The Duke Takes a Bride (Entitled Book 2) (19 page)

“
I
’m okay
,” Imogen repeated for the nth time.

Julian was crouched in front of her, pressing a wet handkerchief to her face. He was wiping off the gunk covering her, judging by the smears of make-up she glimpsed on the damp cotton. Her wig lay like roadkill on the floor. They were in the stockroom, and she could hear Stella arguing with an angry male voice. Probably Steve, the bar owner. Right now she was too distraught to care. “How did you find me?”

“Gray.”

Rat.
He had been eager enough at the start to help her escape Julian and his bodyguards, but her pregnancy became a game changer. For one crazy, foolish moment there she had thought Julian had come for her. That he had realized he had finally come to love her after all. But no. He had only come after her because he had found out about the baby.

“I told you to wait for me. That we would talk.”

Funny how the same pattern repeated itself. Two years ago he had said he wanted to talk. She ran. He raked a hand through his already-disheveled golden hair. He looked gaunt and exhausted. His hands were resting on her knees and her traitorous body was responding to their heat, remembering how they played her. She wanted badly to wrap his arms around her and feel his solid strength against hers. Then she remembered what was in the letter.

“Your note said it all.” Steve was shouting to be let in the stockroom. It sounded like a riot outside. “I’m not stupid.” She blinked several times, stemming the flow of tears. “I know when someone’s dumping me.”

Julian flinched. “I’m the one who was stupid. I didn’t realize−” He took a ragged breath. “I didn’t know how−”

Imogen couldn’t bear to see this proud man being reduced to such a state. “Sshh. It’s okay. You don’t have to say anything. It doesn’t matter anymore. I know why you’re here.”

He searched her face. ”You do?” His tone was odd.

A scuffle sounded outside.

“Sir, things are going to get rough pretty soon. We can’t hold them off longer without anyone getting hurt.” It was the bodyguard’s voice coming through the door.

Imogen felt nausea rising up her throat. She usually threw up in the mornings, but the tension of the past few minutes must have thrown her body in a loop. She threw off Julian’s hands and rose on unsteady legs to burst out of the exit that led to the back alley. One of the security detail standing guard outside reached for his gun automatically but relaxed when he identified her.

“Imogen!” She could hear him saying her name urgently, but she threw off a hand to stave him off. She was finally sick all over the alley pavement. When it was over, she slumped against a wall weakly, wiping her knuckles across her mouth.

“Genie!” His voice was alarmed. His hands descended on her shoulder. “Are you ill?” He brushed off the damp tendrils of hair that had come loose from her ponytail and clung to her moist, clammy face.

“I’m not ill,” she said feebly to reassure him
.
“It’s just the pregnancy.”

Julian staggered backwards, as if from a blow. Must be the puke all over the floor that had him rearing back as if in shock. His tanned face paled, leaving him sallow looking.

“Sir! We must leave now!” The bodyguard’s tone was urgent. The other beefy security man was holding off the back alley exit door where somebody was pounding furiously. “This way, sir. Follow me.”

Julian stood in the middle of the alley, looking oddly lost and defeated.

“Julian?” She tugged at his hand. “We have to get out of here.”

He snapped out of his trance and seemed to regain his composure quickly. The bodyguards flanked them as they made their way to the waiting vehicle and sped away from the chaos they left behind.

I
mogen was pregnant
?

She was staring resolutely out of the window, her hands fisted on her lap. The silence in the car was oppressive. No one had been inclined to be the one to break it off.

The penthouse had also been eerily silent when he had come home from a two-day weekend trip to San Francisco a month and a half ago. Julian had wanted to cut short his meetings, but he couldn’t do it without disrupting the other entrepreneurs’ schedule. He had sent Imogen messages but she hadn’t responded. He decided to give her some space. When he called the penthouse, Mrs. Nero had told him that Imogen had called to say she was staying over at Maggie’s. On his first day back in L.A. and Imogen’s third day of absence in the penthouse, he had finally called Maggie, who was puzzled and then alarmed and furious.

“What did you do, Julian?” Maggie had demanded.

