Virgin: Undone by the Billionaire: The Innocent's Dark Seduction / Count Maxime's Virgin / Untamed Billionaire, Undressed Virgin

She took in a sudden breath.

Lia’s own feelings meant nothing, compared to her daughter’s needs. She had to put her child first. And no matter how Roark might hate Lia, if there was a chance he might want to be Ruby’s father, she had no choice.

She had to tell him the truth.

“I hope you don’t mind me speaking to you like this,” Mrs. O’Keefe said, tears sparkling in her kind eyes. “I think of you as the daughter I never had. I don’t want you to make the same mistake I did …”

Slowly Lia rose to her feet.

“Thank you,” she whispered. “You’re right.”

The doorbell chimed. Mrs. O’Keefe cleared her throat awkwardly. “I’ll get the door. It’s likely that new stroller I ordered from the shop.”

Nodding absently, Lia grabbed the phone on the elegant table. She dialed the operator and asked to be transferred to the Cavanaugh Hotel. She waited with her heart in her throat.

“I’m afraid Mr. Navarre checked out an hour ago,” the hotel receptionist said.

Hanging up the phone, Lia felt like crying. She was too late.

“Yes?” Mrs. O’Keefe inquired at the door.

“I’m here to see the countess.”

Roark’s voice! He couldn’t be here—couldn’t be!

With a gasp, Lia dropped the phone from her suddenly numb hands. It clattered on the hardwood floor.

The gray-haired widow looked at him, then glanced back at Lia. “Ah,” she said with a sudden grin. “So you’re what all the fuss is about. You’ll do well, I think. Come in.”

And she held open the door.

He took two steps inside the foyer. He filled Lia’s foyer with masculine energy, his black coat whirling around him as he came inside her house.

“What are you doing here?” Lia whispered. “You said you’d never contact me again. I thought you were gone for good….”

“Goodbye, then!” Mrs. O’Keefe sang as she left, closing the door behind her.

“I didn’t come here for you,” Roark said. He looked at the baby sitting on the expensive carpet in front of the marble fireplace, playing with wooden blocks. “I came for her.”

She sucked in her breath. “How did you find out?”

His jaw was hard as he turned on her savagely.

“Why did you tell the whole world that she’s the count’s baby? Why did you never tell me I had a child?”

Her mouth suddenly went dry. “I wanted to tell you.”

“You’re lying!” he said furiously. “If you’d wanted to tell me, you would have done it!”

“What was I supposed to do, Roark? You said you didn’t want a child! You said you never wanted to be a father! And I hated you. When you left me in Italy, I never wanted to see you again!”

“That was your excuse then. What about yesterday, at the wedding? This morning, when we had breakfast? When you showed me the park? When we made love at the hotel? Why didn’t you tell me then?”

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I should have told you then. I was afraid you’d hate me.”

His dark eyes froze right through her.

“I do hate you.”

He went into the front room and got down on his knees. He handed a block to the baby, who smiled and chattered nonsense syllables, waving the block at him happily. He looked at her. And looked.

Then he picked the baby up in his arms.

“What are you doing?” she cried.

“My plane is waiting to take me to Hawaii and Japan,” he said coolly. “And I don’t trust you.”

“You can’t think of taking her from me!”

He narrowed his eyes and his lips curved into a cold, cruel smile.

“No. You will come, as well. You will travel with me wherever I wish to go. You will remain in my bed until I am finished with you.”

“No,” she gasped. Be in his bed, have her body possessed by a man who hated her? “I’ll never marry you!”

“Marry?” He barked a laugh. “That was when I thought you were an honest woman with a good heart. Now I know you’re nothing more than a beautiful, treacherous liar. You aren’t worthy to be my wife. But you will be my mistress.”

“Why are you acting like this?” she whispered. “You never wanted to be a father. Why are you acting like I kept something precious from you, when we both know that all you’ve ever wanted is your freedom?”

He just drew his lips back into a snarl.

“You will agree to my demands, or I will take you to court. I will fight you for custody with every lawyer I possess.” He gave her a grim smile. “Believe me, you will run out of lawyers long before I will.”

A cold shiver went through her. She looked at her baby in Roark’s arms. Seeing them together, Roark tenderly holding his child, caused a crack in her heart. It was just what she’d always dreamed of.

