Innocent’s Nine-Month Scandal

by Dani Collins

  “To eat alone?” His tone lashed sharp as a whip. He touched his forehead, then put his hand out in a halt, retaking hold of his own temper.

  She looked to the floor, unable to deny that she was either too sick or fast asleep, so not much company.

  “I know your concern for the baby is legitimate,” she said, trying for calm. “You’re worried about the pregnancy and want this baby as much as I do. I know that.” Pressure gathered in her chest. “But I need to be wanted, too.”

  “You’ve been sick.”

  “I’m not talking about physically! I’m saying you don’t want me. You wouldn’t have leaped to all those suspicions so quickly, every time, if you had any regard for me. You don’t want to believe in me,” she accused. “You don’t want to risk getting hurt, so you hold back, but you expect me to tie myself to a lifetime of being hurt by your accusations. I won’t. I want to marry for love and you won’t give me that.”

  He sucked in a breath as though her words had been a body blow. “Love is a lie. I refuse to lie to you. Be thankful you can trust me.”

  “Love is real,” she cried, releasing the woman who knew when to abandon mediation and fight with the courage of her convictions. She pointed to the middle of her chest. “I’ve experienced it.” So had he, if he would only open his heart to let it in. “But I’m starting to question whether I deserve to be loved.” She shook her head, unwilling to descend into that pit of despair. “That’s why I have to go home. I need to be with people who do love me. Just for a little while, before I can face you again.”

  He did go white then, visibly. But he didn’t stop her when she walked out.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  AT SOME POINT, minutes or hours after Rozi had left, Viktor’s PA rang through to ask if he would rejoin the conference call he had abruptly left.

  His heart had leaped out of his throat at the news Rozi had tracked him down unexpectedly. He had known immediately that her reason for coming could only be bad news. That was all they had between them right now. Bad and worse.

  He told his PA he would remain behind his locked door, then poured himself a drink and stared broodingly out the window. At some further point, the sky darkened so he was staring at a view of slate and black with pinpoints of light.

  The day was gone and so was Rozi. He should have stopped her from leaving, but how?

  I need to be with people who do love me.

  He might not put stock in that emotion, but he believed she believed in it. And in that highly charged moment, he had seen they needed a breather. A reset of some kind. He’d been aware of that all week, since their last argument had ended on her pained, You’re the one who can’t be trusted.

  Those words had been eating at him. Was this how she had been feeling since the mess with her family had come to light? Stung by a lack of faith so bitter all she could taste was gall? It was a terrible feeling.

  The irony was, he hadn’t been giving her the silent treatment as she seemed to think. He had been staying late to finalize a handful of projects and moving meetings so he could take a solid week off.

  He had wanted to take her back to the mountains. She had seemed to like it there. Perhaps she would start sketching again. Why that was important to him, he had no idea, but he sensed that her work was intrinsic to her and that not doing it was akin to not eating or sleeping. Harmful at a basic level of survival.

  Not that he was doing much beyond surviving himself. He was concerned about the baby. Constantly. But he was also worried about Rozi. He spent half the night listening for running water, the other half staring at the empty pillow beside him. What was he? A child? He didn’t need a warm body to hold the monsters at bay.

  But he wanted to hold her. Make love to her, certainly, but more than that, he couldn’t relax without knowing whether she was sleeping peacefully or enduring more of that wretched nausea.

  Now she would be half a world away. He hadn’t had it in him to refuse her a visit with her family. In fact, he would have gladly taken her himself if she’d asked, but...

  I want you to stay here and believe me when I say I’m coming back.

  He knocked back his third? Fourth drink? Then set the glass on the edge of his desk and pushed his hands into his pockets.

  If she had wanted to run away with his baby, she could have done it anytime before now. He had no doubts she would come back. He knew she would return as surely as he knew she would move into her own place when she did. And insist on paying all her bills herself. She was as impractical and idealistic as she claimed her parents to be. She would put herself into hardship to prove her point to him.

