Out in the bedroom, his phone went off, robbing me of those last few minutes of pleasure before we both had to dress.
**********
Damn but it was hot in the desert beyond Dubai! After an hour's drive, we left the limo for a four-hour inspection of an air control facility under construction. We moved from blazing heat to air conditioned interiors to exposed structures then cool, subterranean bunkers.
When we at last returned to the limo after viewing an antennae tower, I felt nauseous and dizzy. Collin wrapped an arm around my shoulder and reached for a bottled water. He broke the seal on the cap then handed it to me.
"Slowly, love."
He didn't need to warn me twice. My stomach lurched at the first swallow and I closed my eyes. The last week had been hard on my body, the early morning bouts of sobbing tying my guts in knots until I had to puke. Now the four hours of moving from hot to cold and back again had me ready to heave in Collin's lap.
I capped the bottle and placed it on the seat next to me. Caressing the side of my face, Collin guided my head onto his shoulder. I inhaled, hoping the deep spices of his cologne would calm the nausea.
No such luck.
"Baby, you're very pale." He kissed the crown of my head. "Are you sure you're okay?"
I looked up, shocked. Was that a note of worry I heard?
"It's nothing," I said, dismissing his concern. "Just the heat."
"Right. One of our team fainted yesterday and he did a full tour in Afghanistan." He rubbed my arm before giving it an apologetic squeeze. "I'm sorry, love. It was selfish to bring you along."
I risked another look at Collin's face, relieved to find him staring out the window, the sides of his mouth pulled down. An all but overwhelming urge to ask what he was thinking bubbled up inside me. I squashed it, remembering my pledge and not wanting to sound like some needy, cliched lover.
Burying my face against his shoulder once more, I blanked my thoughts until my stomach settled and I finally drifted to sleep in his arms.
I slept more than an hour, the time known only by the brief flash of the hotel as I woke, the limo buckling then flipping once to land on its top. I heard Collin's voice issuing orders, his hands on me, pulling me as I blacked out.
When I woke again, we were deep in the basement of the hotel -- a fact I would only learn later. Collin and Kane were with me in a white room, as were a man and woman in blue medical scrubs. A bandage covered the right side of Collin's forehead. Seeing me awake, he reached out, his fingers bloodied. He pulled back before he could touch me and turned to the man in the scrubs.
"Are you certain she's okay?"
The man raised a calming hand. "We'll run a scan to make sure, but I need the blood test back first."
"Blood test?" I tried to push up, but Collin grabbed me by the shoulders and gently forced me to stay on the examination chair. Pain shot through my lower stomach and I curled my arms around my belly. "What happened?"
Kane answered. "Someone tried to kill Mr. Stark."
My head jerked up, pain exploding in my skull until I thought I would pass out. I tried again to stand.
"Mia, sit down..."
Hearing the breathless quality in Collin's voice, I looked to find him staring just below my stomach. I sensed the wetness at the same time my gaze dropped. Blood, read and heavy, soaked through the fabric of my blue skirt. Vision graying, I felt hands seize me.
When I next opened my eyes, more medical staff filled the room. I could see Collin through the open door, his hands shaking from the force with which they gripped the collar of Kane's jacket. His jaw tight, veins popped along Collin's left temple.
"What happened?" I squeaked.
A nurse put her hand on my stomach and shook her head. "The baby--"
The doctor silenced her with a hiss.
Baby?
I looked through the door again to find that Collin had relaxed his hold on Kane. Collin looked at me without an ounce of tenderness in his eyes. Anger, maybe even hate, glowed instead.
He thought I knew? How could he think I knew?
He had taken me only once without covering -- that first night in Dubai when he had been furious with me about Glen. Even that morning in the shower, a thin layer of latex had separated us. I had no symptoms...
My thoughts slowed as I looked back on a week of crying in the morning until I puked.
I shook my head, trying to communicate that I had not suspected. I hadn't lied about this, I hadn't omitted anything. I wanted to tell him that, but couldn't -- not with the way he glared at me. He loathed me. I could see the sentiment burning in his gaze. He looked away, his attention landing sharply on Kane again.
"I want her out. As soon as she can fly." He shook his second in command. "You'll accompany her and a physician from AH or Welcare and a full security team."
"I'm not leaving with someone trying to kill--"
Stark jerked on Kane's jacket until their faces were a hair's width from touching.
"You will," Stark replied, his voice low and dangerous.
I strangled on a plea, the words clogging my throat and robbing me of oxygen until I collapsed into unconsciousness.
Eight hours later, I was on a plane bound for an unknown location. Four months later, I sat in a cube in northern Florida, still a Stark employee, my salary more than doubled, driving a car the company paid for between work and an apartment I lived in rent free. No real job responsibilities and zero contact from the man who placed me there.
For the first few weeks, I told myself over and over that I had misread that look in Stark's eyes as he stood outside the room and grappled with Kane. I lied my way to sleep each night thinking that what I had interpreted as hate and loathing were worry and guilt. I told myself that the only reason he didn't contact me was because he had dropped out of sight the day of the attempted assassination. He could be hurt or dead.
But I could only ignore the fact that there is no fat Cinderella or Sleeping Beauty or Briar Rose. There are just women whom men can love, whom men want to protect and shelter and please. And then there's me.
The truth was slow to sink in. It started with a search through the news archives, building with each photo that showed the women in Stark's life before me, each one slim even if she was just as temporary as I had been. The truth sank deeper, hooking itself in place in my lower intestines when Collin resurfaced in the news six weeks after the attempt on his life. He was not only still alive, but free and able to reach me if only he had the desire to do so.
Knowledge unfurled inside my chest that day like a white flag of surrender and I knew -- whatever the relationship between us had been, it was over.
Thank you!
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