Kidnapped for the Tycoon's Baby

by Louise Fuller

  For a fraction of a second his eyes held hers, and then he glanced pointedly down at her stomach.

  ‘Because I’m pregnant?’ She stared at him in exasperation, the air thumping out of her lungs. How could he do this? It was bad enough that he’d tricked her into coming here in the first place. But to sit there, so handsome and smug, making these absurd, arrogant statements... And then assume that she was just going to go along with them.

  ‘Maybe a hundred years ago that might have been a reason. But it is possible to have a baby out of wedlock. People do it all the time now.’

  ‘Not my baby,’ Ram said flatly, his stomach clenching swiftly at her words.

  How could she be so casual about this? So dismissive? Did she really think that having a father was discretionary? A matter of preference? Like having a dog or a cat?

  He studied her face, seeing the fear and understanding it. Good. It was time she realised that he was being serious. Marriage wasn’t an optional extra, like the adaptive suspension he’d had fitted on his latest Lamborghini. It was the endgame. The obvious denouement of that night on his sofa.

  Shaking his head, trying to ignore the anger pooling there, he said coolly, ‘By any definition this situation is a mess, and the simplest, most logical way to clear it up is for us to marry. Or are you planning on buying a crib and just hoping for the best?’

  Nola felt her heartbeat trip over itself. How dare he?

  She didn’t know what was scaring her more. The fact that Ram was even considering this as an option, or his obvious belief that she was actually going to agree to it.

  Looking up into his handsome face, she felt her skin begin to prickle. She couldn’t agree. She might not have planned this pregnancy, but she knew she could make it work. Marrying Ram, though...

  How could that be anything but a disaster?

  They barely knew each other, had nothing in common, and managed to turn every single conversation into an argument. She swallowed. And, of course, they weren’t in love—not even close to being in love.

  Her head was spinning.

  All they shared was this baby growing inside her, and one passionate night of sex. But marriages weren’t built on one-night stands. And, no matter how incredible that night had been, she wasn’t so naive as to believe that a man like Ram Walker would view his wedding vows as anything but guidelines.

  Her fingers curved into the palms of her hands. For her—for most people—marriage meant commitment. Monogamy.

  But Ram could barely manage five days with the same woman. So how exactly was he planning on forsaking all others?

  Or was he expecting to be able to carry on just as he pleased?

  Either way, how long would it be before he felt trapped...resentful?

  Or, worse, bored?

  Remembering the distracted look in her father’s eyes, the sense that he was always itching to be somewhere else and her own panicky need to try and make him stay, she felt sick.

  She knew instinctively that Ram would be the same.

  Wanting Nola to be his wife was just the knee-jerk response of a CEO faced with an unexpected problem. But she didn’t want her marriage to be an exercise in damage limitation. Surely he could understand that.

  But, looking over at him, she felt a rush of panic.

  He looked so calm, almost too calm, as though her opposition to his ludicrous suggestion was just a mere formality—some twisted version of bridal nerves.

  And with any other woman he would probably be right in thinking that. After all, he’d almost certainly never met anyone who had turned him down.

  Her heart began to pound.

  Until now.

  Slowly, she shook her head.

  ‘I can’t marry you, Ram. Right now, I’m not sure I ever want to be married. But if at some point I do, it will be because the man asking me loves me and wants me to be his wife.’

  His face was expressionless, but his eyes were cool and resolute.

  ‘And what happens if you don’t marry? I doubt you’ll stay single for ever, so how will that work? Are you going to live with a man? Is he just going to spend the occasional night in your bed?’

  She felt her face drain of colour.

  ‘I don’t know. And you can’t expect me to be able to answer all those questions now. That’s not fair—’

  His eyes were locked on hers.

  ‘I don’t know is not a good enough answer,’ he said coldly. ‘And the life you’re planning for our child sounds anything but fair.’

  ‘I’m not planning anything.’ She stared at him helplessly.

