Chapter 8

Three hours later, the limo pulled up in front of Gina’s apartment building. She grabbed the door handle to let herself out. “I’ll email you later to discuss our next move with Southern Mining.”

He laid his hand on her arm to stop her. “Don’t ignore what we have together, Ms. Kemp. I meant what I said before. I want you to move into the penthouse.”

“I already told you I can’t do that.”

“That’s what you said. You keep saying you can’t. You have never once said you don’t want to. And you know I wouldn’t rather spend my time in the penthouse with anyone else. So let’s do this – for the both of us.”

“I do want to, but there are extenuating circumstances that make it impossible.”

He waved his hand. “That’s all nonsense. Nothing is impossible. Today was just a warm-up. After that session we just had, you obviously want me as much as you ever did, and I want you just as much. We could be wild, you and me. We could be going day and night.”

Gina chuckled. Mothers didn’t go day and night with anything unless it was feeding and comforting and changing crying babies.

“I mean it, Ms. Kemp. I want you to move in.”

She squeezed his hand. She really did like him, and it wasn’t all about sex. “I couldn’t move in there. I’m your employee. If I moved in, I would be….What would I be? I’d be your kept woman.”

“You wouldn’t be a kept woman because I would move in there with you. We would be legit.”

Her eyes popped out of her head. “Are you serious?”

“I’m drop dead serious about you, Ms. Kemp. I want to go all the way with you, in more ways than one. I want to be there for you when you wake up and when you go to sleep at night. I want to occupy your space and have you in my space.”

“What about your house?”

He shrugged. “That’s not going anywhere. If things work out in the penthouse, maybe you’d like to move into the house later.”

Gina pulled away. “Now I know you’re not serious. You can’t seriously expect me to move into your house. It’s….I mean, it’s practically a museum.”

He leaned forward. “I want you, Ms. Kemp. I want your days and nights. I want your free time and your bad hair days and your dirty laundry. I want it all, and I want you under my roof with me. I’ve made up my mind. I’ve had enough of living without you. Now you’re back, and I won’t let you go again, not even to go back to that apartment of yours.”

She stared at him, but she couldn’t think of one thing to say. This couldn’t be happening. He couldn’t be making the closest thing to a declaration of love a guy like Giles Pendragon was capable of. He couldn’t be claiming her as his own when he didn’t know she was the mother of his child.

She leaned over and gave him a kiss. “You’re really sweet. I love doing it with you, and I love working for you. I only wish it was possible, what you’re talking about. I wish I could accept.”

He sat back in the seat. “You didn’t say no, and I’m not accepting no for an answer. If you don’t come now, you’ll come later. That’s all there is to it.”

Gina’s face burned. She couldn’t say no to him. She couldn’t resist even this extravagant demand, but she had to run back to her baby. She picked up his hand and pressed a quick kiss against his knuckles. Then she ran for her life.

She slammed the limo door and bolted up the stairs. She burst into the apartment. There was Maggie on the couch in front of the big bay windows. She flipped the pages of a magazine and rocked the carry capsule with her foot. She smiled up at Gina.

Gina panted for breath. “Sorry I’m late. I came as soon as I could.”

Maggie put down the magazine and stood up. “Don’t worry about it. How did it go?”

Gina brushed her hair off her forehead. “It went great. It’s all wrapped up.”

Maggie headed for the door. “I better go.”

Gina fished in her bag and held out a handful of bills. “Here’s the extra I owe you, plus a bonus for being so awesome.”

Maggie waved both hands and laughed. “I couldn’t accept that.”

Gina shoved it at her. “Please take it. I feel awful for sticking you here while I was out painting the town red.”

Maggie’s eyes shone as she stuffed the bills into her pocket. “You didn’t have to do that. The extra hours is enough. You let me know anytime you need me to take care of her. She’s beyond perfect.”

The door shut behind her, and Gina gazed down at the sleeping baby. Beyond perfect? Maybe. Too bad Giles would never find out about her.

Gina sat down on the couch. She hadn’t kicked off her shoes thirty seconds before Winnona woke up. Here we go again. Winnona would be beyond perfect for a stranger and fall apart the minute her mother walked into the room.