  To deny him another avenue of suspicion or the opportunity to care for her the only way he could.

  Did she understand that he didn’t know how to give her what she needed?

  This shouldn’t be so hard! It sure as hell shouldn’t be this painful.

  I’m starting to question whether I deserve to be loved.

  That hurt most of all. It hurt in a way he couldn’t describe or endure. It was a psychic sort of pain, penetrating into the very depths of his being. Because even as he denied the existence of love, he believed that if anyone deserved to be loved, it was Rozi.

  She was the embodiment of what he had once understood that emotion to be—generous and kind, empathetic and innately beautiful. Abstract and impossible to fully describe, yet stalwart and strong. Reliant. And joyously uplifting. She was capable of pressing laughter into his dry throat with a glance. And—he winced as something wrenched open inside his chest, forcing him to confront the gaping hole left by her absence—she was necessary to him.

  He needed her.

  Desperately.

  You don’t want to risk getting hurt, so you hold back, but you expect me to tie myself to a lifetime of being hurt.

  And yet, what would he face without her? He was already in agony with a bedroom wall between them. Was he supposed to subsist on an impersonal weekly glimpse of her as they handed their child back and forth like a set of car keys? His first thought when he had realized she could be pregnant had been to lock her into his life so she could give his child what had been denied him. Love.

  He hadn’t consciously put that together, but he had wanted her to express that emotion to his child and teach him how to express it.

  Had he followed her examples? Not lately. No, he had only taught her how to question her own worth. He had driven her to seek love elsewhere because she had given up on his providing her a shred of it.

  His damp gaze hit the ceiling and he released a feral cry of pain, straight from his tormented core. Janitors twelve flights below must have heard it. It left claws in his throat that made each following breath sting to the bottoms of his lungs.

  Rozi hadn’t heard it, though. Because he had let her go.

  * * *

  The front door of her parents’ home was as wide-open as the arms that wrapped around her, strong and familiar. This was the succor she had yearned for. Within the hour, she had told her mother everything about Viktor Rohan except for the most intimate details of their brief history.

  “You love him?” her mother asked, brows pulled into a slant of empathy.

  “So much.” Tears stung her eyes. “And I understand why he has a hard time trusting me, but I can’t live my entire life under suspicion.”

  “Oh, darling.” Her mother hugged her for the millionth time and rubbed her back. And even though her hug fixed nothing, it fixed everything.

  Rozi’s father came home and picked her up and spun her around, then did it again when she told him about the baby. She swore them to secrecy about her pregnancy. “I don’t want to steal Gisella’s thunder tonight. Let her and Kaine have their moment.”

  She had a nap and, a few hours later, joined all her family as they convened at Aunt Alisz’s brownstone.

  Predictably the ext
ended family went crazy when they saw her. Even more predictably, she burst into tears as she accepted one hug after another. She had missed them all so much!

  “You’re here alone?” Gisella asked as she squeezed her. “Is everything all right?”

  “I’m going back in a week. I needed to see everyone, explain things to Mom. Don’t say anything about anything, okay?” She drew her weepy self out of her cousin’s embrace and introduced herself to Kaine. “Hi, I’m Rozi.”

  “I’ve heard a lot about you.” She had seen photos, but it didn’t prepare her for how wickedly handsome he was, especially when he smiled with genuine welcome and concern. “How are you?”

  Apparently at least one other person knew she was pregnant. She shot Gizi a look. Gizi looked to the ceiling.

  She had confided in Kaine because she trusted him. They were in love. It shone bright as a beacon from both of them.

  Must be nice.

  Rozi swallowed her envy and moved to sit with her grandmother. She had no intention of bringing up the earrings, but her grandmother said, “You two girls have been up to things. You should have told me.”

  Grandmamma could have been talking about Rozi’s arrest or the search for the earrings or the true story behind them. Rozi pressed one frail hand gently between her two warmer ones.

  “We love you. I hope you know that. But yes, we’ve been up to things. Can I come by tomorrow to explain?”

