Reclaiming His Pregnant Widow

With the media about to erupt into full bay at his mysterious reappearance any moment, it made no sense to still be hanging around. Not unless he wished to make front-page news … and that had never been Brand’s style.

Clea’s laugh rang out and Brand stilled, his eyebrows jerking together. She looked vivacious and happy—not as if she’d just had a rip-roaring argument with the husband she hadn’t seen for four years. Clearly at ease in the company of power, she’d developed a poise and sophistication she hadn’t possessed four years ago.

His wife had grown up. He’d left a young bride and come back to find a woman. Brand’s gaze dropped to her stomach.

Make that a pregnant woman.

Her father joined the group. Brand’s frown deepened as the senator welcomed Donald Tomlinson with a wide smile. When they’d first met, Clea had told him her father would love him—after all, they had much in common. Donald Tomlinson imported rugs, ceramics, wooden furniture and selected antiquities from Afghanistan, Iraq and Turkey for a string of up-market stores he owned. Clea considered it a miracle they hadn’t already encountered each other.

Brand had known from their first handshake that Donald Tomlinson didn’t care for him. Meeting Clea’s childhood friend had explained why—Harry Hall-Lewis was the man Donald had singled out for his daughter to marry. Ivy League-educated, a successful import-exporter with whom her father had a close business relationship, Harry was affable and easygoing. That Harry’s family could trace their genealogy back to the Mayflower also helped.

An ex-special forces soldier from a rural New Zealand family of no repute could hardly compete, regardless of the reputation for integrity he’d built—or his rapidly growing fortune based on the ever-escalating value of the ancient artifacts he dealt in. Millions meant little to Donald—he had enough of his own. When Clea had chosen a hasty marriage in Las Vegas’s Chapel of Love to her soldier-turned-antiquities-dealer, Donald’s displeasure had become outright enmity.

“Brand … it is you. How wonderful. Where have you been?”

Brand turned his head. Clea’s mother stood beside him, her dark hair swept into a chignon, her black dress timelessly elegant. Diamonds glittered at her throat. He’d only encountered Caroline a handful of times during his marriage to Clea. The only child of a wealthy industrialist, Caroline had walked out on her marriage to Donald when Clea had been ten years old and remarried soon after her divorce had come through. A successful businessman, her new husband was a widower with a daughter—the same age as Clea—and a younger son.

“It’s been a while.” Brand gave her a careful hug. After so long without close human contact it felt strange. “You look beautiful.”

“Flatterer.” Caroline Fraser Tomlinson Gordon hugged him back, before stepping away with a small smile. “You look surprised to see me here. Of course, you should be—I wasn’t invited. I had the sense not to bring my husband, but I wanted to see Cleopatra’s exhibition so I slipped in—the doorman told me I had the same eyes as Cleopatra and never considered refusing me entrance. I’ve been admiring the exhibits. She’s done a magnificent job. I’m so proud of her.” Caroline’s emerald eyes shimmered with emotion.

Omitting to mention that he was also a gate-crasher, Brand said gently, “You ought to have been invited.”

Brand suspected that the estrangement between Clea and her mother hurt Clea more than she’d ever admit. She had always craved family and she needed her mother—even though she was too stubborn to admit it.

“My daughter will never forgive me for leaving them.”

Brand shifted uncomfortably. There was no tactful response to that. Finally, he settled for saying, “She needs you, she just doesn’t know it yet. Give her time.”

At a scuffling sound behind him, he turned his head a fraction. His peripheral vision caught sight of a newsman changing the lens of his camera.

He turned away. Afghanistan, Iraq and other hot spots during his days of active duty had taught him the game. There was no glory in a back-of-the-head view: Cameramen wanted to see the torment in the eyes of their prey.

Caroline said quietly, “Cleopatra must know you’re back?”

“Yes.” Brand’s answer was clipped as he focused on what the cameraman’s next move might be.

His mother-in-law tapped his jacket sleeve. “Brand, you know I’ve never been in her confidence, but I do know she missed you terribly after you … disappeared. The weight that fell off her was evidence enough.”

Her eyes were full of questions. Questions that he couldn’t—wouldn’t—answer. Not yet.

He gestured to where Clea was talking and smiling. “So much that she’s pregnant?”

“Pregnant?” Caroline examined her daughter’s figure. “Cleopatra?”

Brand scanned the crowd. The cameraman had disappeared, but two others were hunched together talking furtively. “Uh-huh.”

“She can’t be!”

He turned his attention back to Clea’s mother and bent forward. “Trust me, she is.”

Caroline had paled. “I didn’t even know she was seeing anyone. But why would Cleopatra tell me? We don’t talk.”

Brand heard the movement beside him, and then a light flashed. He ducked his head and retreated farther behind the pillar. Someone swore softly.

Another movement. Brand tensed. He had no compunction about breaking a lens if a camera was aimed directly at him. Clea, however, might take a dim view of such behavior. It was time for him to leave.

