Bridal Bargains: The Tycoon's Bride / The Purchased Wife / The Price Of A Bride

Like her own room, his was lit by only a single small lamp left burning on the bedside table. In fact, in almost every way the room was a match to hers, she noticed—except his bed didn’t look as if war had taken place in it, she thought with a small shudder as she laid the clothes down on the smooth pale grey counterpane then walked back into her own room to eye with distaste her tumbled bed.

An honour, he had called it. She called it a waste of something so very precious and she knew there was no way she could sleep in this bed again tonight.

Tears back and burning, with an angry jerk, she turned away from the wretched bed and walked across the room to the soft-cushioned sofa, where she curled herself up, then closed her eyes tightly in a grimly determined effort to shut the last dreadful hour right out of her head.

Surprisingly she slept, though she hadn’t really expected to be able to switch her mind off as easily as that. Moreover, she slept long and heavily, and awoke the next morning vaguely aware of half surfacing only once during the night when she’d been dreaming that she was being carried.

It had been a disturbing sensation. Strangely painful though not in a physical way, she recalled as she lay there watching the morning sunlight draw patterns on the ceiling via the white voile drapes covering the windows.

‘Don’t cry,’ an unbelievably gentle voice echoed inside her head.

Recognising that voice, she sat up with a start, saw she was back in her bed and knew exactly how she’d got there. It had been no dream last night! Andreas had come into her room and found her asleep on the sofa! He’d woken her up when he’d gathered her into his arms to carry her back to bed, and she even remembered the raw humiliation in starting to cry all over again!

Oh, how could you, Claire? she chided herself furiously. How could you let him see how hurt you are?

And there was worse—much worse, she recalled, closing her eyes in the hopes of shutting it all out again. But it would not be shut out. And she saw herself clinging to him. Saw him lay her gently on the bed then come down to lie beside her. She felt the light brush of his lips on her cheek and the way his hands had stroked her, quietly soothing her back into oblivion before he must have got up and placed the covers over her.

I hate him, she thought angrily. I really, really hate him for catching me out like that!

Too angry to just sit there tormenting herself, she got up and dressed quickly, needing to soothe her savaged ego by spending some time with Melanie.

She could even make herself a drink there, since the nursery came with its own fully equipped kitchen, which would save her having to face Andreas across the breakfast table.

The idea lifted her spirits, and as her brain fed that inspired thought to her stomach she realised just how desperate she was for some food and a hot cup of tea.

Dressed comfortably in a sage-green tee shirt and a pair of slim-fitting yellow Capri pants, she stepped out of her room to be immediately struck by how quiet the rest of the house was.

Early though she knew it was, she had expected the house to be a hive of activity by now as the staff cleared up after last night’s party. But as she peered over the gallery rail at the huge hallway below she saw that the place had already been wiped clean of all evidence of partying.

The staff must have been working until the early hours, she realised, leaving them at liberty to have a well-earned lie-in this morning which probably meant that she was the only person up and around.

A prospect that suited her very well while she was still struggling to deal with what had happened last night, and she resolved to use their long day yesterday as an excuse for them to leave her to take care of Melanie today.

The nursery would give her somewhere to hide. Somewhere to lick her wounds and try to come to a decision as to what she was going to do. For the impulse to just pick up the baby and run before she dug herself even deeper into the mire her emotions were in was a gnawing ache that filled her brain.

If it hadn’t been for Andreas’s grandmother, she had a suspicion she would have done it already and stolen away in the dead of night like a thief running off with the family silver.

Also there was still Melanie to consider. Melanie who could gain so much from living this kind of luxury life—and so little from the life Claire could give her.

Not many pluses in favour of running, she heavily concluded, and she hadn’t even taken into consideration the dire threat of retribution Andreas had laid on her last night.

Inside the nursery all was quiet, the early morning sunlight diffused by the pretty apple-green curtains still drawn across the windows. Claire quietly closed the door behind her, and was about to walk over to the crib to check on the baby when a sound in the other corner of the room had her head twisting round, expecting to see Althea—only to freeze when she found herself looking at Andreas.

Dressed in what looked like a white cotton tracksuit, he was sitting in the comfortable rocking-chair in the corner, cradling a sleeping Melanie in his arms.

His eyes were closed, his dark head resting back against the chair’s cushioned back—though he wasn’t asleep. The way one long brown bare foot was rhythmically keeping the chair rocking while the other rested across its knee told her that.