  “There’s no rush. You only just got back.”

  Rozi appreciated her grandmother’s reluctance to delve into painful memories, but she would soon reveal that she was only home to quit her job and sublet her apartment, and why. Grandmamma would need to hear that firsthand and soon because she would need as much notice as possible to get used to the idea.

  “Oh, my word!” her grandmother gasped, trembling fingers pulling away to touch her collar.

  “What—?” Rozi looked over her shoulder and gasped, as well. “It’s not a ghost!” she hurried to reassure her grandmother. Although her own heart leaped as though the grim reaper himself had shown up for her soul. “It’s Viktor.”

  “The man who put you in jail?”

  “And got me out,” she clarified, heart soaring and sinking, swooping every direction as she drank in the way Viktor took command of the room simply by entering it. His tailored suit clung to his powerful frame and if his eyes looked deeply set and bruised from travel, it only added to his air of dangerous mystique.

  She didn’t ask herself what he was doing here, though. It was devastatingly obvious why he was here.

  He didn’t trust her.

  * * *

  Viktor knew his mistake the second his searching gaze found the somber pair of eyes he was looking for. Beneath her surprise lurked accusation and worse, disappointment.

  Believe me when I say I’m coming back.

  The ache in his chest intensified. This wasn’t a failure to trust. He had had one thought from the second he had realized he loved Rozalia. Get to her.

  The young woman who looked like Rozi and had let him in the door stopped in front of her. She planted her hands on her hips. “This is Viktor Rohan. He’s looking for his fiancée. Does Mom know?”

  Rozi gave her an exasperated look. “I said I would tell you everything later, Bea! This is Gisella’s day.” Rozi stood and gave him a faltering smile. “You’ve met my sister.” She let her hair fall forward to hide her expression as she bent to help an elderly woman rise from the sofa. “Grandmamma, this is Istvan’s great-nephew, Viktor Rohan. My grandmother, Eszti Barsi.”

  Her grandmother set her cool, frail hand on his cheek.

  “So much like him.” She smiled mistily, her eyes filled with a glow that seemed vaguely familiar to Viktor. Rozi had her eyes, he realized.

  She loved Istvan very much, he could hear Rozi saying.

  The light he saw in this aged pair of eyes was poignant and faded by time, not directed at him, but by the memory he inspired in her. He had caught glimpses of something like this incandescence in Rozi’s eyes, though. A potent and fierce version that had been achingly beautiful and painfully absent since her family’s troubles had torn them apart.

  Since he had rejected her for no crime except his own presumption she would commit one.

  “You’re marrying our Rozi?” Eszti looked to her granddaughter. “You girls have been up to many things.”

  “It’s a long story, Grandmamma. We’ll come by tomorrow for a proper visit and I’ll tell you everything,” Rozi promised. “But I should introduce Viktor to Mom and Dad.”

  She took him into the kitchen to meet her mother, then to the barbecue, where her father was mastering the grill. Both were surprised and welcoming. Rozi had obviously told them about the baby.

  She drew him away to a corner of the garden as soon as she could.

  “Those are usually comfort smells for me, but not today.” She set her fist against her tight lips.

  “Did you take a pill?”

  “I let it wear off so I wouldn’t be in a coma for this party.”

  “Do you want to leave?”

  “No.” She blinked eyes damp with frustration and hurt.

  “I’m not here to take you away,” he said through his teeth. “It was time I met your family.” He searched her gaze, uncertain how to salvage their relationship. He had thought coming here would prove he cared enough to follow her, but—

  “Rozi,” a woman called from above them on the veranda. She was willowy with caramel-colored hair and held the hand of a man Viktor recognized as Kaine Michaels. Gisella tucked her hair behind her ear, head cocked in silent question. “Come tell me about the earring.”

  “You’ve come all this way,” Rozi said, offering Viktor an ironic smile. “You might as well meet your cousins.”