But instead of a cameraman, Caroline peered around the pillar at him, her eyes the same intense green as her daughter’s.

Wondering if she had any idea how close she’d come to triggering the violence and rage that simmered within him, Brand flexed his fists and forced a smile. “I seem to be causing something of a stir—I have to go. The last thing I want is to cause an incident. This is Clea’s evening—it should be a wild success, not a brawl.”

She nodded, and then whispered conspiratorially, “There are two journalists on the other side of the pillar—I’ll stall them. Civility can be very hard to get away from. But, believe me, you and Clea always had something special. Whatever the problems, I’m sure you can get through them.”

As Brand headed out, he wished he shared Caroline’s confidence—and wondered if she’d noticed she’d finally called her daughter Clea.

Of course her bravado didn’t last.

The sight of Brand leaving caused Clea’s hard-won composure to flag. Faced by a flock of beaded and feathered designer ball gowns, ever-circulating trays of champagne and endless curious stares due to Brand’s unexpected return, the last thing Clea wanted to do was party—even if it was to celebrate her success.

She wanted Brand back—the Brand she’d married, the husband she’d adored. To be held in his arms. To curl up against his body. Most of all, she wanted his assurance that he loved her, and that everything was going to be okay …

And she wanted to know where he’d gone … when she would see him again.

But duty called. So she plowed on, talking, laughing, saying all the right things. Refusing to reveal how shaken she’d been by the Brand she’d faced in her office: a dangerous, hard-eyed stranger. Or how her rock-solid confidence in what they’d once shared had been eroded.

An hour later, her father found her, his expression pugnaciously set in what she privately called his bulldog face, causing her inner tension to escalate. Helping herself to a glass of soda from a waiter’s passing tray, Clea glanced surreptitiously over the rim of sparkling bubbles to her father’s barreling approach. What she wouldn’t give to be able to go home and crawl into the bed she’d once shared with the old Brand and examine every moment of the painful reunion with his frigid doppelgänger.

“That bastard’s got gall showing up here after deserting you.”

“Hush, Dad, let’s not make a scene.”

Donald tempered his voice. “The evening is over—people are leaving.”

Clea glanced around. Plenty of onlookers still filled the museum. “So we can leave, too?” She tried to keep her voice light as she linked her arm through her father’s.

In the foyer downstairs, the doorman saw them coming and picked up the handset to call her driver, Smythe, to bring the car around, while the cloak attendant retrieved her wrap. Clea smiled her thanks.

“Did he say where he’s been?” her father asked as they exited through the glass doors.

There was no need to ask who he was referring to. Clea averted her face, not wanting her father—anyone—to read her confusion. She shook her head. “He wouldn’t talk. He’s angry about the baby.”

“You told him about the baby?”

Clea picked her words with care. “I didn’t have to. He guessed that I was pregnant.”

“And he’s far from pleased, I take it. What did you expect?”

Her father had tried to persuade her against having the baby, but Clea’s mind had been made up.

“I told you it was a rash decision, that you shouldn’t do it. But you wouldn’t listen. Now it turns out your obduracy might just save the day.”

“Dad …” Clea’s voice trailed away. Please, please don’t let him say Brand shouldn’t have come back. She wouldn’t be able to bear it. As much as the confrontation with Brand had shaken—shocked—her, the heady euphoria that he was actually alive still flickered under all the pain.

But her father was already saying, “You should not have married the man. It was a mistake. You should’ve married Harry—he’s one of us.”

One of us.

The thing her father had held against Brand all those years ago. He’s not like us.

But from the moment Clea had encountered Brand at an auction, where he was inspecting the coins she’d been sent to bid on, she’d been fascinated. Still a student, her father had arranged a vacation job for her at the museum. She’d been briefed to bid on two Roman coins, and her enthusiasm had bubbled over. Until Brand told her that the coins were fakes—which was why there wasn’t more interest in them.

Tall, handsome and with the kind of raw physical command she’d never encountered, Brand had intrigued Clea. His reasoning had been persuasive, his expertise obvious. In a quandary, Clea had first tried to call the assistant curator, then Alan Daley, and finally her father without any success.

So she’d made the decision not to bid.

Afterward, Brand had offered to buy her lunch but, knowing she had to get back to work and explain her decision, she’d declined. When he’d invited her to dinner instead, Clea had been overjoyed. By the end of the evening she’d been lost. She’d fallen in love with all the desperation of her nineteen-year-old heart.

Donald gave a deep sigh that broke into her reverie. “That man was trouble from the start.”

“How can you say that?” The Lincoln was purring at the curb, but Clea made no move toward it. “Brand saved the museum from buying overpriced fakes the first day I met him.”

“And had you in his bed within a week.” Donald headed for the car.

It wouldn’t be politic to admit that it had taken Brand far less time than that. Instead, Clea followed her father to the car and clambered into the backseat. Once inside, she said instead, “He married me a month later.”

“A hasty affair that wasn’t what you deserved.”

