One Night Heir
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One Night Heir
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“Nana called before I skimmed the results.”
“One would think on something so important, one might do more than skim.” His speech only grew so formal when he was very annoyed.
What did he have to be angry about?
“I’ve been healthy since my appendicitis at sixteen.”
“The surgery to keep you alive left your fallopian tubes compromised,” Maks said with the air of a man who did not like having to explain himself.
Compromised fallopian tubes? What the heck did that mean?
Unable to stand the false sense of intimacy their situation provided once second longer, she jumped out of the bed. Grabbing her robe, she yanked it on so hard she wouldn’t have been surprised if the sleeve ripped right off.
Gillian stepped back from the bed, putting as much distance as possible between herself and Maks while staying in the same room. “What are you talking about?”
Once again, Maks looked pained. “The likelihood of you getting pregnant is very low.”
“What about fertility treatments?” Or had he not even considered them?
She was defective and therefore not worthy to be his bride. Oh, God. The silent prayer was filled with anguish, but received no heavenly reply.
Last night had not been about hunger or passion. It had been about saying good-bye. Everything she’d taken to mean they belonged together was in fact supposed to indicate the opposite.
“Fertility treatment could be an option for you with someone else,” he said, like he was offering her good news.
“But not you.”
“Marrying you knowing we would have to use them would not be an intelligent or well thought out move on the part of our House.”
“I would not be marrying your House,” she practically shouted.
She wouldn’t be marrying anyone. Pain at that realization nearly took her to her knees.
What all this talk meant was that she was losing Maks.
“That is not true. I am a prince who will one day be king. I was born to a burden of duty none but elected officials in country can begin to understand. And even they live in their roles only temporarily whereas I will never know a day when my small country does not have to come first and foremost in my thinking.”
She knew that. One of the few truly ruling monarchies left in the world, as Crown Prince of Volyarus, Maks’s life was not his own. But his choices were.
“You do not love me.” It was the only thing that really mattered and incidentally made absolute sense of his unwillingness to pursue fertility options.
He liked her, he desired her, he might even be as sad as he appeared at first over breaking up with her, but he did not love her.
“Love is not an emotion I have the freedom or inclination to pursue.”
“Love either is, or is not. You don’t have to pursue it.” She’d learned as a small child, no matter how hard you tried, you could not make someone love you.
No. Love could not be forced. Nor could it be denied. Though she would give up her next visit with her grandparents and any hope of ever seeing either of her biological parents again if she could deny the tidal wave of emotions threatening to drown her now.
“You said you love me. I am sorry.” Genuine regret reflected in the espresso depths of his eyes.
That regret hurt her as much as the words that came with it because the remorse proved their sincerity. Pain was a vise around her heart, radiating through her body in an unexpected and equally undeniable physical reaction to the emotional blow.
She could barely breathe for the agony. It was by sheer will she remained on her feet.
He was sorry.
She wanted to cry, felt like screaming, but she held it all in along with the pain building toward nuclear meltdown.
“Get out.” She spoke quietly, but she knew he heard her.
“You are not thinking rationally.”
“Since our first date, you’ve been very careful to keep us out of the eyes of the media.”
“Yes.”
She didn’t ask, “Why?” Didn’t really care about his reasoning anymore.
She just wanted him gone so she could let the pain out. He didn’t get to see it.
“Do you think me calling the building’s security to have you removed from my apartment would blow all those efforts to hell?”
His eyes widened at her oblique threat. “You’re not going to call security.”
He really didn’t know her as well as he thought he did.
She spun around and pressed the panic button on her bedroom’s security box.
“You have about a minute, maybe two, before they arrive. If you want to be caught here, by all means, stay.” She didn’t turn to face him as she spoke and she didn’t raise her voice, either.
If she did, she’d end up screaming. She just knew it. And Gillian had never screamed a day in her life. She wasn’t going to start now.
Not with him.
Not when the anguish inside her was already so close to imploding and taking her heart with it.
Ukrainian curses sounded along with the brush of clothing being yanked over naked limbs.
He paused at the doorway. She could sense it, though hadn’t turned to watch his departure.
“I am sorry.” Then he was gone.
And she was alone. Unable to stand under the onslaught of emotional agony ripping through her, Gillian sank to the floor.
Every dream she’d nursed in the past months shattered, every hope she’d let herself entertain despite her past and present life that in no way matched his for brilliance ripped violently from her still bleeding heart.
Nine weeks later, dazed and disbelieving, Gillian sat on the park bench outside her doctor’s offices.