Then he looked back at Lia, and all tenderness disappeared from his eyes. Instead she saw only hatred.

Hatred—and heat.

“Do you agree to my terms?”

She couldn’t let him win. Not like this. She wasn’t the kind of woman to surrender without a fight.

She lifted her chin. “No.”

“No?” he demanded coldly.

“I won’t travel with you as your mistress. Not with our child living with us. It’s not decent.”

“Decent?” His dark eyes swept through her like a storm. “You’ve never thought of decency before. In the rose garden. In the broom closet. In my hotel suite.”

“That was different.” Tears rose to her eyes, tears she despised as she glared at him. “If Ruby is with us, that changes things. I’m not going to set that kind of example for her, or give her that kind of unsettled home life. It’s marriage or nothing.”

“You’d rather show her the example of selling yourself in marriage without love—not just once, but twice?”

She flinched.

“I will accept your terms, Roark,” she said hoarsely. “I will sleep in your bed. I will follow you around the world. I will give myself up to your demands.” She swallowed. “But only as your wife.”

He stared at her for a long moment. Then he bared his teeth into a smile.

“Agreed.”

He put out his hand.

She reached out to shake on the bargain. The touch of his skin against her fingers sizzled her as he jerked her close.

“Just remember—becoming my wife was your choice,” he whispered in her ear. He reached his other hand to stroke her cheek, looking into her eyes. “It was your mistake.”

Roark married Lia in a drab little affair at city hall that evening. Mrs. O’Keefe held Ruby and acted as one of the witnesses; his assistant, Murakami, acted as the other witness. No family was in attendance. No friends. No flowers. No music.

Lia wore a cream-colored suit she’d pulled hastily out of her closet. Roark didn’t bother to change out of his black shirt and pants. Why should he act like this wedding meant anything to him at all?

He didn’t smile as they were married. He didn’t look at her. He didn’t even kiss her at the end. He just put a plain gold band on her finger as the judge proclaimed them man and wife.

And he would make his wife pay for what she’d done.

They left city hall for the downtown heliport in a Cadillac SUV. His assistant sat in the front passenger seat, next to the driver, with Roark directly behind him. As they discussed the current financial details of the Kauai and Tokyo build sites—the price of steel was going through the roof—Roark couldn’t stop glancing at Ruby, who was in the baby seat next to him.

He had a daughter.

He could still hardly believe it. As Murakami droned on about the rising costs of concrete, a situation that normally would have been of the utmost importance to Roark, he barely paid attention. He couldn’t take his eyes off his baby. She was yawning now, sucking sleepily from a bottle.

There could be no doubt she was his child. Her eyes were as dark as Roark’s, with the same coloring he’d inherited from his Spanish-Canadian father. She looked just like him.

But she also looked like Lia. She had the same full mouth, the bow-shaped lips. She had the same joyful laugh, holding nothing back.

Roark would just have to ignore that. He despised Lia and didn’t want to be reminded of her features in his baby’s face.

He had the strangest feeling in his heart every time he looked at Ruby. He didn’t know if it was love, but he already knew he would die to protect her.

A totally different feeling than he had for his baby’s mother.

In the third row of the SUV sat Lia and the nanny, who seemed like a sensible, trustworthy sort of woman. But Roark would have her references investigated just in case.

He ground his jaw. His instincts were clearly not as sound as he’d once believed.

God, he hated Lia.

When he remembered the pathetic way he’d lowered his guard at the snow-filled park and spoken of how his family died—something he’d never discussed with anyone—his cheeks went hot. He’d even told her about his humiliating upbringing with his grandfather. The way Charles Kane had despised his low-class blood. The way he’d fired the nannies as soon as Roark began to love them. The way he’d tried to toughen Roark up as a boy, stamping out his childish, desperate yearning for his dead family with harsh lessons and cold comfort.

Roark had revealed himself to Lia in a way he’d never done with anyone in his life.

He had laid his soul bare to her.

Now, remembering how he’d been so determined to blow her mind in bed, practically begging her to run away with him, Roark was overwhelmed with anger and shame.

He would enjoy punishing her. Their marriage vows would be the chains he’d use to destroy her. He would make her regret eighteen months of lies.

