A Pregnancy Scandal (9 page)

She'd ignored it then. But couldn't have in this moment for a million dollars. Her emotions were fully engaged in this relationship, despite her best effort to stick with what was logical, and she wanted things, so many things. Things she didn't know how to express. Things that scared her because she'd been convinced none of them were real.

Right now, all of them were oh so real.

She couldn't let go of Phillip. Didn't want to let go. But she should.

None of this internal catch-22 should have been happening just because they'd had sex. Sex had been part of the agreement. They were married; of course they were going to take care of each other's needs.

The reality? Not the nice, safe marital bed she'd imagined. Actually, nothing about her marriage had gone like she'd thought it would. The confusion and swirl of uncertainty nearly overwhelmed her, and all she wanted to do to soothe it was cling to Phillip. The author of her alarm. What was she supposed to do with that?

For his part, he seemed sated and content to lie there murmuring lovely things about round two in her ear as he stroked her hair. Maybe he was onto something. There was no cause for panic. She could stay focused on how good they made each other feel and forget about stuff she couldn't explain.

Her marriage would work because they'd both agreed to keep emotions out of it. The rules were there for a reason. Rules kept you from getting hurt and from hurting other people. Rules kept the subject of divorce at bay.

Besides, Phillip didn't believe in second chances. He'd married the great love of his life already, and there was no room for Alex in his heart. If only... No. That was the opening phrase of a path straight to madness.

But as she lay in Phillip's arms, cradled by the husband she'd never planned to have, pregnant with the babies she'd never imagined being gifted with, her heart started filling in the blank without her permission.

* * *

The Back to Basics Plan might be the best one Phillip had ever devised.

When sunlight filtered through the drawn curtains, he'd already been awake for a while, just listening to Alex breathe. Even that was a turn-on.

If only he could wake her up with a kiss and dive in again. But he resisted. Barely. She needed her sleep, especially since she'd been working until ten o'clock. The woman needed a good spanking. Among other things. His imagination got busy thinking up additional wicked items for that list.

And now he had an erection the size of the Senate chambers. Where he should currently be but wasn't because he'd flown home on a whim to have it out with his wife about her bad habits. Guess he'd skipped over that confrontation in favor of something much more necessary.

His marriage was on much better ground than it had been. Fortunately. Some things were worth the sacrifice, and Alex, the mother of his twins, definitely was. He sent Linda a text message, begging her to cover for him at Capitol Hill, and tossed his phone back on the nightstand. On Silent.

The government could do without a senator for one day.

Alex sighed and rolled over, facing him. Her eyes were still closed, her body relaxed in sleep. Even in the dim light of the rising sun, he could see the line of her hip and the length of her legs as they stretched toward the footboard.

Gina had always slept curled in a ball, one hand over her face, as if to ward off the darkness. Since she'd died, he sometimes woke up in the middle of the night and, in that half second of semiconsciousness, could feel Gina's presence in the bed. It was always so real he'd have a moment of panic when he couldn't find her.

And then reality would wash over him with biting, bitter coldness. She was gone. Irrevocably. In those moments, it felt like his heart had been clawed from his chest and buried with her.

A part of him wondered why he didn't bring home a new woman every night in an attempt to ward off such a visceral nighttime experience. But he couldn't. He hadn't let other women into his bed except very briefly, and then he always escorted them home after. Alex was the first to still be there in the morning.

He'd put off sleeping with her overnight, hoping to assuage the guilt before it affected the friendship they were developing, but he'd known marrying Alex meant she'd eventually fill the empty space.

And now that it had happened...it was so much better than he'd imagined. Better than he'd planned to allow. His chest hurt with the conflict waging an all-out war inside. He wanted to embrace what he had with Alex, and what it might become, but how could he? It was so disloyal to Gina he could hardly breathe.

Alex blinked awake and smiled. “You owe me. I never got tea or a massage last night.”

That pulled a laugh from him in spite of all the turmoil seething under his skin. “And here I thought what I did give you made up for losing out on those.”

Nodding, her smile widened. “Mmm, yes. Good point. I'll give you a pass on both.”

All at once, she stretched one arm over her head and the sheet slipped down. One rosy nipple popped free of the covers, drawing his eye. Her breasts had grown fuller, lusher since the party and he obviously hadn't paid enough attention to them last night because his mouth started watering as he pondered tasting them again.

He snaked an arm out and gathered her against him in one motion. Sex made sense. It was a release and then over. No disloyal emotional commitment involved.

“Oh, no,” he said smoothly over her squeal. “You're far too quick to forgive. I promised you a massage. And tea. But we'll get to the tea later.”

Her gaze filled with heat instantly, her eyelids dropping a touch as she tangled her legs with his, aligning their hips to bring her dampness flush with his hard-on. Yes, that would do nicely. Last night, he'd been so focused on her pleasure that he'd ignored his own needs.

