his brother.

  Oh, Jensen, she’d sighed, smiling through her tears. You really do know how to make me smile and laugh, thank you. He’d grinned back, his eyes closing a second before he’d pulled her into a hug.

  It’s what I’m here for.

  She wished she’d taken him up on that offer now. Made that laugh fall from his face as he realised what he’d done. But at the same time, she was glad she hadn’t. Every time he’d jokingly asked for her hand in marriage, it had brightened her day and let her know she had good friends out there who loved her even if they couldn’t do it in the way she most wanted to be loved. Even if she’d never hear that question asked for real…

  Jensen had proposed for laughs, to make her smile. What was Roman doing it for? First of all, he was
engaged to Fiona, the heiress to the Martin fortune. Combined their bank accounts would finally allow them to step into the big leagues with the likes of her father’s and O’Malley’s companies. And even if he was to break it off with the ice maidan to marry her, she had no money and marrying him would mean she wouldn’t be able to claim her inheritance. There would be no advantage to him.

  She had no access to her father’s company, and it was still uncertain if it would be sold, broken up, or managed by a new CEO on a permanent basis. Mr Kelly, as good a friend as he was to her father, was getting too old to continue on, he’d told her and her sisters. So Roman couldn’t be hoping to get his hands on that, and she certainly wouldn’t let him either! She’d never let Gerald Tyrrell—directly or through his son—get anywhere near her father’s company.

  And Roman didn’t have to marry her to give the child the Tyrrell name. All he had to do was acknowledge it, maybe provide a sample of DNA so they could confirm her child was indeed a genetic match—a close one. Close enough to be Jensen’s son or daughter.

  So why was he asking? What benefit would he get from it? All she could see was a weight around his neck; married to a woman he didn’t love and raising someone else's child—even if it was his niece or nephew—and giving up the chance of a more advantageous alliance with the Martin’s.

  Why are you even questioning this? her mind asked, slightly panicked she was considering saying no. Not only does it solve all your problems, it’s what you always wanted. Roman as your husband. With you forever.

  But he doesn’t love me, her heart replied.

  Marrying and loving weren’t the same thing. She’d seen that plenty with her aunts and uncles, and it was true for Roman and Fiona according to Jensen, but people could fall in love once they were married, right? Victoria and Cormac had done that very thing. Could she and Roman do the same? She stared at the man before her, evaluating the way he was looking at her against the way Cormac had looked at Victoria from the first day Hattie had walked in and declared them both insane.

  It was nothing like the way her brother-in-law had looked at her sister. Even back then there had been something shimmering in his eyes. An attraction, a desire, a need to be close to Victoria there and then, even if it wasn’t to be forever.

  There was nothing of the sort in Roman’s. No, he looked at her the way he always had, one she finally understood; he was scrutinising her, searching for a chink in her armour so he could get what he wanted. Did he know she still held a torch for him? Did he think he could exploit it in some way?

  What would marriage to Roman even be like?

  She’d never really featured a baby as part of her fantasies, but her mind quickly showed her a dark-haired child running around a garden…

  If it had been Jensen raising the child, he’d have given chase, making them squeal with glee as she stood watching their antics, laughing with such joy and delight.

  But it wouldn’t be Jensen, it would be Roman, and chasing a child, one that wasn’t even his, around a garden wasn’t something even her mind could conjure. She had no choice on bringing the child into the world, she couldn’t deny a part of Jensen living on, but with a child she wanted the bigger picture; the loving, devoted family. Not a father who would merely greet the child upon waking and returning home from work of an evening—

  They see other people all the time.

  —if he wasn’t spending the night with one of his many mistresses.

  Her fingers curled into the skirt of her dress at the thought of marrying Roman only to be stuck at home as he spent nights in hotels or an apartment he had somewhere just so he could bed other women. It wasn’t as if she didn’t have first-hand experience in such a thing. Of course, that was from the side of being the other woman. The first other woman.

  ‘No.’

  It was a single word. Just two letters. But it was so firm, so definitive. To a man in love, to someone asking such a question with hope in their heart, it would have been devastating. She imagined them rocking on their knee, their eyes filled with hurt, and spluttering out questions to know why they’d been so thoroughly rejected. Roman didn’t even flinch.

  ‘You’re pregnant and penniless,’ he pointed out, his voice as neutral as ever, as he climbed to his feet and stared down at her. ‘Why are you turning this down?’ She looked at him and laughed as she took to her own feet.

  ‘Are you kidding? One, I’m pregnant with your brother’s baby, two you’re already engaged to Fiona, and—’

  ‘We’re over.’

  ‘Three- What?’

  ‘Fiona and I, we’re over.’ He turned away from her, shoving his hands deep into his trouser pockets. It stretched the fabric tight over his behind, and Hattie’s eyes dropped to it without thought. He did have a fantastic arse.