She had made Roark want her. The thought still made him furious. She’d made him think she was special, a smart, sexy, loving woman different from the rest. She’d almost made him care.

And all along she’d been playing him for a fool.

“Thanks for coming,” he heard Lia whisper behind him.

“It’s no bother,” Mrs. O’Keefe replied softly, settling back noisily against the leather car seat. “I couldn’t let you and wee Ruby fly off into foreign lands without me, now could I?”

He realized the woman saw more of the truth about the relationship between Lia and Roark than she was letting on. She knew something wasn’t right about this marriage, and didn’t want Lia and her baby to face it alone.

For Ruby’s sake, Roark was glad the woman had agreed to leave New York with them. He’d offered to double her salary for the inconvenience. He wanted his child to receive the best of care. He didn’t want her to be separated from her caregiver, as he’d been as a child.

But he disliked the thought of Lia having a friend. He didn’t want her to have any comfort.

He wanted her to suffer.

But not at the cost of Ruby’s happiness.

The chauffeur parked the Escalade outside the Pier 6 heliport, following with their luggage and the baby seat. Murakami stayed behind as Roark’s chief bodyguard, Lander, awaited them on the tarmac and escorted them to the helicopter.

After a seven-minute helicopter ride, they touched down at the small Teterboro Airport and boarded Roark’s private plane. It was comfortable and luxurious. Roark, Lia, Ruby and Mrs. O’Keefe were the only passengers, waited on by three bodyguards, two copilots and two flight attendants, one of whom brought crackers and juice for Ruby as the other offered Lia a glass of champagne before takeoff.

“Congratulations, Mr. Navarre,” the first flight attendant said, then turned to beam at Lia. “And best wishes to you as well, Mrs. Navarre.”

Mrs. Navarre. The name went through Roark’s soul with a shudder.

He had a wife.

A wife he hated.

Lia paled. As she took the champagne flute in her hand, she glanced uneasily at Roark.

He could see the question in her eyes. What did he intend to do with her?

He coldly looked away. Carrying his briefcase, he passed her without a word. He paused only to kiss the top of Ruby’s tousled head, then went to the couch in the back cabin. He didn’t want to see his wife’s beautiful, troubled face.

She was meaningless to him, he told himself fiercely. Meaningless.

And so she would remain until they arrived in Kauai, where the beach house awaited them with a massive master bedroom overlooking the Pacific.

Then she’d learn her place in his life.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

WITHIN an hour of landing on the beautiful Hawaiian paradise of Kauai, Lia knew she’d just arrived in hell.

Warm tropical winds swayed the palm trees above the tarmac. Lia had never been to Hawaii before, but it was lovely. The morning was fresh and bright as the dawn broke over the eastern hills. She took a deep breath, cuddling her baby as she descended the steps from the plane.

Two convertible Jeeps waited for them. Roark approached her, his eyes glittering and bright. For a moment she thought he meant to say something to her, but he only took Ruby from her arms and snapped the sleeping baby into the car seat in the back of the first Jeep.

“Come with us,” he invited Mrs. O’Keefe. “I’m driving this one.”

But he didn’t say a word to Lia.

It was like a stab to her heart. And there was no way she was going to be left in the second car with the bodyguards and other staff. Raising her chin, she defiantly climbed into the back seat of Roark’s Jeep, next to Ruby. She waited for him to insult her or tell her to leave.

He did something worse.

He ignored her. As if she wasn’t there. As if she was a ghost.

Mrs. O’Keefe climbed into the front passenger seat. With a smile at her, Roark started the car and drove north on the narrow highway that twisted along the coast. The intense, fierce, demanding billionaire looked so different in this light. He wore a white T-shirt that revealed the hard-muscled shape of his body, casual jeans and sandals.

Lia had changed clothes, as well, into a tiny knit halter dress and high-heeled sandals that she’d brought in her suitcase, that she’d foolishly hoped might please him. But he hadn’t even looked at her.

He was now speaking courteously to Mrs. O’Keefe, pointing out the sights as they traveled through quaint little surfing towns clinging to the edges of white sand beaches and rocky cliffs.