This morning, he'd sate himself. As soon as he made sure the coast was clear.

He bent his head and nuzzled her ear. “You're feeling okay this morning?”

“Very okay,” she purred and fused her lips to his, drawing him into a kiss that spiraled out of control in a heartbeat.

He groaned as her skin ignited his. He didn't remember her being this way before they'd got married. Hot, sure. Willing, absolutely. But this was different, an urgency he could barely keep up with. Though he'd give it the college try.

Tearing his mouth from hers, he treated himself to those gorgeous breasts, massaging them with his tongue as promised. But she arched against his mouth, moaning with little sighs that drove him crazy, and then got her hips in on the action, writhing against him.

One small shift of his hips and they joined.

It was insanely perfect. Beautiful. They fit together better than anything he could have imagined and he reveled in it for a moment, too overcome to break the spell. Alex was in his arms, hair spread over his pillow, and she was so much more than the wife he'd thought he needed, he could hardly reconcile it all.

With a sound, she rolled her hips, taking her own pleasure, apparently too impatient with his sightseeing to wait. He let her take control despite starting out this jaunt with his own pleasure in mind because in the end, they both won.

Far too quickly, she had them both gasping through a mutual, explosive orgasm. It took him by surprise, engulfing him, which made it that much more powerful.

He gathered her up and held her tight, loath to let go. After all, sex was the only normal part of their relationship. Why not spend as much time in bed as possible? Here he could pretend nothing had changed in their relationship and that the Back to Basics Plan was still about making sure he was included in doctor's appointments from now on.

He knew deep down that was a lie. But he couldn't deal with the truth.

“I have to go to work. It's Friday,” she reminded him, though she didn't sound too thrilled about it. She sighed and pushed at his arms with very little strength. He didn't let go.

“Call in sick.” He kissed her temple. “You're allowed to take time off, especially since you've probably already worked sixty hours this week.”

She scowled. “I'm not an hourly employee. I never monitor my time like that. Fyra is my company that I built alongside my friends. I like my job.”

“Okay.” He held up his hands in mock surrender despite feeling anything but conciliatory. Now was not the time to push, obviously, even though part of the reason he'd come home a day early was to make sure she was taking care of herself. And not working too much.

So he'd let her think she'd won that round and help her climb from bed. As she padded across the room toward the bathroom, he called out, “I'll come by this morning and we can catch up on the FDA status.”

She glanced over her shoulder. “Sure. I have an opening at eleven.”

Excellent. That gave him time to devise a plan to get her out of the office for lunch. And if he played his cards right, she wouldn't be going back until Monday.

His wife needed rest and relaxation. It was his job to make sure she got that. The other stuff going on in their relationship could be ignored if he put his mind to it.

Eight

M
elinda, Fyra's receptionist, smiled as Phillip strode through the glass doors of Alex's company.

“Mr. Edgewood, always a pleasure. I didn't know you were in town.”

“Short notice,” he allowed easily. “Alex penciled me in at eleven.”

Melinda glanced at her computer screen, the corners of her mouth tilting down. “Oh, she must have gotten the time wrong. She's in a meeting with the people who run our accounting software.”

“No problem.” Phillip pasted on his Capitol Hill smile, the one he reserved for lobbyists and the media. “I'll wait in her office.”

Cooling his heels in Alex's office gave Phillip plenty of time to think. And the FDA approval process didn't cross his mind once. There was some movement on that front, but concern for the health of his wife and babies trumped government bureaucracy. By the time said wife strolled through the door forty-five minutes later, he had his strategy laid out for how he would get her out of this place.

“Great timing,” he said pleasantly as she eyed him warily. “I have reservations at the Crescent for lunch. We'll eat and talk about the status of the FDA application, and then we've been invited to the new children's hospital ribbon cutting this afternoon. We have just enough time to run by the house so you can change.”

“Hello to you, too,” she said with obvious sarcasm. “I have a protein bar for lunch that I brought from home and three meetings this afternoon. The ribbon cutting sounds great, but today is impossible.”

Actually, he'd already convinced Melinda to rearrange Alex's schedule, and it had been far too easy to sway the receptionist to his way of thinking—namely that Alex needed the break—which told him his wife was definitely working entirely too much. But she clearly hadn't glanced at her calendar yet in order to notice her clear afternoon.

“We had an appointment that you blew off. You owe me.” He raised his brows, driving the point home. He wasn't above layering on some guilt if it got her out of the office.

She sighed. “You're right. The meeting with the software people was critical since it's nearly quarter end, but I could have scheduled it another time. I didn't think you'd mind and took advantage of our relationship.”

Well, that was laying it on a bit thick, but it worked in his favor, so he bit his tongue. “It's okay. I forgive you. As long as you agree to go to the ribbon cutting with me. That's one of the reasons we got married, right? So we could do things like that together.”

