“Believe me, Amira. This past week I’ve learned a great deal about myself. Most of it I don’t like. But one thing I have learned is how much you mean to me. How much I love you.
“When you collapsed on the island, I’d never been more scared or felt more helpless in my entire life. It was a wake-up call I hope never to get again. I thought I was going to lose you. One minute we were arguing and the next you were unconscious and bleeding. I would have given all my wealth and my right arm to know you were okay. I went with you to the hospital, but they separated us at emergency.”
“I don’t remember any of that. The first thing I remember was waking up in a recovery room and the doctor telling me—” Her voice broke off, and she shoved a fisted hand against her mouth.
A piece of Brent’s heart tore away at the gesture, at the helplessness in her voice. He lifted his hands to take her into his arms to try to comfort her; but her body was stiff and unyielding in his embrace.
“Please, Amira. Don’t reject me now. I tried to see you at the hospital. I waited, day after day, but they wouldn’t let me near you. I had to see you. To tell you what a fool I’d been. To tell you how much I love you and how sorry I was for everything. Especially for the loss of our baby.”
“But don’t you see,” Amira cried out, “it wouldn’t matter. None of it matters anymore. I have nothing left. You’ve stripped me of every last thing that was mine.”
“My solicitor told me this afternoon that you’d returned the foundation proposal letter, signed. I told him to tear it up. That the foundation was nothing without you. And I’ve instructed my accountant to return the money that you paid out to me. Your solicitor should have it in his trust account as we speak. I could never have kept it. Not even if our baby had lived. Let me make up my misjudgment to you. Let me love you as you deserve to be loved. Please, Amira, give me one more chance.”
“I don’t know if I can do that again, if I can trust you again.”
“Do you love me?”
“What does that have to do with anything? I’ve always loved you, even when you’ve hurt me. What kind of pathetic person does that make me?”
“The kind of person who deserves the best of everything. The kind of woman I want to spend the rest of my life with. Marry me, Amira. Let the past go. Let Isobel and her ridiculous dictates go. Please, if you can find it in your heart to forgive me I promise you I will make it worth your while.”
A crazed laugh shuddered through her as he repeated to her the words she’d uttered to him a few short months ago.
“I don’t want you to make it worth my while.”
Brent dropped his arms, let her go, his heart pounding. He’d lost her. Forever. The pain was indescribable. He stepped away from her, every cell in his body screaming at him not to.
“I’m sorry. You’ll never know how sorry.” He slowly walked toward the door. “I won’t bother you again.”
“Brent, stop.” She ran across the room and threw her arms around him. “I said I don’t want you to make it worth my while, but I never said I didn’t want you to love me for all my life. We can’t change what we’ve done to each other. But it’s more than enough to me to be the woman you love. I love you. I’ll always love you—every day and every night for the rest of my life.”
“Will you marry me even though it’ll mean saying goodbye to all of this?”
He swept an arm to encompass the home she’d lived in for eighteen years, and Amira suddenly understood that the bricks and mortar meant nothing to her now. Yes, it had been where she’d grown up. Yes, she was the last of the Forsythe line. And that was where it all ended. With her. Right now.
“Yes.”
She looked around her. Aside from her father’s portrait in the main house, there was nothing here she wanted to keep, nothing that was intrinsically hers. Nothing but the man in her arms.
“It doesn’t matter anymore. Let Roland have it. Let him have it all. As long as I have you, I don’t need anything else.”
“I will look after you, you know—you and the family we’re going to build together. And if you want, we can make Roland an offer he can’t refuse for the place. Gerald Stein told me about your plans—how you wanted to turn it into a respite center and head office for the foundation. We can still do that. I’ll make it happen if that’s what you want.”
Amira lifted her hand to stroke his face, the face that was so dear to her. She lifted her lips to his and kissed him, trying to imbue into her caress how much she meant what she’d just said. And he understood. She felt it in his body, in his kiss, in the way he held her.
“I want you,” she said gently.
“Let’s go home, then.”
Brent took her by the hand and led her to his waiting car. As they walked out into the night, Amira realized the sensation of joy and lightness that suffused her was freedom. Freedom from Isobel’s expectations, freedom from doing what had always been expected of her by others.
Freedom to love the only man she’d ever wanted.
ISBN: 978-1-4268-2768-6
CONVENIENT MARRIAGE, INCONVENIENT HUSBAND
Copyright © 2009 by Dolce Vita Trust
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*New Zealand Knights
*New Zealand Knights
*New Zealand Knights
†Rogue Diamonds
Convenient Marriage, Inconvenient Husband Page 14
