An Unlikely Bride for the Billionaire

by Michelle Douglas

  ‘I didn’t appreciate your implication this afternoon that I was trying to own you. I simply felt responsible for putting you in a situation that had obviously made you uncomfortable. I set about fixing the situation. I don’t see how that can be seen as trying to control you.’

  She stared into her glass of water. ‘I appreciate your intentions were good, but it doesn’t change the fact that you didn’t ask me my opinion first.’

  ‘There wasn’t time!’ He flung an arm out. ‘Where people like Felipe are concerned it’s best to come at them hard and fast.’

  ‘And what if I told you that your solutions were more horrifying to me than the initial problem?’

  ‘Were they?’

  ‘Yes.’

  He widened his stance. ‘Why?’

  She stood then too, pressing her hands to her stomach. ‘Ever since I got out of jail I’ve had one objective—to keep a low profile, to keep out of trouble. A lawsuit would create a hundred times more furore than an anonymous photograph in some exhibition.’

  He straightened, his height almost intimidating. Not that it frightened her. She sensed that frightening her was the last thing he wanted.

  ‘Are you concerned that someone from your past will track you down?’

  ‘No.’ And she wasn’t. That was all done with.

  His hands went to his hips. ‘Look, I understand your dismay at the thought of publicity, but what on earth was wrong with me buying the photograph?’

  ‘I’m already beholden enough to you!’

  ‘It’s my money. I can do as I please with it.’

  ‘Not on my watch, you can’t. Not when you’re spending that money solely for my benefit.’

  He stared at her with unflinching eyes. ‘You’d rather have let that picture go public then be beholden to me?’

  She met his gaze. ‘Yes.’

  He wheeled away from her. When he swung back his eyes were blazing.

  Before he could rail at her about ingratitude and stubbornness, she fired a question back at him. ‘If Felipe had sold you that photograph, would you have given it to me?’

  He stilled. His chin lowered several notches. ‘I’d have promised to keep it safe.’

  They both knew it wasn’t the same thing. She could feel her lips twist. ‘So, in the end, it was Felipe who did what I truly wanted after all.’

  A tic started up in his jaw. ‘This is the thanks I get for trying to help you?’

  She refused to wither under his glare. ‘You weren’t trying to help me. What you’re angry about is missing your chance to buy that picture.’

  He moved in closer. ‘And that scares the pants off of you, doesn’t it?’

  Bullseye.

  She refused to let her fear show. ‘I’ve told you where I stand on relationships and romance. I don’t know how I can make it any plainer, but offering such a ludicrous sum for a photo of me leads me to suspect that you haven’t heard me.’

  ‘Some women would’ve found the gesture romantic.’

  Exactly.

  ‘Not me.’

  He shoved his hands in his pockets and strode around the room. Mia did her absolute best not to notice the way the muscles of his shoulders rippled beneath the thin cotton of his business shirt, or how his powerful strides ate up the space in her tiny living room. He quivered like a big cat, agitated and undecided whether to pounce or not.

  She knew exactly how to soothe him. If she went to him, put her arms around his neck and pressed her length against his, he’d gather her in his arms and they’d lose themselves to the pleasure they could bring each other.

  The pulse at her throat pounded. She gripped her hands together. It wouldn’t help. It might be possible to do ‘uncomplicated’ when it came to a fling, but refused to risk it.

  If only that knowledge could cool the stampede of her blood!

  He swung around. ‘You might have your heart under lock and key, Mia, but you have no right to command mine.’

  He wasn’t promising her his heart. Heat gathered behind her eyes. He wasn’t promising anything more than a quick roll in the hay, and they both knew it.

  ‘You’re forgetting the ground rules. We promised!’

  ‘Just because I wanted that photo it doesn’t mean I want you.’

  But they both knew he desired her in the most primitive way a man could want a woman. And they both knew she desired him back. They were balancing too narrowly on a knife-edge here, and she couldn’t let them fall.

