he’d been smart enough to let her believe returning home would be possible, when in reality it sounded as if it would be very hard on their child.
He hadn’t out and out lied. In fact, if the option really was available for her to return to the United States, then he hadn’t lied at all. But he was counting on her love for their baby to help her to see that returning home might be an option but it was a poor one.
She couldn’t decide if he was manipulating her or trusting her, but after eighteen years of a bullying, manipulative father, that misstep made her stomach roil.
She rose. “You know what? I’m a bit tired. I think I should go back to the room.”
He bounced to his feet. “Of course.”
She faced Sally. “I’ll need some help with etiquette. I know the basics but the specifics are way beyond what a high school guidance counselor needs to know. Even if I decide not to marry Dominic, I have an entire week here and I don’t want to embarrass him.”
Sally grabbed her calendar. “I’ll make appointments for you.”
“Just let me know when to be where.”
Dominic laughed. “The teachers will come to our apartment. You’re not just a guest of a prince. You’re pregnant. We want to take care of you.”
She ignored his laugh. Ignored the smile on his face. Ignored that he was solicitous about her pregnancy. Her dad had been exceptional at being sweet, being charming, when it suited him. She didn’t want to think Dominic was like her dad, but the facts were out there plain and simple. He’d told her a half-truth the day before.
Still, she could deal with this. She was unfortunately good at dealing with people who told her half-truths.
She straightened her shoulders. “That’s fine. I’m happy to have the sessions in your apartment.”
She held her head high as she walked out of Sally’s office, but her stomach churned.
Why was she even considering marrying a man who was a manipulator like her father?
DOMINIC HAD TO run to catch up to her. “What was that all about?”
“What?”
“Your sudden need to leave as if Sally had done something wrong.”
“It wasn’t Sally.” She turned on him. “You led me to believe I could go home.”
“The option is yours.”
“Oh, sure, if I want to make our child’s life a miserable succession of plane rides between Texas and Xaviera.”
Not waiting for a reply, she raced to the elevator, punched the button and was inside before Dom had wrapped his head around what she’d said. He jumped into the plush car two seconds before the door would have closed.
“I’m sorry if the truth offends you.”
She turned on him again, poking her index finger into his chest. “The truth? You told me half the truth, so I would get false hope. When the situation looked totally impossible, you held out the offer of being able to return home. Now that I’m adjusting to you, to your family and to people bowing to you, I’m told the option exists, but, oh, by the way, it will make your child’s life suck.”
He caught her finger. “What did you want me to say? No. You can’t ever go home again?”
“Yes! I’m twenty-five years old. I handled two thousand kids for three years. I can handle this!”
The elevator door swished open. She yanked her finger from his hand and headed across the big square marble floor to the regal double doors of his apartment.
He ran after her, but didn’t reach her until she was already in the sitting room of their apartment. When he did, he caught her arm and forced her to face him. “I will not have you be mad at me for something I didn’t do! We didn’t talk a lot yesterday. I gave you your bare-bones options because that’s all you seemed to want to hear. Sally expanded on those options today. If you’d wanted the entire explanation yesterday, you should have stayed for it! Instead you said something about wanting to go to your room. I was fully prepared to talk it all out. You left.”
He could see from the shifting expressions in her blue eyes that she knew what he said was true.
She dropped her head to her hands. “Oh, God. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
She shook her head. “No. It isn’t.” She sucked in a breath. “Look, my dad was a hopeless alcoholic who was always lying to me. I have trust issues.”
Glad to have his real Ginny back, Dom breathed a sigh of relief. “We all have trust issues.”
He motioned for her to sit, so they could talk some more, but she shook her head. “I’m fine. Really. Tired, but fine.”
A trained diplomat, he read the discretion in her answer and knew she didn’t want to talk about this. Who would want to talk about a father who drank so much he’d clearly made her miserable? But at least he understood why she’d absurdly said she would have taken his family when she was a child.
“I probably also should have told you that all of this will be set out in an agreement.”
“An agreement?”
“Yes, the legal office will draw up an agreement that sets out everything. Your responsibilities. Our responsibilities. What’s required of you as mother to our future heir.”
“You’re going to put all this into an agreement?”
He chuckled. “You wouldn’t?”
She considered that. “A written agreement would make things easier.”
“It’s one of the few documents that will remain totally secret. Because it’s considered private, no one but you and I, the king and both of our counsels will even know it exists. But your jobs and responsibilities will be spelled out and so will mine. Plus, we can provide you with counsel who can assure you the agreement is fair. If you don’t like who we provide, you can choose your own counsel.”
She nodded.
“We’re not trying to cheat you.”
“Right.”
“Really. And we don’t sign the agreement until the day of the ceremony. So right up until the day we get married, you can change your mind.”
“I’ll just be doing it publicly.”
He shrugged. “Sorry. The press sort of comes with the territory.”
She didn’t answer, but she’d definitely calmed down. A written agreement seemed to suit her, but she still looked