What have I done?

He had panicked that morning. He felt he was being suffocated. It wasn’t part of the bargain. Those feelings she had been professing, what was he supposed to do with them? The way he felt completely stripped of his defenses when he was with her, he didn’t like it. That path led to sure heartache and Julian had had enough of it. Imogen was not to be allowed inside. She was not allowed to slice open old scars and create new wounds.

And since he couldn’t let her in, he would have to let her go. Let her find someone who was capable of loving her back. He had felt edgy and restless the morning after her confession. If he didn’t get it out of his chest, he was going to explode. He had written the letter, loath to wake her up. Julian had wanted to tear it up the minute he was in the car and on the way to the airport. He wasn’t usually this impulsive, this emotional. She was already wreaking havoc with his judgment and they weren’t even married yet.

Imogen deserved someone better. Someone who could return her feelings one hundred and one percent. Julian couldn’t risk it. Wouldn’t risk stepping on the line beyond friendship. That area was a quagmire of murky emotions, all of which threatened to suck one whole.

Unfortunately, her pregnancy meant she would now be stuck with someone like him. Someone who had a serious case of arrested emotional development. Someone who didn’t fucking deserve her.

He had this speech all prepared for when he found her. How he was sorry he couldn’t be the man for her. How he couldn’t shortchange her. That to prevent her from being unhappy, he was letting her go.

That it wasn’t her. That it was fucking him who was the problem.

That if he could love someone, it would be her.

Instead the words that came out of his mouth showed just how far he had sunk. “Is the baby mine?”

Her head whipped towards him. The streetlight illuminated the shock and hurt in her brown eyes. She looked like a puppy that had just been kicked to the curb.

Fuck.
Julian felt gutted by the pain in her eyes, the pain he himself inflicted.
“
Genie, I’m sorry−“

“It’s okay, Julian,” she said, all emotion leached out of her voice. “I’m just sorry too that it’s yours.”

Her words hit him like a slap on the face. He deserved them. What he wouldn’t forgive himself for was reducing his kind-hearted Imogen to saying such cruel things. He longed to take her in his arms and ask for her forgiveness, but what would be the point? He was bound to hurt her again.

Of course he had known all along that the baby was his, but some stupid compulsion needed him to have her confirm it. That by her saying that the baby was his just made everything inevitable.

Imogen had to marry him. That was the wisest course of action. If she wouldn’t, he’d make her see, enumerate all the advantages their child would have if they raised him together. He’d been rash when he wrote that letter, but he wouldn’t waste this chance again. He would make sure of it.

She had gone back to staring out of the window.

“Imogen,” he said, wiping out any trace of uncertainty in his voice. She turned to him slowly, her face blank. “Marry me.”

Her expression underwent a change. Her eyes roiled with emotions, intense, frightening before she banked them down, leaving only one he could recognize. Resignation. “Might as well. Seems I have no choice now.”

He ignored the bitterness in her tone. He’d have time to make it up to her. For the first time in several weeks, Julian felt the tightness in his chest loosen up a bit. With detachment, he noted that his hands were trembling.

He rolled down the divider and spoke to the driver. “Jenkins, take us to the airport.”

I
n a span of several hours
, she had become Imogen Walkden, the Duchess of Blackmoore. The fulfillment of her childhood dreams brought no joy. It was so far removed from what she had envisioned−tulle and lace, a parade of pageboys and flower girls, her long, stately, and graceful march down the aisle where at the end, her handsome groom would be waiting, trying to hold it in but overcome with emotion. Instead she had married him in a French maid costume.

The only emotion Julian had exhibited at the Vegas wedding was mild distaste for the gaudy chapel and the tackily dressed officiant who seemed to be channeling Liberace. He was solicitous, draping his coat on her shoulders, cupping his hand on her elbow, even passing by a fast food drive thru to make sure she ate something, but he was polite and distant. She didn’t know how he managed to procure wedding bands at short notice. Probably one of the bodyguards had been dispatched to get it posthaste.

As soon as every thing was official and signed, they had flown back to Los Angeles the same way they came to Las Vegas – via his private jet.

