The tycoon bride

Chapter six

      When she did eventually resurface, it was to find herself lying in a small side room with her wrist encased in its new plaster cast and secure by a sling. They had left her fingers and thumb free at least, she noticed  not that she felt overwhelmed with gratitude for that because she knew she still wasn't going to be able to handle a baby. 

       What did concern her was that it was going to take up to eight weeks to mend. 

        Eight weeks........  

          Sighing heavily, she closed her eyes and tried to pretend that this was all a bad dream. 

          " Worrying already? " a deep voice dryly intruded. 

          Melony's eyes flicked open, something disturbing close to pleasure feathering across her skin as a tall dark figure loomed up in front of her in the very disturbing form of aunt Laura's hot shot tycoon banker. 

        "How are you feeling? " he enquired politely. 

         "Dopey, " she replied, with a shy little grimace. 

         His dark head nodded in understanding." Give yourself time to recover a little from the anaesthesia, "he advised. "Then if you feel up to it they said you can go home".

         Home..... That sounded good. So good in fact that she made herself sit up and slide her feet to the ground. It was then she realised what poor state her clothes were in. Her Jean were scored with with distant tar from the road and had blouse had manage to lose half of its buttons. She made a half hearted attempt to tidy herself. But it was difficult to look pin neat after the kind of day that she had, she decided heavily. 

         "Where is Melanie? " she asked sharply, unable to believe she had been so irresponsible as not to give the poor baby a single thought until now. 

        For the first time today, he suddenly looked cross. "I would have expected by now that you would trust me to ensure your child is perfectly safe and well taken care of, " he clipped out impatiently.

       "Why?" she immediately challenge. "Because my aunt works for you? "

        Something made his broad shoulders flex in sudden tension, though what made them do it Melony had no idea, but she felt her own tension rise in response to it. 

         "Just because you were gracious enough to pick me up and dust me off, then condescended to accompany me here instead of going off to  off to Milan, that does not automatically win trust, you know, "she pointed out, coming upright on decidedly shaky legs. 

         "Madrid, " he corrected her absently as if it really mattered! 

           "I don't know you from Adam, for all I know you may be one of those  weirdos that prey on innocent young females in vulnerable situations!"

            A wild thing to say, a terrible thing to say considering what he had done for her today. Watching the way his elegant frame stiffened in affront. 

           But as she opened her mouth to apologise he beat her to it by retaliating in kind. 

            "Young you may be, "he grimly conceded, "what are you, after all, not much then eighteen? And vulnerable you certainly are at the moment, one only has to look at your face to know that a relatively minor accident was not enough to cause quite that amount of fatigue in one so young. But innocent? "he questioned with cutting cynicism. "One cannot be innocent and give birth to a child, miss stenson. It is, believe me, a physical impossibility."

              Two things hit her simultaneously as she stood there absorbing all of that. One was the obvious fact that he had got her age wrong. And the other was his mistakes belief that Melanie was her daughter!

               Had aunt Laura not bothered to explain anything to him? She wondered. And who the hell did he think he was, standing in judgement over her, anyway? 

                " I am not eighteen—I am twenty one! "she corrected him angrily. "And Melanie is not my daughter  she is my sister! Our mother died, you see, just two weeks after giving birth. And if you hadn't been so quick to send my aunt off to do whatever business you felt was more important to her than we are, "she railed on, regardless of the clear fact that she had already managed to turn him to stone, "then maybe she would have had the chance to explain all of this to you, so you don't have to stand here insulting me! And my innocent or lack of it is none of your damned business, "she tagged on for good measure.