  ‘Well, at least we can agree on that,’ he snarled. ‘Believe me, Nola, when I tell you that no child of mine is going to be brought up by whichever random man happens to be in your life at that particular moment.’

  ‘That’s not—’ She started to protest but he cut her off.

  ‘Nor is my child going to end up with another man’s name because its mother was too stubborn and selfish to marry its father.’

  She stood up so quickly the chair she was sitting on flew backwards. But neither of them noticed.

  ‘Oh, I see. So you marrying me is a selfless act,’ she snapped. Her blue eyes flashed angrily up at him. ‘A real sacrifice—’

  ‘You’re putting words in my mouth.’

  ‘And you’re putting a gun to my head,’ she retorted. ‘I’m not going to marry you just to satisfy your archaic need to pass on a name.’

  ‘Names matter.’

  She shivered. ‘You mean your name matters.’

  Ram felt his chest tighten. Yes, he did mean that. A name was more than just a title. It was an identity, a destiny, a piece of code from the past that mapped out the future.

  His eyes locked onto hers. ‘Children need to know where they come from. They need to belong.’

  ‘Then what’s wrong with my name?’ she said stubbornly. ‘I’m the mother. This baby is inside me. How could it belong to anyone more than to me?’

  ‘Now you’re just being contrary.’

  ‘Why? Because I don’t want to marry you?’

  He shook his head, his dark gaze locked onto hers. ‘Because you know I’m right but you’re mad at me for bringing you here so you’re just going to reject the only logical solution without a moment’s consideration.’

  Nola felt despair edge past her panic. His cavalier attitude to her objections combined with his obvious belief that she would crumble was overwhelming her.

  ‘I have considered it and it won’t work,’ she said quickly. ‘And it doesn’t have to. Look, this is my responsibility. I should have been more careful. That’s why this is on me.’

  ‘This is on you?’ He repeated her words slowly, his voice utterly expressionless.

  But as she looked over at him she felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. His eyes were narrowed, fixed on her face like a sniper.

  ‘We’re not talking about a round of drinks, Nola. This is a baby. A life.’

  She flinched. ‘Biology is not a determining factor in parenthood.’

  He looked at her in disbelief. ‘Seriously? Did you read that in the in-flight magazine?’

  She looked at him helplessly. ‘No, I just meant—’

  He cut her off again. ‘Tell me, Nola. Did you have a father?’

  The floor seemed to tilt beneath her feet. ‘Yes. But I don’t—’

  ‘But you don’t what?’ He gave a short, bitter laugh. ‘You don’t want that for your own child?’

  She blinked. Tears were pricking at her eyes. But she wasn’t going to lose control—at least not here and now, in front of Ram.

  ‘You’re right,’ she said shakily. ‘I don’t want that. And I never will.’

  And before he had a chance to reply she turned and walked swiftly out of the kitchen.

  She walked blindly, her legs moving automatically in time to the thumping of her heart, wanting nothing more than to find somewhere to hide, somewhere dark and private, away from Ram’s cold, cr
itical gaze. Somewhere she could curl up and cradle the cold ache of misery inside her.

  Her feet stopped. Somehow she had managed to find the perfect place—a window looking out into the canopy of the rainforest. There was even a sofa and, her legs trembling, she sat down, her throat burning, hands clenched in her lap.

  For a moment she just gazed miserably into the trees, and then abruptly her whole body stilled as she noticed a pair of eyes gazing back at her. Slowly, she inched forward—and just like that they were gone.

  ‘It was a goanna. If you sit here long enough it will probably come back.’

  She turned as Ram sat down next to her on the sofa.

  She stared at him warily, shocked not only by the fact that he had come to find her but by the fact that his anger, the hardness in his eyes, had faded.

  ‘Did I scare it?’

  Ram held her gaze. ‘They’re just cautious—they run away when something or someone gets too close.’

  Watching her lip tremble, he felt his heart start to pound. She looked so stricken...so small.