“Dad, it was what I wanted.” She wasn’t in the right frame of mind to hear her father’s favorite, much expounded opinion that Brand had only married her because she’d inherited a sizable sum of money from her maternal grandmother. “I can’t cope with another lecture.” Not tonight.

Tears pricked her eyes as Clea stared out the window, watching the city lights pass in a blur of color.

“Surely you’re not going to cry over him?” Donald snapped. “The man deserted you, had an affair and got himself tangled up in God only knows what kind of mess in Iraq. You need to get rid of him.”

His insensitivity caused her shoulders to stiffen. “I don’t know that for sure.”

“You saw photographs of a young beautiful woman who couldn’t keep her hands off him.” Her father gave a snort of disgust. “What more do you need? Fool yourself all you want, but at some stage you’re going to have to face the truth.”

A pang that could only be jealousy pierced her, adding to the turmoil of her emotions. “Dad, the same investigators also said that Brand had been killed in a crash and that locals had confirmed his body was thrown into a grave. They were clearly wrong about that, too.” But now Brand himself had caused her doubts …

“Girl—” her father placed a hand awkwardly on hers “—I’m so sorry you have to face this, have to relive all the misery.”

She brushed the tears from the corners of her eyes and sniffed. “These are happy tears—Brand’s alive.”

She tried to convince herself that was the truth. After the scene with Brand earlier, she suspected that a rocky road lay ahead.

Donald’s hand tightened over hers and she could feel him studying her. “What was your mother doing at the museum?”

Clea’s head whipped around. “She was there? I didn’t see her.”

“You didn’t invite her?”

“No! I’d never do that without clearing it with you first.”

The grim line of her father’s mouth relaxed a little. “Good. I told her to leave.”

Clea fought to ignore the funny feeling in her stomach caused by the news of her mother’s dismissal. Then she steeled herself. She was no longer the ten-year-old girl her mother had abandoned for someone else’s family.

She’d had enough. She’d had a long day, her feet ached from shoes that were too tight and her head spun from the emotional maelstrom she’d been through—the tussle about marriage with Harry, the shock of Brand’s reappearance and her own inexplicable anger at him. She couldn’t face discussing her mother, too.

Tomorrow it would be different. Better. Brand would’ve had a chance to get over his own shock. They’d talk. She’d explain why the baby was so important to her.

And he’d understand. Wouldn’t he? She stared blindly out into the brightly lit night. For the first time the thought flitted through her mind that he might not.

Despite the warm evening Clea shivered, feeling more alone than since the night her mother had left.

Four

Brand strode into the Museum of Ancient Antiquities the following morning seething with frustration. He took the stairs two at a time. The glass doors guarding the management wing opened to him. No one manned the reception desk. So Brand continued along the corridor until through the glass wall of Clea’s office, he could see her talking on the phone, doodling on a pad, her berry-red lips mouthing words he couldn’t hear.

Suspicion, painful and ugly, shafted him. Was she talking to her lover? The father of her unborn child?

He studied her oblivious profile. Despite the sexy red lip color, he noted the absence of preening gestures and flirtatious mannerisms. Brand relaxed a little.

Not the lover then.

He pushed open the door. It made no sound, yet instantly her eyes tracked to him and tension filled the airy space.

“I have to go,” she murmured into the handset. “Talk to you later, hon.”

A girlfriend. No woman called her lover hon. His distrust appeased, Brand took his time surveying his wife’s new office. Last night he’d been too preoccupied by Clea to take in the wall of bookshelves. At the foot of the shelves, open books were strewn over the woven carpet, revealing that Clea had been after information in a hurry. It was comforting to know that the inquiring, impulsive side of her still existed.

He crossed the room, passing a sleek, modern Le Corbusier chair on his way to the picture window. He looked down at the courtyard full of statues below. Visitors spilled out from the coffee shop onto the square, some perching on stone benches set around the edges of the paved concourse among bronze gods and goddesses.

“Very nice,” he complimented her.

“Thank you. I’ve been here for three years, and I still appreciate it.”

Three years. Not such a new promotion then. It highlighted how much of her life he’d missed. It had been around three years ago that his captors had gotten antsy. Vehicles had arrived at the camp in the dead of night, followed by huddled meetings. He’d heard the arguments, Akam’s voice ringing out above the rest. A few nights later he’d been awakened and bundled into a car, a guard on either side, with Akam, as ringleader of the group, seated beside the driver, an AK-47 slung across his lap. The journey had been tense, but there’d been no checkpoints. No roadblocks. No glimpse of Coalition troops. The location of the new camp had been farther into the desert, the closest settlement an hour’s drive away. In the days that followed, Akam’s temper had been increasingly volatile, and Brand had known that any hope of escape, or rescue, had just grown slimmer. They’d moved camp regularly after that … but there had been one advantage—he’d only been locked up at night while the others slept. During the day he was allowed the freedom of the desert camps. It had saved his sanity.

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