She picked up the baby and laid her on her shoulder. She patted between her shoulder blades and shushed into her little ear. She paced around the apartment and made two-second stops in the kitchen to decide what to make for dinner.

She had the fridge open when Winnona started to fuss—again. Gina pulled a bottle out of the fridge and stuck it in the microwave. She strolled out of the kitchen to make another lap when someone knocked on the door. Maggie must have forgotten something.

Gina added a little bounce to her step to settle Winnona until the bottle would be ready. She hummed in the baby’s ear and pulled the door open. She froze dead in her tracks. It wasn’t Maggie. It was him.

Just for a second, she couldn’t move a muscle and stared at him in shock and disbelief. This wasn’t part of the plan. Not at all. Then Winnona barked a sharp cry in her ear, forcing her to snap her out of her trance. But her heart still pounded and her chest tightened. This was it.

Here he was and he’d seen Winnona. She couldn’t undo it, and she didn’t really want to. She could not stand lying and hiding away any longer.

At that moment, the weight of her secret lifted off her shoulders. A feeling of calm overcame her. She didn’t cringe in terror awaiting his wrath as she thought she would. The horse had left the barn. She couldn’t exactly dive for her apartment, slam the door in his face, and hide Winnona under a cushion, could she? He knew, and now she was free. She was free at long last to take her place in the universe as Winnona’s mother.

The microwave pinged behind her back. Winnona’s mother had a job to do, a much more important job than anything he could ask her to do. She shushed Winnona and went to the kitchen. She took the bottle out of the microwave and cradled Winnona in the crook of her arm. She touched the bottle to the baby’s lower lip and started feeding her.

She looked up to find Giles staring at her from the other side of the counter. He looked back and forth between her face and the baby in her arms. “What in God’s name are you playing at, Ms. Kemp.”

Clear calm protected Gina from any upset. She was where she needed to be. The sooner he found out exactly what was going on, the better. “I’m not playing. This is Winnona, my daughter.”

His eyes bugged out of his face. “Your daughter! How did you…..? Did you screw around on me before you left?”

She swayed back and forth to soothe the baby. “I never screwed around with anybody but you, Mr……” She paused to gather her resolve. “She’s yours, Giles. I got pregnant by you before I left for New Zealand. You don’t know how many times I wanted to tell you, but it always… sort of never happened. One lie fed into another, and then I had her down there. Now you know.”

He stumbled back like he’d been shot. His mouth opened and closed without a sound. He stared in front of him, but he didn’t see anything. Gina stayed where she was. She could weather any storm. She would protect Winnona from anything now.

He staggered across the room. He teetered on his heels in front of the windows. The sun struck his hair and cast an angelic halo around him. If he whirled around and cursed her, if he fumed and threatened her, she would handle it. She was Winnona’s mother. No one could take that away from her.

He swayed one way and then the other. Then he collapsed onto the couch. His arms and legs hung limp, and his massive frame shrank down on itself. All the vital energy invigorating him drained away. He sat still and stared, a wrecked man.

Gina wrecked him. She wrecked him with her lies and her weakness, but she couldn’t care about that now. She couldn’t condemn herself for what she’d done. The past no longer existed. Only the future mattered, Winnona’s future, and Gina held that in the palms of her hands.

She regarded this shattered man from a distance. He’d lost everything in a single disastrous moment, but some crucial work still remained for him to do. Gina understood. When all hope seemed gone, when life dealt its cruelest blows, one touchstone kept her going. She could offer him that lifeline now.

She set the bottle on the counter and gave Winnona one more gentle rock. The baby shuddered and settled into the intoxicated sleep of blissful innocence. Gina walked around the counter. She stood in front of Giles and laid Winnona in his arms.

Forgotten instinct infused his dead limbs with new life, just the way Gina knew it would. His arms moved of their own accord to surround that baby with his protective bulk. He held her against his chest and gazed down at her sleeping face.

He stole a glance up at Gina. She smiled at him and arranged the blanket under Winnona’s chin. “She’s yours, Giles, yours and mine.”

