A Valentine Kiss: A Marriage Worth Saving / Tempted by Her Tycoon Boss / The Unforgettable Spanish Tycoon. Jennie Adams
Читать онлайн книгу.
only the tip of the iceberg. It hadn’t fully left his mind since their conversation, and he’d realised that, as he’d initially thought, he had been scared he would turn out to be the same as his father. And that was part of the reason he’d left for Johannesburg.
Jordan knew Greg had loved him, but his childhood had been tainted by his father’s grief. Grief that had made Greg into a bitter and sometimes angry man. The years after his mother had died had been filled with tension for Jordan—he’d sometimes felt as if he was walking on eggshells when he was around Greg. As a child, Jordan hadn’t understood why his father would never look at him in the eye, or why Greg had spoken at him instead of to him. If he’d ever spoken to Jordan at all.
He had started behaving badly because of it, which had strained his relationship with Greg even more. It had also led to the night that would be burned in his memory for ever. The night that had changed Jordan—and his father—with only a few words.
Jordan vaguely remembered a time when laughing had been easy for his father. When there had been an open affection between them. But those memories were so faded he wondered if he’d made them up. The memories that were clear were of a steady man—a sombre, reserved and often difficult man. It clearly highlighted the fact that when Jordan had lost his mother, he’d lost his father, as well. And that had led to Jordan not being able to grieve fully for his mother because, frankly, his father had done it for both of them.
He hadn’t thought about it until Mila had told him she was pregnant, and then suddenly he’d spent nights worrying about whether that grief for his mother would pop up once Mila had had the baby. Whether that grief would turn him into the kind of angry man his father was and spoil his son’s childhood and Jordan’s marriage.
It had made him worry that they’d rushed into marriage, made him think that he should have considered those possibilities when he’d been able to do something about them.
And when they’d lost the baby his fears had only intensified. He’d lost someone he loved, just as his father had, which surely upped the chances of Jordan turning into Greg. So Jordan had left. Escaped. Or, as he’d recently realised, run away...
‘He’s not alone, you know,’ Mila said suddenly as he pulled into the driveway of their old house. ‘The little grape’s with our parents.’
He glanced over and saw a tiny smile on her lips. It made her look peaceful, he thought, and a large part inside him settled at the thought. It brought him peace, too.
‘That’s a really lovely thing to think about, isn’t it?’
She smiled at him, and something in his heart eased. Was that because she’d smiled at him—a sweet, genuine smile that he had only been privy to that day—or was it because it comforted him to think about two generations of his family together?
‘He’ll have met your mom,’ Mila said softly. ‘I always wished I could have met her, you know. Your father used to talk about her sometimes.’
Jordan could tell that Mila was looking at him, but he stared steadily ahead. He didn’t want to talk about his mother. That would mean telling her about his father. About his childhood. About his fears.
‘She sounded amazing.’
He didn’t respond, and then he tilted his head. ‘Come on. Before it gets dark.’
He got out of the car, aware of the disappointment that shrouded her, and waited for her to join him as he stood outside the house they’d lived in during their short marriage. The first time he had seen the house he had thought it timeless and elegant—exactly what he had been looking for for his sweet, beautiful bride.
A marble pathway led to large oak doors that looked newly polished yet still antiquated. Large glass windows overlooked the road, and gave the white façade a modern feel. The pathway was lined with palm trees, which had always made him feel as if he was walking into an oasis of some kind. It still looked the same to him now, though all the memories made him feel more than he had the first time he had seen it.
Now he thought about those days when they’d had breakfast on the patio, just as the sun went up. She had always moaned about getting up that early, but the peace on her face when she was curled up on a chair, a cup of coffee in her hand, made him think she’d thought it worth it. He remembered walking hand in hand with her through their garden, where the roses that were planted there were always the perfect gift for her. And he could still see her lying next to the pool, the slight swell of her stomach obvious in her swimming costume. Could still feel the surge of protectiveness that had gone through him when he’d looked at her.
‘It looks the same...but it feels different,’ she said beside him, and he looked down at her to see a mixture of emotions playing over her face that had him grabbing for her hand.
He could feel that she was shaking, and just like that he realised what he’d been missing in the car—why she’d been anxious about coming back.
‘It reminds you of your fall, doesn’t it?’
She didn’t have to answer him—he could see the truth of his words on her face.
I’m an idiot, he thought, and wondered how he hadn’t thought about it before.
His mind had been too focused on showing her the secret he’d kept since he’d found out that she was pregnant. He hadn’t wanted today to end, hadn’t wanted her guard to come up, and in the process his actions to prevent it had hurt her.
He was a selfish man, he thought in disgust.
‘I sometimes still dream about it,’ she said quietly, and he immediately wanted to hold her in his arms.
But her words told him that she was forcing herself to face it—it was that fire he’d noticed in her when he’d returned again—and he told himself to be content with holding her hand.
‘I can feel myself falling, reaching for a railing that wasn’t there for support. And then the impact of rolling down the stairs.’ She drew a shaky breath. ‘I still feel foolish for falling down five steps.’
‘It had been raining,’ he said immediately, his heart clenching in pain at the anguish—the guilt—that he heard in her voice.
She ignored him. ‘I lay there, my breath gone, with shock keeping me from feeling the true pain of what my body had just gone through, and I felt warmth between my legs and realised...’
Her hand was so tight on his that he could tell there was no blood flowing through it, but that didn’t matter to him. Not when he could feel the pain of what she had gone through—what she had never spoken of before. Not when he could hear the quickness of her breath. He drew her in, though she didn’t seem to notice.
‘I realised that something was wrong...that I had done something wrong...and then I saw you, and your face told me that I was right.’
Tears fell from her eyes and he didn’t care this time if he was interrupting her. His arms went around her and she sobbed—heart-wrenching sobs that broke everything inside him each time he heard them.
‘I’m sorry, Jordan. I’m sorry I wasn’t more careful. I’m sorry I didn’t slow down like you asked me to. I’m sorry I didn’t look after him like I should have.’
‘You didn’t do anything wrong, Mila.’ He felt his own tears as he said the words. ‘I shouldn’t have asked you to slow down. It was just...fear. My own. I think I was hoping to slow us down.’ He paused, held her tightly. ‘Everything was happening so quickly.’
He could feel her body shake, knew his words weren’t having any effect. So he told her the facts, hoping their simplicity would help her.
‘You were walking down stairs we’d both used a million times before. It had been raining—a light summer rain that had come from nowhere. You slipped. It was an accident.’
He said the words over and over again—to himself just as much as to her—until her shaking dissipated and everything