“I'll get my purse.”

Victory, Phillip. She even let Randy drive and settled into the town car without a peep about leaving her own car in the Fyra parking lot. There was a brief scuffle over Alex changing clothes, but Phillip smoothed over it with the very well-made point that the Crescent Hotel's restaurant had a strict dress code.

Once at home, Alex scowled and took the green Ralph Lauren from Phillip's outstretched hand. “I've never even seen this dress before.”

“I bought it for you.” Phillip twirled his finger in a get-on-with-it motion. “I'm dying to see it on you. It's the right size, isn't it?”

That must have been the correct way to play it because Alex threw it on the bed so she could slip off her jeans. A bonus Phillip hadn't expected—he was going to get to watch his wife dress.

As she slithered out of her shirt, his whole body reacted favorably to the sight of lush woman in nothing but a bra and panties. He thought seriously about blowing off his own plans for the day. What was wrong with playing hooky entirely from senator duties? When the mayor had called about the ribbon cutting, it had seemed like a perfect solution to Phillip's problem with Alex. She needed a break; the ribbon cutting was nothing more than a big party where he and his wife would be the guests of honor. It was a low-key event and he got to spend time with Alex. Win-win.

But then she pulled the dress over her head, and as it settled down around her breasts and hips, she twirled and struck a pose. “What do you think?”

His lungs felt like an elephant had just sat on them because he couldn't breathe. The brown fleck in her eye, the one that marked her so uniquely, stood out against the grass-green dress, and the hue complemented her pregnancy glow with unexpected flawlessness. She pulled the ponytail holder from her hair, letting it tumble down her back in a mass of loose waves.

“Gorgeous,” he murmured. “We have to get out of here now before I undo all that.”

She shot him a smug smile. “That good? You should buy me more clothes.”

“I plan to,” he growled. Lingerie, tiny silk robes, the works. “Later. Let's go eat before I lose my mind.”

Laughing, she led the way to the car, and somehow, that had broken the mood, on her end at least. She chatted on the way to the restaurant, asking him questions about the FDA application. Since he'd been the one to bring it up—even though it had been a ploy to get himself into her office, so he could extract her—he obliged her with a status report, explaining that the FDA had scheduled a hearing a week from Monday.

It was a small measure of progress, he told her, but his mind wasn't on anything other than how quickly they could get through lunch and the party so he could be alone with his wife again.

Lunch was nearly as torturous.

If he'd have known buying Alex a dress would be so affecting, he might have picked something else. When he'd seen it in the shop window he hadn't hesitated, had just walked inside and had it shipped home. George had signed for the package and had the dress hung up in Alex's closet.

That was how things should work. Buy your wife a gift, and she wears it. Simple. It was anything but. Somehow the act of clothing her constantly reminded him of the act of unclothing her. He wanted to strip her out of the dress with his own two hands and watch as her luscious skin was revealed inch by inch. He wanted to kiss her and watch her face as he pushed into her again and again.

The dress was too distracting. His wife was too distracting.

Alex laughed at something he said, her face lighting up, and he changed his mind. No. He needed to buy ten more dresses exactly like it. What was wrong with wanting his wife? Perfectly normal.

It just didn't feel normal or friendly or partner-y or whatever they were doing. It felt like...
more
.

And that was dangerous to his careful sense of propriety about their relationship. How could he stay true to Gina if he let himself feel all these
things
for his new wife?

He risked putting his hand against her back as they left the Crescent, guiding her toward the car as Randy sailed to the curb and stopped smoothly in the valet lane. Not because she needed help walking but because he wanted to touch her. But she ducked into the car too fast and he missed the feel of fabric stretched over her body.

The hospital parking lot was a madhouse, so Randy dropped them off in a side lot. They had to walk around to the front where the ribbon-cutting ceremony would be held, which gave Phillip exactly the opportunity he was looking for to put his arm around Alex again.

Throngs of people milled about in the clearing near the entrance. A scarlet ribbon blocked the sliding glass doors, emblazoned with Wharton Children's Hospital. Ceremonial shears the size of his desk stood on end against one of the posts, waiting for the hospital board and guest of honor.

Phillip had donated a lot of money to the hospital building fund and he was glad his schedule had allowed him to participate. Or rather, he was glad his wife's stubbornness had reared its head at the time that it had.

“There are a lot of people here,” Alex muttered into his ear, leaning into his embrace a little deeper. A sure indicator that she was nervous.

“You'll be fine,” he assured her with a light kiss to her temple that drew a small smile from her. Something pulled tight in his chest as she lifted her chin a touch to prolong the contact of his lips on her face. Such a small, brief moment. Why did it feel so massive?

