by Fiona Brand
In that moment he understood how people became so centered on their children that they married when they’d sworn off marriage, and made career U-turns that were detrimental to success. The answer was simple: their priorities changed because they were besotted by the baby.
Rosie’s face screwed up, her pale skin flushing. For a heart-stopping moment he thought she was going to cry. He seemed to remember that after Rosie had been fed the previous day, Zara had put her over her shoulder to burp her, so he figured he should do that next.
After circling the small room a couple of times and carefully rubbing her small back, Rosie made a hiccuping sound and spit up on his shoulder. Feeling ridiculously proud that Rosie had burped right on cue, he headed back to the kitchen, found a paper towel and cleaned around her mouth, before blotting the milk from his shoulder.
After disposing of the paper towel in the trash can he found beneath the counter, he carried his daughter back to the sitting room.
“So, what do we do now?”
Rosie patted his jaw again, as if she was fascinated by the roughness of his five o’clock shadow and, at that point, Damon noted a certain sogginess at her rear end.
“Problem solved. We change your diaper.”
Rosie made a small crowing sound, as if that was a hilarious idea, so he returned to the kitchen and did a brief search through the baby bag, finding disposable diapers and baby wipes. Walking through to the sitting room, he carefully laid Rosie down on the carpet. Five minutes later, he had the dirty diaper off and the clean diaper fitted. Feeling a sense of achievement, he bagged up the dirty diaper and soiled wipes and placed them in the trash. After washing his hands, he collected a now-sleepy Rosie and carried her back to her room and tucked her into her crib.
After watching her for long minutes to make sure she really had fallen asleep, he walked back to the bedroom. It was four thirty; an hour had passed while he’d fed and changed Rosie. In that time, Zara hadn’t moved and still seemed soundly asleep. With effort, he curbed the instinct to get back into bed with her. If he did that, he wouldn’t be able to resist making love to her again, which would be counterproductive, given that his first priority had to be control.
Collecting his shirt and shoes, he walked back to the sitting room and finished dressing. He shrugged into his jacket and checked that he had his cell before he let himself out of the house. As he walked down the steps, the next-door neighbor’s obnoxiously bright security lights came on.
Damon frowned. If Zara and Rosie were going to stay in the cottage, he would ensure that the motion sensors for those security lights were repositioned so they would no longer be triggered by movement on Zara’s property. But, now that he knew Zara was the mother of his child, now that Zara was back in his bed, he did not intend for her and Rosie to remain in a suburban cottage with minimal security.
The solution he had arrived at the previous day settled in more firmly.
It was logical, practical and would cut through a whole lot of red tape. It also had the added advantage of nixing dangerously unstable emotions and dampening any media hype.
A marriage of convenience.
* * *
Zara’s alarm pulled her out of sleep at six thirty.
She groped for the clock. The low buzz ceased and she stared at the numbers that glowed in the pitch dark of early dawn, amazed at the time. By some miracle, Rosie had slept through the night.
Bracing herself, she switched on the bedside lamp. Gold light flooded her room, making her blink and pushing home the reality that she was alone in the bed. Although she had known Damon was gone the second she had reached across the cold expanse of the bed to get to the alarm.
Heated memories cascaded through her, making her blush. Jackknifing, she sat up. Cold air raised gooseflesh on her skin. Shivering, she dragged the quilt up around her chin, because, of course, she was naked, having spent the night making love to Damon. Claiming him physically.
Another memory took center stage. In the moments before she had fallen asleep, she had blurted out something about not being able to resist Damon.
Another wave of embarrassed heat burned through her. She could vaguely remember the silence after she had made her pronouncement, the stiffening of his shoulder beneath her head—probably because he didn’t find her irresistible—then nothing more because she had dropped into a deep, dreamless sleep.
Feeling mortified at the way she had exposed a very private weakness, she pushed the thick feather duvet aside and scrambled out of bed. The icy chill of the marble-smooth, polished wood floor struck through her bare feet as she toed on her slippers and quickly wrapped herself in the thick fluffy robe that was hooked on the back of her door.
She shouldn’t feel embarrassed, she thought a little desperately. But it was hard to blot out the fact that Damon hadn’t responded to her declaration.
Opening her bedroom door, she glanced down the hall and through the sitting room to the kitchen. She tensed when she realized she was looking for Damon on the off chance he was sitting on the couch doing business on his phone or in the kitchen making breakfast.
Of course, Damon wasn’t here. His side of the bed had been stone cold; he had been gone for hours. Her mood plummeted even further. He had probably left at a run not long after she had gone to sleep.
She opened Rosie’s door. Rosie was still fast asleep. Gently, so as not to wake her, she checked her diaper, which seemed inordinately dry. Frowning, Zara walked through to the kitchen and saw the night feed bottle, which had been rinsed and was sitting on the kitchen counter. A quick check of the trash can confirmed there was also a diaper wrapped in a plastic bag sitting on top.
Clearly, Damon had not left as quickly as she had thought. She closed the cupboard door. The last thing she would have expected was for Damon to feed and change Rosie, but that was exactly what had happened.
