She’d almost blurted the truth out then but the arrival of Teresa with the daily fresh provisions, the only few minutes of contact Javier allowed the housekeeper with the so-called honeymooning couple, had stopped her.
There wasn’t going to be a baby.
She’d known that since their first night here. And kept it to herself because her feelings were so horrendously mixed up she didn’t know what they actually were.
On the one hand she had secretly longed to have Javier’s baby and finding out that she wasn’t going to had been a source of really surprisingly deep regret. Yet if she had been pregnant she knew that he would have insisted that they stay married for the sake of their child, and not because he was madly in love with her and wanted her in his life for ever.
Heck no, she knew how his mind worked. He would grit his teeth and do his duty and she wouldn’t have been able to bear the thought that she was an unwelcome albatross around his neck.
And once she told him he could forget the pregnancy scare he would breathe one huge sigh of relief and the status quo would be firmly back in place. And in less than a year, just as soon as she reached her majority and he deemed her fit to handle her huge inheritance, he would consider his duty done and be off out of their marriage at the speed of light, gratefully embracing his new-found bachelor freedom.
Little wonder she was muddled, riven by mixed feelings and terminally depressed.
The moment she was dressed she would find him and confess her sins of omission and have to watch the grin of relief light up his lean and handsome features and know that her mission to get him to fall in love with her had been a complete failure, all her fond hopes vanishing without a trace.
Hopes that had taken a steep nosedive when his behaviour had turned so distant after the night of love-making he had to have considered to be a reprehensible mistake because he had shown absolutely no desire for a repeat performance; hopes that had wriggled their deceiving way into her muddled head during the past few days when he had been so kind.
But ‘kind’ she could do without. It harked right back to his treatment of her during her childhood. A full-grown woman now, she needed more. Much more. And he was patently unwilling to give it.
As she walked out of the bathroom, feeling as if she were about to face a firing squad, the main door to the suite opened with a decisive swing and the love of her life stood there, determination written all over his hard bone structure.
Panic brought her heart jumping up into her throat. As always his sensational looks made her mouth run dry. Clutching at the edges of the slipping bath towel and before her courage deserted her she pushed out a bald, ‘I’m not pregnant.’
For a moment Javier looked poleaxed, his eyes darkening, and it wasn’t a flicker of disappointment she saw there, of course it wasn’t because in the next split second a warm smile was irradiating his unforgettable features.
A smile of wholehearted relief, she decided sickly. He would not now be called upon to do his duty. In a little under a year’s time he would sling his hook, smugly congratulating himself that as far as her wellbeing was concerned he had done everything that could be expected of him.
The depth of his disappointment shocked Javier for the few moments it took to remind himself he was being utterly selfish. He might want to see her hold his child in her arms, but worrying about the possibility had been making her ill. He had to think of how relieved she must be feeling and not dwell on his own disappointment.
He made himself smile and advanced a step towards the tense little darling, all wrapped up in a towel like a parcel waiting to be opened, her silvery gold hair tumbling in enchanting disarray around her naked shoulders. His voice sounded strangely roughened as he told her warmly, ‘Then from now on you can stop worrying. I know you have been.’
He knew nothing! Patronising hog!
‘I’ve known for a good five days, so don’t pretend you can read my mind!’ she flung at him in temper, thoroughly hating him for that grin of utter relief at being let off the hook that his pride and his honour would have had him impaled on for the rest of his life.
And hating herself even more for immediately bursting into a torrent of tears and giving way to out-of-control sobs when his strong arms enfolded her, one gentle hand pressing her head against the accommodating wide span of his shoulder.
‘Hush, sweetheart. I can’t bear to see you cry! It really cuts me up,’ Javier uttered on a driven undertone and Zoe felt she had been somehow swept back over a decade in time. Wrenching her head away from what she didn’t want to admit to being the comfort of his solid shoulder, she flailed her small fists against the immovable barrier of his chest.
‘I’m not an eight-year-old kid any more!’ she bit out in raw-edged fury. ‘So don’t treat me like one! Next thing you’ll be saying, “There there” and promising to buy me an ice cream if I wipe my eyes and blow my nose!’ Breasts heaving with emotion, tear-drenched eyes flashing fire in his direction, Zoe ranted at him. She knew she was being unfair. Few men would enjoy the spectacle of a woman turning on the waterworks, and he’d only been trying to make her stop blubbering. But that knowledge didn’t prevent her from renewing her assault on that broad chest and doing her damnedest to put space between them.
But Javier simply hauled her closer to the lean, hard strength of his body, amusement curling that wide, sensual mouth, his voice dark and drawly. ‘Should I also go the whole hog and offer to kiss you better?’
Zoe’s heart gave a violent lurch. Her wide eyes met the suddenly smouldering intensity of his and her mouth ran dry. A tiny quiver assailed her as she felt her skin tighten. His mouth promised passion. Her own lips softened, parting on a slight tremor as the hands that had been holding her captive became instruments of exquisite torture as they slid up to splay against the naked skin of her shoulder blades. Her head began to spin and she thought she heard herself moan as the aggression melted out of her fisted hands and her palms flattened over the soft fabric of his T-shirt and registered the rapid beat of his heart.
And then that perfect, intoxicatingly sexy male mouth descended to take hers and fireworks exploded inside the entirety of Zoe’s being. Her slim arms lifted to twine around his neck and the towel slipped to the floor and this time the driven groan came from him as his hands travelled down the line of her spine, settled with male possessiveness on her hips and curved her against his hard body.
Zoe’s fingers tangled in the luxuriance of his thick black hair as the mastery of his mouth sent her spinning to heaven, too dizzy and disorientated to take in what he was saying when his mouth parted from hers and he asked on a thickened undertone, ‘Is this what you want? You have to be sure. Tell me now—I’m not made of stone.’
Gazing up into the breathtaking feverish glitter of his darkened eyes, Zoe missed his mouth like crazy. She wanted it back. Now. Pressing even closer, if that were possible, she claimed what she craved, drowning in euphoria as she felt the deep shudder rake its way through his honed, lean frame as his lips ravished hers with blistering passion.
He did want her, was the exultant thought that made its way through her fogged brain. His body betrayed how much. He wasn’t indifferent! With an instinct as old as Eve her hips rotated against his in out-of-control need.
‘Zoe—’ Sheer will-power brought his mouth from the honeyed nectar of hers, aware that his voice sounded like the rasp of an iron file. The beautiful little minx was driving him wild, everything getting way out of hand—
The hard tips of her breasts scorched through his T-shirt. His sanity was on the verge of leaving him. He brought his hands up to cup her face, his fingers sliding under the thick silver-gold hair that fell softly around her flushed face, a perfect frame for those liquid topaz eyes fringed with ridiculously long lashes, delicate cheekbones and lush, ripe lips.
He pushed her name out again, then dragged back some of his slipping sanity. ‘Wait—’
‘Can’t!’ She trembled with the tension he was racking up, turned her head to one