  His breath caught in his throat. In his experience women exploited emotion with the skill and precision of a samurai wielding a sword. But Nola was different. She hadn’t wanted him to see that she was upset. On the contrary, she had been as desperate to get away as that lizard.

  Desperate to get away from him.

  An ache was spreading inside his chest and he gritted his teeth, not liking the way it made him feel, for he would never hurt her. In fact he had wanted more than anything to reach out and pull her against him. But of course he hadn’t. Instead he’d watched her leave.

  Only almost immediately, and for the first time in his life, he’d been compelled to follow. He’d had no choice—his legs had been beyond his conscious control.

  He stared at her in silence, all at once seeing not only the tight set of her shoulders and the glint of tears but also what he’d chosen to ignore earlier: her vulnerability.

  Shifting back slightly, to give her more space, he cleared his throat.

  ‘There’s always something to see,’ he said carefully. ‘We could stay and watch if you want?’

  He phrased it as a question—something he would never normally do. But right now getting her to relax, to trust him, seemed more important than laying down the law.

  She didn’t reply, and he felt an unfamiliar twitch of panic that maybe she never would.

  But finally she nodded. ‘I’d like that. Apart from the odd squirrel, I’ve never seen anything wild up close.’

  ‘Too busy studying?’

  It was a guess, but she nodded again.

  ‘I did work too hard,’ she agreed. ‘I think it was a survival technique.’

  Staring past him, Nola bit her lip. She’d spoken without thinking, the words coming from deep inside. Memories came of hours spent hunched over her schoolbooks, trying to block out the raised voices downstairs, and then—worse—the horrible, bleak silence that had always followed.

  Ram stared at her uncertainly, hating the bruised sound of her voice. This was the sort of conversation he’d spent a lifetime avoiding. Only this time he didn’t want to avoid it. In fact he was actually scared of spooking her, and suddenly he was desperate to say something—anything to make her trust him enough to keep talking.

  ‘Why do you think that?’ he asked gently.

  She swallowed. ‘My dad was often home late, or away, and my parents would always argue when he got home. He’d storm off, and my mum would cry, and I’d stay in my room and do my homework.’

  The ache in her voice cut him almost as much as her words, for he was beginning to understand now why she was so determined to stay single, so vehemently opposed even to letting him know about the baby.

  ‘Are they still together?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘They divorced when I was seven. At first it was better. It was calmer at home, and my dad made a real effort. He even promised to take me to the zoo in Edinburgh for my birthday. Only he forgot. Not just about the zoo, but about my birthday too.’

  Ram felt as though he’d been punched hard in the face. He felt a vicious, almost violent urge to find her father and tell him exactly what he thought of him.

  She breathed out unsteadily. ‘About two months later I got a card and some money. The following year he forgot my birthday again. One year he even managed to forget me at Christmas. Of course when he remembered I got the biggest, glitziest present...’

  Nola could feel Ram’s gaze on her face, but she couldn’t look at him. She couldn’t let him see what her father had seen and rejected: her need to be loved. Couldn’t bear for him to guess her most closely guarded secret. That she hadn’t been enough of a reason for her father to make the effort.

  ‘I thought he’d stopped loving my mum, and that was why he left. But he didn’t love me either, and he left me too.’

  ‘And that’s what you think I’d do?’

  Turning her head, she finally met his eyes. ‘You have to put children first. Only sometimes people just can’t do that, and I’m not blaming them...’

  His grey eyes were searching her face, and she felt a rush of panic. How could she expect Ram to understand? He wouldn’t know what it was like to feel so unimportant, so easy to forget, so disposable.

  ‘Sometimes you have to give people a chance too,’ he said quietly.

  Nola bit her lip. His voice sounded softer, and she could sense that he was if not backing down then backing off, trying to calm her. But her heart was still beating too fast for her to relax. And anyway... Her pulse shivered violently... It wasn’t as though he was going to change his mind. He was just trying a different tactic, biding his time while he waited for her to give in.