Moving on automatic, she put hot water on to boil for tea. She made herself a piece of toast, smeared it with butter and the fig-and-ginger jam she’d made with fruit from the fig tree in the backyard, then prepared a morning feeding for Rosie.
She took a half-hearted bite of the toast, barely tasting it. She guessed she should be happy that Damon was interested in forming a relationship with Rosie, since it was less than a day since he had found out he was a father. But she couldn’t help thinking that Damon’s interest in her, Zara, was depressingly linked with his focus on his daughter and that any idea that she and Damon could remain lovers was majorly flawed.
First, Damon had shown up at her house not for her, but because he had thought Rosie was ill. Second, yes, he had made love to Zara, but that had probably happened because she had literally thrown herself at him.
Another even more horrifying thought froze her in place. Damon was probably under the impression that since she’d had his baby, and now had managed to get him back into her bed, that she was angling for marriage.
She groaned inwardly and ate some more toast. It was no wonder he had left in the night without waking her. He had come for Rosie’s sake and Zara had not only seduced him, but made the silly mistake of revealing how much she wanted him.
Given that Damon had never once said he wanted to be in a committed relationship with her, even when they were first sleeping together, the odds that he did now were bleak. Damon’s true motivation in showing up at her house was his caring for Rosie.
Wiping crumbs from her fingers, she carried her plate to the sink and washed and dried it. As she was putting the plate away a brief flash of the kiss they’d shared in her office stopped her in her tracks. She did not know if Damon had known about Rosie at that point, but she had been clear on the fact that he had wanted her.
Closing the cupboard door, she straightened. It was also a fact that Damon had walked back into her life weeks before he had known about Rosie. And he hadn’t just walked back in, he had pushed his way back into her l
ife, insistently forging a business link and employing people she knew for a fact he did not need. That all pointed to the fact that Damon’s desire for her was genuine and persistent.
Feeling suddenly cheered, she wrapped chilled fingers around her gently steaming mug of tea and sipped. There was hope. She just had to hold her nerve and look for the right opportunity to tell him who she was, in such a way that he wouldn’t despise her.
Feeling buoyed, she checked on Rosie, who was still sleeping soundly. Zara quickly showered, dried off and wrapped herself in the robe while she searched out something to wear.
Dressing wasn’t normally a problem, but today she felt the feminine need to dress for attractiveness as well as for business. Unfortunately, most of her suits were quite plain and, owing to the fact that she had lost a little weight, were becoming a little loose and shapeless.
Happy that her figure had improved, but annoyed at the wardrobe dilemma, she flicked through the closet. Her fingers lingered on an outfit she had worn before she had gotten pregnant.
She pulled out the blue dress and the fitted black jacket that went with it. It was a deceptively simple but gorgeous outfit she hadn’t been able to fit into since her pregnancy.
The dress was also soft and warm and extremely comfortable, but would it fit? She held the blue dress against her and stared into the full-length mirror, which was hung on the inside of her closet door. The sapphire blue did great things for her skin, giving it a honey glow and making her eyes look brighter and her hair more lustrous. The dress also had a V neckline, which showed the merest shadow of cleavage, but wasn’t too blatant.
After slipping into clean underwear, she pulled on the dress, which—happily—was made of a stretchy, bouclé material. Her figure was still more rounded than it had once been, and her waist wasn’t as narrow, but the dress was unexpectedly forgiving. To her surprise the jacket also fitted, cinching in neatly at her waist.
She studied her reflection, her breath momentarily suspended. With her hair still knotted on top of her head from her shower, and dark tendrils clinging to her neck, she looked businesslike, but subtly, classily sexy.
With quick movements, she brushed out her hair and coiled it up into a loose knot, then applied smoky makeup to her eyes and a layer of pink gloss to her mouth.
She had just fitted blue-and-silver earrings to her lobes when Rosie woke up and began crowing happily to herself. Checking her watch and groaning because she was fast running out of time if she wanted to leave early, Zara hurried into Rosie’s room.
Rosie stopped crying the instant she spotted her mother, held out her small arms and smiled her wide, gummy smile, which now contained one tiny, gleaming half tooth.
Warmth and a fierce, tender love suffused Zara as she lifted her daughter out of her crib and cuddled her close. Rosie’s soft, sweet baby scent rose to Zara’s nostrils and the anxious fears around being in a relationship with Damon, if that was even possible, drifted away.
In moments like these, everything was worth it—the months of worry and uncertainty, the solitary birth without anyone to support her except her midwife. The effort and frustration of learning all the things a mother needed to know without her own mother to show her.
Half an hour later, after feeding and changing Rosie and dressing her in a cute pink playsuit, Zara finally got Rosie back to sleep in her fleece-lined car seat. She draped a warm fluffy blanket around her daughter and settled a cute pink beanie on her head so she would stay cozily asleep. Then Zara carried the car seat out to the hall.
After propping Rosie’s portable crib beside the car seat, Zara rinsed out the used bottle and put it into the dishwasher. She checked her watch. Shock reverberated through her when she saw that it was eight o’clock. If she wanted to avoid Damon’s driver and keep her independence, she needed to leave, now.