Imogen napped on the short flight back home. She was so exhausted she climbed into bed in her old room in the penthouse in just her underwear, not bothering to unpack her overnight bag. Was it just a few hours ago when she had stuffed everything inside her overnight bag in a hurry as Julian hovered, frowning at the dingy apartment that had been her temporary home?

She woke up to find the sun streaming into her room. She guessed it was late morning. She had slept like the dead and was still feeling lethargic, but her nausea drove her out of bed. She retched into the toilet bowl miserably. She noted absentmindedly that she was now wearing one of Julian’s shirts, the one he never seemed to wear around the penthouse. She made her way to the kitchen, hoping to find some saltine crackers to counteract the acidity in her stomach.

Julian was already seated by the island counter, a steaming mug of coffee in front of him. He had shaved and his hair was damp from the shower. Imogen could make out faint shadows under his eyes. And he had his shirt on, thank God. He looked up from the newspaper he was reading, his eyes doing a quick scan of her face.

Mrs. Nero was at the stove, cooking. She spared Imogen a quick glance, her smile tentative. Imogen wondered if Julian had informed the housekeeper of their wedding, to explain why she was back in the penthouse.

“Did you sleep well?”

Her answer appeared important, the way his gaze tried to catch hers. As if he could ascertain the truth in her reply from something in her eyes. She was about to nod, but the smell of frying garlic drove her back to the bathroom.

When she emerged from her second episode of vomiting, Julian was inside her room, his eyes alarmed.

“You’re bleeding.”

Imogen followed the direction of his stare. There were some brown spots on the sheets. She twisted her neck and saw that the back bottom of his shirt, the shirt she was wearing, was also stained with dried blood. She had gone to relieve herself sometime at dawn, walking like the living dead itself, that she must have missed it. The bleeding appeared to have become heavier, much more than the tinge of red-brown that had smeared her knickers previously. She suddenly felt cold, like a damp blanket had been wrapped around her. The room began to dim.

“We need to get you to a doctor right now.” Even as he said it, he was already pulling his mobile out of his pocket.

The room tilted and the last thing she remembered was Julian shouting, his hand reaching out to catch her, and the sharp crack of his mobile phone as it fell to the floor.

“
I
never faint
!” Imogen protested crossly.

She and Julian were seated inside a doctor’s private clinic. Across them was the obstetrician, a distinguished-looking man in his sixties. He came recommended by Lukas Martin

“I was there,” he snapped at her, still edgy from the scare that he had been subjected to and was still going through. He then turned to the doctor and in a tone that brooked no argument, added, “She did.”

The obstetrician nodded, maintaining his professional calm despite the obvious tension between them. “Bleeding in the first trimester is quite common. Most often it’s nothing to worry about.”

But there was a but in there. Julian silently prompted the doctor with a raised eyebrow.

“Sometimes they can lead to a miscarriage.”

He saw Imogen grip the armrest of the chair tightly. The light bounced off her platinum wedding band. He had insisted she put it on, after noting that it was absent from her finger, before they made their way to the clinic. If she was photographed, he wanted her wearing it, as he was sure speculations about their visit to a well-known OB-GYN would make the gutter press rounds.

“Is the bleeding because I haven’t−haven’t been sleeping well lately? I might have overdone it a bit at work…” Her fingers twisted the wedding ring in a compulsive action.

Julian was a mass of guilt. He knew that the waitressing job had kept her on her feet until the wee hours of the morning. He was also angry at her for not calling him the second she’d known.

“Fatigue is a common symptom of pregnancy. However, due to your spotting, I am requiring you to be off your feet until I can see you again after a week. If there are any changes or increase in the bleeding, please notify me at once.” The doctor scribbled a prescription for some pills she needed to take.

Julian would tie her to the bed if needed. He would make sure she got all the rest that she required. It wasn’t necessary, however, for the minute they got back to the penthouse, she took to her bed and slept the whole day, just rousing for trips to the bathroom and some soup and crackers for dinner.