  She clamped her hands to her elbows. Wrapped up in his attraction for her were feelings of pity, a desire to make things better, and perhaps a little anger. It was an explosive combination in a man like Dylan—a nurturer with the heart of a warrior. He knew as well as she did that they could never fit into each other’s lives. But hard experience had taught her that the heart didn’t always choose what was good for it.

  He leaned in so close his breath fanned her cheek. ‘Did you destroy the photo?’

  She wanted to say that she had.

  No lying. No stealing.

  She pulled in a ragged breath. ‘No.’

  ‘You will give it to me, you know.’

  She shook her head. ‘I have no need of your money.’

  He ran the backs of his fingers down her cheek, making her shiver. ‘I didn’t say anything about buying it from you, Mia. I meant that eventually you’ll give it to me as a gift.’

  She wanted to tell him to go to hell, but his hand snaked behind her head and he pulled her mouth close to his own and the words dried in her throat.

  Dear Lord, he was going to kiss her!

  ‘The girl in that photograph is the woman you’re meant to be. I know it and you know it.’

  He was wrong! She didn’t deserve to be that girl. She deserved nothing more than the chance to live her life in peace.

  His breath fanned across her lips, addling her brain. She should step away, but she remained, quivering beneath his touch, hardly knowing what she wished for.

  He pressed a kiss to the corner of her mouth. Her eyes fluttered closed as she turned towards him...

  And then she found herself released.

  ‘You want me as much as I want you.’

  Her heart thudded in her ears. She had to reach out and steady herself against a chair.

  ‘I don’t know why the thought of being happy scares you.’

  Disappointment and confusion battled with relief and her common sense, and it took a moment for his words to sink in. She pushed her shoulders back, but didn’t lift her chin in challenge. She didn’t want him to take chin-lifting as an invitation to kiss her.

  ‘I am happy.’

  Easing back from him, she seized her glass of water and took several steps away.

  ‘Liar.’

  He said the word softly, almost like a caress. He had a point. The thing was, she didn’t need happiness. She just needed to stay on track.

  She kept her back to him. ‘I don’t mean this to sound harsh, Dylan, but my happiness is not dependent on my sleeping with you.’

  ‘I’m not talking about myself, here, Mia, or my ability to make you happy. I’m removing myself from the equation.’

  ‘How convenient.’

  ‘I think you’re just as imprisoned now as you were when you were in jail.’

  She spun around at that, water sloshing over the side of her glass. ‘If you believe that, then it just goes to show how naïve you are.’

  He blinked and then nodded. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that to sound glib.’

  She didn’t say anything. She just wanted him gone.

  ‘Was it really so awful?’

  She closed her eyes at the soft question. ‘Yes.’ She forced her eyes open again. ‘I am never going back. An
d happiness is a small price to pay.’

  His eyes throbbed at her words.

  ‘I think it’s time you left, Dylan.’

  He stared at her for a long moment, but finally he nodded. ‘Are you still okay for Saturday?’

  For reasons known only to himself, Dylan had booked her and Carla in for a day of beauty treatments at a local spa. In the evening Mia, and presumably Thierry, were to dine with the Fairweathers at their coastal mansion.

  Despite her curiosity about Dylan’s home, she wasn’t looking forward to either event. But she’d promised.

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘Carla and I will collect you at ten.’

  ‘I’ll be ready.’

  She’d need to go shopping before then. She had a feeling that she owned nothing appropriate for dinner at the Fairweather estate.

  * * *

  ‘You’re very tense.’

  Mia did her best to relax beneath the masseuse’s hands, but found it almost impossible. She’d been poked and prodded, scrubbed and wrapped, and waxed and tweezed to within an inch of her life.

  People did this for fun?

  What she’d really like was to ask the masseuse to hand her a bathrobe, find her a cup of tea and leave her alone to soak up the glorious view on the other side of the picture window.