Moving quickly, she found a pair of black boots that would go perfectly with the dress and slipped them on. She zipped the baby bag closed and set it in the hallway, then found her handbag and cell. As she looped the strap of her handbag over one shoulder, the sound of a car made her stiffen. She peered through the narrow glass panes of her front door just in time to see a gleaming black car glide to a halt outside her front gate.
Her heart thumped once, hard. She was too late; Damon had second-guessed her and sent the car early.
Eight
Feeling distinctly outmaneuvered, Zara tried to check out the driver, but the windows of the car were too darkly tinted.
Another pump of adrenaline made her stomach churn as she noted the kind of car Damon had sent. She had hoped for a taxi, and had been resigned to a company car, but the glossy curves of a long, low sports car did not bode well. It looked like the car Damon had been driving last night. A split second later, Damon climbed out from behind the wheel.
Feeling suddenly vulnerable, she opened the door a split second before Damon could knock and tried not to notice how broodingly masculine he looked in a dark suit teamed with a black V-neck T-shirt. A pair of dark glasses added a remote edge that seemed to negate the intimate things they had done in bed just hours ago.
Movement off to the right caught her eye. Her heart sank when she saw Edna, who, if Zara wasn’t mistaken, was in the process of noting Damon’s license plate and the make and model of his car.
“I thought you were sending a driver.”
“I’m the driver.” Damon’s glittering gaze swept over her, making her feel acutely conscious of how sexy the blue dress was and the fact that, from his height, he could probably see more than just the hint of cleavage she had noted in the mirror. “I thought we should spend some time together before we go into the office.”
Desperate to control the sudden warmth in her cheeks, Zara switched her attention back to Edna, who was now taking down details about Damon himself. No doubt height, weight, hair color and any other distinguishing features.
Although she wouldn’t find any of those unless she managed to get Damon naked.
“What do you mean, ‘spend some time together’?”
“There’s a little café along the waterfront. It’s quiet. The coffee’s good, and we could walk on the beach, if you want.”
In public? A small shudder went through her at the thought that they could get snapped together by a reporter. If that happened, her quiet life of anonymity, and the chance she needed to tell Damon who she was before the media spoiled everything, would be gone. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“We need to talk about Rosie and I’d prefer a more private setting than the office.”
Zara noticed a bright blue hatchback driving slowly down the street, as if the driver was searching for an address. The hatchback glided past. Maybe she was being paranoid, but after what had happened yesterday, she could not help the crawling suspicion that the driver was a reporter, in which case, the sooner they left the better.
“A walk on the beach is not a good idea right now,” she said hurriedly. “Rosie’s sleeping.” And if that had been a reporter, they could be followed to the beach. “We should go straight to the office.”
Damon lifted a brow. “The sooner you start working, the sooner you can finish up and leave?”
Zara picked up the baby bag and portable crib and handed them to Damon, before collecting Rosie, who was still sound asleep in the car seat. Zara set the car seat down on the step and locked the front door. By the time she’d returned the key to her bag, Damon was back and had picked up the car seat.
Zara hurried after Damon, stepped outside her front gate and stopped dead. Last night when she had seen Damon’s car, it had been dark, but now, in the full light of day she realized Damon was driving the same car he’d had when they had been dating.
The very last time they had made love, before she had disappeared, had been in that car. Memories she had ruthlessly suppressed unfolded. Her acute emotionalism at being pregna
nt with Damon’s child coupled with her need to be with him just one last time, to store up memories. The awful feeling of emptiness when she had thought she would never see him again.
The car flashed and beeped as Damon unlocked it. “What’s wrong?”
Zara quickly smoothed out her expression. Note to self, she thought grimly, if she wanted to conceal her emotions, she needed to get a pair of dark glasses herself.
“Nothing,” she said brightly.
She slipped into the front passenger seat while Damon strapped Rosie into the rear. As Damon slid behind the wheel of the Audi, Zara fastened her seat belt, then turned to check on the baby. She noticed a second safety seat, which Damon had installed in the back. A much nicer, more expensive seat than the basic model she had bought.
Suddenly, any notion that Rosie could be just a novelty for Damon evaporated. He must have gone shopping for the seat the previous afternoon. If he had gone to the trouble of buying a car seat, then that meant he was serious about fatherhood.
As Damon pulled away from the curb, Zara sank back into the luxurious seat. “I don’t mind accepting a lift today, but in the future, I would prefer to take my own car to work.”
Damon braked for a traffic light before accelerating through an intersection and joining the flow of cars heading for the central city. “If you want to drive your car to work, you can have Ben’s parking space.”
She glared at Damon. “You could have let me use that today!”
His gaze, still frustratingly masked by the dark glasses, connected with hers. “I didn’t want to risk you not turning up for work.”
“I agreed to work for you. I honor my agreements.”
Damon stopped for another light, this one in the busy hub of downtown. “You walked out on me a year ago.”
She dragged her gaze from the taut cut of Damon’s cheekbones, the clean line of his jaw. Her heart was pounding again, but this time for an entirely different reason. It suddenly occurred to her that no employer manipulated and then personally drove an employee to work because they couldn’t risk them not showing up. Certainly not a billionaire like Damon.