Mrs. O’Keefe glanced back at Lia several times, as if struggling to make sense of the obvious tension between the newly married couple. Lia shook her head with a smile she didn’t feel, then tucked back her wind-tossed hair behind her ear as she stared out at the Pacific Ocean.

They passed resorts, pineapple stands and tiny Hawaiian villages. As they traveled north, the land became more lushly green. The coastline became more wild.

Wild and rocky like Lia’s breaking heart.

Mrs. O’Keefe eventually fell asleep, lulled by the roar of the sea and the hum of the Jeep’s engine. Roark drove silently, looking straight ahead.

Lia stared at the back of his head. Tears welled in her eyes once again. She yearned for him to glance at her in the mirror. To yell at her. To insult her. Anything.

Anything but ignore her.

By the time they arrived at the large estate an hour later, Lia’s heart had turned to stone in her chest. The caravan pulled through a gate, past a guardhouse into a private lane that led to a gorgeous estate. She saw an enormous, palatial beach house. She saw koi ponds edging a wraparound lanai and elegant, slender palm trees waving in the clear blue sky.

Roark stopped the Jeep in front of the beach house. He turned off the engine and walked around the other side of the truck, passing by Lia without a single glance.

He opened the front passenger door. “Mrs. O’Keefe,” he whispered, shaking her gently on the shoulder. “Wake up. We’re here.”

The Irishwoman woke up and nearly gasped when she saw the tropical estate. “It’s beautiful! This is your home?”

“For a few days.” Roark unbuckled his sleeping baby from the car seat and tenderly took her in his arms, holding her against his strong chest.

Lia’s heart ached with the vision of seeing their daughter held so lovingly in Roark’s arms. How long had she yearned for just this moment? Since she’d found out she was pregnant, she’d wished she could give her daughter a father. A home.

And now, seeing their baby held this way by Roark made her want to weep. It was the fulfillment of one dream.

But never once had Lia thought if that dream came true, another cherished dream would die.

She’d been married twice. Her first husband had wed her out of obligation; her second husband had wed her to punish her. She would never know what it felt like to really love a man and be loved by him in return.

One dream gained; the other gone forever.

Or was it?

Was there any way he might someday forgive her? Any way to earn back his trust?

“The housekeeper will show you to your room,” Roark said to Mrs. O’Keefe.

“Shall I put the baby to bed, Mr. Navarre?” the nanny replied. “She hardly got any sleep on the plane …”

He shook his head, then glanced down at his sleeping daughter with a smile. “I’ll put her to bed. I’ve never gotten the chance to do it before.”

Lia could hear the blame in his voice, even though he didn’t look at her.

He greeted the waiting housekeeper and staff with a few brief words, then passed them through the sliding door.

Leaving Lia behind without a single glance or word.

A hard lump formed in her throat as she slowly followed her husband and child inside. She really was starting to question her own existence, so she nearly jumped when the housekeeper greeted her, “Aloha, Mrs. Navarre.”

“Aloha,” Lia sighed, looking around her in amazement. “This place is beautiful. I didn’t even know that Roark had a home in Hawaii.”

The housekeeper cleared her throat. “Actually, this vacation house belongs to Paolo Caretti. They’re friends. He loaned it to Mr. Navarre.”

“Oh.” Of course. Of course this house didn’t belong to Roark. Even a place as incredible as this couldn’t tempt Roark to want to settle down. Her husband only liked to create buildings that he sold to others. Then he always moved on.

And whatever she might wish, he probably wouldn’t stick around long enough to raise Ruby, either. Even if he loved his daughter, he would still leave her. Because that’s just how a man like Roark lived—with no commitments. Neither to places nor to people.

She squared her shoulders and took a deep breath. Perhaps it was a good thing to remind herself of that, then. She’d already started to fall for him hard. She’d felt her heart break at the stark pain in his eyes when he’d spoken about losing his family. She’d felt her body explode with joy when he’d made love to her at the hotel penthouse.

So having him ignore her was a kind of gift, wasn’t it? It would keep her from loving him. Wouldn’t it?

She went inside the front door and saw a man-made waterfall that flowed into an indoor pond. Glancing down at the pond, she saw orange and gold fish swimming beneath the water. She walked though the Japanese-influenced design and modern architecture, crossing the pyinkado hardwood floors and through the shoji sliding doors.