  Suddenly she could no longer rein in the panic rising up inside her. ‘I can’t do this, Ram. I know you think I’m just being difficult. But I’m not. I know what marrying the wrong person can do people. It’s just so damaging and destructive. And what’s worse is that even when the marriage ends that damage doesn’t stop. It just goes on and on—’

  ‘Nola.’

  Her body tensed as he lifted a hand and stroked a long dark curl away from her face.

  ‘I’m not going to behave like your father did. I’m not walking away from you, or our baby. I’m fighting to make it work. Why do you think I want to marry you?’

  She shook her head. ‘You want it now. But soon you’ll start to think differently, and then you’ll feel differently. And we hardly know each other, Ram. Having a baby won’t change that, and there is nothing else between us.’

  His gaze seemed to burn into hers. ‘We both know that’s not true.’

  She swallowed. ‘That was one night...’

  ‘Was it?’ Ram studied her face. He could see the conflict in her eyes, and with shock he realised that it mirrored what he was feeling himself—the longing, the fear, the confusion. The pain.

  He didn’t want to feel her pain, or his own. He didn’t want to feel anything. And for a fraction of a second he was on the verge of pulling her into his arms and doing what he always did to deflect emotion—his own and other people’s.

  But something held him back—a sudden understanding that if he didn’t allow himself to feel, then he would never be able to comfort Nola, and right now that was all that mattered.

  Not himself, nor his business, the launch, or even getting her to agree to this marriage, but Nola herself.

  In shock, clenching his hands until they hurt, he gazed past her, struggling to explain this wholly uncharacteristic behaviour.

  Surely, though, it was only natural for him to care. Nola was carrying his child.

  Turning, he breathed out slowly, staring down into her eyes. ‘I know you don’t trust me. And if I were you I’d feel exactly the same. I haven’t exactly given you much reason to have faith in me, bringing you here like I have.’

  He grimaced.

  ‘I just wanted to give us some time and some privacy. I didn’t think
we could sort things out with everything else going on, and I still think that. But I’m not going to force you to marry me, Nola. Or even to stay here if you don’t want to.’

  Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a phone and held it out to her, watching her eyes widen with confusion.

  ‘I didn’t lie to you. There is no coverage here. That’s why I have this. It’s a satellite phone. If you want to leave you can call the pilot. If you stay, I want it to be your choice.’

  Nola stared at him, her tears beaten back by Ram’s words. This was a concession. More than that, it was a chance to get her life back.

  She glanced down at the phone, her brain fast-forwarding. They could handle this through their lawyers. There was probably no need even to see one another again. But was that really what she wanted? What was best for their baby?

  ‘I’ll stay.’ She held his gaze. ‘But I might ring Anna later, or tomorrow. Just to let her know I’m okay.’

  He pocketed the phone and nodded, and then after the briefest hesitation he reached over and took her hand in his.

  ‘I know this is a big step for both of us, Nola. But I think we can make it work if we compromise a little.’

  Nola gazed at him blankly. ‘Compromise?’

  He frowned. ‘That is a word, isn’t it?’

  She smiled weakly. ‘It is. I’m just not sure you understand what it means. Maybe you’re thinking of another word.’

  His grey eyes softened, and she felt her pulse dip as he lifted her hand to his mouth and kissed it gently. ‘Let’s see... I think it means I have to stop acting like a tornado and listen to what you’re saying.’

  She felt her stomach drop. Ram might have been difficult to defy when he was angry, but he was impossible to resist when he was smiling.

  ‘That sounds like a compromise,’ she said cautiously. ‘But what does it mean in real terms?’

  ‘It means that I think we need time to get used to the idea of getting married and to each other.’

  She bit her lip. ‘How much time?’

  ‘As long as it takes.’ He met her gaze. ‘I’ll wait, Nola. For as long as it takes.’

  Her pulse was jumping again. For a moment they stared at one another, breathing unsteadily, and then finally she gave him a hesitant smile.