  ‘It’s done. Over. Single again.’ Hattie pulled her eyes from his rear as he stepped back behind his desk and fixed his chair. He stood behind it, his long, elegant fingers holding it in place and levelled his gaze on her.

  He and Fiona were finished? But she’d been flashing her engagement ring at the funeral for all the world to see. She’d presided over the wake acting the hostess, treating it as if she were throwing some sort of gala rather than burying what would have been her future brother-in-law. Was that how it had happened? Had her antics that day ruined it? Or had they been about to break up when Jensen had died and hadn’t announced it due to his unexpected death. Her mind raced with so many questions, but she couldn’t seem to speak.

  Had they simply run their course? Had Jensen’s death made Roman realise he couldn’t stay with Fiona? That he needed something more? Had he seen that Jensen’s playboy lifestyle had just been an open version of his own hidden away in the shadows? That Jensen had left the world single and alone; had he faced that fact and acknowledged it wasn’t what he wanted for himself? Had it had to end with Fiona so he could find something more? Something deeper? Something other than just business as Jensen had described it.

  But if—and it was a huge if—that was the case; why was he immediately proposing to her as soon as he was free and single and able to go and find someone to give him a more fulfilling relationship?

  It didn’t add up, the data she had wasn’t computing. She needed answers, she needed to ask so many questions…

  ‘When?’

  ‘It’s recent,’ he confessed. ‘Very recent. Not yet announced. Only a couple of people know.’

  She wished she was still sitting down. She’d dreamt of him walking away, of him finally getting tired of cold and clingy Fiona. How he’d come and find her, beg her forgiveness and whisk her away… She wanted to scoff, to laugh at the irony that now he was finally free she was pregnant with his twin’s baby.

  She held her face in her hands, trying to get a grip on the whirl of thoughts and feelings that tumbled inside her. She should want to hate him or at least feel nothing for the heartless bastard, her mind had told her this for years but her heart… She sighed. Her heart couldn’t let go.

  Her heart kept her hoping, kept her wishing… Sometimes she wished it would stop just so she could be free of the torment it caused her. She’d never been able to have a long-term relationship because it wanted the man in front of her, the man who was offering himself to her.

  But that single question remained, stuck in her mind, unable to move on until she understood…

  ‘Why would you ask me to marry you? Is it just business?’

  He sighed, his shoulders rising and falling with the heavy breath. ‘I could say it makes good business acumen to join our names together; Snape and Tyrrell would send stocks in both companies through the roof. We’d make a fortune.’

  Ah, so even without her inheritance jumping from a Martin to a Snape would be striking gold.

  ‘I see.’

  ‘No, you don’t.’ There was a hint of frustration in his voice, a tick in his jaw jumped before he took a breath and shook his head. It had been a hint of something more beneath his usual coo
l exterior. A taste of what lied beneath, that he wasn’t only cold and hard, that the boy she had known was still inside. ‘You don’t see, Henrietta. While it does make good business sense, us getting married helps you. You’ll get your inheritance and—’

  ‘No, I won’t, Roman. Haven’t you been listening? I have to marry the father of my baby’—she grabbed her stomach as if to emphasise the point—‘and that’s Jensen, not you!’

  He faltered in his step, a little pause most wouldn’t even notice, but she’d watched him often enough to recognise it.

  ‘But we could say it’s mine.’ She watched him cautiously as he moved towards her. He had the same predatory look in his eyes he’d had that afternoon at Jensen’s funeral, when he’d cornered her in his bedroom suite.

  ‘Fiona thought I’d slept with you at Jensen’s wake, you’ve just stormed in here announcing to me that you’re pregnant.’ She watched him reach out for her hand; she didn’t stop him, didn’t pull away. She held her breath as he took it gently in his as he stepped beside her again.

  ‘Sue’s the epitome of discretion, but Terry… Terry will go back downstairs and Daphne will get it out of him what happened here, and Daphne is the biggest gossip this company has. It’s why she’s not progressed.’

  ‘Then why keep her?’ She didn’t actually care why, the heat of Roman’s fingers sliding against hers, entwining with her own was taking all her concentration. She wanted to savour the touch, memorise each caress so she could replay them later tonight when she was cold and alone in her unfamiliar bed. When she needed arms wrapped around her, a warm voice whispering in her ear that everything was going to be okay, when she needed a hot body next to hers as they showed her that she was desired and loved above all others.

  ‘Because she’s useful to have around,’ he said, his voice dropping as he came closer to her. His other hand closed over the one he was holding, his fingers gently tracing the inside of her wrist. Her breath stuttered, her heart beat erratically as the pads of his fingers teased her, gliding up slightly, before moving back down again, turning in a slow circle before starting it all again.