  The spa was located on the sixth floor of an upmarket beachside hotel that boasted a sweeping view of Newcastle beach. It would be a relief and a joy to spend half an hour contemplating gold sands and blue seas.

  ‘It’s probably because of all the hard physical work she does,’ Carla said from the massage table beside Mia’s, her voice sounding like nothing more than a blissed-out sigh. ‘Isn’t this a gorgeous treat, Mia?’

  ‘Gorgeous,’ she murmured back. She might have made a no-lying promise, but in this instance the lie was lily-white. She had no intention of dampening Carla’s enjoyment. That had been the one good thing about all this—spending time with Carla.

  So Mia didn’t ask for a bathrobe and a cup of tea. She gritted her teeth instead and endured a further forty minutes of kneading, pummelling and rubbing down.

  * * *

  ‘Change of plan,’ Carla announced, waving her phone in the air as she and Mia moved towards Dylan in the hotel bar.

  Mia swallowed and nodded in his direction, not able to meet his eye, glad to have Carla there as a buffer.

  He turned on his bar stool. ‘Change of plan?’

  Mia glance up to find him staring straight at her. All she could do was shrug. She had no idea what Carla’s change of plan entailed.

  Meeting his gaze made her mouth go dry. Looking at him had the oddest effect on her. She should look away. If she could, perhaps she would. Instead, she gazed at him hungrily. He wore a pair of sand-coloured cargo shorts and...and a Hawaiian shirt that should have made him look silly, but didn’t.

  It made him look... She swallowed again. He looked like a Hollywood heartthrob, and as he raised the beer he nursed to his lips, a searing hunger burned a trail through her.

  ‘Yes.’ Carla finished texting before popping her phone into her handbag. ‘Thierry’s coming to collect me.’

  He was? Carla was leaving her alone with Dylan?

  Ooh...horrible plan!

  ‘I’ve talked Mia into spending not just the evening with us, but the rest of the afternoon as well. So you’ll need to take her home to collect her things. Thierry and I will meet you by the pool at four.’

  With a perfumed air-kiss, Carla dashed out. Mia didn’t know where to look. She glanced at her feet, at the window, at the bar.

  ‘Would you like a drink?’

  She glanced at his glass, still three-quarters full, and with a sigh slid onto the bar stool beside his. ‘Do you think they’d make me a cup of tea?’

  ‘I’m sure of it. English Breakfast, Earl Grey or Chamomile?’

  ‘Earl Grey, please.’

  He ordered the tea and without further ado asked, ‘What’s wrong?’

  Straight to the heart of the matter. It shouldn’t surprise her.

  ‘Are you feeling awkward after the words we exchanged on Tuesday evening?’

  She wished she could say no, but that lie wouldn’t be lily-white.

  ‘Aren’t you?’

  She doubted she’d ever have the power to hurt him, but she had disappointed him. She suspected women rarely turned Dylan down.

  For heaven’s sake, why would they? You must be crazy!

  ‘Mia, you’ve every right to speak your mind. I might not like what you have to say, but there’s no law that says you have to say things with the sole purpose of pleasing me. The only person you need to please is yourself.’

  Did he mean that?

  ‘I came on unnecessarily strong. I was upset...and I was prepared to throw our agreed ground rules out of the window.’ He dragged a hand down his face. ‘I’m sorry. You were right to hold firm.’

  Her heart had no right to grow so heavy at his words.

  ‘I know a relationship between us wouldn’t work. And you’ve made it clear that a fling is out of the question.’ He wrapped both hands around his beer. ‘The thing is, I like you. It’s as simple and as complicated as that.’

  Her eyes burned.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ He grimaced. ‘Can we be friends again?’

  She managed a nod.

  They were quiet while the barmen slid her tea in front of her. When she glanced back to him he sent her a half-grin. ‘How did you enjoy the treatments?’

  ‘Oh, I...’ She hesitated too long. ‘It was lovely.’ She scrambled. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘You’re lying!’