Julian worked from home and did tele-conferences for his meetings. Creatus sent a temp to act as his secretary. News had leaked about his Las Vegas wedding, so he issued a statement confirming it. With her pregnancy he had kept mum. Stefan had called, congratulating him, but had failed to hide his shock at his hasty marriage.

Imogen occupied the same guest room she had before she became his wife.
His wife.
The term brought a bitter pang to his chest. They were more like strangers.

Since she was on bed rest, her meals were brought to her room. He had asked her once if they could eat together. She refused, saying the smell of some food made her nauseous. Julian didn’t press her.

Maggie had given him the evil eye when she came to visit. Due to a typhoon, the dig had to be aborted temporarily so she was stuck in L.A. She came to the penthouse carrying several shoppings bags and locked herself in with Imogen, only coming out to eat lunch, and then dinner, with him.

Julian stared at the meal laid out before him morosely. He couldn’t eat anything. Imogen didn’t eat anything, either. He checked the tray a despondent-looking Mrs. Nero carried out of her room.

Maggie, though, ate everything Mrs. Nero had prepared.

Julian sighed and pushed his plate away. Their stand-off wasn’t good for the baby.

And Imogen.

It pained him how wan and thin she looked whenever he checked in on her while she was sleeping.

“Pull yourself together, Julian.”

He realized he had been staring into space and Maggie’s voice, lacking its usual abrasive tone, pulled him back to the present.

“How is she?” Three of the most painful words he had ever uttered. His ignorance revealed how wide the gap between him and his wife had become.

“Why don’t you ask her yourself?” Maggie countered, almost gently.

He nodded distractedly, avoiding his sister’s concerned eyes. “Yes. Yes. I’ll do that.”

Maggie rose from the dinner table and deposited a kiss on the top of his head. “Courage, brother. Walkdens never lacked any of it.” His hand was resting on the edge of the table and as she took her leave, she tapped his signet ring on her way out of the dining area.

He glanced down at the engraved words on his ring, his wedding band adjacent to it.
Non metuam.

Their lighthearted banter from long ago drifted to him like it was yesterday.

“The family motto has been shortened to ‘I shall not fear.' Thank God. No self-respecting duke would be able to hold his head high if word spread around that he was henpecked.”

“I like the unedited version better.”

“You would.”

It seemed Imogen was right
.
He chuckled bitterly.
Non metuam uxor mea.
How apt. How she had reduced him to fearing her, his own wife.

He stared at the ring for a long time, willing it to give him the answers.

I
mogen closed
the tabloid magazine she had been reading, the fifth from the stack Maggie had brought with her. Her best friend told her it was to keep her from expiring from boredom.

But Imogen had noticed a trend. All of the magazines were from the period she had gone “missing.”

“From Delicious to Distraught Duke” one of the articles headlined. Accompanying it was a photo of Julian entering a car, his eyes shielded by dark glasses, his mouth a stern line. The article claimed that the Duke of Blackmoore was desperately trying to locate his live-in girlfriend who had left him after a tiff. “Friends” of the couple who remained “anonymous” scoffed at the idea as “ridiculous” and a “blatant lie.” To “help” the Duke in his search, the media had posted “Imogen sightings”−a series of photos sent in by readers and press alike of shots of women who bore a passing resemblance to her.

Julian had kept his silence throughout the whole thing, but apparently his first time to be absent from playing for his own polo team in the prestigious Argentine Open that took place a week ago was evidence of how “distraught” he really was. Imogen cringed at the circus Julian had been subjected to while she had been gone.

She had never asked about him in her weekly calls to Maggie. It had pained her to even mention his name. Worse, she had been afraid she’d break down and sob the whole story out, and she’d vowed never to do that and create a rift between brother and sister, so she had kept her calls short.

Flashes of the night he found her intruded in her thoughts. She had been appalled at how much weight he had lost that time when he came to the bar. And how haunted he looked. Something began to niggle at the back of her mind. The stunned look on his face at the alley when she puked all over the ground.

The suspicion grew in her mind. Could it be…?

Imogen fired off an SMS. Her phone pinged after several minutes. The response had her catching her breath.