The Inconvenient Bride - By Anne McAllister Page 0,47
go to bed with him, her mind argued.
There was no question that he wanted her to. He still looked at her with the same hunger. He didn’t say a word. He didn’t have to. She saw it in his gaze.
But later that evening when he came home, telling her it was as ugly a kid as he’d ever seen, and it was a good thing he’d given it the Yankees’ cap to distract peoples’ attention, she burst out laughing, and they smiled at each other, and the flames of desire rose between them hot and fierce.
But still she didn’t go to him.
Because she wanted not just his child, but his love.
“Your father,” Shyla’s replacement said the next morning, “on line one.”
Dominic didn’t feel the usual instant clench in his stomach that he normally felt when he heard those words. Douglas had been lying low since the night he’d met his son’s new wife. But Dominic knew better than to hope such reticence would last forever.
He punched in line one and said with all the good cheer he could muster, “Dad! What’s up? Haven’t heard from you in a while.”
“I’ve been busy,” Douglas said flatly. “Had a reception to arrange.”
“Somebody getting married?”
“You did,” Douglas replied. “So I thought it was only fitting that I give you a wedding bash.”
A wedding reception for him and Sierra? “We don’t need—”
“Of course you do.” Douglas’s voice was a smooth tempered steel. “We need to introduce your bride to our friends and colleagues. Don’t we?”
Dominic felt ill. “It’s not necessary,” he began again.
But his father cut him off. “Of course it is. Unless you’re ashamed of her?”
Dominic gritted his teeth. “I’m not ashamed of her!”
“But you are married to her?” There was a faint desperate note in Douglas’s voice.
“Of course I’m married to her! What the hell did you think? That I brought her along just to make a point?”
“You married her to make a point, didn’t you?” Douglas asked mildly.
Dominic shoved his fingers through his hair. “It’s my business and hers why we got married.” His response was weak, and he knew it. His father’s snort of derision only underscored the fact.
“You damn fool,” Douglas grated.
“I’d have been a bigger fool letting you tell me who to marry, how to run my life!”
“So you married someone entirely inappropriate instead!”
“Who says she’s inappropriate?” Dominic couldn’t believe how suddenly angry he was.
“You think she’ll fit right in, do you? No one will even notice when she takes her place on the board of the charity foundation? No one will bat an eyelash at having a purple-haired woman on the hospital committee.”
“Why should they care what color her hair is if our money is still green?”
“It’s not them who will care,” Douglas bit out. “It’s the committee!”
“Too damn bad.”
“Too damn bad,” Douglas echoed mockingly. “For God’s sake, Dominic!”
Dominic scowled, knowing exactly what his father meant, and resenting it furiously. Anyone who knew Sierra would know she was worth ten of those women. “They need to look beyond the surface,” he growled. “They need to wake up and realize not everyone in the world dresses the way they do.”
“And it was your mission in marrying Sierra to teach them that?”
“Of course not. But—”
“No, it wasn’t. It was your mission in marrying Sierra to show me up. What I want to know is, did you stop and think how all this was going to affect Sierra?”
Oh, now he was going to make it seem like Sierra was a victim? Anyone less like a victim Dominic couldn’t imagine. “She didn’t have to say yes!”
“Why did she?”
It was like being socked in the gut. A simple mild question that cut straight to the bone. As if Sierra had had no more reason to marry him than Carin—who hadn’t.
“Go to hell, “he said through his teeth.
“Sorry,” his father said quickly. “I didn’t mean—” He cleared his throat, but didn’t speak.
What, after all, Dominic wondered, was there left to say?
But being Douglas, of course, he found something. “I’m giving a reception for you, Dominic. For you and Sierra.”
“Why? So you can hurt her the way you think she shouldn’t be hurt?” Dominic said bitterly.
“If you believe that, you’re no son of mine.”
“Then why?”
“To show a little family solidarity. She’s your wife. She’s my daughter-in-law. She’s a part of Wolfe’s now.”
“Lucky her,” Dominic muttered. Then, “Fine,” he said recklessly, “have a reception for us. Invite the whole damn city if you want.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
“A RECEPTION?” Sierra beamed at the news. They were walking through Central