  She debated with herself for a moment and then nodded. ‘I hated it.’

  His brows drew down low over his eyes, fire sparking in their depths. ‘Was anybody rude or unpleasant...or worse?’

  ‘No!’ Before she could stop herself she reached out and touched his arm, wanting to dispel his dark suspicions. ‘Everyone was attentive and professional. I couldn’t fault anyone. It was me—not them. I just... I just don’t like being touched by people I don’t know.’

  She closed her eyes and pulled in a breath. He must think her a freak.

  When she opened them she found him staring down at her, his lips rueful. ‘I’m sorry. It seems I’m constantly forcing you to do things you hate.’

  She waved that away. ‘It’s not important. It’s all in a good cause.’

  ‘It does matter.’

  ‘Let’s talk about Carla and—’

  ‘No.’

  Mia blinked.

  ‘Let me apologise. I’m sorry I took it for granted that you’d enjoy a spa day.’

  ‘The majority of women would.’

  ‘You’re not the majority of women.’

  That was true, but if she dwelled on that fact for too long she might throw up.

  ‘Apology accepted.’

  He sat back and she found she could breathe again. He had the oddest effect on her—she simultaneously wanted to push him away and pull him closer.

  Maybe this time it wouldn’t be like it was with Johnnie.

  Maybe. Maybe not. But even if Dylan were willing she had no intention of finding out. She couldn’t risk it.

  She pushed those thoughts firmly out of her mind. ‘Now, can we talk about Carla?’

  He grinned. ‘Absolutely.’

  Despite her confusion she found herself smiling back. ‘That was the one good thing about today. I enjoy spending time with her. She’s good company.’

  ‘Did she confide anything in you?’

  Mia poured herself some tea and stared down into the dark liquid. ‘She’s totally in love with Thierry. Even if he is all your worst fears rolled into one, I can�
�t see how you’ll be able to stop this wedding.’

  He dragged a hand down his face and her heart went out to him.

  ‘But on the plus side...’

  He glanced up, his eyes keen. ‘Yes?’

  How to put this delicately...? ‘I’ve had some close experience with women who’ve been in emotionally and physically abusive relationships.’

  His eyes went dark. ‘How close?’

  She knew what he wanted to know—if she’d ever been in an abusive relationship. She sidestepped the unspoken question. ‘My father was abusive to my mother.’

  ‘Physically?’

  ‘Not quite.’ Though that latent threat had hung over every fraught confrontation. ‘But he was emotionally abusive until I don’t think she had any sense of self left.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘I’m not telling you this so you’ll feel sorry for me. I’m telling you because I don’t see any of the same signs in Carla that I saw in my mother. Carla is neither meek nor diffident. She’s kind and easy-going, and I suspect she’s peace-loving, but I wouldn’t describe her as submissive or compliant. I don’t think she’s afraid of Thierry’s displeasure.’

  ‘Changes like the ones you describe in your mother—they don’t happen overnight. They’re the result of years of abuse.’

  He had a point.

  ‘There are men out there who prey on emotionally vulnerable women.’

  He didn’t need to tell her that. ‘You think Carla is emotionally vulnerable because of what happened between her boyfriend and her best friend?’

  He ran a finger through the condensation on his glass of beer. ‘It’s one of the reasons. She was only sixteen when our parents died. It was a very difficult time for her.’

  ‘I expect it was a difficult time for you too. How old were you?’

  ‘Twenty-one.’

  Twenty-one and alone with a sixteen-year-old sister. Mia swallowed. ‘It must’ve been devastating for you both. I’m sorry.’

  He looked haggard for a moment. ‘It was tough for a while.’

  Understatement, much?

  ‘And then there’s the Fairweather name...’

  She shook her head, not knowing what he meant.

  ‘It’s hard to know if the people we meet like us for ourselves or whether what they see is the money, the tradition, and the power behind the name.’