  * * *

  They made the rounds, and while Viktor earned sharp looks of curiosity, everyone was their warm, loving self toward both of them. Even so, Rozi found it excruciating.

  Viktor might have a point that it was time he met her parents, but his coming here was still a giant billboard advertising his complete lack of faith in her.

  As such, Rozi couldn’t relax. He was attentive, hovering protectively, but that only made her wonder if it was a show for her family. Then she hated herself for doubting his sincerity. He worried about her. Physically. Or at least, he worried about the baby.

  She gripped her elbows defensively as she introduced him to Aunt Alisz, then left them chatting about his mother as she excused herself to the powder room where she tried to pull herself together.

  When she came back, Viktor was in discussion with Gisella. It didn’t surprise her. Men were always drawn to her more sophisticated cousin, but it stung worse than usual.

  “How did you make out with the earring?” Kaine asked, intercepting her.

  “Hmm?” She dragged her gaze off the pair. “Oh, like I said to Gizi, I don’t think here is the place to compare notes. I don’t want to upset Grandmamma.”

  Kaine’s mouth twitched. He tugged his earlobe again. “I’m using your code. I want a private conversation. To ask you something.”

  “Oh.” She blinked, then chuckled. “You must be very special if Gizi has shared that with you.” It was a signal they’d developed in childhood and still used occasionally if they happened to be stuck in a conversation and wanted rescue. “Careful, though. If she catches you, she’s liable to think you’re asking her to get you out of talking to me.”

  “Let’s be quick then, before she comes over.” He told her what he wanted and she answered quickly as Viktor and Gisella came across to join them.

  “We’ve been invited for brunch tomorrow,” Gisella said, taking Kaine’s arm. “At your hotel,” she informed Rozi with a perplexed smile. “I thought I was coming to your apartment in the morning, to help you start closing it up.”
<
br />   Rozi sent Viktor a look that silently said, See? She had every intention of tying off loose threads here and going back to Budapest.

  “Sounds great,” Kaine said smoothly into the stilted silence.

  As for Viktor’s presumption that she would stay with him at his hotel, she didn’t bother arguing that. No sense in ruining a perfectly good party.

  But they would have to talk this out sooner than later. She was already suffering a pit of dread in her gut and wanted it over with.

  “We should say good night.” Rozi smiled wanly at Viktor. “Quit while I’m ahead.”

  His gaze sharpened as though he knew she was feeling well enough to stay and was cutting short their evening for other reasons.

  “If you’re sure.” He took his time as he drew out his phone. “I’ll call for my car.”

  Gisella hugged her and Rozi told her mother she was leaving. Moments later, they slipped away.

  Her bag was at her mother’s, but after their talk she could take a cab back there, so Rozi sat quietly beside him, not speaking until they walked into his penthouse at the five-star hotel.

  The suite held plush furniture in a large sitting room, crown moldings and brass fixtures and cherrywood side tables topped with fresh flowers. There was a dining area and two bedrooms, each with a massive bed and a gorgeous en suite bathroom full of marble and thick white towels on heated rods.

  When she came back to the lounge from exploring, she joined him overlooking the view of snaking lights glowing between the tufts of Central Park’s darkened treetops.

  “What did you think of Aunt Alisz and Gisella?” she asked curiously.

  “We don’t need a blood test. Alisz is exactly like my mother.”

  Despite his flat assessment, she smiled. “That’s what I thought when I met your mother. I found her strangely endearing for it.”

  “What were you and Kaine talking about?”

  Whatever lightness had briefly elevated her spirits drained away. “Really?”

  The disdain in her tone had him snapping his head to look down at her.

  “For one solitary minute, I let myself think...” She walked away, chest tight. She went all the way to the other side of the suddenly too-small living area, then flung around to confront him. “Are you genuinely suspicious of me having a conversation with a man at his own engagement party? One who’s marrying a woman who consistently outdoes me when it comes to male attention? You came a long way to deliver another insult, Viktor. I should be asking you what you were talking to Gisella about, since you went straight to her the second my back was turned.”