A flash went off in his peripheral vision. Odds were good that the press had just captured that moment for all posterity. That should be a good thing. That was what they were here for. To schmooze and give photo ops, drum up support for Phillip's name and platform. All press was good press.

Except this time, it was intrusive. That moment with his wife hadn't been for public consumption and it infuriated him to have it tarnished. But his life was not his own, and neither was hers.

“Come on.” He led her to the knot of suits near the entrance, most of whom comprised the hospital board.

He introduced Alex around and she shook hands demurely, opting to keep her comments minimal and largely of the noncommittal variety. Good. She was learning. Something pulled inside his chest again and he rubbed it with the flat of his hand. What the hell was going on in there?

The ceremony began and the board president took the stage to say a few words about the financial generosity of the Wharton family for whom the hospital was named and then thanked a few local businessmen who had also donated money, including Phillip.

“I didn't know you'd given money,” Alex whispered and her breath warmed his ear. “This is a great cause. I'm proud to be the plus one standing next to you. Why didn't you tell me?”

“It never came up,” he said, suddenly uncomfortable with the direction of the conversation. He'd inherited a vast amount of wealth. So what? “It's not a big deal. I give money to lots of stuff.”

But the admiration and pride shining from her eyes said she thought it
was
a big deal and that sharpened the strange ache in his chest. He carried it with him as the president of the hospital board called Phillip up to help him, along with four other board members, cut the ribbon. They posed for pictures and then cut as one group. Just like he'd done a dozen times before, except never with Alex watching him while she wore a dress he'd selected and a smile he'd elicited through a deed she found heroic.

The mayor's wife approached Alex and he was too far away to hear the conversation, but they shook hands, then chatted for a moment. The mayor's wife kept smiling and even laughed at one point. Not once did she get that bemused, cockeyed look on her face that so commonly appeared on people's faces after two seconds in his wife's company.

When Phillip finally sprang free of his duties, he cornered Alex. “What did the mayor's wife say to you?”

“That she had naked pictures of Channing Tatum on her phone and did I want to see them?” Alex snorted as he raised a brow. “What do you think she said? She introduced herself and apologized for missing the wedding.”

Okay, he'd probably deserved that. “She seemed charmed. That's good.”

“I'm trying, Phillip. Like we talked about. I want to be an asset to you or I wouldn't be here.” Alex folded her hands in front of her, clearly more poised than he would have expected, and even that sat funny on his nerves.

A beep from Alex's handbag interrupted and she fished out her phone, read the message and glanced up to meet his gaze, her expression clouding. “The problem with our accounting software just got worse. The vendor is on-site trying to help and they need my guidance. Sorry. I have to cut this afternoon short.”

Disappointment flooded the ache in his chest, drowning it thoroughly. “Fyra can survive without you until Monday. I need you by my side.”

Actually, he needed her for a whole lot more than that. The reality of it froze his tongue. He could do a ribbon cutting without her. He'd been solo for two years with no problem.

But that wasn't the issue. He'd wanted to go home with her after this. Lock the bedroom door and forget about the outside world. Just spend his weekend reveling in her body, her smile, the way she made him feel.

That wasn't what was supposed to be happening in their relationship. When had Alex become so critical and necessary?

Panic pounded in his breastbone and melded with disappointment he absolutely should not be feeling.

“Well, I can't stay. This is
your
job.” She waved curtly at the milling ribbon-cutting attendees. “Not mine. I have to go resolve these issues or Fyra's quarter-end filing will be late.”

He shrugged, hoping it had come off as nonchalant. “Your company isn't publicly traded. It's not like your stock will tank if you don't produce a financial statement.”

Alex went still. “What's that supposed to mean? Because Fyra's a private company, I shouldn't worry about a little thing like quarterly numbers? I'm talking about
tax
filing. That's not optional unless you know of some IRS loophole I've been ignorant of all this time.”

Arms crossed, she stared him down, and yeah, he heard himself acting like an ass but couldn't physically stop himself. Not with all the panic still racing through his veins over when and how Alex had become someone he didn't like being separated from. “You're working too hard. It's not good for the babies. Maybe you should think about taking a leave of absence. Think about that instead of your numbers.”

“What are you saying?” she whispered. “That it's not okay with you if I work simply because I'm pregnant? That was never part of our deal.”

“Neither were twins, Alex.” His voice rose too loudly for his own comfort, so he pulled her to a more private area and tried to reel in his temper because none of this was about her working. It had everything to do with making sure she knew this marriage was about the babies. Nothing more. “No second chances. If you harm the babies through your own selfishness, how will that sit with you?”

That had been over the line. He started to apologize but she cut him off.

“Is that how you think of my career? As being selfish?”

Stricken, her eyes went wide and filled with unshed tears. The tears cooled his temper instantly. He'd hurt her with his asinine comments and inability to have a conversation simply because she'd dug too far under his skin. Which was his fault, not hers.