shown some sensitivity and chosen somewhere neutral for us to meet.’
‘I don’t require a life partner. I require a wife.’
‘Is that not the same thing?’
‘A life partner suggests permanency. I only need a temporary wife.’
Removing her professional notebook from her bag, Elizabeth wrote ‘temporary marriage’ in it and circled it so heavily the nib of her pen bent.
Determined as she was to keep things on a professional footing, she couldn’t help but say, ‘Using your ex-wife to find you a new wife is one thing, but conducting the preliminary interview on the very island we met and married screams insensitive jerk to me. You have the money and resources to travel anywhere your heart desires so why here? Was it to rub my nose in it?’
When she finally looked at him, he was staring at her with a look she couldn’t interpret.
‘I had a number of reasons.’
She forced herself to remain poised. If he wanted to play mind games he could play them on his own. She was here to do a job and nothing else. ‘Tell me what kind of woman you have in mind to marry. Are there any turn-offs I need to avoid, like smokers or bearded ladies?’
Or five-foot-eight blondes with a pedigree your mother wouldn’t approve of.
She wished she had a chain-smoker with the world’s worst halitosis on her books to fix him up with.
Elizabeth waited for him to answer but his gaze remained on her, the same unfathomable expression on his gorgeous face.
Uncertainty crept up her spine. The way he was looking at her...
He took a swig of his beer then set the bottle steadily on the table.
‘I don’t need you to find me a wife, Elizabeth. I already have one.’ He leaned forward and lowered his voice. ‘There is no easy way for me to say this but you’re still my wife. Our marriage was never annulled. We’re still married.’
* * *
Xander watched the blood drain from Elizabeth’s face.
Long moments passed before she gave a quick shake of her head and finally removed her shades.
The dazzling amber eyes Xander had never forgotten finally met his, flecks of gold and red firing at him, disbelief resonating. Not even a professional actress could fake shock that well. It put the last of his doubts to rest. She hadn’t known.
Although the compression in his chest loosened a little at this, it made no difference to how things needed to proceed.
‘Elizabeth?’
Her throat moved. Her words came out in a croak. ‘Our marriage was annulled.’
‘Our annulment was rejected by the judge at the last hurdle.’
Blinking rapidly, she put her sunglasses back on and pushed them up to sit atop her head. ‘You’re not joking, are you?’
He shook his head and watched her slump in her chair.
She inhaled heavily. ‘I don’t get it.’
Xander had a two-week heads up on it and he still didn’t understand. ‘Did you ever receive official confirmation?’
Her eyes were wide and bewildered before she put her elbows on the table and rubbed at her forehead. ‘I received confirmation of the paperwork. I remember that. I remember it saying it would be rubber-stamped within a month, or whatever the time frame was.’ She looked back at him. ‘It was ten years ago. I don’t remember all the details.’
‘But you don’t remember receiving the official annulment?’
‘I...’ She slumped some more. ‘I moved out.’
‘Moved out from where?’
‘My mother’s. I left home soon after I received the confirmation letter. Mom was supposed to forward all my mail to me but she didn’t. I ended up having to redirect it myself.’ She straightened and let out a forced shaky laugh, muttering, ‘I can’t believe her.’
Their marriage had been too short-lived to get to the ‘meet the parent’ stage. They’d both been so wrapped up in each other they’d hardly spoken of their families. All he’d known of hers was that her parents were divorced and she was an only child. She’d taken a vacation to St Francis on the back of an inheritance she’d received from her paternal grandmother.
Elizabeth shook her head, trying to clear it of all the noise crowding in it. She felt as if she could explode. She shoved her chair back and got to her feet. ‘I need to walk.’
He stayed seated, a set look on his handsome face, his blue eyes turning to steel as they held hers. ‘You can walk later. Right now we need to talk.’
Her stomach clenched and there was a moment she feared she would bring up the morsel of food she’d managed to eat since their phone call the evening before.
Being with Xander again was a thousand times harder than she’d imagined and learning they were still married...
It wasn’t possible. It wasn’t.
Yet somehow it was.
Swallowing a ragged breath, she sat back down heavily.
The sun had almost set, its orange crescent gleaming over the horizon, the sky a deep blue shining with stars peeking out and waving at them. Such a beautiful sight and one that felt sacrilegious with all the turmoil Xander had just thrown her into.
Their food was brought to them. Xander had ordered monkfish fillets. The delicious scent from it turned her stomach.
Elizabeth looked at her tuna tartare, beautifully presented with an avocado salad, and knew she wouldn’t be able to manage even a bite of it.
‘Why was the annulment denied?’ she asked, trying frantically to get a grip on herself.
‘The judge determined there were “no unknown facts from either party” and that “no law had been broken” so there was nothing to justify it.’
‘But we were only married for five days.’
He sighed. ‘Another judge would probably have rubber-stamped it without any issue. We were unlucky that ours landed on the desk of a judge who took issue with it. We’ll never know his real reasons why—he passed away four years ago. How did you not know the annulment was declined?’
‘I never received the letter.’ Her mother had probably thrown it away unopened in a fit of pique.
‘You’ve already said that, but why didn’t you chase it? It seems strange that you didn’t call or do something to find out where the confirmation was.’
‘The same could be said for you,’ she retorted, removing her gaze from the sunset to look at him. ‘Didn’t you think you would receive something too?’
‘Hardly.