Gina withdrew to the other side of the room. She left them alone. She set about tidying up the kitchen and getting ready to start dinner. Contented quiet filled the apartment. It was supposed to be this way. He completed the picture in ways she never imagined. He was supposed to be part of this. That heavenly aura of domestic peace hovered around him when he held his baby and watched her sleep.

Gina happened to glance over at them and saw tears streaming down his cheeks. She hurried over, but he got up before she reached him. He hugged Winnona in his mighty arms and sniffled “I can’t believe it. I can’t believe I may never have known about you.” He gazed softly into Winnonas eyes before hugging her close again.

The next moment, he shot a ferocious glare around the room. “Pack your bags, Gina. You’re coming with me.”

Gina gasped. “Where?”

“To the penthouse. You’re moving in with me right now.”

“Giles, I….”

He cut her off with a shake of his head. “I don’t want to hear any more. Ditch this backwater apartment. We have a daughter here Gina, yours and mine. You’ll be a lot more comfortable in the penthouse, and we can be together there—all of us. Come on. Grab your diaper bag. The limo is waiting for us downstairs.”

Gina’s jaw dropped. “But you…you just got here.”

He fixed his smoldering eyes on her face. “Is this your big secret? Is this the reason you wanted to work from home, so I wouldn’t find out about this? Well, now I know. Nothing is going to change how I felt when I held my Winnona for the first time.

You don’t have to work from home anymore. We’re gonna work together from now on. I saw that today. You’re too good to be stuck in front of a computer doing research and writing reports. You’re gonna work with me, bagging the big game.”

“What about Winnona?”

“What about her?”

“I couldn’t leave her alone. I decided to work from home so I could take care of her.”

“Who took care of her today?”

Gina waved her hand. “Some lady from down the hall.”

He jerked his head sideways. “She’s not staying with some lady from down the hall anymore. She’s coming with us. You can take care of her at the office as well as you can at home. Bring her along. We can take care of her together.”

Gina snorted. “Do you mean take care of her during contract negotiations? Get serious Giles. You haven’t thought this through.”

Giles didn’t crack a smile. “Yes, I am serious. That is exactly what we are going to do.”

Gina stared at him. “My God! You’re serious.”

“You’re coming with me to the penthouse right now. That’s final.” He gazed down at Winnona’s face. “We’re a family, and this little girl needs her family around her.” His head snapped up, and he set off toward the door. “Come on. You’ve spent too much time here already. Where’s your diaper bag?”

Gina watched him walk away. Of all the possible reactions she expected, this was definitely not one of them. Curses, tears, threats, hatred, firing her from work—she expected those. Move into the penthouse with him? Raise Winnona with him as a real family? She couldn’t imagine it.

He walked out the door without looking at her again. He only had eyes for Winnona now. The baby encompassed his whole world. He was a father smitten with his little girl. She would always encompass his whole world from now on. They would be joined at the heart forever. Isn’t that what Gina wanted all along?

She cast a long, heartfelt glance around her apartment. When she first moved in here, this place stood for her freedom, for her ability to raise Winnona on her own with no help from Giles and his billions. She’d proved to herself she could work from home and take care of Winnona at the same time. Did she really need to keep doing this when she could have the penthouse instead?

All of a sudden, the apartment looked wretched, dingy, squalid. The food lay unprepared on the kitchen counter. Piles of papers littered her desk. Give up all this for the penthouse? Give up her lonely existence to share Winnona and her precious days with the father who adored her?

Gina’s whole soul screamed the answer, Yes! Praise to God and all the angels, Yes! She could walk away from hardship and loneliness and fear and lies to embrace love and belonging and togetherness. She could leave behind squalor for abundance and luxury and satisfaction. She could leave behind all this for Giles’s love and their future together.

She took one last look around, and this time, the litter and chaos and squalor made her happy. Her heart said goodbye to the past, a past Giles didn’t even care about. Nothing mattered but their family.

Gina danced across the room, snatched Winnona’s diaper bag in one hand and her own handbag in the other, and tripped out of the room on feet lighter than air. She hopped down the stairs and out the front door to the street, where Giles climbed into the limo with Winnona still in his arms.

THE END

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