Diana Hamilton - Claiming His Wife

But he had barely listened. But then why should he have when her misery—the feeling of being abandoned, a prisoner—hadn’t been important to him? After their disastrous wedding night, it had suited him to have her out of sight and out of mind.

‘It isn’t the place,’ she corrected sharply. ‘It’s the people.’ And if that was insulting to his family, tough! She had grown out of pussy-footing around him, trying to please him, vainly hoping he would start to feel something for her beyond indifference. ‘If we were here, they’d be watching like hawks to see if I got pregnant. I’ve been there, done that. And I don’t want a repetition.’

‘You could have told them they were wasting their time,’ he said coldly. ‘That the likelihood of your conceiving my child was non-existent because you couldn’t bear me to touch you.’

Cassie swallowed the instinctive, vehement response that the blame for that was just as much his as hers. After all, she’d broached this subject yesterday; the snap of his eyes and the tightening of his jaw line had showed her that her criticism of his family had made him angry.

She took a deliberate sip of coffee, then took a deep breath and made her tone entirely reasonable as she told him, ‘I don’t want to get into a fight, Roman. Our marriage was a mistake. It didn’t work for all sorts of reasons. The past is best forgotten; it’s no longer important. What matters right now is deciding how we’re going to handle the next three months, and where we’ll spend them.’

Another few sips while she weathered the startling frisson that racketed through her body at the mere thought of the coming three months. And, if anything, her prosaic words—meant to pour oil on waters that were beginning to look ominously turbulent—seemed to have worsened the situation, because his black brows were drawn together, his haughty Spanish disdain sharp enough to cut.

‘We’ll spend them together. That was the bargain.’ He got to his feet, the dappled shade reinforcing the mystery of the man. He was a complex character, many-faceted; she had never been able to understand him. ‘I will break the news of our reconciliation to my family. Be ready to leave in an hour.’

His mouth pulled back against his teeth, he stared down at her, as if daring her to say another word, then swung round and walked away. He left her wondering at his change of mood.

Set to charm the socks off her to start with—most probably in an attempt to persuade her to fall in with his wishes. Then showing flashes of simmering black temper after she’d agreed to what he wanted: the pretence of a reconciliation!

No, she never had been able to understand him. But it really didn’t matter now, did it?

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