She followed the sound of his footsteps through the cool, darkened house. She stopped in the doorway of a nursery and watched as he carefully set their sleeping baby down in a sleek, simple crib, still holding her cuddly blanket and wearing her soft knit clothing set.

“Do you need any help?” she whispered, because she couldn’t bear the silence any longer.

“No.” He spoke without looking at her. “Your room is down the hall. I’ll show you.”

After hours and hours of silence, he’d finally acknowledged her presence! That was something, wasn’t it? In spite of everything, she felt a tiny flame of hope in her heart as she followed him down the hallway.

He pushed open the sliding doors and revealed a large bedroom with a balcony overlooking the private beach. Sunlight sparkled over the bright blue Pacific like waves of diamonds over sapphires.

“It’s beautiful here,” she said.

“Yes.”

She felt him put his hands on her shoulders.

Questions trembled on her lips. Roark, can you forgive me? Can you change your wandering soul and stay with us?

But she didn’t dare ask the questions because she feared his answers. She closed her eyes as a breeze blew in from Hanalei Bay, warm against her skin. His body pressed against her back.

“It’s time for bed,” he said in a low voice.

The intent in his voice was unmistakable. Was it possible that he’d realized why she’d kept Ruby a secret and forgiven her? That he wanted and desired her as he had in New York—with a simple fierce longing that had led him to ask her to travel with him around the world?

Roark turned her around in his arms and she saw the harsh truth in his dark eyes.

No.

He still hated her. But that wasn’t going to stop him from taking her body. He intended to coldly possess her.

And as he lowered his head to claim her lips in a fierce, bruising kiss, God help her but she couldn’t deny him what he wanted. The heat and force of his embrace overwhelmed her senses. As he stroked her body, untying the back of her halter dress and dropping it to the floor, her longing was so sharp it edged between pleasure and pain.

He lowered her to the enormous bed. He looked down at her. He pulled off his jeans and silk boxers. She heard the roar and crash of the surf outside their open window, the warm breeze blowing in the hibiscus-scented air.

Then he possessed her roughly, without tenderness. But as she gasped with the joyful force of her pleasure, she could have sworn she heard him whisper her name as if it was torn from deep within his soul.

They settled into a pattern of sorts over the next four days.

Busy with work, overseeing the extensive remodel and expansion of a luxury resort on Hanalei Beach, Roark ignored her during daylight hours.

In the evenings he would come home for an elegant dinner prepared by the mansion’s chef. He spoke courteously with the staff and pleasantly with Mrs. O’Keefe. His handsome dark features glowed as he played with Ruby and read her a story before putting her to bed. But it was as if Lia didn’t exist.

At least not until dusk.

She existed only to pleasure him in the dark. And every night it was the same. No tenderness. No words. Just a fiercely hot possession taken by an unloving lover.

Roark came home early one afternoon, and as usual it was as if Lia were invisible. Lia watched him play with the baby on the private white sand beach, helping Ruby make a sand castle. When it grew too hot, he cradled the baby against his tanned, naked chest and carried her into the ocean to feel the water against her skin.

For a moment, the baby looked nervous and glanced back at Lia, as if considering whether to cry and reach her arms for her mother.

“You’re all right, little one,” her father said to her softly. “You’re safe with me.”

Ruby looked up at him, and her expression changed. She didn’t cry for her mother after all. Instead, she clung to Roark, giggling as her toes splashed in the water.

No one could resist Roark Navarre for long.

Watching them, Lia, sitting alone on the beach in the perfect sunshine of a Hawaiian day, felt her heart break a little more.

He was punishing Lia. Cruelly. Deliberately taunting her with what she’d never have.

And what she was starting to realize that she desperately wanted.

His attention.

His affection.

His love.

Lia tried to tell herself that she didn’t care. The next day she went on a catamaran with Mrs. O’Keefe and Ruby, circling the island to see the sharp black cliffs of Na Pali, known as the Forbidden Coast. As the crew set up fresh pineapples, papaya and mango with chocolate croissants and a full breakfast, Lia sat with Ruby, who was wearing a baby-size life jacket. She stared out at the ocean.